8/27/19: RED FLAGS OF FREEDUMB
RED FLAGS OF FREEDUMB
MONOLOGUE WRITTEN BY CLYDE LEWIS
In the political climate we find ourselves in, it is becoming very difficult to lift the veil of secrecy, peer under the rocks and pry into the business of the authorities without stepping on the toes of those who hold their identity politics close to their heart and their country at the bottom of their shoes.
Conspiracy theorists now get bad press only because when an open conspiracy is identified – there are people that don’t want to admit they are fooled and immediately say that what has been revealed is fake news or some other parroted cliché that has been created by the mainstream press.
I know from my experience as a conspiracy researcher that being the person to break the story can be far worse than the perpetrators of the so-called conspiracy or cover-up.
Mainly because conspiracies are aimed at politicians and organizations that have definitive political leanings and it has to be clear that a good analyst of conspiracy theories remains in the center.
It is easy for me because I am already detached from having some devotion to political groups that want me to be part of their group think rather than exposing them for the crooked manipulators they truly are.
True listeners of Ground Zero do not waste time trying to figure out if there are agendas to exposing treachery – the truth is far more valuable than remaining victimized by powerful individuals that abuse our freedoms and use trauma-based manipulation to create a problem that they already have the answer for something that has been developed in a think-tank that does not answer to the government which is for the people and by the people.
We are in the midst of what can be called a conspiracy domino effect of social engineering that will almost guarantee the cloaked enslavement of the American Republic. Once you are sure that there is one conspiracy to undermine our well-being we begin to see other conspiracies that tie into several neighboring conspiracy theories.
Pretty soon you begin to believe in many conspiracy theories because, quite frankly, the media has now been very good at not reporting what you really need to know and what they offer is their own bit of conspiracy spinning that is most certainly dividing the people and putting them in a position of overthink.
I think a lot of my approach to any conspiracy would be similar to what Robert Anton Wilson stated about such matters of treachery.
Wilson once said “just because you are paranoid doesn’t mean they are not out to get you” –and one of my favorite quotes “Is”, “is.” “is” — the idiocy of the word haunts me. If it were abolished, human thought might begin to make sense. I don’t know what anything “is”; I only know how it seems to me at this moment.
It was never a matter of what “is” or what “was” it is how it appears rather than say that something is something – you say that something appears to be something.
Well, it appears that we live in a free country and Trump has been declared a savior; something that the Right have no problem with and something that the Left wish to exploit as pure lunacy.
Of course, with all of the derangement comes the distraction determination to find something wrong with the President, even if it means undermining everything that we have fought for and cherished for over 200 years.
It is certainly not far-fetched to suggest that the elements within the government might be engaged in nefarious activities that run counter to the best interests of the American people; however, expressing this sentiment is certainly the precursor to thought crime that is actionable. It is just a matter of whether or not someone in a black suit wishes to pay you a visit when you say such things.
Oh, I can hear people say that saying something like that is simply alarmist.
If you have nothing to hide then why should you worry about the authorities with standard issue kicking in your door?
This attitude is pure and simple and attitude of acclimation. We are now engaged in a bit of Stockholm Syndrome with those who wish to take our freedoms away.
The big question that is never asked by the people or the media is how people can support the state when it is so obviously immoral and against the best interests of the vast majority of people.
One would expect, given all the terrible things that government has done, that people would be far more receptive to the idea of shrinking the size and scope of government, but suggestions of this nature are almost universally met with hate and vitriol.
Things like propaganda, forced and compulsory education and media manipulation can certainly explain part of it. However when you try to explain this to people it is like you are kicking their inner child – that inner child that still wants to believe that everything America was back then, is the same now.
The state has now become the ultimate father figure or Big Brother if you will.
Most people believe that the heads of state are certainly to be trusted and even politicians that sell you on socialism are not out to hurt them but to improve upon this life that we have here in America, forgetting that this life was all about securing the blessings of the liberty to ourselves and our posterity within the foundation of our Constitution.
Socialism to the young and progressives is like America in a chrysalis – once the changing takes place –we will be able to fly under a new flag, a new world, a new form of government.
How relieving is that?
All of the young and the progressives think that there is a world coming that is so utopian that we forget the dystopian models of surveillance and rights violations that are actually implemented in the process of this change.
Some Americans have now allowed themselves to be groomed into a kind of psychological defense mechanism, very much like what can be seen as Stockholm Syndrome where hostages come to identify with and have generally positive feelings towards their captors.
