01.24.07 – A Compendium of News Articles, Blog Posts, and Commentary on the Ongoing Ed Brown Tax Resistance Siege

I hope this doesn't end up as the fate of Ed Brown

Update on the Brown's Situation
“We visited Ed Brown at his home in Plainfield today. The Feds have not shown up there yet, but a few more supporters dropped by while we were there and a few media outlets. Ed was warm and in good spirits at his house. He was talking on the phone with well-wishers and was entertaining guests. When we talked with him he was resolved to defend his rights even if that meant killing federal agents or his own death. He was also comparing our country with Nazi Germany. Since the Feds do seem to want total control over our lives, I cannot fault his comparison....” (Keene NH Free Press)

Tax Resister Ed Brown in His Own Words
A short article which includes a brief video clip of Mr. Brown explaining himself. (informationliberation)

An Income Tax Bloodbath A-Brewing? “His death would accomplish nothing (except show some people the government's brutality) and would convince nobody of the correctness of his position. If they starve him out instead of storming the place, he will have accomplished absolutely nothing.” (Reason.com blog)

“Show Us the Law and I’ll Pay” Says Tax Resister
Which totally misses the point; Just because it’s legal doesn’t mean it’s right. Law or no law direct confrontation is futile, suicidal and serves the purpose of the state more than it does his own. I wonder why Brown doesn’t see this? (Fox News)

Wife Makes a Deal; Husband Digs In
"While her husband barricaded himself in their Plainfield home for the fourth day in a row, Elaine Brown returned to federal court yesterday, accepted the help of a lawyer and appeared close to reaching a plea deal in her tax evasion case.” (Concord NH Monitor)

Why I Support Ed Brown
“I'll be there, with my sign: "Fed. Bullies, Leave the Browns alone". I'm asking you who also believe the income tax is wrong, or illegal, or however you look at it to be there, too. Being there doesn't mean you have to be in a gun battle with the feds. It just means you are taking a stand with Ed Brown to say "The income tax is wrong" and to tell the feds to leave the Browns alone. Now is the time to take a stand. Our freedom is worth it.” (The Libertarian Enterprise)

Militia man prepares for standoff that, so far, isn't coming
“Ed Brown's supporters prepared for a stand off with the government despite U.S. marshals' continued statements that they have no plans to attack.” No plans they’ll gonna tell us about until they do it, methinks. (An unnamed blog entry)

And if you have any interest in what the mainstream media have to say about this, here is a list of their crapola. Pretty predictable though; (i.e. “what a nut cake” and such.)

01.22.07 – I Guess I Had Better Watch My Mouth After All

I saw this article link on Fark.com and which was no doubt meant to be ironic and funny. Take a gander:

“An elderly man who wrote in a letter to the editor about Saddam Hussein's execution that "they hanged the wrong man" got a visit from Secret Service agents concerned he was threatening President Bush.
The letter by Dan Tilli, 81, was published in Monday's edition of The Express-Times of Easton, Pa. It ended with the line, ‘I still believe they hanged the wrong man’.”

I wrote this piece as a short column for a website a few weeks ago and the editor told me that, while he had no problem with it himself, he just didn’t want to take the risk of having federal goons knocking on his door about it. And so he declined to post it. “Farfetched and chicken”, I thought at the time, but whatever. It’s his site and he can do as he thinks best. But now comes this. I guess he had a point. So WTF do they do this sort of checking up on mere words expressing opinions, which the US government claims is our right after all? To establish FUD in our minds and fear in hearts, that’s why. And because it seems to work too, eh?

Sorry dude, I guess you had it right, and I was wrong. This wouldn’t be the first time, either. My apology is offered.

Technorati Tags: FUD, fear_uncertainty_doubt, censorship, Freedom_of_Speech

01.18.07 – Another Ruby Ridge in the Making Here Folks?

It sure seem that way here in both respect to the foreshadowing for state sponsored violence and ready-made answers to why it always seems to go down this way. This news item caught my eye on the Drudge Report website today.

