Disabled South Vietnamese (VNCH) veterans need help

Via Michael and WRSA

I have been back many times since 1992 and this is indeed true.  For instance, children of the VNCH weren't allowed to attend school, but finally in 1981 this was changed and my wife finally entered grade school at nine years of age. I have met many veterans and it brings tears to your eyes to think of their betrayal.

 

Brief History of VHF

In late 2005 some American veterans of the war met with some Vietnamese survivors of the war who had relocated to the Raleigh-Durham area.  The Vietnamese related their concerns over the disabled South Vietnamese veterans still living there, whose lives are doubly difficult due to their disabilities and the restrictions they have faced ever since the end of the war.

The American veterans immediately identified with the sufferings of their former comrades, and so everyone wanted to work to bring some level of aid and comfort to those disabled veterans who are worst off.  From the discussions eventually came the idea of a charity specifically to help these most needy victims of the war.  And thus the Vietnam Healing Foundation was set up and officially registered as a 501 (c)3 organization.

In early 2006 the first expedition to Viet Nam was conducted, to begin locating needy veterans there.  A bilingual translator from Canada worked with one American vet in visiting and interviewing a number of disabled veterans in the Saigon area, with guidance from helpful Vietnamese living there.

Over a period of several days, careful visits were made to a couple dozen disabled veterans, to validate their claims of service and examine their situations.  Most of them were extremely poor, leading lives of deprivation and hardships, trying to make a living in ways such as selling lottery tickets, doing street repairs on motorbikes, or just being supported by family members, so the whole family shared the hardships.  Many were also in poor health, due in part to their wounds, but more from all the years of next to no health care.

All of them received cash gifts of several hundred thousand dong, for which all were grateful.  But as one of them said, it was as important to them to be remembered and visited by someone from the US, after all their years of being forgotten and abused.

Since that time VHF members have made several more trips to Viet Nam, and located needy veterans all the way from Saigon to Hue.  The stories all have much in common, lives of quiet desperation, trying to just make enough money to pay some rent and at least one bowl of rice per day.

Because the authorities are suspicious of anything that concerns old Southern veterans, VHF has to operate as much in the shadows as possible.  Twice every year we arrange for our clients to receive packages of money, amounting to at least 1.5 million dong and for some sponsored vets, as much as eight million.  These amounts don’t make any veteran rich, but they do help make life much better, paying for food, medical treatment, and sometimes for house improvements or school tuitions for children.

While we have a list of over 80 confirmed clients to receive regular aid, we have also made special one-time gifts to at least another 80, plus paid for houses to be built, special bicycles for those missing limbs, and other particular needs to be met.  We also contribute to orphanages and have arranged for shoes, clothing, and even a day at an amusement park for the Bui Doi street children.

All of this is done with no part of our budget going anywhere except to those in need, and about a 3% overhead for costs of distributing the funds.  All VHF members contribute their time and effort for no compensation other than the knowledge that the work we do really helps people who need and very much deserve help.

We are always looking for more members and more contributors, since there is a huge number of needy old veterans in Viet Nam, and we hope to keep expanding our client base.  This is truly worthwhile work, and very rewarding to all of us who have been involved in it.

More @ VHF

China's Eminent Domain laws are stronger than Americas?

Ninety Miles

VERBATIM

 

(from Reuters (member of corrupt media))

A car stops beside a house in the middle of a newly built road in Wenling, Zhejiang province, China, November 22, 2012. An elderly couple refused to sign an agreement to allow their house to be demolished. They say that compensation offered is not enough to cover rebuilding costs, according to local media. Their house is the only building left standing on a road which is paved through their village. REUTERS/China Daily

(from Ninety Miles (not a member of corrupt media))

So it seems China has stronger Eminent Domain laws than the U.S.?  Currently if a company wants to build condominiums on your property, a city can deem this an economic benefit and use Eminent Domain, yes for a private company and China can't use Eminent Domain to build a road?  We need to start firing Government in the U.S.

Oldest examples of hunting weapon uncovered in South Africa

Via Mike Miles

 

 Scientists working in South Africa have unearthed the oldest-known spear tips, apparently made by a common ancestor of people and Neandertals around 500,000 years ago.

More than 200 stone points found at a site called Kathu Pan 1 display modifications and damage consistent with having been attached to spear handles and hurled at animal prey such as springbok, say Jayne Wilkins, an anthropologist at the University of Toronto, and her colleagues.

“These were close-range weapons, either thrusting spears or spears thrown from fairly short distances,” Wilkins says.

 

A description of the South African spear points appears in the Nov. 16 Science.

 

More @ Ninety Miles

Help Wanted: Economists Who Understand the Economy

 

 The Independent Institute

VERBATIM

 By Mary Theroux

 

Ronald Coase, the 101-year old, Nobel Prize-winning economist from whose essay, “The Lighthouse in Economics” the Independent Institute takes its logo, is at it again: tweaking his fellow economists for being out of touch with reality in a new piece in the December 2012 Harvard Business Review (HBR), “Saving Economics from the Economists.”

Economics as currently presented in textbooks and taught in the classroom does not have much to do with business management, and still less with entrepreneurship. The degree to which economics is isolated from the ordinary business of life is extraordinary and unfortunate.

Coase is well known for—gasp—venturing out of the ivory tower to go see how people and firms actually operate in the real world. Terribly unorthodox and anti-academic, but he is English, after all, and everyone knows they’re somewhat eccentric.
Just as Coase blew the lid off the myth of the pure “public good” (lighthouses), he also revolutionized understanding of why firms exist, as well as showing that understanding economics negates much of the perceived need for government regulation.
Unfortunately, as he points out in his current HBR piece, his brand of economics rooted in the real world is increasingly rare, with the result:

Government is increasingly seen as the ultimate solution to tough economic problems, from innovation to employment.
Economics thus becomes a convenient instrument the state uses to manage the economy, rather than a tool the public turns to for enlightenment about how the economy operates.

