FrankRep
05-27-2011, 12:59 PM
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The Chaos in Madison -- Much Is At Stake -- The Big Picture
Arthur R. Thompson, CEO
John Birch Society (http://www.jbs.org/)
Over the past few months, we have been focusing on the well-publicized disruption in Madison. The brouhaha in Wisconsin’s capital city has received enormous attention nationally in the mass media. We have given it prominence because it points to an important juncture in American politics, indeed in the future of our country.
Let me say up front that not all labor unions engage in the type of tactics witnessed in Madison. We have union leaders as members of our Society. They agree with 95 percent of what we have always stood for and disagree on a mere 5 percent. They feel the battle for our country is much too important not to work together to preserve the system.
Having grown up in a family that included union members, I know there are large disagreements within union ranks. We continue to have many members of our Society in the law enforcement, firefighting, and teaching professions who are union members. The majority of the people in these professions are decent and caring. What follows is certainly not directed at them.
Support Your Local Police
For many years, The John Birch Society led an ad hoc effort called Support Your Local Police (http://www.reformed-theology.org/html/issue03/local.htm) (SYLP). Founder Robert Welch knew that the front line against the communists and the violence they would generate in America would be the local police. He also knew that the United States was one of the last countries to have local independent police departments beholden only to the local citizens who hired them and paid their salaries. These police were not controlled by the state legislatures or the federal government.
The United States is one of the last countries, if not the last country, to retain local police rather than a national system. It is an important layer of strength for maintaining liberty.
Locally controlled police may, in some instances, be hampered when it comes to stopping criminal activity because they are local. But by cooperating with other locally controlled police departments, this problem is minimized. What is most important to realize, however, is that it is practically impossible to impose a dictatorship over the people with local independent police departments. They must come under centralized control to make a dictatorship work.
Communists launched a comprehensive program to nationalize local police, and part of implementing their strategy started at the local level itself. They sought control over local police departments while they simultaneously worked to generate excuses for national oversight leading to federalization of all local police departments.
The first major step toward carrying out this plan began with Allan Pinkerton and the subsequent formation of the Secret Service due in large part to his influence in the 1860s. Pinkerton was a Chartist who had to flee Great Britain. The Chartists were British communists. Pinkerton’s use of the Eye of Horus as his symbol and his “We Never Sleep” slogan for the detective agency he eventually formed led to the phrase “private eye” being applied to detectives. However, the process leading to the destruction of local control of police did not move forward with any alacrity after the Civil War; therefore, we will confine our remarks to more modern developments.
Beginning in the 1960s the communists tried to bring local police under the thumb of local communists and other radicals through the imposition of Civilian Police Review Boards. These were to be official boards made up of political appointees who would be placed between the working policemen and their superiors. They would have power to discipline the working policemen in numerous ways. Wherever civilian police review boards were established, police effectiveness and morale suffered.
This campaign was particularly intense in the 1960s and 1970s. With few exceptions, members of The John Birch Society were able to stop this plot in cities where attempts were made to establish these boards.
The campaign always included a smear attack against the police. The term “police brutality” became a media favorite even though aiming it at a policeman doing his
job was almost always a false charge instigated by communists and their far-left allies. When confrontations, demonstrations, and riots were staged, violence initiated by the participants would spark justifiable retaliation by the police. The retaliation, rather than what instigated it, was regularly caught on film and made the police look guilty of excessive violence.
When it wasn’t possible to get the suitably “correct” photos demonstrating police brutality, editors had no problem doctoring something from their files. We are aware of one photograph that was shown in order to denigrate local police four times over a span of three years. In one instance, the caption under the photo in Life magazine stated that the supposed brutality had occurred in a particular city. Later, the same photo was used by Life to depict supposed police brutality in a completely different city. The photo then appeared in numerous other publications.
In another case, a woman demonstrator grabbed a policemen’s baton when he had his back to her and started to hit him with it. The policeman grabbed the baton to defend himself but couldn’t get it out of her hands. During the struggle, the woman fell to the sidewalk on her back still grasping the baton on its handle while the police officer who was standing above her was trying to wrestle it out of her hands. His hands were above hers on the baton. A photo taken at this instant showed the policeman standing over a woman and supposedly beating her with his baton while she was trying to defend herself. Very few noticed that her hands were on the handle portion. I saw the sequence of photos of the entire incident and it was obvious that the photo chosen for
display in the newspapers gave a completely erroneous impression of what had taken place.
