LDS Freedom Forum

Fiannan wrote:http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/434315b2-8ea6 ... ab49a.html

If Obama's credibility really is going down, now is the time to intensify our efforts to expose him and his Gadiantan lords and send them packing in November. Let's give Obama a little Christmas gift -- a Republican House and Senate.

Fiannan wrote:http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/434315b2-8ea6 ... ab49a.html

If Obama's credibility really is going down, now is the time to intensify our efforts to expose him and his Gadiantan lords and send them packing in November. Let's give Obama a little Christmas gift -- a Republican House and Senate.

Fiannan wrote:Ah, but local governments have nothing to do with who gets seated on the US Supreme Court.

Original_Intent wrote:Now is the time to really go after the Republicrats who break their oath of office!

Anyone still fighting a party war is still stuck in the Matrix.

Follow the white rabbit, Neo!

Jason wrote:imo fwiw - the best you can do is prepare yourselves, your family, your friends & neighbors, and your local community for what's about to roll down upon us. Who cares about the nation? Its a decrepit rotten old beast that needs to die so a new one can be formed from the ashes with a restoration of principles that got the old one going....and perhaps hopefully even a little better.

Original_Intent wrote:Jason, I don't often say this to a fellow man, but I truly love you! We are so on the same page! It has to be done at the individual/family, then the ward/stake/community, then hopefully we can get to the statewide level. And it is getting back to the basics. What food/shelter/other resources do we have? What means do we have to produce more of the NEEDS? What means do we have to protect both of the above from those who don't want to play nice?

That is all there is to it. We do not have to go down in flames with the whore! We have got to get out of our heads this idea that printed pieces of paper drive the economy! It is all about production! It is about people keeping the fruit of their labor, being able to prepare for old age, being able to truly educate ourselves and devote ourselves to performing a great and marvelous work! I hope there are a lot more like you out there, we might have a chance!

John Locke wrote:

Jason wrote:imo fwiw - the best you can do is prepare yourselves, your family, your friends & neighbors, and your local community for what's about to roll down upon us. Who cares about the nation? Its a decrepit rotten old beast that needs to die so a new one can be formed from the ashes with a restoration of principles that got the old one going....and perhaps hopefully even a little better.

John Locke admires Jason, however this defeatism attitude and "i'll grab mine before it goes down" mantality makes John Locke want to echo Samuel Adams in saying " Go home from us in peace. We seek not your counsel nor your arms. Crouch down and lick the hand the feeds you; may your chains set lightly upon you, and may posterity forget that you were our countrymen." John Locke does not yet think this nation is doomed, John Locke will never admit it so. John Locke will see old glory flying over New Jerusalem one way or another. John Locke intends to strengthen the thread by which the constitution hangs. John Locke is not alone.

“Our great Constitution has been beaten and torn until now it hangs by a single thread, and that thread is our franchise to vote.” - Ezra Taft Benson, Freeman Institute, Provo, Utah, 1976.

"Whether it [the Constitution] shall live or die is now in the balance." - President J. Reuben Clark, Jr., 1942.

"Brethren and sisters, let me say in closing that we have it of record, that the prophet Joseph Smith said the time would come when, through secret organizations taking the law into their own hands, not being governed by law or by due process of law, but becoming a law unto themselves, when, by those disintegrating activities, the Constitution of the United States would be so torn and rent asunder, and life and property and peace and security would he held of so little value, that the Constitution would, as it were, hang by a thread. But he never said, so far as I have heard, that that thread would be cut. I believe, with Elder Richards, that this Constitution will be preserved, but it will be preserved very largely in consequence of what the Lord has revealed and what this people, through listening to the Lord and being obedient, will help to bring about, to stabilize and give permanency and effect to the Constitution itself. That also is our mission. That also is what we are here for. I glory in it. I praise God with all my heart and soul that I am a member of it." - C.W. NIBLEY, 1923.

