“We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.”   – The Declaration of Independence

I am a libertarian; specifically of the voluntaryist variety to be exact.  I believe in your right as my fellow human being reading this right now to believe absolutely anything you want to believe as well.  I will stand up for your right to speak your mind both openly and freely in any non-violent presentation you see fit – even, and maybe especially, if I disagree with you.  That’s because I’m a true-blue libertarian who fundamentally believes in the ‘unalienable Right’ of the individual to have free speech; speech that has to be freely open for times when something important needs to be said; speech that is unpopular and confrontational and uncomfortable; speech that is spoken by the one individual who wishes to be the lone objector in the collective; speech that must stand freely ready to be enjoyed by an individual who wishes to speak truth to the power that is his or her own government.  As was said of Voltaire by Evelyn Beatrice Hall, my attitude is, “I will disagree with what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it.”

Liberty is fundamentally important to preserve for the self and our fellow mankind.  Without liberty; there is no freedom to speak your conscience, to own private property, or to even defend one’s self or other innocents from violence.  Without liberty; the market of ideas tries to run on fumes, the great engines of progress fall into disrepair, and human life suffers at the hands of its’ own oppression.  Liberty is the full potential of life realized in actuality by each sovereign sentient consciousness, unfettered from obstacles to pursuits which don’t destroy the same equal claim to liberty as every other person.  Nature’s implication that you own yourself and that your natural state is to be free to follow your own conscience, is the bedrock of libertarian thought to which I subscribe.  The logical extension of this liberty to other humans on equal footing under ‘natural law’ is the both philosophical and utilitarian way of ethics I think correct for any axiom of peaceful human interaction; hence ‘voluntaryism,’ which is obviously the idea that all interactions between human beings should be voluntary and done with consent of each party involved.  The revolutionary author of The Rights of Man, Thomas Paine, was quoted as saying, “He that would make his own liberty secure, must guard even his enemy from oppression; for if he violates this duty, he establishes a precedent that will reach to himself.”  Understand; I want you to have this kind of liberty and freedom as well because I think that I am more free by having freedom-friendly people around me as well.  And why not a whole world full of free people?  But, let me not stray too far on this one tangent… There is one thing, and one thing only, more sacred than the concept of liberty.

It’s not mere chance that the order in which America’s revolutionary liberators listed our unalienable rights began with life, immediately followed up by liberty, and then a good dose of reaffirmation of both of those principles by throwing in some well-wishes of happiness in our free pursuits for good measure.  Just like I don’t think it’s coincidence that our First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution in the Bill of Rights was an affirmation of the individual’s right to speak out against his or her own government, followed by a right to the gun to protect yourself when you say something that controversial, then by two more Amendments that told the government’s enforcers to stay the hell out of your house and personal belongings, and a right to remain silent when they harass you, etc. Maybe this attempt to canonize our unalienable rights in writing and ‘official’ documentation has failed, and maybe you even believe it was set or possibly meant to fail from the beginning.  But, the principles of holding human life and liberty sacred are nature’s own which precede and are preeminent to any document or written word.  Surely there can be no such thing as human liberty, if there’s no human life to begin with.  Although I don’t personally believe in the existence of god or even a supernatural realm at this point in my life, I still think Thomas Jefferson had a point when he said, “”The god who gave us life gave us liberty at the same time; the hand of force may destroy, but cannot disjoin them.”

This is where I wish to draw a difference with the rise of the racial politics I see in my country right now.  Unfortunately; many who purport to be looking out for truth, both in media and in our politics, have forsaken the duty to watch for liberty’s torch to keep bright to focus instead on segregation and privilege for one demographic over another – all enforced with the violent guns of government.  You don’t even have to be a fellow voluntaryist, anarcho-capitalist/agorist, or libertarian to have common ground with me here; we simply must fundamentally recognize each other’s right to coexist… in disagreement… and with a countenance towards non-violent solutions to our differences.  This ideal of the preeminent sanctity of human life is where a voluntaryist libertarian like me absolutely and completely parts ways with any political movement even resembling the current ‘Alt-Right.’  Racial politics is immoral, unethical, and dangerous because it is at its’ very core an ‘ANTI-LIFE’ ideology.  Forget liberty; we don’t even get to that part of the conversation because racial politics doesn’t even respect human life to begin with.  This is axiomatic as to why the term ‘Alt-Right Libertarian’ is an oxymoron; you can’t reconcile racial politics with the sanctity of human life or the concept of unalienable liberty.  Racial politics puts human beings on separate footing as a basis to then deny the equal application of law to all (the idea that what’s good for the goose is good for the gander, and that the POTUS and a random homeless man have the same rights).  Raicial politics is a fundamentally un-American idea in this way, and the purveyors of racial politics stand in direct defiance of the intellectual birthright of the American revolution and independence from oppressive governments.

