Mexican Drug War Progress?

Mexican Drug War Progress?

A few years ago, the Mexicans coming up here were mostly two groups, the marijuanos and the braceros. One group brought a product which is highly valued by millions of Americans who appreciate the ability to obtain it, freely or not. It is well known to be a product which causes no harm to its users, and leads to peaceful activities. The braceros, the laborers, were willing to come here and to work long and hard for less money than the poorest of Americans are paid. Good and honest workers, they hoped most to someday be able to live here legally, perhaps even as citizens.
The Mexicans we have coming here today are not dealing marijuana, but have switched to methedrine, which by comparison to the danger of marijuana, is like comparing the plague to the sniffles. Instead of groups of willing workers, we now have the Gangs in our prisons creating cadres of committed homicidal death squads, and networks in the cities to conduct predatory crime. These are not starry-eyed peasants who dream of being Americans. They hate America, and Americans, and they are here to prey upon us. To save us from the pot mules and chile pickers, we have let our right-wing Drugwar nazis create them. Like our Muslim problem, today’s Mexican problem is our own Frankenstein.

Here is a link to an indepth article on this subject.

Is It Progress?

Computer games damage kids?

We hear a lot about the damage being done to the minds of children by their super-violent computer games and TV cartoon shows. If such damage is actually possible, then what should be done about a TV channel for adults that glorifies killing alien people with strange cult beliefs, promotes hatred and fear of things they invent to frighten the viewers, considers people who make terms for peace to be weak, and leads viewers to believe that their actions are led by powerful ancient supernatural beings who can take over your mind and make you do bad things, decide who wins the ball game, and make hurricanes happen… FOX NEWS? THE 700 CLUB?

What about FOOTBALL GAMES to make soldiers?

What About The Mexicans?

What About The Mexicans?
The Mexican families here in Albuquerque have been here five hundred years. We are the most Hispanic state, and the most happily multi-cultural, from the Anasazi to the rocket age, and from agriculture to oil. We know the truth is that Mexicans make good Americans, hard-working, community and family minded citizens. The most cruel, tragic, and impractical way possible to deal with the “illegal aliens” problem is by building a “Tortilla Curtain” and looking to shoot the Mexicans you can’t keep out. The better solution is to deal with their “illegal” status by simply giving them papers. Instead of treating them like criminals and insurgent invaders, make them legal. I’m not for giving them the social support that should come only with American citizenship, but I believe making it possible for them to do legitimate work to contribute something to the society is the only thing that will prevent them from doing all that is left for them, and that is to enter the criminal underground. Our present policy is creating a huge, tightly organized, and brutally homicidal Mexican underground who hate America and Americans. Watch Mel Gibson's Apocalypto. These people are not pendejos. Only a little time ago they liked to play ball games with other people’s heads. They are already here, about forty million of them, some illegal, some with citizenship, some with power, some with nothing but their hunger, and their rage. They will be your friends, or your enemies. You choose.
Post “Lancer 17”


Check my video question to Governor Palin a couple of years ago on the border issue.

Birthers

The state of Hawaii, the INS, both houses of Congress, the Democrat Party and begrudgingly the Republican Party also, the Electoral College, the State Department, and even the Bush Supreme Court under which he was elected are all in agreement that the citizenship of Barack Obama is legitimate, and he is in fact, truth, and deed the President Of The United States of America, worthy of all men so to be received, amen.  Nobody, that is, I say again, NOBODY has come up with one piece of substantial evidence to the contrary.   Even so, every stump-shouting Bible-whacking closet-Klan Jingoist who ever made Corporal seems to think he knows better. For a US Army DOCTOR to declare he is so sure of it that he refuses to serve in the uniform he is paid to wear to save the lives of wounded troops is straight-up DERELICTION OF DUTY, and a true shame to every troop who ever bled on his own uniform serving in combat.  He should be stripped of his insignia, denied all benefits, dishonorably discharged immediately, and sent back to whatever torch-lit swamp he came from.

Unconstitutional laws

President Barack Obama is a graduate with honors and Professor of Constitutional Law from what is arguably the most prestigious school of law in the WORLD. The Congress, the Supreme Court, and the entire Justice Department of our government consist principally of educated and highly qualified lawyers, schooled in that fundamental document.  Short of accusing them ALL of a "socialist conspiracy" we might reasonably assume they know what they are doing. Yet we see the ignorant mobs with the torches and pitchforks howling in the streets that they all know better, and therefore are somehow exempt from obeying whatever laws they think are too far “left” of God and Teddy Roosevelt.

