Let’s All Spy On Our Neighbors

In an article I wrote on January 16th, 2013, I said the following, “Back in the early sixties when folk music was the rage, there was a group called the Chad Mitchell Trio that recorded a song called “The John Birch Society.” It was a great song. Some of the lyrics stated:

Oh, we’re the John Birch Society, the John Birch Society

Here to save our country from a communistic plot

Join the John Birch Society holding off the Reds

We’ll use our hand and hearts and if we must we’ll use our heads

Do you want Justice Warren for your Commissar?

Do you want Mrs. Krushchev in there with the DAR?

You cannot trust your neighbor or even next of kin

If mommie is a commie then you gotta turn her in.”

I don’t necessarily agree with the slam on the John Birch Society, but unfortunately what they were singing about back then is happening today.

On January 4th, Newsbusters posted the following:

Wednesday’s edition of the PBS NewsHour featured veteran journalist Judy Woodruff cheering on an obsessive group of “citizen investigators” who have teamed up with the media’s favorite domestic surveillance organization to turn in people who entered the U.S. Capitol building on January 6, 2021: “How citizen investigators are helping the FBI track down Jan. 6 rioters.”

One suspects these unlabeled, left-wing activist “Citizen investigators” would have been condemned as troubling vigilantes by PBS if they were crowdsourcing video for Black Lives Matter rioters and thieves in 2020.

Host Amna Nawaz: The federal investigation into 2021’s January 6 attack on the U.S. Capitol is the largest FBI operation in history. More than 1,200 people have been charged and over 900 convicted so far, and hundreds more charges are expected before the investigation concludes. But it has stretched the bureau’s resources, and it’s often had to rely on the work of a bipartisan group of citizen investigators who came to be known as sedition hunters….

“Sedition hunters.” The tolerant left’s lexicon certainly sounds McCarthyite these days. This is a “public broadcasting” trend. NPR touted the “sedition hunters” last year at this time.

Woodruff interviewed someone who spends her every waking hour playing detective, seemingly determined to put everyone who walked into the Capitol on January 6 in prison. She won’t give her name, or show her face, but she exposes everyone else.

Please follow the link above to read the entire article. It is chilling.

Slouching Toward Banana Republic Status

Evidently in modern-day America when you stand before a judge, it doesn’t matter what you did, it matters which side of the political aisle you favor.

On Sunday, Trending Politics reported:

Two far-left rioters who pleaded guilty to burning down an Atlanta Wendy’s during the Black Lives Matter riots in 2020 have been sentenced to five years of probation by a Fulton County judge.

The Wendy’s was the site of the fatal, officer-involved shooting of Rayshard Brooks on June 12, 2020. Brooks had fallen asleep in the drive thru and attacked the responding Atlanta Police Officer, Garret Rolfe, when he was detained. Brooks was shot and killed after he tried to grab Rolfe’s taser, leading to riots not long after George Floyd’s death in Minneapolis.

Atanta’s BLM chapter, along with other chapters and far-left activists nationwide, called for Rolfe to be charged. He ultimately was charged with murder by then-Fulton County District Attorney Paul Howard, though charges were dropped in 2022 by a special prosecutor.

The article concludes:

On Saturday, 11 Alive reported that two suspects charged with torching the Wendy’s had accepted generous plea deals. Chisom Kingston and Natalie White were each sentenced to five years of probation, court records show.

Both Kingston and White will also be forced to complete 150 hours of community service and pay a $500 fine. A third suspect, John Wade, was indicted for his role in starting the blaze this past January.

According to an analysis from The Guardian, upwards of 99 percent of charges brought against Black Lives Matter rioters in 2020 were dropped by local prosecutors.

Meanwhile, people who did nothing more than walk through the Capitol on January 6th are rotting in Washington, D. C. jail

Contrast

On Wednesday, Red State posted an article about the sentencing of Montez Lee, a Black Lives Matter protester who set fire to a pawn shop after looting it in May 2020. The owner of the pawn shop was trapped in the blaze and died of smoke inhalation, leaving behind five children. Mr. Lee had a long criminal record, but his sentence does not reflect that record.

Red State reports:

Given that Lee had a long criminal history, you would think a harsh sentence would be in order. Instead, the DOJ turned into his biggest advocate. 

Here’s what the government’s sentencing memo to the judge stated.

Mr. Lee credibly states that he was in the streets to protest unlawful police violence against black men, and there is no basis to disbelieve this statement. Mr. Lee, appropriately, acknowledges that he “could have demonstrated in a different way,” but that he was “caught up in the fury of the mob after living as a black man watching his peers suffer at the hands of police.” As anyone watching the news world-wide knows, many other people in Minnesota were similarly caught up. There appear to have been many people in those days looking only to exploit the chaos and disorder in the interest of personal gain or random violence. There appear also to have been many people who felt angry, frustrated, and disenfranchised, and who were attempting, in many cases in an unacceptably reckless and dangerous manner, to give voice to those feelings. Mr. Lee appears to be squarely in this latter category. And even the great American advocate for non-violence and social justice, Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., stated in an interview with CBS’s Mike Wallace in 1966 that “we’ve got to see that a riot is the language of the unheard.”

The article also notes:

On Tuesday, Proud Boys leader Enrique Tarrio was sentenced to 22 years in prison for his role in the unrest on January 6th. Convicted of seditious conspiracy, Tarrio, who was not present at the Capitol, pleaded for leniency but received none. 

How does any of this make sense?

 

Is Anyone Surprised?

The bailout of the Silicon Valley Bank was a little odd–depositors are going to be paid for bank deposits above the $250,000 limit of the The Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC). That’s very interesting when you begin to examine who these large depositors are.

On Saturday, The Washington Free Beacon posted an article revealing who some of the depositors in the Silicon Valley Bank whose money will be paid back are regardless of the supposed limit.

The article reports:

Prominent tech companies, liberal news outlets, and a Democratic politician’s vineyards are among the thousands of businesses that breathed a sigh of relief on Sunday when the Biden administration moved to bail out Silicon Valley Bank.

It’s good to have dishonest friends in high places.

The article continues:

Silicon Valley Bank maintained $209 billion in assets and $175.4 billion in total deposits, making it the 16th-largest bank in the country. It was the second-largest bank to fail in American history when the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation took control of the institution on Friday.

President Joe Biden has insisted that the FDIC’s move was not a bailout, and claimed his administration is working to protect “American workers and small businesses.” But average Americans won’t benefit the most from the bailout. Ninety-three percent of the bank’s depositors kept more than $250,000 in the bank.

While the California bank was famous for its rolodex of tech clients, it happily accepted deposits from all manner of people, including some of the individuals and institutions involved in pushing the Biden administration’s bailout.

