Breakfast For The Brain Weekend Edition

Have a great weekend deplorables!

Red Flag Gun Laws Are Rooted In Communist Methods Of Oppression

Via Zero Hedge

This week government officials came back from their summer recess, and I have heard from a couple different sources that the US Senate in particular is seeking to fast track legislation on Red Flag gun laws as well as a possible ban on private party transfers of firearms and a possible ban on high capacity magazines. I can only hope that these are just rumors, but I suspect they are accurate.

Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell has publicly vowed to pursue any new gun control legislation that the Trump Administration supports, and Donald Trump has openly called for Red Flag gun laws involving mental health guidelines. The mainstream media now claims that a majority of Americans on both sides of the political divide support red flag legislation, but we all know how rigged such polls can be. The real question is, does the average American even know what red flag laws would entail? I think they do not.

Red flag gun laws are a method of gun control by which a family member or law enforcement can petition the court to confiscate a person’s firearms on the SUSPICION that the person may present a danger to themselves or others. But it doesn’t necessarily stop there. Some reports indicate that Trump is seriously considering using big tech companies like Amazon and Apple to monitor people’s behavior and link this data to a social credit system similar to the system that already exists in China. Your gun rights could then be determined by algorithms that mark you as a potential risk simply by what you post online.

Prosecution using the public to spy on itself is a hallmark of these kinds of laws. It is also nothing new. The Puritans in early America used intangible evidence, such as “spectral evidence” to punish people of various crimes including witchcraft. This encouraged extreme collectivism and conformity, for anyone stepping outside the lines of what the group saw as righteous behavior could find themselves secretly accused using rhetorical evidence and unable to defend themselves. Their only option was to admit to the crime, whether they were guilty or not, and then repent.

But in a social or political witch hunt, you are not repenting to get in God’s good graces, but to get in the good graces of the collective. You are supposed to sublimate yourself for the group and beg their forgiveness; not for the crime you are accused, but for the crime of acting as an individual. The message is clear – There is no way to fight back. Just give in and if you are lucky the collective will let you continue living, under their watchful eye, of course.

This might sound like something that could never happen in the US today, but it already has. The existence of the No Fly List, which is generated in secret, is often politically motivated and is based on evidence that the accused is never allowed to see. It is a perfect example of a “law” that is similar to Red Flag legislation. While the no fly list has been confronted in court numerous times, it still endures and is little changed since its inception. Once ingrained, these laws are rarely ever removed.

Read the entire article HERE.

‘They wanted me gone’: Edward Snowden tells of whistleblowing, his AI fears and six years in Russia

Via The Guardian

The world’s most famous whistleblower, Edward Snowden, says he has detected a softening in public hostility towards him in the US over his disclosure of top-secret documents that revealed the extent of the global surveillance programmes run by American and British spy agencies.

In an exclusive two-hour interview in Moscow to mark the publication of his memoirs, Permanent Record, Snowden said dire warnings that his disclosures would cause harm had not come to pass, and even former critics now conceded “we live in a better, freer and safer world” because of his revelations.

In the book, Snowden describes in detail for the first time his background, and what led him to leak details of the secret programmes being run by the US National Security Agency (NSA) and the UK’s secret communication headquarters, GCHQ.

He describes the 18 years since the September 11 attacks as “a litany of American destruction by way of American self-destruction, with the promulgation of secret policies, secret laws, secret courts and secret wars”.

Snowden also said: “The greatest danger still lies ahead, with the refinement of artificial intelligence capabilities, such as facial and pattern recognition.

“An AI-equipped surveillance camera would be not a mere recording device, but could be made into something closer to an automated police officer.”

He is concerned the US and other governments, aided by the big internet companies, are moving towards creating a permanent record of everyone on earth, recording the whole of their daily lives.

Read the entire article HERE.

