June 06, 2009

Did you happen to catch Governor Terminator talking about Judgement Day in California? Mr. Schwarzenegger went on the tube this past week to tell us that “We can only spend what we have. That is the harsh but simple reality,” he said in the rare midyear appearance before a joint Legislature session. “Our wallet is empty, our bank is closed and our credit is dried up.”[Schwarzenegger sees opportunity in budget crisis, By Juliet Williams, Associated Press, June 2, 2009,]

Earlier talk of a Federal bailout was judged a poor idea by many, including the Washington Post in a May 24 editorial, just as General Motors went into bankruptcy with billions of our tax dollars as an inducement.

And just now, in responding to the Governor’s urgent message for cutting costs, the California Senate passed a bill to give driver’s licences to illegal aliens.

As if losing an average of almost 600,000 jobs a month in the US should mean we make it easier for the illegal aliens to stay here and to get to jobs American citizens don’t have.

 But then, of course, our helpful Federal government is bowing to strong business pressure and allowing over 100,000 legal aliens a month to come here to the US on various brands of work visas.

How many to California? Well here’s a bit of basic demography.

Since the 1965 changes in our immigration laws, we have added huge numbers of immigrants and their children to our national population. In 1970 California’s population was about 20 million. Today, that population is estimated at about 37 million. Of those, the Center for Immigration Studies estimates about 10 million are legal (7 million) and illegal (3 million) immigrants. 35% of all Californians are persons of Hispanic origin, principally Mexicans. Over 8 million Californians were born outside the USA.

Just on the sheer numbers alone, it is not hard to see why California is now bankrupt.

I am a long-time San Francisco Democrat, now transplanted to Washington D.C. So recently I wrote Congresswoman Nancy Pelosi to ask why we didn’t fix our broken immigration system. This was her June 5, 2009 email reply?

“I have long called for comprehensive immigration reform to address the growing disconnect between our nation’s immigration policy and the reality on the ground in cities and communities across our country. Our immigration system needs to honor the promise of America and recognize the enormous contributions immigrants make to our nation. We must enact immigration reform that is humane and honors our American tradition of being a nation of immigrants and a land of opportunity for all. At the same time, we must secure our borders, enforce our laws, and ensure the safety of the American people.

While immigration reform remains an unsolved challenge for our nation, we must recognize that America was built by immigrants, and the immigrant community continues to make significant contributions to our nation. The debate on immigration reform must be framed by our nation’s rich tradition of respect for our shared immigrant heritage. Please be assured that I will keep your comments in mind as I work with President Obama, leadership and the committees of jurisdiction to develop a strategy to advance immigration legislation that promotes our core American values.”

Can you imagine such chutzpah? You know her “comprehensive immigration reform” simply means “amnesty” for the 20 million illegal aliens here now and encouraging many more later. We know the fiasco that the 1986 immigration reform legislation proved to be.

And believe me House Speaker Pelosi is not alone. Senator Charles Schumer (D-NY) recently held very unbalanced hearings on “comprehensive immigration reform” which failed to give time to those opposed to the massive giveaway of American citizenships.

But it really gets much worse if one is trying to calculate the fiscal effect on California–and project what this means for America.

Folks, California is the biggest example of the famous canary in the coal mine theory ever. Remember, until 1986 in the U.K., canaries were regularly used in coal mines as an early warning system. The birds died in the presence of toxic gases. Because canaries tend to sing much of the time, they provided both a visual and audible cue.

California is certainly getting toxic budgetary news. It is killing the economy and all that this once-vaunted state had to offer in the way of education and environment, making it the envy of the world. The decline I have personally observed is obvious to so many I talk to, yet this fiscal death notice to California which has counterparts in other states, does not seem to worry other Americans—yet.

Fortunately, thanks to a careful and exhaustive research report by Steve Camarota, Director of Research at the Center for Immigration  Studies, entitled “Immigrants in the United States, 2007: A profile of America’s Foreign-Born Population” we learn that:

“Of adult immigrants, 31 percent have not completed high school, compared to 8 percent of natives. Since 2000, immigration increased the number of workers without a high school diploma by 14 percent, and all other workers by 3 percent.

“The proportion of immigrant-headed households using at least one major welfare program is 33 percent, compared to 19 percent for native households.

“The poverty rate for immigrants and their U.S.-born children (under 18) is 17 percent, nearly 50 percent higher than the rate for natives and their children.

“34 percent of immigrants lack health insurance, compared to 13 percent of natives. Immigrants and their U.S.-born children account for 71 percent of the increase in the uninsured since 1989.”

