BLACK THURSDAY

Regardless of what happens with the Holder contempt vote, today will likely be remembered by freedom-loving people as Black Thursday. My response to a reporter a few moments ago: "You may call tyranny a mandate or you may call it a tax, but it still is tyranny and invites the same response."


LATER: The other day I did an interview which will appear, I am told, on Monday. Here is a relevant portion of that which deals with the decision today.

Question: You said in an interview with the Washington Post that a handful of Americans “are armed and are capable of making such resistance possible and perhaps even initiating a civil war.” Would you support a civil war over health care law?

"Initiating a civil war" is a misquote. All of my work has been focused on preventing a civil war by making the clueless understand that one is possible. Their Weltanschauungs prevent it. I'm trying to get them to understand that we are in fact two countries now. We share a common language (most of us) and border, but we disagree on the critical question that the Founders answered with defensive violence against King George's violence -- shall the people serve the government of the government serve the people? Does it matter if we agree on traffic laws or the rules by which our kids play soccer if we disagree on something so fundamental? The health care law carries with its meeching platitudinous promises the hard steel fist of government violence at the center. If we refuse to obey, we will be fined. If we refuse to pay the fine, we will in time be jailed. If we refuse to report meekly to jail, we will be sent for by armed men. And if we refuse their violent invitation at the doorsteps of our own homes we will be killed -- unless we kill them first. It is Nancy Pelosi who first plunked the threat of violence on the table like Goering reaching for his revolver. How should principled, free people react to such threats? I am on record as advocating the right of defensive violence against a tyrannical regime. The Founders would agree. If someone on the street threatens to break into my house and steal my property or kill me, and I tell them, "If you do this, you will be killed," am I the violent one? Or is it merely good manners to warn the miscreant of the probable outcome?

I was once asked by a gun prohibitionist my thoughts on his desire for my disarmament. I began to explain as best I could and he cut me off with an impatient, "Give me the short answer." "Okay," I said after pausing briefly, "If you try to take our firearms we will kill you." He left quickly, muttering oaths about my sanity. Yet you will get the same answer from that other half of the country that such people make no attempt to understand, only deride and name-call. Such ignorance can get a whole lot of people killed. That is the point I'm trying to get across. If the Constitution as crafted by the Founders and the rule of law no longer applies, that is, if we now have the law of the jungle, then my half of the country is far better prepared to live and thrive in that jungle others force into than they are. Another formulation: If the rule of law no longer protects us from government tyranny, it no longer protects that tyranny and its acolytes from us. It is a two-way street and I hope desperately that Nancy Pelosi and her ilk understand that before it is too late.

Question: What are your thoughts about how the Supreme Court will rule on health care Thursday? What do you see as the potential implications of its decision?

See above. If the individual mandate is upheld, me and a few million of my friends will not comply and we will make ourselves so obnoxious in our refusal that sooner or later some government agent is going to try to kill us. Because the one thing a tyrant cannot tolerate is the example of someone being unafraid and saying "No." It's a bad example for the rest of the sheep and might encourage noncompliance. When that happens, you have only to read history to predict the outcome. To believe anything else is to whistle past the graveyard of history.

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