9/11 & The Politics of No Return

Previously posted at The Excavator on May 8, 2010.

"The obscure we see eventually. The completely obvious, it seems, takes longer." - Edward R. Murrow

"We have now sunk to a depth at which restatement of the obvious is the first duty of intelligent men." - George Orwell

On the morning of 9/11 a relentless will to power was set into motion, innocent life was taken, war was declared, a scapegoat was identified, history was made, a cursed shadow was cast over the sky, a parallel political universe was blasted open, a new world was born and dropped on its head in the same moment, an entire civilization was shaken to its core at its core, in the heart of New York City. The criminal masters of the United States executed their evil designs to the point of no return. A bold new course for the world was set in the aftermath of 9/11, and we haven't returned to the beginning of that day ever since. And because of our inertia, more than a million people have died in Iraq and Afghanistan, and we are all beginning to suffer the consequences of the War of Terror.

It's been almost nine years, and many have thoughtlessly accepted the official story given by the US government, but not all of us have registered the lies and war slogans. So it falls upon us, the politically awakened in every country, to direct our efforts collectively, and peacefully address our governments, and particularly, the US embassy in every major capital in the world, and ask government officials to face the uncomfortable facts about 9/11 and answer our questions. We cannot evade our duty as conscious citizens and intelligent human beings. We must as a global civilization revisit that morning, attend to the crime scene in a new light, raise the painful but necessary questions, re-investigate the murder, solve it, punish those truly responsible for the violent deed, and then learn to forgive the forgivable and move on.

II. The Age of the Assassinated

A Kingdom, defenseless and deceived, was attacked and conquered anew on 9/11; a generation earlier, the King of the Kingdom, President John F. Kennedy, was struck by a secret assassin's bullet. His head was blown to pieces, and in a flash of lightning, the political universe shattered, the prospects for future world peace collapsed, and American leadership took a dive into full-blown insanity and evil.

The prophet of the Kingdom, Rev. Martin Luther King Jr., as well as the rebel, Malcolm X, and the reformer, Robert Kennedy, were all struck dead in a similar fashion following Kennedy's death, and their words and deeds were immediately forgotten. The tremendously powerful agency that operates away from public view, in the darkness of the American political machinery, most likely had its fingerprints on all four deaths, the King, the Prophet, the Rebel, and the Reformer, and of course, countless other citizens who also resisted the naked aggression by the powers-that-be were murdered as well.

This sinister conclusion about the nature of the current US government cannot be explained away as another rendition of defunct conspiracy theories. Eye witnesses and forensic evidence in the JFK assassination establish a narrative that counters the official government cover-up. The same is true for the murder of MLK. In 1999, a trial on the MLK assassination was held in Memphis. It was the first time that evidence surrounding Dr. King's death was analyzed and inspected in a court of law, and 12 jurors came to the verdict that Dr. King was killed as a result of a conspiracy, involving government agencies. Coretta Scott King said the following upon the conclusion of the trial:

This verdict is not only a great victory for my family, but also a great victory for America. It is a great victory for truth itself. It is important to know that this was a SWIFT verdict, delivered after about an hour of jury deliberation. The jury was clearly convinced by the extensive evidence that was presented during the trial that, in addition to Mr. Jowers, the conspiracy of the Mafia, local, state and federal government agencies, were deeply involved in the assassination of my husband. The jury also affirmed overwhelming evidence that identified someone else, not James Earl Ray, as the shooter, and that Mr. Ray was set up to take the blame. I want to make it clear that my family has no interest in retribution. Instead, our sole concern has been that the full truth of the assassination has been revealed and adjudicated in a court of law.

Mrs. King's words have not seen any light in the establishment media. The trial doesn't exist in the mind of most Americans, or most citizens around the world. Consequently, the trial never happened, the suffering of the King family doesn't matter, and the truth is not important for establishment journalists, reporters, and organizations.

III. Silence of the Scams

The silence about the 9/11 crime and cover-up, this unbelievably evil act, this epic treason, mass deceit, historical betrayal, fraud of the ages, in the corporate cable channels and on the pages of the national newspapers and magazines, speaks to collective ignorance, guilt, cowardice, culpability, fear of the unknown, fear of persecution, and it also speaks to the much larger crisis of modern science, government, media, and industry. As a result of the silence, liberty is at a standstill, and the truth has been dumped in a landfill.

The fact that 9/11 questions are only raised and spoken about in the outposts of the media landscape means that we who tell the truth are a political threat. Those of us who are trying to understand and make sense of the current historical situation must persist, persist, persist. We must continue to speak up, because speaking is a political act. Political theorist Hannah Arendt writes in her classic book "The Human Condition," that "whatever men do or know or experience can make sense only to the extent that it can be spoken about," (1). That is why freedom of speech is the first amendment in the US Constitution. Nothing is more important. Without speech, we're not citizens; without speech, we're not even human beings; without speech, we're mere slaves buried alive in a fear-filled grave.

Later in the book, Arendt writes that "a tyranny is always characterized by the impotence of its subjects, who have lost their human capacity to act and speak together," (2). Thankfully, there are voices like Alex Jones and others who are gaining mainstream attention. Not everybody is silent. Not everybody is deluded and hypnotized. But it counts for nothing if we do not also act.

IV. Treading Into The Darkness

What is keeping a lot of us from speaking about the 9/11 crime and cover-up, as well as the government assassinations, is the inability to think critically or too deeply about these events. The concept of "crimestop" in George Orwell's 1984 illustrates this psychological mechanism in a person who just isn't ready to hear the truth. The person will simply dismiss any evidence of the truth out of hand, for it raises political implications that are too devastating to accept. It's easier to self-censor and toe the party line rather than accept a reality that is beyond comprehension at first. Orwell:

"Crimestop means the faculty of stopping short, as though by instinct, at the threshold of any dangerous thought. It includes the power of not grasping analogies, of failing to perceive logical errors, of misunderstanding the simplest arguments. . . of being bored or repelled by any train of thought which is capable of leading in a heretical direction. Crimestop, in short, means protective stupidity." (3)

Speaking about the government assassinations of JFK and MLK, James Douglass, author of "JFK and the Unspeakable: Why He Died and Why It Matters," said in a June 2008 interview with Talking Stick TV that "Crimestop means you don't ask those questions because its inconceivable, inconceivable, that the government of the United States could kill its own president. Inconceivable!" Systematic evil, and systematic corruption are, indeed, inconceivable for people who live under such systems, and who are repeatedly told by the major voices in the society that their government is good, benevolent, trustworthy, and protective. But the inconceivable is quickly becoming the inescapable. A nation cannot evade the truth forever.

Plus, a worldwide political reckoning is coming. An economic crisis of vast proportions, spanning all levels of global society is already upon us. Trust of public officials in North America and Europe have diminished over the last several years, and will continue to diminish. International moral standards have been crushed by the United States and its allies in the War of Terror. Also, there seems to be no end to the barbarity and insanity in America's foreign and domestic policies.

The people of the world must tread these unnerving waters, and most of all, the American people. "If we go there, we go into darkness," says James Douglass, but better the narrow darkness of truth than the limitless darkness of tyranny.


Notes:
1. Arendt, Hannah. The Human Condition. Pg. 4.
2. Arendt, Hannah. The Human Condition. Pg. 203.
3. Orwell, George. 1984. Pg. 220

Lights Out: William Cooper's Warning of The 9/11 Massacre

Originally posted on March 22, 2010.