Yet the current era, with an explosion of increasingly complex and diverse economic relationships, is precisely when the field of real-world economics could provide the information desperately needed for markets to work well.
We’re glad Dr. Coase is still going strong, and greatly appreciated his serving as Honorary Co-Chair of our 25th Anniversary Gala last year, honoring Robert Higgs, Mario Vargas Llosa, and Lech Wałęsa. It would be wonderful to celebrate his upcoming 102nd birthday on December 29th by seeing a strong response to his plea to his profession:

It is time to reengage the severely impoverished field of economics with the economy. Market economies springing up in China, India, Africa, and elsewhere herald a new era of entrepreneurship, and with it unprecedented opportunities for economists to study how the market economy gains its resilience in societies with cultural, institutional, and organizational diversities. But knowledge will come only if economics can be reoriented to the study of man as he is and the economic system as it actually exists.

A Tale of Two Abolitionists

 The Independent Institute

VERBATIM

  By Mary Theroux

An excellent movie released six years ago, “Amazing Grace,” depicted the life of William Wilberforce and his ultimately successful efforts to abolish, first, the British Slave Trade in 1806, and then slavery throughout the English empire with the Slavery Abolition Act of 1833. He did so entirely peacefully, through the British parliamentary system. It was a long and arduous struggle, and he is rightly depicted as a man of deep religious conviction who dedicated his entire life to this noble cause.

Last weekend Steven Spielberg’s biopic, “Lincoln”, was released, concentrating on the several weeks of Lincoln’s similarly successful machinations to have the 13th Amendment abolishing slavery passed by Congress.

While the carnage and horrors of the Civil War make brief appearances, the movie focuses on the political back-room deal-making, horse-trading, and scheming surrounding Lincoln’s championing of the amendment.

In this, then, the two movies similarly deal with slavery as public policy, and how laws abolishing the practice were passed.

Which then begs the question—why, then, the American Civil War?

If, ultimately, what did away with slavery was a change in the law of the land, which passage of the 13th Amendment accomplished in America in 1865 what the Slavery Abolition Act accomplished throughout the British empire in 1833, why did 620,000 Americans out of a population of 30 million die horrific deaths in a war supposed to have been to “end slavery” in the U.S., with no war required to abolish it anywhere else?

Or, as Thomas DiLorenzo expounded in our event, “The Real Abraham Lincoln: A Debate”,

In the book, Time on the Cross, by Fogel and Engerman, they do a survey of emancipation in this time period, and they find that dozens of countries, including the British Empire, the Spanish Empire, the French and Danish colonies—dozens of countries ended slavery peacefully through some sort of compensated emancipation.
...The one big quandary is, why didn’t we do what every other country in the world did during the previous 50 years that ended slavery, and end it peacefully through compensated emancipation?

Numerous scholars have done superb work studying the issues around the Civil War and Lincoln’s despotic rule during it, and Spielberg’s movie includes the president’s musing aloud upon the legality of his actions. In addition to unleashing total war against the South, instituting a draft, and violently suppressing draft riots in New York, he famously suspended habeas corpus, censored all telegraph communication, nationalized railroads, and ordered federal troops to interfere in Northern elections.

Lincoln deported Ohio Congressman Clement Vallandigham for disagreeing with him. He confiscated firearms. Ministers in the South were imprisoned for not praying for Abraham Lincoln. Secretary of State William Seward set up a secret police force, and he famously boasted to Lord Lyons, the British Ambassador, that he could ring a bell and have any man in America arrested.

Steven Spielberg is, of course, a master filmmaker, and “Lincoln” is no exception, with a superb cast. But for a tale of the principled fight to abolish slavery, see “Amazing Grace.” It is a far more satisfying tale of how one pursues noble ends—not through a wanton disregard for human life, liberty, and the rule of law under the guise of “the ends justifying the means.”

Meanwhile, the reader interested in further enlightenment on the question of why the United States, uniquely in all the history of the world, required a war to “end slavery”, should read the transcript or listen to the audio of the above-referenced debate; or check out any of the following wonderful resources on our site—and there are many more elsewhere:

• “The Great Centralizer: Abraham Lincoln and the War between the States,” by Thomas J. DiLorenzo
•  “The Bloody Hinge of American History,” by Robert Higgs
•  Emancipating Slaves, Enslaving Free Men: A History of the American Civil War, by Jeffrey Rogers Hummel, reviewed by Stanley L. Engerman
•  “The Civil War: Liberty and American Leviathan,” featuring Henry Mayer and Jeffrey Rogers Hummel
•  “Civil War and the American Political Economy,” by Joseph R. Stromberg

And, of course, Robert Higgs’s prescient classic, Crisis and Leviathan, now in a new 25th Anniversary Edition, tracing the growth of today’s leviathan state from its roots in the American Civil War and Lincoln’s precedent-setting power-grab.

Chuck Woolery on Assault Weapons

Via SF Medic

Silent Conquest - The End of Freedom of Expression in the West

Via The Feral Irishman

'Red Dawn' Doles Out Tea Party Patriotism

Via WRSA

 

According to Merriam-webster.com, one of the definitions of the term "tea party" is as follows: an exciting disturbance or proceeding. Basically, a protest. Well, while everyone was out catching the Black Friday Deals (I caught a few myself), I decided to have my own little tea party and share the story with some fellow patriots.

