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Consent Of The Governed – Not The Elite Few

Newsletter | October 20, 2022

Projecting and gaslighting are routine tactics used to intimidate. In today’s political environment, when we hear or read the phrase “(this/that or he/she) undermines our democracy,” it’s typically coming from those who scream the loudest. It is they – the screamers – who are projecting to intimidate and are, in fact, the real threat to democracy. What they really mean is that they don’t like sharing the country with people who disagree with them; in other words, people who believe in the Constitution, free speech, and all our God-given inalienable rights.

The screamers have spent the last several years trying to slander, silence, censor, and infiltrate our educational institutions, government agencies, and every other system or sector in our country. That makes them not only undemocratic but also un-American.

These screamers make a lot of noise on the propaganda press platforms but they’re talking out of an echo chamber. In reality, they’re a pretty small minority. It’s made up of political operatives, bureaucrats, paid TV pundits and stenographers, and now even from the White House — all of them ranting repeatedly about how anyone who doesn’t fall in line with the latest narrative is a threat to America. Sure.

We’ve come to call them the elite class. Every nation, every civilization — from ancient Greece and Rome to the present — has an elite political class, but ours is among the most dangerous and destructive in all of history.

Elite educational institutions aim to indoctrinate young people with the latest ideological fashions about race and gender or whatever else they weaponize to poison our great nation.
Local and state governments run by elites are populated by the same people who defend policies that have turned once majestic American cities into chaotic cesspools of crime and disease, fear, and violence.

Elite ideas? Well, just look at the real-world effects of policies based on progressive causes, like climate change, “no border wall,” and “defund the police.” Climate change policies have caused energy prices to soar; the failure to secure our southern border has caused record-high numbers of illegal aliens, including unknowns and terrorists to pour into America bringing with them unfathomable amounts of drugs like fentanyl that poison and kill our nation’s young adults; and the “defund the police” movement emboldened violent criminals, endangering our streets and each one of us.  Elite ideas, ideals, and policies hurt the average American every day.

So when they talk about preserving “our democracy,” they’re fearful of patriotic Americans and scared of losing their privileged position. And for good reason — by any rational measure, they’re spectacular failures.

They know it, too. As the “screaming elite” steer us from one financial crisis into another and one pointless and wasteful foreign conflict to another, Americans have stood up to say we’ve had enough.

We didn’t vote for open borders or to send our hard-earned money to fund someone else’s war. We don’t support locking our children out of school for two years or spying on parents concerned about what those children are being taught when school finally reopens. Those are their ideas, and they implemented them without our consent, and that’s not how democracy works. Consent of the governed means that they follow our lead.

Come election day, make sure to remind the people who keep screaming about “our democracy” what democracy truly looks like.

Hundreds of people have taken our weekly surveys about the topics we address in our feature article. Please continue to participate. We read all the insightful comments and learn from each of the responses. Thank you! And please join our Executive Director, Mary O’Neill, every Monday at 9 a.m. on America’s Mondays With Mary to hear some of our readers’ responses and other news about America’s Future activities. 

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This Election Day Take Nothing For Granted – VOTE

Win Vote

Imagine if George Washington took for granted that victory would be his before the last major battle of the Revolutionary War in Yorktown, Virginia. And imagine if our Founders took for granted that they would be successful in creating a new nation – a Constitutional Republic – without the formation of the Constitution. Better still, imagine that your children’s and grandchildren’s First Amendment rights – or any one of our citizen rights – would remain intact and indestructible “just because.”

Taking important events in life for granted is not wise. They require our full participation, informed decision-making, planning, and taking action.

In 19 days, on November 8, every eligible voter in America has a right and responsibility to show up at the polls and vote for political candidates in local, state, and national elections. Many Americans will get there and vote; some will not for one reason or another. Don’t sit this election out.

While every election at any time in our nation’s history is meaningful, the results of the 2022 mid-term elections are certain to be highly consequential in areas such as parental rights, censorship, the cost of living, the rise in crime on our streets, border security and trafficking, national security and foreign relations, vaccine mandates, funding or defunding police, and so many other issues of great importance that will impact you and your fellow Americans now and in the future.

These are monumental times in America. Take nothing for granted. Be among the committed voters of America this Election Day and apply the power constitutionally conferred to you by exercising your right to vote. As the Declaration of Independence states, “Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed.”

Your voice matters and your vote counts.

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Keeping You Informed
SCOTUS to Decide Blockbuster Social Media Censorship Case

To keep our readers up-to-date and well-informed, we continue our series focusing on cases currently in front of SCOTUS during its new October 2022 term.  This week we turn to a case centering on censorship by social media, including their algorithms.  The case is Gonzalez v Google, Dkt. No. 21-1333 and the docket is located here.

