Big Brother From The Ground Up?
**WELCOME INSTAPUNDIT READERS!**
I’ve been thinking a lot about the prospects of the much feared age of “Big Brother” — where the Government knows all and uses that information to suppress. And as dedicated readers know, my view of America and our past and future was radically altered after I read the book “The Fourth Turning.”
Clearly there are a lot of elements to Orwell’s vision that have arrived — too many to list, but originating with the Bush-era Department of Homeland Security. But recently, I’ve thought about a new phenomenon that turns “1984” upside down.
The Internet, blogosphere, New Media, and everyone owning a video camera device has made the “Army of Davids” also an check and balance on the “Big Brother” State. In fact, one could argue that We, The People are the true Big Brother (in a good way) by constantly monitoring and calling out the never ending moves toward tyranny by the Federal Government. Exhibit A: Congressman Bob Etheridge (Ruling Class – NC). Exhibit B: Congressman Brad Sherman (Ruling Class – CA) Exhibit C: Congressman Ciro Rodriguez (Ruling Class – TX) Exhibit D: Any Town Hall meeting in 2009 & 2010 (Ruling Class vs. We, The People)
I’ve also been pondering (under the influence of “The Fourth Turning”) whether or not the United States is in a “low grade civil war” (here and here) and whether it will become a “hot” one. Yesterday’s Investor’s Business Daily has an editorial that combines all of these ideas and lays it on the line.
Will Washington’s Failures Lead to Second American Revolution? – IBD.com (h/t – Instapundit)
The Internet is a large-scale version of the “Committees of Correspondence” that led to the first American Revolution — and with Washington’s failings now so obvious and awful, it may lead to another.
People are asking, “Is the government doing us more harm than good? Should we change what it does and the way it does it?”
Pruning the power of government begins with the imperial presidency.
Too many overreaching laws give the president too much discretion to make too many open-ended rules controlling too many aspects of our lives. There’s no end to the harm an out-of-control president can do.
Bill Clinton lowered the culture, moral tone and strength of the nation — and left America vulnerable to attack. When it came, George W. Bush stood up for America, albeit sometimes clumsily. Barack Obama, however, has pulled off the ultimate switcheroo: He’s diminishing America from within — so far, successfully. He may soon bankrupt us and replace our big merit-based capitalist economy with a small government-directed one of his own design.
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A wounded rampaging president can do much damage — and, like Caesar, the evil he does will live long after he leaves office, whenever that may be.
The overgrown, un-pruned power of the presidency to reward, punish and intimidate may now be so overwhelming that his re-election in 2012 is already assured — Chicago-style.
It is interesting to see a number of people now thinking the way I have been since August 2009. I certainly am not advocating armed revolution. But I also know that we have the right to it under the Declaration of Indepedence (Read up on it, please. It is important.).
Step one is holding Members accountable with the power of technology (someone should write a book about that!) The second step is voting.
-Bruce (GayPatriot)
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Pingback by GayPatriot » Big Brother From The Ground Up? | Stix Blog ver 4.0 — July 31, 2010 @ 12:35 pm - July 31, 2010
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Pingback by The Camera Can Look Both Ways « Beagle Scout — July 31, 2010 @ 12:38 pm - July 31, 2010
Freedom and independence today begins with freedom and independence from the Democratic and Republican party machines, from the tyranny of the two-party state and the duopoly system of government.
Have no doubt, the Democratic and Republican Parties, the political class as such, are literally at war with the people of the United States. They have been for some time. It is no coincidence that so many millions of Americans are locked up in cages; that more and more everyday behaviors are criminalized year after year; that the police state is becoming ever more corrupt and ever more powerful; that we are under constant surveillance etc.
Comment by d.eris — July 31, 2010 @ 12:48 pm - July 31, 2010
“I certainly am not advocating armed revolution.”
Under certain conditions, I am. And I’m far from alone…
Brian Reno (Gay 3%er)
Comment by Brian Reno — July 31, 2010 @ 12:56 pm - July 31, 2010
Kudos, Bruce for bringing the “unmentionable” to the table. The “unmentionable” being armed resistance.
We were dying as a republic from the thousand little cuts of liberalism as thrust upon us by the Democrats and the Democrat-Lite Republicans. Then Obama and his band of termites showed up with machetes.
We can not just vote these people away. We have to clean out the stables and reaffirm our 9th and 10th Amendment powers of We the People.
Trent Lott’s attack on the TEA Party movement was spoken as a true ruler fending off the hoi polloi.
Our only hope is to load the Congress with hard-nosed fiscal conservatives who will not compromise in order to get along. Naturally, such a sea change would feed the liberals and send them lying and unleashing the simple minded demagogue rhetoric they so love.
But, a very great deal of change must be made if we are to survive and return to freedom.
In 1900, New York City was a major manufacturing place. The tenements were full of people making shoes, clothing, knives, pots, small furniture, etc. There was ship building, carriage making, jewelry manufacture, etc.
