Americans push back against government overreach with some real defiance
Bring a gun to a knife fight: For the first time since 2020, when state and federal governments nationwide decided the Constitution and Bill of Rights no longer applied to them and began imposing a whole range of abusive illegal regulations and lockdowns and mandates and blacklisting on Americans everywhere, we are now finally beginning to see some real push back from ordinary people, in ways that leave these tinpot dictators no choice but to back down.
Two examples in the past week. First in St. Louis the city government (controlled by radical leftist Democrats) decided it was time to institute a new panic over COVID, likely to give them the ability to once again easily manipulate voting in 2024, by instituting a new city mask mandate. Though it only recommended strongly that everyone wear masks everywhere, its director of health Matifadza Hlatshwayo Davis said that masks were required of government employees if they were indoors or in a car with another person.
Davis’s problem was that, unlike 2020, almost no one obeyed her demands.
[W]hile many employees at City Hall strapped the masks back on, many visitors did not, raising questions about the effectiveness of the new policy. Of the 10 people sitting outside the city assessor’s office around 3 p.m., for instance, just two people were wearing masks: an older woman and an assessor’s office employee.
At the same time, the Republican governor Mike Parson contacted the city’s mayor, leftist Tishaura Jones, to tell her to rethink this idiocy, noting that her health department had issued false information exaggerating the current health situation. It claimed that “hospitalizations [were] increasing by 38 percent over the past month (December)” when hospital systems themselves had found no increase at all.
Less than 24 hours later, the city backed down, cancelling the mandates on city employees. It had found that bullying only works when people obey you. If they defy you, you look weak instead of powerful, and so the mandates had to be deep-sixed.
Further defiance of government overreach was also seen this week in Illinois. In January 2023 the state government — entirely controlled by Democrats — had passed strict new gun control legislation that banned AR-15s and AK-47s as well as magazines capable of holding more than fifteen rounds. The law also required owners of these guns to register them with the state.
Gun owners who lawfully purchased affected weapons and magazines will have 300 days to register them with the state’s police. They will also be forced to restrict their use to a select few limited applications or face criminal penalties for continuing to possess them.
One year later, the Democrats in Illinois have discovered that the state’s citizens have told them to jump in a lake, with barely 1% of all owners registering, with some gun owners defiantly and publicly refusing to comply, while some of the state’s law enforcement officials stating unequivocally that they have no interest in enforcing the law.
The Sheriffs of roughly 80 Illinois counties vowed not to enforce the ban under most circumstances last January by issuing statements that like-minded law enforcement officials quickly adopted. “I, among many others, believe HB 5471 is a clear violation of the 2nd Amendment to the U.S. Constitution,” DuPage County Sheriff James Mendrick, whose jurisdiction is the second most populous in the state, said in a public letter a week after the law passed. “Therefore, as the custodian of the jail and the chief law enforcement official for DuPage County, neither myself nor my office will be checking to ensure that lawful gun owners register their weapons with the state, nor will we be arresting or housing law-abiding individuals that have been arrested solely with non-compliance of this Act.”
What the Democrats in the state legislature will do next is unclear. They have passed a law that they cannot enforce and that the state’s citizens are refusing to obey. If they don’t back down, it will undercut any future abuse of power they wish to impose.
The bottom line remains the same: Since 2020 too many government officials at both the state and federal levels decided they no longer had to obey the Constitution and the Bill of Rights, the supreme laws of the land that supercede any other laws or mandates these power-hungry goons might try to impose. Americans obeyed this illegal power grab at first, though it was fundamentally illegal.
It appears that Americans today are no longer so willing to be so meek. In both St. Louis and Illinois they demonstrated that the abuse of power cannot work if no one do obeys.
It is time this point is made more clearly, by every American citizen to every petty dictator in office or in a bureaucracy nationwide. If you abuse your power we will not obey you. We will defy you, in increasing numbers. Or to put it another way, we need to take the advise of Matt Walsh, who when attacked for criticizing the purveyors of the queer agenda for their campaign to mutilate and castrate little kids, told them this:.
We all need to refuse to consent. Since politicians are nothing more than bullies, such defiance will quickly cause them to back off. Both Illinois and St. Louis this week clearly proved this.
The support of my readers through the years has given me the freedom and ability to analyze objectively the ongoing renaissance in space, as well as the cultural changes -- for good or ill -- that are happening across America. Four years ago, just before the 2020 election I wrote that Joe Biden's mental health was suspect. Only in this year has the propaganda mainstream media decided to recognize that basic fact.
