by Russell D. Longcore, DumpDC

My business expertise is in the Insurance Risk Management field. I consult individuals and businesses on the best ways to manage their risks. So, when considering the concepts of secession for US states, I look at their exposures to risk and the actions they can take to minimize their risks.

Here are just a few of the risk exposures that states and individuals face, and solutions to manage those risks in the best ways.

Monetary Collapse

The risk here is collapse of the dollar’s value, leaving anyone with dollar holdings and earnings with nearly worthless money. Add to that risk the precursor to collapse, which would be bank closings and suspension of credit card usage. A medium of exchange is necessary for commerce. If your medium of exchange becomes worthless, your ability to engage in commerce will rely only on barter. And, for most individuals, barter is a very limited medium of exchange. What would a normal city-dweller take to the grocer to exchange for food? You likely have nothing the grocer needs.

Article I, Section 8 of the US Constitution clearly states that the Congress shall have the power to “coin money, regulate the value thereof, and of foreign coin, and fix the standard of weights and measures.” Delegating this power to the Federal Reserve was unconstitutional. The word is “coin” money, a verb. That means minting coins, not printing paper currency. The printing of irredeemable paper currency without underlying precious metal value is counterfeiting.

The US Congress has spent trillions of dollars of worthless paper money and taken on more trillions in debt. There is only one sure consequence of counterfeiting, and that is the collapse of the monetary system. Eventually, the money will become worthless. But before that occurs, the money will go through a period of massive inflation. It will look as though prices for goods and services are skyrocketing, but that is simply the way that inflation manifests itself in the marketplace. Today it takes a dollar to buy what a five-cent-piece would buy in the 1930s. The dollar’s value has diminished by 95% in that time. That also means that a person earning $100,000 in today’s money could have lived the same standard of living in 1930 for $5,000.

The nations of the world made the gold-backed dollar the reserve currency for the world. A “reserve” currency means that every nation agreed to accept dollars in payment of debts. But now that the dollar has no real value, the world is forsaking the dollar as reserve. The world looks into America’s future and sees no willingness toward fiscal responsibility or even the resolve to support the value of the dollar. Eventually the world will supplant the dollar with another reserve currency. When other nations are unwilling to accept dollars, any remaining value in American dollars will vanish.

A sub-risk in this topic is the timing and procedure used by the nations of the world as they move away from dollars. To prevent a worldwide collapse of the financial system, all nations must make perfectly-timed decisions relating to divesting themselves of American debt securities. Statistically, the chance for a mistake in timing among the nations of the world is extremely high. That means that collapse could happen very suddenly and without warning.

Monetary collapse in the United States is unavoidable. There is nothing that Washington is willing to do to avert the disaster. There is nothing that Washington could do to avert the disaster. They have already gone over the cliff. They simply haven’t hit bottom yet.

Any new nation that replicates US monetary policy will suffer the same consequences over time. A new nation that establishes a gold and silver-backed monetary system, in which gold and silver coins are the only true money, will thrive.

A new nation has only two choices for a new monetary system. Choice One is a gold and silver standard, sound money, no inflation and no debt. Choice Two is counterfeit currency, fractional reserve banking and loans from the International Monetary Fund to operate. Choice One guarantees liberty. Choice Two guarantees financial slavery.

A state that secedes from the Union to form a new nation must establish their monetary system before they do anything else. All private, public and commercial exchange, and the viability of the new nation will turn on this one decision.

Taxation

The risk here is ever-increasing taxation to levels that are unsustainable, reducing citizens to serfs and state property.

Americans are taxed in every way possible. There are personal income taxes, business income taxes, capital gains taxes, inheritance taxes, user fees, property taxes, license fees, sales taxes, Social Security and Medicare taxes and many others. The Federal tax code runs into the thousands of pages, and is so complicated that even the IRS cannot agree on the meaning of the code. The Federal Government has cleverly required employers to collect taxes at the paycheck level, making American employers the tax collectors for the Feds. But this also has the effect of making people seemingly unaware of the total tax burden confiscated from them. The concept of voluntary taxation is pure fiction.