Immigrants

If you go back far enough, all of us, even the Indians, are immigrants or the descendants of immigrants.  We are a nation of immigrants, and though I agree we should all learn English for practical reasons, millions over the 234 years of this nation’s existence never have, and still managed to contribute to our collective well-being.  Every generation has had a hated group of immigrants of varying “legality” from the Irish, the Polish, the Italian, Chinese, Vietnamese – even the aboriginal Natives right to be here has been questioned by the arrogant xenophobes. The part of America now being “invaded” by Mexicans was in fact ripped off from Mexico by unprovoked military invasion, and the Mexican families who live in my state have been here five hundred years. We should find a way to legalize their presence, not start another genocidal war against our nearest and formerly-good neighbor.

Pre-emptive “defense

For one Jimmy-Doolittle style mission by a small group of religious-nutcase civilians using borrowed equipment and no weapons, we made aggressive and unprovoked war on two nations who had nothing to do with it, and our Bible-whacking oil-patch Jingoists are now waving their battle flags and demanding we start bombing Iran, Pakistan, Yemen, Syria, and even Venezuela.  Now for importing a popular agricultural produce that competes successfully with the pharmaceutical corporations that own our Congress, and their willingness to work here for less than we pay our poorest citizens, we are hooting and yowling to start shooting Mexicans. For all our patriotic call for liberty and alleged love of Jesus, we have become the most aggressive and destructive national assholes on the face of the Earth, prepared to nuke us all back to the stone age to prove it.

Female circumcision

I agree that female circumcision is an abomination, but I feel that way about many of the so-called “sacraments” of many religions.  Much as I hate it, I must agree that our Constitution’s First Amendment guarantees the right to the practices of all religions, not just whichever brand of the Jesus idolatry you are buying into. To permit Jews and Christians to circumcise their males, but insist other religions may not perform their own versions of such savage “rites” is, I believe, clearly unconstitutional.  (Though neither Christian nor Jewish, my son and I are both “chop-cocks.”) As with the anti-abortionists who claim the right to “protect” the unborn of others, there is nothing in that Constitution which makes those children the property of anyone but their parents, such that they should be protected by denying those parents the right to do as their version of God declares they should.  However you may feel about the spiritual righteousness of anything, the Constitution does not give you the right to make your “faith” a badge to impose your feelings upon others at the point of a law-enforcement officer’s gun.

Elena Kagan Nomination

President Barack Obama nominated Solicitor General Elena Kagan to the Supreme Court.

What Do You Think?

A.R.M. Blueprint

TO A. R. M. ‘s AMERICA
(blueprint for a second American Revolution)
by W. R. Taylor

FOREWORD

Any thinking citizen and taxpayer of this great republic must realize by now that our social and political structures have gone terribly awry. Equally obvious is the fact that, if nothing is done to set things right, America, as we have known it, may not last another century.

The principal cause of this degeneration and disintegration has been the ever expanding encroachment of the Federal government into the conduct of our private lives. An encroachment far beyond anything conceived of by the Founding Fathers, or even defined by the Constitution.

The two main instruments of that encroachment have been the Congress and the Supreme Court. The Congress, by its usurpation of State and local community sovereignties, with an ever growing number of mandates, few of which are supported by the provisions of the Constitution. The Supreme Court, by generally acquiescing to such mandates from Congress, thus making them almost irreversible.

Since the Court is immune from popular or political pressure (short of surrounding its grandiose building and burning it down around its ears), the only avenue of leverage left to the people is the Congress itself. Thus, for the ordinary citizen and taxpayer, the only way to recapture the governance of our country, to reform the way things are done, is to focus our collective wills on the Congress, and specifically, on the House of Representatives.

If the people can regain control of the House, they will then be able to revise, repeal, and otherwise change that which is onerous or usurping of their rights under the Constitution. If they can accomplish that, they will have then successfully waged a second American Revolution, by the ballot, rather than by the bullet. A revolution that will seek to return the Congress to a more temperate legislative role, and the Court, to the original arbitrating and refereeing role envisaged for it.

What follows is a blueprint for such a revolution.

