Well, I will say this,
I witnessed this little bad in action
on Lock 'N Load with R. Lee Ermey.
It's only costs $80,000 PER SHOT. Ouch!
Thursday, October 29, 2009
What I Want For Christmas
Well, I will say this,
I witnessed this little bad in action
on Lock 'N Load with R. Lee Ermey.
It's only costs $80,000 PER SHOT. Ouch!
Sunday, October 25, 2009
H1N1 Must Be Science Talk For Hog Droppings
Well, the Obama Administration, those kooky clowns living on the American tax dollars in The Big House, are at it again.
The "Swine Flu Epidemic" ... isn't. The strain is mostly harmless. So, there's no crisis folks. The flu isn't fun, and just like in years past, can pose a danger for those with weakened immunities, the very young, the very old, yada yada yada If contracted one will probably wish one was dead but more than likely you'll live to see another day. What can be and is dangerous is the vaccine. It has proved to be toxic to many.
This "epidemic" is just something else that the phony "Science Czar" [John Holdren - the same dude that believes in forced abortions, sterilizations, etc.] made up so as to not "waste a good crisis" in order to take over something or other. Yeah, another communist Obama power grab.
Gates Of Vienna's blog put this whole charade into better words here: The Flu Vaccine “Story” Mutates into a Deadly Strain
Move along ... there's nothing to see here ...
Saturday, October 24, 2009
Andrew Klavan on PJ TV: Obama The New Jesus
Unveiled Controversial New Work in NYC's
Union Square on Obama's 100th Day in Office
Atlas Shrugs recently had a good article on the Obama blasphemy too.
Walter E. Williams "Our Problem Is Immorality"
As our country muddles its way into another inescapable quagmire under the Obama Administration, I am left to ponder what will become of the generations behind us. Those of us who are older will probably be long gone before all the real crap hits the fan. Our generation has become selfish and immoral, "waxing fat" with laziness.
Our treasury is robbing from Paul to pay Peter (and Paul is broke too!).
Our troops are languishing in Afghanistan with no clear direction and our guys are putting themselves at risk needlessly. Obama: Please bring them home since you obviously have no clue what you're doing!
I've come to the conclusion that one of the worst things ever created was health insurance. I have learned that since it's inception in the 1920s it was encouraged for 'workers' to be paid for by employers by .... wait for it ... TRADE UNIONS! link **Ding, ding, ding, ding** [waving red flag] Yep, it's been wrong from the get-go. Company's have been paying for most all health insurance. But as you and I know, NOTHING is paid by corporations. Taxpayers and consumers pay for everything. NOTHING IS FREE. ObamaCare is NOT FREE. It will crash and burn our economy forever and ever, amen.
I found a very good article about this very subject by Walter E. Williams, PhD. Mr. Williams is a patriot and a true American. He put my opinions down on paper in such a profound way. He expressed My Thoughts Exactly in a recent article:
Our problem is immorality
by Walter E. Williams
Link
Most of our nation’s great problems, including our economic problems, have as their root decaying moral values.
Whether we have the stomach to own up to it or not, we have become an immoral people left with little more than the pretense of morality.
You say, “That’s a pretty heavy charge, Williams. You’d better be prepared to back it up with evidence!” I’ll try with a few questions for you to answer.
Do you believe that it is moral and just for one person to be forcibly used to serve the purposes of another?
And, if that person does not peaceably submit to being so used, do you believe that there should be the initiation of some kind of force against him?
Neither question is complex and can be answered by either a yes or no.
For me the answer is no to both questions but I bet that your average college professor, politician or minister would not give a simple yes or no response. They would be evasive and probably say that it all depends.
In thinking about questions of morality, my initial premise is that I am my private property and you are your private property. That’s simple. What’s complex is what percentage of me belongs to someone else.
If we accept the idea of self-ownership, then certain acts are readily revealed as moral or immoral. Acts such as rape and murder are immoral because they violate one’s private property rights. Theft of the physical things that we own, such as cars, jewelry and money, also violates our ownership rights.