All this means more public costs, more demands on government resources.

How long will this madness continue? California Governor Pete Wilson tried long ago to get help from our Federal Government, but those elected officials knew better than to try to buck the industrial-military complex that now rules our former Republic. Those worthies (notice in what high regard our Congress is rated in the polls) handle immigration like a political popularity contest where the more cheap labor you support importing, the more money flows to re-elect you from the coffers of business.

Result: Just take a look at the bloated California budget. And then we learn that the City of Oakland, California will be soon joining San Francisco in giving all residents including illegal aliens ID cards. That can only serve to add to that city’s nearly $100 million deficit, as public services will now flow to illegal aliens and their anchor babies.

Of course the California voters don’t want to pay to fix this mess. In the May special election, voters rejected all five budget-related measures placed on the ballot by Schwarzenegger and legislative leaders. Revenue has continued to plummet as residents have reduced spending and unemployment has soared to 11 percent.

I predict that as matters get worse—and they surely will–Californians and all Americans will finally wake up to the fact that unchecked immigration, wanton use of the public trough and loss of expected public services will cause a revolt by voters.

But for now too many are sitting on their hands, fat, dumb and perhaps apprehensive but unwilling to take part in the political rough and tumble. Sad that corrective action will likely not happen before devastation to our culture, our traditions, our comity and the prosperity we have enjoyed.

California has had many recent internal signs of overuse and unsustainability. For example, the fish resources of the state have precipitously declined and the commercial salmon fishing season is now closed, while when reasonable new regulations to save the salmon have been proposed, Terminator Schwarzenegger has sided with the farmers who keep degrading the free water they abuse, so that renewal of this great resource is imperilled.

California is the Big Canary. It’s dying—and Americans had better take notice.

Donald A. Collins [email him] is a freelance writer living in Washington DC, and is Co-Chair of the Federation for American Immigration Reform’s (FAIR) National Advisory Board. His view are his own.

The articles on VDARE.com are brought to you by the VDARE Foundation. We are supported by generous donations from our readers. Contributions are tax deductible and appreciated. Contribute…

Copyright © 1999 – 2010 VDARE.com

http://vdare.com/collins/090606_immigration.htm

One of the more objectionable features of the Employee Free Choice Act (EFCA) is the card check feature wherein a union can simply gather publicly signed cards by employees agreeing to become unionized, thereby eliminating the secret vote for the workers. Opponents say this process is ripe for union abuse leaving workers open to any sort of intimidation and quashing their vote of conscience.

If any more evidence of how corrupt the card check system could be were needed, one need only look at a recent union organizer in Ohio to see the abuse that will happen with card check.

An Ohio union organizer has been fired after he was caught forging documents to deduct money from public employees’ wages to pay for political activity, the Service Employees International Union said yesterday.

The organizer, whom Williams declined to identify, had forged about 40 “PAC cards,” which are documents that allow the union to deduct about $14 per month from employee wages to pay for the union’s political activity.

If union bosses are so readily prone to forging these donor cards, what will they do when it comes time to use similar signed cards to get their foot in the door of a business in which they have not previously been able to gain access?

If union chiefs and organizers have in their control all the signed cards to present to the employer to “prove” that 50% + 1 of the employees wanted the union to come in, how does anyone know that the employees really signed any of those cards?

This is the sort of mess we are asking for as a nation if the EFCA passes.

For decades, protests and marches have primarily been associated with the Left.

There are many reasons for this. They generally internalize politics to an extreme extent, becoming obsessed with policies that have absolutely nothing to do with their lives, families, or communities. They have jobs that either give them large amounts of free time or have few repercussions for disappearing for a few days, assuming they have jobs at all. At least half of any Leftist mob will be teachers, baristas, or unemployed. Politics is the center of their lives. The time most people spend on hobbies or with friends and family they spend on organizing and networking, usually on Leftist websites.

Unfortunately, all that time and effort has paid off. They have managed to drag the country so far to the left everything most Americans hold dear is now in danger of disappearing, even from the pages of history given the enemy’s obsession with revisionism.

This guide is to help familiarize patriots with the do’s and don’ts of exercising the First Amendment right to public redress of grievances.

Planning

Whether countering a Leftist demonstration or organizing your own, planning is vitally important. Once when and where are determined, figure out how to get there, where to park, the nearest mass transit, and where to meet up before and after the event, including alternate routes if roads are unexpectedly blocked. It’s a very good idea to scope out the site before hand. Something as simple as knowing where the nearest restaurant or restroom is can be important.

