Mission statement:

Armed and Safe is a gun rights advocacy blog, with the mission of debunking the "logic" of the enemies of the Constitutionally guaranteed, fundamental human right of the individual to keep and bear arms.

I can be reached at 45superman@gmail.com.You can follow me on Twitter at http://twitter.com/45superman.

Saturday, October 24, 2009

Interesting statement from a BATFE flunky

David Codrea's Gun Rights Examiner column yesterday prompted me to take another look at the Southern Preposterous Lie Center's "The Second Wave: Return of the Militias" report (pdf file). In doing so, I came across a quote I had somehow missed before, that I find kinda interesting (my emphasis added).

“You’re seeing the bubbling [of antigovernment sentiment] right now,” says Bart McEntire, who has infiltrated racist hate groups and now is the supervisory special agent for the U.S. Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives in Roanoke, Va. “You see people buying into what they’re saying. It’s primed to grow. The only thing you don’t have to set it on fire is a Waco or Ruby Ridge.
The eternal optimist in me looks at that and wants to believe that the string-pullers at the Department of "Justice" have read and heeded Mike Vanderboegh's "No more free Wacos" letter to AG Eric Holder, and thus are aware of the danger of "set[ting] it on fire" (a rather unfortunate choice of words in reference to Waco), and will behave with at least a modicum of self-restraint.

My more realistic side wonders, on the other hand, if the federal thugs want to "set it on fire," and thus provoke something akin to the 1995 Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building bombing, and thus guaranteeing a huge boon to agencies like the BATFE, in terms of power and funding. That power and funding would then, the fed thugs might be thinking, be used in the War on Patriots (the SPLC perversely uses the word "patriot" as a pejorative).

As with that bombing, no actual evidence linking Constitutional militias to any new attacks would be necessary. The SPLC report, for example, describes OKC bomber Timothy McVeigh as being "steeped in the ideology of both militias and hate groups." What the report does not mention is that whatever McVeigh was "steeped" in, he was not in a militia.
Yet Dees and Stern build their books around the claim that the militia/patriot movements are unindicted co-conspirators in the Oklahoma City murders. The link between accused bomber Timothy McVeigh and the militia movement is based mainly on two pieces of information: First, he and his friend Terry Nichols attended two Militia of Michigan meetings--which, significantly, they were told to leave because they were advocating violence. Second, allegedly Mark Koernke, a short-wave radio personality who runs a mail-order business that sells militia gear, was seen with someone who looks like McVeigh. In addition, a Michigan talk show host supposedly said (he denies it) that the host's Rolodex listed McVeigh as a contact for Koernke. This evidence does not come remotely close to showing that militia members encouraged McVeigh to do anything illegal, let alone to perpetrate one of the most vicious mass murders in history.
The SPLC, with its talk of McVeigh's supposed militia "steep[ing]," implies a connection between militias and McVeigh, but even they have backed away from openly asserting something as demonstrably false as a claim that McVeigh was a militia member.

Here's the thing, though--as Mike said, there will be "no more free Wacos." The question for the feds won't be how to exploit the backlash from the next Waco or Ruby Ridge--it will be how far they have to run, how deeply they have to bury themselves, to survive that backlash.

Here's a tip, feds: the answer is "farther than you can run, and deeper than you can bury yourselves."

10 comments:

Tangalor said...

How deep? About 6 feet, I reckon.

Newbius said...

After researching the current administration's tactics and their personnel, I think the presumption that they WANT to precipitate something is not all that far-fetched.

I hope we are wrong about this.

(Added you to the blog-roll - I thought you were already there.)

Pax,

Newbius

Kurt '45superman' Hofmann said...

Thanks, Newbius--I've just reciprocated.

M. Simon said...

You don't get it. They will not be fighting militias. They will be fighting Drug Gangs.

Here is a comment I left at:

No More Free Wacos.

Wake up. They are going to use the Drug Gangs against you.

When they do a "drug sweep" should they happen to find an "unauthorized" weapon you will be strung up or summarily shot.

You will not be a Three Percenter. You will be a member of one of those murderous Drug Gangs resisting law enforcement. Ten days later it will be announced on page 13 that no drugs were found. Or perhaps they will bring the Drugs with them and you will have a oz. of pot in your dresser drawer or a couple of grams of smack in your medicine chest. Or maybe meth precursors under your kitchen sink.

