article on LewRockwell.com<\/a> about “Renewing the Patriot Act while America Sleeps.” I was struck by how little I cared, even though it was a fine, informative article. Sometimes I find myself not caring simple because one can’t get all het up about every piece of creepy news without going bonkers. But in this case, I felt as if the author, John W. Whitehead, was talking about some other nation — some far-off tyranny (call it DCLand, Mordor, or whatever you wish) having nothing to do with me.<\/p>\nJust a feeling. <\/p>\n
I live in the rainy NorthWET, in a river valley lined with evergreens. I live in a small town where, if I have a problem with the local government, I can walk over to City Hall and probably get it solved by an actual, probably even friendly, human being. I live where the cops wave at me as I walk my dogs down the highway (and where one of those cops stopped the other day to shoo a loose neighborhood pooch off the street without ticketing the owners or confiscating the hound). Where I live, I enjoy the fabled “blessings of liberty,” partly because some old dead guys were smart enough to recognize them and because a lot of other old dead guys (and women) in my family tree were smart enough to seek them. And because I seek those blessings, too. I can’t imagine anybody here reporting a neighbor to the Department of Homeland (Achtung!) Security without some sort of extreme provocation. I don’t thnk too many feddies are tapping too many phones around here, mostly because they prefer cities (barring the occasional Randy Weaver or militia case). I’m under no illusion that this government or these cops in this isolated corner of the world are my friends. But I live with them. And get by from day to day. I feel very, very far away from that other government and its cops, spies, soldiers, and other arms of its “security apparatus.”<\/p>\n
We’re all subject to the stormtroopers of the American empire. No illusions about that. But then, so is everybody, all over the world. But aren’t most of us, in our tiny bergs or backwoods homesteads, actually farther from DCLand’s influence that the people of, say, Afghanistan, Iraq, Israel, or Egypt?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Or maybe I should ask — Do you see yourself as living in your “country of record,” wherever and whatever it may be? Of course, whether we’re anarchists, minarchists, unquestioning patriots, or brain-dead vegetables (but I repeat myself), we do reside within some country of record. Obviously a fact, even when we philosophically posture against bondage or allegiance to any governmental gang. But I’m asking about perceptions. The other day I read an article on LewRockwell.com about “Renewing the Patriot Act while America Sleeps.” I was struck by how little I cared, even though it was a fine, informative article.…<\/p>\n
Continue readingDo you live in the USA?<\/span><\/a><\/div>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11,18],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-4003","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-government","category-mind-and-spirit","ratio-natural","entry"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.clairewolfe.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4003","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.clairewolfe.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.clairewolfe.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.clairewolfe.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.clairewolfe.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4003"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.clairewolfe.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4003\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.clairewolfe.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4003"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.clairewolfe.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4003"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.clairewolfe.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4003"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}