My girlfriend's mother is hosting two foreign exchange students this year. One is from China and the other is from Thailand. For the sake of anonymity, we will refer to them as E and F. As I was searching for a film to kick off Thanksgiving weekend, I kept running into the mainstream reviews of the "Red Dawn" remake. To mention them specifically would be a disservice to my intelligence and yours. Anyway, I decided in protest of this lame and lazy smearing of the new "patriotic" film that I would go see it. But, I took E and F on the offhanded chance the film would capture the same American patriotism that the original practically defined for a generation of Americans.

I wasn't expecting much as the three of us took our seats in the packed theater. And they were simply following my lead expecting just another movie. I'm a big fan of John Milius's original film, and what I was expecting was a politically correct remake without an iota of intelligence in its head. But when the lights went down the three of us were subjected to a two-hour film filled with great action, unabashed patriotism and love for freedom.

We got "Red Dawn."

More @  Breitbart

The Classified Report DHS Doesn’t Want You To See: “The Electric Power Delivery System… Could Be Severely Damaged By A Small Number of Well-Informed Attackers”

Via WRSA

In 2007 the National Academy of Sciences completed an extensive review of the national power grid infrastructure in a 164 page report titled Terrorism and the Electric Power Delivery System. In it the NAS detailed a wide array of physical, personnel and cyber vulnerabilities that could pose a significant risk to the national security of the United States.

Even though the report was originally written for public release, notes Madison Ruppert of End the Lie, the entire document was almost immediately classified by the Department of Homeland Security and hasn’t seen the light of day until this week. That release came after five years of committee reviews, reversals, deliberations and pressure from the Academy itself.

 The contents of the report make it clear why DHS wanted to keep it out of public view, as it illustrates severe deficiencies within the whole of the national power grid infrastructure.

So serious are the problems, that a coordinated attack by just a few people in just a few critical components could wreak such havoc that the effects would be measured in hundreds of billions of dollars and thousands of lives:

The electric power delivery system that carries electricity from large central generators to customers could be severely damaged by a small number of well-informed attackers.

More @ SHTF Plan

Here’s How it Will be Done….....

Via The Feral Irishman

 

Incrementalism has proved depressingly effective as a tool for getting most people to quietly surrender their rights piecemeal. For gradually habituating them to an ever-diminishing circle of liberty. When the circle finally closes and their rights no longer exist at all, they hardly notice – because by that time, most of their rights have already been taken.

The final surrender is met with a shrug rather than a scream of outrage.

Think how Americans have been habituated to arbitrary search and seizure. Something like the TSA would simply not have been tolerated if it came out of the blue sky circa 1980. And no, the terrr attacks of nineleven did not “change everything.” Getting people to accept “sobriety checkpoints” beginning around 1980 changed everything. Accept that – and something like Gate Rape is inevitable.

The same process works just as well when it comes to dismantling due process – and removing limits on what the government may not do to us. We didn’t get to legal strip searches for jaywalking or littering in one fell swoop. Nor rendition, torture as policy – and presidential kill lists. It is a matter of getting them – getting us – to  tolerate “A” so that “B” will be accepted in turn.

This is how the citizens of the United States will be disarmed.

More @ Eric Peters

Wives and corners

Via Knuckledraggin' My Life Away

New Movie Propagates Lincoln Historical Myths

Via Mike

If you are planning to see the new, Steven Spielberg directed, Lincoln movie you might want to invest in an accurate history book instead. While it is successfully dramatic, the movie rehashes several 150 year old myths about the Lincoln presidency and America's most horrible war. 

 

First, to the movie's credit, the script avoids a key, blatant lie that is currently being taught throughout American public schools today. The script focuses correctly on explaining how slaves were freed by the 13^th Amendment of the U.S. Constitution, not the Emancipation Proclamation.  Abraham Lincoln's proclamation did not apply to any northern states. It only applied to southern territory that was not under control of the Union. Therefore, it was ignored by the Confederacy too. The original proclamation of September 22, 1862, even stated that all southern states could keep their slaves if they returned to the Union by January 1, 1863. 

LINCOLN AND SLAVERY:

Although properly focused, the movie misleads its audience into believing that Abraham Lincoln was consumed with the thought of freeing slaves. In reality, Lincoln was a white segregationist from Illinois, whose state Constitution had banned permanent black residents since 1848. Lincoln stated repeatedly in his 1861 inaugural address, his 1862 Horace Greely letter and other times during and before the war that his only intent was to "preserve the union" not free slaves. As a lawyer, Lincoln actually represented Robert Matson, a slave owner who wanted his part-time seasonal slaves returned to him. In 1847, Mr. Lincoln took his case all the way to the Illinois Supreme Court where he lost. Throughout his presidency, Lincoln made repeated attempts to colonize all African Americans beginning in 1862 with his Commissioner of Emigration, James Mitchell, the former leader of the American Colonization Society. In April of 1865, wellafter Congress passed the 13^th Amendment and just before his death, Mr. Lincoln was still discussing his colonization plans with Union Army General, Benjamin Butler. 