Here are some of the companies and individuals involved:

Gavin Newson

BuzzFeed

Vox Media

Black Lives Matter

The Green Energy Racket

The article concludes:

Silicon Valley Bank’s failure could have delivered a seismic blow to the climate change industry and the more than 1,550 technology companies that specialize in solar, hydrogen, and battery storage solutions that held funds at the bank, had Biden not bailed the institution out.

Still, the bank’s failure will have lingering effects for the industry, with insiders warning that Silicon Valley Bank was often the only institution willing to lend funds for their projects.

“Silicon Valley Bank was in many ways a climate bank,” Kiran Bhatraju, the chief executive of the nation’s largest community solar manager, Arcadia, told the New York Times. “When you have the majority of the market banking through one institution, there’s going to be a lot of collateral damage.”

Wedbush Securities technology sector analyst David Ives added that the bank’s failure is a “major blow to early-stage and even late-stage tech startups.”

Please follow the link to read the details. Hard-working Americans are bailing out people who make more money than most of us every dreamed of. President Biden really doesn’t want the rich to ‘pay their fair share.’

Who Controls The Democrat Party?

Who is in control of the Democrat party, and what have they done lately to consolidate that control? The same people who brought you Joe Biden as the 2020 candidate for President have now moved to consolidate their power. One of the main players in that group is Barack Obama. He has essentially shoved Hillary Clinton off the stage and taken over the Democrat party primary process. The Conservative Treehouse posted the background story on Friday.

The article reminds us of what was done in 2020 to prevent Bernie Sanders from becoming the Democrat candidate:

Right before the 2020 SC Primary the DNC Club knew they had a problem with the Bernie Sanders momentum.  An urgent assembly of all party control officers was called. The DNC Club designed a plan around using James Clyburn as the official spark for Joe Biden to take back control of the primary outcome.

Barack Obama the figurative and ideological leader of the movement known as “Black Lives Matter”, and South Carolina Congressman James Clyburn, the figurative and ideological leader of the political construct within the African Methodist Episcopal (AME) church, struck a deal.

Obama and Clyburn really had no choice but to come to an agreement and form the alliance. If they did not act fast, Bernie Sanders was gaining momentum, and they could not have Sanders at the top of the 2020 ticket, because he was too outside the club system which was now almost exclusively focused on racial identity as a tool for political power.

A Bernie Sanders -vs- Donald Trump general election would have been a disaster for both clubs.

To get rid of Sanders, BLM (based in Georgia) and AME (based in South Carolina) aligned. This was the actual moment when Hillary Clinton was cast into the pit of irrelevance in Democrat politics.

Within the agreement, Obama and Clyburn selected Biden as the tool they could easily control to deliver on their larger, progressive, leftist intentions. The only one told not to drop out yet was Elizabeth Warren, as she would be needed as the insurance policy, the splitter against Bernie Sanders.

Within 48 hours all members of the club and candidates had their instructions and proceeded to follow-through on the plan. They had no choice. If they did not comply, they would suffer the consequences of a fully aligned club hierarchy who would target them personally and financially.

The plan worked flawlessly. A few days after their meeting James Clyburn endorsed Biden while Barack Obama began making phone calls telling each of the other candidates to drop out in sequence and support Biden or else the club would destroy them.

The article explains how the Democrats plan to use that strategy in the future:

The DNC is on track to reshape its primary calendar after dissatisfaction with the traditional first state, Iowa, boiled over in 2020. Members of the party’s Rules and Bylaws Committee, charged with recommending a new calendar, gave a near-unanimous vote of approval on Friday for Biden’s proposal, with only minor tweaks to the dates and two ‘no’ votes from Iowa and New Hampshire members.

The revised proposal would see South Carolina host the first 2024 presidential primary on Feb. 3, a Saturday, followed three days later by New Hampshire and Nevada. Georgia would then hold an early primary on Feb. 13, and Michigan would hold its contest on Feb. 27. Iowa would be out of the early lineup altogether.  (read more).

Please follow the link to the article for further details. Don’t be surprised if the Democrats nominate Michelle Obama for President in 2024.

The Role Of The Internal Revenue Service In Elections

On Sunday, The American Thinker posted an article about the role the Internal Revenue Service has played in American elections.

The article notes:

Should the projections of a Republican tsunami at the midterms prove true, there are so many things that a Republican Congress must prioritize. Not the least of which is revising the civil-service laws to permit removing incompetent and corrupt bureaucrats, cutting drastically the federal bureaucracy, and reforming, among other agencies, the CDC, NIH, FBI, and the IRS.

I’m focusing now on the IRS, which first hit my radar screen when with no consequences whatsoever.  Loretta Lynch’s Department of Justice declined to press criminal charges against Lois Lerner, whose outfit delayed and denied the Tea Party reform groups the tax-exempt status to which they were entitled, hamstringing them against the very well-financed (probably including illegal funds from abroad) Obama crowd. 

This time, pay attention to Black Lives Matter, an utterly corrupt outfit whose riots and lootings destroyed so many cities and wreaked havoc on the black communities and their businesses.

The damage continues to this day as the riots fueled the defund police movement, a ridiculous effort that leaves the poor and the black communities particularly vulnerable to violent crime, and as another consequence caused an exodus of needed businesses from those places.

On her own, the mayor of D.C. ordered one street painted in huge letters “Black Lives Matter.” School kids were urged to walk out to support the group, while big corporations sent them money. All told, the group reportedly raised $90 million in 2020.

The article concludes:

While the IRS makes it harder for you to get your refunds, Black Lives Matter is not the only sketchy Democrat-controlled election-rigging outfit whose tax-exempt status the IRS has not looked into. David Horowitz and John Perazzo detail how Mark Zuckerberg funneled $419.5 million to tax-exempt outfits (Center for Election Innovation and Research and the “Safe Elections” Project of the Center for Technology and Civic Life through yet a third tax-exempt outfit, the Silicon Valley Community Foundation.)

The purpose of these grants was obvious — it was to tip the scales for the Democrats in the 2020 election despite the fact that such tax-exempt foundations are “barred from contributing their resources to election campaigns.”

The grants to these two outfits and the ways they used them to tip the election for Biden are well laid out in this article. 

Under the Internal Revenue Code, all section 501(c)(3) organizations are absolutely prohibited from directly or indirectly participating in, or intervening in, any political campaign on behalf of (or in opposition to) any candidate for elective public office. Contributions to political campaign funds or public statements of position (verbal or written) made on behalf of the organization in favor of or in opposition to any candidate for public office clearly violate the prohibition against political campaign activity.

The existence of such a regulation is meaningless, however, if it is not enforced. Consequently, this ban on campaign activities by “charitable” organizations didn’t daunt Facebook billionaire and Democrat Party patron Mark Zuckerberg and his wife when they plotted a massive campaign to swing the 2020 presidential election in favor of the Democrat, Joe Biden.