Our SYLP campaign educated fellow Americans about these tactics and utilized every tool in our arsenal to do so.
Support Your Local “Whatever”
After several years, our slogan “Support Your Local Police” became very popular. Other bumper stickers started showing up using the same theme, such as “Support Your Local Firefighter” or in support of other local initiatives. A movie starring James Garner entitled Support Your Local Sheriff took its name from the popularity of our effort. Our members had created this atmosphere yet we were vilified as extremists by
some and ineffective by the communists and media. Many others parroted a false picture of our Society.
At the same time, Congress passed a new federal law containing the potential of nationalizing the police. This Omnibus Crime Control and Safe Streets Act of 1968 established the Law Enforcement Assistance Administration (LEAA).
The LEAA never accomplished the goal of those who engineered its passage and it was finally abolished in 1982, both due to our efforts. Some of its activity included imposing regulations over police departments that received any federal funding or grants, and establishing rules and regulations regarding hiring practices. While the overall goal of gaining control over all police didn’t succeed, work went on to establish control of local police through a myriad of obscure agencies such as the Office of Justice Assistance, Research, and Statistics, and the Office of Justice Programs.
By this time because of federal funding, local police departments were becoming accustomed to having the federal agents tell them how to conduct themselves. At the same time, three developments started to weigh in on the future independence of local police: 1) general recruiting proceeded among local citizens who had received less and less education about the Constitution and the American system during their school and college courses and were, therefore, easily made into social reformers instead of good police officers; 2) leftists became more involved in the task of police administration and worked in tandem with leftist mayors to create a revolving system of appointments of police chiefs, especially in the large metropolitan departments; and 3) the rise of the police unions.
Unions were begun more because of a need for the police to protect themselves from corrupt city administrations and politicians than for the reasons most unions are started. There were many instances where we were able to work with the local police unions as part of our overall SYLP program and we were always doing so on friendly terms. Mutual self-interest figured in this relationship.
Over time sad to say, the police unions started to play much of the same role all public employee unions play.
The Enemy of My Enemy Isn’t My Friend
Now we saw some police unions engaged in the mess in Madison. Some police union leaders allied themselves with radical union leaders who focused on such issues as collective bargaining, pay and benefits, and a socialist agenda. They didn’t want to defend the rights of tax-paying Wisconsinites.
The head of the Wisconsin Professional Police Association and the leader of the parallel organization for firefighters signed on to something called the Socialist Alternative, calling for a general strike. Of course, there has to be a guiding force and in this case it is the socialists, not the leaders of the police or firefighters.
This is the first time that we have witnessed police, who are our protectors, aligning themselves with those who would be our oppressors.
If our protectors become part of the coterie that wants to tell us what to do, then we have lost our freedom. And, that is what is happening. If you put it that way to some policemen or firefighters, a few would probably disagree — some vehemently. I know because one of our members who is a firefighter told me in no uncertain terms of his displeasure after reading my thoughts about the chaos in Madison. He even stated that he will do all he can to persuade others to quit our Society.
He is no different than most who feel that their position is so correct that they will turn a blind eye to the harm being done in what they are assured is a righteous cause. They don’t care that their leaders have aligned them with socialists. More often than not, the tactics like those employed in Madison will polarize the opposition
to the point where no solution is possible without a traumatic effect on society as a whole.
The reality is that the police allowed the disruption in Madison. They were ordered to restore peace and they didn’t carry out the order. Had the Tea Party or some other group been responsible for the uproar, I am sure the capitol police would have acted in a far different manner.
By no means were all police and firefighters in Wisconsin involved, or necessarily sympathetic. But there were enough who showed up as a gesture of “solidarity” to give credence to the idea that even the most respected of our public servants were involved in the protests.
If it had not been for the participation in the demonstrations of some units of firefighters and police, public support for the demonstration itself would not have been nearly as high as it was.
There is a fourth aspect to the changes that have taken place within local law enforcement over the past 40 years. While it does not directly affect the independence of local police, it does have an indirect effect in that it misdirects the police away from their natural allies. Here we are referring to the influence of the Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC), the federal government, and certain state governments in pointing to the sources of danger to public safety.
