Washington is abuzz preparing for the anointing of Obama and a rerun of the Clinton era. Several nominees for key cabinet positions did their undergraduate work for Bill Clinton; they are now well-prepared to do the heavy lifting for Obama. Aside from the highly publicized cabinet appointments, Obama will name nearly 7,000 people to management positions in the various federal agencies. Resource and land management agencies will, once again, become extension offices of environmental organizations. Nearly 30 environmental organizations have already prepared
Obama’s “green” agenda. And, with expanded majorities in both houses of Congress, Obama expects his left-leaning vision of social organization to unfold uncontested in his version of ‘a new deal for a new century’.
Maybe not.
Ammunition Accountability Act
Gun Owners of America has been tracking Obama’s anti-gun voting record, and preparing its membership for quick and effective response when new anti-gun legislation is introduced. Organization such as GOA and
Keep and Bear Arms concentrate on Second Amendment issues. When there is a threat to the Constitutional right to own guns, they inform their members, and the members of other
Freedom21 organizations. Because of their work, hundreds of organizations are now aware of, and working to defeat the latest Second Amendment threat.
It’s called the “Ammunition Accountability Act.” It is model legislation designed to force ammunition manufacturers to identify every bullet with a serial number, that is then registered to a purchaser, and recorded in a federal database. Theoretically, if a shell-casing is found at a crime scene, law enforcement officers could trace the purchaser of the bullet.
In reality, it is another intimidation system, designed to identify, log and track gun/ammunition owners. The model legislation also calls for a five-cent-per-bullet tax to cover the cost of the system. The system would provide the government with the name and location of gun owners and an inventory of the ammunition held. The model legislation would outlaw any and all unregistered ammunition within a year after the legislation is adopted.
Ammunition Accountability legislation has been introduced in 12 states. Thanks to organizations such as GOA and KABA, this law will not be enacted without serious opposition, open debate, and public awareness.
Omnibus Federal Lands Act
With Obama soon to be in the White House, Senate Democrats are lining up land acquisition bills. More than 150 separate bills that seek to lock up land in one way or another were dumped into HR5151 “Omnibus Federal Lands Act” at the end of the 110th Congress. This bill is about to be resurrected and, amid all the pomp and circumstance of the inauguration, passed by Congress with little opposition.
Too late! The
American Land Rights Association has alerted organizations across the country, and provides detailed information on their website about the bill and its impact.
National Animal Identification System
The U.S. Department of Agriculture expected to simply mandate a National Animal Identification System which would be fully implemented by 2009. In fact, an Agriculture Department official told an audience in Utah in 2006 that NAIS is coming “like a freight train; there’s nothing that can stop it.”
That official had not met the
Liberty Ark Coalition, or the dozens of other grassroots groups that sprang up to educate and activate the people who do not want the federal government to register their premises, electronically tag their animals, and maintain a national database tracking the movement of every animal.
The USDA had to back off its mandatory plans, and announce that the program would be voluntary. Every time the USDA tries to advance the program through some coercive rule, these organizations issue an alert and flood the phone lines of elected officials.
When USDA turned to the states and provided funds for state agencies to implement the program, state and local organizations such as the
Ozark Property Rights Congress rallied their troops who educated and urged their state representatives to enact legislation that prohibits mandatory NAIS in their state. More than a dozen states responded in the same way.
Freedom21 movement
Obama and the Democrats may reign in Washington, but across the land there is a network of grassroots organizations in place that did not exist when Clinton came to power. Advances in technology make it possible to inform and activate hundreds of thousands of people in a matter of minutes. All of the organizations described here are affiliated with the
Freedom21 movement. They are autonomous organizations, working within their own areas of interest and expertise, but joined together by a common desire to advance the principles of freedom in the 21st century.
The coffers of all these organizations combined would not match the budget of The Nature Conservancy, or the Sierra Club. But these organizations are armed with members who are informed, active, and determined to let no power – domestic or foreign – extinguish the freedom fashioned by our founders.