“A former militia man convicted of tax evasion,” says the story, “prepared for a government siege Friday at his fortress-like home, but U.S. marshals gave no indication they were planning to confront him.” [Emphasis mine]

Ah yes, goes the mainstream media, a much dreaded and no-doubt thoroughly reprehensible oaf of a tax cheat and “ex-militia man” [sic] is holed up in his “fortress-like home” in the Granite State waiting for his own personal Armageddon with the feds after being convicted in absentia of tax evasion. But the slagging doesn’t stop there folks. Look at what the article goes to say about the people that support this man.

“The Browns' case has found support on the Internet from militia members to libertarians and anti-tax groups.” Yikes! Militia members, anti-tax groups and even libertarians are in support of Mr. Brown; A trifecta of subversive evildoers to be sure, eh sheep? [Emphasis mine]

No doubt some day soon, stories such as these will include terms like abolitionist [sic] and freedom-lover [so called] as well, should those terms find any widespread acceptance. And they will be added to the mix for sure, should the rebranding nomenclaturists of the liberty movement make any headway whatsoever in their rebranding efforts in order to circumvent the influence of the mainstream media, pundits and academics, as seems to be the intent.

Chalk up another media coup for the Southern Poverty Law Center, the ADL, and all the other regressive sorts who make it their business to dominate political discourse and language, and hence the perception and interpretation of current events in American political culture. And so, if and when Mr. Brown and his wife get arrested, shot, gassed, burned alive, or whatever sad fate no-doubt awaits their Custer-like “last stand,” it will all be swallowed whole by the ever content and listless grazing sheep that inhabit this nation as their just desserts.

And so it goes.

Technorati Tags:
linguistic_deconstruction , mainstream_media, militia, taxes, tax_resistence, Ruby_Ridge

01.14.07- Pirate Bay Website to Buy its Own Nation-State?

Well now! This is an interesting approach. Buying your own sovereign entity sure doesn’t put you on an equal basis as, say, nuclear-armed England, (AKA the United Kingdom [sic]) in real terms; but it does by the norms of international law. This is kind of an extreme response to PB’s ongoing persecution for audio and movie file sharing, but whatever, eh? It’s their time and money and so I wish ‘em well, and I hope it works out.

Now if they really wanted parity with the bigger and better armed nation-states of Europe they’d find some way to get a nuke. Remember Raven in Neal Stephenson’s novel Snowcrash? Like that. National governments would have to be crazy to try anything then. The media corporations may have a lot of pull with the political types, but what politician would be willing to trade political contributions and the goodwill of the entertainment companies for even the remote possibility of cruise-missiles landing on a major city? Even if they weren’t nuclear. World War II was a long time ago, but I’m sure the Brits remember the V-2 missile attacks against London from those times. Which must be kind of scary to contemplate too; and just so a few music and movie companies can get paid their royalties, eh?

I think that this is the real reason that Iran, North Korea and the rest truly want nukes. Nation-states aren’t created equally in terms of power, but nukes sure go a long way toward evening things out in this regard. The “balance of terror” they called this concept during the cold war years, if I recall correctly.

I hate to say it, but this balance of terror concept may well be the only real to way to check the power of the nation states and protect small enclaves of independent liberty, sad as it makes me to say it. Imagine how the Paris Commune uprising or the War for Southern Independence and other blatant actions of nation-state entity’s to crush and eradicate succession and independence movements would have fared if the rebels had possessed equal defensive capability?

Technorati Tags: Pirate_Bay, filesharing, Snowcrash, digital_rights_management

01.11.07-What is a "Libertarian" to the Mainstream Media?

Usually it means (to them) someone who is a hopelessly unrealistic Utopian in their views about things social and political. To wit, this short outburst from social critic and political writer Barbra Ehrenreich on her blog.

"13. Create a new airline –Libertarian Air– for people who would rather risk being blown up than be treated like potential mass murderers every time they fly." [my emphasis]

See the context here? Only idiots (i.e. those "libertarian types"), don't see and understand that the need for a mini-police state at every airport and border crossing is an unhappy, but absolutely necessary, condition of modern life, however sad this may be.

And so the slagging continues. Just remember; who controls the language controls the culture. Remember that the next time Keith Olberman, John Stewart, Stephen Colbert, Al Franken and the rest of the currently popular and trendy political funnymen rip on Bush and the Republicans. They are all just as ready and willing to slag any "crazy notions" about liberty, economics or politics, that you may have or yearn for, as they are as to trash the current targets of opportunity in the White House.