As most of our veteran members know, there has been an ongoing campaign to convince police that terrorism and violent behavior stem only from Islam, drug lords, and conservatives, never from the Left. Seminars for law enforcement personnel and a systematic barrage of bulletins and reports have been issued listing individuals that police have to watch out for: those who invoke the Constitution, veterans, militias, pro-lifers, homeschoolers — even Bible believers!
While we understand that there will always be a bad seed in any movement, the tar-brushing of Constitutionalists, veterans and others as potential terrorists is outrageous. When word got out that such reports were being issued by the Obama administration, the resulting backlash made the Administration back away publicly. This campaign to convince police that conservative groups were their enemy started in earnest under Clinton. SPLC seminars and monthly bulletins sent to police departments outlining every bad example they could run across continued to tarbrush conservatives and patriots. But even this activity now pales in comparison to the training of local police by the Department of Homeland Security. A full report about this would require an entire full-length article, such as this one, all by itself. What Homeland Security is doing is much worse than anything the SPLC has done.
Couple this with leftist mayors and chiefs of police and the waning effect of law enforcement in general, and the problem is quite serious. It appears that we live in an Alice in Wonderland world when anyone considers who and what constitutes the real danger to society. This upside-down situation transcends all elements of police activity.
Playing With Matches
On a recent trip, I was going through security behind a man who doesn’t travel by air very often. I noted him emptying his pockets, including his cigarettes and matches. He turned to the TSA agent and asked if it was all right to take his matches through the screening process. The answer was yes, but he would have to leave his cup of coffee behind!
I don’t know about you, but I would think that the matches would be more dangerous. In fact, I remember my mother telling me not to play with them!
If terrorism is Muslim-generated as claimed, it seems as though our government is providing the opportunity for some of them to perform their deeds by the hiring of so many Muslims in airports, hoping for something to happen. Regular readers are aware of several incidents of hiring Muslims I have reported on in the past. The point I’m making isn’t directed against Muslims. It is that, if the problem is what Homeland Security says it is, then why are they doing what they are doing?
And now that we get a full body scan or suffer through an outrageous groping, I am noticing more TSA agents who appear to enjoy what they are doing and would normally be arrested for public indecency if caught doing the same thing outside the airport. In fact, recently a TSA agent was arrested for posting child pornography online. This makes the recent YouTube of the little girl being groped by TSA even more disconcerting. I must say, however, that the TSA personnel at my home airport are very nice people who are doing their job because they really think they are performing a patriotic duty.
My point is that the entire spectrum of what can be called “policing” is becoming skewed and is leading to control of citizens rather than protecting citizens. This departure from traditional law enforcement toward the problems discussed above gains its impetus from our nation’s capitol. It manifests itself in our local police, the TSA, and on our borders where the federal government is at war with our Border Patrol personnel.
From Demonstrations to Voting
The result of the demonstrations in Madison as well as the support they received as noted above led to much closer results in the statewide spring elections than were registered in the elections of last November. Real or feigned outrage resulting from the chaos swayed many votes and led them toward backing a socialist agenda.
Much of the outrage has been contrived and made into a theatrical event by socialists. They know how their demonstrations appear on television and they act accordingly. They get more and more people to participate and their effort begins to look like a legitimate protest, not just the work of a few well-trained extremists.
In addition, the Left trucked in people from all over the country and presented them as locally concerned citizens rather than the rent-a-mob who are used in major socialist events in numerous cities. At the same time, leftists intimidate those they oppose and, by association, the general public as well, particularly businessmen. Such leftist activities are designed to stifle opposition. They employ the fear factor.
Arranging for a general strike or boycott is not new to America. It has been around for a hundred years. It was also used in Germany where Jewish-owned businesses had the word Juden painted across their fronts and a Storm Trooper was stationed at their entrances. Woe to the German who wanted to enter such a shop to do business. It was direct intimidation of the Jewish and non-Jewish German people.
Let us make the point that intimidation by itself is part of the larger problem of violence. Intimidation doesn’t work if the threat of violence or some loss is not implied.
In Wisconsin, we see the union coalition under the Socialist Alternative has been requiring business owners in some areas to put signs in their windows stating that they support workers’ rights. If they refuse, they will be boycotted.
A few years ago, I went into a place of business that was being subjected to union picketing. When I returned to my car, it had been “keyed,” the process of scratching the paint with a key. The message: I should stay away from any place of business that the union didn’t favor.