THE STRATEGIC OUTLINE:

The key to success in such an effort is to focus voters’ attention entirely on the House of Representatives. Who gets a four year leasehold on the White House, is largely irrelevant. As for the Senate, it’s too filled with entrenched interests to be attacked head on at this time. So, the main reason for focusing on the House first is because, there, members of Congress are subject to direct popular pressure every two years. Of greater importance, a Congressional District only involves a relatively small number of people, readily lending itself to a grassroots, low tech, and low cost approach in each district.

For all practical purposes voters have little or no say about who is chosen to be a Presidential candidate. Our two party system has made that a prerogative of the two major parties. For the average taxpayer, that usually just boils down to having to make a choice between Tweedledee and Tweedledum. Consequently there can be little reform achieved at that level. That’s just the way things are. As for the Senate, because it has become such an exclusive club of mainly large vested interests, and because Senators hold office for six years, there’s little popular leverage to be had there at this time.

But with the House, however, the ordinary citizens still have a strong amount of leverage, so that is where their attention should be directed and focused. Only when the voters have gained greater control of the House, will it be possible to force both the Senate and the Presidency to pay attention, modify, or change, how business is done.

And to achieve such a result it is thus necessary to create a political mechanism fully independent of the two major parties. A mechanism which is local, cellular in concept, and unconventional from the usual political structure. That is, a political mechanism which is composed of autonomous “Chapters” in each and every congressional district of every state.

However, while promoting and supporting an overall common agenda, each Chapter will focus on issues of local concern. But the main function of such chapters will be to provide a means by which ordinary citizens can become “independent” members of Congress, to serve as “Citizen Legislators” performing civic duty for a finite period (much like jury duty), rather than serving for purposes of long term career.

And from that, systematically, district, by district, voters can then work to replace incumbents who, from their voting records, have shown they are more concerned with being re-elected than doing what is right and in the best interests of their constituents.

We might call the mechanism for accomplishing this --A. R. M. – the American Reform Movement. Simply put, voters in each and every congressional district can form a local chapter without the need for a “national” organization. Nevertheless, within each state, such chapters might participate in a statewide congregational type association, where each individual chapter is on par with the others. And where, at an annual convocation, they will be the means for developing a broad consensus on issues of concern to all. In this way a more or less universal ARM voting platform will be available in any election year.

Such a system should motivate the broad central mesa of the electorate to mobilize itself into an activist RADICAL CENTER. One which will no longer remain quiescent or docile, but rather, one which can more effectively challenge the extreme LEFT and RIGHT wings currently dominating the two major parties.

It’s in that broad centrist portion of the electorate where our true American values lie. Most voters are neither fully “conservative”, nor absolutely “liberal”, but a mixture of both. That is, they’re generally “conservative” on matters of taxation and spending, and government intrusion into our personal affairs. Whereas they are somewhat more “liberal” in matters related to social issues. The major parties have gone off the track by failing to properly address themselves to that kind of mix. That’s why there’s such a current of voter dissatisfaction today.

Thus, by creating such a RADICAL CENTER mechanism, that dissatisfaction can be channeled into an effective and politically useful form. One which can then rein in whatever extremes of public policy promoted at any given moment by the major parties. In a sense it can become the ultimate means of “check and balance.”

GOALS:

To elect a sufficient number of independent Representatives to the House, not bound to either of the major political parties. To that end, the minimum target is to elect at least one (1) from each state, or approximately 10% of the total number of members of the House. With such an independent bloc, or caucus, ARM will then have the leverage for or against any proposed legislation, as the BALANCE OF VOTES in the House, thereby placing it in a very strong bargaining position to promote ARM agendas

OBJECTIVES:

1. Organize and set up an ARM Chapter in each and every congressional district.
2. While committed to a common platform, each Chapter will be an autonomous entity, free to promote issues of interest to its own locality.
3. To minimize the need for dues or contributions, Chapters will be operated by the volunteer services of its members (similar to the 40+Plus organization).
4. The only qualification for membership will be the requirement to be a registered voter in that district. Disaffected Republicans and Democrats will be encouraged to switch affiliation, and re-register as Independents.
5. Once organized, each Chapter will focus its efforts on informing and educating local voters in its district on issues of concern, seeking to create a consensus voting bloc on such issues. 

WAYS AND MEANS:
 
The main group of individuals who have a sufficiently strong and shared experience, are Veterans. And because of that shared experience and the bond that instinctively creates among them, Veterans are the logical choice to be the initiators of such a reform movement. Furthermore, given that there are millions of Veterans, from all eras, any given congressional district should be able to collect a large enough group of them to get things started. The key to success, however, will be to welcome any and all registered voters of a district, regardless of their current political affiliation.

