The Gorilla Bully at Mozilla

The Tolerance Terrorists struck at Mozilla, forcing CEO Brandon Eich to resign because he contributed $1000 to Proposition 8 six years ago.

This is ugly. It is also tyranny—the tyranny of those who demand rights for them while stomping rights for anybody else into the ground.

This is bullying—big-time bullying, and it’s a dastardly kind of wrong.

We have the right to believe and support what we want. In our country we are all equal before the law, before the courts and in justice, and before God. That means we are also equal in our right to hold and express opinions. That’s our Constitution—freedom to think, believe, freedom to speak and act. We don’t have a society where some get to have opinions and some don’t. That’s totalitarianism, and its a no-go.

Not for Brandon Eich, however. He got to have an opinion only if it was the opinion activists said he could have. “You think what we say you should think or you’re outta here, buddy!”

I don’t know what was behind this—there likely is more to the story than we know. I wish Mr. Eich had stood up to the Tolerance Terrorists. Every person that caves makes it more likely that the next person will do the same—it sets a pattern that haunts us all in the end. We need the integrity of standing up to the bully, not capitulating.

This is an ugly bully, however—a gorilla sized one. It’s so mean and vindictive that most people run from it or buckle before it. This bully plays dirty.

  

DOING GOOD IS PART OF THEIR CODE????!!!!!

 

Stand up for the right—for what’s right and for your rights--on this! You have the right to your opinion, your speech, and your actions. We can’t give those up when we get pushed around, or every opponent to our freedom will take the cue and duplicate the methods.

Speak up for morality—the greater sense of what is right and wrong. Speak up for Christian values. Defend goodness, defend the family, defend truth. It’s time to speak up to friends, family, and to social media.

And while you’re at it, drop Mozilla’s services if you use them. Encourage everyone else to do the same, and tell them why you did. 

Don’t buckle before the Gorilla Bully!

Onward! 

Get it Right: Ode to the Bulldogs of Freedom

“The people who do not revere the deeds of their ancestors will never do anything to be remembered by their descendants.” 

So said British historian Lord Macauly. It is notable, then, that history so well favors Samuel Adams, Boston's unyielding bulldog of American independence. Two and a half centuries ago Adams turned colonial anger at unfair taxation into full-blown American independence. Three recent patriots, Utah County's homegrown Senator Mike Lee, along with Senator Ted Cruz of Texas and Congressman Paul Ryan of Wisconsin recently invested themselves in a modern crusade against repressive taxation,as well.

On May 24, 1764, Samuel Adams took to the rostrum in Boston's Faneuil Hall to instruct new representatives to the Massachusetts provincial legislature. That day, Adams, the consummate politician so at ease in Boston's political arena, lit the bonfire that ultimately chased the British from colonial America. A fundamental transformation had been foisted on the colonists, as British Parliament declared its intention to violate colonial charters and tax American prosperity to enrich British coffers. Adams said, "If our trade may be taxed, why not our lands and everything we possess or make use of? This ... annihilates our charter(ed) right to govern and tax ourselves." The rest is history. Samuel Adams drove his principles to national independence as those who could hear the infant chant of freedom responded to his clarion call.
Over the last few weeks a similar refrain echoed through the United States Congress as three legislators put themselves on the political grill to plead freedom from unethical taxation. While Cruz took to the Senate rostrum in a marathon filibuster, Lee and Ryan worked the partisan crowd. They also fought fundamental transformation that will enslave one-sixth of the American economy to total government control. Like Adams, their past experience with myopic, runaway government fueled their fears.

Samuel Adams fought the Sugar Act, a seemingly benevolent law the British claimed would increase colonial prosperity by reducing taxes to half the amount of previous policies. The problem, however, was that this tax would be strictly enforced rather than universally ignored, as was its predecessor. Our recent legislative triad fought the ill-named Affordable Care Act (Obamacare), a supposedly benevolent policy to bring health insurance to the uninsured. Its problem is 2500 extra pages of pork barrel, government-imposed fee structures, reduced availability of medical care, an open format that allows endless additions to the law and a legion of add-ons that have nothing to do with health care.
Both Adams and our current legislators feared the precedent set by federal appetites -- what will come next if we permit this power grab? Both responded to the bullying of federal authorities -- Adams to Parliament's scorn of the colonists; our modern legislators to the resentment of Americans who watched the ramrod passage of an oppressive law by extortion, bribery and outright lies.
Political forces moved against Samuel Adams in the aftermath of his stand against tyranny. British Governor Bernard and British-loving Tories clamored for his removal, and those who later embraced his activism initially viewed him with skepticism. So, also, forces within their own party turned against the modern trio of legislators. For Lee, within his own state under the Count Your Vote initiative, powers are at work to unseat him for his stand against bureaucratic health care.
The more things change the more they remain the same -- in history, in politics, in leadership. Repressive governments seek control; patriots seek liberty. Party leaders can shamefully turn on their own who take the moral high ground. Unfair taxation leaves welts on the backs of those who suffer under the political lash. The ledgers of history record that Samuel Adams, the bulldog of American freedom, never gave up. Is there more our modern bulldogs can do to derail Obamacare, this fast track from partial to full socialism? Pray that there is. If not, another major segment of liberty has become history.