It is funny how people will believe they can do things in the name of union bargaining that they would believe is immoral or illegal at any other time.
The only way to overcome the fear associated with intimidation is the education of people so they gain a complete understanding of the situation. This includes: 1) knowing the principles involved; 2) understanding the morality of not only of what is wrong, but how to fix it without resorting to the same tactics as the Left; 3) realizing the consequences of doing nothing and allowing the intimidators to triumph; and 4) organizing good people to work together, reenforcing each other in all of their efforts.
The use of leftist tactics, especially crowded demonstrations, makes many citizens think there is substance to the outrage. Destroying opposition campaign signs, disrupting meetings, and employing other unethical means, usually has a telling effect on the uninformed. They tend to gravitate toward the perpetrators rather than reject them. If they don’t begin supporting the Leftists, they stay home where it is safe — for the moment.
As an aside, it is interesting that the Democrat-dominated Massachusetts House of Representatives did the same thing the Wisconsin Legislature did, but at night, prior to the planned demonstration called for the next day, thereby, dodging the flak. It is not simply a Republican problem as the militants profess.
History tells us that during a period of public disorder, the majority will gravitate to the side of those who can bring order out of chaos. Most will demand that something be done and that something is usually more government. This is similar to students laughing at a fellow student who is being harassed by a bully. One would think they would stop the bully. They don’t because they fear that the bully might target them next.
Consider how the German people were manipulated. In the 1920s and 1930s, civic disorder was almost a daily occurrence. Fights during meetings and violence in the streets were common enough to make people nervous. The disorders were almost always traceable to the communists and/or the Nazis. But once the Nazis had gained more power, the people turned to them to quell the lawlessness. The Nazis were happy to oblige because that was their goal from the beginning.
People want peace and tranquility. They always gravitate toward those who can give it to them and they rarely extend the lines that would show the ultimate result of giving control to the ruthless. Today, we must encourage policemen and firefighters to extend the lines so they can see the result of uniting with socialists.
Citizens of all types will turn to the perpetrators of trouble for solutions unless they understand the principles of freedom and how they are being undermined by the violence. The schools no longer teach such principles. After all, we are witnessing the very people who are supposed to teach these things participating in demonstrations designed to preserve their power base, not make them better teachers. They are even enlisting their students in the process.
We tend to marvel in amazement at the thought of German school teachers in the 1930s becoming nothing more than mouthpieces and organizers for the National Socialist movement. Shouldn’t we be concerned when some American teachers are now acting similarly in promoting international socialism?
Here again, we want to recognize the decent, hardworking teachers who have educating youth most on their minds. However, even many of these teachers are not teaching what needs to be taught in the schools. This is the result of the instruction they received in the education colleges across the country, being forced to use inadequate text books, and being subject to peer pressure where they teach. They are trapped in a system whose students now rank from 9th to 24th when compared to the rest of the world depending on whom you believe.
We have seen good teachers try to make a difference, not only with their students, but within the system. We know of an educator who went to Madison and appeared on FOX News in opposition to what the demonstrators were doing, and when he returned to his school he was so ostracized that he has left the institution. So much for the freedom of speech that is so often touted on campus. Freedom of speech seems to exist only for leftists, and tenure is granted to those who go along to get along.
As we mentioned in our preceding “From the CEO” articles, government officials who want to return sanity to the state and local budgets, must be encouraged to use their posts to tell the people that the issue is no longer just fiscal sanity. The broader concern is whether the people have the right to elect representatives who will enforce fiscal responsibility, or whether the public service unions (government workers) will force their will on the people.
To give you an idea of the enormity of the problem and how it can affect the well-being of all in the future if the people lose their ability to stop the kind of chaos that Wisconsin has endured, be aware that today, about twice as many people are employed in government jobs as are employed in manufacturing. This is a complete reversal of the situation that existed in 1960. We are reaching the point where there will be more votes cast by government workers along with those who depend on government for sustenance via an array of government handouts than those in the private sector.
The point is that government is now crossing the threshold of being the deciding factor in everything. We are facing a very serious situation.
The only recourse we have is to build our own base among the people by organizing them into chapters of The John Birch Society. It has worked time and time again. If we do not out-organize the Left, we cannot win. The recent events in Madison are an indication of what can happen all across the country if we do not recruit enough people into our ranks.
The situation certainly isn't hopeless. Addressing it boils down simply to building the Society and expanding its influence.