LINCOLN AND THE WAR:

The movie aptly shows graphic scenes depicting some of the many horrendous battles in the appalling war against Southern independence where 620,000 Americans died, almost as many Americans killed as in all other wars combined. But the script serves to conceal Lincoln's role in instigating the war. Lincoln refused to meet with Confederate commissioners who came to Washington to negotiate a peaceful separation in February of 1861. He did not seek a constitutionally required declaration of war from Congress before initiating the war or petition the U.S. Supreme Court for a ruling as to the legality of secession according to the rights of the states under the 10^th Amendment of the U.S. Constitution. He ignored the vast majority opinion of his own cabinet and decided to invade Virginia on July 21, 1861 over objections of his military commanders, Generals Winfield Scott and Irwin McDowell. At that time, the Union had never suffered a single casualty from the Confederate military, which had committed no hostilities against the Union for over three months prior to the invasion. The script tends to ignore these well established, largely suppressed facts and imply that Mr. Lincoln had no choice but war.

CAUSES OF LINCOLN'S WAR:

The script also tends to deceive the audience into believing that slavery was the major cause of the war. It avoids the issues of Constitutional rights that Jefferson Davis so frequently wrote about and the excessive tariffs that caused South Carolina to initially threaten to secede 30 years earlier. Given that just over 15% of southerners owned slaves, it should be obvious that 85% of southerners were not fighting for the right of the minority 15% to own slaves. Although northern soldiers fought to preserve the union as Lincoln demanded, southern concerns about Constitutional rights and excessive taxation were proven to be justified. After southerners elected state representatives, who voted democratically to secede and unanimously elected Jefferson Davis as their President, they were then forced to fight to protect their homes, families and property from continual invasions. Today, almost all of us are victims of the uncontrollable federal government and taxing excesses that were spawned by President Lincoln's war.

LINCOLN AND THE PEOPLE:

The script further misleads the audience into believing that Lincoln was a beloved populist although with 39.8% of the vote, he was the most unpopular president ever elected. In one scene, Sally Fields, who plays Mary Todd Lincoln, remarks that: "No one has ever been loved so much by the people…" She obviously was not referring to southerners since they were victimized by death and destruction from dozens of invasions. She also could not have been referring to the 30,000 or so northerners who were imprisoned without trial for opposing the invasion of the south. Among them, 30 Maryland legislators were imprisoned to keep the state from voting to secede and thus preventing the war by encircling Washington D.C. with Confederate states. Hundreds of newspaper editors, publishers and citizens were also imprisoned for publicly opposing the invasion. Imprisoned notables include Frances Key Howard, grandson of star spangled banner author, Francis Scott Key and George Armistead Appleton, grandson of Major George Armistead, who commanded Fort McHenry during the key victory in the war of 1812. 

LINCOLN AND HUMANITY:

The movie theme seems to purposely exaggerate Abraham Lincoln's concern for slaves to falsely portray him as a great humanitarian. In another dramatic scene, Daniel Day Lewis, who plays Lincoln, asks: "Shall we stop this bleeding?" This line is acutely ironic since it was Lincoln who initiated the bleeding for millions of Americans. Mr. Lincoln personally directed key activities of the Union Army that repeatedly attacked civilian populations. The army burned hundreds of homes in South Carolina, destroyed dozens of farms and killed thousands of head of cattle in the Shenandoah Valley, burned dozens of cities and towns across Georgia, pillaged civilian homes in Fredricksburg, Virginia, and fired cannon shells into the towns of Vicksburg, Mississippi and Petersburg, Virginia for months. These unprecedented atrocities against American citizens are documented in "War Crimes Against Southern Civilians" by Walter Brian Cisco.

CONCLUSION:

The movie leaves a burning question as to why Steven Spielberg chose to continue the historical glorification of Abraham Lincoln while covering up the horrible truths about his administration and concealing the source of the greatest atrocities ever committed against American citizens. The real facts must have been uncovered given the historical research that was performed. Did Mr. Spielberg's lust for money and a "feel good" plot far outweigh his desire to present the full truth? We may never know the answer to such questions. In the meantime, if you are simply looking for dramatic entertainment that will make you comfortable by filling your Kool-Aid cup with propaganda, this movie might be for you. If, on the other hand, you expect any historical documentary to inform you accurately about past events, then your admission fee would be better spent on obtaining an accurate historical education of the Lincoln administration by reading a book such as Professor Thomas DiLorenzo's The Real Lincoln.

Garland Favorito
770 993-3622
garlandf@msn.com

Stone Mountain Plaque

Via Calvin Johnson

Plaque at Stone Mountain Park on the observation deck behind the museum. The vast majority of those who fought and died for the Southern Confederacy had little in worldly goods or comforts. Neither victory nor defeat would have greatly altered their lot. Yet, for four long years they waged one of the bloodiest wars in history. They fought for a principle: the right to live life in a chosen manner. This dedication to a cause drove them to achieve a moment of greatness which endures to this day.

 --Beverly M. DuBose Jr

This treaty could put the government in charge of your child: Calls Needed Immediately

 

Dear HSLDA Members and Friends,

Yesterday afternoon, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (NV) announced that the Senate will vote to ratify the UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (CRPD) treaty on Wednesday. We need you to call your two senators immediately, and urge them to oppose the CRPD.
If the U.S. Senate were to ratify the CRPD, this would give the United Nations the power to influence and change domestic law and threaten parental rights and homeschool freedom.
Thirty-six senators have signed a letter stating that they “respectfully request that no treaties be brought to the Senate floor for advice and consent during the lame-duck session of the 112th Congress.” These senators have promised in the letter that they “will oppose efforts to consider a treaty during this time.”

Senator Reid has purposefully ignored this letter by promising to file cloture by Wednesday (if 60 senators vote to invoke cloture, a filibuster will be ended) and will make every attempt to proceed to the CRPD for ratification this week. Ratification of the CRPD will take a two-thirds vote of the Senate, or 67 senators to vote in favor of the CRPD if all 100 are present.

We need you to call both of your U.S. senators right now and ask them to oppose the CRPD. You can use our Congressional Directory to find your senators’ contact information.

