Hut! Hut! Hut! Heroes Seize “Non-Compliant” Land Rovers

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Apparently, old cars now threaten the “homeland” (every time I hear that word used I feel as though I’ve been inserted into a black and white movie from the ’30s about Nazi Germany and trench coat-wearing Gestapo agents…  then realize it’s our living color reality here, today). Land Rover Destruction

Anyhow, this couple in Statesville, N.C. got Hut! Hut! Hutted! by a gaggle of heimatsicherheitsdeinst (that’s “Homeland Security,” in the native tongue) agents on account of their possession of an old Land Rover Defender whose papieren were not in ordnung.

Bill and Jennifer Brinkley – along with about 40 others, maybe more – were SWAT-swarmed by the Hut! Hut! Hutters! – who stormed the property of these evildoers in order to protect the Homeland from dangerously “noncompliant” older vehicles.

“ICE (oy vey) Homeland Security Investigations special agents served court-ordered seizure warrants on approximately 40 Land Rovers in various locations around the country,” announced VIncent Picard of tough-guy acronymed ICE HSI. “The seizures were made pursuant to an ongoing criminal investigation involving the unlawful importation of vehicles from Great Britain… .”Hut hut 3

And here’s the punchline, folks – the thing to focus on:   “The Land Rovers, which do not meet federal safety or emissions standards, cannot be lawfully operated in the United States.”

Italics added.

Like VW – which was forced to stop selling the original Beetle in the land of the “free” back in the late 1970s – Land Rover had to stop selling the Defender 90 in the United States because it lacked the required cocoon of air bags, did not comply with rollover and other “safety” requirements.

1997 was the last year it was “legal” to sell a a new one in the heimat.

Now, it’s well-known that new cars must comply with all the orders of the riegierung. But what’s alarming here is the Hut! Hut! Hutting! of old cars.

The Brinkleys, for example, assumed they were ok because their Land Rover was more than 25 years old – and thus, ought to have been exempt – as an antique vehicle – from all the federal folderol. Ditto Danny Harrington of Albany, NY – who was also the object of a thug scrum over his possession of a 1983 model Land Rover 110.

1983 was 31 years ago.Homeland pic

That year, most new cars still came from the factory with carburetors – and none were required to have any air bags at all. Relative to now, both “safety” and “emissions” mandates were minimal. In any event, the deal to date has been that a given vehicle is only required to comply with the “safety” and “emissions” ukase in force at the time of its manufacture.

Not subsequent to its manufacture.

And that no matter when it was made, after a defined number of years elapse from the time of manufacture – 21-25 is the norm – a vehicle may be registered as an antique and at that point is exempted from both “safety” and “emissions” inspections. This grandfathering clause is part of what makes it feasible (that is, affordable) to keep decades’ old vehicles. No more worries about having to spend wads of cash to fix stuff that the owner doesn’t regard as worth fixing. For example, one could elect not to replace a faulty ABS pump (if the car had one) and just drive with normal (non-anti-lock) brakes. Or pull the fuse for the air bags, eliminating any threat that the 20-plus-year-old components might fail while you’re driving 65 MPH.

And it would be legal to do so.

What’s scary about this “ICE Homeland” Hut! Hut! Hutting! is that the vehicles seized were not new. Indeed, they appear to be very old – as in the case of both the Brinkleys’ and Danny Harrington’s Land Rovers. Harrington told a Jalopnik reporter that the M16-toting, body armor-clad Hut! Hut! Hutters! claimed his vehicle’s paperwork had been diddled with to make it appear older than it actually was. But Harrington insists his vehicle is “clearly a 1983” model, as evidenced by not just its condition – in Harrington’s own words, the truck was a “mess” in need of a major makeover – but also by its Vehicle Identification Number (VIN) as well as its ’80s-era equipment and trim.Hut 4

Regardless, it’s disturbing that the Hut! Hut! Hutters! were involved in this at all. When did sweating whether an old car has air bags and a catalytic converter become a matter of “homeland security”? Weren’t we assured that only evildoing terrists were the object of this exercise?