On September 11, 2001, shortly after the terror attacks, author, radio show host, and our generation's truth-telling trailblazer, William Cooper, began his broadcast by saying:

Ladies and gentlemen, this is William Cooper, and Alan Wiener has asked me to take the, uh, take the microphone on this, . . this probably worst day in the history of the entire world. For what we're witnessing now today is most probably the herald of the, at least, the redefinition of freedom, and most probably it's death.

Cooper, obviously shaken by the sheer act of terror, had more reason to be trembling with fear than the average American because he had predicted that such an event would happen almost three months prior. Specifically, he warned that the controllers of the United States government would stage a false flag attack on American citizens and then blame it on Osama Bin Laden. "I'm telling you," said Cooper on his June 28 broadcast, "be prepared for a major attack. But it won't be Osama Bin Laden. It will be those behind the New World Order." He went on to say, "I wonder what Osama Bin Laden's targets are supposed to be? And if this doesn't materialize in the next two or three weeks, it will eventually materialize, because they haven't succeeded in getting the guns out of the hands of the American people, nor have they succeeded in taking our freedoms away. And so I can tell you with a certainty they must do something terrible."

Cooper was America's vigilant guardian before and on the day of 9/11, when a NORAD training exercise that went by the same name as "Vigilant Guardian," caused enough confusion to disable America's defenses. Even before he made his declaration of an impeding government-orchestrated attack within the United States, Cooper was considered the "most dangerous radio host in America" by then President Bill Clinton, a label just as true as when Henry Kissinger called Daniel Ellsberg the "most dangerous man in America," after he leaked the Pentagon papers. But Cooper didn't just blew the whistle once, he sounded the horn every day on his radio show "Hour of the Time," which was in his stewardship from May, 1992 until November 5th of 2001, the day of his death. His life, both on and off the radio, is littered with meaning, and serves as a reminder that not all of us were fooled on 9/11, in fact, one man exposed the machinations of the criminals in charge long before the attacks actually took place, and fervently tried to alert his countrymen. His warning will go down in history as undoubtedly heroic, legendary, mythical, and his voice will be remembered as immortal for as long as men live.

II.

The 9/11 tragedy caused the deaths of nearly 3,000 Americans, and out of those, less than 300 bodies were found intact. The most visceral memories of that day are images of rising smoke and ash from the collapse of the two towers, but what is often forgotten is that real human beings were lost, some who were recently married, and some who left behind a young family. All of them were brutally murdered in cold blood. A number of them spoke with their loved ones in their last moments, and they're recordings have been recently made available to the public in a documentary called "9/11: Phone Calls from the Towers." A listen to anyone of the calls made on that day will make you reflect on the painful urgency in their voices in a way that no film, or song will ever be able to capture. Death visited them on a beautiful, unsuspecting morning, and their families lives, and ours, have changed immeasurably forever. Listening to their last words made me realize even more how important it is for us to re-investigate the attacks, and bring the real perpetrators to justice. If we do otherwise, we will fail the victims, and humanity, and in our failure, we will leave open this painful chapter in history until a darker ending is written, an ending too terrifying to imagine.

"Nothing is at last sacred," wrote Emerson in his essay Self-Reliance, "but the integrity of your own mind." Former Canadian diplomat and Professor Peter Dale Scott must have accepted Emerson's truism early in his life, for he remains a critical voice in academia, and his work has been integral to the public understanding of what really happened on 9/11, and why it happened. His thoughts on the subject of 9/11 and other disconcerting events in recent memory are very illuminating, he ties the 9/11 cover-up to previous acts of cover-ups by the US government, and argues that America is currently under a permanent state of emergency, in which the members of Congress are disallowed from finding out, among other things, COG plans, which were first established during Reagan's era. In a talk he delivered on January 30, 2010 at an anti-war conference in MIT called "9/11, Deep Events, and the Curtailment of US Freedoms," Professor Scott said:

I do not know the truth of what happened on 9/11. I do know for a certainty that there has been a cover-up of 9/11; and also, what the 9/11 Commission itself admits, that there has been high-level governmental lying about what happened, and what didn’t happen, on that day. It became clear to me early on that 9/11 was another in a string of what I have called “deep events” -- which I define in my forthcoming book as;

events which are systematically ignored, suppressed, or falsified in public (and even internal) government, military and intelligence documents, as well as in the mainstream media and public consciousness. Underlying them is frequently the involvement of deep forces linked to either the drug traffic or to agencies of surveillance (or to both together), whose activities are extremely difficult to discern or document.[6]

Such "deep events" define our eye-opening era. Men are not more paranoid than before, they're just more knowledgeable and outspoken about government crimes and cover-ups, thanks to the Internet, and mavericks on the radio like William Cooper.

In the immediate wake of the 9/11 Massacre, a crime of biblical proportions that is still unsolved to this day, Cooper, while on the air, told the nation in a moment of truth:

"We are truly now at this moment a nation of sheep. And ladies and gentlemen, I assure you that sheep are always led to the slaughter. But it does not have to be that way. There is tremendous power in knowledge. There is also tremendous power in secrecy. Take away that secrecy, you make sure that you're informed, and you can change things. And stop fighting with each other."

The accuracy and potency of his statements are unparalleled by anything that was said on that day, or since. The state of things suggest that the day will come when William Cooper will no longer be considered as America's lost treasure, but recognized as its indescribable hero, who refused to abandon America in her most crucial hour.

William Cooper's Prediction of 9/11 on June 28, 2001.


William Cooper's Live Broadcast on September 11, 2001. He stayed on the air for nine hours. This is part one of many.

"Like it or not, everything is changing. The result will be the most wonderful experience in the history of man or the most horrible enslavement that you can imagine. Be active or abdicate. The future is in your hands." - William Cooper, October 24, 1989

A Dying City Upon a Hill

Originally posted on November 5, 2009.

I live in a nation where it ain't what's physical that fights us
Now it's silent strikes from political insiders
- Deacon the Villain, Cunninlynguists - "Dying Nation"

When tragedy strikes a people, it's easy to look outside for a cause to explain the sudden event. It could be an ideology, a nation, a religion, or, supposedly, a network of terror cells who will die for all three. But rarely do a people look inward, and respond to the situation out of understanding and compassion rather than fear and hatred. Today, tragedy again struck America, in Fort Hood, a military base in Texas, and the new ground zero for the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.

The killing of soldiers on American soil is an uncommonly violent sight, it has shook even those resistant to the wars in Middle East to ask if these wars are, in fact, legitimate and necessary. But others have become even more enraged at the bloody conflicts overseas and view this unfortunate incident as the natural consequence of a destructive foreign policy. I agree with the second cast of anti-war activists. These are the costs of war. Lives are lost, and entire nations become hostage to the inflamed wrath of men. This is what suffering entails - London was under fire during WWII, but it survived. America will survive too, but not without struggle and tragedy. Overseas, two entire countries are besieged, millions have lost their homes, brothers, sisters, aunts, uncles, cousins, some have lost their entire families. Iraqis and Afghans have suffered much grief in this last decade, during which most Americans were presented with war as a video game.

America's destruction of homes and families in Iraq and Afghanistan is very rarely expressed by the news personalities on television, or the president, or really anybody. War, for good reason, is a silent matter in America. This blatant omission of reality by the pentagon and the propagandist media reflects the establishment's demented view that America's wars must be won without the sight of American blood, and grief, because the American people may actually feel something if they see what their complacency produces and do something about it. Such tyrannical hopes by the military and financial establishment are more than delusional, though, they are dangerous. War, if anything, means endless pain and death. And Americans are modern masters of it.