Fourteen years ago I wrote that SLS and Orion were a bad ideas, a waste of money, would be years behind schedule, and better replaced by commercial private enterprise. Even today NASA and Congress refuse to recognize this reality.
In 2020 when the world panicked over COVID I wrote that the panic was unnecessary, that the virus was apparently simply a variation of the flu, that masks were not simply pointless but if worn incorrectly were a health threat, that the lockdowns were a disaster and did nothing to stop the spread of COVID. Only in the past year have some of our so-called experts in the health field have begun to recognize these facts.
Your help allows me to do this kind of intelligent analysis. I take no advertising or sponsors, so my reporting isn't influenced by donations by established space or drug companies. Instead, I rely entirely on donations and subscriptions from my readers, which gives me the freedom to write what I think, unencumbered by outside influences.
Please consider supporting my work here at Behind the Black.
You can support me either by giving a one-time contribution or a regular subscription. There are five ways of doing so:
1. Zelle: This is the only internet method that charges no fees. All you have to do is use the Zelle link at your internet bank and give my name and email address (zimmerman at nasw dot org). What you donate is what I get.
2. Patreon: Go to my website there and pick one of five monthly subscription amounts, or by making a one-time donation.
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5. Donate by check, payable to Robert Zimmerman and mailed to
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You can also support me by buying one of my books, as noted in the boxes interspersed throughout the webpage or shown in the menu above. And if you buy the books through the ebookit links, I get a larger cut and I get it sooner.
Bring a gun to a knife fight: For the first time since 2020, when state and federal governments nationwide decided the Constitution and Bill of Rights no longer applied to them and began imposing a whole range of abusive illegal regulations and lockdowns and mandates and blacklisting on Americans everywhere, we are now finally beginning to see some real push back from ordinary people, in ways that leave these tinpot dictators no choice but to back down.
Two examples in the past week. First in St. Louis the city government (controlled by radical leftist Democrats) decided it was time to institute a new panic over COVID, likely to give them the ability to once again easily manipulate voting in 2024, by instituting a new city mask mandate. Though it only recommended strongly that everyone wear masks everywhere, its director of health Matifadza Hlatshwayo Davis said that masks were required of government employees if they were indoors or in a car with another person.
Davis’s problem was that, unlike 2020, almost no one obeyed her demands.
[W]hile many employees at City Hall strapped the masks back on, many visitors did not, raising questions about the effectiveness of the new policy. Of the 10 people sitting outside the city assessor’s office around 3 p.m., for instance, just two people were wearing masks: an older woman and an assessor’s office employee.
At the same time, the Republican governor Mike Parson contacted the city’s mayor, leftist Tishaura Jones, to tell her to rethink this idiocy, noting that her health department had issued false information exaggerating the current health situation. It claimed that “hospitalizations [were] increasing by 38 percent over the past month (December)” when hospital systems themselves had found no increase at all.
Less than 24 hours later, the city backed down, cancelling the mandates on city employees. It had found that bullying only works when people obey you. If they defy you, you look weak instead of powerful, and so the mandates had to be deep-sixed.
Further defiance of government overreach was also seen this week in Illinois. In January 2023 the state government — entirely controlled by Democrats — had passed strict new gun control legislation that banned AR-15s and AK-47s as well as magazines capable of holding more than fifteen rounds. The law also required owners of these guns to register them with the state.
Gun owners who lawfully purchased affected weapons and magazines will have 300 days to register them with the state’s police. They will also be forced to restrict their use to a select few limited applications or face criminal penalties for continuing to possess them.
One year later, the Democrats in Illinois have discovered that the state’s citizens have told them to jump in a lake, with barely 1% of all owners registering, with some gun owners defiantly and publicly refusing to comply, while some of the state’s law enforcement officials stating unequivocally that they have no interest in enforcing the law.
The Sheriffs of roughly 80 Illinois counties vowed not to enforce the ban under most circumstances last January by issuing statements that like-minded law enforcement officials quickly adopted. “I, among many others, believe HB 5471 is a clear violation of the 2nd Amendment to the U.S. Constitution,” DuPage County Sheriff James Mendrick, whose jurisdiction is the second most populous in the state, said in a public letter a week after the law passed. “Therefore, as the custodian of the jail and the chief law enforcement official for DuPage County, neither myself nor my office will be checking to ensure that lawful gun owners register their weapons with the state, nor will we be arresting or housing law-abiding individuals that have been arrested solely with non-compliance of this Act.”