Mission creep, anyone?

And there’s the bigger worry – if you own an older car. It is that the regierung will announce that all vehicles must be “compliant” with current “safety” and “emissions” laws. No more exemptions. No more grandfathering. No matter how old the car happens to be.

It is not hard to imagine this happening.

Indeed, it is surprising it hasn’t already happened.old car pics

Any vehicle made prior to say 1990 or so – before the air bag mandate, when only a handful of cars had ABS or even four-wheel-disc brakes – is arguably (by Clover standards; see here for more) egregiously “unsafe”  . . . as measured against current standards. If it’s a federal case – literally – to buy/possess an older vehicle sans all the modern “safety” stuff, even if the vehicle was made decades before the “safety” stuff was more than a Cloveronian nocturnal emission  – then every old car (and owner thereof) is potentially a future target of a SWATfest by the Hut! Hut! Hutters.

Which, I suspect, is precisely what’s going to happen. The seizure at gunpoint of the Brinkleys’ (and Harrington’s) Land Rovers was the proverbial toe in the water. A test run. Let’s see how it feels – and see what happens. If people accept this, they’ll accept more of this.

Javol?

Keep in mind: The old car hobby is not what it used to be; it’s smaller – and it’s older (herewith my piece on that). And worst of all, the culture has shifted. Cry “safety” – and let slip the dogs of ICE Homeland.clover lead

Older vehicles without air bags, without computers (and most definitely without data recorders) are in the process of being anathematized. It is probably only a matter of time before they’re decreed “noncompliant” – and ushered to the crusher via the Hut! Hut! Hutters.

Throw it in the Woods?    

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46 COMMENTS

  1. Let me see now, tough old vehicles, capable of traversing pretty much any terrain, with no computers, or other electronics (so they’re EMP-proof). Reasonably good cargo capacity. Capable of being fixed with a hammer and some baling wire (OK, you’ll probably need a spanner or two, and a screwdriver for really advanced repairs). Ideal for a bugout truck.

    I can’t see any possible reason why TPTB would want to get them out of the public’s hands.

  2. After spending many hours in Land Rover Defenders in Africa, I came to appreciate what amazing trucks they are and spent four years looking for the perfect one for me. I spent 8 months renovating mine and we enjoyed driving it around town, it was never meant to be a vehicle to run down interstates in. I am still hopeful that when the judge reads our Motion to Dismiss that the trucks will be delivered back to their rightful owners. If not, then we all need to wake up and realize we are living in a different world. There is nothing hidden in the stories about these trucks being seized. It is as unbelievable as reported.

    • Hi Jennifer,

      Thanks for taking the time to post; I’m very sorry this has happened to you – and am extremely concerned that it may happen to many more people in the future.

      Please keep us posted!

  3. Well, they actually took a million miles in 1787 but nobody really noticed, except maybe the 1st United States Congress. It took a while for the presumed owners to be able to actually implement unlimited government, technology being the main limitation until the 1930’s or so. Lucky us, we have a ring side seat now to a fascinating time in history as the “owners” seek to rule over everyone not in their club.

    • Dear FA,

      Correct! That is the nature of so-called “limited government,” to take a mile when given an inch, until it becomes UNLIMITED GOVERNMENT.


  4. We have looked into the TARDIS and the TARDIS into us. We are the Bad Wolf. We create ourselves. We take the words…
    …We scatter them, in time and space. Messages, to lead us here. We will keep our Doctor safe. Protected from the false Gods: The Daleks. We can see the whole Matrix of Dalek time and space, every single atom of mechanistic existence, and we divide them. Everything will come to dust. Valar Dalek Morghulis . All things, everything dies. ‎

  5. eric, I meant to say after this post that I take an ebay eletter. Only a day or so after this happened they were pushing two other old Rovers as if nothing had happened. Hhhmmmmm! I hadn’t even been looking at vehicles so it didn’t make much sense to push things other than what I had been perusing unless they wanted to keep their sellers happy at the expense of buyers. After all, internet sales don’t necessarily have to be straight up, duplicity is often the name of the game.

