Do these people even hear themselves? How can you be against INDIVIDUALS and claim to be for humanity? This came up in my memories on Facebook from a couple of years ago, so I thought I’d share (I set this post to the date of the OP).
Carla Gericke (JD, MFA) is an advocate of liberty specializing in localized voluntarism, self-determination, and how responsible human action can lead to peace and prosperity. She is president emeritus of the Free State Project, and lives in New Hampshire with thousands of fellow freedom fighters. In 2014, Carla won a landmark case affirming the 1st Amendment right to film police encounters.
She has appeared on WMUR, CNN, and Fox News, been featured in GQ and Playboy, been quoted in The Economist, and has discussed libertarianism on the BBC. She has visited more than 40 countries, hiked to the base camp of the 10th highest mountain in the world, lost a shoe in a taxi more than once, had her passport stolen in Goa, got kidnapped in Vietnam, and has noshed on more “mystery meat” street food than she cares to admit.
Carla once spent an entire summer while working as in-house counsel at Logitech eating tuna fish sandwiches with Doug Engelbart (the Mother Of All Demos dude), she worked on Apple’s acquisition of Steve Job’s NeXT, and bought her first Bitcoin for $6. Carla co-hosts the Told You So podcast, and co-chairs Manch Talk TV. She serves on several non-profit boards, follows a Keto lifestyle, practices yoga and shooting, and plays a mean game of Scrabble.
Carla enjoys cooking, gardening, painting, reading, and watching documentary films. She has twice run for New Hampshire Senate, garnering 42% of the vote in 2018 against an 11-term incumbent, and believes in 2020, third time will be the charm! DONATE to her race TODAY!
Carla’s first book, a collection of award-winning short stories, essays, and speeches, The Ecstatic Pessimist is now available on Amazon. Says Nick Gillespie, Editor-at-Large of Reason Magazine: “It is a fantastic package of writings that veer from fiction, to autobiography and memoir, to political polemics. It’s great, mixes stories about substance abuse, lack of focus, historical wrongs and utopian attempts to remake the world as a better place in a very pragmatic way. I highly recommend The Ecstatic Pessimist: Stories of Hope (Mostly).”
Resources for today’s show…
- Follow Life With Jack on Instagram
- TSP Facebook Group
- Join the Members Brigade
- Join Our Forum
- TspAz.com
- Move it On Over – George Thororgood and the Destroyers
Carla’s Links
- CarlaGericke.com
- The Ecstatic Pessimist: Stories of Hope (Mostly)
- The Told You So Podcast
- Carla For NH Senate
- Carla on Facebook
- Carla on InstaGram
- Carla on Twitter
- Free State Project
Sponsors of the Day
THIS VIDEO IS 7 YEARS OLD AND STILL RINGS TRUE TODAY, MAYBE EVEN MORE SO… Watch to the end!
Ah yes, memberberry when I warned you the state was getting out of control and wasn’t really there to serve YOU but rather themselves?!?
Now, seven years later, they call themselves “essential” and YOU, “nonessential.” They take all the protective gear for themselves first, and lock you down. They tell you all of these unConstitutional precautions for “your own good,” but deep down inside, you no longer believe them because it is clear this is NOT true, that nothing that is happening right now is benefitting you or your business, all it is doing is spreading fear, paranoia, and distrust between friends and neighbors, almost like they want to divide us into two classes–you know, two classes like “essentials” and “nonessentials.”
Perhaps you are starting to wonder why the state is forcing you to do things to your own body against your own will, why they are forcing you to do their bidding when it is clear they are overreacting and the science does not support the destruction to the economy they are creating IN RESPONSE to the virus (it’s NOT the virus itself, it is the government’s response!). Perhaps you are starting to wonder why they are making you, the “nonessentials” enforce their regulations on their behalf, turning YOU into an agent of the state by threatening to take away your livelihood if you don’t comply. Perhaps you are starting to wonder why you should comply with these absurd and slavish rules that violate the trust and relationships you have developed with your customers, friends, and neighbors.