The Facebook couple donated to two left-wing tax-exempt foundations “with the intention of tipping the result to Biden by launching “get-out-the-vote” campaigns focused on Democrat precincts in battleground states.” And they achieved that purpose.

The authors contend that none of these travesties could have taken place “without the seditious collusion of I.R.S. Commissioner Charles Rettig and his 63,000 agents“ who neglect their duty to protect our tax laws and elections.

I find their argument compelling. On the one hand, they tied the hands of the Tea Party, on the other, they put on blinders to the patent corruption of the BLM and Zuckerberg-funded outfits.

Please follow the link to read the entire article. If we don’t vote the current crooks (in both parties) out of office in November, I fear we will lose our country.

Changing The Rules After The Fact

On Monday, PJ Media reported the following:

On Jan. 6, 2021, a protestor, 40-year-old Brady Knowlton, says that an officer at the Capitol told “You can go in, as long as you don’t break anything.” At 2:35 p.m., Knowlton did, entering through the Upper West Terrace doors. He looked around inside the building, walked through the Rotunda, lobby, and Senate chamber gallery, obeyed the officer’s injunction not to break anything, and left the building at 2:53 p.m. For that, Knowlton now faces twenty years in prison in Old Joe Biden’s vengeful banana republic.

…According to the charges filed against him in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia, Knowlton “did unlawfully and knowingly enter and remain in a restricted building and grounds.” He also “did knowingly, and with intent to impede and disrupt the orderly conduct of Government business and official functions, engage in disorderly and disruptive conduct in and within such proximity to, a restricted building and grounds, that is, any posted, cordoned-off, and otherwise restricted area within the United States Capitol and its grounds, where the Vice President and Vice President-elect were temporarily visiting.” He “willfully and knowingly engaged in disorderly and disruptive conduct within the United States Capitol Grounds. He “willfully and knowingly entered and remained in the gallery of either House of Congress, without authorization to do so.”

If Knowlton’s contention that a police officer said he could go in is true, it vitiates all these charges, and Knowlton’s claim is certainly corroborated by photographic and video evidence of cops at the Capitol opening gates, holding the doors open for protestors, and reports that police even posed for selfies with protestors. Also, when the FBI raided Knowlton’s home, they found no evidence whatsoever “concerning the breach and unlawful entry” of the Capitol, or “of any conspiracy, planning, or preparation,” or “maps or diagrams” of the Capitol, or of any “materials, devices, or tools” that Knowlton might have planned to use to get inside.

The article notes the obvious contrast with the way people with other political views have been treated:

Compare the treatment of Knowlton and the other Jan. 6 scapegoats to the treatment of Quintez Brown, the Black Lives Matter activist who recently shot at Louisville mayoral candidate Craig Greenberg. Journalist Miranda Devine noted that Brown was “portrayed sympathetically by the media and immediately bailed out of jail by his Black Lives Matter comrades, who crowdfunded the $100,000 cost.” Devine added that Brown was “a celebrated gun control advocate, anointed as a rising star by the Obama Foundation, he was an honored guest on Joy Reid’s MSNBC show. He was granted a biweekly opinion column in the Louisville Courier-Journal to spew boilerplate leftist, race-based, anti-cop sentiment.” Brown had, Devine says, “BLM privilege.” Indeed.

This sort of uneven treatment divides America. It is time that we went back to the concept of “equal justice under the law” which was part of the foundation of our government. If the foundation is destroyed, the building falls down.

My How Times Have Changed

On Sunday, Diamond and Silk posted an article contrasting Canada’s Prime Minister Justin Trudeau reaction to the Black Lives Matter protests to his reaction to the truckers’ protest.

The article includes the following image:

The article reports:

Just days ago, the Canadian government announced there will be “a police operation” carried out against the remaining peaceful protesters who support the Freedom Truckers.

“A police operation is expected to take place on Wellington Street and other locations in the downtown core of Ottawa,” according to Speaker Anthony Rota of the Parliamentary Protective Services (PPS).

Keep their promise, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau demonstrated an incredible show of police brutality and systemic discrimination. The Royal Canadian Mounted Police charged the line of remaining mandate freedom protesters, which injured multiple people.

“During the charge, two protesters were trampled by the police horses,” according to reports.

The article includes a clip of the police horses trampling a woman. Initially the police claimed that she had thrown a bicycle at one of the horses. That charge was proven false, but as far as I know, there has been no apology or retraction of that charge.

Public opinion is not on the side of the police, and the recent actions of the police are not helping their cause. It’s time for the police to refuse to remove the protesters and stand up for their own rights in the process.

Exactly Where Did The Money Go?

On Wednesday, The Washington Examiner reported that Black Lives Matter shut down all of its online fundraising streams late Wednesday afternoon. California recently threatened to hold the charity’s leaders personally liable over its lack of financial transparency.

The article reports:

The move comes less than a week after a Washington Examiner investigation found that BLM has had no known leader in charge of its $60 million bankroll since its co-founder resigned in May. California and Washington recently ordered BLM to cease all fundraising activities in their blue states due to the failure of the Black Lives Matter Global Network Foundation, the legal entity that represents the national BLM movement, to report information about its finances in 2020, the year it raised tens of millions amid the racial protests and riots that followed George Floyd’s killing.

…The California Department of Justice told the Washington Examiner on Tuesday that “BLMGNF is prohibited from soliciting donations so long as its status is listed as delinquent.”

Despite the notice, BLM accepted a $1 donation from a Washington Examiner reporter based in California on Wednesday morning.

The California DOJ said Wednesday afternoon that it would not confirm or deny an investigation into BLM so as to “protect its integrity.”

BLM also received notice from the state of Washington on Jan. 5 to “immediately cease” all fundraising activities in the state. Washington warned the charity that it could face fines of $2,000 for each violation, but as recently as Monday, the charity accepted a $1 contribution from a Washington resident.

In April 2021, Townhall reported:

On Thursday, Facebook decided to censor a New York Post article about Black Lives Matter co-founder, Patrisse Cullors, a “trained Marxist” who has come under heavy criticism for the hypocrisy in her buying a $1.4 million home in a largely white neighborhood. The piece in question, by Isabel Vincent, from April 10, reported that “Marxist BLM leader buys $1.4 million home in ritzy LA enclave.”

On January 29, 2021, The New York Post reported:

Black Lives Matter transferred millions to a Canadian charity run by the wife of its co-founder to purchase a sprawling mansion that had once served as the headquarters of the Communist Party, public records show.

M4BJ, a Toronto-based non-profit set up by Janaya Khan and other Canadian activists, snagged the 10,000 square foot historic property for the equivalent of $6.3 million in cash in July 2021, according to Toronto property records viewed by The Post.