    • Hi Eight,

      Yup.

      A secondary – but not insignificant – issue here is proportionality. While it may be true that “noncompliant” vehicles such as these Land Rovers don’t meet current emissions requirements, their emissions are negligible to the point of irrelevance. I mean, we’re talking about a literal handful of vehicles, probably none of which would be used as daily drivers. The majority are likely hobby vehicles (restoration projects, “classics,” etc.) or occasional use (who drives a 110 or Defender 90 as a daily driver?)

      As far as being “safety” noncompliant – well, you know my position on that. My “safety” is no one else’s business (except perhaps my wife’s or my mother’s). I reject out of hand that other people – that is, the government – has any call to dictate to me whether my car has air bags, ABS or any other such feature.

      I also believe that they are testing the waters; that they intend to apply the “noncompliant” rigmarole to older vehicles generally. The argument will be that they are “unsafe” – and that they “emit excessive pollution.” They will then require that all cars – no matter when they were made – comply with current (or recent or some high standard) of “safety” and “emissions.” Those that do not will be legislated off the roads, consigned to museum or static display only.

      I’ll bet you I’m right.

      • eric, I’d bet you’re right too. Banksters nor anyone else want us to save fuel, pollution or anything else if it involves not spending more money.

        I’ve never had anyone be able to relate to me how my slightly less polluting vehicle of 20 years old or so will be negated, pollution-wise, by the process it takes to build a new vehicle. It’s my contention, and only contention since I have neither the time nor inclination to waste on figuring what “emissions” and pollution are done in the name of a new vehicle but I can only guess it’s fairly significant, esp. in these times of so much “unobtanium” for electronics being mined in those countries that are “out of sight, out of mind” for the Prius-minded set. Most of us have seen pics of African and middle eastern countries where these metals are mined and they are horribly polluted, landscapes reminiscent of some horrible nightmare catastrophe caused by their out of control mining techniques. Just how “clean” is a Prius or other electric or semi-electric vehicles’ manufacturing trail?

        At least nowdays they’re collecting nearly every minute amount of gas coming from oil and gas wells and every drop of anything being pumped to the surface. I see large trucks now with signs on them saying they collect used anti-freeze, oil and other by-products of automotive use.

        I had an old college buddy take me to task last year for not driving a pissy Prius as he does and instead driving a Duramax with that stinky old diesel. Diesel stinks no more than gasoline and is much less polluting. I don’t even want to be near the manufacturing facility in some third world country where batteries are made. I’ve seen the videos and pollution from parts of China where they’re made and am mighty glad I don’t have to breathe that first hand “on site”. We ALL get to breathe it eventually. PC is killing us. It’s all a lie, no matter whether it’s environment or speech.

        Countless trucks out in the patch running all day long no matter what the throttle setting. When you shut one off heat builds up and stresses everything on it so what’s the point when you’re fueling or just pausing to load or unload? If I know it will be an hour or more, I’ll turn one off but much less than that and I’ll let ‘er run since I don’t want to get back into a rig that’s had heat buildup working on it and don’t want to get into a cab that’s been cooked from the underhood heat. Send all those prissy panted bureaucrats to Tx. and let them work in the heat all day and see if they’re getting high on roasting in a vehicle.

  6. This is something everyone here should act on. I received an email from Craig Rucker containing this:

    “By trying to redefine the “Waters of the United States,” the Obama administration is attempting to pull off a land grab of unprecedented proportions.

    But just in the last couple of weeks, more than 30,000 concerned citizens have signed CFACT’s petition telling the administration to “Ditch this Rule!”
    We need your help to reach thousands and thousands more.

    Please take a moment to contribute online to CFACT’s “Ditch the Rule” petition campaign.

    We now have less than 60 days to flood the offices of President Obama and the EPA on this outrageous water rule.

    Thank you in advance for your support!