Once such an organization makes itself known in a district, it will attract other voters. Some out of curiosity. Others, who may be looking for an alternative political home. And still others, who are dissatisfied with the status quo, and wanting to effect real change. Ultimately, many of these will cross over to become full-fledged independent ARM members. In this way ARM will be the key channel for a so-called THIRD PARTY presence on the political landscape of America.

While acting as the “primer” for such a movement, veterans can also give it the benefit of knowing how to organize and operate in small disciplined groups. But the guiding model for this early stage of mobilization should be taken from the Revolutionary War period’s COMMITTEES OF CORRESPONDENCE, which were the grass root underpinnings of our War of Independence. And thanks to today’s technology with things like email, fax, internet hosting, websites, online services, desktop publishing, etc., it should be relatively easy and inexpensive to organize, prepare, and propagate, a common and focused viewpoint for reforming political action throughout the country.

And the key for success here is to focus only on those who are the REGISTERED VOTERS of any district, since these are THE ONLY ONES WHO COUNT. No one else does. Furthermore, of those registered voters, only those who actually vote are worthy of effort and attention. So, only a relatively small number of people in each district need to be contacted. Much of that can be done by phone, direct mail, personal contact, and, by invitation to a series of town hall type meetings. These can be conducted both with e-net chat forums, and live scheduled gatherings at specific places. Such a low tech grass root approach does not require expensive media ads, pricey political consultants, image shapers, pollsters, or similar techniques. Why waste time, energy, or money, on people who either don’t register, or don’t vote?

For lack of a better term this approach might be called the TERMITE approach, because, like termites, it can quietly, systematically, undermine the existing constituency of any incumbent “career” politician, until an ARM Chapter is ready to replace him/her with its own selected CITIZEN LEGISLATOR. Someone who will be there to serve only for a finite period of terms, not for purposes of “career”, as a public duty, analogous to jury duty.

SELECTING ARM CANDIDATES FOR OFFICE:

The Constitution gives no specific instruction on HOW candidates for Congress are to be selected. It only provides for having one (1) Representative per so many thousand population. Accordingly, ARM chapters can adopt whatever means they want to select candidates for office. The following method is recommended because it minimizes the potential for faction or partisan politicking, and, provides all ARM members with equal opportunities to become candidates for Congress. That, will be a strong motivating factor to become an active member in Chapter work:

1. Five (5) members’ names will be drawn by lot from the Chapter roster. These will be the preliminary “slate” of candidates. Anyone selected who declines the honor, will be replaced by a replacement draw.
2. With a series of town hall meetings, nominees will be scrutinized as to their general background, personal capacity, viewpoints on issues of concern, and their ability to debate about these. This kind of one-on-one exchange will enable their peers to better know who they’re selecting to represent them. The present system doesn’t do that. Nor does it encourage it.
3. Once the slate is accomplished, a PRIMARY election will be held within the Chapter, and the most acceptable candidate chosen to run in the next Congressional election. The name with the most votes, becomes the Chapter’s candidate for Congress.
4. The name of that person will then be filed as an INDEPENDENT candidate for that congressional seat, and the chapter will conduct a district wide campaign on behalf of that individual. Where local electoral rules do not facilitate filing as an
   INDEPENDENT candidate, the Chapter will promote a WRITE-IN VOTE instead.

The very fact that there are such independent candidates, all over the country, free of major party affiliation, or other political obligations, with strong local grass root organizations behind them, will make it very difficult for any incumbents to ignore these ARM candidates. Thus, the odds of defeating such incumbents are quite good. And if ARM achieves its goal of getting at least one INDEPENDENT elected from each of the 50 states, it will have achieved its bloc/caucus objective.

But even if it only manages to get a few of its candidates at any one time, their very presence in Congress will give them VOTING CLOUT disproportionate to their actual numbers. They will be in a position to effect real change.

STATE LEVEL ORGANIZATIONS:

The ARM movement won’t have any, in the formal sense. Instead, the various district chapters will coalesce into a loose knit collegiate form of assembly each year. At such convocations, delegates from these chapters will work out consensus positions on issues of concern to all their districts.

For this purpose, each chapter will send three (3) delegates to represent it at such meetings. However, when voting, these delegations will vote as a single unit. The purpose of such annual meetings will be to develop common voting platforms to present to the state’s electorate at large; and, to publish and promote such voting guidelines for any like-minded voters in their respective districts.


