Articles by Herschel Smith

Fox News:

Five Iranian Christian converts who were detained late last year will reportedly begin trial in Iran’s Revolutionary Court this week, according to a human rights group following the case.

The five men were among seven arrested in October when security forces raided an underground house church in the city of Shiraz during a prayer session. They will be tried at the Revolutionary Court in Shiraz’s Fars Province on charges of disturbing public order, evangelizing, threatening national security and engaging in Internet activity that threatens the government, according to Christian Solidarity Worldwide, a religious persecution watchdog group.

“Judging from recent cases, it is likely that, at the very least, those detained may face lengthy prison sentences,” said CSW spokesperson Kiri Kankhwende.

Christianity threatens national security.  In fact, anything but Islam threatens national security, because Islam is a political religion meant and designed for people control.

The reason these Christians are under threat by the state is that the Islamists know that if they expose their own system (I use that term loosely) of faith to inspection and logic, it will fall.  Christians have no such fear.

Islamists threaten people with violence when their thinking is under the slightest threat because they are scared.  They are cowards.  Would my reader ever threaten someone with bodily harm if they didn’t “convert,” or ever relinquish their own faith when under such threat?

CBS Los Angeles:

Fire officials were on hand to remind the public of what a similar quake could mean for Southern California.

“A lot of people don’t realize that we are earthquake prone in California, but we also could get a tsunami,” Los Angeles County Fire Asst. Chief David Stone said. “We just haven’t had one in a long time.”

Residents were urged to prepare for a number of disaster scenarios, including how to cope for being at least “two weeks on your own”.

You mean that the police won’t protect the people?  You mean people need to have medical supplies, food and water, and lights and batteries?  You mean that preparing for a disaster – natural or man-made – is wise move?  Oh, and by the way, California residents need to think about this while living in one of the most gun restrictive states in the country, maybe second now to New York or Illinois.

So who are you going to call when there is no power or police, and the inner city gangs are at your doorstep demanding your stuff, or your daughter?

Just Piper sends an important study our way.  We are accustomed to discussing al-Qaeda in Afghanistan, or al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula, or al-Qaeda in the Maghreb, and so on.  It seems rather odd to be among the first to use the phrase “Al-Qaeda In the United States,” but with our failure to execute the war on the transnational Islamic insurgency, it was bound to happen at some point.

The study was done by the Henry Jackson Society, a British think tank, and includes a detailed statistical analysis of perpetrators of terror who were affiliated or associated with al Qaeda.  There are a lot of take-aways from this study, including how active Afghanistan and Pakistan are as havens for terrorists and their training camps.  The foreign threat has not disappeared regardless of what the administration is saying.  But knowledge of this fact should be coupled with knowledge of the local threat.

According to the new report, Al-Qaeda in the United States, of the 171 al-Qaeda or al-Qaeda-inspired terrorists who either committed acts of suicide terrorism in the U.S. or were convicted in U.S. civilian or military courts from 1997 to 2011, 54% were American citizens, and more than a third were born in the United States.  “Moreover, 36% of all individuals were U.S. born, indicating that these were citizens who had grown up in the U.S. rather than having moved there later in life.

This is important to us for a whole host of reasons, but let me focus briefly on just two.  First, while I have recently written about the potential for an apocalyptic shattering of the stability of American civilization due to governmental totalitarianism, there are other possible catalysts, one being attacks by groups of Islamic fighters (and we also know that Hezbollah cells are already embedded in American civilization).  Several well-placed attacks on infrastructure will cause the American economy to screech to a halt.  Shooting attacks on shopping malls will bring retailers to their knees across America.

But there is yet another, more insipid, attack that could happen on our freedom and liberty.  In the event of an attack such as I’ve described above (or a series of attacks), the U.S. government might (and probably will) use it as the expedient to declare martial law, and include firearms confiscations as the central policy of that control.  This might be done by the federal government, or it might be done by Governors of states (recall that gun owners had their firearms confiscated in New Orleans after Katrina).

The point is this.  There are a number of different catalysts for societal instability and the consequent push for totalitarian control.  Be wise and circumspect, and be prepared for any exigency.

