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Tag:

National Security

Blog

Liberty Guard Opposes Funding for the REAL ID ACT

by lgadmin May 18, 2016
written by lgadmin

Liberty Guard Opposes Funding for the REAL ID ACT

 

5/17/2016

(Atlanta, GA) – Liberty Guard today announced its opposition to funding for the Real ID Act. .

The REAL ID Act gives broad latitude to the Department of Homeland Security (DHS), including the power to add to the list of “official purposes” for which a compliant ID is required, “all authority to issue regulations, set standards, and issue grants” toward compliance, and the power to determine whether a state is in compliance with the Act.

Liberty Guard has joined more than one dozen organizations opposing California’s funding of this ill-conceived federal mandate.

Bob Barr, Chairman of Liberty Guard, commented, “The Read ID Act represents a massive federal overreach, that raises serious problems for individual privacy and principles of federalism.” The program, Barr also noted, “should, not be forced onto states, and I am proud to join with other organizations that support privacy and liberty, and oppose funding for Real ID implementation.”

About Liberty Guard:

Formed in 2009 by Bob Barr, and supported by over 150,000 Americans across the country, Liberty Guard is dedicated to restoring and strengthening liberty against intrusions by government at all levels; including taking action against TSA privacy intrusions and ObamaCare. Liberty Guard remains committed to identifying and supporting policy, candidates, and causes which champion liberty and return our country to constitutional principles.

###

Contact:

Steve Thomas

703-819-0127

Support Liberty Guard by visiting libertyguard.org.

 

May 18, 2016 0 comment
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BlogFrom the Desk of Bob Barr

Defund and Repeal Military Gun Free Zones Now!

by lgadmin July 22, 2015
written by lgadmin

On September 16, 2013, civilian contractor Aaron Alexis entered a building at the Washington Navy Yard, where he walked to the fourth floor bathroom and loaded a shotgun. Within six minutes of the first shots fired, Alexis had murdered 10 people; and before police killed him more than an hour later, the death toll would rise to 12. It was the second deadliest shooting on a U.S. military base in American history; occurring only four years after Nidal Hasan, an Army psychiatrist turned radicalized Muslim terrorist, killed 13 service men and women in Ft. Hood, Texas.

When the news broke last week of another mass shooting at two “Gun Free” military sites in Chattanooga, Tennessee, the story was all-too-familiar. “Gun Free Zones” make absolutely no sense to begin with; but mandating them at locations we know to a virtual certainty are terrorist targets, including U.S. military sites, borders on criminally negligent.

The failure of two presidents and several congresses to reverse the Clinton-era ban on firearms on military bases, in spite of the horrific attacks over the last few years, only heightens the outrage all Americans should feel; but especially our military personnel.

Yet not a single high-ranking officer in any branch of the armed forces, has dared express doubt about the policy. In fact, a major roadblock to this latest response to yet another attack against a military target is the military itself. Top brass in the military’s current leadership have simply fallen in lock-step with the Obama Administration’s politically correct world-view that firearms are too “scary” and “dangerous” to be trusted in the hands even of combat-trained military personnel.

Common sense steps such as removing the prohibition on military personnel carrying personal or military-issued firearms, or installing bulletproof glass at recruitment centers, are rebuffed by military leaders like Army recruiting spokesman Brian Lepley. In the immediate aftermath of last week’s shooting, Lepley defended the military’s “Gun Free” policy and blabbered about needing “to maintain a connection to the American people.” To these timid Obama bureaucrats, military recruitment centers should have the feel of a processing center for the Peace Corps, rather than displaying any signs of being actual military facilities.

This domestic pacification policy has not just prevented us from taking any meaningful action following recent terror attacks; it has stunted our ability to learn anything from them. For example, not a single page in the Ft. Hood post-mortem analysis contained any relevant or substantive policy recommendations to “protect the force” against future attacks. Instead, the 80-page report signed by then-Secretary of Defense Robert Gates contained page after page of politically-correct gobbledygook designed to appease the Administration and not ruffle any feathers.

