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[Rejected for posting by Strike-the-Root 02-05-2013]
[Rejected for posting by Strike-the-Root 02-05-2013]
An Open Letter to Alex Knight Regarding
His Open Letter to Philip Baruth
Dear Alex,
At the risk of seeming like an ass-hat...
You don't vote. You urge others not to
either. And, you live in a de facto one-party state entity. So bearing all that
in mind, it seems unlikely to me that your Internet column here,
or your
previous one, (in re Vermont state senate majority leader Philip Baruth),
will have much impact on him. While posting your objections to his
anti-liberty, anti-gun legislation to STR surely doesn’t hurt your cause, might
I suggest some additional tactics that have worked for me, on the local level,
in my neck of the woods, whose
politics are quite similar to Vermont’s?
If you really want to influence Mr.
Majority Leader you should try and enlist the help of a dozen or so of
like-minded friends and set up picketers everywhere Mr. Majority Leader shows
up for a public appearance in order to get noticed by your fellow citizens and
the media. You should call in to radio and TV shows that take live callers and
complain about him, and bonus points if he’s live on the program and so has to
listen and respond to you in real time. You should offer to contribute work
and/or money to groups or coalitions that oppose him on this issue. You may
have to start such a coalition on your own. Don’t be afraid to accept
contributions or help from someone who you have disagreements with on other
issues. That’s for another day.
Pass out some well-written, single page
leaflets with your contact info around gun & knife shows, target ranges,
outdoor expos and other places or events that likely supporters might be. Just
knowing such opposition exists out there will have some influence on Mr.
Majority Leader. You and your friends need to be the stone in Mr. Majority
Leader’s shoe that he feels every time he moves.
I see from the biographical blurb
on your STR profile that you are a former Libertarian Party communications
director, and so I have to believe that you must already know these two key
points, but let me remind you; one, that reality-based, street-level politics
is the art and science of applying political pressure toward achieving a
specific goal; two, that there are really only two kinds of political tactics:
Those that work, and those that don’t. If the tactics that you use aren’t
working, then you have to try something else.
I have noticed for long time now an air
of derision about any kind of participation in the political process - not just
party related stuff or voting - for fear of being contaminated by it from
writers and bloggers of the libertarian and anarchist bent. I find this strange
too. As philosophers from the time of Aristotle onward have noted, human
beings are born “political animals” and of necessity must be so
in order to live peacefully in groups larger than family size. Being
“political” is the same thing as “being human.” Being one implies being the
other said the old Greek.
That doesn’t mean we should all become
Democrats or Republicans though. I completely agree with the sentiment of “a
pox on both their houses” when it comes to conventional party
politics. Gore Vidal was quite apt when he noted that the two-party system in
America is a deception, and that we truly have only one ruling party that
presents two faces in order to deceive us. This situation is, sadly enough,
just how it is, and so that‘s what we have to contend with, like it or not.
I don’t want to join up as a party
member, a nomenklatura, or a mindless dupe, for the Democratic, Republican,
Libertarian, Working Families, Progressive, Constitution, Green, Bong Hits for
Jesus, or any other political party. However, that said, I have no problem at
all participating in an ad hoc, united-front coalition with any or all of the
above mentioned to protect my family and myself from the machinations of
statist entities and their apparatchiks, and lackeys. To paraphrase that famous
Old West scoundrel “Canada Bill” Jones, I know the political process is crooked,
but “it’s
the only game in town.” And until the state is seriously
diminished or destroyed, if it even can be, I’ll have to play those games out
of necessity. The only other realistically achievable alternative would be to
find a very sparsely populated desert wasteland somewhere and just hide under
the state’s radar and exist and on my own terms for as long as I can, which
some groups have successfully done, more or less, until they find me out, or I
pass away. That is the reality of trying to be a free man in an un-free world.
Engaging in effective, non-violent, and
non-partisan Saul
Alinsky-style tactics,
or even in civil disobedience, in order to preserve my life, liberty, and
happiness is not without some consequent mental turmoil, but it also may very
well be worth enduring in order to prevent our being disarmed, regulated to
death, snooped upon, and otherwise being continually held in a permanent, and
ever worsening condition of anxiety and fear. Whether these uncertainties and
doubts are worse than the hardships of living in a cold, damp teepee out in the
desert, but with as many AR-15s, untaxed liquor, tobacco, cannabis, raw milk,
or wives as I care to have, are worth it in the end, I can’t say for certain
just now. So let me say in closing Alex that wish you good luck, and I hope
I’ve provided you with some food for thought with this letter.
All the best,
Ken Kraska.