The reason why your college professor, politician or minister cannot give a simple yes or no answer to the question of whether one person should be used to serve the purposes of another is because they are sly enough to know that either answer would be troublesome for their agenda.
A yes answer would put them firmly in the position of supporting some of mankind’s most horrible injustices such as slavery. After all, what is slavery but the forcible use of one person to serve the purposes of another?
A no answer would put them on the spot as well because that would mean they would have to come out against taking the earnings of one American to give to another in the forms of farm and business handouts, Medicare, Medicaid, food stamps and thousands of similar programs that account for more than two-thirds of the federal budget.
There is neither moral justification nor constitutional authority for what amounts to legalized theft. This is not an argument against paying taxes. We all have a moral obligation to pay our share of the constitutionally mandated and enumerated functions of the federal government.
Unfortunately, there is no way out of our immoral quagmire. The reason is that now that the U.S. Congress has established the principle that one American has a right to live at the expense of another American, it no longer pays to be moral.
People who choose to be moral and refuse congressional handouts will find themselves losers. They’ll be paying higher and higher taxes to support increasing numbers of those paying lower and lower taxes.
As it stands now, close to 50 percent of income earners have no federal income tax liability and as such, what do they care about rising income taxes?
In other words, once legalized theft begins, it becomes too costly to remain moral and self-sufficient. You might as well join in the looting, including the current looting in the name of stimulating the economy.
I am all too afraid that a historian, a hundred years from now, will footnote America as a historical curiosity where people once enjoyed private property rights and limited government but it all returned to mankind’s normal state of affairs — arbitrary abuse and control by the powerful elite.
Our treasury is robbing from Paul to pay Peter (and Paul is broke too!).
Our troops are languishing in Afghanistan with no clear direction and our guys are putting themselves at risk needlessly. Obama: Please bring them home since you obviously have no clue what you're doing!
I've come to the conclusion that one of the worst things ever created was health insurance. I have learned that since it's inception in the 1920s it was encouraged for 'workers' to be paid for by employers by .... wait for it ... TRADE UNIONS! link **Ding, ding, ding, ding** [waving red flag] Yep, it's been wrong from the get-go. Company's have been paying for most all health insurance. But as you and I know, NOTHING is paid by corporations. Taxpayers and consumers pay for everything. NOTHING IS FREE. ObamaCare is NOT FREE. It will crash and burn our economy forever and ever, amen.
I found a very good article about this very subject by Walter E. Williams, PhD. Mr. Williams is a patriot and a true American. He put my opinions down on paper in such a profound way. He expressed My Thoughts Exactly in a recent article:
Our problem is immorality
by Walter E. Williams
Link
Most of our nation’s great problems, including our economic problems, have as their root decaying moral values.Whether we have the stomach to own up to it or not, we have become an immoral people left with little more than the pretense of morality.
You say, “That’s a pretty heavy charge, Williams. You’d better be prepared to back it up with evidence!” I’ll try with a few questions for you to answer.
Do you believe that it is moral and just for one person to be forcibly used to serve the purposes of another?
And, if that person does not peaceably submit to being so used, do you believe that there should be the initiation of some kind of force against him?
Neither question is complex and can be answered by either a yes or no.
For me the answer is no to both questions but I bet that your average college professor, politician or minister would not give a simple yes or no response. They would be evasive and probably say that it all depends.
In thinking about questions of morality, my initial premise is that I am my private property and you are your private property. That’s simple. What’s complex is what percentage of me belongs to someone else.
If we accept the idea of self-ownership, then certain acts are readily revealed as moral or immoral. Acts such as rape and murder are immoral because they violate one’s private property rights. Theft of the physical things that we own, such as cars, jewelry and money, also violates our ownership rights.
The reason why your college professor, politician or minister cannot give a simple yes or no answer to the question of whether one person should be used to serve the purposes of another is because they are sly enough to know that either answer would be troublesome for their agenda.
A yes answer would put them firmly in the position of supporting some of mankind’s most horrible injustices such as slavery. After all, what is slavery but the forcible use of one person to serve the purposes of another?