The name Stockholm Syndrome comes from an instance in 1973 where two bank robbers held several bank employees hostage in Stockholm. During the standoff, the hostages bonded with their captors and ultimately ended up defending their actions. In fact, they came to view the police as the ones who were acting dangerously, rather than the robbers who were holding them hostage.
An even more dramatic instance came one year later, with the abduction of Patricia Hearst. At the age of 19, she was kidnapped by a left-wing urban guerrilla movement called the Symbionese Liberation Army (SLA). They locked her in a closet, tortured, and occasionally raped her for several weeks. Just two months after her abduction, she was actively involved with the SLA and committed bank robberies with the organization. Despite opportunities to escape, she did not.
While Stockholm Syndrome may result in people behaving in seemingly irrational ways, it is actually a perfectly rational response to certain circumstances. When under the power of what can be seen as a violent, traumatic, and toxic environment, there are survival benefits to developing traits that would be pleasing to those who inflict the pain and trauma.
A more submissive and less antagonistic attitude may result in more favorable treatment.
Exposing the lie is often met with scorn and if you do, you have graduated from being a citizen to a belligerent combatant where red flags are raised as to what your overall attitude is and whether or not you will become a targeted individual.
Back in 2008, an Army War College report revealed that “widespread civil violence inside the United States would force the defense establishment to reorient priorities in extremis to defend basic domestic order and human security.” The 44-page report went on to warn that potential causes for such civil unrest could include another terrorist attack, “unforeseen economic collapse, loss of functioning political and legal order, purposeful domestic resistance or insurgency, pervasive public health emergencies, and catastrophic natural and human disasters.”
In 2009, reports by the Department of Homeland Security surfaced that labeled right-wing and left-wing activists and military veterans as extremists (a.k.a. terrorists) and called on the government to subject such targeted individuals to full-fledged pre-crime surveillance. Almost a decade later, after spending billions to fight terrorism, the DHS concluded that the greater threat is not ISIS but domestic right-wing extremism.
Meanwhile, the government has been amassing an arsenal of military weapons for use domestically and equipping and training their “troops” for war. Even government agencies with largely administrative functions such as the Food and Drug Administration, Department of Veterans Affairs, and the Smithsonian have been acquiring body armor, riot helmets and shields, cannon launchers and police firearms and ammunition. In fact, there are now at least 120,000 armed federal agents carrying such weapons who possess the power to arrest.
Rounding out this profit-driven campaign to turn American citizens into enemy combatants (and America into a battlefield) is a technology sector that has been colluding with the government to create a Big Brother that is all-knowing, all-seeing and inescapable. It’s not just the drones, fusion centers, license plate readers, stingray devices and the NSA that you have to worry about. You’re also being tracked by the black boxes in your cars, your cell phone, smart devices in your home, grocery loyalty cards, social media accounts, credit cards, streaming services such as Netflix, Amazon, and e-book reader accounts.
The proposal is part of an initiative to create a Health Advanced Research Projects Agency (HARPA), which would be located inside the Health and Human Services Department, the report notes, citing sources inside the administration. The new agency would have a separate budget and the president would be responsible for appointing its director.
HARPA would take after Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency, or DARPA, which serves as the research arm for the Pentagon. The idea was first crafted in 2017 but has since gotten a renewed push after mass shootings killed 31 people in El Paso, Texas, and Dayton, Ohio, in August.
The Suzanne Wright Foundation approached the president recently and proposed the agency include a project called Stopping Aberrant Fatal Events by Helping Overcome Mental Extremes, or Safe Home, the report notes, citing two people familiar with the matter.
President Donald Trump has a close relationship with Bob Wright, who founded the foundation after his wife died of cancer. Wright was a former chair of NBC and occupied that position while the president hosted “The Apprentice.”
Due to the recent mass shootings, there is a major push for so-called “Red Flag” gun laws at both the state and federal levels. These laws are the latest tool for gun control advocates to confiscate guns from people based upon only tips and suspicion. No crime has to be committed to trigger an investigation or confiscation.
Red Flag laws violate multiple rights protected by our Constitution.
However, there are those that push the limits and while thoughtcrime is an Orwellian concept, there are those who you may or may not approve of being arrested and detained by their attitude and the words they use.
The recent case of Brandon Wagshol and his dad illustrate what is in store for the future.
