By Doug Newman – email me here.
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“We will not be driven by fear into an age of unreason.” – Edward R. Murrow

On the afternoon of September 11, 2001, I received what would turn out to be a most prophetic email from an old friend in Arizona. The subject line read “They want you to panic”. The body of the email began with “….so don’t”.

It is bad enough that, in the aftermath of Sunday morning’s carnage at the Pulse nightclub in Orlando, so many politicians and pundits are so hell bent on scaring the smack out of the rest of us. It is even worse that so many people are giving in to such fearmongering.

The elites on the left want more gun control … and the rank-and-file left is more than happy to jump on board. The elites on the right want to fan the flames of Islamophobia … and the rank-and-file right is more than happy to jump on board.

By all means, mourn the dead, pray for the injured and dying and extend your thoughts, prayers and condolences to all affected by this most horrific crime. But in the name of all that is sacred – and much that is profane – do not allow yourself to be conned, manipulated and just plain USED into giving up what remains of your personal liberty out of baseless fear.

Fear is not always a bad thing. But it has to be grounded in reality.

• The left wants us to fear guns. The right wants us to fear immigrants and Islam. The truth of the matter is that even though there are more guns, immigrants and Muslims than ever in America, violent crime rates are off by almost half in the last 20 years. Yet when, there is a mass shooting the left FREAKS OUT and demands that we give up our guns. And when there is a terrorist attack the right FREAKS OUT and demands that we give up the rest of our liberties.
• Yes, America leads the world in gun ownership. And yet dozens of countries have higher homicide rates than we do. There is simply no correlation between gun ownership and violent crime.
• And for those of you who would ban “assault weapons”, thus leaving Uncle Sam with a monopoly on them, I’ll just leave this picture here.
  

  Credit: ABC News

• Your actual chances of dying in a terrorist attack are, just like your chances of dying in a mass shooting, microscopic. Even in 2001, about 2 million Americans died from various causes. This means that 1,997,000 died of something other than terrorism. Just how much liberty will you give up in order to be “safe”?
• If you think that by “terrorist”, Uncle Sam means just scary looking guys with names like Abdul and Rahim, think again. 72 groups of people are named in various federal documents as potential terrorists. Just about anyone could fit into one or more of these categories.
• It has been several centuries since a Muslim country conquered a non-Muslim country. The 9/11 hijackers, the San Bernardino killers and Omar Mateen, the accused Orlando killer, are all dead. You can’t take over a country, impose Sharia law, force everyone to speak Arabic and convert everyone to Islam when you are … I’ll say it one more time … DEAD!!!
• If Hyman Lipschitz set off a bomb in a church killing 50 Christians and injuring 53 more, would that be any less horrific than what happened early Sunday morning in Orlando? Let me help you out here: NO! Murder is murder, regardless of the implements used and the demographics of the murderer and his victims.
• And then there is this.
• And, as with every show stopping event, you MUST ask if we are getting the full truth. Don’t believe every conspiracy theory you read and don’t believe everything in the mainstream media. Do your own research as well as your own thinking. If you disagree with me that is FINE! Just don’t be anyone’s tool! Could one person have fired off enough rounds with one weapon without taking time to reload? And what about  eyewitness accounts of multiple shooters? And does a militant radicalized jihadi consume alcohol regularly at a gay bar? There are several other reasons to doubt the official story.
• An omnipotent government is always more to be feared than any individual or small group thereof. Omar Mateen had two hands; the state has millions of hands. And to give up all your rights, or to force others to give up theirs in the name of some Higher Good, is to leave yourself defenseless against the one thing that has killed more people throughout history than any other.

• And if you are naïve enough to think that “it can’t happen here”, just look around. America has the world’s highest incarceration rate, widespread warrantless surveillance, sexual molestation as a condition of travel (something neither the Nazis nor the Communists ever did), rampant police brutality and indefinite detention without due process. And consider the freedoms the American people have given away since the early 1980s. Uncle Sam only took them away because we gave them away – overwhelmingly in every election.

Our Constitution establishes an intricate set of firewalls against tyranny. It protects unpopular words, unpopular deeds and unpopular people. However, it does not enforce itself. If “we the people” do not stand firm when the rights of others are threatened, even people we may not like, we have zero business complaining when our own rights are threatened.

To quote Sir Thomas More in A Man for All Seasons, “What would you do? Cut a great road through the law to get after the Devil? … And when the last law was down, and the Devil turned round on you – where would you hide, Roper, the laws all being flat? This country is planted thick with laws from coast to coast, Man’s laws, not God’s, and if you cut them down — and you’re just the man to do it — do you really think you could stand upright in the winds that would blow then? Yes, I give the Devil benefit of law, for my own safety’s sake!”

An absolutely unspeakable crime was committed at the Pulse nightclub. If you would disregard all constitutional protections in order to “go after” the perps, don’t complain when there are no protections in place when someone wants to “go after” you. When these firewalls are eliminated, and the infernos of tyranny rage, will you, reader, be able to withstand being burned alive?

In most respectful memory. Credit: NY Daily News

• REAPING … SOWING: “Violence Begets Violence” by John Whitehead.
• There is no “policy solution” to prevent another Orlando.
• Your chances of dying in a mass shooting are a tiny fraction of 1 percent.
• When seconds count, the cops are just hours away.
• “The Real Orlando Aftermath” by Jack Perry.
• “Orlando: The New 9/11?” by Ron Paul.
• According to Judge Andrew Napolitano, no one died at Pulse until 5:13 am.