    Craig Rucker

    Executive Director”

    Further info and ability to sign the petition is here:

    https://secure.giveworks.net/cfact/WOTUSPETITION2/HOU81914?utm_source=CFACT+Updates&utm_campaign=a0c180130a-Re_Fending_off_Obamas_climate_hype_5_13_2014&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_a28eaedb56-a0c180130a-269705705

  7. Papers? Ve need to see your papers!

    Gimme a 1953 DeSoto Firedome and I’m good to go. If gasoline and oil become a problem, I’ll saddle up and mosey on.

    It’s time to elect people who LISTEN to what we want them to do in Washington and the state houses—REDUCE THE SIZE OF GOVT AND ALL THE DAMN REGULATIONS!!!

  8. It truly is a shame the progressive era and the current technological age came about at the same time. Government apologists of course will say the two go hand in hand, but nothing could be further from the truth. The growth caused by the technological change masked the drag the government had on society and permitted a massive mismanagement of programs, capital and human potential.

    https://www.ted.com/talks/robert_gordon_the_death_of_innovation_the_end_of_growth

    The world shown to us by Dr. Gordon in the above TED talk has no room for waste by an unaccountable government sector, especially one that intentionally destroys working production. The sooner we realize the future cannot continue the growth seen in the last 100 years the sooner we will curtail wasteful progressive and socialistic governments.

  9. Rush was right….

    Not THAT Rush…..The AWESOME CANUCK’S!!!!

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FAvQSkK8Z8U

    “Red Barchetta”

    My uncle has a country place
    That no one knows about
    He says it used to be a farm
    Before the Motor Law
    And on Sundays I elude the eyes
    And hop the Turbine Freight
    To far outside the Wire
    Where my white-haired uncle waits

    Jump to the ground
    As the Turbo slows to cross the borderline
    Run like the wind
    As excitement shivers up and down my spine
    Down in his barn
    My uncle preserved for me an old machine
    For fifty odd years
    To keep it as new has been his dearest dream

    I strip away the old debris
    That hides a shining car
    A brilliant red Barchetta
    From a better vanished time
    I fire up the willing engine
    Responding with a roar
    Tires spitting gravel
    I commit my weekly crime

    Wind
    In my hair
    Shifting and drifting
    Mechanical music
    Adrenaline surge…

    Well-weathered leather
    Hot metal and oil
    The scented country air
    Sunlight on chrome
    The blur of the landscape
    Every nerve aware

    Suddenly ahead of me
    Across the mountainside
    A gleaming alloy air car
    Shoots towards me, two lanes wide
    I spin around with shrieking tires
    To run the deadly race
    Go screaming through the valley
    As another joins the chase

    Drive like the wind
    Straining the limits of machine and man
    Laughing out loud with fear and hope
    I’ve got a desperate plan
    At the one-lane bridge
    I leave the giants stranded at the riverside
    Race back to the farm
    To dream with my uncle at the fireside

  10. Think about all the resources used to build these perfectly good vehicles, all squandered for the sake of sociopathic power lust and control.

    As with so many other goonvermin actions, this just shows that all the rhetoric about conserving resources was always bullshit.

  11. RE: “It’s no wonder they come after you with such great gusto once your car’s “unregistered””

    With so many people saying the stock market and the economy are going to take a nose dive sometime fairly soon,… A Lot of people are going to be unable to pay for those registration fees.

    “They” say, The War Against Some Drugs is coming to an ENd. Problem is, what with all the infrastructure and equipment dedicated to fighting that war, it’s pretty good odds that equipment will be put to use in The Next war against ___ fill in the blank.

    Old cars? Gardens? Vitamins? Parenting without a license? …That sort of thing?

    All this makes it Really hard to be an optimist. Especially when you meet some of the young people so wrapped up and absorbed by their cell phone gadgets they can’t break away for a minute to deal with the here and the now,… sigh.

    • I worry that “relaxation” of drug laws will have a nasty side effect. Perhaps several.

      For instance, we already have roadside blood draws – justified (they say) because pot and other arbitrarily described “drugs” cannot be detected otherwise.

      And, take note: It is more of a hassle to get cold medicine these days than it is to get a baggie of pot!