Let’s not forget that drone attacks cause the same amount of human suffering that was inflicted against soldiers stationed in Fort Hood yesterday, the only difference in this case is that judgment to kill was not made by men thousands of miles away from the scene of the crime, but by a man who was engulfed in the horror of war and decided to act out violently at the same place where he heard stories of trauma and blood. Despite never being deployed in a war zone, Nidal Malik Hasan was more battle-hardened than many military personnel. That, of course, doesn’t excuse his unforgivable actions, but it does help explain them.

The sad reality to accept is that the military trains murderers. And this is true of any military. To kill for profit is their raison d'etre. The Armed Forces, like other branches of the State, is an investment. As Gunter Grass said, after discovering Döblin's novel, Walllenstein, "we're still unwilling to recognize that Hitler didn't take over industry, but that the industrialists - Wallenstein's adepts - bought themselves their Hitler," (Grass, On Writing and Politics, p. 14). Forget the misplaced sentimentality. Those who wear the uniform are not heroes, but employees of a war machine owned by ungodly oligarchs, whose job is to kill, destroy, and take the lives of anyone deemed the enemy by the bosses.

Two years ago, when a similar tragedy struck the campus of Virgina Tech, Arthur Silber made some remarks in an essay entitled, "The United States as Cho Seung-Hui: How the State Sanctifies Murder," that are applicable for today:

In our blindness, we have brought ourselves as close to perfection as is possible for human beings: we obliterate and distort the past, we render ourselves incapable of grasping the present, and we blindly plunge into an increasingly desolate future, with all our cognitive abilities rendered permanently disabled.

Further on, Silber adds:

Cho was a detestable, sickening amateur. The governing class of the United States, together with its military of unprecedented strength, are professional killers.

There are hundreds of Hasans in military uniform overseas, and they inflict the same horror on innocent victims in Iraq and Afghanistan. I will again say what needs to be said; these men and women in uniform who are deployed in war zones are not heroes, despite their personal bravery and honor, but killers for the United States oligarchy. That is a simple fact. They are not defending our lives; our liberties, or our values. If my country was invaded tomorrow by an invading army, then I would physically fight and not wait for the military to defend my family, friends, and country. Modern armies do not defend the people, but enslave them.

If I knew my life was in jeopardy from an approaching enemy, I would not depend on men in uniform to protect me, because that is not their job. In a perfect world, these armies would be destroyed. They are not needed for the defense of nations. Citizens of nations, when threatened by foreign intrusion, must, according to natural duty, take up arms and defeat the enemy. And no such enemy has existed since the Nazis. Al Qaeda does not have a navy ship in the banks of Newfoundland. If they did, I would not be writing right now but fighting.

The real enemies modern civilization faces are the hidden manipulators of our various governments, and their desire to implement a world dictatorship is far more threatening than any wish the Muslim genie may have at this moment in history. The corporate system in America has bred a plutocracy, a generation of psychopathic fascists, whose wealth and power rivals the kings and ruling families of the feudal period. These individuals are hell bent on destroying the last vestiges of the country's sacred document, the Constitution, which demands that the government upholds the God-given rights of the people, or else be abolished.

II.

At one time America attracted the eyes of the world for her self-reliance and dedication to do good for her citizens. Today, the country is more like a volcano than a city, and the hill is held up by layers of human carcasses. As Paul Craig Roberts wrote more than two years ago:

The eyes of all peoples are still upon us, only for different reasons. Whom will we attack next? When will we be bankrupt? What good is the American consumer market when the mass of the people are employed in third world jobs? How much longer will those trillions of dollars held by foreign governments be worth anything? How long before Americans will be knocking on European doors claiming political asylum.

Once the purpose of America's mission was forsaken, it was certain that the land of the free would become the absolute antithesis of its founding image. No longer a safe haven for dreamers, the United States today is the home of horror, a nation led by mass murderers living out a Wes Craven script. America's grand promise of liberty was only great because it was born in act of revolution against corrupt tyrants. We admire Jefferson and Washington equally, one without the other is unimaginable. The people of America have aspired to moral heights while at the same time committing cruel acts against their own countrymen, whose color signified an invisible barrier to progress, a barrier that was more devastating in nature than any wall. And if the country has delivered on any of her promises, it is only due to the courage and intelligence of her enlightened citizens, and their uncompromising resistance to the policies of their government during their day. But those moments of resistance were rare. For the most part, America has been a quiet nation.

This promise was, at bottom, a promise against power, made by a political class of men who were inspired by the ancients to re-imagine the ideal of human perfection, and whose intelligence and seriousness far exceeded the challenges of their time. Jefferson, with a swoosh of a pen, affirmed to the whole world that humankind is destined for freedom and the good life, and that America would fulfill this living promise as long as its people kept in agreement with their government. If he were alive today, he would have no words to write on the massive transformations that have taken place.

Washington, too, would be dazzled, for he understood, above all, that power is greedy and brings countries to ruin if it is not put in constant check. It is doubtful that we will ever put the State in checkmate, all the lessons we can draw from history tells us one thing; power conspires to the point of defeat, but once defeated, quickly forgets, and begins to conspire all over again. Jefferson wasn't trying to be a romantic when he suggested a new revolution for every coming generation.

All Americans, of whatever ability or heritage, understand the inherent goodness of this promise; the current puppet in chief sealed his election by identifying himself with it, and the military's growth is predicated on protecting it. And when this promise is spoken, as it has by poets, pastors, and presidents, it has the ability of transforming men into saints, and the future into a shared reality. It is because of this promise that no other people in the modern world have shaped history as much as Americans, and in this sense they can be compared to the Greeks, though, unlike their ancient predecessors Americans are severely lacking in a tragic sensibility.

III.

What is required in our own dangerous times is not an entirely new political philosophy, but simply a redeclaration of independence, as well as a little bit of guts. And some blood, if necessary. Jefferson's words will guide us still, but it will be our neighbors and friends who will inspire us to do good and fight, which in my eyes, are one and the same. We may even need to put aside Jefferson's words and invent new images and promises to serve us in the trials approaching ahead. And while only the dead truly inhabit the shinning city on the hill, it is also our living fate to try and make that city come to life on Earth's ground, which is no less sacred. Before we reach that pedestal, however, we must reflect on our failure to move on from historical tragedies and accept change, especially on an individual level, and on this point I am as much a coward as any other man there is. Change takes a lifetime to accept, that is clear, even for the greatest minds like Goethe, who had to conceive poetry in order to come to terms with the abruptness of modernity.

Goethe realized, through the study of nature, the inborn ability of Man to live out his inner voice. "Man's nature," said Goethe, speaking to Eckermann, "contains some wonderful powers, and it has something good in store for us just when we are the least hopeful." And these wonderful powers still exist in America at the end of the first decade of the twentieth-first century. For the past sixty years, that beautiful country has been tied like a dog of war to an ancient tree, and more mercilessly than other countries because of her unchanging promise that is still possible to be fulfilled, if her powers for good are unleashed.

Also, more than any other country, America embodies the figure of Goethe's Faust. What Nicholas Boyle, an English biographer of Goethe, said of "Faust: Part Two" also rings true of America's national life:

Faust makes fleeting contact with the spirit of antiquity and is inspired with a vision of Arcadian life which was once, and should still be, the true perfection of humanity. But that too he shakes off to pursue 'power and property' and to establish his own counter-image of humanity, in the contemplation of which he dies: a wholly artificial society maintaining itself only by endless collective effort under the permanent threat of mass extinction." (J. W. Von Goethe, Selected Works; From Introduction by Nicholas Boyle, li.)