In a new nation, all of the US Federal taxation would cease. Not one more dollar would flow to Washington. Hundreds of billions of dollars would not be extracted by force from individuals in the new nation and sent to Washington. Every individual and business that earns income would immediately begin receiving the gross amount of their earnings. So, if your weekly salary was $1,000, your paycheck would be for $1,000. Imagine that!

The method of taxation that carries the lowest risk of abuse, and the highest levels of individual liberty is the national sales tax. A new nation could opt for no income tax, which would mean no income tax withholding. A new nation could raise their revenue from only sales tax, rather than a mix of taxation schemes. A national sales tax pulls revenue from all commerce in the new nation, not just citizens. Property taxes could be entirely abandoned as a taxation scheme. The only tax code that would exist is the codification of the sales tax. There would be no other code necessary, no individual tax filings, no tax liens, no tax foreclosures. There would be no deductions and no tax-exempt organizations. The new national sales tax could be divided among the counties and cities as needed.

Voter Fraud

The risk here is that when voting cannot be determined to be accurate, confidence in the outcome of an election or referendum vanishes. In addition, this means that voting outcomes can be manipulated. In America, voting has become an anachronistic relic, and only serves to placate the populace and deceive them into believing that their vote counts for something.

It has been proven over the last 10-15 years that electronic voting machines are wholly unreliable and that their systems can be hacked to change voting outcomes. Therefore, when voting outcomes can be rigged, all elections and referendums are subject to suspicion. This happens from the highest office to the lowest, and in every referendum. The only way to alleviate this problem is through a physical ballot system, which can be counted and verified.

A new nation will have the ability to organize the new government any way it wishes to protect the integrity of the voting process.

US Debt Level

The risk here is bankruptcy and dissolution of the US Federal Government.

The US debt is almost unknowable. There are so many spending programs that are not considered in Generally Acceptable Accounting Principles (GAAP) on government books that the brightest minds cannot know the total amount of Congressional spending. Congress increases the so-called debt ceiling in every session of Congress, recognizing absolutely no restraint on their ability to spend.

A new nation will instantly forsake the US debt, leaving Washington and the remaining United States to fend for themselves. The new nation plots its new course with no debt.

Regulation

The risk here is that unconstitutional Federal regulations stifle human behavior and commerce, steal individual rights and liberty, and make good governance impossible.

There is not one second of any 24-hour period in which an American citizen is not regulated by some law. There is not one human act that an American citizen can do that is not regulated by some Federal law. Even thoughts are regulated in today’s America when you consider hate crimes laws on the books.

A new nation would start with no burdensome regulations. This would allow maximum freedom for the individual.

Health Care

The risk here is that health care in the USA has been regulated so much by the Federal Government that it is becoming unmanageable. The unconstitutional health care legislation currently being negotiated in Congress will add thousands more pages to Federal regulations, and make matters worse for individuals and insurance companies.

A new nation will have no health care system. But if the citizens of the new nation decided that they wanted to spend their own money on a national healthcare system, they could do so with only their own resolve and funds.

War and Defense Spending

The risk here is that America is experiencing negative outcomes from its foreign policy decisions, which are carried out by the military.

Any military action done outside the borders of the United States is an offensive action. You cannot defend your country by attacking another on their soil. Defense means to defend, to repel, to thwart attack. Maintaining military bases on foreign soil is unconstitutional and costly.

The defense budget for the United States has become so large that it can scarcely be controlled. And it’s more than just prosecuting foreign wars that runs up the cost. Hundreds of billions are spent annually for new weapons systems that are unnecessary, as well as maintaining the existing weapons systems. Every one of the 50 states has either a military base or businesses that help produce military goods…or both. The Department of Defense cleverly planned it that way so that cutbacks would be very unpopular and difficult to achieve.

In a new nation, properly organized, there would be no standing army, but a citizen militia, just like each state had in 1776. A new nation would walk away from the gigantic defense budget of the USA. If a new nation wanted new weapons systems, it would have to look to its founding documents for authority, then pay for the new toys itself.