Here too, there will be no formal organization. However, every four years, to coincide with Presidential elections, there will be a national gathering of delegates from every congressional district from around the country. A similar process of developing voting guidelines will be followed as at the State level, and, similarly promoted to the country as a whole. .

NATIONAL LEVEL ORGANIZATION:


When such a NATIONAL guideline is worked out, ARM will then promote it nationwide. This will exert a very strong influence on whatever Presidential candidates the major parties present. ARM will gain further “leverage” by the carrot of possible ENDORSEMENT, to become a coveted source of support for any would be President. This will provide further political leverage for the aims of its constituency. It will be the mother of all PACs, without having to spend a dime.

Nevertheless, ARM will maintain its primary focus on House contests to maintain the strongest possible bargaining position in it. Over time, both Senatorial and Presidential Candidates will always have to consider that, and adjust their ways accordingly.

At that moment, ARM will have become the dominating political force in the country, and the goals and objectives of this second American Revolution will have been achieved, without firing a shot.

We, the people, will have finally broken the power and influence of career professional office seekers. We will have recaptured our government for ourselves, and once again become a constitutional and representational republic. By our leverage in the House of Representatives we will be able to control tax policy, revenue spending, and other regulatory issues or policies, all of which have the most profound social and economic impacts on the lives of each and every citizen.


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INDIVIDUAL ACTIONS:

As a first step forward for real change to happen in our country, here are two very simple things we, as individual citizens and voters, can do all on our own:

1. If you haven’t done so already, march yourself over to your local voter registration office and RE-REGISTER as an –Unaffiliated- or –Independent- voter. That might not sound like a significant thing to do, but here’s why it’s an important first step, and one that can have a major impact on the political scene. If enough voters do that, it will rattle the political cages of the two major parties, forcing them to re-think some of their political agendas and positions, and the way they do business. Keep in mind, the largest voting demographic today are – Independents-. Currently they comprise some 49% of all registered voters….and growing. Taking that action adds to the effect. So, if you want change….this is a way to be there.
   
2. The second thing you can do as an individual voter is to create your own personal voting policy concerning - TERM LIMITS.

Here’s why: For the past forty years or so we’ve allowed an elitist class of career politicians to develop. A class which no longer serves our collective interests. Instead, it focuses on ways and means to maintain itself in office, so it can feed at the trough of “public service” for as long as possible. In the process it has become more and more corrupt and under the influence of major private interests. Interests that contribute massive amounts of money to have them legislate in their favor rather than ours.

And the key factor that allows them to operate this way is long term incumbency in office. Being able to stay in legislative office for 10-20-30- or even 40 consecutive years inevitably leads such office holders to favor their political benefactors over the rest of us, and legislate accordingly. But, if that long term incumbency in office is short circuited by –TERM LIMITS – then the baneful influences of such large campaign contributors is reduced, mainly because the cost/benefit returns with –TERM LIMITS- is no longer attractive. It’s that simple.

Since trying to get a constitutional Amendment enacted by Congress and ratified by the States to impose term limits is a near impossibility(after all that would be against their career interests), here below is way for you to do so, again, all on your own, and in a way no one can prevent. In a word, you are simply making a pledge, a covenant with yourself, to impose your own limits on how many consecutive terms you will allow anyone to serve in the House of Representatives and the Senate.

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ORGANIZING & SETTING UP

The important thing to keep in mind here is that you are not trying to create another political party.
The idea of A.R.M. is to provide you with an alternative means for political action, and in a way that will allow you to get together with like-minded friends, neighbors, work and business associates to activate an effective grass roots and local effort focused entirely on getting one of your own elected as an – Independent – to the House of Representatives. That’s all.
The other important thing to also keep in mind is this….as long as you are not a formal political organization or party….you can pretty much operated however you like. You are truly “independent”. So, for this purpose think of yourselves as a private “investment club”. One which is aiming to invest more wisely in the governance of this country.

1. Getting Organized: Obviously, someone has to take the initiative to get things started. No reason it can’t be you. The worse thing that can happen is….nothing happens.