The Chaos in Madison -- Much Is At Stake -- The Big Picture
Arthur R. Thompson, CEO
John Birch Society (http://www.jbs.org/)
Over the past few months, we have been focusing on the well-publicized disruption in Madison. The brouhaha in Wisconsin’s capital city has received enormous attention nationally in the mass media. We have given it prominence because it points to an important juncture in American politics, indeed in the future of our country.
Let me say up front that not all labor unions engage in the type of tactics witnessed in Madison. We have union leaders as members of our Society. They agree with 95 percent of what we have always stood for and disagree on a mere 5 percent. They feel the battle for our country is much too important not to work together to preserve the system.
Having grown up in a family that included union members, I know there are large disagreements within union ranks. We continue to have many members of our Society in the law enforcement, firefighting, and teaching professions who are union members. The majority of the people in these professions are decent and caring. What follows is certainly not directed at them.
Support Your Local Police
For many years, The John Birch Society led an ad hoc effort called Support Your Local Police (http://www.reformed-theology.org/html/issue03/local.htm) (SYLP). Founder Robert Welch knew that the front line against the communists and the violence they would generate in America would be the local police. He also knew that the United States was one of the last countries to have local independent police departments beholden only to the local citizens who hired them and paid their salaries. These police were not controlled by the state legislatures or the federal government.
The United States is one of the last countries, if not the last country, to retain local police rather than a national system. It is an important layer of strength for maintaining liberty.
Locally controlled police may, in some instances, be hampered when it comes to stopping criminal activity because they are local. But by cooperating with other locally controlled police departments, this problem is minimized. What is most important to realize, however, is that it is practically impossible to impose a dictatorship over the people with local independent police departments. They must come under centralized control to make a dictatorship work.
Communists launched a comprehensive program to nationalize local police, and part of implementing their strategy started at the local level itself. They sought control over local police departments while they simultaneously worked to generate excuses for national oversight leading to federalization of all local police departments.
The first major step toward carrying out this plan began with Allan Pinkerton and the subsequent formation of the Secret Service due in large part to his influence in the 1860s. Pinkerton was a Chartist who had to flee Great Britain. The Chartists were British communists. Pinkerton’s use of the Eye of Horus as his symbol and his “We Never Sleep” slogan for the detective agency he eventually formed led to the phrase “private eye” being applied to detectives. However, the process leading to the destruction of local control of police did not move forward with any alacrity after the Civil War; therefore, we will confine our remarks to more modern developments.
Beginning in the 1960s the communists tried to bring local police under the thumb of local communists and other radicals through the imposition of Civilian Police Review Boards. These were to be official boards made up of political appointees who would be placed between the working policemen and their superiors. They would have power to discipline the working policemen in numerous ways. Wherever civilian police review boards were established, police effectiveness and morale suffered.
This campaign was particularly intense in the 1960s and 1970s. With few exceptions, members of The John Birch Society were able to stop this plot in cities where attempts were made to establish these boards.
The campaign always included a smear attack against the police. The term “police brutality” became a media favorite even though aiming it at a policeman doing his
job was almost always a false charge instigated by communists and their far-left allies. When confrontations, demonstrations, and riots were staged, violence initiated by the participants would spark justifiable retaliation by the police. The retaliation, rather than what instigated it, was regularly caught on film and made the police look guilty of excessive violence.
When it wasn’t possible to get the suitably “correct” photos demonstrating police brutality, editors had no problem doctoring something from their files. We are aware of one photograph that was shown in order to denigrate local police four times over a span of three years. In one instance, the caption under the photo in Life magazine stated that the supposed brutality had occurred in a particular city. Later, the same photo was used by Life to depict supposed police brutality in a completely different city. The photo then appeared in numerous other publications.
In another case, a woman demonstrator grabbed a policemen’s baton when he had his back to her and started to hit him with it. The policeman grabbed the baton to defend himself but couldn’t get it out of her hands. During the struggle, the woman fell to the sidewalk on her back still grasping the baton on its handle while the police officer who was standing above her was trying to wrestle it out of her hands. His hands were above hers on the baton. A photo taken at this instant showed the policeman standing over a woman and supposedly beating her with his baton while she was trying to defend herself. Very few noticed that her hands were on the handle portion. I saw the sequence of photos of the entire incident and it was obvious that the photo chosen for
display in the newspapers gave a completely erroneous impression of what had taken place.