What the Democrats in the state legislature will do next is unclear. They have passed a law that they cannot enforce and that the state’s citizens are refusing to obey. If they don’t back down, it will undercut any future abuse of power they wish to impose.
The bottom line remains the same: Since 2020 too many government officials at both the state and federal levels decided they no longer had to obey the Constitution and the Bill of Rights, the supreme laws of the land that supercede any other laws or mandates these power-hungry goons might try to impose. Americans obeyed this illegal power grab at first, though it was fundamentally illegal.
It appears that Americans today are no longer so willing to be so meek. In both St. Louis and Illinois they demonstrated that the abuse of power cannot work if no one do obeys.
It is time this point is made more clearly, by every American citizen to every petty dictator in office or in a bureaucracy nationwide. If you abuse your power we will not obey you. We will defy you, in increasing numbers. Or to put it another way, we need to take the advise of Matt Walsh, who when attacked for criticizing the purveyors of the queer agenda for their campaign to mutilate and castrate little kids, told them this:.
We all need to refuse to consent. Since politicians are nothing more than bullies, such defiance will quickly cause them to back off. Both Illinois and St. Louis this week clearly proved this.
The support of my readers through the years has given me the freedom and ability to analyze objectively the ongoing renaissance in space, as well as the cultural changes -- for good or ill -- that are happening across America. Four years ago, just before the 2020 election I wrote that Joe Biden's mental health was suspect. Only in this year has the propaganda mainstream media decided to recognize that basic fact.
Fourteen years ago I wrote that SLS and Orion were a bad ideas, a waste of money, would be years behind schedule, and better replaced by commercial private enterprise. Even today NASA and Congress refuse to recognize this reality.
In 2020 when the world panicked over COVID I wrote that the panic was unnecessary, that the virus was apparently simply a variation of the flu, that masks were not simply pointless but if worn incorrectly were a health threat, that the lockdowns were a disaster and did nothing to stop the spread of COVID. Only in the past year have some of our so-called experts in the health field have begun to recognize these facts.
Your help allows me to do this kind of intelligent analysis. I take no advertising or sponsors, so my reporting isn't influenced by donations by established space or drug companies. Instead, I rely entirely on donations and subscriptions from my readers, which gives me the freedom to write what I think, unencumbered by outside influences.
Please consider supporting my work here at Behind the Black.
You can support me either by giving a one-time contribution or a regular subscription. There are five ways of doing so:
1. Zelle: This is the only internet method that charges no fees. All you have to do is use the Zelle link at your internet bank and give my name and email address (zimmerman at nasw dot org). What you donate is what I get.
2. Patreon: Go to my website there and pick one of five monthly subscription amounts, or by making a one-time donation.
3. A Paypal Donation:
5. Donate by check, payable to Robert Zimmerman and mailed to
Behind The Black
c/o Robert Zimmerman
P.O.Box 1262
Cortaro, AZ 85652
You can also support me by buying one of my books, as noted in the boxes interspersed throughout the webpage or shown in the menu above. And if you buy the books through the ebookit links, I get a larger cut and I get it sooner.
Good for Matt Walsh, and good for you, Robert.
The government is supposed to operate by the consent of the governed and by the rule of CONSTITUTIONAL laws, but we have tragically fallen away from this paradigm into a form of tyranny.
Without push-back, the oppression will only worsen.
I have two, related :
“”Always remember, the government and I do not care which party is in control of it has NEVER told you or anyone else the truth, not the real truth anyway. NEVER. And so, if “IT” is involved in some issue you must assume that there is something other ongoing related to power and control rather than the “truth” that “IT” proposes.”
You are going to have to read the entire thing and share it with a bewildered good friend or enemy………………”
ABOUT CLIMATE CHANGE: https://www.sigma3ioc.com/post/about-climate-change
NOT GOING TO WORK OUT WELL: https://www.sigma3ioc.com/post/not-going-to-work-out-well
I wanted to find out what “be forced to restrict their use to a select few limited applications” meant, so I read the bill.
Aside from being ridiculously multi-subject, I found these gems.
Much to my surprise, non-citizens are banned from getting this card (it’s far too fragmented to quote, here).
This is one of the criteria for the “red flag” law:
I can see a lawyer reading that as one must keep one’s spools of 3D printer plastic out of sight.
This seems more than a bit dubious:
The list here is basically the feature set of my Christmas present to myself!
For example: (vi) a shroud attached to the barrel or that partially or completely encircles the barrel
The list makes it up to XLIII. Isn’t there some language in a Supreme Court decision about not banning things in “common use”? A non-exhaustive list of 43 manufacturers seems a bit much for something that is “not common”.