Khan is the wife of Patrisse Khan-Cullors, a co-founder of Black Lives Matter Global Foundation Network and a self-avowed Marxist.

It seems as if there might be a number of valid reasons for shutting down the online fundraising streams for Black Lives Matter.

 

Notes On The Kyle Rittenhouse Trial

At some point in the next day or two we will probably get a verdict or a decision on the Kyle Rittenhouse trial. Whatever the verdict or the decision, it will probably be followed by some rioting or violence. Why would there be rioting or violence if the Antifa or Black Lives Matter (BLM) people get the verdict or decision they want? Because it’s not about the verdict or the decision–it’s about chaos, intimidation, and destabilization of society.

There is a drama being played out here, and it will continue to be played out until Americans and the courts put an end to it. The drama includes what is happening in Kenosha and it also includes the recent threatening of the Mayor-elect of New York City by an activist. The activist essentially told the Mayor-elect that if the Mayor-elect chooses to enforce the laws in the city when he takes office, there will be riots. There are those among us who would rather destroy what others have built than successfully build things themselves.

At this point I need to mention that if I were Kyle Rittenhouse’s mother, I would have tied him to the bed to prevent him from going to Kenosha during the riots regardless of how noble his intentions were. However, that is not the question. The fact that he was open carrying a weapon in a riot (legal, but probably not smart) is not the question. Just for the record, of the four people in the incident who were carrying guns, Kyle Rittenhouse was the only person legally entitled to own a gun. The legal question (and the only question that should be asked at this trial) is whether or not Kyle Rittenhouse had the right to defend himself when threatened. During the trial, it was revealed that one of the men shot drew his gun to fire at Kyle Rittenhouse. That evidence alone should be enough for the jury to protect Kyle Rittenhouse’s Second Amendment rights.

So why are we going on day three of jury deliberations? Let’s back up and look at the whole picture. The mainstream media (with no evidence) has portrayed Kyle Rittenhouse as a white supremacist (despite the fact that the three people he shot were white). The media has failed to mention that Kyle Rittenhouse’s father and much of his family lives in Kenosha and that Kyle Rittenhouse when to Kenosha after being asked to help protect private property. Neither of these facts should have any bearing on the verdict, but the omission of these facts is being used to manipulate public opinion. Since the members of the jury have not been sequestered, it is quite likely that they are aware of the media spin and the unrest that spin is fomenting.

Remember, the verdict should be determined by the facts and the law in any case brought before a jury. A verdict should not be influenced by threats of violence against the jury, the judge, or the city. To bow to those threats of violence is mob rule and will only result in future verdicts based on fear of the mob rather than the evidence and law.

A Necessary Move

Last summer, many of us watched as Mark and Patricia McCloskey brandished weapons to protect their home from rioters who had broken down the gate into their neighborhood. Although I would not recommend the McCloskey’s gun safety techniques, after watching the video of the incident, I suspect what they did may have saved their lives. They were responding to threats by a mob. The overzealous St. Louis judicial system charged them with various violations of the law, and the case proceeded.

Today, MRC TV reported the following:

The St. Louis, Missouri couple who became famous for defending their home against an aggressive Black Lives Matter mob have been pardoned by their Governor after picking up misdemeanor charges and some convictions for brandishing guns at the rioters.

Fox News reported on August 3 that Missouri Governor Mike Parson pardoned both Mark and Patricia McCloskey of their misdemeanor convictions after they had pled guilty for “threatening the passersby with an AR-15 rifle and was fined $750.” 

The infamous incident for which they were fined was, of course, was when the couple – feeling threatened by a Black Lives Matter mob which had broken down the gate to their private road – brandished a semi-auto rifle and pistol to keep the mob off of their property. 

The dramatic self-defense situation occurred at the peak of the George Floyd riots in June 2020. 

The article concludes:

Several of the BLM protesters received citations for their actions on that day, but prosecutors deemed that their actions were more peaceful than threatening and didn’t pursue charges. Though that treatment seems a bit lenient, at least compared to how the McCloskeys described the event.

Thankfully Governor Parsons disagreed with the charges and convictions and issued the couple a pardon on July 30. Mr. McCloskey expressed satisfaction at the pardon and slammed his charges and misdemeanor convictions. “It’s a correction of something that should have never happened in the first place,” he told Fox News.

Well thank goodness for the pardon. At the very least we are not at a point in our country’s history where we can’t defend our own private property. Still the left is testing those waters.

Notice that charges were pursued on the McCloskeys, but not on the BLM protesters (who did actually break down a gate — trespassing and destruction of property — to get into the McCloskey’s neighborhood). That tells you all you need to know about the St. Louis judicial system.

There Is Definitely Some Irony In This

Yesterday The New York Post reported that Rhode Island Democrat Senator Sheldon Whitehouse has been given an ultimatum by the Rhode Island Chapter of Black Lives Matter – resign or cut ties with Newport-based Bailey’s Beach Club (an exclusive all-white beach club) — or we will make your life miserable. The ultimatum was given by BLM Rhode Island on WLNE.

The article reports:

“We’ll go to his club, we’ll go to his office, we’ll go to his home — wherever we need to go,” one of the (BLM) chapter’s directors, Mark Fisher, vowed.

“This is an issue that’s not going to go away and Senator Whitehouse needs to address it, he needs to take it on,” Fisher said.

The threat comes more than a month after the state’s junior senator denied being a member of the controversial club, and insisted it was not his place to force family members to quit.

Bailey’s Beach Club also dismissed as “inaccurate and false” the characterization that its private membership was “all-white.”

“Over many years, Club members and their families have included people of many racial, religious, and ethnic backgrounds,” the club told the Providence Journal, saying it included a “diversity of view and background.”

The article concludes:

The activist group is also not buying the senator’s claim that the club was on “the right side of pushing for improvements.”

“It doesn’t matter, you know what type of black people he brings in,” Fisher said.

“This club is a proven racist club with exclusive ties to supremacy and exclusion, and that’s something that’s not gonna be tolerated by me, by my associates, my affiliates or my organization,” he said.

Whitehouse did not respond to requests for comment, the outlet said.

I am reminded of Maxine Waters’ instructions to her audience to get in the faces of Trump supporters and let them know they are not welcome anywhere. This is the same tactic being used against a Democrat. If this illustrates nothing else, it illustrates that bullies can easily turn on their own. If you don’t want to be bullied, don’t participate in the  bullying of anyone else.

 

The Questions That Were Neither Asked Nor Answered

Yesterday Fox News posted an article about comments made by the National Police Association Spokeswoman Betsy Brantner Smith about the Congressional hearings about the events of January 6th.