A no answer would put them on the spot as well because that would mean they would have to come out against taking the earnings of one American to give to another in the forms of farm and business handouts, Medicare, Medicaid, food stamps and thousands of similar programs that account for more than two-thirds of the federal budget.
There is neither moral justification nor constitutional authority for what amounts to legalized theft. This is not an argument against paying taxes. We all have a moral obligation to pay our share of the constitutionally mandated and enumerated functions of the federal government.
Unfortunately, there is no way out of our immoral quagmire. The reason is that now that the U.S. Congress has established the principle that one American has a right to live at the expense of another American, it no longer pays to be moral.
People who choose to be moral and refuse congressional handouts will find themselves losers. They’ll be paying higher and higher taxes to support increasing numbers of those paying lower and lower taxes.
As it stands now, close to 50 percent of income earners have no federal income tax liability and as such, what do they care about rising income taxes?
In other words, once legalized theft begins, it becomes too costly to remain moral and self-sufficient. You might as well join in the looting, including the current looting in the name of stimulating the economy.
I am all too afraid that a historian, a hundred years from now, will footnote America as a historical curiosity where people once enjoyed private property rights and limited government but it all returned to mankind’s normal state of affairs — arbitrary abuse and control by the powerful elite.
Thursday, October 22, 2009
Help Stop ObamaCare: Important Update
To Mr. Barry Obama and all 535 voting members of the Legislature,
To our elected Officials: you are ALL corrupt morons:
* The U.S. Post Service was established in 1775 You have had 234 years to get it right and it is broke.
* Social Security was established in 1935. You have had 74 years to get it right and it is broke.
* Fannie Mae was established in 1938. You have had 71 years to get it right and it is broke.
* War on Poverty started in 1964. You have had 45 years to get it right; $1 trillion of our money is confiscated each year and transferred to "the poor" and they only want more.
* Medicare and Medicaid were established in 1965. You have had 44 years to get it right and they are broke.
* Freddie Mac was established in 1970. You have had 39 years to get it right and it is broke.
* The Department of Energy was created in 1977 to lessen our dependence on foreign oil. It has ballooned to 16,000 employees with a budget of $24 billion a year and we import more oil than ever before. You had 32 years to get it right and it is an abysmal failure.
* And the government 'war on drugs' is a dismal failure.
YOU HAVE FAILED in every "government service" that has been shoved down our throats while overspending our tax dollars! NOW YOU WANT AMERICANS TO BELIEVE YOU CAN BE TRUSTED WITH A GOVERNMENT-RUN HEALTH CARE SYSTEM??
If this, or any other communist bill, passes into law there will be conflict and you'll be the cause of it, just like the first so-called Civil War (War of Northern Aggression). Be very careful what you do next elected officials.
** Great call to action from Dick Armey, Chairman of FreedomWorks**
Earlier this week, the Finance Committee filed their version of ObamaCare. Clocking in at 1,502 pages, the bill contains cuts to Medicare and Medicare Advantage, fines on those who do not purchase their own insurance, taxes on many private insurance plans, taxes on medical devices and drugs, and new taxes on employers. This is a far cry from the campaign promise President Obama made when he said he would not raise taxes on those earning less than $250,000. [Obama YOU LIE!]
Our heavy-handed government is at it again because that’s just the beginning. This ObamaCare is evil through and through. It has nothing to do with health care and everything to do with a power grab by the Communists.
Please Visit the Virtual War Room To Take Action now before it's too late!
Thanks for praying for a velvet solution to all this evil. I still believe that God is in control.
Monday, October 19, 2009
READY TO REVOLT: Oath Keepers pledges to prevent dictatorship in United States
I received this from another patriot this morning and thought I'd share the article.
All I can add is 'WHERE DO I SIGN UP??!!' 'cause I'm ready for a rumble with this Administration if they push any of these unconstitutional bills on us. "Go nuclear, Pelosi, and you'll be caught in the blast too."
By the way, I just purchased the book "Arguing With Idiots" by Glenn Beck. Can't wait to start reading it.
