Liberty’s TorchThanks to “our” Main Stream Media…well, I suppose any left-liberals in the audience would regard them that way…the Nixon Administration’s “enemies list” is a notorious, even legendary item. There’s some irony in that, for it’s been stated by numerous Nixon White House staffers that if such a list did exist, President Nixon never spoke of it and probably never saw it. All the same, the open hostility between the Nixonites and the media makes the suggestion of such a list plausible, whether or not it was real.
These days, lists of enemies of the regime are compiled in a different fashion, and by a different agency: the Department of Homeland Security. The indefatigable Doug Ross has the scoop:
Are you a conservative, a libertarian, a Christian or a gun owner? Are you opposed to abortion, globalism, Communism, illegal immigration, the United Nations or the New World Order? Do you believe in conspiracy theories, do you believe that we are living in the “end times” or do you ever visit alternative news websites (such as this one)?If you answered yes to any of those questions, you are a “potential terrorist” according to official U.S. government documents.
At one time, the term “terrorist” was used very narrowly. The government applied that label to people like Osama bin Laden and other Islamic jihadists. But now the Obama administration is removing all references to Islam from terror training materials, and instead the term “terrorist” is being applied to large groups of American citizens.
And if you are a “terrorist”, that means that you have no rights and the government can treat you just like it treats the terrorists that are being held at Guantanamo Bay. So if you belong to a group of people that is now being referred to as “potential terrorists”, please don’t take it as a joke. The first step to persecuting any group of people is to demonize them. And right now large groups of peaceful, law-abiding citizens are being ruthlessly demonized.
Below is a list of 72 types of Americans that are considered to be “extremists” and “potential terrorists” in official U.S. government documents. To see the original source document for each point, just click on the link. As you can see, this list covers most of the country…
The list is indeed extensive. I’m a member of quite a number of the listed categories. Perhaps you are, too. And as Doug says, it’s not something to take lightly. If there’s a saving grace to the situation, it would be that if the majority of Americans are “potential terrorists,” then according to democratic norms we can all cheer that we “potential terrorists” have “won!”
(No, not really. I’m being facetious; note the snark quotes. It’s how I keep my blood pressure in check.)
The relevance to “New Class” political dynamics is obvious. Anyone who qualifies as a “potential terrorist” by one or more of the criteria on that list is clearly not a member of the “New Class.” Therefore, should such persons eventually league with one another to oppose the existing regime, the political elite will have a prefabricated justification for ordering the military to suppress the “coup.” That the existing regime, in and of itself constitutes a coup against the Constitution only adds to the irony.
Patriotism is a form of allegiance: that is, it expresses a sense of contingent obligation to serve one’s country, even at cost to oneself. Members of the “New Class” being less inclined to patriotism as conservatives understand it, they would therefore be less inclined toward public service — real public service, rather than a highly paid job bossing less fortunate types around.
Let’s ponder the de facto meaning of “public service.” The “New Class” would have you interpret that as a position within the government, whether elected, appointed, or Civil Service. But when we inquire into the actual “service” being rendered to the “public,” it often proves to be vapor: the awkward, insubstantial self-justifications of the self-serving, endlessly more concerned with personal incentives than with doing something for someone else. (Note: notdoing something to someone else; that’s part of the problem.)
In the private sector, to “serve” the “public” has a fairly strict meaning. Whether or not the service is compensated in some fashion, it must involve something that accords with the interests of the “public” as represented by the particular persons being served. In that light, a reasonably diligent waiter has a better claim to being a public servant than any federal bureaucrat.
This is not to say that there are no genuine public servants in government employ. Soldiers and firemen come to mind at once. But the tendency to equate government employment with “public service” has leached all the virtue out of the term – and the soldiers and firemen should be as aggrieved over that as you and I.
Genuine public service is the best overt demonstration of patriotism. Therefore, that both patriotism and a sincere ethic of public service are notably lacking among the “New Class” should come as no surprise. It follows that those who are sincerely patriotic should be prominent on the “New Class’s” enemies list.
America has entered a time of trial. Whether it’s to be what its political elite demands that it be, or what the great majority of its true patriots want it to be, cannot be foreseen. All that’s guaranteed is the struggle. In that struggle, the broad sweep of the “enemies list” is an asset in the patriots’ favor: it’s too clearly an attempt to pre-demonize those who oppose the “New Class’s” grip on political hegemony.
Randy Weaver would understand the situation at once.
So would Simon Dubnov and Martin Niemoller.
Remember their fates, and be watchful.
http://bastionofliberty.blogspot.com/2015/02/the-new-class-part-2-enemies-list.html