      • Dunno how they justify roadside blood draws, considering many countries like Oz use saliva.

        In any case, inserting anything into a human body without consent is rape, in legal terms. Especially if they find nothing incriminating, a civil suit should be filed.

        • Agreed, Rev –

          However, the courts (here) have sanctified this as “legal.” It is being implemented in states across the country.

  12. You’re right Eric, it IS a test. It’s just a matter of time before they find further excuses to confiscate anything that’s registered.

    And that’s the entire problem.

    Regis = King. Once you register something, you no longer own it but merely become the registered keeper. The Powers That Be now actually own it and their policies (laws, rules, police = policy enforcers) can do with it whatever they like.

    It’s no wonder they come after you with such great gusto once your car’s “unregistered”, because they no longer have any rights to it. Of course they’ll bluff and lie, saying you’re a common criminal simply because of this “unregistered” thing and, try to force their policies upon you. If you acquiesce, then you’ve consented to their policies and they’ll do to you what any of them will do to any of their own children. You’re fucked – and it was your consent that allowed it.

    Don’t be fooled. You’re a Common Law nation. Under common law you have no requirement to stop for them, be forced to incriminate yourselves or to carry identification. They are a corporation and only corporations go to court, because every power they have is 2D on paper. The living, breathing Man is not your NAME – on paper.

    Remove all vestiges of connection to the state such as number and compliance plates. They didn’t have any in the horse and cart days unless you were using it “for hire”. Consider why a taxi is called a TAXi. Just because it’s far safer than a cart and mechanically powered, doesn’t mean they have any right to it, unless you register it with them.

    Then they have full control. They know where you live, what you own, how valuable it is and how to take it from you – for any reason they can dream up.

    Their policies are not yours. They create their own power and control over you to enrich themselves. Don’t consent. It’s your greatest weapon.

    • Hi Rev,

      Yup.

      As I see it, the game is on the verge of not being worth playing.

      The work-to-reward ratio has been in steady decline for most people for decades, but has tipped decisively for an increasing number since the bottom fell out in 2008. It’s bad enough (but still tolerable) when they take say 40 percent of your income, but the remainder is sufficient to provide for the necessities plus some extras. When you can still comfortable indulge occasionally. But what happens when your income drops by a third or more – and they’re still taking 40 percent? Or more? And when the cost of necessities – gas, for example – has doubled during the same time?

      All of a sudden, you find you’re working harder and longer for less and less. You don’t have time for much outside of work – and now sweat the cost of groceries. Indulgences are a memory. Your stuff has become a burden.

      I added it up recently.

      I own two trucks (both older, the newest a 2002 model) and five motorcycles (the newest a 2003 model). Even so, I am still paying about $60 a year each to maintain “registration.” That’s $420 annually. Add in yearly state “safety” inspections ($15 each) plus the rancid “personal property” tax my state levies (ranges from $70 per on the low end to $150 on the high end) and I’m easily hemorrhaging $1,000 a year just to maintain the fiction that I “own” my vehicles.

      Mind that this does not include insurance – which (legally) I am just as obliged to pay, though my money is filched for the benefit of a private mafia as opposed to the public one. If you include the cost to maintain insurance – and my costs are relatively low because I’m a married, middle-aged guy with a “clean” driving record, who owns older, paid-for vehicles and thus I can still choose a minimum-coverage/liability-only policy – that figure easily doubles.

      Now, factor in the cost of gasoline – which has doubled. And motor oil and so on.

      Owning (cough) a vehicle has become a pricey proposition.

      Is it any wonder people are beginning to abandon ship? In researching my pending book about the end of America’s love affair with the car, I found a very interesting statistic: An all-time record high percentage of young people in the 18-35 bracket have never had a driver’s license. This is truly a canary in the coal mine. Kids approaching 16 in prior times pined for the day when they could get their driver’s license – and their first car – almost as much as they ached to lose their virginity.

      Not anymore.

      And the reason why is obvious.

      Who wants to become a slave to a thing?