-----
First, here's this:
OATH KEEPERS: ORDERS WE WILL NOT OBEY
1. We will NOT obey orders to disarm the American people.
2. We will NOT obey orders to conduct warrantless searches of the American people
3. We will NOT obey orders to detain American citizens as “unlawful enemy combatants” or to subject them to military tribunal.
4. We will NOT obey orders to impose martial law or a “state of emergency” on a state.
5. We will NOT obey orders to invade and subjugate any state that asserts its sovereignty.
6. We will NOT obey any order to blockade American cities, thus turning them into giant concentration camps.
7. We will NOT obey any order to force American citizens into any form of detention camps under any pretext.
8. We will NOT obey orders to assist or support the use of any foreign troops on U.S. soil against the American people to “keep the peace” or to “maintain control."
9. We will NOT obey any orders to confiscate the property of the American people, including food and other essential supplies.
10.We will NOT obey any orders which infringe on the right of the people to free speech, to peaceably assemble, and to petition their government for a redress of grievances.
Click here to read full length version.
-----
Group asks police and military to lay down arms in response to orders deemed unlawful
By ALAN MAIMON
LAS VEGAS REVIEW-JOURNAL
Article here
Depending on your perspective, the Oath Keepers are either strident defenders of liberty or dangerous peddlers of paranoia.
In the age of town halls, talk radio and tea parties, middle ground of opinion is hard to find.
Launched in March by Las Vegan Stewart Rhodes, Oath Keepers bills itself as a nonpartisan group of current and retired law enforcement and military personnel who vow to fulfill their oaths to the Constitution.
More specifically, the group's members, which number in the thousands, pledge to disobey orders they deem unlawful, including directives to disarm the American people and to blockade American cities. By refusing the latter order, the Oath Keepers hope to prevent cities from becoming "giant concentration camps," a scenario the 44-year-old Rhodes says he can envision happening in the coming years.
It's a Cold War-era nightmare vision with a major twist: The occupying forces in this imagined future are American, not Soviet.
"The whole point of Oath Keepers is to stop a dictatorship from ever happening here," Rhodes, a former Army paratrooper and Yale-trained lawyer, said in an interview with the Review-Journal. "My focus is on the guys with the guns, because they can't do it without them.
"We say if the American people decide it's time for a revolution, we'll fight with you."
That type of rhetoric has caught the attention of groups that track extremist activity in the United States.
In a July report titled "Return of the Militias," the Alabama-based Southern Poverty Law Center singled out Oath Keepers as "a particularly worrisome example of the Patriot revival."
The Patriot movement, so named because its adherents believe the federal government has stepped on the constitutional ideals of the American Revolution, gained traction in the 1990s and has been closely linked to anti-government militia and white supremacist movements.
The movement is blamed for spawning Timothy McVeigh, who bombed a federal building in Oklahoma City in 1995, killing 168 people.
"I'm not accusing Stewart Rhodes or any member of his group of being Timothy McVeigh or a future Timothy McVeigh," law center spokesman Mark Potok said. "But these kinds of conspiracy theories are what drive a small number of people to criminal violence. ... What's troubling about Oath Keepers is the idea that men and women armed and ordered to protect the public in this country are clearly being drawn into a world of false conspiracy theory."
Oath Keepers got some unwanted attention in April when an Oklahoma man loosely connected to the group was arrested for threatening violence at an anti-tax protest in Oklahoma City. Rhodes called the man "a nut" who had no real affiliation with his group.
Nonetheless, Potok's group now monitors Oath Keepers on its Web site blog "Hatewatch."
Oath Keepers is not preaching violence or government overthrow, Rhodes said. On the contrary, it is asking police and the military to lay down their arms in response to unlawful orders.
The group's Web site, www.oathkeepers.org, features videos and testimonials in which supporters compare President Barack Obama's America to Adolf Hitler's Germany. They also liken Obama to England's King George III during the American Revolution.
One member, in a videotaped speech at an event in Washington, D.C., calls Obama "the domestic enemy the Constitution is talking about."
According to the law center, militia groups are re-emerging in this country partly as a result of racial animosity toward Obama.
It's the "cross-pollinating" of extremist groups -- some racist, some not -- that is of concern, Potok said. As evidence that the danger is real, he points to several recent murders committed by men with anti-government or racist views.