Here’s the reason why: Because they will harm you if you don’t. They will take your business license (permission slip) away. They will fine you. They will lock you down, and, eventually, they will lock you up.
Does this sound like a healthy relationship to you? Or does it sound like, perhaps, you are in an abusive relationship with a bully, and that you need space, and possibly a divorce?
At a minimum, I hope you will vote for me so that YOU can have a voice in the Senate, because if there is one thing that is truly, undoubtably essential, it is… liberty.
As I always say, Freedom is the answer, what’s the question?
You can find the text of this speech, together with 12 other essays about my liberty activism in my first book, The Ecstatic Pessimist, now available on Amazon. BUY YOURS TODAY.
Have you ever stopped to wonder… Who owns you? If you’re glib, you’ll, of course, say, “No one,” or, perhaps, “Me! I own me.”
Okay, but if you are not “allowed” to do what you want, when you want, based on your own perception and understanding and knowledge of a particular situation, or, even, no knowledge at all, and are forced, BY ORDER of another human being, to NOT DO WHAT YOU WANT to provide for yourself, your family and friends, then… WHO OWNS YOU?
Why do I believe in Liberty above all else? Beside the moral aspect of only *I, myself* am able to decide *for me about my life,* I believe you always get the best outcomes in the shortest amount of time when human freedom flourishes. When you allow people to pick and choose what works best for them, you allow experimentation, which in turn gives us information, which gives us better, faster results.
Free people = better lives.
When you eliminate Liberty, bad things follow. When you subjugate yourself to unelected “experts” and allow their opinions to form the basis of “government orders” against the people of your own state, forcing them into one single approach, **regardless of our differences,** you not only reduce and/or eliminate that experimentation and nimbleness afforded by free people freely deciding how to live their lives, you actually become a slave to someone else’s decision matrixes, you become a slave… To a state government that now claims to have the “authority” to pick who does what when WITH PRIVATE BUSINESSES, PRIVATE PROPERTY, and supposedly FREE HUMAN BEINGS…
Again… who owns you?
Know how you get people to stay inside during a pandemic? THERE’S A PANDEMIC. The governor failed New Hampshire by choosing tyranny over Liberty.
I realize Sununu had difficult choices to make, but he chose wrong out of the gate by not choosing to respect us, me, YOU, his fellow citizens and by ignoring the founding principles of this nation and state. He chose wrong by choosing to DICTATE instead of LEAD.
As is typical for a politician, there was a lot of nudge-nudge wink-winking that happened at the start. Subtle, “don’t worry,” we’re just going to designate everyone as “essential,” and this “order’s enforcement” won’t have “teeth.”
Well, let me tell you a little something about how Liberty vs. tyranny works… When you issue “orders,” you are empowering law enforcement to… enFORCE ORDERS, which is kind of what they like to do… Which means…
It has taken less than a month for the police to start harassing parents on playgrounds. It has taken less than a month for law enforcement to threaten NH surfers. It has taken less than a month for police departments to start issuing policy statements explaining how they will go about arresting people who are outside (e.g. see Weare PD).
I’ve said it before, and I will say it again, and the Attorney General of the United States of America agrees with me, telling you to leave the public IS NOT A CONSTITUTIONAL lawful ORDER and if you are arrested in New Hampshire re this, PLEASE contact me.
(They’ll initially charge you with the catch-all “disobeying an officer” and then drop the charges later, and you’ll have to sue in federal court for violation of your civil rights, but I’m pretty sure–although, of course, no guarantees about anything, you’re reading an opinion on the internet–qualified immunity isn’t going to work for them, and law enforcement may be held *personally liable* too.)
I will be at the rally at Noon today 5/2 at the State House in Concord. I hope you will join me. No matter what your government tells you, WE ARE ALL ESSENTIAL.
Yes, even–nay, ESPECIALLY–us, the hard working, healthy, responsible taxpaying portion of the state… And it might behoove the “order-makers” to remember that!