The article reports:

The National Police Association on Wednesday slammed Congress’ investigation of the Jan. 6 Capitol riot as a politically motivated “dog and pony show” that has no intention of uncovering the truth of what really happened that day.

In an interview with Fox News on Wednesday, association spokeswoman Betsy Brantner Smith, a retired police sergeant who describes herself as a conservative, said Congress should hear from the thousands of police officers who were injured during the George Floyd riots last year.

…”Myself, like millions of Americans, sat there watching the testimony thinking, ‘Wait, where are the police officers who appeared – appeared – to let some of the protesters in?” she asked. “Where is the police officer who shot Ashli Babbitt? In fact, why aren’t we talking about Ashli Babbitt? I mean there’s so much more here.”

Brantner Smith’s comments came the day after four law enforcement officers who responded to the Jan. 6 riot at the Capitol gave testimony to a House select committee about their experience.

Brantner Smith said those officers have been “politicized by Congress,” and that while their stories are important, the American public also deserves to hear the stories of the “more than 2,000” men and women in law enforcement who were injured during last year’s violent protests.

She cited a poll last week by the NPA and Rasmussen Reports that found 66% of likely U.S. voters think Congress should investigate the riots spurred by Floyd’s murder last May.

The article concludes:

“The veracity of the defund the police movement is directly related to crime in that area,” she continued. “We’re not saving Black lives by defunding the police, by reimagining police, by vilifying the police. And that’s what I think is so disingenuous, and I think it’s confusing for people. Because I think a lot of Americans say, of course, black lives matter. I mean, who doesn’t believe that black lives matter? But yet these policies in the name of Black Lives Matter are actually killing more Black people, damaging the lives of Black people than the police ever have.”

“We’re reaching a tipping point and I think yesterday kind of woke some people up — I hope. I hope,” she said.

Show trials are not going to help the ongoing crime problem that has developed in American cities since the ‘defund the police’ movement. Residents of the cities where crime has spiraled out of control need to seriously consider who they will vote for in their next mayoral and city council elections. That decision could be the beginning of a solution to the crime problem.

Who Decided The Polices Involved?

Yesterday Trending Politics posted an article about freshmen Rep. Lauren Boebert of Colorado, who is leading Republican efforts to find out why those involved in the events of January 6th are being treated so differently than those members of Antifa and Black Lives matter who were involved in the riots last summer.

The article reports:

A group of Republican lawmakers led by freshmen Rep. Lauren Boebert of Colorado are demanding that the Biden administration explain the alleged unequal treatment of Black Lives Matter and Antifa protesters, many of whom have never spent a night in jail, and those who have been incarcerated for months following the Jan. 6 Capitol breach.

In a letter, Boebert and 10 other House Republicans asked Attorney General Merrick Garland to address “the apparent inconsistent application of the law with respect to rioters across the country,” according to the Washington Times.

“The foundation of our criminal justice system requires that all defendants are treated equally before the law, but the Biden regime is not living up to this solemn obligation,” said Boebert, in a statement.

The lawmakers say that prosecutors in Oregon have signed off on at least 12 “deferred resolution agreements in federal felony cases” resulting from clashes during last year’s protests in Portland, while some rioters from Jan. 6 are being held in solitary confinement.

“Reports are circulating that the Biden regime has held January 6th rioters in solitary confinement, while at the same time, they are letting BLM rioters that attacked federal buildings off with just a few hours of community service,” Boebert said.

The article concludes with a quote from a letter written by four Senate Republicans led by Sen. Ted Cruz of Texas in June:

“DOJ’s apparent unwillingness to punish individuals who committed crimes during the spring and summer 2020 protests stands in stark contrast to the treatment of the individuals charged in connection with the breach of the U.S. Capitol Building in Washington, D.C.,” said Tuesday’s letter from Boebert and the 10 other House members.

“Whether it is a mob breaking laws in D.C. or a mob in Portland or Minneapolis, the standard of justice should be the same in America,” they added.

The treatment of the people who entered the Capitol Building on January 6th is much more representative of a country ruled by a dictatorship than a free democratic republic.

Why Would Anyone Want To Defund The Police?

On Saturday The Epoch Times posted an article (updated Sunday) about the movement to defund the police. Anyone who looks past the spin understands that defunding and decreasing the police will not make our streets safer. The proponents of the idea claim that it will prevent the murder of black people. However, those black people who live in black neighborhoods do not support the idea of defunding the police. Most residents of black neighborhoods want more police presence in their neighborhoods in order to lower crime rates. So what is going on here?

The article reports:

“Defund the police” has become a popular phrase among leftist activists, gaining momentum during a rash of Black Lives Matter protests and riots last summer following the police-custody death of George Floyd in Minneapolis in May 2020.

As news of these protests spread through the media, local governments across the country quickly started acquiescing to the demand. Cities such as New York and Los Angeles significantly cut funding for their police departments, while Minneapolis City Council went further, introducing a measure to try and outright abolish and replace its police department.

According to former Arizona police officer Brandon Tatum, author of the upcoming book, “Beaten Black and Blue: Being a Black Cop in an America Under Siege,” there is a broader agenda behind the “Defund the Police” movement.

“I believe it’s an agenda to completely destroy and dismantle local police departments so that the government can have control of law enforcement in this country and push a nationwide agenda,” Tatum told Jan Jekielek, host of EpochTV’s “American Thought Leaders” program.

Tatum explained that if law enforcement is federalized and there are unconstitutional mandates or restrictions, such as those involving vaccines or guns, the federal government will be able to enforce those directives more easily.

In most counties in America, the Sheriff (Office of the Sheriff) is the chief law enforcement officer in the county and is only answerable to the voters. He takes an oath to uphold the U.S. Constitution. Your local sheriff is actually the only thing standing between you and the government in terms of gun confiscation and mandatory vaccines. If the police were to be defunded, the local sheriff would not be far behind. All law enforcement would be left to the federal government, and we know how well they do things. That is the ultimate goal of Black Lives Matter and the defund the police movement–the end of states’ rights and the end of many of our Constitutional freedoms.

Transparency Is Needed

Black Lives Matter (BLM) was formed in 2013. The organization’s stated purpose was to fight racism and anti-Black violence, especially police brutality. I would describe those as noble goals.

Interestingly enough, the Britannica article on Black Lives Matter includes the following statement:

The name Black Lives Matter signals condemnation of the unjust killings of Black people by police (Black people are far more likely to be killed by police in the United States than white people) and the demand that society value the lives and humanity of Black people as much as it values the lives and humanity of white people.

Wow. I am surprised that Britannica is that ill-informed. Here is the chart of the actual numbers of police killings by race (from The Washington Post):

Obviously Britannica does not have the right numbers.