The U.S. Department of Homeland Security reached a similar conclusion in a report earlier this year about the rise of right-wing extremism. The report said the nation's economic downturn and Obama's race are "unique drivers for right-wing radicalization and recruitment."
The homeland security report added that "disgruntled military veterans" might be vulnerable to recruitment by right-wing extremist groups.
That warning was enough to make Rhodes feel paranoid.
"They're accusing anybody who opposes Obama of being a racist or a potential terrorist," he said. "What they're saying is, 'We're coming after you.'"
The motto of Oath Keepers: "Not on our watch!"
The message Rhodes hears from the government: We're watching you. [well, we're watching you too government!]
Las Vegas police Lt. Kevin McMahill said his department's homeland security bureau isn't overly concerned with Oath Keepers at this point, even though Rhodes says several active-duty Las Vegas officers are members of the group.
"I wouldn't classify Oath Keepers as no threat at all, but I wouldn't classify them as a threat either," McMahill said. "There's always a chance an individual can step outside the boundaries of what an organization stands for and do something wrong."
Rhodes, a former firearms instructor, said he easily could have started Oath Keepers during the Bush administration, but his focus during those years was first on getting his law degree and then volunteering on the 2008 presidential campaign of Texas Congressman Ron Paul, a libertarian Republican in whose office Rhodes worked during the 1990s.
What Rhodes terms "the rise of executive privilege" during the post-9/11 years of the Bush presidency will in his opinion only accelerate with Obama in office. What's worse, he said, is that "gun-hating extremists" now control the White House.
Two things have happened since the Homeland Security Department and Southern Poverty Law Center released their reports on extremism: Membership of Oath Keepers has spiked dramatically. And Rhodes has had to do a lot of explaining.
"We're not a militia," he said. "And we're not part and parcel of the white supremacist movement. I loathe white supremacists." [me too, they're nut cases]
Oath Keepers doesn't offer paramilitary training; nor does it have a military command structure. It instead has board members, which include directors in seven states and outreach coordinators to currently serving local and federal law enforcement and military personnel. The group's state director in Montana, who goes by the name Elias Alias, has said Montana and other states should consider seceding from the United States in protest of the federal government's conduct.
Leaders of the group will come together in Las Vegas starting Oct. 24 for the inaugural national conference of Oath Keepers.
Among the group's other leaders is Dave Freeman, an Army veteran and former Las Vegas police sergeant who spent more than 30 years with the Metropolitan Police Department.
For Freeman, Oath Keepers has become something of a family affair. He recruited his niece, a former police chief, to serve as state director for Oath Keepers in Massachusetts.
"When you believe in something, you have to do more than just pay it lip service," said Freeman, the group's Southern Nevada director and national peace officer liaison. "This is a crusade I believe in."
Another prominent Oath Keeper is former Arizona sheriff Richard Mack, who has long been an outspoken government critic. [read my post about this fellow patriot and download the video to share with your Sheriff]
The Southern Poverty Law Center calls Mack a "longtime militia hero" who helped weaken gun control laws.
An incident earlier this year in rural Iowa, not inside the Washington Beltway, motivated Rhodes to start Oath Keepers.
He questioned why the Iowa National Guard planned to use residents of a small town to participate in training on door-to-door searches for weapons.
The Guard said the training was to help soldiers who might be asked to carry out similar searches in Iraq or Afghanistan.
But for Rhodes, it looked like preparation for a future declaration of martial law. It reminded him of the response to Hurricane Katrina in 2005 when police officers reportedly confiscated legally owned firearms. What the government called emergency response after the levees broke, Rhodes saw as the imposition of martial law.
If it hadn't been for April 19 of this year, Oath Keepers might not have gained the notoriety it now has.
On the anniversary of the Battle of Lexington Green, the Massachusetts battle that started the American Revolution in 1775, a group of Oath Keepers went to the battle site and reaffirmed their pledge to the Constitution.
The gathering was mentioned in the Southern Poverty Law Center report because April 19 is also the anniversary of the deadly end to the federal siege on the Branch Davidian compound in Waco, Texas, in 1993; and of the retaliatory bombing of the Oklahoma City federal building in 1995.