Recall in Chicago SWAT Raid Gone Terribly Wrong we discussed stupidity and incompetence of the Chicago SWAT team and their terrible, thuggish, Gestapo-like tactics when raiding the home of Charlene and Samuel Holly in Chicago.

The SWAT team officers, except for one named officer, were referred to as “John Doe 1-8.”  Their names ought to be public knowledge, and I have submitted a freedom of information request to the Chicago Police Department to make this so (to the best of my ability).

Chicago_FIR_SWAT_Raid

Oh brother.  Not this again?

In the Gospel of Luke, chapter 22, verse 36, Jesus tells his disciples to acquire a sword.

Or does he?

How that passage is interpreted has sometimes influenced believers to justify arming themselves. Owning weapons, namely firearms, has been part of the national debate on gun violence and gun regulation in the wake of the Newtown elementary school shooting and other shooting tragedies.

With the Bible and other church teachings in hand, the question of how involved Christian communities should be in the guns debate is as varied as the viewpoints in the entire dialogue itself.

At least one Licking County church recently has directly joined the conversation on gun violence prevention, and while other local churches aren’t directly demonstrating a particular stance, their leaders lent their thoughts about how Christians could regard guns.

In Feburary (sic), the United Church of Granville conducted a Gun Violence Prevention Sabbath, one of many across the country that did so, said Dwight Davidson, pastor at United Church.

At the sabbath, prayers were said for peace and congregation members placed stones on the altar that symbolized the number of lives ended by gun violence in Ohio in 2008, Davidson said. He said the event was meant to raise awareness about the prevalence of gun-related deaths in the U.S.

“On the theological question, ‘Is it God’s will for … people to die every year from gun violence?.’ The answer is ‘no,’” Davidson said.

Yes.  Christ commissioned his disciples and told them to “go forth and be social planners.”  I can’t think of anything better for a church to do than have a “gun violence prevention sabbath.”

Actually, Deuteronomy 29:29 tells us “The secret things belong unto the Lord our God: but those things which are revealed belong unto us and to our children for ever, that we may do all the words of this law.”

Mr. Davidson no more knows the secret will of God for when or under what circumstances men will perish than does my dog.  Davidson is lying.  He doesn’t know what God’s will is regarding any particular event that has not been revealed.

But this is what has been revealed.  He has told us that he has made man in God’s image and that failure to protect life is equivalent to murder.  Davidson should go back and study the great commission to inform him whether God wants us to have a “gun prevention Sabbath.”  And by the way, he should do some basic research before be preaches on firearms again.  Finally, this is a reminder just what worthless junk most of the main stream churches have become.

Las Vegas Review-Journal:

A Henderson officer suspended after he drove a damaged SWAT vehicle until it caught fire drove at least a mile and a half with sparks shooting from the car.

That is according to the man who called 911 after he followed the smoking SUV to the driver’s gated Southern Highlands neighborhood about 11 p.m. Feb. 27.

“My first thought was a drunk driver or something. It was evident the tire was completely gone on the car. I said, ‘What the hell is this guy doing?’ ” said the man, who asked that his name not be used.

“Hot metal was flying. It looked like something you see in a police chase in a movie where the tire blows and you just keep driving,” he said.

At the time, the caller had no idea the 2008 Chevrolet Tahoe was a $50,000 unmarked SWAT vehicle being driven by 36-year-old Justin Simo, a veteran Henderson officer.

The caller followed the Tahoe north on Southern Highlands Parkway and then east on Somerset Hills Avenue. By the time the driver arrived at the gate to the Interlude development, it was on fire.

“The dude came out (of the car) and said, ‘Can you believe this? My car’s on fire,’ ” the caller said. “I said, ‘Dude, you just drove a mile and a half on a blown tire.’ ”

The driver took several water bottles from the car and tried to douse the blaze, which was spreading from the front left tire to the rest of the vehicle.

By this time, the caller was on the phone with 911 dispatchers.

His conversation with Simo could be heard on a Clark County dispatcher’s recording, released Wednesday:

“Dude, hey! Hey, just let it – get back, get away from that thing dude!” the caller yelled.

He then warned the driver about the Tahoe’s fuel line catching fire before responding to the dispatcher:

“I’m sorry. I’m trying to talk to him. I think he’s drunk.”