Inviting some folks you know and believe have similar views to a brunch-type event is probably the simplest and easiest way to gather in a core founding group together. It doesn’t have to be a large group, a half-dozen or so will do. In your invitation for such a brunch let them all know you’ve come across an idea that might be of interest to all. You don’t have to go into long explanations.
If you have the facility for it, this first session can be at your home. If not, or if you prefer, pick a decent restaurant or hotel small party or meeting room. Keep it simple, and within whatever budget you can afford.*

2. Meanwhile, to prepare for this founding session to set up an A.R.M. Chapter in your District, download and print out the – Blueprint – with enough copies for each of those you’ve invited to the brunch. If you have a laptop, you might also set it up and be ready to click on the intro video clip about A.R.M. The combination of these two things should have a stronger effect than just a printed handout of several pages.

3. Prepare a simple “FOUNDING COMMITTEE RESOLUTION” along the following lines:

FOUNDING COMMITTEE RESOLUTION

We, the undersigned founding committee, to establish a A.R.M. chapter for the Congressional District #---- of the State of -----, hereby agree to the following:

1)The Chapter is a voluntary association of concerned voters of this District

who wish to have a non-party, unaffiliated means for effective political

action.

2) Active membership and participation in the Chapter’s activities is open to

any registered voter of this District who is prepared and willing to re-register

as an independent and un-affiliated voter.

3)All members of this Chapter are prepared and willing to donate their time

and services to support the Chapter’s activities, and, to share any incidental

costs the may be required from time to time. Such costs to be equally share among all active members.

4)The primary objective of this Chapter’s political action efforts will be to have

one of its own elected as an –Independent- Representative to the House of

Representatives. The process for that to be as follows:

a.)Five members’ s names will be drawn by lot as its “primary slate” of

candidates for that office. Any member declining to be replaced by a

further draw.

b.)By a series of town hall type meetings, these selected candidates will be

examined and questioned by the membership as to their backgrounds,

positions on any issues of common concern, and any other qualifications

they may have to be their Representative in Congress.

c.) Following these proceedings, the membership will then vote on which of

the five candidates they believe will best be able to be the Chapter’s entry

for Congress in that election cycle.

d.)Having selected a candidate for Congress, the Chapter will campaign for

that person as an independent candidate for Congress, either by gathering

sufficient signatures to get its candidate officially placed on the ballot; or,

as a write-in choice. The Chapter will concentrate its efforts only on those

who are registered voters for their District.

4. Through a variety of means the Chapter will communicate and collaborate with other Chapters throughout its State, and elsewhere from around the country, to help develop and promote broad consensus on issues of concern to all, and for common and coordinated political action, as appropriate.

Approved and adopted on --------------------- at----------------------------------

SIGNED: ------------------- ------------------ ---------------------- --------------- ------------------

(typed names for each signature)

NOTE: This is just a suggested outline for such a resolution. It can be worded any way that is preferred.

5. Once the basic organizing has been accomplished, the next steps should be:

1. Obtaining a copy of the list of registered voters for your District. This is a public record, and will provide their names and addresses for contact.
2. Establish an internet account and name. In the regard it’s recommended that all A.R.M. chapters adopt this standard format for that purpose. That is…. "ARMchapt_CA.D12@yourmail.com". This will provide each Chapter with a specific and unique designation that will avoid any confusion with any other Chapter. More importantly it will enable the A.R.M. as a whole to see what progress is being made across the nation.
3. From the voters’ registration list, begin preparing invitations to periodic town hall type meetings, a hundred or so at a time. The brunch approach may be the best way for that. The membership dividing the related tasks for that among themselves, based on skills, talents, etc..
4. The purpose of such meetings will be to promote the A.R.M. idea, to get other voters to register or re-register as Independents, keeping in mind the more of the District’s voters switch that way, and get involved with your A.R.M. Chapter, the better the odds will be for getting your Chapter’s candidate elected to Congress. And the big “carrot” for getting voters involved is the possibility that any one of them could become a candidate and be elected to Congress.

6. At some point your Chapter will probably have to become more formalized in its operations. It’s strongly recommended that it consider the 40+ Organization’s model for that purpose. That’s because it operates on the basis of its membership working on a volunteer and rotating schedule basis, to do whatever tasks are needed. This spreads the load of work, and minimizes costs besides. It will also be beneficial to recruit HS and College age students as interns/volunteers, to tap into their generations’ idealism and eagerness to be involved in constructive political action (keep in mind these are all potential voters, so the earlier they are exposed to the A.R.M. idea, the more likely they are to support and become active with it later on).