As a rule it’s a good idea for the organizers to get in touch with the police before hand, although there are exceptions to this. Even more important is contacting the media, print, television, radio, and internet. Call, write, fax, and e-mail. Encourage others to do the same. Spread the word as far as possible. Prepare press releases and send them to everyone you can think of.

Print out stacks of flyers to hand out to passersby stating who you are, why you’re there, what your for or against, and what your goals are.

When making signs, be sure they’re legible and easily read at a distance. Use large letters.

Bring sign-in sheets and take down names, e-mails, web sites, and phone numbers so you can stay in contact, organize, and share information.

Social networking sites like Facebook can be very helpful in setting things up.

Prepare talking points so everyone can stay on message. When being interviewed, be clear, concise, and polite. On TV, it’s all about the soundbite. Be careful not to ramble.

Appearances

Probably the most important thing to remember is the media’s double standard. They will edit out anything that makes the Left look bad and the Right look good. If there are a hundred people and ninety-nine are holding “Bush = Hitler” and “Kill Cheney” signs, and one is holding a “No Blood For Oil” sign, take a guess what someone watching the evening news sees.

Given the risk of creative editing and taking things out of context, always having at least one camera running is highly recommended. If any confrontations start, everyone who can film should be filming. That can be vital later to counter enemy propaganda, or even to use in a lawsuit or criminal trial.

The flip side is if there are ninety-nine “Support The Troops” and “Surrender Is Not An Option” signs, everyone gets to see the one guy with a “Fuck Obama” sign. If you see someone with a sign that makes us look like a bunch of Nazis, don’t be afraid to counsel them. This goes for shirt emblems, as well, although those, being less visible, are less of a problem. Profanity should be avoided, along with racist comments. Bear in mind, Islam is not a race, whatever the Muslim Brotherhood and it’s fronts might say.

When it comes to symbols, nothing can compare to the American flag. Flags of the armed services (no patriotic rally is complete without the USMC Eagle, Globe, and Anchor) and historic flags such as the Gadsden show everyone who we are and what we stand for better than any slogan. (A good place to get them is here: http://www.flagstuff.com/historic-flags/index.html )

One of the most effective weapons we have is humor. Above all else, the Devil can’t stand to be mocked, as the saying goes. The most attractive thing about liberalism is that it gives liberals a false sense of intellectual superiority. Even though they are demonstrably wrong on almost everything, they believe that simply parroting Marxist talking points makes them better than the proles who are dumb enough to work for a living. They’re taught that ‘wingnuts’ are too stupid to grasp humor. Poking fun at them threatens that worldview.

Chants and the like are also important. The more people yelling something, the more the impact, for good or ill. Counterprotesting a Leftist event, “COMMIES GO HOME” gets better reception than “KILL THE RED BASTARDS” even if the latter is more emotionally satisfying. Leave the real heckling to those who have a talent for edging up to the line but not going over it. It’s easy to say something you’ll regret later when your blood is up.

It’s also important to look normal. The average Lefty protester looks like a refugee from a post-apocalyptic movie: matted hair, ragged clothes, appalling personal hygiene, and crazy eyes. Patriots are normal Americans (including many who weren’t born here). You can’t smell them from blocks away, and clouds of marijuana smoke, patchouli, and BO don’t follow them around. No matter how much the editing room tries, if shots of the opposing groups shows a bunch of Woodstock wannabes on one side, and clean-cut, appropriately dressed, flag-waving people who look like their neighbors, who are they likely to empathize with, meta-narrative or not.

When the media comes to do interviews, try to have eloquent public speakers who have a clear understanding of the arguments to talk to the reporters. If someone uses more ‘uh’s than Obama without a teleprompter, it might be a good idea to let others do the talking.

That said, there’s definitely something to be said for having the kind of people the media prefers to show as the typical right-wing nutjob around: bikers and big, mean-looking guys. Despite their professing to love peace, the Left is full of violent, rage-filled maniacs. “Give Peace A Chance,” it turns out, doesn’t apply to Enemies of the People’s Revolution. Given that well over a hundred million people have been murdered by the Left over the last century, this shouldn’t come as a surprise to anyone with more than a passing acquaintance with history.

If they think they can avoid retaliation, many will not hesitate to assault anyone they disagree with. Women, children, and the elderly are their preferred target, given the innate cowardice of most of them. If they have the numbers, they think no one is looking, and their target appears to be unlikely to defend themselves, anything can happen.