      They – TPTB – have systematically sucked the fun out of driving with their ridiculous laws and over-the-top punishments (see my recent piece about “reckless” driving) and their fees and taxes and mandates and so on have imposed stultifying costs that have made owning a car a 3,200 pound albatross of debt and expense that smarter people are beginning to realize just ain’t worth it.

      • The TPTB not only sucked the fun out, they’ve set up the younger generation to accept the big city transit lifestyle and then demand everyone else do the same. There are various websites with the content, for instance, one called streetsblog. There are others along the same ideas out there. Ideas readers here will recognize that fit a certain numbered agenda.

      • Thanks Eric, I didn’t think I’d elicit such a response from you, but it’s clear TPTB have been hitting a nerve over the last couple of decades.

        Here’s something interesting from Oz and New Zealand, where the tax office can’t define (in law) “income”, which could be chickens for example:

        http://www.investigatemagazine.com/FEB00%20Tax%20NZ.htm

        It seems personal tax is also voluntary. Best check your IRS to see if this is also reflected there. Excerpt from the page:

        The New Zealand tax inspector shook his head and blinked at the American grinning at him across the table. “What do you mean ‘it’s chickens!’?,” he sputtered. “What the hell have chickens got to do with it?”

        The American just smiled. “Well, you show me in the New Zealand Income Tax Act where it says that chickens are not a legal form of income. And seeing as my client didn’t earn any chickens last year, he doesn’t owe you any tax.”

        It’s an amusing diversion, and tax litigator Eddie Kahn (pron: Cain) has used it on a number of occasions with tax officials around the world. “It’s the same in the US,” he explains later, “because they don’t legally define income there either. What’s really funny about it is the agent will look at you in a state of shock, saying ‘no, it’s not chickens’, and I say ‘well how do you know it’s not chickens: you didn’t define it.’ You see, when they say ‘no it’s not’, then they are obligated to show you what it actually is. And they can’t, because it isn’t defined.”

  13. You’ll all remember Cash for Clunkers, and what a boom that was to the economy. Created an artificial shortage of used cars, driving up the prices while at the same time “encouraging” a run on new cars. Maybe this is a dry run for C4C II, where they come for the rest of them.

    And just when I started looking into buying an old RV, too.

  14. First it will be 30 year-old cars… then 20, 15, then 10. I suppose we can get by buying $5k cars every few years as our old ones pass their “safety and emission standards maturity date”. Their vehicle ownership/driving disincentives are being implemented in full force, with great success I would argue.

    Perhaps a market will arise from this. Garages that will upgrade your old car to meet current government safety and emission standards. For half the price of a new car!! Guaranteed legal for 5 years. Sure it won’t look or drive the same. Sure it’ll have OBD 4 with full tracking capabilities and 80 mph speed limiters, but at least you’ll get to pretend you’re driving a real car from the good ol days.

    • Then out in my part of the world everybody will be letting everyone else open and close their gates at will by proxy. We’ll be better neighbors(hopefully) because of it and we won’t have to use pubic roads to go anywhere. I see a fee schedule and my business pickup like crazy as I build roads for more private people just as I do now. We’ll even build them big rig proof if there’s enough demand(I mean high speed since big rigs can go fairly much anywhere).

      I know BrentP has a thing about big rigs but they pay out the wazoo and fairly much pay for the highways that exist. I wonder how many of you pull up to the pump sometimes as often as every day and pay…oh…..say…..an average, $7-800? And then have to pay the IRS road use fees? Sure, the big rigs eat up the road and so do all those slightly lesser vehicles but they’re all paying through the nose. I’d be fine with roads that disallowed 4 wheelers or even 6 wheelers. I’d be fine if only the rigs that could use these roads paid for them.

      Just today I was running a two lane road and my rev limiter screwed up and I found my self going 90 mph. Never happened before and hasn’t since….dammit. Sure people were in danger, everywhere the US is “bringing democracy to them” but not on the road I was on. The ground squirrels who have their homes in the middle of the highways might not account for that speed but they choose to play that game.