Social Programs

Over time, Americans have had an intolerably heavy burden of social spending laid on their backs. Many programs are so deeply buried in the Federal budget that they are known only to the ones who benefit from them. Programs like farm subsidies, loan guarantees, and thousands of government grants given out to either promote or prevent certain human actions fill the various Cabinet-level agencies’ spending. We usually only discuss Social Security and Medicare, but think about obscure pork barrel projects. The long list of pet projects passed by Congress in a record deficit year includes $1.8 million to study why pigs smell. Other gems include $1.9 million for a water taxi in Connecticut, $3.8 million to preserve a baseball stadium in Detroit and $380,000 for a fairground in Kotzebue, Alaska, just above the Arctic Circle.

In a new nation, all of the criminal, unconstitutional spending done by all the 50 states vanishes overnight. The new nation is free from the burden of contributing their hard-earned money to waste and fraud.

Education

The risk under consideration is whether the state has an obligation to educate its citizens or not. If the new nation decides to fund education, it must collect more taxes from the people residing in the new nation. If it decides to forego compulsory education and allow parents to educate their own children and themselves, the new nation will allow for maximum individual liberty and responsibility.

Immigration

The risk in immigration is normally the strain it places on government services. But a new nation, properly organized and formed, would turn the immigration question on its head, and make many of the immigration concerns irrelevant.

If the new nation adopted the “corporation model,” no immigrant could gain citizenship without a procedure of some sort. No children born of immigrants would achieve automatic citizenship. If the new nation resisted the Siren’s song to pay welfare benefits, there would be no drain on the coffers of the new nation. The free marketplace would handle the influx of new individuals coming to the new nation to live. They would have to work and earn income, or leave the way they came. The new nation could also use its citizenship as an incentive to attract the most talented immigrants from around the world. Prices for goods, services, food and housing would accurately reflect supply and demand and directly affect immigration. Said another way, why would you immigrate to the new nation if you could not find work, housing, food, and you knew there were no welfare benefits? But if work, housing and food were available, the immigrant would contribute to the new society.

Constitutional Governance

I left this point until last to emphasize the greatest risk of all. The risk here is how to prevent fraud. The US Constitution is a mere compact between parties, and it cannot bind any two parties into a legal contract. Consequently, the US Federal Government can enact any legislation it pleases and spend any money it pleases in any manner it pleases. It truly answers to no one but itself. So the general understanding of constitutional law is misleading. My points listed above that direct your attention to the US Constitution are true, but the fact that the Constitution has no authority makes many of the arguments moot. It does not, however, diminish the risk for a seceding state. If anything, it increases the political risk. Any new government not founded on contract law is less than a gentlemen’s agreement affirmed with a handshake.

A new nation would have the opportunity to create a new form of government that is actually a legal contract between all parties. The new government could be structured like a corporation. Each person who wanted citizenship would be required to execute a legal contract. No one would be automatically born into citizenship, but would have to attain the age of majority before becoming eligible for citizenship. Stock and voting rights would be issued to each citizen.

Conclusion

The overall recognition of risk found in this article is that a government not strictly limited cannot be controlled, and in such nations, individual liberty is lost.

But a government strictly limited in authority and scope can be successfully managed with the goals to “establish justice, insure domestic tranquility, provide for the common defense, promote the general welfare and secure the blessings of liberty to ourselves and our posterity” (excerpted from the Preamble of the US Constitution). The founding documents for the new nation must be enforceable, and the corporation model would provide for this enforceability.

Try to envision yourself and your family in a new nation created by secession. All the people you meet are excited and breathless in their anticipation of the future. The general opinion of the populace is pure unbridled optimism. The new nation’s economy is booming, the money is backed by gold and silver, and there is no inflation. “Now Hiring” signs are in all the shop windows. The newspaper’s “Help Wanted” ads are packed full. Prices for goods and services are low, and the stores are loaded with goods. Manufacturers are streaming into the new nation to take advantage of the rare pro-business atmosphere. Wages are climbing steadily in manufacturing jobs as companies compete for the best and brightest to be their employees. New businesses are being created at a fever pace. Residential and commercial construction is at a high level to meet the demand of the new residents.

All because one state recognized this historic opportunity and chased the dream of liberty through the process of state secession.

Secession is the hope for mankind. Who will be first?

DumpDC. Six Letters That Can Change History.