Please give them some or all of this message:

“I urge you to oppose the UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities. This treaty surrenders U.S. sovereignty to unelected UN bureaucrats and will threaten parental care of children with disabilities. Our nation already has laws to protect disabled Americans. This treaty is unnecessary and will hurt families. If the Senate ratifies this treaty, it would be the first time ever that the U.S. has ratified a treaty that obligates us to recognize economic, social, and cultural entitlements as rights under domestic law.”

Then, please forward this email to your friends and family and urge them to call, as well. Please also post this information on social media to help get the word out to every parent and freedom-loving person in America.

For more information on the dangers of this treaty please visit our CRPD page.

Thank you for standing with us for freedom.

Sincerely,

J. Michael Smith, Esq.
President, HSLDA

Rand Paul Continues To Fight Against Indefinite Detention Of US Citizens

 

 Freedom Outpost

 VERBATIM

Senator Rand Paul has made it know that he is interested at a run for the presidency in 2016 and continues to be one of a few in the Senate who will stand for the Constitution. Paul has spoken out numerous times against the National Defense Authorization Act’s Section 1021 which deals with “indefinite detention” of American citizens. Now he has an amendment ready for a vote and is threatening a filibuster in order to obtain that vote.

The Hill reports,

Paul’s amendment takes a new tack to curb the military’s ability to indefinitely detain U.S. citizens suspected of terrorism by affirming they have the right to a speedy trial by jury under the Sixth Amendment.

His push to change the indefinite detention laws for U.S. citizens follows a contentious fight last year where liberal Senate Democrats waged an unsuccessful attempt to scale back the detention laws before an 11th-hour, watered-down compromise was ultimately reached.

Paul’s filibuster threat could throw into flux what’s already been a long-winding road to the floor for the Defense authorization bill, which Armed Services Committee leaders have been clamoring to get on the floor since it passed out of committee in May.

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) said last week that he would move to the Defense bill after the Thanksgiving holiday, and would allow for an open amendment process with a limited number of amendments managed by Senate Armed Services Chairman Carl Levin (D-Mich.) and ranking member John McCain (R-Ariz.).

The day after Reid said the Senate would move to the defense bill, however, Paul put a hold on the legislation, a move Paul took because there was not an agreement to vote on his amendment, according to his office.

The text of Paul’s amendment is simple and to the point:

A citizen of the United States captured or arrested in the United States and detained by the Armed Forces of the United States pursuant to the Authorization for Use of Military Force (Public Law 107-40) shall enjoy the right to a speedy and public trial, by an impartial jury of the State and district wherein the crime shall have been committed, which district shall have been previously ascertained by law, and to be informed of the nature and cause of the accusation; to be confronted with the witnesses against him; to have compulsory process for obtaining witnesses in his favor, and to have the Assistance of Counsel for his defence.

The point is to preserve the rights of U.S. citizens guaranteed to them under the Sixth Amendment of the U.S. Constitution, which reads:

In all criminal prosecutions, the accused shall enjoy the right to a speedy and public trial, by an impartial jury of the State and district wherein the crime shall have been committed, which district shall have been previously ascertained by law, and to be informed of the nature and cause of the accusation; to be confronted with the witnesses against him; to have compulsory process for obtaining witnesses in his favor, and to have the Assistance of Counsel for his defence.

Joe Wolverton of The New American believes the amendment doesn’t go far enough. He points out, “There is not one word of repeal or abolition or revocation of the indefinite detention of Americans from the NDAA.”

Wolverton went on to write,

By a vote of 238-182, members of Congress rejected the amendment offered by Representatives Adam Smith (D-Wash.) and Justin Amash (R-Mich.) that would have repealed the indefinite detention provision of the NDAA. The Fiscal Year 2013 NDAA yet retains the indefinite detention provisions, as well as the section permitting prisoners to be transferred from civilian jurisdiction to the custody of the military.

“The frightening thing here is that the government is claiming the power under the Afghanistan authorization for use of military force as a justification for entering American homes to grab people, indefinitely detain them and not give them a charge or trial,” Representative Amash said during House debate.

Speaking in support of his amendment, Representative Smith reminded his colleagues that the NDAA granted to the president “extraordinary” powers and divested the American people of key civil liberties, as well as divesting civilian courts of their constitutional jurisdiction.

Smith pointed out that there was no need to transfer suspects into military custody as “hundreds” of terrorists have been tried in federal courts since the attacks of September 11, 2001.

We are now in a real pickle. The Republican party had plenty of opportunity to stand up against the NDAA and it’s indefinite detention section. The Georgia State Convention was ready to stand against the section and anyone that signed or supported the NDAA, but when they realized that their potential nominee this year supported it, they withdrew. The RNC platform committee took it up, but ended up utterly rejecting to take a stand on it, presumably because of similar understanding concerning their nominee and the fact that some believed this was not a major concern.

Drugs during long term survival situations (Part II: Marijuana & other drugs)

 The End Of A Republic (My Citroen)

Before SHTF I tried marijuana one or two times, and my alcohol experiences were connected to parties just like young folks everywhere around world.

In our political system people who used drugs of any kind were strictly separated from normal way of life, so in our city circle of folks who used any kind of drugs were stigmatized and definitely outsiders.

Nobody really talked about these people. So normal folks knew there are drug users, but what kind of people and drugs and any other details were not known much. Those kind of folks were just wrong kind of people and thats it. Period. That was before the war and total collapse of normal society.