The mainstream media, including the funnymen previously noted above, have an agenda, and the only reason they are aren't trashing us, right now, is because they think there's no real need to. Not yet, anyhow.

Technorati Tags: politics , mainstream_media, linguistic _deconstruction, libertarian libertarianism

01.05.07 - An Anarchist Meets the Mainstream Media cont’d

I mentioned in a previous post regarding the rebranding of the term “anarchist” to “freedom lover” [sic] and/or “abolitionist” [sic], that I believe that the mainstream press, who act as meme carriers for the politicians, academics and pundits, will easily and quickly slag any new term that denotes anti-statism. I mentioned the “Michigan Militia treatment" in that post, and I promised some further explanation at some future time; and that time is now. So, here goes.

“The militia movement,” says the ADL Law Enforcement Agency Resource Network , a website directed at American law enforcement agencies, “is the youngest of the major right-wing anti-government movements in the United States (the sovereign citizen movement and the tax protest movement are the two others) yet it has seared itself into the American consciousness as virtually no other fringe movement has. The publicity given to militia groups in the wake of the Oklahoma City bombing in 1995, when the militia movement was erroneously linked to that tragedy, made them into a household name. Even comedian David Letterman frequently joked about the militia; in 1999, for instance, his list, ‘Top Ten Signs You're Watching a Bad Disney Movie,’ included ‘It's called 'The Little Right-Wing Militia That Could.’ Indeed, reporters, pundits and politicians alike have used the term so frequently that it is often tossed about carelessly as a synonym for virtually any right-wing extremist group. ‘ ” [emphasis and links mine]

Please note in the cited paragraph (and highlighted) how the use of the derogatory term “right-wing” is applied to any group that is for the sovereignty of individuals, for individual rights, or are opposed to tax injustices, are all lumped together. To wit: if you oppose the continual encroachment on your natural rights as human beings, or are opposed to excessive and unfair taxation, then you too are “right-wing” and de facto allies, if not actual ones, although from the way the rest of the article is written, you might be involved in an actual alliance with them as well. I urge those interested to read the entire article and see for themselves the contextual implications of these associations.

And all this since the Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building bombing in Oklahoma City in 1995, which was attributed to lone-wolf nihilist Timothy McVeigh, who was never shown in a court of law to be affiliated with any group whatever; So why the militia associations in the press and other media then? I could write a whole book on that topic, but suffice it to say that any person or group that puts individual rights ahead of the state’s prerogatives, is suspect to the statist mindset, even to the point of considering such views as evidence of mental instability or illness.

For most of Western history, from the end of the feudal period in Europe and then inAmerica until 1930[1], the militia was considered to be the entire local male population of physically capable men of militarily appropriate age, usually between the ages of 15 to 45. They were loosely organized along paramilitary lines and were often required to keep their own swords and spears and later rifles, in their own homes, and at their own expense. These militias were not deployed in foreign wars (usually) unless invaded, but were instead used for local peacekeeping (at a time when police and private security firms didn’t exist yet), or for local or regional emergency and natural disaster response. [2] These forces were commanded locally and later (in America at least) by local officials. [3]

From the American Heritage Dictionary, (1990 edition)

mi·li·tia (mə-lĭsh'ə)
noun.

1. An army composed of ordinary citizens rather than professional soldiers.
2. A military force that is not part of a regular army and is subject to call for service in an emergency.
3. The whole body of physically fit civilians eligible by law for military service.

And so there it is. But consider this newer entry from Dictionary.com as to the meaning of the term militia.

mi·li·tia (mə-lĭsh'ə)

noun.

1. A body of citizens enrolled for military service, and called out periodically for drill but serving full time only in emergencies.
2. A body of citizen soldiers as distinguished from professional soldiers.
3. All able-bodied males considered by law eligible for military service.
4. A body of citizens organized in a paramilitary group and typically regarding themselves as defenders of individual rights against the presumed interference of the federal government.

[emphasis mine]

Note the additional definition, and thus by inclusion in a dictionary, made authoritative the slagging of the term in modern times. And I have absolutely no doubt that, should any new, rebranded terminology or nomenclature for anarchist, anarchy, and anarchism, catch on in the public mind, this new term, will in time, become a term of disparagement and used as an epithet.

