Everything’s already in place; the circle is closing. Soon it will be impossible to pretend we still live in an even semi-free country. 

I try to practice avoidance – for example, not flying anymore to avoid being scanned/felt up. But I know that eventually, it will be impossible – illegal - to avoid being scanned (and much else, besides). For example, they are going to require us all to carry a biometric National ID card – not merely a driver’s license. Without it, you will be unable to function (legally) and be subject to arrest merely for going about your peaceful, harming no one else business without it. Just wait. 

The choice will be: Become an outlaw – or submit.

We got a taste of this with gun control laws. The choice was: Comply with “the law” and render yourself defenseless, or become a Felon Walking for daring to refuse to comply by retaining a gun for self-defense. People who were harming no one – and exercising their basic human right to self-defense – were criminalized at the stroke of a pen. 

It was an easier choice to make, though, because as a practical matter your chances of being caught in defiance of “the law” were very slim and your illicit possession of a gun would probably only become an issue if you were forced to use the gun – in which case, better to be alive and dealing with “breaking the law” than dead but “law-abiding.”

But what happens when “the law” requires everyday, inescapable evidence of submission and compliance? When you have to submit to a scan/grope before entering a public building, such as the DMV or a courthouse, say?  

“The law” already requires submission to random roadblocks. Is it a stretch to imagine “the law” will take the next logical step and require us to submit to scans/gropes at these random roadblocks? What possible argument – based on existing legal precedent – can be made against it? Everything that matters has already been conceded. You, as an individual, no longer have any meaningful 4th Amendment rights when you are in your vehicle or on public roads. The Supremes have said so. You have given “implied consent” to random stops, interrogations and de facto searches.

Oh yes, there is still the fiction of probable cause prior to an actual search. But it is just that – fiction. “Probable cause” amounts to I want to search your vehicle. Virtually any pretext given after the fact will be sustained by the Volksgerichthof. Refuse the search and the cops will likely detain you anyhow – then search you anyway. Ask around. Check out YouTube. See for yourself. Here are some recent samples:

All it takes is being “uncooperative” – which amounts to such things as declining to answer the cop’s questions, or – much more dangerous – daring to question anything he does or demands of you. Do that, and expect the modern equivalent of a wood shampoo via Tazering.   

Imagine what will happen when they scale down the airport scanners and can mount them in a vehicle – like a cop car. There won’t be any “opting out,” then.

The point is, we (the lowing, beef-headed, football and celebrity obsessed oblivions who now constitute a working majority of the Anerican public) have already conceded the point. Everything that matters has been given up and gone for years – long before 9/11. In the name of the “war” on drugs, we accepted outrageous invasions of our private lives. For the sake of “getting drunks off the road” and “seatbelt safety checkpoints,” we cheered random dragnets that subject every motorist on the road to an East German Stasi-like once-over and ihre papierien, bitte!

Safety, safety – always more safety. In exchange for less and less freedom – and human dignity, too.

No longer can you enter the world as a man (or for that matter, a woman). As captains of our destinies, masters of our fates – beholden to none, free to go in peace. And even more important, able to talk back, to refuse, to question – and to demand to be left in peace if we’re not doing anything to cause harm to anyone else. 

We are all children now – fearful, obedient – and to be punished, if we’re not.

No freedom to make our own way and depend upon our own good judgment. We will be told what to do – and how and when. The “why” no longer concerns us. 

No more live – and let live. 

Submit. Obey. 

That is the New American – and the New America.

Throw it in the Woods?

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Jan. 4, 2011