Rhodes and Potok have never talked, but if they did, they might find themselves speaking a different language.
"Let them say what they want to say, but April 19 has very much become a day for the extreme radical right," Potok said.
Rhodes couldn't disagree more.
"There are thousands of Americans who go to Lexington to watch re-enactments of people shooting at troops," Rhodes said. "But if you're a group of military and police there, they somehow find this offensive."
Rhodes said he hopes Oath Keepers members think about the lawfulness of day-to-day orders they receive.
For example, if a police officer feels he is being asked to do an illegal search of a home or vehicle, he should stand down.
Rhodes eventually wants to create a legal defense fund for Oath Keepers who are disciplined by their employers for defying orders they deem unlawful or immoral.
"The message to law enforcement is not to become a tool of oppression," he said. [amen to that!]
Rhodes, a husband and father of five home-schooled children, said he gets hundreds of e-mails a day, mostly from people interested in knowing more about his group.
He also gets a lot of questions from "birthers" wanting to know if he thinks Obama is really an American citizen and from "truthers" asking whether he believes the attacks of 9/11 were an inside job. The group doesn't have an official position on either issue, he said.
Some of his responses to questions have turned would-be allies against him.
"I've been accused of being a traitor or a CIA operative because I'm not coming out and declaring that the H1N1 (swine flu) vaccine is a biological weapon," he said.
Contact reporter Alan Maimon at amaimon@reviewjournal.com or 702-383-0404.
All I can add is 'WHERE DO I SIGN UP??!!' 'cause I'm ready for a rumble with this Administration if they push any of these unconstitutional bills on us. "Go nuclear, Pelosi, and you'll be caught in the blast too."
By the way, I just purchased the book "Arguing With Idiots" by Glenn Beck. Can't wait to start reading it.
First, here's this:
OATH KEEPERS: ORDERS WE WILL NOT OBEY
1. We will NOT obey orders to disarm the American people.
2. We will NOT obey orders to conduct warrantless searches of the American people
3. We will NOT obey orders to detain American citizens as “unlawful enemy combatants” or to subject them to military tribunal.
4. We will NOT obey orders to impose martial law or a “state of emergency” on a state.
5. We will NOT obey orders to invade and subjugate any state that asserts its sovereignty.
6. We will NOT obey any order to blockade American cities, thus turning them into giant concentration camps.
7. We will NOT obey any order to force American citizens into any form of detention camps under any pretext.
8. We will NOT obey orders to assist or support the use of any foreign troops on U.S. soil against the American people to “keep the peace” or to “maintain control."
9. We will NOT obey any orders to confiscate the property of the American people, including food and other essential supplies.
10.We will NOT obey any orders which infringe on the right of the people to free speech, to peaceably assemble, and to petition their government for a redress of grievances.
Click here to read full length version.
Group asks police and military to lay down arms in response to orders deemed unlawful
By ALAN MAIMON
LAS VEGAS REVIEW-JOURNAL
Article here
Depending on your perspective, the Oath Keepers are either strident defenders of liberty or dangerous peddlers of paranoia.
In the age of town halls, talk radio and tea parties, middle ground of opinion is hard to find.
Launched in March by Las Vegan Stewart Rhodes, Oath Keepers bills itself as a nonpartisan group of current and retired law enforcement and military personnel who vow to fulfill their oaths to the Constitution.
More specifically, the group's members, which number in the thousands, pledge to disobey orders they deem unlawful, including directives to disarm the American people and to blockade American cities. By refusing the latter order, the Oath Keepers hope to prevent cities from becoming "giant concentration camps," a scenario the 44-year-old Rhodes says he can envision happening in the coming years.
It's a Cold War-era nightmare vision with a major twist: The occupying forces in this imagined future are American, not Soviet.
"The whole point of Oath Keepers is to stop a dictatorship from ever happening here," Rhodes, a former Army paratrooper and Yale-trained lawyer, said in an interview with the Review-Journal. "My focus is on the guys with the guns, because they can't do it without them.
