Second, a national referendum about whether the government is acting in a tyrannical way will not be held. Instead, one or two guys sitting around with beers will decide that the time has come for insurrection. The rest of us will get the word when the insurrectionists commit some heinous act. In Dallas Johnson concluded that it was time for him to act. In Nevada Cliven Bundy decided it was time to act; in Oregon, his son, Ammon, decided it was time to act. Fortunately, no lives were lost in either of these incidents, although the possibility of violence was rife. It is time for politicians, ex-politicians, and MSM to disavow the militia movement and take robust steps to ensure that their possession of firearms does not lead to further loss of life.
The Dallas sniper, Micah Johnson, who killed 5 law enforcement officers and wounded 7 others, was ideologically tied to the militia movement. While none of the Main Stream Media’s (MSM) narratives about Johnson acknowledge this connection it is based on two incontrovertible facts. First, the militia movement holds that when the government acts to tyrannically oppress the people, citizens have the right to use armed force to overthrow it. The act of overthrowing the government would inevitably involve killing police officers who are agents of the government.
Second, a national referendum about whether the government is acting in a tyrannical way will not be held. Instead, one or two guys sitting around with beers will decide that the time has come for insurrection. The rest of us will get the word when the insurrectionists commit some heinous act. In Dallas Johnson concluded that it was time for him to act. In Nevada Cliven Bundy decided it was time to act; in Oregon, his son, Ammon, decided it was time to act. Fortunately, no lives were lost in either of these incidents, although the possibility of violence was rife. It is time for politicians, ex-politicians, and MSM to disavow the militia movement and take robust steps to ensure that their possession of firearms does not lead to further loss of life.
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The Main Stream Media has gone to great lengths to point out that Donald Trump is having trouble raising money for his campaign. The usual wealthy Republican donors suspect that contributing to the Trump for President Campaign would be throwing their money away.
Unfortunately, but as usual, the Main Stream Media fails to connect the dots as they speculate about who Trump will select as his running mate. Newt Gingrich is a favorite of multi-billionaire Sheldon Adelson. Selecting Gingrich for his running mate will help Trump raise money. The discussion of Brexit has focused on globalization, immigration, and working class anger. What has been missing from the discussion is the political decision to invoke austerity and services like the National Health Service on which the working class rely.
Similarly, in the U.S. discussions of the role of trade deals in decimating the middle class has omitted the feebleness of any measures to mitigate the negative effects of those trade deals. Trade adjustment assistance was always supposed to be a part of these trade deals, but have generally been referred to as “feeble” at best. The level and need for trade adjustment assistance is a political decision; it need not have been feeble. A fortuitous side effect of Bill Clinton inappropriately talking to Attorney General Loretta Lynch aboard her plane is that she had to distance herself from the decision not to prosecute Hillary Clinton for conducting State Department business on her private email. As a result FBI Director James Comey, a conservative favorite, will have to take their criticism, not Lynch or even President Obama. Was this outcome simply luck or planning?
Criticizing the size of the U.S. debt, now at about $19 trillion, and lamenting over the consequences of a debt for future generations has become standard practice for conservatives and the Main Stream Media (MSM). A standard rightwing gibe has been the Chinese invading the U.S. by lending money rather than landing boats.
No one, including the MSM, mentions that more than two-thirds of the national debt is held by the U.S. and most of the remaining one-third is held by countries other than China, including our allies. The two-thirds held by the U.S., and arguably the entire $19 trillion, provides stability for the global economic system. For example, some of the debt is held by individuals in the form of treasury bonds. If treasury bonds were not available, then individuals would have to put their money somewhere else, presumably at greater risk. The question then becomes, why future generations would benefit from a world with a riskier financial system. |
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