Our SYLP campaign educated fellow Americans about these tactics and utilized every tool in our arsenal to do so.
Support Your Local “Whatever”
After several years, our slogan “Support Your Local Police” became very popular. Other bumper stickers started showing up using the same theme, such as “Support Your Local Firefighter” or in support of other local initiatives. A movie starring James Garner entitled Support Your Local Sheriff took its name from the popularity of our effort. Our members had created this atmosphere yet we were vilified as extremists by
some and ineffective by the communists and media. Many others parroted a false picture of our Society.
At the same time, Congress passed a new federal law containing the potential of nationalizing the police. This Omnibus Crime Control and Safe Streets Act of 1968 established the Law Enforcement Assistance Administration (LEAA).
The LEAA never accomplished the goal of those who engineered its passage and it was finally abolished in 1982, both due to our efforts. Some of its activity included imposing regulations over police departments that received any federal funding or grants, and establishing rules and regulations regarding hiring practices. While the overall goal of gaining control over all police didn’t succeed, work went on to establish control of local police through a myriad of obscure agencies such as the Office of Justice Assistance, Research, and Statistics, and the Office of Justice Programs.
By this time because of federal funding, local police departments were becoming accustomed to having the federal agents tell them how to conduct themselves. At the same time, three developments started to weigh in on the future independence of local police: 1) general recruiting proceeded among local citizens who had received less and less education about the Constitution and the American system during their school and college courses and were, therefore, easily made into social reformers instead of good police officers; 2) leftists became more involved in the task of police administration and worked in tandem with leftist mayors to create a revolving system of appointments of police chiefs, especially in the large metropolitan departments; and 3) the rise of the police unions.
Unions were begun more because of a need for the police to protect themselves from corrupt city administrations and politicians than for the reasons most unions are started. There were many instances where we were able to work with the local police unions as part of our overall SYLP program and we were always doing so on friendly terms. Mutual self-interest figured in this relationship.
Over time sad to say, the police unions started to play much of the same role all public employee unions play.
The Enemy of My Enemy Isn’t My Friend
Now we saw some police unions engaged in the mess in Madison. Some police union leaders allied themselves with radical union leaders who focused on such issues as collective bargaining, pay and benefits, and a socialist agenda. They didn’t want to defend the rights of tax-paying Wisconsinites.
The head of the Wisconsin Professional Police Association and the leader of the parallel organization for firefighters signed on to something called the Socialist Alternative, calling for a general strike. Of course, there has to be a guiding force and in this case it is the socialists, not the leaders of the police or firefighters.
This is the first time that we have witnessed police, who are our protectors, aligning themselves with those who would be our oppressors.
If our protectors become part of the coterie that wants to tell us what to do, then we have lost our freedom. And, that is what is happening. If you put it that way to some policemen or firefighters, a few would probably disagree — some vehemently. I know because one of our members who is a firefighter told me in no uncertain terms of his displeasure after reading my thoughts about the chaos in Madison. He even stated that he will do all he can to persuade others to quit our Society.
He is no different than most who feel that their position is so correct that they will turn a blind eye to the harm being done in what they are assured is a righteous cause. They don’t care that their leaders have aligned them with socialists. More often than not, the tactics like those employed in Madison will polarize the opposition
to the point where no solution is possible without a traumatic effect on society as a whole.
The reality is that the police allowed the disruption in Madison. They were ordered to restore peace and they didn’t carry out the order. Had the Tea Party or some other group been responsible for the uproar, I am sure the capitol police would have acted in a far different manner.
By no means were all police and firefighters in Wisconsin involved, or necessarily sympathetic. But there were enough who showed up as a gesture of “solidarity” to give credence to the idea that even the most respected of our public servants were involved in the protests.
If it had not been for the participation in the demonstrations of some units of firefighters and police, public support for the demonstration itself would not have been nearly as high as it was.
There is a fourth aspect to the changes that have taken place within local law enforcement over the past 40 years. While it does not directly affect the independence of local police, it does have an indirect effect in that it misdirects the police away from their natural allies. Here we are referring to the influence of the Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC), the federal government, and certain state governments in pointing to the sources of danger to public safety.
