Wear Your Best Suit Of Armor & Avoid Punching Walls

Special to The Bold Pursuit ... Commonsense advice from Silence Dogood.

The Rules for Radicals dictate that your are to be targeted, marginalized, attacked, and eliminated as a threat. You will be attacked. Prepare to be called “backwards,” “stupid,” “dangerous,” “uneducated,” or worse. The best thing you can do is wear your best suit of armor: knowledge, faith, and dignity.

With knowledge, you can counterclaim and expose the fraudulent for who they are. Faith will give you strength and guidance to do so effectively. When you have dignity, you have credibility. Are your apathetic neighbors more likely to believe a claim from someone who is diligent, thoughtful in speech, and dignified, or a crazy mad radical screaming lunatic?

In your communications with others, reach out to those receptive. Avoid punching walls. When you happen upon someone closed to your message, you will not convert him or her—at least not overnight. Move on. Spend as little time possible with people who have their minds made up opposite as yours. You would be punching a wall. Walls don't move. Walls always win. It hurts to punch a wall. The longer you stay to punch the wall, the more damage the wall does to your dignity and credibility (the enemy angers you, gaining ammunition). Punching walls in plain dumb. Move on (no pun intended).

Likewise in your communications with others, don't spend a great deal of time reaching out to people who are already as motivated by the same core values as yourself. It is important to build relationships and networks for support. Exchanging ideas and organizing is equally important, however, don't overindulge in “shop talk” or “making fun off the crazy leftists” when that time can better be spend elsewhere. Again, move on (again, no pun intended).

Spend the majority of your valuable time with the apathetic, uninformed, and misinformed. We don't want to confuse these people as being “stupid” or “uneducated.” Think of them as politically inactive, busy people with families and friends who barely have time to take Mom to her doctor appointments and pick the kids up from baseball practice, much less watch six-hour debates on C-Span on Saturday night.

They know only what others tell them or what is slipped by them in 30 second news bits on television. Most don't know who Nancy Pelosi is, nor so they care. That is your job. Your job is to tell them who she is and why they should care. Do this in a helpful manner rather than a confrontational manner. You understand how busy they are. You simply hold a moral obligation to make their lives easier (if they so choose to allow your message) to present facts and allow them to take action on Election Day.

Let Us Always Make Error on The Side of Liberty Over Safety & Convenience

Special to The Bold Pursuit ... a provocative blog contributed by Silence Dogood

"They who can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety, deserve neither liberty nor safety." --Benjamin Franklin

We all know or have heard that quote before. Stop and think about what it really means for a second. Understand that this statement is a one-size fits all approach to liberty and not some cliché to be battered about between partisans and paradigms. Both the political left and right have fought each others' agendas in the name of good Ole Ben's quote and more often than not, both have been right.

The political left has used this statement to defend against the "Patriot" Act's passage after 9/11. They were right. The right has used it in response to the left's attack on gun ownership. They are also right.

Liberty is not a left/right issue. Moreover, anytime we must make a decision regarding Liberty vs. Safety, let's always err on the side of Liberty.

Do you feel safer in the streets knowing that the government has access to private and public surveillance cameras the area to deter against muggings and other violent crime?

Isn't it more efficient now that the government can listen in on phone calls or view the documents of terrorists and take them into custody for further questioning before waiting for the slow process of a legal warrant?

Aren't we all a bit more safer in some of our busier cities knowing that strict gun laws ensure only trained, licensed, law-abiding citizens (and, yeah well, criminals) are the only one's carrying concealed weapons?

Those of us who live in states that allow law enforcement to pull us over because we don't have our seat belt on is a life saver, is it not?

Is it not so quicker to safely fly from place to place now that we can just walk up to a machine and be scanned for weapons? We really don't care that our wives and children are having nude photographs taken of them. Screw privacy; this is safe!

We are so much more safe, and the world is a better place.

Come close. Come really close. Come on in just a little closer. I want to ask you a question:

How safe will you feel when the government criminalizes you?

How wonderful will it be that the surveillance cameras used to protect us from muggers can also be used to identify us personally the next time we peacefully gather to protest the next legislative nightmare in Congress? Some may consider your protest seditious. I suppose the government could collect the video and enter your photo into a government data bank of dissenters for future use (along with your Google searches, bank account info, so on and so on).