"We say if the American people decide it's time for a revolution, we'll fight with you."
That type of rhetoric has caught the attention of groups that track extremist activity in the United States.
In a July report titled "Return of the Militias," the Alabama-based Southern Poverty Law Center singled out Oath Keepers as "a particularly worrisome example of the Patriot revival."
The Patriot movement, so named because its adherents believe the federal government has stepped on the constitutional ideals of the American Revolution, gained traction in the 1990s and has been closely linked to anti-government militia and white supremacist movements.
The movement is blamed for spawning Timothy McVeigh, who bombed a federal building in Oklahoma City in 1995, killing 168 people.
"I'm not accusing Stewart Rhodes or any member of his group of being Timothy McVeigh or a future Timothy McVeigh," law center spokesman Mark Potok said. "But these kinds of conspiracy theories are what drive a small number of people to criminal violence. ... What's troubling about Oath Keepers is the idea that men and women armed and ordered to protect the public in this country are clearly being drawn into a world of false conspiracy theory."
Oath Keepers got some unwanted attention in April when an Oklahoma man loosely connected to the group was arrested for threatening violence at an anti-tax protest in Oklahoma City. Rhodes called the man "a nut" who had no real affiliation with his group.
Nonetheless, Potok's group now monitors Oath Keepers on its Web site blog "Hatewatch."
Oath Keepers is not preaching violence or government overthrow, Rhodes said. On the contrary, it is asking police and the military to lay down their arms in response to unlawful orders.
The group's Web site, www.oathkeepers.org, features videos and testimonials in which supporters compare President Barack Obama's America to Adolf Hitler's Germany. They also liken Obama to England's King George III during the American Revolution.
One member, in a videotaped speech at an event in Washington, D.C., calls Obama "the domestic enemy the Constitution is talking about."
According to the law center, militia groups are re-emerging in this country partly as a result of racial animosity toward Obama.
It's the "cross-pollinating" of extremist groups -- some racist, some not -- that is of concern, Potok said. As evidence that the danger is real, he points to several recent murders committed by men with anti-government or racist views.
The U.S. Department of Homeland Security reached a similar conclusion in a report earlier this year about the rise of right-wing extremism. The report said the nation's economic downturn and Obama's race are "unique drivers for right-wing radicalization and recruitment."
The homeland security report added that "disgruntled military veterans" might be vulnerable to recruitment by right-wing extremist groups.
That warning was enough to make Rhodes feel paranoid.
"They're accusing anybody who opposes Obama of being a racist or a potential terrorist," he said. "What they're saying is, 'We're coming after you.'"
The motto of Oath Keepers: "Not on our watch!"
The message Rhodes hears from the government: We're watching you. [well, we're watching you too government!]
Las Vegas police Lt. Kevin McMahill said his department's homeland security bureau isn't overly concerned with Oath Keepers at this point, even though Rhodes says several active-duty Las Vegas officers are members of the group.
"I wouldn't classify Oath Keepers as no threat at all, but I wouldn't classify them as a threat either," McMahill said. "There's always a chance an individual can step outside the boundaries of what an organization stands for and do something wrong."
Rhodes, a former firearms instructor, said he easily could have started Oath Keepers during the Bush administration, but his focus during those years was first on getting his law degree and then volunteering on the 2008 presidential campaign of Texas Congressman Ron Paul, a libertarian Republican in whose office Rhodes worked during the 1990s.
What Rhodes terms "the rise of executive privilege" during the post-9/11 years of the Bush presidency will in his opinion only accelerate with Obama in office. What's worse, he said, is that "gun-hating extremists" now control the White House.
Two things have happened since the Homeland Security Department and Southern Poverty Law Center released their reports on extremism: Membership of Oath Keepers has spiked dramatically. And Rhodes has had to do a lot of explaining.
"We're not a militia," he said. "And we're not part and parcel of the white supremacist movement. I loathe white supremacists." [me too, they're nut cases]
Oath Keepers doesn't offer paramilitary training; nor does it have a military command structure. It instead has board members, which include directors in seven states and outreach coordinators to currently serving local and federal law enforcement and military personnel. The group's state director in Montana, who goes by the name Elias Alias, has said Montana and other states should consider seceding from the United States in protest of the federal government's conduct.