The Power of One Against the Bully Gun-Control War

One man in Colorado has changed the national paradigm and the message has carried to Utah Valley. Victor Head, a plumbing contractor from Boulder, Colo., opposed Colorado's liberal gun control measures through his organization, Pueblo Freedom and Rights. With assistance from the National Rifle Association and concerned Colorado citizens in the state's first ever recall election, he unseated Liberal Senators John Morse and Angela Giron in their push for citizen non-protection. The nation has a new example of The Power of One.

In the mid-1950s journalist Willis E. Stone almost single-handedly piloted what would have been the Constitution's 23rd Amendment to the floors of Congress. First proposed in his newspaper column in 1944, it was known as the Liberty Amendment, designed to restore checks and balances and get government out of private business. That currently stalled amendment, approved by nine states -- Utah is not yet one of them -- waits to restore financial stability when we want it badly enough.
In both these situations, brave individuals stood up to the bullies that kill freedom, be they individuals, groups, or government. The bully war escalates today as constitutional freedoms fall before illegal executive orders and Supreme Court decisions on topics from immigration to gun control to economic bailouts. Conservatives across the country are being bullied into silence for their views, while liberal opinions are touted at will. Why? One reason is that conservatives let themselves be pushed around.
In many states, some citizens are still somewhat sheltered from the tirades of progressive bullies, like here in Utah County. The relative peace of this county draws many here to retire or raise families; hence, the nickname Happy Valley. The term denotes contempt from some, heartfelt gratitude from others, myself included.
Only Pollyanna could believe that our relative calm will continue. Activist commotions have begun -- Provo's Gay Pride event on Saturday, Sept. 21, is an example. While we are obliged to respect the rights of others, diversity is negative when a few in some circles encourage those who plan to abolish the values we cherish. Leaders in the gay rights movement, such as activist Masha Gessen in her speech to the Sydney Writer's Festival in May 2012, state the ultimate intention of the Gay Rights movement is to abolish marriage altogether. (You can view her video on YouTube from April 23, 2013.) Such movements strike at the heart of conservative Utah values of family and fidelity, not to mention common sense.
Can we keep the standards we cherish in Utah County? That's partly up to us, and that's where The Power of One comes in. While what we can do is harder, what we must not do is obvious: we must not be bullied into silence on our views and values. We must speak out in defense of the things that matter to us.

Guns

"We have four boxes used to guarantee our liberty: The soap box, the

ballot box, the jury box and the cartridge box."

  Ambrose Bierce (1887)

In 1553, Frenchman Etienne de la Boetie wrote "The Politics of Obedience: Discourse on Voluntary Servitude." It reads like a 2013 conservative advice column. He said no one has power to oppress us unless we give them that power. The eyes to spy on us come from us; the arms to beat us are borrowed from ourselves; the feet to trample us wear homegrown boots. How can enemies assail us if they have no cooperation from us? He declares we can cast off tyranny simply by refusing to concede; those who resolve to be servants no more are at once freed. To topple a tyrant, simply support him no more.
Back to the bullying of conservative views and The Power of One: we are bullied into further silence because we remain silent. We are victims no more when we clearly, calmly, and without rancor state our views and hold to them. It begins at home, with one -- you; me. When we complain about the state of things, let us remember Boetie: "Resolve to serve no more and you are at once freed." The power of one voice, repeatedly heard, has the force to transform.

• Pamela Romney Openshaw is a Utah Valley speaker and author of "Promises of the Constitution" and "Lessons of the Constitution for Family and Home School Study." She writes the weekly column "Get it Right" for the Daily Herald and for heraldextra.com. To reach Pamela, you can contact her through her website, PromisesoftheConstitution.com or by email at promisesoftheconstitution@ gmail.com.