© Copyright 2010, Russell D. Longcore. Permission to reprint in whole or in part is gladly granted, provided full credit is given.

by Russel D. Longcore, DumpDC

“But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such government, and to provide new guards for their future security.” Thomas Jefferson, Declaration of Independence, 1776

Jefferson wrote that the People had a duty to “throw off” a despotic government.

“Throw off.”

That sounds to me like a somewhat unfriendly separation. It doesn’t sound particularly cordial. It also makes me think that the throwee ain’t exactly thrilled about getting thrown off and might take exception to the decision of the throwers.

The quote above is only once sentence from the Declaration of Independence. But it is one of the most seminal thoughts and principles of the document. Let’s take it apart and consider its words, their meanings, and the consequences.

“…A long train of abuses and usurpations…” In 1776 that was the caprice of King George III as he and his Parliament created laws that affected the colonies in ways that did not affect any other Englishmen. Those laws included the Stamp Act, various taxes and tariffs, prohibitions on imports and exports, more and more taxes, Redcoats patrolling American streets, the suspension of habeas corpus, and requiring those charged with crimes to travel back to England for trial.

Today, Washington has ignored the strictures of the Constitution of the United States, and has done so for over a hundred years.

It violates the First Amendment. There are plenty of laws that abridge free speech, not the least of which is the Patriot Act.

It violates the Second Amendment by enacting laws and regulations infringing on the rights of the people to keep and bear arms, simultaneously destroying the militia and making citizens less safe and states less secure.

It violates the Fourth Amendment through internet surveillance, airport searches and warrantless searches.

It violates the Fifth Amendment by rendition of American citizens without due process and IRS double jeopardy prosecutions. You also are compelled to be a witness against yourself every time you sign your tax return.

It violates the Sixth Amendment as no one gets a speedy trial.

It violates the Seventh Amendment when it does not protect the right to jury trial, but allows judges or administrative bodies to adjudicate cases.

It violates the Eighth Amendment as excessive bails and fines are imposed regularly.

It violates the Ninth Amendment as it ignores certain rights retained by the People.

It violates the Tenth Amendment by accruing to itself powers not delegated to it, and others reserved to the States and the People.

Need I go on? There are seventeen more Amendments.

“…pursuing invariably the same object…” What was that object? The object was to milk the maximum revenue from the colonies as possible. England had won the Seven Years War from 1756 to 1763 and were heavily saddled with war debt. So the more taxes and tariffs that King George laid on the colonies, the more the colonists rebelled. Then, the King made still more laws to bring the rebels to heel.

Washington’s object today is much the same. It has a crushing war debt as well as a crushing domestic debt load. Then add the mind-boggling financial liabilities, like Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid, Freddie Mac and Fanny Mae and the total comprises nearly 1000% more than the entire Gross Domestic Product of the USA. Then consider the ramifications of laws like The Patriot Act.

“…evinces a design to reduce them under absolute despotism…”To evince is to show clearly. Colonists could see clearly that King George’s taxes and laws, designed only for the colonies, were a design to reduce their rights as free Englishmen and confiscate their wealth without due process.

Today’s long train of abuses and usurpations coming from Washington evince a design to accomplish the same objects by turning the Constitution on its head. The Federal Government of the USA started with very limited roles and clear restrictions. Washington’s design has been to acknowledge no restrictions on its power and to accomplish anything it desires.

“…it is their right, it is their duty…” American citizens may have rights that they do not exercise. But that is different than duty. Many Americans consider that military service is a duty, and there is nothing in the Constitution that states anything of the sort. But find me a person who argues with the content of the Declaration of Independence. If you run into a person who is against secession, show them the Declaration and see what they do with fulfilling their duty.

“…to throw off such government…” The process of state nullification does not throw off government. It merely attempts to control the actions of the government, and to nullify its unconstitutional laws while staying a part of the whole. Throwing off such government can only mean secession, which is the act of withdrawing formally from the United States of America.

“…and to provide new guards for their future security.” To explain this, we return to the Declaration for another quote: “whenever any form of government becomes destructive to these ends, it is the right of the people to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their safety and happiness.”

For the People to provide new guards for their future security can only mean to institute new government. That precludes and omits any continuing relationship with the old government.

That means secession.