Leaders of the group will come together in Las Vegas starting Oct. 24 for the inaugural national conference of Oath Keepers.
Among the group's other leaders is Dave Freeman, an Army veteran and former Las Vegas police sergeant who spent more than 30 years with the Metropolitan Police Department.
For Freeman, Oath Keepers has become something of a family affair. He recruited his niece, a former police chief, to serve as state director for Oath Keepers in Massachusetts.
"When you believe in something, you have to do more than just pay it lip service," said Freeman, the group's Southern Nevada director and national peace officer liaison. "This is a crusade I believe in."
Another prominent Oath Keeper is former Arizona sheriff Richard Mack, who has long been an outspoken government critic. [read my post about this fellow patriot and download the video to share with your Sheriff]
The Southern Poverty Law Center calls Mack a "longtime militia hero" who helped weaken gun control laws.
An incident earlier this year in rural Iowa, not inside the Washington Beltway, motivated Rhodes to start Oath Keepers.
He questioned why the Iowa National Guard planned to use residents of a small town to participate in training on door-to-door searches for weapons.
The Guard said the training was to help soldiers who might be asked to carry out similar searches in Iraq or Afghanistan.
But for Rhodes, it looked like preparation for a future declaration of martial law. It reminded him of the response to Hurricane Katrina in 2005 when police officers reportedly confiscated legally owned firearms. What the government called emergency response after the levees broke, Rhodes saw as the imposition of martial law.
If it hadn't been for April 19 of this year, Oath Keepers might not have gained the notoriety it now has.
On the anniversary of the Battle of Lexington Green, the Massachusetts battle that started the American Revolution in 1775, a group of Oath Keepers went to the battle site and reaffirmed their pledge to the Constitution.
The gathering was mentioned in the Southern Poverty Law Center report because April 19 is also the anniversary of the deadly end to the federal siege on the Branch Davidian compound in Waco, Texas, in 1993; and of the retaliatory bombing of the Oklahoma City federal building in 1995.
Rhodes and Potok have never talked, but if they did, they might find themselves speaking a different language.
"Let them say what they want to say, but April 19 has very much become a day for the extreme radical right," Potok said.
Rhodes couldn't disagree more.
"There are thousands of Americans who go to Lexington to watch re-enactments of people shooting at troops," Rhodes said. "But if you're a group of military and police there, they somehow find this offensive."
Rhodes said he hopes Oath Keepers members think about the lawfulness of day-to-day orders they receive.
For example, if a police officer feels he is being asked to do an illegal search of a home or vehicle, he should stand down.
Rhodes eventually wants to create a legal defense fund for Oath Keepers who are disciplined by their employers for defying orders they deem unlawful or immoral.
"The message to law enforcement is not to become a tool of oppression," he said. [amen to that!]
Rhodes, a husband and father of five home-schooled children, said he gets hundreds of e-mails a day, mostly from people interested in knowing more about his group.
He also gets a lot of questions from "birthers" wanting to know if he thinks Obama is really an American citizen and from "truthers" asking whether he believes the attacks of 9/11 were an inside job. The group doesn't have an official position on either issue, he said.
Some of his responses to questions have turned would-be allies against him.
"I've been accused of being a traitor or a CIA operative because I'm not coming out and declaring that the H1N1 (swine flu) vaccine is a biological weapon," he said.
Contact reporter Alan Maimon at amaimon@reviewjournal.com or 702-383-0404.
Saturday, October 17, 2009
ALERT: Global Climate Scam! Please Sign The Petition!
The Obamanation is up to his old tricks but we can STOP HIM by contacting our representatives and congressman. Hurry!! Before it's too late and we've lost our Sovereignty!!
Obama Poised to Cede US Sovereignty
Please go here to sign the petition! Hurry!! Share this with others and get them to write. Thank you for helping and praying.
Please go here to sign the petition! Hurry!! Share this with others and get them to write. Thank you for helping and praying.
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