Articles by Herschel Smith

Views.

As much as I’ve enjoyed Sandy Banks’ columns through the years, I must take issue with her characterization of wild coyotes’ presence in her suburban neighborhood.

In truth, any “reign of terror” being perpetrated there stems from humans’ ubiquitous war on wildlife.

Banks concedes that human housing has invaded the coyotes’ natural habitat. Yet she villainizes them for adapting to our trespass.

Any “unrepentant hoodlums” are the residents who have dispossessed the coyotes; any “scourge” she perceives was wholly foreseeable, not “unpredictable.”

Rather than demonize coyotes for being coyotes, Banks should keep in mind that they aren’t able to earn a living by writing newspaper columns.

Sandra Perez, Santa Maria

Her view is irrational and inconsistent.  Let me prove it to you.

Her view is likely the one of an evolutionist.  Upon her view, men are animals and the Coyote is just another animal.  We must all learn to live together in one gigantic utopia and men are the dastardly ones waging war on other animals.

But you see, upon the evolutionist view, there is no such thing as evil, and thus if men are just animals, men are behaving like animals when they kill other animals, as a lion would in the Serengeti desert.  She has no business complaining.  She’s watching nature in action.

This is what Professor Alvin Plantinga would do.  He would explain how the naturalist view is self referentially incoherent and self defeating.

The proper view if that God created man in His image and gave him dominion over the animal kingdom.  Dangerous animals who kill men are to be put to death, and animals who destroy your property are thieves – and your property includes your beasts as well.

Even dogs are smarter than her.  They figured this out a long time ago, and they and men are friends.

More than 20,000.  Here is the data.  More than 1.1 million adverse event reports.  Here is the data.

Now, multiply those numbers by 20.  VAERS underreports by a factor of 20.

Take it all under advisement.  I didn’t make these numbers up.

Here is the video.

But wait!

The Ontario Provincial Police said in a statement it launched an internal investigation into the incident, adding it “raised concerns about professionalism and depicts opinions that are not in line with the OPP’s values.”

“We recognize that views expressed by the member has caused public upset,” the OPP wrote in a statement on Twitter. “The OPP does not condone current illegal activity.”

It added: “Officers must maintain the highest standard of conduct, integrity, and ethical behavior.”

The gang can’t be seen agreeing with the poors and peasants, can they now?

He’s determined.  And this is fun to watch.

We Told You, We're Not Leaving Until The Mandates Get Dropped @JustinTrudeau @OttawaPolice @rcmpgrcpolice #freedomconvoy #EndTheMandates pic.twitter.com/4uVnis1mca

— Political Pooper Scooper (@SenojYerac) February 14, 2022

The Canadian government is fighting back the only way they can, i.e., sending in the cops to arrest, tow and imprison people).  It has been all over the news this weekend.  Some locations are standing firm.

Others are in a bit more trouble.  When the cops arrest the main actors and tow their trucks, there isn’t much that can be done about it.  Or is there?

At Coutts, they have changed tactics up a bit.  I’m not sure what this was about, but I’m guessing that a way around the roadway was being planned by the government, and the farmers figured out a way to circumvent those plans.  The farmers and tractors have supplemented (or in some cases fully supplanted) the truckers.  Everyone needs sleep and has to go home at some point.

And this brings me to the analysis.  At the Ambassador Bridge, after the arrests and truckers finally leaving, the line of protestors formed in a different location, while still blocking access.

The tactics are going to have to be malleable and evolving.  When one trucker drives away, he should be replaced by another.  When one protester leaves, another should come along to take his or her place.  When arrests begin happening, reform the line elsewhere.  When more arrests occur, truckers can jam up traffic by moving slowly or “strategically” running out of fuel right beside another trucker to which that also happens.  When the truckers tire, the farmers can take their place.

It looks like much of this is already happening.

This can be done, but it will require determination and evolution of tactics, techniques and procedures.

TCJ is calling for full scale war.  SpecOps has gotten a new deployment.

Against the backdrop of Russia’s truculence in Eastern Europe, US special operators have established a new forward-operating base in another tense corner of Europe.

In early January, US Special Operations Command Europe (SOCEUR) announced its decision to set up a special-operations headquarters in Albania.

The new headquarters will help in SOCEUR’s mission to “galvanize our relationship with Allies and partners to counter malign influence, build interoperability, rapidly respond to emerging threats and if necessary, defeat aggression,” the command said.

This is presumably one of the more than 100 countries where American troops have a presence.  Meanwhile, there are now over 130,000 Russian troops staged near Ukraine.

No, TCJ isn’t calling for war in the European or Asia theater.  TCJ is calling for war at the U.S. Southern border where troops are needed, doing the only thing American troops were ever meant to do, i.e., defend the U.S. border from invasion.

We have absolutely no business in a war with Russia.  We have no strategic interest there except for oil pipelines owned by the Bidens.  But we do have business doing things with our troops other than draining their blood in needless foreign misadventures or wasting their time.

Last March, Abbott, who’s up for reelection, launched “Operation Lone Star,” citing a crisis at the US southern border. The operation — which leaned on resources from Texas Department of Public Safety and Texas National Guard — has swelled to more than 10,000 service members.