Thanks To Tech Totalitarians, U.S. ALREADY Has A China-style “Social Credit System”

Via The Unz Review

Only the most naïve can believe that private data or recorded conversations won’t be weaponized against patriots. After all, an email, Facebook comment, or old tweet can already get you fired from your job–even a government job. Leif Olson’s rehiring may not have been a true victory against “cancel culture,” but we shouldn’t lose sight of the casual cruelty that motivated the attack in the first place. Hurting people, rather than informing people, seems to be the only motivation of MSM journofa.

We’ll never know the story behind Jeffrey Epstein or what motivated the mass shooter in Las Vegas (remember that?). But journofa won’t rest until they’ve doxed every Gamestop employee and pizza deliveryman who went to Charlottesville!

Another example: “dozens” of Customs and Border Protection officers may lose employment or suffer lesser penalties after their comments in a private Facebook group were leaked [Customs and Border Protection moving to fire and discipline dozens of agents for Facebook posts, by Anna Giaritelli, Washington Examiner, September 5, 2019]. An unnamed “senior CBP official” proclaims that this isn’t enough because they need to “change the culture” of the service.

Words and symbols can also be labeled “hateful” retroactively. A month ago, “kritarchy” was an objective term that referred to “rule by judges.” Today, it’s an anti-Semitic slur because journalists simply declared it so.

In Utah, an interracial couple who brought a Betsy Ross flag to a soccer game was threatened with ejection. The stadium management said the flag was a symbol of “hatred, divisiveness and/or intolerance, whether intentional or otherwise” [Controversy erupts over Betsy Ross flag at RSL soccer game, by Lauren Steinbrecher, Fox 13, August 29, 2019]. Yet nobody thought this until Colin Kaepernick declared it so because of its “connection to an era of slavery”–which, of course, could be said about anything related to the Founding.

The System’s arbitrary nature makes it even more dangerous. Already, websites have been stripped of payment processors or access to PayPal (VDARE among them) after attacks by journalists and “nonprofits” like the Southern Poverty Law Center and the Anti-Defamation League. The loss of a YouTube account can mean the end of a creator’s career. Some individuals have been banned from Airbnb or Uber or have lost their personal PayPal accounts, not because of any violation of terms of service, but because of an unknown ideological test. This is the equivalent of the gas company cutting off any California residents who voted for Proposition 187.

Don’t laugh—it’s coming.

Read the entire article HERE.

The Surveillance State: Have Americans Unwittingly Opted In?

Via The American Thinker

Let’s be honest. When was the last time you sat down and read through the entirety of an app or hardware devices terms of use? The usually thousands of words long legalese omelet is easily bypassed by scrolling to the bottom of the page and clicking on the “I agree” box and unfortunately, that’s what most Americans in the modern world of instant gratification tend to do.

I mean, all of these apps that we use on a regular basis to order food, listen to music, and even find a mate, require that we “opt in,” and whether we have a conscious understanding or what that truly means or not, doing so has allowed for everything from the contents of your inbox and contact list to control of your phones camera and microphone to be manipulated by the application.

A society once so afraid of first the possibility and later the reality of NSA spying has seemingly allowed it’s guard down to the point that most Americans are running around with apps on their phones that are designed by foreign companies, many of whom work under governments which can legally force the app maker to turn over the personal information of their user base.

Americans aren’t walking around with an attorney on their shoulders to help guide then through the ever-expanding app stores and the growing market of new “smart speaker” or “smart home” devices, so here are four important points to consider when choosing what apps or devices are right for you..

Read the entire article HERE.

Trey Gowdy Warns Everyone to Lower Their Expectations…

Via The Conservative Treehouse

Former congressman Trey Gowdy warns everyone to tamp down expectations from the IG report on FISA abuse. One point of focus from Horowitz’s letter today is that he *only* looked at the singular FISA issues surrounding Carter Page, nothing more.

…”Relating to a certain U.S. person.”

Therefore if Carter Page was not a victim; meaning if Carter Page was an active participant (mole) in the FBI operation – willing to be the vehicle by which the Steele Dossier could be injected into the investigation; then there will likely be no criminal conduct outlined by Horowitz.

Read the entire article HERE.

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