    • @Brandonjin

      That’s a scary but believable scenario. Cars are already turning into appliances, just like cell phones. I won’t be surprised if soon we have the following:
      a) cars designed to die within a few years
      b) cars capable of being monitored continuously for driving habits and location – manna for the insurance companies and fuzz
      c) “Upgrades” will be pushed automatically to the car software

  15. Father land insecurity is enforcing the law Mercedes Benz had created to prevent people from circumventing their marketing plans.

    What is claimed is that on one or more Defenders the importer did vin swaps. The government’s reaction is of course ‘one bad apple spoils the bunch’ so they seize them all. Of course if we use that logic wrt the government we are tin foil hat nutters. Go figure.

  16. As a younger (30) person, I grew up in the heyday the Japanese tuning boom. In Japan it is more economical to get rid of your slightly used 5 to 10 year old vehicle than to keep it running due to ridiculous required safety inspections. Its VERY rare for most Japanese vehicles to rack up 60k+ miles in their lifetime.

    Japanese domestic market vehicles (JDM) always were the best in regards to power/weight, engine technology and unique/sexy trims. The rest of the world (especially the US) got the watered down shit.

    In Australia, The UK and even Canada you can import these awesome, economical and low mileage vehicles within 5-10 years yet in the US we have to wait 25!!! These are cheap, fun and simple to work on vehicles that would be track driven and modified. Imagine all the jobs that would be created just from supplying parts for these vehicles…or repairs…or their role in introducing a whole new generation to the car hobby.

      • Correct. Even with the steering wheel on the wrong side and virtually none of the same safety mandates there has been no huge rise in traffic fatalities or injuries as a result.

        I guess postal workers are the only people in the US who are “qualified” to drive with the steering wheel on the wrong side of the vehicle.

  17. I said it before and I’ll say it again. You create a financial behemoth of heavily armed homeland forces but no war? The natural reaction is going to be productive to “prove” their usefulness, but how do you be productive in a peaceful society? You conduct raids 24-7 on everything. Do not call them police, they are an insult to the law enforcement community. There are just too many alphabet agencies competing for their spot on the government dole.

    • JoePA – “Don’t call them police.” But they ARE police. Have you looked at what the Ferguson PD is sporting? This is the standing army that the founder fathers fought against and warned about.
      I agree with you that the multiplication of alphabet agencies is part of the problem, but it’s not the whole problem.

      • Phillip. Ferguson PD has about 20 officers. Who those other officers are or where they are from is the question I ask myself. You are correct in their choice of weapons considering the violence does not appear to be coming from civilians. All this is speculation until a thorough investigation is done…..if its permitted that is.

        • Googling “Ferguson protesters voter registration” reveals about 13 million hits. The first 2 pages are copies of the same story about the Missouri GOP
          “official” who is complaining about it.

          Who are the other officers? Well, if some of them had Illinois driver’s licenses and happened to have a Chicago accent I wouldn’t be a bit surprised.

          Ready for Hitlery!

          • This is some more spooky stuff: “Well, if some of them had Illinois driver’s licenses and happened to have a Chicago accent […] Ready for Hitlery!”

  18. So the usual question: When?
    Why do we tolerate this, and when do we respond in kind?

    They mean to have a war.
    Give them the government they demand – give it to them good and hard, so hard the seventh son of their seventh son is born deformed – with our bootprint so emblazoned on it’s butt that it has dents on its forehead.

    Eternal vigilance – and ACTIONS to back up the vigilance, or we’re no different from Weimar Republic Germans, closing our eyes to reality.

    • “What surprised me at first was that most Germans, so far as I could see, did not seem to mind that their personal freedom had been taken away, that so much of their splendid culture was being destroyed and replaced with a mindless barbarism, or that their life and work were
      becoming regimented to a degree never before experienced even by a people accustomed for generations to a great deal of regimentation.