To you folks who disagree: All I can say is that you should give this a try; if it works, I’ll admit I was wrong and join in your efforts. But I’m not holding my water waiting for this to happen though.

Notes
1
Grimes, Gerald. The People’s Army. New London: Yale University Press. 1978. pp. 4-7.
2
Grimes, p.67
3
Grimes, p.68

Technorati Tags: anarchy, anarchist, anarchism, linguistic_deconstruction, militia, mainstream_media

01.02.07 - Saddam Hussein Dies – RIHYB

Saddam Hussein Abd al-Majid al-Tikriti is dead, finally. The hangman has sprung the trap, and Saddam is gone. And as photographic proof from the usual sources has shown, he is well and truly dead. And so I'll offer some final observations on his life and the manner of his death.

1.) Once again all the talking-head “experts” [sic] on MSNBC, CNN, ABC, C-Span, and the BBC are proven wrong. The Sunni communities in Iraq and elsewhere didn't come unglued with rage and grief and run amok with an orgy of rioting or terrorism. No more than usual anyhow. They understand that Saddam provoked the U.S. too many times, started too many wars, and was finally deposed, given a show trial, and executed. This is the norm for Middle Eastern and Iraqi politics you see. The only thing that bothers anyone, other than the most hardcore Saddam loyalists, is that a Shia hangman in the pay of the puppet government pulled the lever to hang him. It's an "honor culture" thing, which I am not gonna go into here and now, but you can look it up. In honor cultures people like to handle things such as this for themselves.

2.) Being the arrogant ego-maniac he was, Saddam wouldn’t just hop on a jet with his wife, sons, and entourage, and fly away into exile, as he was offered the chance to do. Bad move, Mr. President.

3.) Even though it would have brought the roof down on his head from the usual suspects in the American mainstream media, Bush should have been more upfront and supportive of the decision to execute Saddam. Sure, this would have been denounced by Amnesty International and the rest of that ilk, but “victor's justice” is a concept that is widely understood and accepted in the Arab world. And it would have made perfect sense to Iraqis of all denominations and factions. We won, you lost, so you die; and this is especially just in their eyes too, in that Saddam wasn't astute enough to run off into exile; this appeals to their sense of justice on several different levels.

4.) When Saddam went into exile himself for a while in 1959, it was because he had tried to shoot dead the then-current Iraqi dictator, who had himself driven the previous tyrant, King Faisal II, into exile. So Saddam knew the stakes involved here, and chose to stay and fight it out with the U.S. This will be admired by some, but derided as insanely foolish by most. Saddam wasn't a martyr in their eyes (i.e. some who dies defending his country, his family, tribe, or for Islam); he was a fool who didn't know or couldn't see the party was finally over. This, to the Middle Eastern mind, seems very stupid indeed. Nixon bailed out when his position became untenable, as did Gorbachev when the Soviet Union imploded, because that is what smart politicians do. When your time’s up, you leave. Because you will leave, one way or another, like it or not. Saddam was lucky, and even brave in some respects, but not that wise apparently. And so he paid for it.

5.) Middle Eastern leaders leave office as head of state in one of three ways typically; they get assassinated (Sadat in Egypt, Harreri and Gemayal in Lebanon, Rabin in Israel, and King Faisal I in Saudi Arabia), die of natural causes while still in office (Nasser in Egypt, Assad in Syria, Arafat in Palestine), or they flee into exile (the Shah of Iran, King Farouk of Egypt, and King Idris I of Libya). Saddam gambled and picked door number four; and his "prizes," so to speak, were humiliation via a show trial and then death at the end of a rope.

Hmm... Perhaps Saddam’s manner of death will begin a trend. I kind of like the thought of the tyrants in my life, and their numerous enablers, beneficiaries and minions, dancing on air under the local streetlight poles. But this murderous feeling usually passes after a while. Usually...

P.S. – The “RIHYB” acronym in the title means, “Rot in hell, you bastard”.