Considering that racial politics is fundamentally an un-American and ANTI-LIFE ideology, it is no wonder the bloody violence that broke out in the streets of Charlottesville, VA this past weekend of August 2017.  Maybe it’s exactly the result we should expect from the largest gathering of and efforts to unite the most vile and violent elements of racial hate-groups in American politics in decades.  And that’s NOT hyperbole.  I’m going to include links and videos in this piece and make suggestions on other materials so that you may do your own homework and make up your own mind what’s happening in the political realm right now.

I want to back up here a second now to bring in another piece of this which will apply to the conclusion of this writing.

I’m a spring chicken of only about 40 years now, but I’ve been paying close attention to and educating myself about politics and government for well over 25 years.  I don’t hold a degree or credentials from some law firm or fortune 500; but I am your fellow American, and I think I should at least probably be able to claim a vested interest in my country from the perspective of a medically retired combat veteran of the U.S. regular Army.  I am also a product of the religious right who grew up steeped in the ‘Reagan Revolution’ and constantly around people and publications produced by the Christian Coalition and Moral Majority, the 700 Club, Dr. Dobson, the John Birch Society, Sword of the Lord publications, the United Pentecostal Church International & Word Aflame Press, and many types who you might expect to be teaching or lecturing at Bob Jones University or the Southern Baptist Conference – little country churches all over Appalachia and the south, where uneducated country preachers preach lots of hellfire and brimstone out of the O.T. and doomsday prophecy out of Revelation.  I’ve grown up in a Civil War ‘brother against brother’ border state with battlefields and monuments to both sides all around me and in my history books.  I’ve been there when white friends told jokes about “niggers, kikes, and injuns;” when black kids in school ganged up on me to poke fun at my white skin and white hair and white accent; when a white girl told me that I am the wrong color to date; and when church leaders would spend their potluck dinner time after church service poking fun at “colored folk.”  I’ve worked along black, white, brown, red, and yellow people alike who were all over the spectrum in both intellectual capacity, work ethic, and moral conscience.  Before I deconverted, I stood as a licensed minister in the pulpit and tried to make the case from Genesis that we’re all just dirt and it doesn’t matter what color dirt is because it’s still dirt.  I’ve served in the military with all races and both genders, and some who are attracted to their own sex or even changed their own sex – and with whom I’d still trust my life in a combat zone in a heart-beat.  I’ve travelled to almost every American state, and several foreign countries; and I have met and communed with many people from various cultures, races, and religious affiliations from all over the planet.  I am a white southerner from the hills of Kentucky, an American, a fellow human traveller on this Earth, and a consciousness who looks to the stars with a hopeful eye to humankind’s future.  I have something I think is important to say right now.

Along with the vast majority of the rest of the world, I did not think that Donald Trump could become POTUS when he first kicked off his campaign.  I was paying attention to all the hopefuls in several political parties, and I didn’t think Donald Trump was a serious player.  My impression of Donald Trump was that he was a petulant egomaniac and self-aggrandizing buffoon.  He certainly seemed to have a knack as a glorified car salesman who could ogle millionaires with his silver spoon and capitalize on reactions to sensationalism, but I thought there were enough level-headed and reasonable people to see through him that he could never actually be voted in as POTUS.  As the Trump campaign gained steam in 2015 & 16, I became increasingly concerned about the elements he was giving voice to and the key players who were rallying around him.  I already started sharing concerns about the racists and conspiracy nutjobs who were trying to push Trump, I believe most of them probably just trying to capitalize on what was thought to be a temporary phenomenon while it lasted and until Trump was inevitable beaten by a fellow Republican primary opponent or definitely by Hillary Clinton in the general election.  As I shared my concerns about the stench of fascism in the Trump campaign, I would be constantly reminded that the best policy was just not to give it any more attention because those racist and unhinged elements of Trump’s base weren’t going to keep growing or being taken seriously and everybody knew it.  Only, we knew wrong.  And today, Donald Trump stands as POTUS – and those elements of racial and conspiratarian political activists have just burst into the mainstream with a big and bloody crash.