America began as an agrarian wonderland for the striving and starving people of the world, inspired by former republics in history, but has since then been transformed into a totalitarian corporation that is driven to commit evil and mass misery. And its black citizens were caught in the underbelly of this trajectory from the beginning of the nation's inception. But, not all of America has joined in the pursuit of 'power and property,' many Americans throughout the nation's history have contributed to the betterment of their own society as well as others. In the middle of its transformation to tyranny, America produced some of the greatest human beings in world history. Alfred North Whitehead shared a similar appreciation for America. In his Dialogues, recorded by American journalist Lucien Price, Whitehead said of the United States:

Your diffusion of literacy and average comfort and well-being among the masses, in my opinion, is one of the major achievements in human history. In previous lands and times, even under the best conditions, the diffusion of culture was to only a small stratum at the top, never more than twenty per cent at the most. I think this extending to the multitude of at least a decent standard of living is an enormous contribution to civilization. (Dialogues of Alfred North Whitehead, p. 55).

But that same country has also created the meanest elite to ever appear in human history. Whitehead acknowledged the shifty class identifications in America for this development, saying that because Americans "leave their class behind," "American democracy is creating an aristocracy." And this aristocracy has designed a plan for America that is wholly opposed to human betterment and mass liberation. An emerging crisis will put this design into complete action.

Fortunately, though, Americans are beginning to sense that the real enemy is behind the gates, preparing to destroy their country; a divinely-inspired creation to be replaced by a synthetic order of government. The New World Order has been envisioned to be a band-aid in the wings of terror and conflict. And along with it comes political, economic, and psychological slavery of the people, but that, of course, is not advertised. It is meant to be the last word for a lost world. But, all is not lost. A conscious resistance is mounting. Americans have had years to reflect on the ongoing corruption at the heart of their government, and it is only a matter of time before the irate people take back their country for good.

The countless trials and tragedies America has had to face, and the many more to come, are necessary for her citizens to realize the full potential of their country. A new direction must clearly be taken, but all the current leaders of the country are either unwilling to make this change, or are intent on suppressing it. Soon, however, the luxury of hiding behind slogans will be gone, and a new crop of leaders will emerge to propel the country forward in this time of crisis. Obama has proven to be a gutless fraud. By all estimations, he is not a free leader. What he says no longer resonates because he has shown himself to be a mannequin. Words are never enough, even poets realize that they must act if they believe in what they write. I believe America's original promise must be carried out, or else humanity will not see much progress in this century. "Woe to the race," said Ortega, "which does not stop at the crossroads before continuing on its way, which does not make a problem out of its own inner life, which does not feel the heroic necessity of justifying its destiny and of throwing light on its mission in history!" (Jose Ortega Y Gasset, Meditations on Quixote, p. 103).

Cunninlynguists - Dying Nation

A Rebel On The Radio: In Defense of Alex Jones

Originally posted at Disquiet Reservations on February 25, 2010.

Originally posted at Disquiet Reservations on February 25, 2010.

In the wake of last week's suicide attack on an IRS building in Austin, Texas by software engineer Joseph Stack, numerous media critics and establishment pundits are blaming influential documentary filmmaker and radio show host, Alex Jones, for the violent act.

An article in The Guardian called Austin, Texas: paranoid politics central by Amanda Marcotte makes the linkage between isolated acts of violence with truth-telling and data-mining that Jones is known for. As a regular listener of Alex's radio show, I can say for certain that the notion that Alex has made statements in favor of violence against government authorities and government property is completely false. Although Marcotte doesn't target Alex as the prime motivator for Stack's decision to commit what is clearly an act of terrorism, she makes the point that his informational operation in Austin is the nucleus that should be held responsible.

But what is Alex Jones doing wrong exactly? Is questioning your government a vice? Why is disbelief in government accounts of reality considered paranoia? Shouldn't we have learned by now, after the brutal oppression of human rights by governments in the last century, that distrust of authority is a healthy thing in society?

Unlike Joseph Stack, Alex Jones is not a political man. He is a vigilant truth-teller, and unfortunately for the rulers of America, a very successful one. To him, breaking political ties, even when it is against the interests of his politics, is more desirable than lying or sacrificing his integrity. When Debra Medina, a candidate for the Governor of Texas, appeared on his radio show at the beginning of her campaign he was enthusiastically supportive of her intentions and encouraged his listeners to assist her run. But after Medina made the remark that 9/11 truth and the individuals who compromise it are despicable on national television, Alex immediately held her feet to the fire for backtracking on her previous statements, a quality that many journalists lack today. A starkly political man would have let it go, being that the statements were campaign rhetoric meant for the less tolerant members of the voting public. But a man who is dedicated to liberating his countrymen from deceitful politicians, criminal interests and powerful delusions is unfriendly to all who turn their back on the truth and those who righteously demand and stand by the truth.

There is indeed much to admire in such a man. And they are few in number. Even fewer are those who combine passionate truth-telling with mighty eloquence, as Alex Jones does. But such men do not live to enjoy their fruits. As Hannah Arendt writes in her essay "Truth and Politics":

Throughout history, the truth-seekers and truthtellers have been aware of the risks of their business; as long as they did not interfere with the course of the world, they were covered with ridicule, but he who forced his fellow-citizens to take him seriously by trying to set them free from falsehood and illusion was in danger of his life: "If they could lay hands on [such a] man . . . they would kill him," Plato says in the last sentence of the cave allegory. 1

The fact that Alex is attracting all citizens, instead of just those from the left or right, is another telling sign of what he is about. The call of patriotism reaches beyond republican and democrat, liberal and conservative, and Alex is a citizen who has responded the loudest. Marcotte acknowledges his wide appeal but spins it in order to portray it as a bad thing. She says:

Jones's politics are ostensibly libertarian-conservative, but really, his ideology is paranoia. His empire sucks in rightwingers with conspiracy theories that feed the militia gun culture, but they also love conspiracy theories that appeal more to the left, such as the belief that 9/11 was an "inside job".

Marcotte and others are obviously troubled that Alex is objective about the different White House administrations and political candidates, unlike others in the mainstream media who have taken only one side of the field, such as Beck and Limbaugh. Marcotte fails to realize that truth is neither left nor right. That freedom is not republican. And that justice means putting the country above yourself and your party. Then again, how should she know? For she is not a rebel.

And what is a rebel? To Albert Camus, a rebel is a "man who says no, but whose refusal does not imply a renunciation. He is also a man who says yes, from the moment he makes his first gesture of rebellion." 2 And "with rebellion, awareness is born, " Camus writes, specifically, the awareness that all men are born free and have certain rights. And not just any act of rebellion guarantees these rights for a new generation, but a confident act of rebellion, the kind that requires battle out in the open, the kind that Joseph Stack, who cowardly attacked a building out of nowhere, was unfamiliar with. Camus points out:

Rebellion, though apparently negative, since it creates nothing, is profoundly positive in that it reveals the part of man which must always be defended. 3

Stack acted from the part of man that must always be denounced, the profane part that targets civilians, which will cement his reputation as a terrorist more so than his raunchy rhetoric will solidify him as a one-time populist polemicist. His suicide attack was not an act of rebellion, but an act of resentment, and false desperation. If he had burned himself alive in his own home, and left a note for the media and IRS explaining his wrath, he would have gained much more sympathy, but causing destruction and injuring ignorant authorities automatically discredits all his grievances.

As Camus writes, "the man who kills himself in solitude still preserves certain values since he, apparently, claims no rights over the lives of others." 4 In contrast, "the rebel's aim is to defend what he is," Camus says, and since a true rebel is peaceful and honest like Martin Luther King Jr, he must remain peaceful to the very end, or else his whole work will unwrap before the rest of the world as another episode in the violent age of humanity.