My first contact with drugs during the collapse

When SHTF, I went with my friend to some guy because word was that someone sees him going out from military storage in the first days of chaos with few RPG. So we just want to check the guy and see can we trade something for that weapon.

After hours of finding right connections with people and digging trough the rumors we finally find the house of the guy. Man who brought us there went first in front of the house to call him, and he tell to me and my friend to take cover somewhere until he is done negotiating, because guy inside is heavily armed (from military storage) and he usually shoots first and then checks the remains of who was outside.

Finally we were cleared to go inside house. First floor looked like big animal fight with other big animal. Fight must have went on for few days. Everything was upside down, and common things were mixed with strange things. So you could see refrigerator taken upside down with bullet holes, and next to that there was traffic light severed from pylon.

First floor was not in use, guy made something like medieval fortress from his house. Second floor was in use and we climbed up there trough the hole in ceiling and some kind of navy stairs (ropes). His stairway was burned down.

We did not make any kind of trade for that RPGs because he fired all of that as he said. But I saw 5-6 full trash bags in one of the corner, and I asked him what is that? He said:“check it, be my guest“ .
Every bag was full of marijuana. There was small mountain of it. I never before saw so much of that stuff in one place.

I guess guy was dealer before the war, instinctively I was paralyzed, flashbacks of police, jail, courts, and folks point at you went trough my head. Man noticed that and laughs to me and say “do not worry, just take it and smoke it, that sh!t is our smallest problem now“. He was right and I was there to get a RPG but in shock in seeing drugs.

Why drugs matter during long term survival 

More @ SHTF School

Supreme Court Allows Obamacare Challenge by Liberty University

 

A lawsuit brought by Liberty University challenging part of the Affordable Care Act’s (Obamacare) requirement for employers to fund birth control through insurance for employees has been given new life.

Fox News reported that the Supreme Court on Monday ordered 4th Circuit Court of Appeals in Richmond, Va., to reconsider the suit, which argues that the employer mandate in the law violates protection of religious practice held in the First Amendment.

Although the Court upheld Obamacare in a 2012 on the basis that it is built around a legal tax, the ruling did not say lawsuits could not be filed which challenge other parts of the law.

More @ Newsmax

Exit Polls Prove US Still a Red State Nation

Obamacare. Only 44 percent of Americans said they believe the program should be expanded or left as it is. Almost a full majority — 49 percent — said they wanted the program fully repealed or partially repealed.

Income tax rates. Only 13 percent of Americans said they favored raising income tax rates for all citizens. And the suggestion that those earning over $250,000 a year — the benchmark the president uses to describe the so-called “rich” — should be taxed more received the support of 47 percent of the electorate. With all the media spin, one would think that view would have enjoyed majority support. It didn’t.

When asked if “taxes should be raised to help cut the budget deficit,” only 33 percent of the voters agreed, with a strong majority of 63 percent saying no more taxes.

The role of government. Asked the all-important question of whether government should do more or less in people’s lives, American voters strongly favored less government.

When respondents were asked if “government should do more to solve problems,” only 43 percent of voters agreed.

But 51 percent of voters agreed with the statement that “government is doing too many things better left to businesses and individuals.” Nothing better demonstrates that America rejects Obama’s statist policies and that the country remains a center-right nation.

And when asked to describe their ideological views, 41 percent of Americans said they were moderate, 35 percent said they were conservative, and only 25 percent described themselves as liberal.

The Tea Party. Despite a blizzard of negative press and media spin against the tea party, exit polls show they didn’t fare too badly among all the electorate. A total of 63 percent of voters say that they either support the tea party or are “neutral” toward it.

More @ Newsmax

Nigel Farage, topping his last barrage,:) says EU president Herman van Rompuy has the charisma of a damp rag and the appearance of a low-grade bank clerk.

Wish my buddy would come over here and run!

SIGN Re-Declaration of Independence 2012!

Via  safetalker

 

When in the Course of Human events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another, and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature’s God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation.

Those are the words of Thomas Jefferson in the Declaration of Independence 1776 and are as true today as they were 236 years ago, and perhaps far more vital to the survival of this great nation and her people today. There is no doubt or argument that America is in the most dire and urgent of situations she has ever seen. The only thing that stands between America and total collapse and invasion by foreign intervention is her people.

In a nation divided by social issues, race, faith, political ideologies and gender, by careful manipulation and design of those in power it is difficult to imagine a people united to one cause. There is however one cause, one great and irrefutable fact which binds us one to the other in America and around the globe; Freedom and Liberty. All men and women are indeed created equal; all are born with unalienable rights endowed by their creator; Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of Happiness. All creatures great and small possess the same right to Freedom and Liberty; to be free of Tyranny and Despotism.

There is a great enthusiasm for the idea of secession from the out of control and unlawful federal government we find ourselves at the mercy of today and there are petitions to that end on the Whitehouse.gov site but is it really about secession? No, none truly believe the overgrown and bloated federal government will dissolve the shackles of slavery so carefully placed on us. It’s not an issue of secession it is an issue of Re-possession; Re-possession of that which has been stolen from us, our Freedom and Liberty. It is not separation we must declare but our RIGHT TO EXIST AS FREE MEN AND WOMEN! THE RIGHT TO LIVE AS FREE AND SECURE IN OUR LIBERTIES AS OUR FOUNDERS INTENDED.

SIGN AND RATIFY YOUR DECLARATION OF INDEPENDENCE

More @ Soldier Hugs

GOA Alert: The political Left is firing back.

 

We alerted you recently to how our country’s representatives to the United Nations -- in less than 24 hours after the President’s reelection -- cast a vote in favor of producing a UN gun control treaty in March, 2013.