The speed at which the operation launched and its scope has fueled frustrations internally and among veterans of the Guard. Multiple members of the Guard who are deployed as part of Operation Lone Star and spoke to CNN described long hours with little to do, poor planning, and a lack of mission — all of which, they say, are contributing to low morale among soldiers.

“As military, people know the term hurry up and wait. This is just the biggest hurry up and wait I was a part of, and there’s really no set, ‘hey, we’re doing this, or hey, go out and do this.’ It’s just, we’re sitting around doing nothing,” one soldier said.

[ … ]

The National Guard, though, generally serves in a support role and notifies US Border Patrol if they encounter migrants, so that agents can pick them up. In Del Rio, Humvees are located along the border at observation points with soldiers assigned to them to monitor for activity, which can range depending on location.

“There’s guys standing at our points doing nothing, so they don’t really see a mission. They just see this as we’re just used as political pawns for an election year,” the soldier said.

As it has always been.  But invasion isn’t a law enforcement function – it’s a military function.  TCJ is calling for the deployment of the USMC on the Southern border, including every infantry battalion along with Scout Snipers and Recon Marines.  They should have arrest powers and full authority to kill enemy shooters (including the “Coyotes” who bring the invaders North).

We can leave the border patrol in the rear to do paperwork.

Garand Thumb titles his video “we end the debate.”  BLUF: There will always be a debate.

Views.

The protests are a “despicable display of hate that does not reflect the values of them Teamsters.”  It “prevents hardworking Teamsters from doing their job.  The Teamsters Union denounces the ongoing freedom convoy protest at the Canadian border that continues to hurt workers and negatively impact our economy.  The livelihood of working Americans and Canadians in the automotive, agricultural and manufacturing sectors is threatened by this blockade.  Our economy is growing under the Biden administration, and this disruption in international trade threatens to derail the gains we have made.”

Hmm … nothing about inflation growing out of control, nothing about wages of workers being diminished from that, nothing about flooding the economy with unnecessary trillions of dollars in cash, nothing about shutting down the economy for two years, nothing about violating the religious rights of people who don’t want forced shots for a low-risk disease.

I wonder how much money he was paid to say those things?

Do we have any Teamsters reading these pages?  Are you proud of your leader?

Reason.

Today I filed an amicus brief in support of a cert. petition challenging Maryland’s ban on various semiautomatic rifles. The case is Bianchi v. Frosh, and was brought by the Firearms Policy Coalition, the Second Amendment Foundation, and individual plaintiffs. Petitioners are represented by the D.C. powerhouse litigation boutique Cooper & Kirk. (Docket page here, Petition here.)

[ … ]

1. Many lower courts have narrowed Heller from below.

2. Failure to grant review would tempt Congress to enact a national ban, over-riding the policy choices of 43 states.

3. The Fourth Circuit’s novel rule that governments can ban all firearms that are supposedly “like” military arms is based on an egregious misreading of one phrase from Heller. The Fourth Circuit rule would uphold a ban on many common firearms, such as the ubiquitous Colt 1911 .45 caliber pistol, and every semiautomatic pistol that is essentially similar to the Colt, which is to say all of them.

4. The Maryland ban harms public safety because the rifles that it singles out for prohibition are easier to fire accurately, easier to store safely, and often superior for lawful self-defense. To say that improved firearms can be banned because criminals might take advantage of the improvements would be to say that firearms can never be improved.

He gets into “common usage” as well, and we can all agree that any weapon can be and has been a military weapon and that the common usage doctrine was an abominable and inconsistent idea.  As one reader pointed out recently, if something isn’t in common usage, it cannot be introduced into circulation and therefore will never become commonly used.

But Kopel is one of the good guys, and he knows what he’s doing.  He has to play within the rules he’s been given.

News.

US Forest Service sharp shooters killed 47 head of stray cattle on Thursday, Feb. 10 and were in the air again on Friday as part of the USFS aerial gunning in the Gila National Forest and Wilderness in New Mexico. Numbers were provided to New Mexico Cattle Growers Association from APHIS Wildlife Services Thursday evening and reported no cattle were observed with ear tags or brands prior to engagement.

According to Caren Cowan, publisher of New Mexico Stockman and a consultant for New Mexico Federal Lands Council, the cattle located in the rough, mountain terrain are strays left behind by forest service permittees that grazed prior to the removal of corrals, fences, and other infrastructure. This action is a direct result of a lawsuit against the US Forest Service by the Center for Biological Diversity (CBD) which the Forest Service settled, according to Loren Patterson, president of the New Mexico Cattle Growers Association. In 2021, The Center for Biological Diversity and Maricopa Audubon Society sued the U.S. Forest Service claiming that stray cattle have destroyed critical habitat for the endangered New Mexico meadow jumping mouse.

Well, I sure am glad that my federal taxes go to training US Forest Service “sharp shooters.”  I can’t think of anything America needs more than that.

And I sure am glad that the New Mexico jumping mouse can live in peace now.

It’s good to hear that the U.S. government is focused on the right things.  I can sleep comfortably tonight.