Islamic extremists, and all extremist suicide bombers, deserve no respect or be given any clout because they either have a mentality of conquest, or are still in ignorance of their true power. Stack falls in the second category. He made the mistake of letting the IRS get to him, and copied their values of destruction and robbery with his final act, which revealed a tired individual's indifference to life. Camus, again:

Resentment is always resentment against oneself. The rebel, on the contrary, from his very first step, refuses to allow anyone to touch what he is. He is fighting for the integrity of one part of his being. He does not try, primarily, to conquer, but simply to impose. 5

Stack did not impose himself by flying a plane into a building, he exposed himself. He grabbed the attention of the country by performing a weak and desperate act, whereas Alex Jones has continually used peaceful and educational means to wake up individuals from across the globe. Some falsely equate the ability of Alex Jones to impose himself in conversation and on a public street with a pure act of aggression, but it is not, it reflects the warrior's urge to defend the values of his community and all the people in it. And the reason he is able to strongly position himself is because he has chosen to stand behind an invisible shield, the truth, with all his being, which in the present political climate is a very dangerous thing to do because never before has the truth been a bigger threat to the powers that be than today.

In her essay, Arendt describes the indestructible nature of truth, and its much feared ability to stand above the crowd. She writes:

Seen from the viewpoint of politics, truth has a despotic character. It is therefore hated by tyrants, who rightly fear the competition of a coercive force they cannot monopolize, and it enjoys a rather precarious status in the eyes of governments that rest on consent and abhor coercion. Facts are beyond argument and consent, and all talk about them--all exchanges of opinion based on correct information--will contribute nothing to their establishment. Unwelcome opinion can be argued with, rejected, or compromised upon, but unwelcome facts possess an infuriating stubbornness that nothing can move except plain lies. 6

Almost a year ago I wrote, "I'm sure as Alex Jones' popularity and influence grows a bucket full of lies will be thrown at Americans about his intentions, affiliations and message by the government and corporate media." It appears that is happening with increasing frequency, except a bucket full of lies may become a bucket full of spikes. The fact that there is a rebel on the radio whose influence grows every day does not sit well with the rulers of America and the cowardly bunch who stick up for them. But nothing they throw at Alex Jones will ever stick. They can even throw sticks. And bones. And bullets. And bones infused with bullets. And still, they will cause no damage, because Alex Jones is a testament to resistance and courage. He has demonstrated that rebellion is a daily act, not a final violent deed, and surely he packs more explosive energy into one radio broadcast than anything a plane could muster.

Once America's totalitarian government is peacefully and financially reduced to a fraction of its size, and our nightmare is over, we'll have a lot of people to be thankful for, and Alex Jones is certainly at the top of the list. "No permanence, no perseverance in existence," said Arendt, "can even be conceived of without men willing to testify to what is and appears to them because it is." 7




Notes
1. Arendt, Hannah. The Portable Hannah Arendt. Pg. 547
2. Camus, Albert. The Rebel. Pg. 13
3. Ibid. Pg. 19
4. Ibid. Pg. 7
5. Ibid. Pg 18
6. Arendt, Hannah. The Portable Hannah Arendt. Pg. 556
7. Ibid. Pg. 547

A Future State of the Union Address

Originally posted at Disquiet Reservations on January 28, 2010.



A Future State of the Union Address

Here is a what a real president would tell the American people and the world in a future State of the Union address.

Madame Speaker, Vice President Paul, members of Congress, distinguished guests, and fellow Americans:

We have all struggled through a time of great deception, and have been made to witness haunting immorality by our leaders and system of government. The unforgivable crimes that were committed in the name of liberty and the American people will never be forgotten. We will do future generations of the world a great service by examining where we went wrong as a nation, and how we the people failed most of all. The popular notion that we did not know is a lackluster excuse. Self-deception played a decisive role, one that we cannot evade simply because our institutions and leaders repeatedly lied to us.

Our leaders, in the guise of defenders and patriots, exploited our tragedy and told us that we must give up our rights to save the nation from monsters abroad and barbarians at home, but the only threat to our demise came from them alone. They appealed to our worst prejudices of the other in a time of crisis, and banished reasonable debate on the important issues of the day from public light. And while the White House turned off its lights, our personal flashlights were also missing in action. We too abandoned our most cherished principles and falsely believed that this time we were being told the truth. By policing ourselves we gave our despicable leaders ample opportunity to accomplish what destroyers and oppressors throughout history have always attempted to do, mainly, position themselves beyond approach. And for a long time, they were.

True, our fall into tyranny was not marked by mass troops stamping their feet on Pennsylvania Avenue, but who can rightly deny that the clear signs of a totalitarian order were non-visible? Ask the victims of the American justice system if lawlessness was kept hidden. They will confidently tell you that they faced government charges without any protection of the law; or will show you pictures of their dead family members who were innocently killed off in a criminal aerial campaign sold as an operation against Taliban extremists. You will not be able to look away from them because facts are facts.

And the facts of our nation's crimes will continue to stare us in the face long into the future. Although it is impossible to return to September 10, 2001, or August 5, 1945, it is never too late to apologize for what we have done, and pray that the people of the world will forgive our criminal actions over the course of many years. But our compassion can not end there. We must reconcile with our past and also forgive ourselves, while still realizing that any justification for the crimes committed in our name is a cowardly denial of the truth. The truth is no doubt hard to accept, but a national recovery is not possible without complete acceptance of the truth.

To be sure, nobody possesses the whole truth. Knowing even half takes the most resilient of wills. But there are always exceptions who try harder than the rest. Individuals, empowered with the facts on the ground, can stand against the largest of armies and the cruelest systems of thought control because they can see farther than the twenty-four hour news cycle. For them no opinion is sacred. Blessed with a passion for the truth, they aim for clarity, and don't shrink from criticism or insult. The triumph of truth and reason does not rest on their shoulders, but without their constant appeal to mankind's better instincts, no progress can be made. The German philosopher Karl Jaspers communicated some of the most sublimest thoughts on the conception of existence, truth, and reality in his lectures at the German Academy of Frankfurt in 1937. Near the end of his address on truth he said:

"Reason does not set itself up here as judge, nor does it make any absolute doctrinal pronouncements; but with honesty and fairness it penetrates all reality and allows it to come to light. It does not explain anything away; it does not conceal or oversimplify."

To acknowledge that a few resourceful members in our national establishment knowingly murdered nearly 3,000 innocent citizens on September 11, 2001 in order to thrust the nation into criminal wars of aggression, and that our national media outlets masterfully participated in brainwashing the public, turns the ground on which we stand into vaporizing dust. Everything comes into question. So we must refrain from being too hard on ourselves. Living in a world where truth is defenseless against unthinking bullies and murderous liars is an alienating experience. And for a long time such a state was the case; our society was wrapped up in the abyss of unreason; the chasm between true reality and a makeshift world was daunting for any individual who was at all able to take a glimpse at the disorder without jumping back into his preconditioned ideas of the world and of historical events; it was a period of spiritual disintegration, when authority, as Jaspers understood it, came to be "a mere power in existence without enlivening all the sources of truth." But I am glad that we experienced this great unrest because our country, our people, and our world, is stronger today than at any time in history.

The German Jewish political theorist Hannah Arendt recognized the grave psychological impact that organized lying has on the individual mind and society at large, saying: "The experience of a trembling wobbling motion of everything we rely on for our sense of direction and reality is among the most common and most vivid experiences of men under totalitarian rule."