Brandon Wagshol wrote some vile racist and transphobic tweets. He also seemed to taunt the FBI in his tweets, which certainly isn’t the smartest thing in the world to do. That being said, holding bigoted views is not the same things as acting on those views. Voicing his bigoted opinions, while disgusting, is not a criminal act. The First Amendment protects his right to voice his hate in the same way that it protects flag burning. No one has to like it, but it’s not a criminal act.
Wagshol may also have been caught in a few lies made on Facebook. According to Norwalk Police Lt. Terry Blake:
“A Facebook page for the younger Wagshol said he was a former U.S. Marine and worked at the Department of Homeland Security as a janitor. Blake said both of these statements on Facebook are untrue.”
Wagshol also admitted to purchasing four 30-round magazines at a Bass Pro Shop in New Hampshire to circumvent Connecticut law limiting magazines to ten rounds. Wagshol is now facing four felony counts for possessing those magazines. Whether or not you support Connecticut’s ban on 30-round magazines, he will be found guilty under current CT law for possessing them.
Finally, Wagshol did admit to ordering a kit to build an AR. A lot of preppers and gun enthusiasts have done the exact same thing. That’s more than understandable with the government chomping at the bit to enact more gun control. Wagshol will likely be in legal trouble in CT for that too.
This is where a “concerned citizen” stepped in. Wagshol shared a meme on Facebook that someone found scary.
According to News12 Connecticut:
FBI investigators say the Norwalk Police Department received a tip about Wagshol’s activity from a concerned citizen. The joint investigation began after the FBI received a tip that Wagshol was trying to buy high capacity magazines from out of state.
Police say all the weapons recovered from the home are legally owned and registered to Wagshol’s father, but that the 22-year-old had access to them. Investigators also recovered body armor with a titanium plate, camouflage shirt, pant and belt, ballistic helmet, tactical gloves, camouflage bag and computers.
That’s right. The confiscated guns belong to his father. The son “had access” to them by living in the same house, but they are his father’s property. His father didn’t do anything wrong, but his property has been seized nonetheless.
This might be a good time to remind your own kids, both young and adult, to watch what they say on social media because it has real-world implications.
Red Flag Watches lead to thought crime arrests and confiscations. Pre-crime is not science fiction anymore.
What we have here is an angry young man who has run his mouth on social media combined with a general atmosphere of fear over mass shootings and firearms in general. Someone got freaked out and reported him under Connecticut “red flag” law.
He chose to violate the law and obtain banned magazines and a kit for a banned gun. These were only found during the confiscation, which was the result of a ruling that denied him and his father (who legally owned the guns) due process.
The confiscation violated multiple constitutionally-protected rights. Regardless of what is or isn’t constitutional, he’s still in jail.
While Wagshol is not at all a good guy, he still has civil rights which appear to have been violated.
Some will argue – for a good reason.
Again, this is acclimation because of trauma – rather than prosecuting a crime when committed they jail someone who they think is a potential criminal and confiscate the property of the father – there was no council and no due process.
The question is whether or not freedom is worthy of risk? Is freedom a death sentence? Is constitutional a right fallible and do we support draconian pre-crime laws?
Granted; what I gave you was an extreme case where a scumbag was apprehended and put in a cage where he won’t harm anyone but what about average people who probably have not even thought about the possibility of pushing on the system to deny them life, liberty, and property?
Well, many listeners of Ground Zero know that we reported that in 2013, China started its social credit system, coordinated by the Central Comprehensively Deepening Reforms Commission. What they’re planning to do by next year is to have a comprehensive credit system under one roof that will cover pretty much everything in the lives of its citizens.
You’ll be able to travel freely around the country and get into jobs that you want and live in better neighborhoods, and your kids will attend better schools. If you have bad social credit, you’ll be increasingly limited in where you can go and how comfortable your life is until you finally get yourself back in line with everyone else.
Our lives are now steeped in social media and corporations that leverage user-created content to make money. Instead of getting our news from trusted news agencies, we now get it from our echo chambers on Facebook. If we do want to explore past that, we get on Google and “fact-check.”
Now part of the problem here is that mass media news stations long ago stopped being news, and threw out their ethics in exchange for advertising revenue. It’s big business. However, it gets worse.
Both Facebook and Google have been caught censoring information that they deem not to their liking. Now, they’re both private companies and we don’t HAVE to use them, but they’re essentially monopolies that are allowed to exist. By dropping certain viewpoints lower down in the algorithm or even outright blocking them altogether, you now no longer get any sort of balanced view of the world. You start seeing things the way they want you to.