As most of our veteran members know, there has been an ongoing campaign to convince police that terrorism and violent behavior stem only from Islam, drug lords, and conservatives, never from the Left. Seminars for law enforcement personnel and a systematic barrage of bulletins and reports have been issued listing individuals that police have to watch out for: those who invoke the Constitution, veterans, militias, pro-lifers, homeschoolers — even Bible believers!
While we understand that there will always be a bad seed in any movement, the tar-brushing of Constitutionalists, veterans and others as potential terrorists is outrageous. When word got out that such reports were being issued by the Obama administration, the resulting backlash made the Administration back away publicly. This campaign to convince police that conservative groups were their enemy started in earnest under Clinton. SPLC seminars and monthly bulletins sent to police departments outlining every bad example they could run across continued to tarbrush conservatives and patriots. But even this activity now pales in comparison to the training of local police by the Department of Homeland Security. A full report about this would require an entire full-length article, such as this one, all by itself. What Homeland Security is doing is much worse than anything the SPLC has done.
Couple this with leftist mayors and chiefs of police and the waning effect of law enforcement in general, and the problem is quite serious. It appears that we live in an Alice in Wonderland world when anyone considers who and what constitutes the real danger to society. This upside-down situation transcends all elements of police activity.
Playing With Matches
On a recent trip, I was going through security behind a man who doesn’t travel by air very often. I noted him emptying his pockets, including his cigarettes and matches. He turned to the TSA agent and asked if it was all right to take his matches through the screening process. The answer was yes, but he would have to leave his cup of coffee behind!
I don’t know about you, but I would think that the matches would be more dangerous. In fact, I remember my mother telling me not to play with them!
If terrorism is Muslim-generated as claimed, it seems as though our government is providing the opportunity for some of them to perform their deeds by the hiring of so many Muslims in airports, hoping for something to happen. Regular readers are aware of several incidents of hiring Muslims I have reported on in the past. The point I’m making isn’t directed against Muslims. It is that, if the problem is what Homeland Security says it is, then why are they doing what they are doing?
And now that we get a full body scan or suffer through an outrageous groping, I am noticing more TSA agents who appear to enjoy what they are doing and would normally be arrested for public indecency if caught doing the same thing outside the airport. In fact, recently a TSA agent was arrested for posting child pornography online. This makes the recent YouTube of the little girl being groped by TSA even more disconcerting. I must say, however, that the TSA personnel at my home airport are very nice people who are doing their job because they really think they are performing a patriotic duty.
My point is that the entire spectrum of what can be called “policing” is becoming skewed and is leading to control of citizens rather than protecting citizens. This departure from traditional law enforcement toward the problems discussed above gains its impetus from our nation’s capitol. It manifests itself in our local police, the TSA, and on our borders where the federal government is at war with our Border Patrol personnel.
From Demonstrations to Voting
The result of the demonstrations in Madison as well as the support they received as noted above led to much closer results in the statewide spring elections than were registered in the elections of last November. Real or feigned outrage resulting from the chaos swayed many votes and led them toward backing a socialist agenda.
Much of the outrage has been contrived and made into a theatrical event by socialists. They know how their demonstrations appear on television and they act accordingly. They get more and more people to participate and their effort begins to look like a legitimate protest, not just the work of a few well-trained extremists.
In addition, the Left trucked in people from all over the country and presented them as locally concerned citizens rather than the rent-a-mob who are used in major socialist events in numerous cities. At the same time, leftists intimidate those they oppose and, by association, the general public as well, particularly businessmen. Such leftist activities are designed to stifle opposition. They employ the fear factor.
Arranging for a general strike or boycott is not new to America. It has been around for a hundred years. It was also used in Germany where Jewish-owned businesses had the word Juden painted across their fronts and a Storm Trooper was stationed at their entrances. Woe to the German who wanted to enter such a shop to do business. It was direct intimidation of the Jewish and non-Jewish German people.
Let us make the point that intimidation by itself is part of the larger problem of violence. Intimidation doesn’t work if the threat of violence or some loss is not implied.
In Wisconsin, we see the union coalition under the Socialist Alternative has been requiring business owners in some areas to put signs in their windows stating that they support workers’ rights. If they refuse, they will be boycotted.
A few years ago, I went into a place of business that was being subjected to union picketing. When I returned to my car, it had been “keyed,” the process of scratching the paint with a key. The message: I should stay away from any place of business that the union didn’t favor.
It is funny how people will believe they can do things in the name of union bargaining that they would believe is immoral or illegal at any other time.