State secession is the only reasonable, logical and pragmatic solution to overcome the absolute despotism and criminal tyranny pouring out of Washington, DC.

DumpDC. Six Letters That Can Change History.

© Copyright 2009, Russell D. Longcore. Permission to reprint in whole or in part is gladly granted, provided full credit is given.

by Russel D. Longcore

“God grants liberty only to those who love it, and are always ready to guard and defend it.” ~ Daniel Webster (1834)

“Eternal vigilance is the price of liberty.” ~ Wendell Phillips (1811–1884)

I’ve just finished reading the book Constitutional Homeland Security, Volume 1: The Nation in Arms, by Edwin Vieira, Jr., Ph.D., J.D.

This is the definitive book on (1) how every American State has forsaken its DUTY to maintain a Militia, that force that is “necessary to the security of a Free State,” (2) how states can revitalize their Militias, and (3) how Citizen’s Homeland Security Associations (CHSA) may be organized.

This book should be read by every State governor and every State legislator in the USA. But it should be read by every citizen that desires liberty…true liberty in their lifetime.

“They that can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety.” ~ Benjamin Franklin

Vieira devotes five of the twelve chapters in the book to the formation and operation of the CHSAs. He contends that a program of public education be instituted to inform the public of the necessity of state militias.

Citizen’s Homeland Security Associations are completely different than the “Committees of Safety” of old. The CHSA is a grass-roots organization that will build awareness in the populace in anticipation of the formation of the Committees of Safety and legislative action on re-forming state Militias.

The original Committees of Safety were composed of actual members of the States’ legislatures, recognized activists and other leaders within the States…who were appointed to theCommittees by the legislatures, to serve as the legislatures’ agents and advisors, and to carry on the legislatures’ work during recesses. The Committees were never independent of the legislatures, and never carried out any plans that were not approved by the legislatures.

The chief concern of the Committees was the safety of the public: “to put the territory under their supervision in a state of defense and maintain it there effectively.”¹

The author wrote this book in 2007, and mentions that we don’t have much time to reinstitute militias in the states before societal events begin to occur that will throw America into chaos. It’s now almost three years since publication, and many of the events have taken place, while more events loom just over the horizon.

We can thank the government schools of the entire United States for the dearth of knowledge in the populace about the Constitution and the necessity of the State Militias. But what could we really expect? The very Federal government that benefits from the LACK of militias could hardly be expected to promote a concept that would diminish their power. Still, remember that the Federal Department of Education did not exist before 1980.

“Those who have been once intoxicated with power and have derived any kind of emolument from it can never willingly abandon it.” ~ Edmund Burke

So, what of the states? Education has always been a state issue. Can you think of any reasons that states would shrink from their obligation under their own state Constitutions to maintain a state militia?

How about these?

(1) State legislators and governors view themselves as servants of Washington.

(2) Maintaining a state militia is expensive. The money could be used for other purposes that would make more voters happier.

(3) Nearly 150 years have passed since the War of Northern Aggression, in which Lincoln called up the state militias to invade the Confederate States of America. So generations of state legislators have not seen a need for militias.

(4) Besides, states have a National Guard, don’t they? What’s the difference?

I’m sure there are others, but those reasons should do for now.

“Liberty cannot be preserved without a general knowledge among the people.” ~ John Adams

Here are some of my own thoughts on secession and state militias.

1. Any individual who has reached the age of majority in the United States who does not own a firearm has accepted the position that they have no duty to be a part of the well-regulated Militia that is NECESSARY for the security of a Free State.

2. Any state of the fifty states that comprise the United States of America that either has enacted or will enact any legislation that infringes on the individual right to keep and bear arms has accepted the position that a well-regulated Militia is NOT NECESSARY for the security of a Free State. That state government is an enemy to liberty and a lackey of Washington.

Patrick Henry did not say “Give me safety and security or give me death.”

3. There is seemingly very little interest in the general populace or the state governments to revitalize state militias. But there is interest coming from a restless citizenry about state secession. We must tie the two together into an inseparable bundle, as one relies upon the other.