“…our stand for freedom is a most basic part of our religion; this stand helped get us to this earth, and our reaction to freedom in this life will have eternal consequences. Man has many duties, but he has no excuse that can compensate for his loss of liberty.” - Ezra Taft Benson, Conference Report, October 1966.

When the 20 agents arrived bearing a search warrant at her Ventura County farmhouse door at 7 a.m. on a Wednesday a couple weeks back, Sharon Palmer didn't know what to say. This was the third time she was being raided in 18 months, and she had thought she was on her way to resolving the problem over labeling of her goat cheese that prompted the other two raids. (In addition to producing goat's milk, she raises cattle, pigs, and chickens, and makes the meat available via a CSA.)

But her 12-year-old daughter, Jasmine, wasn't the least bit tongue-tied. "She started back-talking to them," recalls Palmer. "She said, 'If you take my computer again, I can't do my homework.' This would be the third computer we will have lost. I still haven't gotten the computers back that they took in the previous two raids."

As part of a five-hour-plus search of her barn and home, the agents -- from the Los Angeles County District Attorney's office, Los Angeles County Sheriff, Ventura County Sheriff, and the California Department of Food and Agriculture -- took the replacement computer, along with milk she feeds her chickens and pigs.

While no one will say officially what the purpose of this latest raid was, aside from being part of an investigation in progress, what is very clear is that government raids of producers, distributors, and even consumers of nutritionally dense foods appear to be happening ever more frequently. Sometimes they are meant to counter raw dairy production, other times to challenge private food organizations over whether they should be licensed as food retailers.

The same day Sharon Palmer's farm was raided, there was a raid on Rawesome Foods, a Venice, Calif., private food club run by nutritionist and raw-food advocate Aajonus Vonderplanitz. For a membership fee of $25, consumers can purchase unpasteurized dairy products, eggs that are not only organic but unwashed, and a wide assortment of fermented vegetables and other products.

The main difference in the two raids seems to be that Palmer's raiding party was actually much smaller, about half the size of the Venice contingent: Vonderplanitz was also visited by the FBI and the FDA.

In the Rawesome raid, agents made off with several thousand dollars worth of raw honey and raw dairy products. They also shut Rawesome for failure to have a public health permit, though the size and scope of the raid suggests the government officials might have more in mind. Regardless, within hours the outlet reopened in defiance of the shutdown order.

Earlier in June, agents of the Minnesota Department of Agriculture, escorted by police and also bearing search warrants, raided and shut down Traditional Foods Warehouse, a popular food club in Minneapolis specializing in locally-produced foods. They also raided two farms suspected of illegally selling raw milk. And in a national first among such raids, agents searched a private home and made off with computers; the family's offense appears to have been that it allowed one of the raw dairy farmers to park in its driveway to distribute raw milk to area residents who had ordered it.

The Minnesota Department of Agriculture has declined comment on such raids, saying they are part of an ongoing investigation into raw milk distribution in the state in lieu of eight illnesses in May linked to raw milk.

Meanwhile, the Wisconsin Department of Agriculture, Trade, and Consumer Protection has launched three raids over the last three months on the dairy farm and farm store of Vernon Hershberger, near Madison. The day after DATCP agents placed seals on his fridges storing raw dairy products in July, Hershberger cut the seals, and announced he was going to challenge the agency's contention he needs a dairy and retail license to sell his products. Obtaining such licenses would be problematic, though, since Wisconsin prohibits sale of raw milk, except "incidental" sales, and defining "incidental" has been a bone of contention for many years. In any event, Hershberger contends he sells only to consumers who contract privately for his food.

What's behind all these raids? They seem to stem from increasing concern at both the state and federal level about the spread of private food groups that have sprung up around the country in recent years -- food clubs and buying groups to provide specialized local products that are generally unavailable in groceries, like grass-fed meats, pastured eggs, fermented foods, and, in some cases, raw dairy products. Because they are private and limited to consumers who sign up for membership, these groups generally avoid obtaining retail and public health licenses required of retailers that sell to the general public.