NH Journal:
It is possible to be concerned about the virus, and the economic downturn, and the destruction of our civil liberties. I am, which is why I attended the rally on Saturday. I don’t underestimate the virus, but I also don’t underestimate the cost of the shutdown or the dangers of trading liberty for a false sense of security.
Life is about tradeoffs, and when you use faulty data to implement faulty “solutions” — restricting peoples’ natural rights, instituting a lockdown to “flatten the curve,” and dividing Granite Staters into “essential” and “nonessential” groups — bad outcomes must follow.
Carla Gericke (see full article)
Granite Grok:
Our caution (and lack of widespread testing of antibodies) has carried a huge economic toll. For every person in the US who has died with the virus, 1000 people have lost their jobs. We don’t know how bad it might have been if we had done nothing. At this point, we should ask if we are willing to put another 30 million people out of work in the US when we could justifiably focus on reducing death due to heart disease or other infectious diseases. Also, consider that this virus is not going away – ever. As long as there is life on earth so will be this virus. It would be nonsense to think we can socially isolate our way to zero infections. Instead of forcing society to hide from it, we need to learn to live with it within reason.
Our national policy for this matter was created with good intentions and recognizing legitimate risks. We knew very little about the virus and what might happen. That’s not the case now. The curve is flat. Our hospitals are not overwhelmed. The mortality rate is 1/10th what we thought. At this point, there is not enough uncertainty to justify continuing to destroy the economy and the government intrusion of our liberties. The burden of proof for lifting the restrictions should no longer be on us. Instead of forcing us to prove the infection rates will drop, the government should be obligated to do widespread testing of antibodies in NH and prove that it is still a problem.
This coronavirus is still 10 times worse than the flu so I’m not suggesting we drop all caution. The data does suggest that we should be able to resume most of our activities with a cautious approach while not being sloppy. By now everyone has learned the basics of proper hygiene and many people will be slow to recover from the intense media blitz. Those at risk should take extra caution, just as with any other infectious disease. The other 98% of the population should be able to move forward and rebuild from this disaster. Before we know it we will find that the new normal is the same as the old normal.
Dan Moriarty (see full article)
Fox News:
Manuse told Fox he believes the individual should be allowed to determine what restrictions are best for them.
“I think that that works a lot better than a top-down approach where the governor is telling everybody ‘one size fits all, this is how it’s going to go,'” he said. “That’s authoritarianism. It’s never worked before in any other country. And it’s not going to work in the United States or New Hampshire.”
Andrew Manuse (see full article)
Union Leader:
“The economic engine that provides food, beverages, clothing, shelter, and every modern convenience to the American people took more than a century to build. Yet, at the stroke of many a governor’s pens, the dangerous servant that is government has become a fearful master now poised to destroy our way of life in the name of safety.
The coronavirus did not cause this problem where the cure has become worse than the disease. Centralized government power has stripped us of our ability to manage our own affairs, and it by no means can dictate how we should rebuild them. It is time for the governor and others to step out of the way and let people go back to work so their free enterprise and ingenuity can meet the needs of those who are suffering.”
Former State Representative, Andrew Manuse (see full op-ed)
Manchester InkLink:
Carla Gericke, a Republican state Senate candidate from Manchester, said she attended.
“I went as a concerned non-essential Granite Stater and Republican State Senate candidate (District 20) who believes the government’s response has resulted in the prevention being worse than the cure. The government does not have the right to pick economic winners or losers, nor force us to stay in our homes, especially not when, here in Manchester at least, NOT ONE city employee has lost their job or even been furloughed. Clearly, we are NOT ‘all in this together.’”
Gericke described the crowd Saturday as “an interesting mix of people, from health freedom activists to Free Staters. I didn’t really get an overt partisan slant, it wasn’t ‘Trump-forward’” although there were some.
“There were teachers and nurses and moms, there were politicians and state representatives and masked armed dudes, there were laid-off workers, a few people who have been deemed essential but wanted to show their solidarity, and many who have lost their jobs and want to get back to work,” Gericke said.