The full-throttled march towards gun control has begun.

But liberal media outlets are now going to bat for the Administration and trying to convince Americans that the UN Arms Trade Treaty will not affect average gun owners.  For example, Media Matters calls efforts by the gun community to raise awareness of this treaty as nothing more than a “right-wing U.N. gun grab conspiracy.”

However, they couldn’t be farther from the truth.  Retired Lt. Gen. William Boykin said earlier this year that, “[The ATT] means the United Nations, an international body, will decide how you and I as Americans can buy and sell our weapons, how we control those weapons, who is authorized to have those weapons and where they are. This is a dangerous trend.”

Gen. Boykin is absolutely correct.  And this is why Gun Owners of America is pressing U.S. Senators to reject the outlandish lies from the political Left and to oppose the President’s gun control agenda.

GOA has the facts and the information to show Senators that the UN Arms Trade Treaty will adversely affect the rights of their gun-owning constituents.

Click here to help Gun Owners of America reach millions of gun owners to defeat this reprehensible UN treaty!

There is no doubt that the UN treaty will infringe upon our Second Amendment rights.  While GOA has already written a more detailed analysis of this treaty, consider just one Article in the treaty which would, undoubtedly, lead to gun owner registration:

“State Parties shall put in place adequate measures that will allow them, where necessary, to MONITOR and CONTROL imports of [weapons, and to] adopt appropriate measures to prevent the diversion of imported items to unauthorized end users or to the illicit market.” (Article 8)

Elsewhere the treaty requires each nation to “adopt appropriate legislative, administrative or OTHER MEASURES [aka, Executive Orders] to monitor and control” firearms.

This treaty would pave the way for an anti-gun Obama Administration to unlawfully impose registration restrictions -- just like they did last year when they imposed gun owner registration in four southwest border states as the “answer” to Operation Fast & Furious.

This is a huge problem, as gun registration has historically been a first step towards gun confiscation!

We cannot stay silent.  We must take action.

Click here to email your two U.S. Senators in opposition to the UN treaty!

Take action.  And then distribute this email far and wide!

Gift ideas under $10

Swisskey – Kinda useful, but always cool for the ‘neat!’ factor. I use it mostly for opening mail at the post office although it has served well in it’s capacity as a screwdriver for small detail work.

Gerber Artifact – I find this one a bit more useful than the previous item. The replaceable xacto blade is handy and the ability to be used as a handy little prybar is very appealing. A little bulkier, but the apocalypse won’t be won with carbon-fiber and ultra-light materials.

Silva Carabiner 28 – No reason not to have a last-ditch compass hanging off your zipper pull or your hunting bag. Not for precision mapwork, but when you need to know which way is N-NW so you can “Get to da choppah!” you don’t need much more than this. Plus, Silva is usually good stuff.

Improved Military UTM/MGRS Reader & Protractor – Speaking of knowing where youre going, these thigns are awesome when used properly in conjunction with a map. They let you get down to some very, very fine coordinates and make maps much more useful. They make a circular version of this template as well, but I like the straight edges for measuring distances and drawing lines. Use this with your UTM-marked map and you’ll wonder how you ever navigated without.

Tuff Quickstrip Black 6 Round – Pack of 2 (.44/.45/.460 Caliber) – I’m a .357 kinda guy, but I know lotsa folks still packing wheelguns like the .41, .44 and .45 calibers. Bianchi still makes their SpeedStrips in .38 so I’m cool on those, but they never made them for other calibers. This company makes them for the bigger calibers that Bianchi ignored. Flatter than a speedloader and ‘universal’ to pretty much any swingout-cylinder revolver these things are a great way to carry spare ammo for faster (but not fastest) reloading.

Mainstay Emergency Food Rations – 3600 Calorie Bars (Single) – Nice for adding bulk to a Christmas stocking. I see these as a very limited use item, since freeze drieds are lighter and taste a lot better. But, for leaving in a vehicle these are almost the perfect food…impervious to temperature shifts, non thirst-provoking, long shelf life, high calorie content.

Israeli Battle Dressing and Blood Stopper Compress – Some day there might come the time when the rest of your life is measured in that thick red stuff pouring out a new orifice that you didn’t have five minutes ago. You can’t scopp the goop back into your body but you can keep what you’ve got left from leaving with one of these. The Israelie version gets high praise in the survivalist forums.

More @ Notes From The Bunker

Gun Store Owner Who Banned Obama Supporters Says 'Business Is Booming'

Via Don

 

Last week, the owner of an Arizona gun shop made national headlines after it was reported that he had posted a sign and taken out a full page ad in a local newspaper that banned Obama supporters from entering his store.  One week later, Cope Reynolds is cashing in on the attention.

Mr. Reynolds, owner of Southwest Shooting Authority says “business is booming” after his sign and newspaper ad caught the attention of various media outlets.  The sign read: “If you voted for Barack Obama, your business is not welcome at Southwest Shooting Authority. You have proven you’re not responsible enough to own a firearm.”

Reynolds says he has been inundated with hundreds of calls and emails from media types and supporters.  When asked about business, he replied, “I’ve been busier than a cat covering up poop on a marble floor.”

The Arizona Republic spoke with Mr. Reynolds about his sign and the effect it’s had on his business:
“People are saying that I’ve alienated half of our customers,” Reynolds said, laughing. “No, I haven’t. I haven't alienated any of my customers, because the people who voted for Obama don’t buy guns here. They don't come here at all. I haven’t alienated. I’ve improved things. I have packages sitting on my desk to be shipped to places like Massachusetts, Connecticut, New York, Idaho, Nevada and California.”

