There are few people in this world who I actually feel humbled by, intellectually, but Billy Beck is one of them.
Without even getting into the links provided, I run across this tidbit:
"I make this point, and cite this single example, in order to illustrate the *scope* of political challenge in America today. Without diminishing (please!) the importance of, or
blood-sweat-&-tears investment in, the civil rights movement, it seems clear to me that it cannot compare to the urgency of the problem which is manifest in the very existence of a "militia movement". I will stand corrected if I am mistaken, but I think that the last time so many people seriously uttered the words "civil war" in America (outside of history class), we actually *fought* one. Today, lots of people on every side do their best not to utter that phrase out loud...and they are less successful as time passes. Many people don't make the pretense of circumspection." [My emphasis]
It is not just a little thing to mention the words "Civil War," or "Revolution," especially when there are
turdball politicians running around drafting anti-First Amenment legislation without any thought (or care) as to its consequences.
He continues with other cogent thoughts, and arrives at the conclusion that I came to, albeit about five years later it seems; that there
will be a time when the gloves come off.
I was at the university studying the arcane aspects of Architecture, with a capital "A", at the time of the referenced rant, and doing a damn fine job of resisting the fawning of BJ Boy Bill by his felating minions, by the droves, in Lawrence. However, I was somewhat insulated at the time by not only the nature of academia, but by the utter lack of contact with the reality of the world around me. For but one example, it was almost 8 hours after the improvised explosive device detonated that I was informed by a classmate that the Murrah Building in Oklahoma City had become the target of domestic terrorism. How is it that someone is not aware of something like that at that day and age (1995)? I was not within a mile of a TV or radio, and was in my studio at the time of the events, and that is all I can say.
During this time, the U.S. was in full bloom, or so I am told. Everything, it seemed, was tinted with the rose colored glasses: the economy was booming, gas was cheap, stock market on a run to the moon, unemployment next to non-existant, inflation low, political ties (supposedly) were strong. This is the
popular view of
the way things were. Supposedly. I am not at all as optomistic about these years, as I was a broke student working three jobs and getting about 3 to 4 hours of sleep a night for 5 of those years during Slick Willy's presidency. Again, more insulation. Nothing could be done about it beyond what I was already doing, which was keeping my nose to the grindstone.
Back to my point.
Billy eventually comes to this frightening thought, from his last link, "Threshold of Outrage":
"How can one determine the moment when reason has failed, and that there is no longer any hope of argument against force?"
Damn. Good. Question.
He continues;
"the depth and breadth of ideological "corruption" is beyond the reach of such
methods with regard to the years, days, and hours of my own life."
" [Those] who do not commit their own intellectual efforts to sorting through it in explicit terms."
"At this point in our history, individuals are responding ever more frequently." - The Hell you say!
Ah, Hell. Here's
the whole thing.
"my
individual resistence would be perfectly futile against the massed force of the government." I disagree here. His point is well taken, and possibly true, but there are points in human events, many even, that were spurned from individual action against what can only be described as an overwhelming foe.
"back a man into a corner with other men -- all proficient in modern weaponry, and all unbending believers in liberty -- make it clear that you mean to destroy them, and a most dangerous type of resistance is born:
a competent one." [My emphasis] - David Codrea, GUNS Magazine, November 2005
Labels: Politics