* * * * * * * * * * *

 

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COMMENTS & FEEDBACK

COMMENTS & FEEDBACK (this is where you can post comments and feedback about any aspect of the A.R.M. concept. Also, where the four of us can post our responses to these, as we choose). Obviously we should have some sort of auto-filtering system with this, but, I don’t think we want it too restrictive. Expletives, name-calling, extreme rants, etc., should be excluded, but otherwise we should keep it as open as possible.

ARM Mission Statement

ARM Mission Statement.

What the hell do we think we are actually doing here? There is the fact it is self-gratifying to publicly express views we hold dear, our patriotism, our desire to see things promoted in our society like justice, honesty, and compassion. Many of the articles here started as letters to editors back in the 1980’s, letters to politicians, communications between Veterans all over the world as well as our Active Duty Military, and among just plain, simple Americans surfing the Internet. Today we have consolidated these writings here on this web site. If we are out to have some kind of social impact, then just what do we think we can do, and what are we trying to do?

The key to doing that is, in a word, exposure. Success can only result from getting masses of people finding what we offer as free reading online interesting enough that they will invest their time and their energy to join us. As I see it, there are three ways to make this happen, presuming our content is exciting enough to begin with. One, to pay for advertising to promote the site, two, to inspire people to propagate the site like a chain letter, and three, to do something else which gets enough attention that people will seek us out – like painting graffiti halfway up the Washington Monument, or kidnapping Barack’s dog Bo.

Hopefully, our primary objective should be to have a political effect. That, in a word, means votes. Next to selling artificial opium, pimping for Jesus, and bombing rag heads, the marketing of political candidates is one of America’s top industries. The key words here are again, masses and money. Millions of people, and millions of dollars. A dozen chatline fans and a few $10 donations just ain’t gonna cut it. The American electoral system is 100% marketing. It all takes place on TV, or in media-generating mass gatherings. As has been clearly articulated by such brilliant even if amoral strategists as Karl Rove, we Americans do not vote what we are for, but what we are against. Karl quite cynically observes that talking about yourself and your issues is political suicide, merely giving the other side grist for objection. You talk about your opponent, not yourself, and what is wrong with him, and you persuade the voter to find a reason not to vote fo! r your opponent. It is not possible in our system to vote “against” anyone; you must vote for someone. If the voters can be made to hate or fear your opponent, then you get their vote by default, no matter who you are or what you believe. This is the basis of the “vote out the incumbent” idea, whereby it doesn’t matter what a candidate is, only that you vote for somebody other than the presumably crooked guy in office now. I think lots of this kind of low-grade thinking is motivating the so-called Tea Party.

Though it is very important that the positions and issues of minor third or fourth or tenth parties of the less-than-2% variety be publicly presented and debated, as election “leverage” they are actually powerless. Votes for them are simply meaningless, like voting for your Granny’s goat. Though the fringe parties' self-sacrificing statement-making votes might have some influence on which R-Ds are chosen by their parties to run next time, in most elections even very regional, the only votes that make a difference in who actually gets elected are those cast for the Repo or the Demo. Closest anybody ever got to pulling off a real independent win was Ross Perot, who did it by investing about $30 million of his own money, made by building super-computers for the CIA and IRS, and appealing to those who hate both the Repos and the Demos. A few so-called independents who already have great power and following, like Joe Lieberman, have been elected, but what they do in of! fice then is simply sell their votes at the best price they can get from the majors.

Suppose we actually succeed in getting somebody elected by arousing a sufficient vote. What can we then expect that person to do in office? There is only one thing they can do, and that is to vote for or against new laws, according to the rules and their job descriptions, and as Scott Brown quickly learned, knuckle under to the power. When the GOP openly declares it will simply vote as a bloc against the Demo, no matter what the issue or the law proposed, it clearly just doesn’t matter what any individual Republican believes in or stands for. They have reduced themselves to rubber-stamp automatons, a lock-step vote without will or reason. The likelihood of them backing the ideas of an independent is incalculably small. As long as we continue to use the same system of election, based on media power which must be bought, on voters who are mindlessly propagandized by the marketing techniques which exploit them, and we continue to fill the same offices, and en! act the same policies, then no substantive changes are going to be made in the way life and the law are conducted in America.

Though clearly there is nothing to be gained from organizing bands of armed angry men ready to blow up something and kill Americans, what can we realistically do in the face of the implacable and un-resistable power of a highly evolved and interdependent infrastructure of government and industry? Is there really no option except trying to influence the way people vote? There is a point at which that begins to look like pissing in the wind.