Backing up again for a moment…

It has been almost cliche in the history books now to talk about the rise of Nazi Germany and the Third Reich, along with Mussolini’s Italy, and the other fascist regimes during WWII – how nobody thought that it could actually happen when these movements were in their infancy in the streets of European cities.  Time and again, history records how many people saw the Nazi menace early on and thought it would quickly peter out or that they should just give it no attention for whatever reason.  This history also tells us how some few who were marginalized for what was perceived as their paranoia, were speaking out early on as to where this racial political movement would lead and the bloody terror that it could be.  There’s the famous words of German protestant pastor Martin Niemoller who said;  “First they came for the Socialists, and I did not speak out—
Because I was not a Socialist.  Then they came for the Trade Unionists, and I did not speak out— Because I was not a Trade Unionist.  Then they came for the Jews, and I did not speak out— Because I was not a Jew.  Then they came for me—and there was no one left to speak for me.”  This stands as a cautionary tale from history about what happens when people forsake the basic principles of life and liberty to embrace racial politics and fascist ideology.  It also stands as a warning that like George Washington actually said of liberty as well; that when racial political violence takes root, it is a tree of rapid growth.  This is why it is the never-ending labor of states/governments to quickly squash liberty in their natural growth towards tyranny; and why it is incumbent upon the citizenry, media, and other watchers of society to quickly squash racial politics and fascism wherever it rears its’ ugly head.  Alleged murderer James Alex Fields’ own mother didn’t even realize what was going on right under her nose with her own son… this is how fascism takes hold.

I care not whether you are a Republican, Democrat, Libertarian, Green, Constitutionalist, progressive, fascist, communist, monarchist, socialist, marxist, anarchist, non-political, etc.  You are human, and therefore your life and liberty are important.  Others may disagree, but only you and I can defend the sanctity of human life; and try we MUST!  It doesn’t matter about who is right and wrong so much here in this moment, where America seems poised on the brink of a bloody race war – a war in which the pump has already been primed with blood in the streets, and has vocal advocates with a big microphone in public view openly advocating for more of the same.  The bloodletting has already begun.  I know there are ridiculous voices on the left which cry wolf and engage in ‘virtue-signaling’ and moral posturing to play political games; but now is NOT one of those times in which political opponents should be shy to answer “negative” on racial politics or to engage.  The ANTI-LIFE and anti-liberty rhetoric and actions of the now publicly manifest Alt-Right should be enough to compel condemnation from every single American man and woman who wishes to preserve life and liberty for anyone.  My hope is that all these bloodthirsty attention-whores have accomplished in their ‘Unite The Right’ rally is to unite the rest of American and the world against them.  Unfortunately, history is that these movements don’t experience that kind of resistance from a public that just doesn’t take their threat seriously and they just keep growing until it’s too late.  This is why it is imperative that we each and every one take a stand now and use our voices to counter the speech coming from the Alt-Right.  The fact that they already have blood on their hands just means that we need to be actively engaged in crushing this movement immediately.  And this is the reason I am going back active as a political activist right now and encouraging you do as well; the sanctity of human life demands it, and certainly life is on the line.  The Alt-Right is organized, and it shouldn’t be underestimated because of the show of a lot of ‘nerdy’ young men; to the contrary, these poorly misguided young men are mostly probably very intelligent and competent.  These are the scared young ‘evil geniuses’ who are being radicalized, and if not stopped now – will be your future SS, SA, & Gestapo style leadership as they go further down this path.

So as not to be too terribly long-winded here, let me just refer you to finding out who the players are and what the movement is about for yourself from original sources and the due diligence of journalists doing the work.  I realize that not every Trump supporter is Christopher Cantwell, but you need to understand the campaign of lies and disinformation and dangerous racial politics with which President Trump has surrounded himself and in which the Alt-Right movement is entrenched.  Please get out of your political echo chambers and take in ALL media sources right now for a more objective view of what’s happening; because there’s even a polarization in the media with vastly different ‘facts’ and narratives.  There is “fake news,” but it’s just as much the conspiratorial Alex Jones and the admitted disinformation kingpin Roger Stone just as much as it is CNN, NBC, & FOX, etc.  There are people who went to Charlottesville last weekend organized JUST and ONLY to help support the right to free speech and assembly, and who even armed themselves to defend the speech of those with whom they vehemently disagree – as well as people who went there to start a race war – as well as those who went to oppose the speakers – as well as those looking for propaganda that helps spread disinformation – as well as innocent bystanders genuinely interested in objective observation.  None of these lives or the liberty of those in attendance was important to the racial politics of the organizers; and you need to understand the link between them and Donald Trump, and the movement that literally threatens the lives of Americans and our basic liberties in this very moment.  PLEASE do your homework to educate yourself on who these Alt-Right people are and what they intend to do; and PLEASE use your voice to speak out against it.