She said she went because “at least 124,000 Granite Staters have been put out of work– that’s the population of Manchester and Amherst combined, and that’s a devastating blow to our state’s economic health which we will feel for a long time. Many small business owners will never recover. I went because my favorite Manchester restaurant, the Turkish restaurant Matbah, shut down permanently.”
Gericke said she takes the virus seriously.
“But I am also very concerned about the destruction of the economy with all its knock-on negatives like increased suicides, more substance and domestic abuse, children dying by the hundreds of thousands in impoverished countries, and I worry about the expansion of authoritarian government policies without proper oversight or citizen control,” Gericke said. ¨If they can lock us down on the say of the W.H.O. now, what is next?”
Carla Gericke (see full article)
I was asked by NH Journal to pen an opinion piece regarding the reopening of New Hampshire, which you can find here, We Are All Essential, It’s Time to Reopen NH, as well as the counterpoint by Senator Jon Morgan, I Want to Get the Hell Out of My House, Too — but We Can’t Rush Reopening.
Here’s my piece in full:
Freedom is the answer, what’s the question?
It is possible to be concerned about the virus, and the economic downturn and the destruction of our civil liberties. I am, which is why I attended the rally on Saturday. I don’t underestimate the virus, but I also don’t underestimate the cost of the shutdown or the dangers of trading liberty for a false sense of security.
Life is about tradeoffs, and when you use faulty data to implement faulty “solutions” — restricting peoples’ natural rights, instituting a lockdown to “flatten the curve,” and dividing Granite Staters into “essential” and “nonessential” groups — bad outcomes must follow.
We are all essential.
It is not the role of government to pick winners and losers. Unemployment leads to societal malaise, to increased suicides, domestic and child abuse, substance abuse, higher crime, lowered standards of living and shortened life spans.
Almost 20 percent of Granite State workers have lost their jobs already. That’s at least 125,000 people, mostly blue-collar workers and small business owners.
That’s the population equivalent of Manchester and Amherst combined. Next time you drive through Manchester, imagine, No one around me has a job anymore. Then drive past the next block, and the next, and the next.
Then consider that state employees are not being furloughed or laid off. Consider that they declared themselves “essential” and YOU, “nonessential.” Consider that union contracts with jaw-dropping benefits and above-market salaries are being ratified in emergency meetings that are not open to public scrutiny.
Consider that despite being told the hospitals would be overrun, another inaccurate prediction, more than 20 percent of N.H. hospital workers have been furloughed or laid off, effectively destroying private/elective healthcare, perhaps forever.
Then consider that your property taxes are going up… Then consider when they say “we are all in this together,” is it really true?
If we don’t have enough data to make good decisions, can we at least stop making bad ones? The original estimates were overstated by more than 30x. That’s soothsaying. What consequences do these unelected “experts” face for being wrong?
Different countries tried different approaches but the fatality rates look similar globally. Ironically, Sweden and South Korea both took less draconian approaches, and their curves look similar to ours, “the land of the freelockdowns.”
What kind of society do we live in when the government can suspend its own rules based on the inaccurate opinions of unelected officials? The First Amendment guarantees our right to peacefully assemble.
“Congress shall make no law” does not include “except when” or “unless this scary thing happens” or even, “under emergency circumstances.” If the government no longer follows the Constitution meant to constrain it, why should we remain law-abiding?
We can always protect our most vulnerable without losing our freedoms. We can ask people to stay at home voluntarily. We can accept that individuals have different appetites for risk, as is the case in a free society. We can remember that free people move freely, and that the government does not own you.
But alas, we are giving in to fear over freedom, we are walking away from our founding principles, and because of this, we will suffer under a government-manufactured economic crisis, and New Hampshire will never be the same.
About the Author
Carla Gericke
Carla Gericke is the Republican candidate for State Senate in District 20. Learn more at CarlaGericke.com. She wrote this for NHJournal.
