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Quote of the Day: Freedom
The trouble with fighting for human freedom is that one spends most of one’s time defending scoundrels. For it is against scoundrels that oppressive laws are first aimed, and oppression must be stopped at the beginning if it is to be stopped at all. – Robert L. Heinlein
Once upon a time, Jewish lawyers in the ACLU were willing to defend the rights of Nazis to march through the predominantly Jewish community of Skokie, IL. The Nazis claimed they wanted a peaceful march through the town — their Constitutional right as US citizens.
At the time I thought that was nuts. (At the time the only thing I knew about Skokie was it was the home of Lindberg Models.) The Nazis were disgusting people. This was a lot closer to World War II than the fight over the march is to today. Why should anyone put up with them?
Over time I realized the ACLU and Heinlein were right. Denying scoundrels rights they were entitled to because they were scoundrels was to invite your own rights to be denied. At some point, someone would declare you the scoundrel who should be denied the rights everyone is entitled to. Especially if you previously accepted that principle in the past.
If you think about it, outlawing individuals by declaring them scoundrels is the heart of cancel culture. Anyone can be the scoundrel: Ilya Somin, Joe Rogan, vaccine mandate opponents, Christians, Canadian truckers, January 6 protestors, really anyone – including you and me.
Because what begins as a tool to punish scoundrels, quickly turns into a tool to oppress you. It becomes Aeschylus’s fable brought to the present:
Published in GeneralSo in the Libyan fable it is told
That once an eagle, stricken with a dart,
Said, when he saw the fashion of the shaft,
“With our own feathers, not by others’ hands,
Are we now smitten.”
The ACLU was right. Too bad they haven’t continued to hold those values.
They were old fashioned liberals. They morphed over the years to full blown progressives/Regressives . Communist Utopians/Dis-topians .
As unlikeable as the Canadian government is we still have to allow them to speak out. Perhaps because of how unlikeable and thuggish they are. It is the only way we will know that for sure.
By the way for anyone seeking an uncensored view of what is going on in Canada, check out Rebel News and Small Dead Animals.
It would seem to me that the “Liberal” Party of Canada is approaching an extinction-level event.
Stock up now. Some shelves may be empty.
Seems a better fit for Nine Meals. It was part of my unspoken reason for that posting.
The DC convoy is like a game of Can You Top This. Or Follow the Leader.
DC representatives raised the Jan 6 protests to a level of malignancy that tops the Civil War and the assassination of Lincoln. It walled off the Capitol and the White House with barbed wire and US troops. At the time people asked, What are they afraid of?
And the Canadians are staging a truck protest, and Ottawa is now responding with the mini-me version of vilification and blocking roads and buying up empty hotel rooms so that protesters can’t rent them.
So the US stages its own truck convoy. But the Federal gov’t has already been there and has prepared for the next move. DC has dug in and placed pop-up bollards at major city intersections around the Capitol and the White House so no trucks can be photographed resting with idling engines at the place of the head of government. I think DC has a plan and has begun executing it already, to show an overwhelming response. This will likely be ugly and effective.
What are the DC truckers protesting? Are they showing solidarity with their Canadian counterparts? They aren’t facing mandates here, right?
I’ve only been reading the headlines, most of which tout the convoy but not the reason for it. The Daily Wire has this headline:
‘Convoy To DC’ Facebook Group Amasses 90k Followers, Calls On American Truckers To Form Nationwide Protest Against Vax Mandates
I found this–
A large share of truck drivers who work for big U.S. fleets will not face vaccine or testing requirements under rules introduced for U.S. businesses with 100 or more employees.
In an update released on Wednesday, the U.S. Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) confirmed its requirements will not apply to truck drivers who do not occupy vehicles with other individuals as part of their work duties. Nor will they apply to truck drivers who encounter other individuals exclusively in outdoor settings.
This is from January. Didn’t SCOTUS overrule vaccine mandates except for certain health care workers?
As in Canada, this isn’t a truckers’ demand issue. It is a people issue that the truckers have embraced. We have all been looking around and wondering how and when the people would reassert control over their government. And this is why the DC response is going to be so harsh. Truckers can bring the hurt. No government can long endure supply chain disruptions that an organized truckers action can bring about. If the truckers can rightly lay the hurt at the feet of government and not themselves, then people will finally get the message what the consequence of loss of freedom truly is. It is not just giving up speech, weapons, and due process for “deplorables”. It is a reordering of America where their dreams die.
You do raise an important question. What is the purpose of the convoy?
First we know at least the current model for the government’s response. Vilify, infiltrate, direct (with road closures), threaten, assault (non-lethally), arrest, and incarcerate indefinitely. And it may get worse. Debank the protesters? Draw guns on them?
What do the truckers hope to accomplish? Make a statement? Raise awareness? Inflame the public? Diminish supply deliveries? Threaten the dinners of the government representatives? Shut down the city for a month or two? Martyr themselves?
Or is this just a prelude to something more drastic?
I think the government is prepared for this, and has been preparing since after the 2020 election.
I don’t think that shutting down anything actually goes against the government’s wishes; they’re shutting things down themselves. I don’t think that they fear the public, and I do think they can grow and inflame sympathizers within the US population. I think they will create, at least, social martyrs.
Was that concrete blast wall still around the White House just temporary? Or is it still up.
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