The only way to overcome the fear associated with intimidation is the education of people so they gain a complete understanding of the situation. This includes: 1) knowing the principles involved; 2) understanding the morality of not only of what is wrong, but how to fix it without resorting to the same tactics as the Left; 3) realizing the consequences of doing nothing and allowing the intimidators to triumph; and 4) organizing good people to work together, reenforcing each other in all of their efforts.
The use of leftist tactics, especially crowded demonstrations, makes many citizens think there is substance to the outrage. Destroying opposition campaign signs, disrupting meetings, and employing other unethical means, usually has a telling effect on the uninformed. They tend to gravitate toward the perpetrators rather than reject them. If they don’t begin supporting the Leftists, they stay home where it is safe — for the moment.
As an aside, it is interesting that the Democrat-dominated Massachusetts House of Representatives did the same thing the Wisconsin Legislature did, but at night, prior to the planned demonstration called for the next day, thereby, dodging the flak. It is not simply a Republican problem as the militants profess.
History tells us that during a period of public disorder, the majority will gravitate to the side of those who can bring order out of chaos. Most will demand that something be done and that something is usually more government. This is similar to students laughing at a fellow student who is being harassed by a bully. One would think they would stop the bully. They don’t because they fear that the bully might target them next.
Consider how the German people were manipulated. In the 1920s and 1930s, civic disorder was almost a daily occurrence. Fights during meetings and violence in the streets were common enough to make people nervous. The disorders were almost always traceable to the communists and/or the Nazis. But once the Nazis had gained more power, the people turned to them to quell the lawlessness. The Nazis were happy to oblige because that was their goal from the beginning.
People want peace and tranquility. They always gravitate toward those who can give it to them and they rarely extend the lines that would show the ultimate result of giving control to the ruthless. Today, we must encourage policemen and firefighters to extend the lines so they can see the result of uniting with socialists.
Citizens of all types will turn to the perpetrators of trouble for solutions unless they understand the principles of freedom and how they are being undermined by the violence. The schools no longer teach such principles. After all, we are witnessing the very people who are supposed to teach these things participating in demonstrations designed to preserve their power base, not make them better teachers. They are even enlisting their students in the process.
We tend to marvel in amazement at the thought of German school teachers in the 1930s becoming nothing more than mouthpieces and organizers for the National Socialist movement. Shouldn’t we be concerned when some American teachers are now acting similarly in promoting international socialism?
Here again, we want to recognize the decent, hardworking teachers who have educating youth most on their minds. However, even many of these teachers are not teaching what needs to be taught in the schools. This is the result of the instruction they received in the education colleges across the country, being forced to use inadequate text books, and being subject to peer pressure where they teach. They are trapped in a system whose students now rank from 9th to 24th when compared to the rest of the world depending on whom you believe.
We have seen good teachers try to make a difference, not only with their students, but within the system. We know of an educator who went to Madison and appeared on FOX News in opposition to what the demonstrators were doing, and when he returned to his school he was so ostracized that he has left the institution. So much for the freedom of speech that is so often touted on campus. Freedom of speech seems to exist only for leftists, and tenure is granted to those who go along to get along.
As we mentioned in our preceding “From the CEO” articles, government officials who want to return sanity to the state and local budgets, must be encouraged to use their posts to tell the people that the issue is no longer just fiscal sanity. The broader concern is whether the people have the right to elect representatives who will enforce fiscal responsibility, or whether the public service unions (government workers) will force their will on the people.
To give you an idea of the enormity of the problem and how it can affect the well-being of all in the future if the people lose their ability to stop the kind of chaos that Wisconsin has endured, be aware that today, about twice as many people are employed in government jobs as are employed in manufacturing. This is a complete reversal of the situation that existed in 1960. We are reaching the point where there will be more votes cast by government workers along with those who depend on government for sustenance via an array of government handouts than those in the private sector.
The point is that government is now crossing the threshold of being the deciding factor in everything. We are facing a very serious situation.
The only recourse we have is to build our own base among the people by organizing them into chapters of The John Birch Society. It has worked time and time again. If we do not out-organize the Left, we cannot win. The recent events in Madison are an indication of what can happen all across the country if we do not recruit enough people into our ranks.
The situation certainly isn't hopeless. Addressing it boils down simply to building the Society and expanding its influence.