Central to this case is Section 230(c)(1) of the Communications Decency Act of 1996, which shields internet publishers from liability arising out of good faith decisions to restrict or enable public access to content (i.e., speech) that originated from another source.

Section 230 was created prior to the rise of social media as we know it today.  The Act was intended to shield interactive internet websites (and their owners) from liability related to content displayed on their websites that originates from another source and/or is created and placed by a user that is interacting with such a website.

Social media platforms, Google in this case, argue that Section 230 allows them to suppress or promote user content at their discretion.  In taking this position, it appears they have disregarded that for Section 230 to apply, the decision to restrict or enable user content must be made in good faith.  Based upon reason and fact, social media giants use Section 230 as a sword, and not a shield, to oppress dissent and propagandize information for their own benefit and to advance perverted political or financial agendas.

SCOTUS will resolve the following question, presented to them by the Petitioner, Mr. Gonzalez:

Does Section 230 immunize interactive computer services when they make targeted recommendations of information provided by another information content provider, or only limit the liability of interactive computer services when they engage in traditional editorial functions (such as deciding whether to display or withdraw) with regard to such information?

SCOTUS will tackle issues related to the algorithms used by Twitter, Facebook, etc., and expectedly will analyze whether actions by social media conglomerates are taken in good faith.  It is unclear whether the SCOTUS will include analysis related to recent Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) releases, including emails, demonstrating social media platforms suppressed and promoted content as directed by the Biden Administration, the FBI, and/or the Democrat Party leadership.  

If the SCOTUS dives into this issue, the Justices will be compelled to consider whether government officials colluding or directing Twitter, etc. to ban political dissent and suppress information because it does not squarely fall within the political narrative of the Democrat Party amounts to governmental “censorship by proxy” and is, therefore, a gross violation of our First Amendment right to free speech.

Undoubtedly, social media platforms have gathered immense power and that power has been grossly abused, e.g., casting off a sitting U.S. President from their websites, suppressing President Trump’s voice, and recklessly preventing all Americans from hearing directly from their Commander in Chief.

At some point, the social media boardrooms undeservedly decided they would be the arbiters of truth and would decide who says what, and when. And corrupt politicians sensed blood in the water.  And now we find ourselves in a perfect storm.  America is depending on SCOTUS to restore free speech and prohibit harmful abuses by powerful villains and crooks.

We, at America’s Future, believe free speech is essential to the survival of this nation. We trust the SCOTUS takes this opportunity to outlaw and penalize oppressive conduct.  It is intolerable in a free America.

To access the SCOTUS website for more information, visit https://www.supremecourt.gov.  

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Unequal Justice Under Law
FBI Lies While Prosecuting Americans for Lying

This is the ninth article in our series on the nation’s premier law enforcement agency, the Federal Bureau of Investigation, and its self-destruction over time.

Every day, it is getting more difficult for the FBI to persuade Americans that it is fighting “a never-ending battle for Truth, Justice, and the American Way.”  Every time the FBI is caught doing wrong, it doubles down, claiming to be pure and unspotted.  For example, after suffering heavy criticism of its unprecedented raid on former President Trump’s home, FBI Director Christopher Wray responded:  “Every day I see the men and women of the FBI doing their jobs professionally and with rigor, objectivity, and a fierce commitment to our mission of protecting the American people….”

The reality of the FBI is far different — and far more disturbing — than the image the FBI wants to project, especially in its commitment to “Truth.” As noted liberal Alan Dershowitz bluntly puts it in a recent interview, “The FBI’s work model is to lie to people, to tell them they have more evidence than they have, to tell them that their friends have decided to cooperate. Lying is very much a part, unfortunately, of dialogue between FBI agents and defendants.”

The FBI probably would not deny Dershowitz’ charge that it lies but would explain that it lies only to get “bad guys” to tell the truth.  Even assuming it is right for the FBI to lie to persons being interrogated, that’s not the end of the story.  The FBI also lies to prosecute Americans that are perceived as a threat to the ruling class.  Here’s how it does it.  

Unlike local law enforcement, which often videotapes its interviews of suspects, the FBI has a policy not to record the interview.  Instead, one agent takes notes on a “Form 302,” while another asks the questions.  Why would that be?  Certainly it’s not a lack of resources, for if local police have the technology to conduct video and audio recordings, the FBI could do the same. 