More @ CNS

‘Red Dawn’ Then and Now: Critics Recoil at Pro-America, Anti-Communism Messages

The original "Red Dawn" hardly won over film critics, and understandably so. It's considered a cult classic today, but "Red Dawn" served up plenty of cheese along with its stirring story of young Americans battling against a Communist invasion. The film's critical drubbing was about more than just storytelling hiccups, says National Review contributor John J. Miller.

“Better dead than Red Dawn,” sneered the Washington Post’s Rita Kempley, who called the film “sick and silly.” Janet Maslin of the New York Times labeled it “rabidly inflammatory,” “incorrigibly gung-ho,” and “a virulently alarmist fable.” Bob Thomas of the Associated Press condemned its “bathos” as “unrelenting.” Perhaps these were the honest assessments of dispassionate reviewers....

The makers of Red Dawn, complained Kevin Thomas of the Los Angeles Times, “spent too much time playing to the rabid anti-Commies.” You know: The movie must be awful because those icky conservatives approve of it. Even today, many liberals resort to knee-jerk denunciations: “Its guiding ideology is actually fascism,” wrote David Plotz of Slate in 2008.

That was then. This is the response the "Red Dawn" remake is getting from movie critics.

More @ Breitbart

Bias: PolitiFact's 'Pants on Fire' Awarded Overwhelmingly to Republicans, Conservatives

 

This particular chart was assembled by calculating the number of "Pants on Fire" awards to what PolitiFact claims are lies by our national political figures. "Pants on Fire" is the greatest demerit PolitiFact offers.

Blogger Chuck Rogers explains:

    We assembled this chart by sorting PolitiFact's complete list of "Pants on Fire" rulings. We filtered out any rulings of chain email or anonymous Facebook posts (although these were virtually all conservative viewpoints), as well as politicians or organizations who had only one "Pants on Fire" ruling (but again, even these were mostly conservatives).

The most impressive result is how PolitiFact treated Mitt Romney. He has received a "Pants on Fire" ruling more than twice than that of any other politician except Michele Bachmann. And, according to PolitiFact, Bachmann herself is far and away a worse liar than any other pol besides Romney.

Amazingly, Romney's "Pants on Fire" hits are three times more than Obama's and Obama has had seven years of campaigning and four years of Presidency during which he's committed one lie after another.

More @ Breitbart

Russian News Outlet Pravda (Previously the Official Press of the USSR) Labels Obama a ‘Communist’ in Scathing OpEd

 Via Billy

The famed Russian news site “Pravda,” which ironically was formed as the official Communist publication of the former Soviet Union, recently released a scathing opinion column entitled, “Obama’s Soviet Mistake,” in which the author unabashedly labels the U.S. president a “Communist without question promoting the Communist Manifesto without calling it so.”

The author, Xavier Lerma, goes on to note how Obama’s “cult of personality” has mesmerized the ignorant in America, who will follow the hope and change icon in much the same way as ”fools” still praise Lenin and Stalin in Russia.

“Obama’s fools and Stalin’s fools share the same drink of illusion.”

Adding an interesting twist to the article, the author juxtaposes President Obama with Vladimir Putin, noting that the Russian president has been sounding more and more like “Ronald Reagan” or other “conservatives in America” who seek to promote smaller government and lower taxes.

Lerma attributes the following remarks to Putin regarding the country’s taxes and the economy:

More @ The Blaze

Chief Economist: Quantitative Easing a Ticking 'Time Bomb'

 

Yale University senior fellow and former Morgan Stanley chairman Stephen Roach says that "zero interest rates and quantitative easing are the time bomb that's really ticking... that worries me a lot."

Mr. Roach made his comments last week at a panel discussion for the Rand Corporation's Politics Aside conference in Santa Monica, California.

"The monetary policy and mistakes that were made beginning with Alan Greenspan and continuing with Ben Bernanke played a critical role in setting us up for this monster crisis," he explained. 

Mr. Roach said President Barack Obama should not have "ignored" the recommendations from the Simpson-Bowles Commission, which Roach says offered a "a formula that can get us out of the quagmire we're in on the fiscal side."

More @ Breitbart

GOP warns of shutdown over filibuster

 

A partisan war is brewing that could bring the government to a screeching halt as early as January — and no, it’s not over the fiscal cliff.

It’s all about the filibuster.

Democrats are threatening to change filibuster rules, in what will surely prompt a furious GOP revolt that could make those rare moments of bipartisan consensus even harder to come by during the next Congress.

Here’s what Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid is considering: banning filibusters used to prevent debate from even starting and House-Senate conference committees from ever meeting. He also may make filibusters become actual filibusters — to force senators to carry out the nonstop, talkathon sessions.

Republicans are threatening even greater retaliation if Reid uses a move rarely used by Senate majorities: changing the chamber’s precedent by 51 votes, rather than the usual 67 votes it takes to overhaul the rules.

“I think the backlash will be severe,” Sen. Tom Coburn (R-Okla.), the conservative firebrand, said sternly. “If you take away minority rights, which is what you’re doing because you’re an ineffective leader, you’ll destroy the place. And if you destroy the place, we’ll do what we have to do to fight back.”

“It will shut down the Senate,” the incoming Senate GOP whip, Texas Sen. John Cornyn, told POLITICO.

“It’s such an abuse of power.”

More @ Politico

NC private collection of Original Russian PU and SVT Sniper Scopes for sale

$299 to $449

Special Forces combat proven instinctive shooting grip

FAB Defense just released this Ergonomic Pointing Grip and companion Versatile Tactical Support. I had the opportunity to take it to the range and try it out.

More @ Double Tapper