Henderson police, which has opened an internal investigation into the incident, said there was no indication Simo had been drinking.

Las Vegas police, which investigated the fire, determined nothing criminal had taken place and did not take an incident report, spokeswoman Laura Meltzer said.

It’s unclear whether Simo was given a field sobriety test or an alcohol breath test. Henderson spokesman Keith Paul said that information would be part of the internal case.

Las Vegas police had been aware of the caller’s suspicions.

“He did say the driver was possibly drunk, right?” a police dispatcher asked on the 911 recording.

“Yeah,” the fire dispatcher responded.

Simo was suspended with pay after a Review-Journal story about the incident was published Monday evening, five days after the incident.

The 911 caller said in an interview Wednesday that he assumed the driver was drunk but only because he couldn’t think of another explanation.

The driver hadn’t been stumbling or slurring his words, but he wouldn’t step away from the burning car, he said.

“He told me there was ammo inside,” he said. “I thought, ‘Why don’t you get a little closer, you moron.’ ”

And thus do they have an inferiority complex, having to ask questions like Is SWAT Still Special.

Prior:

Chicago SWAT Raid Gone Terribly Wrong

SWAT Raids Category

UPDATE: The vehicle this officer drive is a total loss.

Isaac Chase of Guns For Everyone sends this along.  It’s an online petition to let Colorado Governor Hickenlooper know where you stand on proposed gun legislation.

So here is my inner struggle.  My head tells me one thing.  I know that I have second amendment brothers and sisters in Colorado who needs our help.  Therefore, for my Colorado readers I am letting you know that this petition exists.

But my heart tells me something else.  I keep thinking, do it, do it, do it, pass the legislation you pansy-ass liberals.  Bring it.  Get what you ask for and what you deserve.  And let the voters see exactly what they voted for.  There is no better teacher than consequences.

Ammoland gives us this.

Erie, Colorado-based Magpul Industries founder Richard Fitzpatrick is making one thing clear: if Democrats in the state house and senate succeed in passing a high capacity magazine ban, Magpul is leaving the state and taking the $85 million it would have generate for Colorado next year with it.

Fitzpatrick’s company has been making magazines for AR-15s since 1999 and is now “one of the country’s largest producers of magazines and other firearms accessories for gun enthusiasts, law enforcement, and the military.”

He says attempts to restrict the size of magazines and add serial numbers to each one will make production costs untenable in Colorado.

Moreover, with state Democrats pressing for a bill to hold gun manufacturers liable for the criminal misuse of “assault weapons,” Fitzpatrick fears that if Magpul remains within the state and a criminal tapes two magazines together to outsmart the ban, Magpul will be held liable.

So now if the Colorado politicians back down, they have let a gun parts manufacturer bully them around.  The liberals couldn’t let that happen, could they?

But that’s my heart speaking.  My head says fill out the petition.  My heart says pass the law and see Magpul run.  Run Magpul run,  see Magpul run.  Hickenlooper sees Magpul run.  Everyone sees Magpul run.  Bye bye, Magpul.

Or perhaps the proper title would have been “You the Extremist and Tannerite.”  David Codrea.

An “Unclassified/For Official Use Only” Federal Bureau of Investigation WMD Intelligence Analysis Section Terrorist Explosive Device Analytical Center intelligence bulletin issued Tuesday “assesses with high confidence recreationally used exploding targets (ETs), commonly referred to as tannerite, or reactive targets, can be used as an explosive for illicit purposes by criminals and extremists and explosive precursor chemicals (EPCs) present in ETs can be combined with other materials to manufacture explosives for use in improvised explosive devices (IEDs).”

[ … ]

“The term extremists,” the bulletin explains in a footnote, “includes international terrorists, homegrown violent extremists, domestic terrorists, and lone wolf offenders operating in the United States or abroad.” Previous Gun Rights Examiner reports have demonstrated the federal government applies those terms liberally to include groups as innocuous as “preppers” and “Constitutionalists,” among others.

Good Lord.  Seriously?  Really?  Western Rifle Shooters reacts:

Boo!

Tannerite!

Hold me close, Uncle Bob — I’m a-skeered.

Boo!