The net effect of all this is that in the five-and-a-half years since the worst mass shooting at a U.S. military instillation in American history — during which time two other major attacks and several smaller ones have been occurred — government officials are still reacting to these tragedies as if each one is the first ever. This head-in-the-sand mentality, punctuated by statements like those from Navy Secretary Ray Mabus, who apparently still believes such attacks are “unfathomable,” has to end if we are to have any hope of keeping our military men and women safe.

Fortunately, some state governors are not waiting around for another vacuous Department of Defense “report,” and are actually leading the charge to protect at least some members of the military from the threat of domestic terror attacks. Governors in Florida, Indiana, Arkansas, Oklahoma, Louisiana and Texas have ordered personnel at National Guard facilities, which are controlled by the states, to arm themselves. As Texas Governor Greg Abbott explained, “it has become clear that our military personnel must have the ability to defend themselves against these type of attacks on our own soil.” This is precisely the point that Congress, the Department of Defense, and presidential administrations of both parties have yet to grasp.

In justifying its power to surreptitiously surveil American citizens on U.S. soil, the federal government routinely emphasizes that the fight against terrorism must be waged both domestically and abroad. Why, then, do we strip members of the U.S. military of their ability to defend themselves against terrorists, simply because they are on U.S. soil rather than in a warzone in the Middle East — especially when these are becoming the preferred targets of terrorists?

That is the question Republicans must be forced to answer now that they are in control of both the House and Senate. The time for excuses and inaction is long past. With the 2016 election cycle in full swing, Republicans have an excellent opportunity to prove to members of the military that their right to defend themselves does not start at the water’s edge.

It’s time to defund and repeal military Gun Free Zones!

Originally published here on townhall.com

July 22, 2015 0 comment
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BlogFrom the Desk of Bob Barr

The Tory Party vs. Rand Paul

by Liberty Guard Author June 3, 2015
written by Liberty Guard Author

If John McCain, John Cornyn, Mitch McConnell, and the other Republican senators lashing into Rand Paul because of his efforts to force expiration of Sec. 215 of the USA PATRIOT Act had been alive and part of the debate back in 1775-76, they would have been blasting Patrick Henry for supporting Liberty. Colonialists McCain, Cornyn and McConnell would have been firmly in the Tory camp; defending the powers of the Crown to “protect” the colonialists through such tools as Writs of Assistance.

Today, in this 21st Century, the tools may have changed, but the foundational principle on which our independence was fought – a federal government of limited and defined powers — remains the same; yet it is in far greater danger today than 240 years ago.

To McCain and other defenders of the all-powerful and all-seeing national security labyrinth that has mushroomed in the last 14 years, Rand Paul’s stand against permitting the National Security Agency to continue exercising a power to electronically surveil American citizens’ private communications without reasonable cause – an abuse a federal Court of Appeals already has ruled to be unlawful — is “reckless” and a threat to America.

These modern-day Tories might as well champion the words of ol’ King George III, who characterized his benevolent tyranny thus: “I wish nothing but good; therefore, everyone who does not agree with me is a traitor and a scoundrel.”

And what has this “scoundrel’ Rand Paul done? Dismantle the NSA? Destroy the power of the Intelligence Community to monitor real threats? Take away the ability of the CIA to conduct legitimate covert operations? Hardly.

All Paul has done to earn the enmity of the “Anything-It-Takes-to-Make-Us-Safe” caucus in the Senate is to try and reform Sec. 215 of the USA PATRIOT Act to bring it in line with the law and the Fourth Amendment.

Moreover, it is not as if the federal government does not have, and would continue to have, a full arsenal of tools at its disposal to identify, monitor and thwart real terrorist threats. And already moves are afoot openly – and quietly – to ensure that during this interim period when Sec. 215 is at least formally in limbo, those communications that pose a threat and are worthy of monitoring, are in fact monitored.