The man who most clearly expressed in the political arena the spiritual agitation that Arendt spoke of was Dr. Paul. On May 19, 2009 he saw what had been done to his country, describing the expansive matrix of lies as an unjust nightmare, and predicted revolutionary changes to come:

"Could it all be a bad dream, or a nightmare? Is it my imagination, or have we lost our minds? It's surreal; it's just not believable. A grand absurdity; a great deception, a delusion of momentous proportions; based on preposterous notions; and on ideas whose time should never have come; simplicity grossly distorted and complicated; insanity passed off as logic; grandiose schemes built on falsehoods with the morality of Ponzi and Madoff; evil described as virtue; ignorance pawned off as wisdom; destruction and impoverishment in the name of humanitarianism; violence, the tool of change; preventive wars used as the road to peace; tolerance delivered by government guns; reactionary views in the guise of progress; an empire replacing the Republic; slavery sold as liberty; excellence and virtue traded for mediocracy; socialism to save capitalism; a government out of control, unrestrained by the Constitution, the rule of law, or morality; bickering over petty politics as we collapse into chaos; the philosophy that destroys us is not even defined.

His lifelong dedication to liberty and the restoration of his country constitutes a strong legacy that we can build on for the rest of this century. He set an example to the youth of the world through his undeviating principled stand for the law, and by consistently being his country's conscience in the Congress when the time mattered. In a previous speech he gave on the house floor on June 21, 1999 called "Let liberty ring loudly," the great doctor said:

"For the sake of the future of our Republic, it is important that we are not just consistent, but correctly consistent. We must defend not just the sections of the Constitution we find popular, we must defend the entire Constitution. Most importantly, we must jealously guard the philosophy of freedom upon which it is based. If we do, the sound we will hear is that of liberty once again loudly ringing across our land."

If we had listened to Dr. Paul's judgment earlier we would not have experienced the great and immeasurable suffering that we are still learning to grapple with. It seems history must always be taught the hard way. If we look back on Dr. Paul's words now, we see a part of God trying to teach us, and point us the way. But if it takes tragedy to wake us, then so be it. We are awake now. Let us remember the voices who told us the truth, and carry on in their footsteps. I submit that we build a statue of Dr. Paul in the 9/11 memorial in Washington D.C. A statue, however, will not be enough in the long run. A deep commitment to our moral conscience and the liberty of this great country by every single breathing soul will do the late doctor a much higher honor.

Our Constitution demands that we, public servants, live up to highest ideals of the country every day we are in office. Giving respect in the form of elegant pageantry and words of appreciation is not enough, we must follow its guidelines faithfully, and adhere to its core principles that generations of Americans have fought and died for. To do anything less is impermissible. At best it would constitute failure; at worst, treason.

If the document that is meant to restrict the growth of government is regarded as just a piece of paper by its chief dissemblers then we submit our fate as a nation not to the law of the land but to the gross activities of crooked public officials and their powerful paymasters. Our treasured way of life and the health of our republic is only possible if we vocally and painstakingly resist when our freedoms are threatened. The much lauded claim that what we lose in liberty we gain in security has once again proven to be a fatal lie. All the heartache our country and the world has underwent in these last few years would not have happened if we had remained vigilant to the task of preserving our liberties. To prevent another crisis of authority in the future we as a people must stay true to our founding principles regardless of difficult circumstances because there is nothing more desirable for the illegitimate forces that constantly seek to misdirect our energies than to help create an atmosphere where tradition is broken, and where respect for the sacrifices of previous generations is diminished.

I realize that every word penned two hundred and twenty three years ago is not definitive. What is sacred is the spirit of resistance, without which our founding document would never have been written. We must remember that the Constitution gives evidence to the strength of the Founders' convictions, but also to the imperfection of their final execution. We are blessed with their ever lasting gift - a republic based on laws - just as they were blessed by being alive at the right position and in the right moment in history. But the work of creation is never finished. In every generation new opportunities arise to perfect the original construct, and those few opportunities would not be possible if not for the daring resilience and enduring capacity of every generation that has come before.

Thomas Jefferson, the author of our conscience, believed this nation's destiny laid in the hands of its citizens. And Americans at every critical moment in our history proved Jefferson right by awakening to the sirens of justice well before their leaders. Numerous examples attest to this fact. Before Lincoln delivered the Emancipation Proclamation in the midst of the Civil War, it was a citizen and a writer, Henry David Thoreau, who gave a clear indictment of the immoral standing of the law and appealed to every individual to play a role in history by serving his inner conscience. In his prized essay "Civil Disobedience," he wrote: "The law will never make men free; it is men who have got to make the law free." Likewise, as President Johnson was intensifying a needless war in Vietnam, it required the work and patience of an outstanding pastor, Martin Luther King Jr, to steer the nation towards a more just equilibrium. In our own time we can learn by the example of Alex Jones, another courageous voice who has stirred the conscience of our people over many years, and whose tireless efforts has allowed me to speak before you tonight.

And so, in the spirit of these men, I ask all Americans, as well as my colleagues on the floor, to take up the call of making sure that this country and this world prevails as a free resting place for all human beings who live on it.

The Virtues of Non-Violent Resistance

Related: A Decade of Resistance

"The military man gains the civil power in proportion as the civilian loses the military virtues." - G.K. Chesterton

The refusal to accept that we live in a very control-oriented, politically suppressed, and untruthful society is reaching the level of psychosis in a lot of people, regardless of their political orientation, economic background, or education level. Such denial is hard to understand, the problems are psychological and above my current comprehension.

To me it is clear that an unresponsive and authoritarian government is being set up deliberately in North America and Europe, and the reasons that will be given in the future for its establishment are not the real reasons. The police-state mechanisms that are being unleashed on the people have very little to do with providing indefinite security, and keeping the civil peace. If those were the goals, noble as they are, then why not create avenues whereby political and economic justice is brought into being, why not be truthful with the people about the government's role in past terrorist attacks, why not put forward real solutions for peace?

Establishing order in a community is not a difficult thing to do, all it requires is for the political leadership to be honest with the people, and that they be held to account in the same manner as everybody else if they commit a crime, or participate in a conspiracy or fraud against the public. It is really that simple. We go wrong when we abandon the rule of law.

But Western governments are not interested in solving the root problems of terrorism because their "secret-intelligence" seeds can be found at the very bottom of the modern terrorism dilemma. And that revelation will put everything on its head. Indeed, a new order will need to rise, but what kind of order will it be, and who will create it? It certainly can't be the same men who help caused the political and social crisis, or men who didn't raise their voices before it occurred.

There are those who still view the opinions that I hold as conspiracy theories. I have nothing to say to those people. I am concerned with the converted, and the committed. The loss of civil liberties in the West was a historical guess in Orwell's time, but not anymore. Today, we don't have the luxury to assume our shadowy decision-makers will reform, nor can we make guesses about our condition in ten years time. Our bleak future has already arrived. Most of us are just beginning to wake up to the apocalyptic situation. Western despotism, marked by corporate power and a glamorous Big-Brother surveillance system, is a fact of life. We must deal with it, and hopefully one day we can overturn it.

Habits of trained indifference to intimidating evidence about government-corporate corruption occurring at the highest levels must be broken. We can no longer deceive ourselves about the grave political reality inside the United States, Canada, England, and Western Europe. Freedom of speech, and the freedom to resist, are no longer allowed in any of these countries. It is as if the soldiers who fought for these countries in WWII died for absolutely nothing. Shame on us if we don't reverse the Western dictatorial police state, and maintain the legacy of those who bled and died for liberty before us.

I realize the fight for freedom will be hard, and long. I can't put faith in a single Messiah who will come down and save us from economic hardship, ecological catastrophes, political control, and psychological domination. Nor can I put faith in the majority of people to confront the troubling obstacles facing them, let alone engage in a peaceful and spiritual fight against the financial occupiers. Besides a huge societal-wide revelation that could only be described as apocalyptic and religious, the general public's ignorance will in all likelihood continue, and probably get worse as conditions in day-to-day life reach an even poorer state.