4. Here is a forecast of how secession and militias will likely play out.

a. Economic meltdown, bank holidays, hyperinflation

b. Societal chaos, riots, rampant crime

c. Washington declares martial law and tries to clamp down

d. The grave crisis jolts states out of their slumber, and secessions begin

e. States NOW begin reformulating their militias

f. The citizenry, in full panic mode, get very focused on liberty issues

g. The United States goes the way of the Soviet Union and dissolves

This is an extremely exciting time in which to live in America. The people of the nation have been lulled to sleep over generations. The tyranny laid upon them is destructive, and any type of destructive force is based in low energy. Happily, freedom and liberty are creative forces of a very high energy level. Just like light dispels darkness, so too will liberty eventually win over tyranny. People will be drawn to the energy of liberty.

You can find Dr. Vieira’s book at Amazon.com.

“The tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time with the blood of patriots and tyrants. … God forbid we should ever be twenty years without such a rebellion; what country can preserve its liberties if their rulers are not warned from time to time that their people preserve the spirit of resistance?  Let them take arms.” ~ Thomas Jefferson, 1787

¹Agnes Hunt, The Provincial Committees of Safety of the American Revolution (Cleveland, Ohio: Western Reserve University, 1904), at 161.

by Russel D. Longcore, DumpDC

In the 6th Century BC, Chinese warrior Sun Tzu wrote “The Art of War.”It has been the definitive treatise on waging war for 26 centuries now. Only thirteen chapters, it was translated first in 1782 when a French Jesuit priest living in China, Joseph Amiot, acquired a copy of it, and translated it into French. Subsequent translations have honed the text into English.

The book is available for free through The Gutenberg Project at: The Art of War I strongly recommend this short read, as the truth can be used in many areas of human interaction.

For this article, I shall concentrate on his writings about waging war by deception. Here are some of his thoughts.

Chapter 1:18 All war is based on deception.
Chapter 2:2 Supreme excellence consists in breaking the
enemy’s resistance without fighting.
Chapter 2:18 If you know the enemy and know
yourself, you need not fear the result of a hundred battles. If
you know yourself but not the enemy, for every victory gained you
will also suffer a defeat.
Chapter 6:8 That general is skillful in attack whose opponent
does not know what to defend; and he is skillful in defense whose
opponent does not know what to attack.
Chapter 6:9 O divine art of subtlety and secrecy! Through you we
learn to be invisible, through you inaudible; and hence we can hold the enemy’s fate in our hands.
Chapter 6:12 If we do not wish to fight, we can prevent the enemy
from engaging us even though the lines of our encampment be
merely traced out on the ground. All we need do is to throw
something odd and unaccountable in his way.

The general concept that I want you to take away from these verses is that in order to win many battles, you must keep your enemy off balance, deceived and confused about your strategies and tactics. If you can attack him at many weak points, he will have to respond, and therefore, you control both the location and the tempo of the battle. This will be important in the thoughts and questions below.

I’ve been writing lately about secession and the well-regulated militia, and how they should be inextricably tied to one another. From the reactions I’m receiving from readers, this concept seems to be somewhat new to them.

Specifically, I and other writers have referred to the truest meaning of the Second Amendment to the United States Constitution, which states: “A well-regulated Militia being necessary to the security of a Free State, the right of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed.”

How many millions of words have been written about the Second Amendment?

Starting with the 1856 Dred Scott decision by the Supreme Court, to the National Firearms Act of 1934 and up to this day, Americans have seen infringement upon infringement piled upon them. But, do you remember in your lifetime hearing of ANY of those regulations that dealt with the security of a Free State?

Could it be that the arguments made over the last 150 years about gun control… the laws and regulations passed by states and the Federal government…and any talk about personal safety, crime prevention, hunting and sport shooting…have been a clever diversion away from the clear intention of the words of the Second Amendment?

Think about it from a purely tactical viewpoint. If you and I are in an argument about a certain topic, and I can get you to engage in a related topic that looks important, but completely diverts you from the real issue, I’ve won. I can drag you around by your nose ring for as long as you want to argue about what matters LEAST. Meanwhile, I can do pretty much what I want in regard to the real issue.

It is the same as General Tzu’s admonition to attack the enemy where he is weakest, combined with his recommendations to attack at multiple weak locations simultaneously. The enemy will expend itself defending its weak points while you conquer.