What motivates people these days to vote? There is taxes. We all want less taxation, but the simple fact is that short of just printing the stuff up, taxation is the only way the government can obtain money to do anything. We all claim we want less government spending, but the fact is we all have things we believe the government should do, from buying bombers to saving the babies of Katrina. The working class are motivated by fear the corporations that employ them will be taxed out of existence, and by the idea they will have to pay more taxes themselves. The lower classes are motivated by hope the government will give them a few of the crumbs that fall from the tables of the rich. The rich want the workers taxed, and the workers want the welfare to the unemployed cut off. The sad truth is that we all wish the government would cut off the other guy’s benefits and fund our program. The other sad truth is if we taxed everybody 99%, including the rich, it wo! uld still take two generations to pay for what has been borrowed in our names in the last 20 years. And if we did pay it, who gets the money? The same banks to which we are indebted now, who can only do one thing with it, and that is to lend it back to us. The people who run things now are aware of this. They know we have reached a point where the amount of the debt is meaningless, and the value of everything is abstract. Everything is done on borrowed money, and all the IOUs are backed up only by the promise of keeping the labor forces working and taxing them. This fact is global, whether we ideologically agree with “globalism” or not.

There is freedom. Though we use the word, and dare anyone to deny it is sufficient justification for anything, it is only a platitude. Though many of us have called for decades for the personal freedom to use our own bodies as we choose, for our habits, sex life, use of our property, trade for our labor, etc etc, Americans seem much more likely to vote for someone who will act to prohibit things they don’t do themselves, and would prefer other people be forbidden to do. Such freedom they decry as license to sin, and condemn it, calling for “freedom from sin.” The control-freak patriots call for “freedom from crime.” The so-called Right Wing uses the word to justify invading and destroying other people’s countries, for economic and religious reasons, calling it “freedom from tyranny.” I think the organized pro-hemp and pro-homo and the civil rights folks will all find common ground with us on most things, and could be encouraged to vot! e for a candidate with Libertarian views on those issues, of either party.

There is religion. Though it is nominally excluded from our electoral process and our government, the fact is that a huge and well-organized cabal exists in US government today striving to use the power of lawmaking to enforce the taboos and prejudices of the most extreme Christian mystic factions, the authoritarian and puritan fundamentalist charismatics and Pentecostals, the born again and called by God to office. These are people who are not moved by reason or even by the hard facts of reality, but only by their “faith” in the idols of their sect. They are willing to make demigods of preachers who claim, for example, that God creates hurricanes to punish homosexuals, and who will make them happy and rich if they will bow down to their altar of Jesus. They command an enormous number of voters, and no election in America today is free of their influence. I think it fair to say that none of us here on ARM today, whatever our view of the truth about God,! is willing to pander to their occult superstitions, prejudices, and beliefs (as the major party candidates do) to get their votes. They will not likely be swayed from their beliefs by rational discourse, so for anyone who stands for the free exercise of our Constitutional personal liberties and the rule of reason, they are the enemy, lovely people though they may be. It is they whom our candidates must defeat, though they have Jesus leading their parades.

Should we then be attempting to establish some kind of reasonable platform that people of both the Left and the Right would leave their own parties to support, and those who take their God to be more reasonable and tolerant might appreciate? What kind of platform might that be? Having such a platform, do we then attempt to locate or create a candidate who can motivate enough public attention that the media will pick him up, shower him with millions of dollars so he can put on a big enough show to get people watching their commercials, as they have done with the manufactured celebrity Palindoll? Should we be promoting just the ideology, and hoping we can find existing candidates that will leave their party to stand for it as independents? Should we be organizing public meetings, making speeches, and chartering jets to fly from one city to another, passing out fliers and living on pizza and Jack? Should we be seeking corporate sponsorship to pay for the PSAs an! d the jets? Ok, I’m not expecting to be doing anything that big, but as a matter of visualizing what direction we are going, and what the terrain looks like, you see what I’m saying. Are we bringing a mule to a Nascar race?

I do love expressing what I think, and reporting honestly and literally as I can how things look to me, hoping somebody will read it and feel elucidated by it. I would certainly love to see the effect of it in our society, but I confess I do not see a clear path to accomplishing a particular end here. Your take on this is our mission, please?

James “Lancer 17” \:--]