It would be naïve indeed to think the massive surveillance apparatus at the NSA is at a true standstill after years of abuse justified by the government’s broad interpretation the USA PATRIOT Act’s provisions. Already, there are attempts to weaken the USA Freedom Act – which passed the House last month and places at least some limits on Sec. 215 abuses. For example, Senate surveillance hawks want to keep secret the rulings of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court (FISC) that has, unshackled by public knowledge or input, shaped how and what information the government collects on American citizens. Other proposals include extending the time the government is allowed to collect bulk phone metadata before handing over control of databases to telecom companies; and requiring the companies to give government advance notice of any changes to their retention policies. This latter provision would give Congress time to enact legislation prohibiting such changes if believed to hamper the government’s snooping efforts.

Of course, even such moves by McConnell and other Rand Paul-bashers do not soften their disdain for the junior Senator from Kentucky. McConnell continues to fume at Paul’s refusal to “play nice”; and he stopped just short of naming Paul directly when accusing the opposition of leading “a campaign of demagoguery and disinformation launched in the wake of unlawful actions of Edward Snowden.”

McCain – never one known for congeniality or subtlety — has taken an even lower road, in accusing Paul of putting “a higher priority on his fundraising and his ambitions than on the security of the nation.” Not that McCain would ever use “national security” as a fund-raising theme.

Threats to American freedom are nothing new. And our Founding Fathers understood that if Liberty was to have enduring life, limitations on government power must be made permanent and not allowed to fade depending on the nature of a particular threat. Thus, our Founders chiseled the Fourth Amendment into the bedrock of our young nation even as we faced a very real and present threat from our former master, Great Britain – an enemy far more powerful than modern-day terrorist organizations.

It is depressing in the extreme that these lessons – this history – have now been forgotten and blithely discarded by so many of our political “leaders” more concerned about restoring the powers of the Crown than protecting the Liberty of the individual.

Originally published here on townhall.com

June 3, 2015 0 comment
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Liberty Updates

Liberty Update – Obama’s AUMF and Potential Repercussions

by Liberty Guard Author February 19, 2015
written by Liberty Guard Author
February 19, 2015 0 comment
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Liberty Updates

Liberty Update – National Security

by Liberty Guard Author February 1, 2015
written by Liberty Guard Author
February 1, 2015 0 comment
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From the Desk of Bob Barr

Can We Survive A Feckless, Egotistic President Afraid To Lead?

by Liberty Guard Author September 10, 2014
written by Liberty Guard Author

Fear. It is a basic, primitive emotion common to every living species on planet earth. It is the instinctual response that keeps animals alive in nature, and influences the thoughts and actions of humans. Edmund Burke once described the potency of fear saying, “No passion so effectually robs the mind of all its powers of acting and reasoning as fear.” Burke’s observations ring especially true in today’s hypersensitive, hyper-connected world of 24-hour news channels and social media, in which the flames of fear can be fanned in ways only dreamed of in ages past.

Our fear of illness feeds the hype about an Ebola virus “epidemic” sweeping across America. International headlines appear anytime someone vomits on a plane. Overlooked is the reality that Ebola thrives only in areas with poor sanitation, nutrition, and healthcare access; and can in fact be prevented and contained in societies like ours where proper sanitation, nutrition and healthcare are the norm.

We fear mass shootings. Although such incidents are extremely rare, and almost always perpetrated by an individual suffering from mental health issues, schools now are mobilized to routinely practice “lock downs,” and have implemented idiotic “zero tolerance” programs with unthinkingly absurd results – such as suspending a child for making hand gestures in the shape of a gun while playing at recess.

Our fear of airline crashes, stoked by the recent disasters involving Malaysian Airlines planes, has recently led to three commercial airliners landing prematurely because of arguments between passengers over reclining seats.

Fear mongering unfortunately is a highly effective tool of government; well-known to the current and previous administrations, which have used Americans’ fear of terror attacks since 9/11 to dramatically and dangerously increase government power in ways previously considered far out of limits, both legally and morally.