Today, NYC manufactures nothing. It is all service. Software is service. The arts are service. Banking is service. As a result, NYC has become an ant colony of people moving things around, but building nothing. The tenements are now rent controlled apartments and public housing filled with people who do little or deliver pizzas on bicycles like so many kamikaze flying objects ignoring street signs and common sense safety measures.
Cut water off to NYC or electricity or access or let garbage pile up and people are going to react like they did in New Orleans when they forgot to get out of the way of well publicized hurricane.
We have festering holes of festering humanity all over this country. You need only look at the riots the Weather Underground and the SDS stoked in the late 60’s to see what is boiling under the surface.
Obama is stirring up the blacks and the hispanics. I pray that he is not really playing the “revolution” card, but he has short-circuited so many Constitutional “rules” that I am not ready to place limits on his audacity.
The point is, we are on a collision course between those who rely on welfare and entitlements and those who are being bled dry paying the bills. The Republican ruling class wants to postpone paying the bill. The Democrat ruling class wants to speed up the handouts.
Since Roosevelt, America fundamentally transformed from a hard scrapple free market to a safety net driven federal government to our more deeply entrenched state socialism. That is a large arc of the pendulum. When the pendulum hits the wall, does anyone really think we will start undoing the mess by a slow arc to the right?
One last thing. If we absorb all these illegal aliens under amnesty, who will do their jobs? We are told they are doing jobs that American Citizens will not do. If that is so, then a new load of illegal aliens will have to sneak in, because the old illegal aliens will be locked into welfare and entitlements.
Comment by heliotrope — July 31, 2010 @ 1:23 pm - July 31, 2010
GP, it is my understanding that the DoI is not a legally binding document and cannot give rise to legal rights independently. Cooper Vs Allen (1957) lays it out that public distain for an action by the federal government can be protested legally in the courts and at the ballot, but violent defiance is not justified in a ‘government of laws and not men.’ where do you see your right to armed insurrection?
The point of the declaration was to separate the US from Britain, not to prescribe legal rights for the colonies. that’s what the constitution was for.
Comment by monty — July 31, 2010 @ 5:34 pm - July 31, 2010
One additional thing
GET QUALIFIED PEOPLE TO RUN FOR OFFICE
Comment by PatriotMom — July 31, 2010 @ 7:42 pm - July 31, 2010
Ah, heliotrope… that’s my kind of pessimism. We Are Doomed (to quote one of my favorite writers).
The biggest part of Orwell’s dystopia (IMO) is the corruption of the language, not the ever-present Big Brother surveillance (although that certainly is a significant and growing threat).
The loss of the language, Diversity (the State Ideology), and our Huxleyian bread-and-circuses culture leaves the Ruling Classes free to plunder the nation.
By the time the middle class wakes up, it will be far too late. We will have been thoroughly pinned down by the ruling elites and their foot soldiers in the dependency class.
Comment by SoCalRobert — July 31, 2010 @ 11:15 pm - July 31, 2010
SoCalRobert,
I really think the TEA Party is an awakening. I am not convinced, however, that they will stick around to do the continued heavy lifting. A bottom up revolution can fairly quickly morph into a series of petty spats.
Everyone needs to keep focused on “It’s the Republic, Stupid!!!” and know what a republic is and what it isn’t. Obama has turned his czars into a politburo and rented out the cabinet room as a movie prop.
He didn’t invent the idea of czars, they go back to “kitchen” cabinets of yore. He just had the audacity to set up shadow government in plain view.
Comment by heliotrope — August 1, 2010 @ 9:38 am - August 1, 2010
“And what country can preserve its liberties if their rulers are not warned from time to time that their people preserve the spirit of resistance? Let them take arms…
“The tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time with the blood of patriots and tyrants. It is its natural manure.”
–Thomas Jefferson in a letter to William Stephens Smith, 13 November 1787
Comment by Nate Whilk — August 1, 2010 @ 9:07 pm - August 1, 2010
Monty, the DoI wasn’t a legal justification for revolution. It was a proclamation that our rights as free men could not be abridged through the force of law. In essence, it said that despite the cloak of legality of King George III’s actions, they were in fact unjust and thus not binding.
And don’t forget, they were well aware of the potential consequences, and pledged their lives, their fortunes, and their sacred honor.
Comment by XBradTC — August 1, 2010 @ 9:27 pm - August 1, 2010
On a related note, a blog post from yesterday:
http://teaparty-editor.blogspot.com/2010/07/path-to-illegitimacy.html
Is the government already illegitimate? Yes!
Comment by T.L. Davis — August 1, 2010 @ 9:40 pm - August 1, 2010
monty —
That is what Progressives WANT you to think.
When our Rights come from our Creator, not from the Government, then the Declaration is always binding.
READ IT, people!