Way down on page 98:
It’s all about “where”, not what you’re doing while there. The five point list is basically “private property” (assuming there are no publicly owned ranges).
I can’t find anything about “use” or “application”, but how many possible “uses” are there for a gun? I can think of three legitimate: Practice, Competition, Self-defense. And only one illegitimate: not-self-defense shooting of person. I suppose shooting the dying pet/farm-animal is another; legitimacy being in the eye of the beholder.
I have to share an experience:
I have conversations with some on the Left, and I asked one this question. And the response is very telling, pure Saul Alynski:
I ask after I sent them my SIGMA3 post the other day about illegal immigrants: https://www.sigma3ioc.com/post/not-going-to-work-out-well
Q: “If you could please explain why the border has been left wide open, what is the purpose?”
And if you have read anything I have posted on the subject you understand, and they understand that I have a pretty well developed sense of what is what. But you must be able to clearly explain your position and why you hold it. If not you are a drone.
A: “I did not entertain your premise because it begins in non-factual inflammatory language: “illegals”, which leads me to believe that the rest cannot be in good faith. ”
My simple response? OK.
I really am close to this person. And I fully understand that they are not equipped to actually answer my question, I understand that.
But there is nothing there, and that is very sad to me. I do not push it, but I do receive communications here and there asking question about a broad range of things including politics and I always answer as best as I can. And if I cannot I say, I do not know. Or I will look into it and get back to you.
But what is offered when cornered is very concerning to me. That is what makes me nervous, and I do not get nervous.
Texas, Florida and other red states should disqualify Biden from the presidential ballot due to his admin not faithfully executing the office of President of the United States by opening the borders to millions of illegal aliens.
Thought of this approach while watching the smug Peter Zeihan on YoutTube this morning. https://youtu.be/-uFjRZ5R5pU?si=3YSKRXKQphOZuZDV&t=127 He was discussing Colorado taking Trump off the ballot. He says “on the merits of the case I am not going to get involved because I am not a legal scholar…” Which is a cowardly dodge. But then he says, well under the Federal system the states control elections in their state. So if Colorado throws Trump off the ballot, the Feds have no legal right to object. Accepting this claim means that other states can also remove candidates from the presidential ballot.
Steve Richter,
That failure to faithfully execute our laws could – and should – be used as an article of impeachment. The Executive branch is required to uphold all the constitutional laws that are in place, even if it dislikes or disagrees with them. The deliberate failure to do this is a willful violation of Joe Biden’s responsibilities.
markedup2 re legitimate use cases:
AR style weapons make really great hunting guns. Many hunters in my state, and our neighboring Illinois, do this every year.
Trent
At least fourteen states consider ARs in .223 Caliber to be to light a round thus illegal to hunt deer with, not powerful enough.
The Doors
“Peace Frog” (1970)
https://youtu.be/5_E3C7sMrOk
(3:00)
Good.
They’ll learn what the word “resist” really means.
I believe similar non-compliance occurred in NY and CT after the registration laws passed in response to the Sandy Hook school shooting.
I also don’t expect civil disobedience to change the minds of the gun grabbers. They are as committed and biased as the Jim Crow advocates whose methods they copy. Rational argument with them is meaningless.
Civil disobedience is important, but as in the civil rights movement, it must be accompanied by an effort to change the hearts and minds of the public. That hasn’t been happening. Hopefully, with LaPierre stepping down, the turmoil within the NRA will subside, and they can refocus their efforts.
On masks
https://doi.org/10.1002/14651858.CD006207.pub6
“supersede”, not “supercede”. Everyone gets it wrong.
Alton:
This is true. However, the AR is just a platform, and it comes in many calibers.
https://palmettostatearmory.com/blog/a-guide-to-ar-15-calibers.html
Also, where I’m at we harvest all manner of creatures, even some we don’t use- my friend often blats coyotes on his property with his decked out .22 AR rifle. Although I suspect that’s more about popping off rounds and looking good doing it than practicality. :)
Minor edit in second paragraph before Matt Walsh: “cannot work if no one obeys.”
Buffalo Springfield
“For What It’s Worth” (1967)
https://youtu.be/gp5JCrSXkJY
(2:37)
the Constitution and the Bill of Rights, the supreme laws of the land that supercede any other laws or mandates
And this right here is the huge difference (aside from representational gov’t and federalism) is the essence of what is meant when we deride people for talking about “our democracy.” Those three things are what makes it a republic.
markedup2
January 8, 2024 at 1:13 pm
…how many possible “uses” are there for a gun? I can think of three legitimate: Practice, Competition, Self-defense.