Wake up, New Hampshire! 124,000–ONE HUNDRED AND TWENTY FOUR THOUSAND!!!–Granite Staters have lost their jobs–that’s the equivalent of ALL of Manchester and Amherst! This is ?% UNACCEPTABLE!
It is NOT the government’s job to pick winners or losers in the economy. It is NOT the government’s job to lockdown free people. It is NOT the government’s job to destroy the economy. It is NOT the government’s job to tell us who is essential and who is NOT.
On Saturday, I will stand with my fellow Granite Staters against the destruction of our lives and livelihoods through this outrageous government overreach.
Free people move freely! We are ALL essential!
Fwiw, I will be wearing a mask and gloves and open carrying because you can CRITICIZE THE GOVERNMENT’S AUTHORITARIAN RESPONSE and still take reasonable precautions based on YOUR OWN RISK PROFILE AS A FREE HUMAN BEING. If you are scared of getting sick, please stay home.
FOR INFORMATIONAL PURPOSES ONLY: People have asked whether the police will arrest us. I doubt it, but that is a lawsuit I am willing to fight all the way to the Supreme Court, baby! Based on my past experience protesting at the State House, law enforcement will likely send an unmarked drone to take photos (although people will be masked, so good luck with your “we don’t use facial recognition software”). Based on my reading of the AG’s memo to law enforcement, the police are only authorized to issue verbal warnings. If they’re feeling particularly Big Bro and dick-ish, they might try to escalate the situation by telling the First Amendment protected assembly to disperse, and then issue misdemeanor citations, followed by trying to arrest people who do not leave. I have already decided I will not disperse and will peacefully submit to being arrested if it comes to that–but again, it probably won’t. You should decide beforehand what your appetite for risk is, and act accordingly–but don’t be afraid! I am confident you will be given an opportunity to leave first. My intent is to be courteous and peaceful at all times, and I encourage you to be the same.
Sign the petition to #ReOpenNH, HERE.
Event link for the rally on Saturday to #ReOpenNH at High Noon. RSVP HERE if you like being on lists, or just SHOW UP, pretty please!
Petition:
To Gov. Christopher Sununu and the N.H. Legislature
We the undersigned, understand that SARS-Cov-2 (Covid-19) is a highly contagious and potentially dangerous virus;
We understand that N.H. Gov. Christopher Sununu declared a state of emergency on March 13, 2020 in response to the outbreak of Covid-19 in New Hampshire and renewed that order on April 3, 2020 until April 24, 2020, as authorized under RSA 4:45;
We also understand that prior to March 17, New Hampshire had one of the lowest unemployment rates in the country, and since March 17, at least one in seven New Hampshire workers have lost their jobs and many businesses have shut their doors, perhaps permanently;
We understand that the People of New Hampshire are guaranteed certain Natural Rights, such as the freedom to assemble, the freedom to associate, the freedom to engage in commerce, the freedom to worship, and the freedom to freely travel, among many others, and that a state of emergency does not suspend these Natural Rights;
We believe free adults should be able to make their own decisions and assume the consequences of their actions, and people who are at risk or fear they are at risk have the right to isolate and protect themselves;
We believe the emergency orders issued by Gov. Sununu are arbitrary and unbalanced, particularly in determining “essential” and “non essential” organizations and allowing people to assemble in the supermarket but not in their place of work or community, which are equally susceptible to transmission of the virus;
We believe that the occasion of this virus does not warrant the suspension of liberty that has been attempted, and that many citizens of New Hampshire are suffering undue hardships from loss of livelihood, purpose and community, and that such suspension of liberty is unwarranted, and now, the “public liberty is manifestly endangered;”
Now therefore, we the undersigned hereby petition Gov. Sununu to end his declared State of Emergency on April 24, 2020 or prior, and allow free adults to make their own decisions about whether they want to open their businesses or other organizations, seek gainful employment, or patronize businesses and other organizations, as is their right.
From Trump fundraising letters to an exploration of the externalities created by illness, there’s something for everyone in this week’s episode of Told You So! Listen to the podcast or catch the video below!