In late 2008 and early 2009, the representatives of state agriculture agencies in Wisconsin, Indiana, Michigan, and Illinois met via phone conferences with representatives of the FDA to map a plan for targeting raw-milk buying clubs in the Midwest. The meetings came to light after Max Kane, the owner of a Wisconsin buying club who was subpoenaed by Wisconsin authorities for the names of his customers and suppliers, obtained email accounts of the sessions via a Freedom of Information request to Wisconsin's Agriculture, Trade, and Consumer Protection department. (Kane has since been prosecuted by Wisconsin authorities for contempt of court for failing to give up the names; his case is under appeal after he was found guilty last December.)

Now, the Midwest program seems to have gone national, and the recent spate of raids suggests a quickening pace and broadened scope. While most raids before the Midwest government meetings had been related to raw-milk distribution, some, like a December 2008 armed raid of Manna Storehouse, an Ohio food club near Cleveland, have been about licensing issues. In that raid, armed law enforcement officers held a mother and eight young children being home-schooled at gunpoint for several hours while they searched the home and food storage areas. A legal challenge to the raid by the family is still tied up in court.

The current uptick has Pete Kennedy of the Farm-to-Consumer Legal Defense Fund concerned, not only about the spreading of the raids, but about the seemingly easy willingness of judges to hand out search warrants. While the U.S. Constitution's fourth amendment suggests judges should exercise tight controls over search warrants ("no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause..."), Kennedy observes, "I haven't seen an agency turned down yet" over the last four years in requests for search warrants connected with raw milk and other food production and distribution.

Given that the targets of search warrants don't get a say in court as to whether they should be issued, legal experts and those who have been raided say the most that food producers can do is take steps to prepare themselves to weather the raids as best they can.

TO THE CONGRESS OF THE UNITED STATES:

Section 202(d) of the National Emergencies Act, 50 U.S.C. 1622(d), provides for the automatic termination of a national emergency unless, prior to the anniversary date of its declaration, the President publishes in the Federal Register and transmits to the Congress a notice stating that the emergency is to continue in effect beyond the anniversary date. Consistent with this provision, I have sent to the Federal Register the enclosed notice, stating that the emergency declared with respect to the terrorist attacks on the United States of September 11, 2001, is to continue in effect for an additional year.

The terrorist threat that led to the declaration on September 14, 2001, of a national emergency continues. For this reason, I have determined that it is necessary to continue in effect after September 14, 2009, the national emergency with respect to the terrorist threat.

BARACK OBAMA

THE WHITE HOUSE,
September 10, 2009.

Jason wrote:It may not have been clear to John Locke.....but the focus is on where best to put the efforts....not on rolling over! I haven't seen you post a strategy or anything else for that matter except attempts at humor or criticism of others stances....why haven't you torn your coat and marched on Washington??? How exactly are you strengthening the thread? What difference are you making?

John Locke wrote:

Jason wrote:It may not have been clear to John Locke.....but the focus is on where best to put the efforts....not on rolling over! I haven't seen you post a strategy or anything else for that matter except attempts at humor or criticism of others stances....why haven't you torn your coat and marched on Washington??? How exactly are you strengthening the thread? What difference are you making?

John Locke wonders why Jason groups forum posts in with "strengthening the thread." John Locke often believes the only thread being strengthened here is various posters ego's. John Locke doesn't post much here except when compelled due to the fact that John Locke feels there is too much of a "if you don't believe this you are simply a fool" attitude here." John Locke likes the thought provoking threads, thus why John Locke visits. As to what John Locke does to strengthen the thread, that is John Locke and his IRL associates business. John Locke likes you Jason...John Locke is sad you are attacking him and making fun . John Locke will attempt less humor and criticism. John Locke still believes voting this year is a "battle" you should choose to fight.

Jason wrote:

John Locke wrote:

Jason wrote:It may not have been clear to John Locke.....but the focus is on where best to put the efforts....not on rolling over! I haven't seen you post a strategy or anything else for that matter except attempts at humor or criticism of others stances....why haven't you torn your coat and marched on Washington??? How exactly are you strengthening the thread? What difference are you making?