Meanwhile, yesterday The New York Post reported the following:

Dissident members of the original 10 Black Lives Matter chapters are demanding more accountability and transparency from the BLM Global Network in the wake of revelations about co-founder Patrisse Cullors’ lavish spending.

Cullors announced she would resign from her post as executive director of the organization in late May, amid controversy over the group’s finances. She’s been in the spotlight for lavish spending on real estate, as revealed by The Post, including a $1.4 million LA home she encircled with a $35,000 electric fence.

BLM10Plus, comprised of the original 10 Black Lives Matter chapters and some of BLM’s newer chapters, repeated calls Friday for the BLM Global Network’s leadership, to open the books about the structure of the sprawling organization.

In a statement Friday, it said the public should know about how many chapters there are, how the various legal entities under the Global Network are related to each other, the salaries of staff members and the founders, deals with contractors and more.

It’s hard to stay on the same page when there is no truth in the foundation of your organization. The actions of Patrisse Cullors call into question her motives for founding the organization. ALL lives matter. Many of the lives lost at the hands of the police in recent years (black, white, and other races) would not have been lost if the victims had not been resisting arrest. Many lives can be saved by teaching our young people to respect the police and follow orders when given by the police. The current campaign of attacking the police and the work that they do will only result in more deaths of people of all races and more division in our country.

The Beginning Of An Awakening?

Many people join organizations hoping that they will fulfill the promise of helping to create a society where opportunities are equal. Sometimes those organizations work toward worthwhile goals, and sometimes those organizations are fronts for goals that are destructive. The title Black Lives Matter is a good one–black lives do matter, just as all lives matter. However, the tenants of the organization do not line up with the title. Unfortunately, there are many black Americans who have not yet realized this, but some black Americans are waking up. The Epoch Times posted an article yesterday about one black American who joined Black Lives matter hoping that they would be involved in activities that would help the black community. Unfortunately, he was wrong.

The article reports:

A Black Lives Matter chapter founder in Minnesota has resigned, claiming that the organization isn’t concerned about helping black communities or helping improve the education quality in Minneapolis, according to a video published last week.

Rashard Turner, the founder of a Black Lives Matter chapter in neighboring St. Paul, said he started the branch in 2015 but became disillusioned roughly a year after becoming “an insider” within the left-wing organization, according to a video released by TakeCharge—a group that rejects various provisions promoted by Black Lives Matter, including critical race theory-linked claims that the United States is inherently racist.

“After a year on the inside, I learned they had little concern for rebuilding black families, and they cared even less about improving the quality of education for students in Minneapolis,” Turner said in the video.

“That was made clear when they publicly denounced charter schools alongside the teachers union. I was an insider in Black Lives Matter. And I learned the ugly truth. The moratorium on charter schools does not support rebuilding the black family. But it does create barriers to a better education for black children. I resigned from Black Lives Matter after a year and a half. But I didn’t quit working to improve black lives and access to a great education.”

Please follow the link to the article to view the video. I hope that many more Americans will  learn what Rashard Turner has learned.

I Don’t Think He Is A Right-Wing Extremists

The Epoch Times posted an article today about John Earle Sullivan, a political activist who reportedly attended Black Lives Matter protests last year. Mr. Sullivan was part of the crowd that entered the Capitol Building on January 6th. The Department of Justice (DOJ) seized $90,000 from Mr. Sullivan for selling footage of Ashli Babbitt being shot during the Jan. 6 Capitol breach. He has also been charged with new weapons charges.

The article reports:

According to the court documents, Sullivan portrayed himself as an independent journalist who was reporting on the chaos, but he actually encouraged other participants to “burn” the building and engage in violence.

Sullivan is accused of having a conversation with others who breached the building and allegedly told them: “We gotta get this [expletive] burned,” according to court documents in his case.

“There are so many people. Let’s go. This [expletive] is ours! [Expletive] yeah,” he allegedly cheered after he and protesters entered the Capitol, the DOJ documents said. “We accomplished this [expletive]. We did this together. [Expletive] yeah! We are all a part of this history,” and “let’s burn this [expletive] down.” The documents accused him of calling on others to burn the Capitol down multiple times.

At one point, he’s also heard saying, “I am ready bro. I’ve been to too many riots. I’ve been in so many riots,” the documents said. “It would be fire if someone had revolutionary music and [expletive],” prosecutors said Sullivan told others on Jan. 6.

…After leaving the Capitol later on Jan. 6, Sullivan was seen, according to prosecutors, telling another individual that he “brought my megaphone to instigate [expletives]” and wanted to “make these Trump supporters [expletive] all this [expletive] up.”

Sullivan recorded a video of the confrontation between rioters and police near the House chamber that included the shooting of Air Force veteran Babbitt and, according to court filings, bragged to a witness that “my footage is worth like a million of dollars, millions of dollars.”

Sullivan sold that footage to several news outlets for a total of $90,000, according to a seizure warrant. The news outlets were redacted from the warrant.

The article concludes:

Black Lives Matter leaders in Utah earlier this year disavowed Sullivan, calling him a “loose cannon.”

And on Jan. 2, just days before the breach, Sullivan’s account wrote: “[Expletive] The System – Time To Burn It All Down. #blm #antifa #burn #[expletive]thesystem #abolishcapitalism #abolishthepolice #acab #[expletive]trump.”

Sullivan’s lawyer had no comment on the case when he was contacted on Sunday.

The man’s lawyer, Steven Kiersh, wrote in court documents that the government should not sieze his money, arguing, “The proceeds of the seized bank account are not the product of criminal activity alleged in the indictment” and that his client was being deprived of the money “in violation of the Due Process Clause of the United States Constitution.”

Mr. Sullivan simply does not appear to be a Trump supporter. The information about him adds to my suspicion that the assault on the Capitol was a ‘false flag’ operation. It may not have actually been a ‘false flag’ operation, but that is the way Democrats in Congress are using it.

Censored Again

I have never actually spent time in Facebook jail. Even the Right Wing Granny group on Facebook where I post has never been blocked. From what I can tell, I and the group have on occasion been shadow-banned, but never actually blocked or put in Facebook jail. Unfortunately, there are legitimate mainstream news sources that cannot make that claim.

On Friday, Dan Bongino reported that Facebook had prevented users from sharing the recent article in The New York Post about the real estate purchases of the head of Black Lives Matter.

The New York Post responded in an editorial:

On Thursday, Facebook decided its users should not be able to share a New York Post article about the property-buying habits of one of the founders of Black Lives Matter.