Ironically, you forgot “hunting.” :)
Alton
January 8, 2024 at 6:19 pm
Trent
At least fourteen states consider ARs in .223 Caliber to be to light a round thus illegal to hunt deer with, not powerful enough.
Trent states “AR style weapons”. And they can come in a lot of calibers. In fact, I finished my .50 Beowulf AR last night. (Now I need to win the lotto so I can buy ammo for it. Yikes, is it expensive!) (But, that info is always helpful when arguing with someone about “That’s such an incredibly powerful weapon!”)
Cotour
January 8, 2024 at 1:28 pm
non-factual inflammatory language: “illegals”
Because they espouse the non-sequitur, “No human is illegal” I’m guessing. Which means they can’t even parse the English language properly. It is one of the hardest parts of re-evangelizing people to the proper mindset – that mangling of language the Progressives are so good at.
Lastly, I do agree with Matt Walsh, though not in that language (at least initially). I’ll start with “I cannot, I will not recant.”
FYSA, the “.50 Beowulf” is a trademark name, and you must pay Alexander Arms to license it. It is also known as 12.7×42 among those who do not want to add to the cost of their upper receivers or ammo. Ammo is about $2 a round.
GWB: Thanks for your response.
“that mangling of language the Progressives are so good at.”
They are good and practiced at it, but it is hollow.
And that level of dishonesty and self-delusion for their cause is what is so sad to me.
It is something that I do not respect with extreme prejudice.
I agree with Steve Richter and his assessment of;
“while watching the smug Peter Zeihan on YoutTube this morning“
Peter said “the states run the elections” in their own republic.
They do not, unless allowed.
He forgets that the states in the north willingly gave up their “individual independent status” in the Civil War and became known as “The Union” (Thought to be “temporary” under emergency orders for a “state of war”…
To this day, the first act of the president after being sworn in to office is to sign a “declaration of emergency” that has been renewed every four years since Abraham Lincoln… Whom was the first reluctant continental emperor)(look again at the Lincoln Memorial, what do you see?)
After the north conquered the south, the spoils of war goes to the victor, and the amendment in the Constitution they are illegally holding against Donald Trump is an example of legal restrictions placed on undesirable politicians. Similar to Texas, as an example, as a Conquered nation no longer has the right to leave the union if it votes to do so.
Likewise the flag of the United States was changed to reflect this “Federal supreme status” by placing a gold fringe around federal USA flags, even though it’s not part as our nations recognized colors. It means “Admiralty Law”.
There is a misconception that the Civil War was to “end slavery”… To the contrary, it turned all citizens into slaves, and there by the ability to tax and regulate us directly. (every citizen of this country is / was “sovereign” and bows to no one, every contribution or agreement by a citizen for the betterment of the community was freely given, or not)
Holding federal office means playing by their Federal rules. The states are regulated by federal jurisdiction to prevent “States rights” (seen as insurrection) which is no longer legal under the state of emergency in which all 50 states must bow before Washington DC. (The illusion of a republic where Rights and freedoms are allowed “with conditions” decided by of our kind benefactor, Uncle Sam.)
Many western Territory’s or states which were considered part of the “conquered slave states” wilderness territory had all open lands confiscated and managed by a federal BLM. Which still refuses to this day to give any land back to the states who should be running and governing their own land to their own benefit. (Utah wanted to mine coal and uranium near Bears Ears, and uranium near Grand Canyon Arizona… But the federal government turned it into federal parks shutting down all economic progress in the four corners area)
The current presidency, with “executive dictator actions”, bypassing Congress and the courts have made exceptions to the rule of law because ultimately ”they have the presumed right to do so” under emergency rule. All challenges to these actions have been ignored, all pretense of a republic (or a democracy) has been given up.
Words and phrases have lost their meaning, such as the “border is secure” when it obviously is not! or undermining civil society by “defunding the police” is so private army’s, can fill the void, working for semi public/private Stockholder corporations… such as tens of thousands of IRS agents outfitted in combat gear working for the private Federal Reserve… will now be the “new normal” in the collective formally known as the USA)
But “we the people” can only be pushed so far… when the federal government told us we no longer owned our own bodies (which ultimately is the only thing we do own) then it became apparent that the right to “life, liberty, and happiness” has been criminalized… they’ve gone to far and push back is for our very survival.