It’s when people are on their way to or from demonstrations that bad things are most likely to happen. Usually, the police will keep the two sides separate at the demonstration site, but when opposing groups away from there bump into each other there is a chance for a confrontation. If they run into some guys on Harleys from Rolling Thunder, they’ll walk small. If they run into some ladies from Band of Mothers, on the other hand, they might decide that maybe, just maybe, if they outnumber them enough, they’d stand a chance in a brawl.

If you’re identifiable as part of a group of patriots, it’s best to travel in groups. Just seeing an undesecrated American flag is enough to send hard-core Marxists and taqiyya-spewing jihadis into a frothing rage. If you’re a 6′2” and 225 lb Marine, odds are they’ll swallow their bile and walk away. If you’re a 5′1” and 98 lb secretary, they might decide to vent some of their rage on you.

Given that, it’s best to travel in large groups and/or make sure that some of you are intimidating enough to stop trouble before it starts, or, failing that, make them regret leaving their parents’ basements that day.

The Opposition

That brings us to probably the most important thing: Know your enemy. The Left is far from monolithic. Different subgroups have different behavior, pose different threats, and provide different opportunities. One thing they have in common is the reason that they believe in so much that is obviously not true: because they want to. You can’t reason someone out of a position they weren’t reasoned into in the first place. That said, the simply ignorant, those who’ve never heard a dissenting opinion such as anyone who’s gone through the public school system, can have their eyes opened.

Liberals

First up, the most numerous, the fair weather protesters: your typical, college-educated liberal. Most of them are young, and either in college or recently graduated. They’re there more to smoke weed, hang out, and get laid. As they move into the workforce, they’ll start getting mugged by reality, especially when they realize how hard it is to support a family when the government is taking half your paycheck every week. Many will become moderate or conservative as they learn the world doesn’t work the way their Meso-American-tantric-consciousness-raising-basket-weaving professor told them. They’re actually our primary target. They provide the mass for the big protests, and they’re by far the most vulnerable to us. Simply by showing up and getting in their faces we make them unlikely to ever show up to another event.

Think of them as support troops. Not much of a threat themselves, but help those who are a clear and present danger to America as we know it.

Hippies

Then there’s the hippies. Don’t be fooled by the Peace symbols, they are actually more likely to assault you than the typical protester. Considering all the chemicals in their bloodstreams, they are on a whole other plane of existence from the rest of us, so they are very unpredictable. They might just lay down and stare at the clouds, or they might charge the barricades and try to eat your eyeballs, or anything in between. Showing up at rallies is about the only thing that gives their lives any meaning. They are by far the most likely to be willing to go to jail. At least part of the reason for that is they have nothing to lose by having a criminal record. If you’re willing to hire someone with a bird’s nest on their head who smells like a landfill, you probably don’t care if they have a dozen disorderly conduct or assault convictions.

They’re the rank and file of Leftist protests. They can sometimes be more numerous than the liberals. They act based on whatever is bouncing around in their empty heads at any given moment, so don’t get complacent if there’s a bunch of them sitting around in a drum circle. You never know when they might decide to start a revolution by smashing the state starting with your skull.

Marxists

They are usually the organizers and what passes for leaders of most Leftist protests. Pure evil. They’re easy to spot because they’ll typically be the ones with bullhorns or wearing something like a shirt, vest, or armband that singles them out from the mob. Skilled at propaganda and rabble rousing, they hide their lust for power behind lofty rhetoric about looking out for the little guy. If you’re talking to someone on the other side capable of putting a coherent sentence together instead of a slogan or talking point, they’re probably a Marxist.

They fill the vacant heads of liberals and hippies with socialist garbage. They’re wannabe commissars, and are perfectly willing to use any tactic if they think it helps their cause. Look at what PETA does to the naive young interns they wrap in plastic in summer and cram into bikinis in winter. The very lives of their followers mean nothing to them. They’re smart enough to know that being seen assaulting you is bad for PR but make no mistake, they’d love to put you in a gulag. If you’ve ever seen pictures of mass executions and wondered what kind of human being could do that, you’ll find out the first time you have a conversation with one of these narcissistic sociopaths.

These are the cadre. They are what passes for officers on the Left. They’re the real enemy; the sheep and fellow travelers that make up the bulk of the mob aren’t a threat without Marxists to mold and use them to influence society. Consider them primary targets.