This is the third time we’ve tangled with social media giants in the past year. In the early days of the COVID-19 pandemic, we published a column that suggested the virus could have leaked from a Chinese virology lab. Facebook’s “fact checkers” decided this was an opinion you weren’t allowed to have and blocked the article. Today, it’s a commonly discussed theory, with officials from former CDC Director Dr. Robert Redfield to CNN’s Sanjay Gupta saying it can’t be discounted. Even the head of the World Health Organization (WHO) has said it can’t be ruled out.

In October, we published a series of articles about a laptop Hunter Biden left at a Delaware repair shop. Twitter suspended our account. You probably know how that ended. Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey admitted to lawmakers months later it was a “total mistake.”

We were right both times. We’re right this time, too.

Please follow both links above to read both articles. Unfortunately, neither the American press or social media is doing a reasonable job of reporting in an unbiased manner or of keeping Americans informed. That is dangerous to our Republic.

 

This IS A True Story

The Black Lives Matter movement has been nominated for the 2021 Nobel Peace Prize.

CNN posted an article about the nomination this morning.

The article reports:

Norwegian MP Petter Eide nominated the global movement “for their struggle against racism and racially motivated violence,” he wrote in his official nomination papers, which were obtained by CNN.

“BLM’s call for systemic change have spread around the world, forcing other countries to grapple with racism within their own societies,” he said.

The Black Lives Matter protest movement, rekindled in the days after an unarmed George Floyd was killed by police in Minneapolis last May, continues to shine a light on what it calls systemic racism and police brutality from America’s small towns to its urban centers.

The article notes the political leanings of MP Eide:

Eide, who has represented the Socialist Left party in parliament since 2017, told CNN he saw in Black Lives Matter a “legacy from both the civil rights movement in America and the anti-apartheid movement in South Africa.”

“The Norwegian Nobel Committee has always recognized a strong connection between racial justice and peace,” Eide said.

Now this makes sense. In case anyone has forgotten, Black Lives Matter was responsible for violence, death, destruction of businesses and a campaign of terror in some cities in America last summer. There was nothing peaceful about what they were doing. If you read their charter, you find out that they do not support the nuclear family (the building block of western civilization).

I believe the online charter for Black Lives Matter has been altered from what it originally was. This is a quote from the original charter:

We disrupt the Western-prescribed nuclear family structure requirement by supporting each other as extended families and “villages” that collectively care for one another, especially our children, to the degree that mothers, parents, and children are comfortable.

We foster a queer‐affirming network. When we gather, we do so with the intention of freeing ourselves from the tight grip of heteronormative thinking, or rather, the belief that all in the world are heterosexual (unless s/he or they disclose otherwise).

Nominating Black Lives Matter for the Nobel Peace Prize is like nominating Jaws for an award for deterring people from swimming at the beach.

 

This May Be The First Step Toward Justice For The McCloskeys

PJ Media is reporting the following today:

A St. Louis judge, citing “improper fundraising emails” has removed Soros-backed Circuit Attorney Kimberly Gardner from a gun case involving two residents who protected their property from Black Lives Matter protesters last summer.

The couple. Mark and Patricia McCloskey, were indicted on one count each of unlawful use of a weapon for pointing guns at protestors on June 28 when a crowd marched down Portland Place, a private street in the Central West End. They were also charged with tampering with physical evidence, a felony.

We can say with a reasonable degree of certainty that Ms. Gardner is not the brightest bulb in the room. Gardner sent out two fundraising emails mentioning the criticisms of her office made by President Donald Trump and Governor Mike Parson, saying they were “fighting for the two who pointed guns at citizens during the Black Lives Matter protests.”

How dumb was that? Circuit Judge Thomas Clark II said she “raised the appearance” that she “initiated a criminal prosecution for political purposes” and promptly disqualified her.

The article notes:

The McCloskeys’ lawyers had filed a motion earlier to have Gardner disqualified because it was painfully obvious she was using the incident to bolster her credentials as a liberal crusader. It should also be noted that nine protesters were charged with trespassing as a result of the incident. The charges were later dropped by Gardner.

So some of the same people who had been rampaging through the city burning and looting trespass on private property and the owner may go to jail for defending himself while the trespassers go free?

As I have previously stated, this saga would have ended very differently had the McCloskeys not decided to defend themselves and their property. Elections have consequences, and St. Louis has paid the price for electing a judge backed by George Soros.

Getting Fired For Doing Your Job

On Friday Guy Benson at Townhall posted an article about the recent firing of the police chief in Portsmouth, Virginia. The police chief was fired for doing her job.

The article reports:

This story out of Virginia is really quite something. If I’m understanding it correctly, it very much appears as though the city’s (Black, female) police chief was placed on administrative leave and then fired as retaliation for her investigation and attempted prosecution of criminal activity related to “Black Lives Matter” protests in the wake of George Floyd’s killing. The only attempt at a justification for the firing I’ve found is that perhaps she was overzealous in the charges she pursued, and even that critique is disputable. There is also “an unspecified conflict of interest” that has not been established or expounded upon. Her real supposed transgression, it would appear, is that she sought to hold prominent people accountable for illegal acts — resulting in punishment for her because said prominent people believe, apparently correctly, that they’re above the law.

The article quotes an NBC report:

The police chief of Portsmouth, Virginia, was fired Monday in what she suggested was a politically motivated move moments before criminal charges were dropped against a prominent state senator and several local Black leaders accused of conspiring to damage a Confederate statue during a protest this year. The latest twist in the case involving state Sen. Louise Lucas, a high-ranking Democrat who is Virginia’s most senior Black legislator, drew praise from members of her own party who condemned the charges. Portsmouth police in August charged Lucas and 18 other plaintiffs, including a school board member and members of the local NAACP chapter and the public defender’s office, with conspiracy to commit a felony and injury to a monument in excess of $1,000.  When Greene, who is Black, later announced the charges, she said Lucas and others “conspired and organized to destroy the monument as well as summon hundreds of people to join in felonious acts.” According to the police version of events in a probable cause summary, Lucas was with a group of people who were shaking cans of spray paint, and she told police that they were going to vandalize the statues “and you can’t stop them … they got a right, go ahead!”  At the Portsmouth protest, demonstrators managed to rip off the heads of some of the city’s Confederate statues while toppling another statue, which police said fell on and critically injured a demonstrator.

Here we see another example of laws that only apply to the ‘little people.’ The person who should be fired (impeached, actually) is the State Senator, who should be charged with inciting violence. The police chief was merely trying to administer justice equally–something many Democrats strongly oppose.

This Could Be Very Interesting

Yesterday The Daily Wire posted an article about a letter recently written to Vice-President Joe Biden and Senator Kamala Harris by BLM co-founder and executive director Patrisse Cullors.

The article reports:

BLM co-founder and executive director Patrisse Cullors said members are “relieved that the Trump era in government is coming to a close,” adding, “As we celebrate his electoral demise, we also know that his political exit does not ensure an end to the intolerable conditions faced by Black people in America.”