My indictment of President Trump and his movement are understood by familiarizing yourself with the following resources to begin, but please go on chasing the rabbit-hole for yourself:  Donald Trump himself began his political campaign with momentum from the birther conspiracy.  This will give you Alex Jones & InfoWars – a lunatic conspiracy fringe group and network of unhinged hate-spewers and closet racists who regularly attack people’s patriotism for things like being an atheist or just simply disagreeing with them or questioning their cockamamie conspiracies about 9/11 being an ‘inside job’ in which George Bush himself plotted to murder thousands of Americans.  Since the Trump phenomenon, it’s no secret this conspiracy theory has trickled into right-wing and conservative news outlets and their blogging networks – along with their other silly conspiracy and sensationalistic garbage.  Steve Bannon &  the Breitbart publication have been part of the Trump team going way back now, and key man Roger Stone is a baron of disinformation who has no qualms about using his talent for lies for political gain.  Then, let’s move on to those with whom they have their connections in the Alt-Right, and that same Alt-Right which attempted to ‘Unite The Right’ under the auspices of white nationalism this past weekend.  There’s Jason Kessler, Richard Spencer, Augustus Invictus, Christopher Cantwell, and others; along with groups like Vanguard America, the Traditional Workers Party, and several other groups and individuals identifying with white supremacist and other violent authoritarian views.

The crimes of the American government are not lost on me, and neither should they be on you.  These certainly are trying and tumultuous times.  The whole world is in upheaval, and there are many desperate situations which need attention.  Certainly, something’s gotta give and big changes need to occur – this much is true.  But as much as the voters may have reached out of desperation and latched onto a man and a political ideology that was out of the mainstream because the mainstream has become so generic and horrifying; Donald Trump and right-wing populism was not the appropriate switch.  Some people may not be ready to switch to a voluntaryist’s world quite yet, but I can promise you that fascism will be worse than anything we’ve seen yet in America.  My grandfather went to Europe in WWII to fight these tyrants, and I am another American war veteran who will not see the rise of fascism in this country as long as I can stop it.  Please use your voice and join me to shout down the rise of the fascist menace in our midst.

To conclude on a note which harkens back to the beginning of this essay and the point about the fundamental gulf between the ‘pro-life’ message of the American revolutionaries, and the ANTI-LIFE message of the Alt-Right, we should look at Alt-Right leader Richard Spencer’s own words; his own admission that he doesn’t believe in the sanctity of human life or human liberty.  It’s in the first video below.  Beyond this first video, you will find further resources to help you get started finding out who is the Alt-Right and their violent racist army and how they are latched on to President Donald Trump.

“Life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness… sounds very enlightenment… kinda…  I’m tempted to say, faggy, to be honest.”   – Richard Spencer, Alt-Right leader, Unite the Right speaker

 

Let cooler heads prevail.  I implore you to be a consistent voice of reason, peace, and love for your fellow humanity.  Please use your voice to combat the clear and present danger of violent fascism which has already christened its’ splash onto the national scene in blood.  It’s not just our unalienable rights to each our individual liberty that is at stake; but the only thing that’s more important than human liberty – life itself.

 A.G. “Brick” House is an Afghanistan war veteran and former licensed minister (UPCI), who has become an outspoken skeptic, peace advocate, and involved himself in many other issues which he believes affect the individual freedoms of the people whose constitutional rights he took an oath to defend.  He currently resides in southeast Texas where he is recovering from PTSD; enjoys the therapeutic hobbies of creative writing https://chaossection.com/, playing drums/percussion, training in martial arts, and other forms of artistic expression   \m/ 

 

 

 

 

Including this as well because there were actual ‘patriots’ who went to Charlottesville as well.  I think these people mean well, but probably very misled…