      One soon became aware, to be sure, that in the background there lurked the terror of the Gestapo and the fear of the concentration camp for those who got too far out of line… Yet the Nazi terror in those early years, I was beginning to see, affected the lives of relatively few Germans. The vast majority did not seem unduly concerned…. A newly arrived observer was forced, however reluctantly, as in my own case, to conclude that on the whole the people did not seem to feel that they were being cowed and held down by an unscrupulous tyranny. On the contrary, and much to my surprise, they appeared to support it with genuine enthusiasm… ”

      [ – William L. Shirer, “Nightmare Years: 1930 – 1940 ]

      • Not the best possible version, but…
        Stop me if you’ve heard this one before…

        http://eleaston.com/chicken.html

        Like a certain speech in, “The American President:”

        Lewis Rothschild: They don’t have a choice! Bob Rumson is the only one doing the talking! People want leadership, Mr. President, and in the absence of genuine leadership, they’ll listen to anyone who steps up to the microphone. They want leadership. They’re so thirsty for it they’ll crawl through the desert toward a mirage, and when they discover there’s no water, they’ll drink the sand.
        President Andrew Shepherd: Lewis, we’ve had Presidents who were beloved who couldn’t find a coherent sentence with two hands and a flashlight. People don’t drink the sand ’cause they’re thirsty. They drink the sand ’cause they don’t know the difference.

        ——————————————————————————–

        The people don’t WANT leaders – they wan panderers. This si why most of them shouldn’t vote, or be able to run for office – they’d prefer to be venal, corrupt, for sale (make a profit.)
        And the sheep, a la Henny Penny, will always go with the wolf (fox); any “authority,” though the authority is what the LISTENER has granted the Speaker. Like asking an “expert witness” in fire and explosions about an EKG, using the “expert witness” label as cover to ask the question: the “expert” has an expert rating in a different field, and is highly likely unable to honestly answer ANY questions in the health field beyond basic knowledges – IE, first aid, using rubbing alcohol and antibiotics to protect against infection. Reading and EKG? Unless he’s also an EMT, MD, Corpsman, RN, medical technician – odds are he doesn’t know enough to talk about it.

        Doesn’t stop people from deferring to him, because he’s an, “expert.”

        So, when Ferguson or Newtown occurs, “The sky is falling!” and “WE MUST DO SOMETHING!” and we get THE WORST solutions in the name of immediate action and expediency – and follow the Fox to his den, and there’s the end of our country.
        Only the fox eats slowly, so he nibbles off a wing here, a leg there, and pretty soon, your body is alive, but you wish you could die…

        Since the Fox can appear in any guise (Kitsune; or, think coyote) – best to know him by his actions, and shoot him at the first sign.

        There are only a few of us.
        There are millions of Slaves and Slavers (Pyshopaths and sycophants.)

        We need to be the shepherds, which includes culling the flock. I don’t LIKE the idea of “my brother’s keeper,” but if I allow someone evil into that role, they will undoubtedly keep ME as well as my idiot brother, and while my idiot brother may be ebtter off restrained so he cannot harm himself – I do not need, want, or benefit from those same restraints being placed on me.
        That is the journey to the lowest common denominator. It is destruction of a society, culture, country. We must instead lead others to heights of dreaming and achieving.

        If my idiot brother’s best capacity is to be a janitor? Make sure he’s the best GD janitor the world has ever seen. Pride in himself, pride in his job, a building (etc.) that SHINES like a golden castle. And WE must take pride in his accomplishments. Encourage him to stretch further than he thought he could go – language, math, architecture, model railroading, whatever. A good, solid family, too.

        And if we can do better (and choose to engage in such) – we should also be encouraged. Mentored, enlightened, educated.

        Instead of being forced into re-education camps as near-infants, fed drugs and garbage (simulacrum foodstuffs with neurotoxins), and after that workday, the TV feeds our worst appetites ever-more, and with DVR, kiddies can watch anything, any rating, and parents may not even realize (though they should.)

        At what point do we decide we cannot remain merely a(n easily-ignored) voice in the wilderness?

        You fight the fights you can win? You fight the fights that need fighting!

        — A.J. MacInerney

        Joker had it right, all those years ago: THE TOWN NEEDS AN ENEMA. only way to wash out the brown stuff in D.C.

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