On behalf of the BLM Global Network, Cullors wrote:

Without the resounding support of Black people, we would be saddled with a very different electoral outcome. In short, Black people won this election. Alongside Black-led organizations around the nation, Black Lives Matter invested heavily in this election. “Vote and Organize” became our motto, and our electoral justice efforts reached more than 60 million voters. We want something for our vote.

We want to be heard and our agenda to be prioritized. We issue these expectations not just because Black people are the most consistent and reliable voters for Democrats, but also because Black people are truly living in crisis in a nation that was built on our subjugation. Up until this point, the United States has refused to directly reckon with the way it devalues Black people and devastates our lives. This cannot continue. Black people can neither afford to live through the vitriol of a Trump-like Presidency, nor through the indifference of a Democrat-controlled government that refuses to wrestle with its most egregious and damnable shame.

I can guarantee that if Joe Biden ever sits in the White House, listening to the demands of Black Lives Matter will not bring the country together.

The following is from a post at rightwinggranny in September:

Black Lives Matter has recently scrubbed their website. However, on September 8, I wrote an article that included some quotes from a “What We Believe” page that was then on their website. I apologize for not taking a screenshot (it didn’t occur to me that they would take down the page)–I just copied the quotes. That page no longer exists on their website. When you read the following quotes from the page, you might make an educated guess as to why:

We disrupt the Western-prescribed nuclear family structure requirement by supporting each other as extended families and “villages” that collectively care for one another, especially our children, to the degree that mothers, parents, and children are comfortable.

We foster a queer‐affirming network. When we gather, we do so with the intention of freeing ourselves from the tight grip of heteronormative thinking, or rather, the belief that all in the world are heterosexual (unless s/he or they disclose otherwise).

Is this a voice you want creating American policy?

Do You Remember Scholastic Magazine?

It seems like propaganda has become a way of life for American education. I remember fondly when Scholastic Magazine would arrive in the classroom, and we would all read it to find out what was going on in the world at a level we could understand. The magazine still exists, but its purpose seems to have changed drastically.

Yesterday John Hinderaker at Power Line Blog posted an article about the current state of Scholastic Magazine.

The article reports:

This is what our children are being told about President’s Trump’s position on “Racial Justice”:

The long history of unjust treatment of Black people in America is a major focus of this election.

This past spring, in the wake of police killings of Black Americans, huge protests erupted across the country in support of the Black Lives Matter movement. Meanwhile, the coronavirus pandemic has seriously underscored the widespread problem of racial inequality in the United States. Data show that people of color are contracting and dying of the virus at the highest rates, largely because of the wealth gap that exists between white people and people of color. Many Americans of all races are now demanding an end to police violence and other injustices toward Black people in this country.

That’s the preface. This is an issue, according to Scholastic Magazine, on which there is only one possible perspective.

In June, President Trump signed an executive order encouraging police departments to change how they train officers and use force. But overall, he has defended law enforcement…

As well he should!

…opposed protesters’ calls for reforms, and taken an aggressive stance against the largely peaceful demonstrations.

“Largely peaceful,” the Democrats’ weasel phrase.

In July, for instance, he sent federal police to Portland, Oregon, to break up rallies there. Local officials say those officers illegally detained protesters and sparked violence.

This is outrageous. What was happening in Portland was not “rallies.” It was rioting, arson, crime and violence. The idea that the presence of federal officers “sparked violence” is a far-left trope that is totally at odds with the facts. The violence long preceded, and succeeded, any federal involvement.

Many people see the president’s response to the protests as part of a pattern of racism.

“Many people.” The most dishonest trick of the left-wing journalist.

He has repeatedly made racist statements and at times shown support for people who promote white supremacy.

This is a lie. It is intended to poison young minds against the president, his party and his supporters.

Please follow the link to read the rest of the article. It is disturbing. It’s time to take a stand against the garbage our children are being taught in school. Pay attention to School Board elections. Your future could depend on them.

I spent part of my day today handing out campaign literature at the polls. I met a very sweet, but very misled young lady who told me that socialism didn’t deserve the ‘bad rep’ it has. It’s really a good thing. God help us if the people she supports ever get in power.

Mafia-style Tactics

Yesterday The America Thinker posted an article about a recent event in Seattle.

The article reports:

Grocery retailer Trader Joe’s, which refused to cave in to political correctness in its product names, is experiencing new problems with Black Lives Matter protesters in Seattle, according to Breitbart News:

Black Lives Matter protesters pushed their way into a Seattle Trader Joe’s demanding the company give “15 percent at least.” The group has repeated the tactic of harassing the store’s staff and customers over the past few months.

A video tweeted Thursday night shows a large group of BLM activists entering a Seattle Trader Joe’s store. They chanted and beat drums as they marched through the grocery chain location.

Seattle has five Trader Joe’s locations, and Breitbart reports that three of them have been hit in this way.  It shows that Trader Joe’s, which resisted the demands, remains a target, based on Seattle’s failure to send police to protect them.

A Tweet included in the article notes:

This is exactly how mafia works. Either you pay us something – il “pizzo” it’s called in Italian – or we burn down the place at least. This can happen when the State is absent, that’s why defunding the police in crucial in every mafia system.

The article concludes:

BLM is led by “trained Marxists” who just happened to have learned their tactics at Hugo Chávez’s knee.  Here’s a piece I did on their pilgrimages to Caracas, where these kinds of shakedowns are what goes on in that hellhole.  And don’t think the Chavista agenda they embrace isn’t to harm the entire U.S.  Here’s one I wrote from 2019.  Venezuelans, too, have noticed the similarities.

Now their successors in the U.S. are turning Seattle into a hellhole, too, complete with Venezuela-style shakedowns. 

Seattle is getting pretty comparable to Caracas without police to enforce rule of law just on crime and disorder alone, but Trader Joe’s is no battered Venezuelan storefront shop.  It’s a huge national private corporation whose structure protects it from activist shareholders stirring up the pot and agitators calling for woke acts, allowing it to do what it always does which is put the interests of its customers first.  Instead of pay the danegeld, Trader Joe’s is in a position to walk out.

It’s shown backbone in standing up to rioters, and who knows how many shakedowns it has fended off.  But if it gets bad — and recall that Breitbart notes that three stores in Seattle have been targeted — it may well decide that the cost of doing business in Seattle outweighs the benefits and pull out of the city and open up someplace less mafia-like.

By then, the city may become a food desert — self-inflicted, based on the majority’s voting choices.

At some point, we are going to hear people who live in the cities that have refused to deal with the BLM protestors complain that there are no convenient grocery stores or other markets. At that point they will have only themselves to blame–if you keep electing people who refuse to enforce the law, eventually you have no law.