Comment by Bruce (GayPatriot) — August 1, 2010 @ 10:51 pm - August 1, 2010
If anyone of you thinks armed rebellion is out of the question, think again. I don’t see the political elites giving up their hold on power anytime soon, but I do see an end run around the constitution by Obama and his cohorts to grant amnesty to illegals without a vote, cap and trade shoved down our throats by the EPA and an ever expanding role of
Federal government in the details of our lives. Ten to one, the second revolution, the bloody one, starts in Arizona when the citizens there reach the end of their ropes. And watch it spread like wildfire. I own a gun, and if I have to, I will use it.
Comment by John in Dublin CA — August 1, 2010 @ 11:00 pm - August 1, 2010
[…] Gay Patriot’s post is the must read for the day. Bruce argues that things may look bleak but we have more power than we realize: The Internet, blogosphere, New Media, and everyone owning a video camera device has made the “Army of Davids” also an check and balance on the “Big Brother” State. In fact, one could argue that We, The People are the true Big Brother (in a good way) by constantly monitoring and calling out the never ending moves toward tyranny by the Federal Government. Exhibit A: Congressman Bob Etheridge (Ruling Class – NC). Exhibit B: Congressman Brad Sherman (Ruling Class – CA) Exhibit C: Congressman Ciro Rodriguez (Ruling Class – TX) Exhibit D: Any Town Hall meeting in 2009 & 2010 (Ruling Class vs. We, The People) […]
Pingback by KimPriestap — August 1, 2010 @ 11:41 pm - August 1, 2010
Patriot Mom wrote “One additional thing
GET QUALIFIED PEOPLE TO RUN FOR OFFICE”.
I would suggest that she is mistaken. Currently, anyone who has graduated from one of the Eastern Ivy League schools is deemed ‘qualified’ by the punditry and the parties.
What we *really* need is to get REAL PEOPLE to run for office. People who have real lives. People who have actually done something other than ponder how to make the lives of the ‘little people’ more appropriate to pay tribute to the upper class with more and more taxes and more and more limits on their liberties.
Comment by Beth Donovan — August 2, 2010 @ 7:56 am - August 2, 2010
The Declaration of Independence is not binding law. I’m sorry, but you’ll have to invent some other justification for your desire to overthrow the government.
Bruce, you just aren’t very bright.
Comment by Levi — August 3, 2010 @ 11:52 am - August 3, 2010
I hate to throw a wet blanket on your hopes that the internet will saves us all from the liberals, but in terms of politics, the internet is dominated by liberals. Conservatives might have talk radio and television, but liberals safely have the web. Here’s a link:
http://cyber.law.harvard.edu/publications/2010/Tale_Two_Blogospheres_Discursive_Practices_Left_Right
Liberal blogs are more collaborative, there is much more of a community, and they are more successful at fundraising, among other things. The study doesn’t explain why this is so, but my explanation would be that it comes down to what I’ve talked about recently; credibility versus authority. Conservatives like to be told what to think, that’s why passive, non-participatory activities like listening to talk radio and watching Fox News are so popular with them. Conservatives need no evidence, they just need an icon to rally around, and thus you have media stars like Glenn Beck and Rush Limbaugh on the right who have no comparable analogues on the left. The same is true of the web; websites like the Drudge Report, Hot Air, and InstaPundit are largely edited by one person who has been given authority by the conservative movement. On the other hand, liberal websites like the HuffingtonPost and DailyKos have a rotating cast of hundreds of contributors. Which is more democratic? Which more embodies the concept of “We, The People?” Authority versus credibility, liberalism wins again.
Comment by Levi — August 3, 2010 @ 12:20 pm - August 3, 2010
Ah, the hilarity.
study doesn’t explain why this is so, but my explanation would be that it comes down to what I’ve talked about recently; credibility versus authority.
And then what does the “credible” Levi try to do?
Speak from authority, without citation or fact.
Conservatives like to be told what to think, that’s why passive, non-participatory activities like listening to talk radio and watching Fox News are so popular with them. Conservatives need no evidence, they just need an icon to rally around, and thus you have media stars like Glenn Beck and Rush Limbaugh on the right who have no comparable analogues on the left.
Levi cited a study, admitted that it didn’t say something, and then proceeded to use that study as proof of his own predetermined conclusions.
As usual, Levi is using data in the same way that a drunk uses a lamppost — not for illumination, but in a last-ditch attempt to avoid falling flat on his face.
Comment by North Dallas Thirty — August 3, 2010 @ 5:20 pm - August 3, 2010
The Declaration of Independence is not binding law.
Or so says the desperate Levi, whose ignorance of what is and isn’t law leads him and his Obama Party to say that the Federal government has the power to do whatever it wants — except arrest, detain, deport, and prevent from taking jobs illegal immigrants.
Of course, we don’t expect an answer from you, Levi; you always run away when your “progressive” beliefs are called out as the bullhockey they are. You silence only proves that you have no intellectual capability or response.
Comment by North Dallas Thirty — August 3, 2010 @ 5:30 pm - August 3, 2010
[…] Sounds like a notion I heard somewhat recently. Now, where was that? Ah, yes, right here! Comments […]
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