Isn’t this what Washington and most of the states have done? They have enacted gun legislation and regulations that force citizens to challenge them in the very courts that the tyrants control. Meanwhile, the politicians subtly changed our states and our nation.

The Second Amendment is the effort of the Founders to guarantee that the sovereign states would have a mechanism whereby the states might thwart Federal tyranny through armed resistance, if only as a last resort. Now, there is nothing in the Amendment about any “last resort.” Common sense dictates that all efforts to settle any difference would proceed peaceably first. And, when a well-regulated state militia is a day-to-day reality, it acts as a deterrent merely by its existence. Thugs seldom attack armed people.

Go ask Switzerland if a militia works. They haven’t been invaded in nearly 500 years.

Washington and the state legislatures have bleached out the reality of the well-regulated state militia from the American fabric. Meanwhile, Americans have been hoodwinked into fighting about whether or not they can carry a gun with or without a permit, or packing heat in a bar or restaurant. While those turf wars raged, Washington absorbed the sovereignty of the states, and made the states into serfdoms.

So, can you now see that because “A well-regulated Militia…is…necessary to the security of a Free State, the right of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed?”

States need to reclaim their sovereignty by revitalizing their state militias. Through the militia, states will once again gain their true freedom to regulate the Federal Government that once was their servant. And, in the failure of the exertion of state sovereignty to control the actions of Washington, the unhappy states may secede knowing that they are capable of defending their decision from all who would attempt to use force to prevent their exit.

DumpDC. Six Letters That Can Change History.

© Copyright 2009, Russell D. Longcore. Permission to reprint in whole or in part is gladly granted, provided full credit is given.

from DumpDC

Soviet President Mikhail Gorbachev, a real Communist in the country that was the laboratory of totalitarianism, faced secession issues in his nation about 20 years ago.

Saint Gorby?

Can the “wannabe Communists” in Washington learn from this historical example? More importantly, can WE draw some lessons from the secessions that occurred back then, and apply them to the USA today?For the sake of our own liberty, let’s try.

November 9, 2009, was the 20th anniversary of the 1989 “fall” of the Berlin Wall. What actually happened on that date twenty years ago was that the government of the German Democratic Republic announced that East Germans and West Germans would be allowed to visit each other freely. Throngs of East Germans climbed onto and crossed the wall. Over the next few weeks, people on both sides of the wall used sledge hammers to knock holes in the wall and topple large sections. Later, demolition crews removed most of the rest of the wall.

This event was a mind-blowing visual and emotional event worldwide, as we saw TV images of euphoric crowds celebrating, dancing and weeping at the Berlin Wall. Leonard Bernstein conducted a version of the Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony in Berlin during Christmas 1989, with the word “Freiheit” (“Freedom”) replacing “Freude” (“Joy”) in the “Ode to Joy”, to celebrate the fall of the Berlin Wall.

Few really believed that the Soviet Union would collapse after only 69 years of existence. The Soviets rivaled the USA in military might, and they were as imperialistic as the Americans, exporting Communism around the globe.

The images beamed around the world from the Berlin Wall were representative of what was happening in all 15 Soviet republics as their secession hastened the dissolution of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics.

Their Union unraveled, beginning in 1989 with the “glasnost” political reforms of Soviet President Mikhail Gorbachev. In 1990, newly-elected Russian President Boris Yeltsin led the Russian Congress to formally declare Russia’s sovereignty over its own territory, and began passing laws to supersede Soviet law. Russia was the largest republic in both territory and population in the Soviet Bloc.

But, Gorbachev and those in the Kremlin did not thwart the secessions. How could this have happened?

The USSR’s aggregate population in 1991 was around 293 million people. A national referendum was held on March 17, 1991, with the majority of the USSR’s population, in nine out of fifteen republics, voting for preservation of the Union. But it didn’t matter. After the attempted coup d’etat against Gorbachev in 1991, Yeltsin emerged as the strongman, and Latvia and Estonia declared their independence. The other republics joined the secessions soon thereafter.

How about military intervention? Lincoln did it in 1861.