I tried to warn you about this decades ago but you weren't listening. Oh. Well.

===

You ladies and gentlemen are the people I want to have covering my six in a fire fight. (side note: I'm a Navy guy and the best I could do would be suppressive fire. My training was in Nuclear Reactors. Not exactly a mobile weapon.)

But I hate to break it to you: strategic tinkers you are not.

There will be no War On Militias. There will be a war on drugs. You will be divided and conquered.

Why? Because you only stood up for the Liberty of the right kind of people. People you could relate to. Not them stinkin hippie pot smokers. Or worse the meth tweakers. Because you were none of them and you bought the government propaganda. Yes. The government that lies to you about everything else has been lying to you about drugs. And you fell for it.

You have been out maneuvered in the mind field. The rest is just a mopping up operation.

The biggest irony is that the "leader" of the opposition was a pot smoking coke snorter in his youth (and may still be for all we know).

Does liberty have its unfortunate features? Well DUH. Tyranny is worse.

I would rather be exposed to the inconveniences attending too much liberty than those attending too small a degree of it. Thomas Jefferson

M. Simon said...

BTW on my sidebar at Power and Control I have a link to a list of Drug War articles I have written. Educate yourselves.

M. Simon said...

And let me touch on another aspect. The violence induced by the War On Drugs has been used as an excuse for a War On Guns.

This has been going on for DECADES and you still fail to connect the dots.

Your very first mistake is in thinking you are smarter than your opposition. Nope. They are running circles around you.

===

The anti-drug crowd has been promising you safety. And you willingly gave up your liberty for it. When they stop your vehicle they will not be looking for guns. They will be looking for drugs.

And you will be cooked. Because you have no practical Fourth Amendment Rights any more when it comes to drugs.

Ironic in a country that was founded (in part) by a smuggler. John Hancock

You can read my thoughts on it at Origins Of The Fourth Amendment

Kurt '45superman' Hofmann said...

You're making a lot of assumptions, M. Simon--among them, your apparent belief that I support the War on (Some) Drugs. This is at the point where, if this were an old Looney Tunes cartoon, I would turn toward the TV audience and say, "He don't know me very well, do he?"

If you think you're among the first ten thousand people to have noticed the nexus between the War on (Some) Drugs, and the War on Guns, you haven't been paying attention--certainly not enough to be taken seriously in your pompous lecturing.

M. Simon said...

My apologies if you thought my rant was directed at you 45.

It is directed at the 2nd Amendment Community in general.

I have been writing on the Drug War on the 'net since Sept of 2004. And you know - as far as I can tell not one of my articles (there are hundreds by now) has ever been picked up by any pro gun blog (other than the one mentioned below) or gun rights organization. In fact I rarely see anything on the Drug War by 2nders. If you have done something leave a link in the comments here or at any of my posts over at Power and Control.

You know who reads my stuff? Hippies. So I try to educate them on other things while I have their attention.

When I was writing for Sierra Times I had a lot more contact with the 2nd community. That was a damn fine blog because they totally got the nexus between the 2nd and the Drug War. They are disappeared from cyberspace now. Pity.

And my article on the 4th was first published in 2001 and got a fair amount of play in the hippie community. IIRC I also published it at Sierra Times.

BTW I gave you a link at A Threepercenter Speaks

Kurt '45superman' Hofmann said...

I was probably a bit overly prickly about what I saw as "pompous lecturing," M. Simon, and for that, I apologize. It's certainly foolish of me to jump all over you for pointing out something with which I fully agree.

I don't think I've really written directly about the drug war--when I bring it up, I do so as an aside to the issue I've chosen for my focus--gun rights.

Anyway, thanks for the link, and sorry, again, for having taken offense needlessly.

M. Simon said...

45,

No problem. You should see me go off when some one lights my fuse.

Any way: we have a long way to go to get ALL our rights back.

And I'm a backer of Oath Keepers and the Three Percenters. When the time comes to head for the hills I can pass as a lefty college professor - if no one examines my docs too closely.

You can see my picture here. They made me do it or they wouldn't publish my stuff. ;-) It is the only place on the 'net you can see me.