The only faith I have is in a fierce and independent minority that practices non-violent resistance, and becomes an example to the whole community. Richard B. Gregg, an American social philosopher and a student of Gandhi, wrote in the beginning of chapter eight in his most famous book, The Power of Nonviolence, "Nonviolent resistance is the key to the problem of liberty in the modern state." Gregg's thoughts and research about peaceful resistance are more timely today than it was in Martin Luther King Jr.'s time.

If the liberty of the individual and the world is to survive coming attacks, then a spiritually disciplined and peaceful minority of world citizens must organize across national boundaries, and work together to enrich the lives of each other's country, in all manners possible. We need to work towards political and economic liberty for all, specifically, the issuing of currency must become a public and national right; draconian laws must be repealed through each country's various democratic processes; anti-democratic and anti-capitalist institutions such as the World Bank, IMF, WTO must be terminated; and free economic competition must be enforced worldwide with as little state regulation as possible.

Those who stand in for the financial occupiers, from the wise-cracking elitist journalists and snobby politicians, to the brainwashed Stormtroopers, are not the enemies of the people. Whether they knowingly or unknowingly do the elite's bidding is a matter of debate, with the exception of the bottom-level enforces, who need to be educated and warned of the implications of their support for NWO-induced political repression. What these puppets need to realize is that sooner or later "We The People" will overpass them at every step. They can decide to either support the present unlawful and evil system through their actions and compliance, or resist with us. The choice is for them to make.

If you are unconvinced that a police state is upon us, then you haven't read the McCain-Lieberman "Enemy Belligerent Interrogation, Detention, and Prosecution Act." You can read it here. "A close reading of the bill," writes Marc Ambinder in The Atlantic, "suggests it would allow the U.S. military to detain U.S. citizens without trial indefinitely in the U.S. based on suspected activity." The bill is not law, yet, but with the way things are going, there is a high probability that America's fine representatives will pass it. As Stephen Lendman writes, "in a climate of fear and intimidation, everyone is potentially vulnerable to legislative lawlessness if congressional timidity lets S. 3081 pass in an election year."

We are not yet in a state of full-blown martial law, but it is coming. All the signs are leading to a 'happy dictatorship." Washington, Ottawa, and London will rule through fear and force, but also with love and kindness. Normal life will be no more. The only way a police state can be maintained is in an indefinite state of emergency, in which detention centers are filled to full capacity with political non-compliants, curfews are regularly enforced in the most sensitive areas, and everybody's daily movement are monitored by government and private authorities. How long such a state is going to last is anybody's guess.

But pursuing the strategies of propaganda, force, divide/conquer, and political demagoguery has its limits, and practicing such strategies in spite of an active and peaceful worldwide resistance movement will not work. The spirit of man is too mighty and powerful. As Napoleon said: "There are only two forces in the world, the sword and the spirit. In the long run the sword will always be conquered by the spirit." Napoleon's prediction has already been proven true in the cases of India's peaceful victory against the British Empire, and the achievements of the civil rights movements, so it only makes sense that a non-violent resistance campaign in our era will also be victorious.

II. An Active Commitment to Non-Violent Resistance

“The spirit of resistance to government is so valuable on certain occasions, that I wish it to be always kept alive. It will often be exercised when wrong, but better so than not to be exercised at all. I like a little rebellion now and then. It is like a storm in the atmosphere.” — Thomas Jefferson to Abigail Adams, 1787

It is my feeling, as it is of many others, that tyranny grows when resistance to it falters. There are other reasons for it, of course, but it is the failure to rebel in the face of brutal terrorism and over-extension by the State gives that gives men in power the confidence to do anything under the sun. Murder. Lying. Stealing.

But as Gandhi revealed to us, violent resistance is not the only way to beat tyranny, in fact, it is the least desirable. A gun is not a symbol of defiance, it's just a tool, what is of greater important is the spirit of resistance. And both Jefferson and Gandhi were born with the same spirit of resistance.

But love of liberty is not enough. We must also sacrifice. And suffer. What I'm asking you, most of all, is to risk your life in the hope that liberty will be won peacefully. I intend to take the same path because it has shown to be the most effective and least bloody path in the historical pursuit of liberty and justice.

Will non-violence work against a hardened and equally committed United States Marine? Most definitely not. The professional military is well-noted for its discipline and execution of orders, which I have great respect for, but there are times when someone must take a risk. Will violence be done on the patient and the just? Yes. Will some peaceful resisters suffer unfair treatment at the hands of the Stormtroopers? Yes. But it's their job to "clear the area of all hostiles and non-compliant protesters," so it's not honest to hold it against them. Non-violent resisters take the oath to trade good with evil, and generosity with meanness. If I can't keep the oath at the most trying of times then I had no right to take it in the first place.

Non-violence demands of us our whole mind, body, and soul. When violence is being done to you, your spirit can't flinch. It also demands that we remain active, and focus on the ultimate goal at hand. Even soldiers aren't capable of doing this, they withdraw into their own heads in the heart of a battle, and go into a 'killer mode' where all discrepancy is removed from their actions. Minutes later, they can't register what exactly they did to defend themselves. When you are being attacked, your first reflex is to defend yourself, so it requires great awareness to keep on the track of non-violence, and not lose sight of your being, and aim.

If you fail even one time to remain non-violent, then there is a good chance that you will fail a second, third, and fourth time. I find it hard to contemplate the spiritual discipline and bodily courage that Gandhi and King each had. I respect them more than most military leaders. Gandhi couldn't have been passive even for a day when he was fighting to win rights for Indians in South Africa, and political independence for India. We have to be actively committed to non-violent resistance just like Gandhi and King were. "Passivity," writes Ken McLeod, "is insidious. It kills your mind (your attention, your intention, and your will) without you knowing it."

Although we are not yet in the same situation as France under Nazi rule, or of Japanese immigrants under American rule, anyone who dares to look can see that the road we're on leads directly towards a New-World dictatorship. The precedent of illegally arresting individuals for political behavior has already been set at the G20 Summit in Pittsburgh, the SPP meeting in Montebello, Quebec, and elsewhere. Protesting global economic and political policies in any North American and European city has been essentially outlawed. Even more disturbing is that assisting protesters via social networking sites can also get you fined and arrested, which is what happened to Elliot Madison and Michael Wallschlaeger.

But such actions by our various governments shouldn't deter us to publicly express our disapproval and rage. Resistance to tyranny is what made the modern world so prosperous. Men cannot flourish as slaves. William Norman Grigg writes in his most recent article "Resistance" that submission in Russia was guaranteed for generations because the Russians failed to resist a Communist dictatorship in its early stages. It went all downhill after the first shot was fired and people fearfully laid down to the Communist thugs. According to Grigg, liberty will be but a theory in a book, and a memory in the mind, if "the right to resist," is not practiced openly. But how shall we in America, Canada, and Europe go about it? Grigg says:

Wherever possible, resistance should be peaceful. Where violence is used it must be strictly governed by the non-aggression principle. Prudence has its proper claims to make as well: The right to resist unlawful violence may not be exercised in every appropriate circumstance, but it must be recognized as valid in all cases.

Going up against overdressed men with guns is a scary thing. I don't know I can face up to my fear if such an occasion as I have described is in store for us. Will a state of martial law be publicly enacted in the future? Will Stormtroopers rule the streets? Maybe. Or maybe not. But we should be ready just in case. And if we do find ourselves one day under a military occupation, we can take solace in the words of mankind's greatest resisters. Sartre would be a good start.