One reason was detailed in a 2006 internal FBI memo.  The Bureau is afraid that if a jury was allowed to see and hear the FBI’s deceptive interrogation tactics, the jury might distrust the FBI more than the defendant.  As the FBI report put it:

[L]awful and acceptable interviewing techniques do not always come across in recorded fashion to lay persons as proper means of obtaining information from defendants. Initial resistance may be interpreted as involuntariness and misleading a defendant as to the quality of the evidence against him may appear to be unfair deceit.

Thus, writes civil liberties lawyer Harvey Silverglate, “rather than risk such juror skepticism in response to a verbatim recording, the FBI feels that a jury will more likely be led to the FBI’s version of the truth by reading an FBI agent’s Form 302 than by listening to the actual interview.”

Even beyond its effort to withhold information from jurors is the FBI’s desire to be able to prosecute those it chooses under a very dangerous federal statute — 18 U.S.C. Section 1001 — the federal false statements law.  That statute makes it a felony, punishable by up to five years in prison, to make a material misstatement to any member of the federal government.

If interviews are recorded, the defendant can only be charged with lying based on the actual words that come out of his mouth.  However, if the only evidence of what the defendant stated is in the form of an FBI agent’s written notes on a Form 302, he can be prosecuted and convicted for what the agent wrote down — which may be very different from what the defendant said.  And if the defendant had been truthful, there is no recording available for him to use in his defense.

Lying to suspected criminals is bad enough, but the FBI has been exposed lying to federal courts, lying to Congress, and even falsifying documents in its political war against Donald Trump.

On August 19, 2020, former FBI lawyer Kevin Clinesmith pleaded guilty to falsifying an email used in a sworn affidavit to convince the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (“FISA”) Court to authorize it to surveil Trump campaign official Carter Page as a suspected “Russian agent.” The FBI had received an email proving that Page was a source for the CIA, not Russia, but Clinesmith added the words “not a source” to completely reverse the meaning of the email, and trick the FISA judge.  This pillar of FBI virtue pleaded guilty, getting probation, and community service.

FISA judge Rosemary Collyer blasted the FBI for its deliberate deception.  “[R]epresentations made by FBI personnel turned out to be unsupported or contradicted by information in their possession,” she wrote.  In other words, they intentionally deceived the court. “The FBI’s handling of the Carter Page applications…was antithetical to the heightened duty of candor,” Judge Collyer added.

The FBI lied to the Senate Judiciary Committee.  In a scathing rebuke, Senator Lindsey Graham stated that “[t]he FBI did to the Senate Intelligence Committee what the Department of Justice and FBI had previously done to the FISA Court: mischaracterize, mislead and lie.

Former FBI director James Comey denied for years that the FBI had spied on the Trump campaign.  “So it was all lies….No spying on the campaign,” Comey tweeted, adding in an op-ed piece that “those who attacked the FBI for two years should admit they were wrong.”  But the details of the FBI’s Crossfire Hurricane investigation into the 2016 Trump Campaign have been widely exposed.

Juries and federal district court judges historically just have assumed FBI agents are telling the truth and have convicted defendants based on what the agent testified.  But as FBI lying is exposed, fewer and fewer jurors will accept the testimony of an FBI agent at face value.  There is a term for law enforcement officers lying during testimony that originated in New York City — “testilying.”  Increasingly, that term is used to describe the sworn testimony of FBI agents.

In August 2020, several House Republicans suggested that the FBI may have to be dismantled if it continues to use investigation and prosecution as political weapons.  We are not holding our breath, but let’s hope the day will come when the FBI’s days of lying to protect the Deep State are ended, once and for all.

Editor’s Note: To read the articles in this series thus far, please click here.

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Order Your Free “America” Book

The first printing of America’s Future first in a series of educational books, “Exploring America’s Founding Documents,” is on its way from the printer. We are excited to share the book with our newsletter readers. We are preparing orders that have already been placed, however, if you have not yet ordered your free copy, please click the button below and complete the form to receive the book at your home.

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Reminders & Updates

ELECTION INFO RESOURCES: America’s Future wants to help ease the way by providing an “Election Information Resources” page on our website. Here you will find direct links, telephone numbers and email address to all 50 states and U.S. jurisdictions’ election information websites. It’s user-friendly with easy access to check where your polling location is and other assorted points of voter information. Click here.

AMERICA’S MONDAYS WITH MARY: Tune in every Monday morning at 9 a.m. (ET) to watch our Executive Director Mary O’Neill report out on the comments and insights submitted via our weekly Reader Survey and listen to updates about America’s Future activities and what’s ahead at America’s Mondays With Mary.

MUST SEE: America’s Future urges all Americans to get involved and never quit the fight for freedom. Please watch the video  and heed our Board Chair, General Michael Flynn’s question: “What am I going to do to help my country, to help my family, to help my community?”

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