Most of the Soviet armed forces were stationed in bases in Western Russia. That translates into a military force that was sometimes just hours away, and at the most a few days’ drive from their bases to the seceding republics. Plus, they had bases inside the borders of some republics. Gorbachev could have easily dispatched entire divisions of troops and tanks to seceding republics and inflicted heavy losses on civilian populations. And these troops were not involved in two wars outside their borders.

In January 1991, Gorbachev did indeed send some troops to Vilnius, Lithuania, to suppress secessionists, killing 14 civilians and injuring hundreds more. In July 1991, Russian OMON military police killed 7 Lithuanian servicemen. The USSR bore the weight of world criticism. But an authoritarian Communist leader does not refrain from the use of overwhelming force to put down secession simply because others object.

(Ironically, the USSR had their asses handed to them by the mujahidin of Afghanistan over a period of nine years. Many of those same Afghan fighters are handing the Americans their asses today.)

So in matters of military intervention to prevent secession, Gorbachev was less of a tyrant and totalitarian than Abraham Lincoln.

By December of 1991, the Soviet Union had ceased to exist.

Perhaps Mr. Gorbachev should be nominated for sainthood…or maybe a Nobel Peace Price. Oh, wait…he already got one of those in 1990.

This little bit of history should give secessionists all over America a boost in morale.

Consider these seven points:

1. The largest of the republics regained its sanity and seceded. That should give the Texas Nationalist Movement additional hope and perspective in their quest for a New Texas nation.

2. This event forever destroyed the “too-big-to-fail” theory. Said another way, the bigger they are, the harder they fall. Prior to collapse, the USSR had the second largest economy in the world after the USA. The Soviet economy was a centrally-planned disaster based on state ownership of industry and management of every facet of commerce. Washington is repeating the same central planning errors the Soviets could not make work. If the second largest world power in human history can dissolve in a matter of months, so can Number One when Number One is following the USSR’s exact footsteps.

3. Most of the people in the Soviet Union voted to maintain the Union, even though it had been the source of oppression and death for 69 years. That shows you how much suffering people will endure willingly…like sheep. That also shows you that the suffering masses desperately need moral leadership that is mostly non-existent in state houses and Washington.

4. Small republics like Latvia, Estonia, Belarus, Lithuania and the rest of the 15 republics became sovereign nations once more. They have thrived since. Small American states will also thrive when they take their places among the sovereign nations of the world.

5. The USSR dissolution started when the Soviet republics rejected national laws that conflicted with local laws. That’s Nullification. The republics also refused to pay tax revenue to the Moscow government. More Nullification. This caused havoc in Moscow. In the USA, 39 American states have enacted sovereignty resolutions that assert their 10th Amendment rights. The American states are on the right path. Now will they do the right thing? (see Cowardice In State Government

6. The greatest complication for the American Federal Government, far greater than any complication that befell the Soviet Union, is that the US Dollar is the world’s reserve currency…the Ruble wasn’t. The nations of the world are forsaking the dollar because of Washington’s criminal counterfeiting ways over the years. Just as creditors can force a corporation into bankruptcy, the nations of the world will force Washington into bankruptcy and eventually the USA will dissolve.

7. Perception is not reality. I remember watching an episode of “Buffy the Vampire Slayer,” in which Buffy and her cohorts were preparing to fight the Fear Demon, the most dreaded of them all. Finally they met face-to-face. When the Fear Demon presented himself, he turned out to be about twelve inches tall with a squeaky voice. But he had projected an image as an unholy terror. Once Buffy and friends actually saw their adversary, they dispatched him quickly….after deriding him with gales of laughter. The lesson? The few people at the top of the Soviet power structure, who looked like the biggest and baddest of bad guys, were seemingly powerless to stop secession. Et tu, Washington?

So the fall of the Berlin Wall was much more significant to your future than you ever realized. Don’t miss the valuable lessons here. Just because America doesn’t have a big concrete wall doesn’t mean that we don’t have barriers to liberty. Oppressive government must be summarily rejected…and laughed at, and free people have a duty to either alter or abolish it.

DumpDC. Six Letters That Can Change History.

I thank George Rizk who emailed me and suggested the idea for this article.

Copyright © 2009, Russell D. Longcore. Permission to reprint in whole or in part is gladly granted, provided full credit is given.