John Locke wonders why Jason groups forum posts in with "strengthening the thread." John Locke often believes the only thread being strengthened here is various posters ego's. John Locke doesn't post much here except when compelled due to the fact that John Locke feels there is too much of a "if you don't believe this you are simply a fool" attitude here." John Locke likes the thought provoking threads, thus why John Locke visits. As to what John Locke does to strengthen the thread, that is John Locke and his IRL associates business. John Locke likes you Jason...John Locke is sad you are attacking him and making fun . John Locke will attempt less humor and criticism. John Locke still believes voting this year is a "battle" you should choose to fight.

Oh...now I'm attacking you. Quite ironic! You were critical....so I called you on it. Judging by your response I called it correctly. I wasn't laughing and I wasn't making fun. I was dead serious about those questions. If you think the strategy given (perspective) was bogus then provide another.....

In reference to voting - If all I do is vote then I will never be able to look at myself in the mirror again. Here is door 1 and door 2....I've prepared the candidates for both doors but please.....pick a door....either door!

FYI - I don't care if you like me or not. I come here to share information and ideas. I hope my perceptions are challenged and I will challenge others on theirs....its one big fairly impartial sounding board that is very difficult to replicate. I've thought about things I never previously conceived and have been driven to do a great deal of scriptural research in response to many. I also stay up to speed on what's going on around the world while hopefully helping others to do the same. Many ideas here I don't agree with....like Bob's version of the hereafter....but who knows he may be correct....I still have a ton of studying to do on the matter.

....on the other hand half the disputes on here are due to semantics and perceptions......and had we been in person 90% of the conflict would not exist.

peace brother

John Locke wrote:

Jason wrote:

John Locke wrote:John Locke wonders why Jason groups forum posts in with "strengthening the thread." John Locke often believes the only thread being strengthened here is various posters ego's. John Locke doesn't post much here except when compelled due to the fact that John Locke feels there is too much of a "if you don't believe this you are simply a fool" attitude here." John Locke likes the thought provoking threads, thus why John Locke visits. As to what John Locke does to strengthen the thread, that is John Locke and his IRL associates business. John Locke likes you Jason...John Locke is sad you are attacking him and making fun . John Locke will attempt less humor and criticism. John Locke still believes voting this year is a "battle" you should choose to fight.

Oh...now I'm attacking you. Quite ironic! You were critical....so I called you on it. Judging by your response I called it correctly. I wasn't laughing and I wasn't making fun. I was dead serious about those questions. If you think the strategy given (perspective) was bogus then provide another.....

In reference to voting - If all I do is vote then I will never be able to look at myself in the mirror again. Here is door 1 and door 2....I've prepared the candidates for both doors but please.....pick a door....either door!

FYI - I don't care if you like me or not. I come here to share information and ideas. I hope my perceptions are challenged and I will challenge others on theirs....its one big fairly impartial sounding board that is very difficult to replicate. I've thought about things I never previously conceived and have been driven to do a great deal of scriptural research in response to many. I also stay up to speed on what's going on around the world while hopefully helping others to do the same. Many ideas here I don't agree with....like Bob's version of the hereafter....but who knows he may be correct....I still have a ton of studying to do on the matter.

....on the other hand half the disputes on here are due to semantics and perceptions......and had we been in person 90% of the conflict would not exist.

peace brother

John Locke does not believe you like being challenged, John Locke observed as you attacked the messenger, while mostly ignoring the challenger of your perceptions as an after thought. John Locke does not fault you in this. Perhaps John Locke should not have challenged you in this, however John Locke feels strongly about not giving up on these United States. John Locke loves them too much to give up on them as you seem to have. John Locke is confused about what you "called correctly." John Locke is not trying to cause contention with Jason. John Locke is saddened that Jason values neither his opinion of him or his opinions in general. John Locke thanks you for the discussion and again adds his apology for having angered Jason.

Just for the record, John Locke has marched on Washington....