"We were never more free than under the German Occupation. We had lost all our rights, above all, the right to speak; we were insulted daily and had to remain silent, we were deported, because we were workers, because we were Jews, because we were political prisoners. All around us on the walls, in the newspapers, on the screen, we met that foul and insipid image that our oppressors wanted us to accept as ourselves. Because of all of this we were free. Since the Nazi poison was seeping into our thinking, each accurate thought was a victory; since an all-powerful police was trying to force silence upon us, each word became precious as a declaration of principles, since we were hunted, each gesture had the weight of a commitment. The often frightful circumstances of our struggle enabled us finally to live, undisguised and unconcealed, that anxious, unbearable situation which is called the human predicament." - Jean-Paul Sartre

A Generation of George Washingtons

Originally posted at Disquiet Reservations on March 19, 2010.

It started with a bang, but the seventh anniversary of the Iraq War passed with a whimper. Another battlefront in the propaganda war against the American people, the health care campaign, received greater attention. Unsurprisingly, President Obama was in hyper-drive mode, acting as the pseudo Commander-in-Chief for what is largely a corporatist health care initiative. But such a reality is unlikely to last. Calls for ending the war have not subsided, many Americans are just waiting for the right opportunity to express their rage at an unresponsive Congress.

The current class of sellouts and political opportunists in Washington have repeatedly disregarded the wisdom of the founding fathers, and have tarnished what little was left of the Constitution when they got there. Through deception and propaganda, they are helping to enslave the American people in ways that King George III could not have dreamed of. Collectively, they represent the tipping point of generations of mindless, petty, greedy, and traitorous politicians. At every moment of political consequence they have put their own careers and salaries above the health and wealth of the country, and the liberties of the American people.

A great reformation of American politics is in order but these men and women would rather perform for the cameras rather than upset their influential paymasters. If they have any love for their country, there are certainly no signs of it. What do men like Cheney, Bush, Rumsfeld, Obama, Emanuel, and Reid, know of sacrifice and patriotism? They have the blood of soldiers on their clothes, not in their veins.

The German poet Rilke remarked that he was a little ashamed of his rebellious nature because he felt that a soldier's blood ran through his body. I think General George Washington, who once said "when we assumed the Soldier, we did not lay aside the Citizen," would have identified with Rilke's sentiments, and many other poets and rebels probably feel the same way. I know I do.

"When You Know The Truth, The Truth Makes You A Soldier."- Gandhi

You can’t be a real soldier unless you truly know what you are fighting for, and who is your enemy. After losing 58,000 of their brothers in an immoral war, the Vietnam soldiers found out that the enemy that is determined by the government is not always the enemy of the people, and the country. Sometimes the enemy is the government. It certainly is today.

In the biography of Washington by historian Joseph Ellis, Ellis makes the point that Washington identified the British Empire as the enemy of the American colonies long before 1776. Well before the war officially began, Washington made sure that his Virginia estate was economically independent from British financial schemers and remained a self-sustaining enterprise. He was a master of his own affairs - a privilege that many of his countrymen lacked. As Ellis writes, "Washington's personal rebellion came before his military conquest of the Moneyed Empire," (p. 56).

It would be wise of us if we follow Washington's example today, and disengage from the current fiat system altogether, so in case a societal collapse does occur, we would be ready to face the challenges of food shortages, electrical meltdowns, etc. By dissociating ourselves from the Matrix that is corporate-organized society, we can develop our own systems of bartering, and currencies to trade with fellow like-minded rebel-soldiers. That way, we'll be in a much better position of surviving any prolonged crisis.

Preparing is half of the battle, the rest is guts and glory. But preparing is also only half the story. Running off into the woods is not a plan worthy of citizen-soldiers. The heart of Washington D.C. must be preserved for us to live happy lives, and to make that possible, we must alter or abolish the current treasonous totalitarian police state that masquerades itself as a democracy. A new generation of political and military leaders must arise to re-institute justice and a level of decency in politics that is missing today.

The new generation, consisting of new George Washingtons, Thomas Jeffersons, Patrick Henrys, Thomas Paines, and James Madisons should be called the "Preservation Generation," because it is this generation's duty to preserve the Constitution, and the Republic that the Founders created. If liberty does not survive, then we will let down our ancestors, and our grandchildren. Failing to recover America's laws and liberties is not an option. It must be done. The people's sanity rests on America being a free country.

Two and a half months ago, Alex Jones did a memorable tribute to George Washington and the principles he fought for. Alex commented on the perseverance of Washington, which was a big reason why America was victorious, and his wisdom to refuse the crown when he was in office, a decision that changed the course of history. Americans are lucky to have had a leader like Washington early in the country's development. Such a heroic example is gravely needed today. We must first, however, "Rediscover the spirit of 76," as Alex says.

But why must there be more than one George Washington to lead the fight? Because we have to do battle on many different battlefields, and our problems are a hundred times more difficult than what the founding generation faced, so it will require at least a hundred George Washingtons to save America, Canada, and the rest of the world from total tyranny. And where will they come from? Anywhere. They could come from the suburbs of Atlanta, Austin, New York, Portland, Calgary, or the current death-traps in the Middle East that are mistakenly called battlefields in the War on Terror.

The skills, expertise, and prestige of the brave men and women who are currently serving in Iraq and Afghanistan are needed in the United States, where liberty is in dire straits. These war veterans are proven patriotic fighters, but they also have a responsibility to be citizens and being an American citizen today means withdrawing your support from the tyrannical federal government in Washington D.C.

The US military, unlike the Congress and the White House, has retained the kind of authority in the minds of the people that still commands respect, and that authority should be used wisely and conservatively in a period of national crisis. At the end of the day, the government must fall under the weight of the people, and civilian authority, but the military has a role in any national crisis, it is its job to assist Americans and keep the country free from danger and despotism. That of course will not be possible unless a sufficient amount of soldiers wake up to the reality of the situation and withdraw their obedience to the totalitarian police state.

Unlike politicians, soldiers don't need to be reminded whose interests they serve, they have fought, bled, and died for their country, and its liberties. Whether or not America's present wars are international crimes does not apply to the commitment that the Armed Forces made to protecting the Constitution and the country, because American soldiers have fought under the assumption that United States was attacked by Arab terrorists. Of course, that assumption is not true, and is no longer believed in by millions of people in America and in the world. A great number of people have accurately identified the real perpetrators of 9/11, and America's enemies, and most of them are still in control of the United States government, media and economy, a fact that has not went unnoticed by some intelligent military minds.

But just in case American soldiers do need a reminder of their allegiance, the Oath Keepers organization is providing a good platform for active and former soldiers, as well as police officers, to retake their oath to the Constitution. Citizens should also take the oath, because Americans must be united to defeat tyranny. And it is an oath that must be kept. The "Preservation Generation" can not let down humanity and history.

"Against the insidious wiles of foreign influence (I conjure you to believe me, fellow-citizens,) the jealousy of a free people ought to be constantly awake; since history and experience prove, that foreign influence is one of the most baneful foes of Republican Government. But that jealousy, to be useful, must be impartial; else it becomes the instrument of the very influence to be avoided, instead of a defence against it. Excessive partiality for one foreign nation, and excessive dislike of another, cause those whom they actuate to see danger only on one side, and serve to veil and even second the arts of influence on the other. Real patriots, who may resist the intrigues of the favorite, are liable to become suspected and odious; while its tools and dupes usurp the applause and confidence of the people, to surrender their interests." - George Washington, Excerpt from his Farewell Address.