On a serious note (because the FBI is so unserious these days), note what is not happening in all of this.  The FBI is not chasing down illegal aliens crossing the border.  They are not targeting the Mexican drug lords.  They are not eradicating MS-13.  They are not burrowing down deep into organized crime in the inner cities.  The folks who work in the field offices might get killed doing those things.

No, those things are hard to do.  They would rather wring their hands over “extremists” and Tannerite.  So there you have it.  Your tax dollars at work.

Read it at Examiner.

Bob Owens:

On January 15 I penned Shock the System: Just one example of how the government could lose a civil conflict.

It was a warning of how patriots could selectively shut down the capitols of states and nations by eliminating the electrical substations and residential transformers that service those cities. Though I stated nothing new either tactically or strategically (power stations were always the first targets of bombers and saboteurs dating back to before World War II), the post absolutely terrified the powers that be.

Hershel Smith at The Captain’s Journal referenced that article in Surviving The Apocalypse: Thinking Strategically Rather Than Tactically three days ago, in a continuation of his thoughts on tactics for “lone wolf”operations in a domestic insurgency.

He referred back to a post he wrote almost two and a half years ago, A Terrorist Attack That America Cannot Absorb, which discussed attacks on the main step-up transformers at coal power plants.

Unlike the residential transformers and smaller substations I discussed in Shock the System that would create short-term, comparatively isolated blackouts, the sort of attack that concerned Smith were well-coordinated attacks that would effectively strike a blow against the entire national grid, by knocking-out the system at the points of generation, taking out very rare pieces of equipment that would take years to replace. If attacks took out even a small number of step-up transformers, it would force the entire nation to ration power, and would have a crippling effect on the national economy.

Some people seem appalled at the fact that the sort of attacks that American forces have used so successfully overseas (Iraq’s electrical grid is still in the process of recovering from two wars) might be used against American cities… and that is the exact point both Smith and I were trying to make. Neither of us are advocates of such attacks, as both of us probably have a better idea than the layman of the effect such attacks would have. I’d likely lose several people I love very much who have medical conditions were such an attack to affect this region. these aren’t things we want. these are things we fear.

Smith and I are pointing out the fact that if states or the federal government is willing to push citizens into a Second Revolutionary War over the natural right to self defense, they will feel the wrath of the right of revolution that is the birthright of ever American.

Read Bob’s entire post.  Exactly.  I felt the necessity to make a similar point in one comment I made.

This article does not “promote this plan.” This article acknowledges reality. Confiscatory policies for guns will never work in America because gun owners will not relinquish their God-given rights to bear arms. Next logical step. Gun owners will not stand down confiscation teams day after day after day on their dootsteps. They will find another strategy. The one I discussed here is but one – there are many more, all of them painful and involving “pressure points.”

The best way to avoid a scenario like this (or similar scenario) is for the government to return to constitutional government.

Why don’t people go to work on that?

And I emphasize that there are many other pressure points.  The electrical grid is only one and the example I happen to choose to make a point.  All of this will be far easier for everyone in the long run if the government honors the constitution.

Is that so hard?  Perhaps so.  Abigail Adams, who is one of my heroes, told John, “Remember all men would be tyrants if they could.”

The web site got badly out of date, and we had to go through an update of several versions of WordPress.  In the process, several comments were completely lost.  Several of them were very astute comments too.  To my readers who had comments lost, I’m sorry for the loss of your work.  It wasn’t intentional.

The “About” page needs to be updated, and it is still possible that there are holdover problems.  For example, if you are signed up for e-mail notifications or feedburner notifications and are not receiving them, please send me a note and I’ll look into it.

In the mean time, thanks for your patience.  I sincerely do appreciate all of my readers, and I value your patronage.  I also find some of the comments amusing.  For example, this one got my attention.

Author : Johnny America (IP: 68.228.180.175)

E-mail : johnnyamerica110@hotmail.com
URI    :
Whois  : [deleted]
Comment:
You are one of the stupidest assholes on the Internet, and Jim Hoft
and Bob Owens are on the Internet.

So I sent Bob Owens a note and told him I was a bigger asshole than he was.  It was time to step up his game.  Bob and I came to a mutual understanding.  The interwebz is big enough for all of us to be the best assholes we can be.

I appreciate Bob’s working with me on this.