As the United States government has engaged in fear mongering to achieve political gains domestically, so have governments and organizations in other parts of the world. Even a relatively small terror organization, ISIS, demonstrated clearly its understanding of the power of fear, in releasing online videos of beheadings to create an image of power. In Russia, Vladimir Putin has kept the international community trapped in a game of cat and mouse with that country’s escalation of tensions in Ukraine, through the savvy use of media and machismo.

Were Ronald Reagan in power today, such displays of terror from these regimes and terror outfits would have been quickly assessed and responded to with clarity of purpose and result. When two U.S. servicemen were killed in the 1986 bombing of a Berlin nightclub, it took Reagan only 10 days to launch airstrikes against the responsible party, Muammar Gaddafi, very nearly killing him in the attack.

Unfortunately, none of Reagan’s hallmark traits of poise and resolve resonate in today’s Oval Office. Instead, we have Barack Obama – a president so thoroughly disinterested in projecting even the appearance of leadership that a round of golf trumps serious consideration of dealing with blatant terrorist acts targeting American citizens. A president so afraid to lead in the international arena, that the response to terror attacks on American citizens such as those by ISIS, is to wait and see whether the “international community” will first “come together” to help “degrade” and “manage” such attacks on US citizens and against his policies directly. A president whose avowed goal is to eventually bring terrorists “to justice” rather than killing them, destroying their sanctuaries and hunting them down like the curs they are.

Can one even imagine a Ronald Reagan, or Margaret Thatcher, mouthing such nonsense? Reagan did not exhibit fear or allow fear to direct his actions as commander in chief in dealing with terror threats from Qaddafi, or when confronting far broader foreign policy issues, such as standing toe-to-toe with the Soviet Union and forcing the “evil empire” to its knees? Reagan never was satisfied with “degrading” the Soviet Union or Qaddafi; his aim in fact and in rhetoric was to defeat them completely. Reagan was a leader who – importantly – knew how to lead; no metrosexual president he.

Is it any wonder Putin does as he pleases, or why terrorists in Iraq openly taunt Obama by name with the severed heads of American journalists? What have they to fear when they know that even as a U.S. Ambassador was assassinated in a terror attack in Benghazi, this Administration’s first, and virtually only, response was to duck responsibility with lies and misinformation?

Even at home, Obama’s fecklessness defines his Administration. This is obvious repeatedly in his utter refusal to work to accomplish anything of substance by actually acting as president. Being president is easy once you have been elected to that high post. Actually serving as president – proposing specific programs and legislation, and then working with the Congress, the media and interest groups actually to accomplish those — takes hard work. Contrary to the liberal myth that Obama is a great “leader,” his only substantive domestic accomplishments came during his first term when Democrats had control of the House and the Senate. Although his actual accomplishments during that interregnum were disastrous substantively — ObamaCare and Dodd-Frank – these were actual accomplishments. But, even so, it was not in fact Obama himself who lent the horsepower to achieve the results; it was the Democrat leaders in the Congress who did the heavy lifting.

Unlike other presidents during whose administrations major legislative victories were had – LBJ and the “Great Society,” or Ronald Reagan’s rebuilding of the domestic economy and America’s military power – Obama shuns the hard work necessary to achieve such results. Instead, he relies on speechifying and unilateral action. Signing executive orders and other presidential documents is easy (even if unlawful and unconstitutional). Such actions demand nothing of a president — none of the hard work on the Hill his predecessors, both liberal and conservative, engaged in to avoid gridlock when power was not firmly in the grip of their political party.

We have survived inept presidents, like Jimmy Carter. We have survived really bad presidents, like Woodrow Wilson. And we have survived narcissist presidents such as Bill Clinton. However, America has never endured a president, who appears so afraid, so egotistical and so seemingly disinterested as this one. We must pray we can survive such a man for the next two years.

September 10, 2014 0 comment
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