Even worse, if two or more of us happen to speak about policy on terrorism (or anything else really involving government policy) in a way in which the Constitutionally untrained ear of some public officer or government sponsored "civilian militant" overhears, we may be considered terrorists by the Patriot Act. Now that we have been defined as terrorists, we are open to unlawful eavesdropping, search, seizure, and arrest.

There's no need to make a big scene arresting you at the event. After all, there are cameras there you know or some other civilian may capture us on tape hassling you regarding your terrorist demeanor. We don't want to look bad on national TV.

We have you on surveillance. We can print or digitally send your photo out in a nanosecond to the proper authorities. There's really no need to set up a "legal" check point and slow traffic down just to find you. We'll just pull you over because it appeared that you didn't have a seat belt on. I'm glad for your safety that we were wrong about the seat belt thing, but we still need to see your license. Wait here for a second so we can make sure everything checks out OK in our computer anyway. It's just procedure--no big deal.

Wouldn't you know, we have a photo matching your ID. Get out of your vehicle, we have to search your car. What is this? Why do you have a pistol? It's registered? You have a permit? Wow, we really need to tighten up on our gun laws around here if people like you can get a gun so easily. I'll have to suggest tighter gun laws to the mayor. By the way, come with us, you are a suspected terrorist.

On the same subject of safety and security, isn't the Arizona legislature doing a great thing to crack down on illegal immigration by allowing the police to stop these criminals and demand on the spot proof of legal citizenship? Let's round 'em up and send 'em packing. Law enforcement against illegals will be so much more efficient and effective now.

Won't it be great that an officer can walk up to us on the street and demand to see our "papers" on grounds that we just might be an illegal immigrant? You left your driver's license at home because you didn't drive? You can't prove you are an American? I'm afraid you are going to be detained while we sort through all of this. By the way, to hell with your Constitutional right to privacy. I don't care if you didn't break any laws. "Papers please!" as they say in Nazi Germany.

This is a dangerous world. It is also becoming a very high tech world making life easier for us while at the same time making certain aspects of law enforcement easier.

I appeal to remind you that despite the danger and the wonderful power of technology, we must be extremely careful. No matter what technological advances are available to us as, we still have an outline of rules we must follow. We still have a 200 year old document that protects our God-given rights to privacy and liberty.

I warn you that once we take the shortcut and allow our Constitution to be usurped by the conveniences of technology--once we transfer our God-given rights to government granted protection--we will remain on a very fast free fall that will guarantee the slavery of mankind to the state.

The same rights guaranteed from God and outlined in the Constitution are to protect us from becoming criminalized by government tyranny. We must remember this first when considering shortcuts to solve society’s problems and tracking criminals.

Let's not politicize or polarize Liberty. Let us always err on the side of liberty over safety and convenience.



http://rogueon.blogspot.com/2010/04/let-us-always-make-error-on-side-of.html

My Observation on The News: Liberal V. Conservative ...

I grew up in a family that reads newspapers and watches the news. Every day, we received a morning and evening newspaper; the “Portland Journal” and “The Oregonian” (now, just “The Oregonian”).

My father awakens at 4:00 each weekday, as he has since I was a child, and spends an hour thoroughly reviewing and then neatly putting the paper back together in its original order. After he left for work, the rest of us took turns at the morning news over our bowls of cereal, but, admittedly, were not as fastidious about reassembling the newspaper. When I moved to California, after ordering electricity, telephone and gas, I subscribed to the “Los Angeles Times” – thus, beginning a new generation of household newspaper subscribers in our family.

A few years ago, I returned to Portland. During my first breakfast at home, I collected the neatly re-organized newspaper and began my daily read. A few pages into the front page section, I realized that I was no longer in liberal L.A., but in a place where conservative viewpoints were virtually verboten and could find scant evidence of balanced, unbiased journalism.

During the 2008 Obama campaign “The Oregonian” became so biased for Obama that I felt the word “advertisement” should appear on every news and Op-Ed page. Eventually, the only section of the “Obama-gonian,” as I now refer to it, I found to be accurate and unprejudiced was the television log.

(A few years ago, the paper’s only conservative commentator left and now there is no respectful disagreement or counterpoint to the often egregious errors or Obama favoritism.)