For quite a while now, we’ve gotten used to user-created credit systems such as Yelp and Amazon reviews. They’re very helpful with deciding what product to buy or service to use. They’re also very unreliable and easily faked.
This idea of reviews is being expanded to other systems. Uber allows you to review your driver so others can have a better ride experience or avoid someone who’s smelly or annoying. Airbnb lets you read about locations and owners to give you a better idea about what the stay will be like. Did you know that you’re also being evaluated when you use these services?
Uber allows drivers to rate their passengers. If your score drops to a certain point, Uber will ban you from using their system. Airbnb is even worse, stating with regard to banned accounts:
“This decision is irreversible and will affect any duplicated or future accounts. Please understand that we are not obligated to provide an explanation for the action taken against your account.”
They can ban you for life, with no explanation, and you have no recourse.
Earlier this year, New York’s Department of Financial Services stated in its guidelines that it will allow insurance companies to use non-traditional (which could potentially, and may even already include both social media posts and information from such places as Uber or Airbnb) to determine your risk and cost and the only stipulation is that they can’t use it specifically to target protected classes:
An insurer should not use an external data source, algorithm or predictive model for underwriting or rating purposes unless the insurer can establish that the data source does not use and is not based in any way on race, color, creed, national origin, status as a victim of domestic violence, past lawful travel, or sexual orientation in any manner, or any other protected class.
They added to that in a press release, stating:
“…insurers’ use of external data sources has the potential to benefit insurers and consumers alike by simplifying and expediting life insurance sales and underwriting processes. External data sources also have the potential to result in more accurate underwriting and pricing of life insurance.”
As these rating systems continue to be more pervasive, and as companies, agencies, and governments increasingly refer to these scores, they will continue to erode your freedoms and those freedoms could easily be constrained by someone with an agenda, purposely manipulating your score.
Because these systems aren’t regulated with any sort of effective oversight, they’re ripe for misuse and manipulation. No longer will you have protections against punishment for living the life you currently live or speaking out. Our laws that protect you against such invasions do not apply to this new de facto system of government that we’re allowing.
As we become more accustomed to this increasingly-aggregate score being allowed to affect our lives and our freedoms, we will be more willing to follow whatever guidelines are put in place to achieve higher scores, whether that be buying the right things, saying the right things, or even worse – not saying the wrong things.
As we see more value in these systems, we’ll not only stop fighting against them affecting our lives, we’ll soon beg for them.
Companies in the United States, and more specifically, Silicon Valley, are building a social credit system for individuals. Much like the social credit system communist China uses to control its population, this authoritarian control is different in one way: it is being done by corporations as opposed to the government.
Make no mistake though; the corporations building a social credit system in the U.S. are already another arm of the government.
China’s tyrannical social credit system is a technology-enabled, surveillance-based nationwide program designed to nudge citizens toward better behavior (or government-approved behavior). The ultimate goal is to “allow the trustworthy to roam everywhere under heaven while making it hard for the discredited to take a single step,” according to the Chinese government.
Our system in the United States begins with Red Flag laws and devolves into a database that rates your overall personality, your ability to pay bills on time, and your political affiliation.
Think about it – it is one thing to be called a white nationalist, or a black radical, or a domestic terrorist. Having that label put into a social credit database makes you a potential criminal and we now arrest people who are potential criminals.
While many United States citizens are disturbed by what they read about China’s social credit system, they need to realize that they live under a system that is similar. Such systems are not unique to China. In fact, a parallel system is developing in the United States, in part as the result of Silicon Valley and technology-industry user policies, and by surveillance of social media activity by private companies. Big Tech is helping advance totalitarian control over the population by censoring information they deem goes against the government’s agenda.
The New York State Department of Financial Services announced earlier this year that life insurance companies can base premiums on what they find in your social media posts. That Instagram pic showing you teasing a grizzly bear at Yellowstone with a beer in one hand, and a cigarette in your mouth, could cost you. So you can’t have a candid moment where you can joke around about being reckless – your insurance company will certainly see to it that your premiums go up.
An increasing number of societal “privileges” related to transportation, accommodations, communications, and the rates we pay for services (like insurance) are either controlled by technology companies or affected by how we use technology services all while Silicon Valley’s rules for being allowed to use their services are getting stricter.
All of the companies participating in these types of behavioral controls want one thing, and it’s the same thing the government wants: power over people.