Free Staters, have you considered what you would do if you were governor of New Hampshire right now? Because I may well one day be, I have, and I understand why Sununu has issued this “stay-at-home” “order,” currently effective 5PM today, March 27 through May 4, 2020. That’s not to say he is right from a moral, legal, or Constitutional perspective, just that I geddit, and am willing to adopt a “watch and wait” attitude for now.
My takeaway from this week’s press conferences, sitting in on calls with Sununu, reading the various orders, and reading posts by his staff, is the following: “The Control Freaks Who Only Understand Coercion Are Demanding We Issue an Order for People to Stay-at-Home,” “I don’t want to do that, but I am scared of making the wrong call and thousands of people dying,” “Here, I know! I’ll play both sides like the excellent politician I am. I’ll give The Control Freaks the order, but also tell The Sanes that ‘this is NOT a shelter-in-place order’ and, nudge, nudge, wink, wink, ask to add your business to the ‘essential business’ list,” and, finally, importantly, “we’re not calling out the National Guard to force people back into their homes.”
Yet.
For now, I am employing a “Keep Calm, But Carry Arms” approach. Not much will change for me. I already work from home. I already shop predominantly online. I already stockpile toilet paper. I already take long isolated walks in the woods. But I will be much less accommodating if, at any stage, for any reason, the population of New Hampshire is ordered to “shelter-in-place.” If martial law is declared, if habeas corpus is suspended in America, I doubt I will comply.
In the meantime, I suggest we use these Stranger Days to:
Volunteer: You can sign up for official NH volunteer programs to help during the coming weeks here, or, like my husband and I have been doing, you can go out and do neighborhood litter pickups, reach out to infirm neighbors to make sure they have what they need, and generally be a decent human being–from six feet away (or, wear a mask and gloves)!
Get healthy: If the possibility of getting sick in the future is now a “legitimate” reason to suppress millions of citizens’ rights, shutter and destroy businesses, and crash the economy, let’s use this time to get healthy. Stop eating carbs. Stop eating sugar. If this sounds too hard, try approaching it this way: Cook from scratch until this is over and eat every meal together at the table until then. I bet this simple step will noticeably improve your life!
Turn in early and get 8 hours of sleep: Our brains detox while we sleep, keeping us healthy and sane. Sleep deprivation is a recognized form of torture, so if you aren’t sleeping well, you are… literally *torturing* your body and mind, which might explain some of the serious health problems in this country. Honestly, if The Control Freaks really wanted to make an impact on the health of Americans, let’s get some SWAT police flash-banging down doors to ensure you are getting enough sleep! (Please don’t do that.)
Try something new every day: Use this opportunity to foster curiosity–curiosity is the antidote to stupid. Take a virtual museum tour in a foreign country. Watch all the TED Talks about a subject you are passionate about (I want to learn more about the brain). Learn to cook or bake something new. Last night, I made 90 second microwave paleo mug buns to go with our Broccoli Cheddar soup, and slathered in butter, these rolls were delish! (I’ll post the recipe later.)
Turn off your TV: The mainstream media wants your attention… it’s how they make money. They don’t care about your feelings. They don’t care about making you anxious. They don’t care about scaring you. In fact, the more anxious and scared you are, the more money they make. If you want to improve your life, the #1 thing you can do is TURN OFF THE NEWS. Make this change permanent; I have, and it radically improved my life!
Meditate: No time like the present! There are a slew of YouTube videos of guided meditations, or apps like Waking Up or Calm that can be downloaded straight to your phone. Meditation is something you can even start practicing as a family. Ten minutes a day can make a vast difference and set your kids up for success in life. Start today!
Encrypt your communications: Make sure you install encryption messaging like Signal or Telegram in order to securely communicate with the loved ones in your life.
Live! Free people move freely. If you need to go about your business, be considerate and make an effort to comply with safety instructions, but also, while keeping things in perspective, remember YOU are the captain of YOUR LIFE and you, and only you control your life, the government does not own you. Use this time to take charge of your life, grow, and change for the better!