Obama-gonians and Bias
I’m certain that my hometown paper’s liberal bent is not unique, but decided to verify that observation. What I discovered corroborated my views:

According to the Media Research Center, the American Society of Newspaper Editors found that liberals outnumber conservatives by a four-to-one ratio; newspaper editors admit that 71% of reporters sometimes/often influence coverage and in 2008, 70% of Americans said journalists wanted Barack Obama to win the election.

Even more disturbing:

“Nearly nine out of ten Americans (89%) think reporters “often” or “sometimes” let their own political preferences influence the way they report the news” – Media Research Center

In the April 4, 2010 Sunday edition of “The Oregonian,” I glanced at the Op-Ed section. In the right-hand “Short Takes” column, there were a few gems that are representative of the daily Op-Ed features and letters to the editor:

“Tea parties and militias: When being Republican just isn’t narrow-minded enough.” Randy Bynum, Southwest Portland

“Would it not be a welcoming change if the tea partiers focused their attention on out-of-control federal spending, insufficient taxation [your eyes did not deceive you, this contributor wrote “insufficient taxation”] and needed banking reforms instead of racial hatred, homophobia and acts of violence?” Gene H. McIntyre, Keizer, OR.

FYI, Gene: this is the (generally accepted) tea party movement platform: “fiscal responsibility, lower taxes, less government, states' rights and national security.” Source: Fox News. Yes, Fox News – get over it.

Tempest in a Tea Party
Based on the iconic Boston Tea Party of 1733 when colonists rebelled against an oppressive government and taxation without representation, the Tea Partiers of today are often misrepresented by mainstream media, as noted by Mr. McIntyre, and portrayed as racist, homophobic and violent.

Of course, the media isn’t alone in its dark view of conservative protest: House Speaker Nancy Pelosi said the protestors are like Nazis and a senior aide circulated a document regarding their rallies: “…the tea parties are "not really all about average citizens," the document continues, saying neo-Nazis, militias, secessionists and racists are attending them.”

Obviously, the defamation of the conservative activist isn’t confined to a politically compromised media; it rains down from the highest levels in the Washington bureaucracy. Perhaps Washington liberals are in a panic as they observe the expanding crowds at rallies, the newly-vocal conservative dissenter at Town Hall meetings, the peaceful, but passionate troops at national and local marches. Certainly, there were people who acted inappropriately – one can find fringe elements or bad behavior in any large group. While that’s not an excuse, the truth is these incidents are the exception and not the norm.

Only one major news outlet is consistently friendly and fair to conservative issues: the much maligned by the left, Fox News Channel. Interestingly, Fox News Channel earned its highest ratings ever in the first quarter of 2010.

Fair and Balanced – and Killing the Liberal Competition

Fox News has ruled the cable news genre for years; CNN, formerly the “Most Trusted Name in News,” lost half its audience in the latest cable rankings. “Larry King Live” lost 43% of his audience and other CNN programs also saw a double-digit loss in viewership. MSNBC is in the cable news ratings basement:

Total Day: FNC – 1,105,000 viewers, CNN – 394,000 viewers, MSNBC – 369,000 viewers

Prime Time: FNC – 2,032,000 viewers, CNN – 503,000 viewers, MSNBC –680,000 viewers  (Source: Nielsen, reported by TVByTheNumbers.com)

Granted, the Op-Ed “Short Takes” and Letters to the Editor are not written by the paper’s reporters, but by its readers. The examples quoted in this blog are not unique; the authors’ opinions are seemingly representative of the average Portland reader or at least, these are the letters and comments that The Obama-gonian deems fit to print.

My hometown has a strong liberal bias (a favorite bumper sticker: “Keep Portland Weird”), but is the bias perpetuated and supported by local media or is the media accurately reflecting the political mindset of the community? Since the reportage and reader input tilts far to the left and pollsters confirm that the media leans liberal offers a perplexing paradigm of politics and journalism.

This much is clear: the most conservative-friendly news outlet is the pre-eminent news source in America. Almost all of the national polling companies tell us that the media has a liberal bias and Americans believe they will use that bias to influence their reports. These same pollsters tell us that our current president’s approval ratings are steadily dropping, and faith in our Congressional leaders has faltered.

My liberal neighbors denounce “Faux News Channel” as a wing of the Republican Party and accuse the network of political partiality. However, the polls, as well as the emergence of multitudes of marchers, protestors and tea parties tell a different story.

I guess we’re just not on the same page … yet.



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