Anarchists

If you see a bunch of punks wearing masks, breaking windows, and setting trashcans on fire, you’ve met the anarchists. They call themselves the Black Bloc, and claim they want to overthrow the government. They believe they should be allowed to do whatever they want. That’s actually the sum total of their political beliefs. They want to smash things and if you try to stop them you’re a tyrant. However, despite openly advocating violence, they’re the biggest cowards on the left. Unless they have overwhelming force, they are very unlikely to do anything that might get their teenage asses kicked. Vandalism is their stock in trade, not brawling. They’ll set your car on fire but won’t throw a punch unless they’re surrounded by their buddies. When the riot police show up, they’re the first ones to run and leave their fellow travelers to deal with the tear gas, horses, and batons. They’ll smash anything they can, loot stores, set fires, and vandalize everything, especially things connected to the government or military. Recruiting offices and war memorials are their most popular targets, police stations tending to be guarded by men with guns.

Saboteurs. They won’t stand up and fight if there’s a chance they’ll get hurt but they’ll set your car on fire.

Muslims

At any anti-American event, you’ll probably find at least a few muslims. Spouting taqiyya like islam means peace, jihad means spiritual self-improvement, and Aisha wasn’t nine years old when mohammed ‘deflowered’ her, they have many talking points that often contradict each other, such as the same individual stating that 9/11 was a Jewish plot in one breath and that it was a justified reaction to America’s foreign policy the next. They try to improve islam’s image in the media, recruit converts, intimidate critics, and replace secular laws with sharia. They are shameless liars, and are often self-contradictory. Western raised and educated muslims will smoothly lie about how enlightened and tolerant islam is, and are focused on fooling your typical empty-headed liberal into converting (or ‘reverting’ as they call it).

They usually restrain themselves when faced with opposition, but that’s never a given. At any moment, Sudden Jihadi Syndrome might rear its ugly head. That’s even more likely when it’s someone born and raised in a muslim nation. Any hint that an infidel doesn’t kiss the ground he walks on might be all it takes for him to go into a murderous rage. Women in particular are their favorite target, along with people they think look ‘Jewish’.

They are the enemies of everyone else on either side at protests. They cynically believe they can use the rest of the anti-American groups to overthrow the government and create a Caliphate governed by sharia law. The Marxists are using them the same way. If they ever succeed in destroying the United States, they’ll immediately turn on each other.

These are the shock troops. If anyone’s going to try to kill you, it’d probably be a jihadi. Sometimes they have their own rallies. If you go to counter-protest one, bring your biggest, meanest, scariest friends. You’ll need them. If a group catches you alone, run. An attack isn’t a possibility, it’s a probability.

Provocateurs

A clean-cut, well dressed man wearing glasses comes up to you, looking like he just stepped out of a cubicle. Then he starts ranting and raving, saying the most vile things you’ve ever heard, daring you to punch his lights out. Meet the provocateur. His goal is to get you angry enough to kick his ass. In his mind, lying in a pool of his own blood means he ‘won’ somehow. His greatest desire is to have you sent to jail. He also intends to sue you for everything you’re worth. If you have any kind of leadership function or high profile, you are his primary target. He’s the kind of guy who drops a grape on the floor of a supermarket, step on it, pretend to fall, then show up in court wearing a neckbrace and demanding a gazillion dollars. Odds are they’re law school dropouts. They pose as much a threat as someone who’s trying to get beat up is able to.

They’re agents of chaos. On the bright side, they’ll often go after the other side as well. They’re not in it for the ideology. Make sure they’re being videotaped as they try to provoke you. Even if you don’t touch them, they’ll probably try to have you arrested or sue you. Having footage to show a jury might be very important. Watch out for others with cameras, though. They can easily edit anything to look like an unprovoked attack.

Truthers

Truthers can be hard to identify from a distance, but up close the glazed, empty stare is hard to miss. Conspiracy theorists gravitate to any gathering, trying to convince everyone they meet that the government carried out 9/11, that contrails are really chemtrails poisoning the planet, or that the moon landings were fake. The Jews are often their favorite boogeyman, and they’ll often reference the ‘Zionist Occupied Government,’ international bankers, and corporations. The media likes to portray them as on the Right, but they find much more fertile ground on the Left.

There is no point in debating them. If you don’t drink their kool-ade, you’re either ’sheeple’ or part of the conspiracy. They are even more immune to logic and reason than any liberal. Refusing to believe that fire melts steel is the least of it. Any discussion will end in frustration and possibly violence; Truthers are not know for being emotionally stable.

The Aftermath

When it’s time to go home, it should go without saying that no one should be able to tell you were ever there. Pick up your garbage, pack up your signs and flags, make your way to the nearest watering hole, and congratulate yourself on a job well done.

Remember to document everything and post it on the web, and try to get the media, local and national, to do stories on it.

Thank you for reading, and God Bless America

http://patdollard.com/2009/04/actives-guide-to-demonstrations/