Technorati Tags: Saddam_Hussein, Saddam_executed, Iraq, capital_punishment, politics, imperialism
Icerocket Tags: Saddam_Hussein, Saddam_Hanging, Iraq, capital_punishment, imperialism, politics

01.01.07- "The Complete Letters of Insurgents" in Podcast

Anarchists being real; what a concept, eh? For once, they speak in their own voices and talk about poverty, jail, repression, internecine squabbling within the movement, the price of cigarettes and groceries, or arguments with their wives; how much they love, and fear for, their kids. I’ve only listened to few of the theses podcasts so far, but if the first few are any indicator, they’re going to be a great listen.

From the moxieO blog.

”After three months of reading aloud to each-other on late nights, Freddy Perlman's Letters of Insurgents has now been recorded in its entirety for Audio Anarchy. The book is a long collection of fictional letters between two eastern European workers who were separated after a failed revolution 20 year prior. It presents anarchist ideas in a way that only a story about relationships could, and the reader is left with a set of questions that are subtle, nuanced, and infinitely complex. While this book explores so much (from Platformism to Situationism, from Hungary '56 to May '68, from Council Communism to Stalinism, from the Watts Riots to Spain '36), it ultimately serves to sketch a line; the line between those who are seeking to realize their own potentialities among others doing the same, and those who are building the crystal palaces which always become barracks.

Reading these 850 pages aloud took us through delirium, laughing fits, and lucid conversations. The 31 hours of recorded audio mean a lot to us, and we will be making merit badges for those who listen to all of it. We hope those who do listen will get as much out of it as we did by recording it.”

Technorati Tags: anarchy, anarchist, anarchism, labor_movement, politics, class_struggle

Icerocket Tag: anarchy, anarchist, anarchism, labor_movement, politics, class_struggle

01.01.07 – I Told You So

We're finally rid of that tyrant permanently!

Some news stories from Baghdad, Iraq and London, England regarding Saddam Hussein’s execution.

Executioners and Saddam Exchange Insults before Hanging
Then they danced a victory jig around the dangling corpse.

Saddam’s Daughter When Told Father was about to Hang while at Beauty Salon, Stayed to Get Nails Buffed
Don’t judge her too harshly here folks. Her dad did, after all, have her husband shot for treason in 1997, so she probably still had issues with him.

Hussein Hung at Prison Where He had Thousands of Enemies Tortured and Killed While in Power
And upon the same gallows, too. This is both ironic and fittingly just, eh?

And of course there is this predictable reaction from the American mainstream media.

Rush to Hang Hussein Was Questioned
Questioned by the American occupation forces, that is. “One participant described the meeting [between the puppet government and the puppet masters] this way: “The Iraqis seemed quite frustrated, saying, ‘Who is going to execute him, anyway, you or us?’ The Americans replied by saying that obviously, it was the Iraqis who would carry out the hanging. So the Iraqis said, ‘This is our problem and we will handle the consequences. If there is any damage done, it is we who will be damaged, not you.’ ” (NY Times) [my emphasis]

What point would a lengthy and drawn out appeals process serve? Is exculpatory evidence or extenuating circumstances regarding Saddam’s crimes likely to emerge that would merit further consideration or delay? These issues being raised by the NYT reporter in the above cited news article are the product of the overly process-oriented American legal system and have no relevance or interest to the Iraqis. But it is very predictable on the America media’s part though. Sheesh.

And finally, why the need to document the hanging so extensively with photographic and video evidence? Again, this is a matter of culture and history. There haven’t been, (until very recently, anyhow) any free and independent new sources in the Middle East. What free and independent media reportage that did exist was all done by exiles based in America and Europe.

The people in Iraq and the rest of the Middle East would never really believe or accept that Saddam was actually dead unless they saw him die with their own eyes, and the evidence for such was brought to them by sources they trust and believe. That is why the need for photo and video evidence, although I don’t rule out a certain degree of morbid curiosity or the desire to witness vicariously the death of this loathsome tyrant who oppressed and slaughtered them for two and half decades. Still not satisfied? Ask your self this: Would you watch a Bush impeachment trial or a Rumsfeld hanging? I would.

Technorati Tags: Saddam_Hussein, capital_punishment, Saddam_Hanging, Iraq, mainstream_media, politics

Icerocket Tags: Saddam_Hussein, Saddam_Hanging, Iraq, capital_punishment