This goes one of two ways: either a) he’s a True Believer and this is something he’s doing in good faith, or, b) this is how you get a list of names and addresses for future roundups and surveillance.
I knew lots of ‘militia types’ back in the 90’s. Heck, I’ve chatted with Johnny Trochman dozens of times at gun shows, met Randy Weaver and Bo Gritz, and been to a few ‘concerned citizens meetings’. By and large it’s all been beer-bellied armchair warriors who would probably not pick up a rifle in ‘defense of liberty’ until the battle was 99% over and there was no risk to their retirements, jobs, mortgages, and dualies. On the other hand, I’ve also met some True Believers and often they were even more sketch because you got the feeling that they weren’t going to support a revolution, rather they were gonna start one. Again, stay away.
If you and four buddies want to take your preparedness to the next level and form a ‘mutual ad group’ or some sort of semi-organized club where you all look out for each other in anticipation of tough times, that is awesome. More people need to do that. And if it incorporates going to gun schools, medical training, finance classes, welding school, extension classes, backpacking weekends, and a touch of small group tactics….good on ya. But for the love of Crom, don’t give your group a name and fancy velcro patch to slap on your cammies. All the badges are gonna be extremely wary of those ‘Paul Revere Militia’ guys that they see tromping through the national forest every weekend in their cammies, and they’re gonna be a lot less curious about the four or five guys with binoculars and bird books they see tromping through that same forest every weekend.
Five Gulf War/GWOT vets getting together on weekends to hike the woods and look for morel mushrooms is a lot less attention catching than those same five guys hiking the woods in multicam and toting rifles. Use your head.
Would I go to a meeting like the one described in the opening paragraph? Probably not. But I wold darn sure find someone who did go and ask them to tell me all about it and share any materials that were offered just so I could evaluate it for myself.
I used to live there. The guy’s heart is in the right place but he’s goofy, not as far gone as the true believers you talk about above though.
Same county, different person; look up the Barry Township chief of police getting the boot in 2014. Dude had 40 armed “reserve officer” thugs in a town of 4000 people.
Are you referring to Victor Pierce by chance?
Well now. I’ve met Sheriff Leaf. He is the Sheriff of the County I was born in. He seems like a genuine member of We the People. He was one of the few elected office holders on Michigan that investigated the voter fraud during the 2020 election.
In MHO he is one of the few honest people in government. His oath to the people is something he takes seriously.
In Michigan we have two political parties. The Marxocrats and the Dead Elephants. The Marxocrats are having a field day running roughshod over the rights of the people. They have a one seat majority in both chambers of the Legislature. The Dead Elephants on the other hand are content to cower in the corner soiling themselves while the Obergruppen Furher Wretched Gretch whiles away her time thinking up new ways to torture and abuse the people.
My home county has one of the few office holders who actually cares about the people he serves. I would imagine that’s why the good people of Barry County keep reelecting him to office. If I still lived there I would surely give him my vote.
Correct, in both regards as to engaging in >ANY< variants of those groups, as well as applying your own "lone wolf" operating posture towards anything resembling some form of human organizations. They are all compromised, (See 'anonomousconservative.com) for how deep the Intel apparatus can get on targets, and it's wrath capabilities. Just be equipped up, reasonably fit and trained to a useful capacity, and stay very alert is all that is really needed. Your own circumstances out there will dictate exactly when, and how deep into, those spicy times you will need get. Meanwhile, just staying frosty in FEMA district 8.
,Rawles’ Rules apply:
1) If you’re in the woods in cammies, you’re not carrying weapons.
2) If you’re in the woods with weapons, you’re not wearing cammies.
The two can always be combined when the situation calls for it, but not waving huge red flags keeps you out of snitches’ reports to their LEO handlers, and out of their intelligence bulletins.
You can also cover for a heap of preparedness by making it a ministry of The Church Of What’s Happening Now™ (or whatever else you want to call it), and organizing canning bees with some amount donated to local food banks, area recons that look a lot like trash pick ups, land nav exercises that look like trail building, and a thousand other good and decent team-building exercises, all helpfully tax-exempt, and none of it preaching apocalypse and shooting up the town come The Big Day, while stockpiling a compound full of weapons and ammo.
The latter approach kind of got Waco’ed a few decades back, and is not recommended for that reason.
But if you have the ability to whistle up tentage shelter, radio communications, food and mess abilities, medical assistance, radio communications, and mobile response teams to check on your neighbors, clear roads, etc., for local and regional disasters small and large? You’re a community resource above reproach. You’ll still be on local law enforcement’s list, but as certified White Hats, and they’ll be leery of going after do-gooders with a record of community service.
You’ll also find a lot more willing hands, and the hard work aspect over time weeds out most would-be informants in short order, since they’re mainly about a quick buck, not playing the long game.
“… the hard work aspect over time weeds out most would-be informants in short order, since they’re mainly about a quick buck, not playing the long game.” <--- money shot
And for bonus points, the skill set to clear blocked roads is exactly the one used to block clear roads, as combat engineers have known for a couple of millennia or so.
Even better money shot: if you can come up with an organized group, what you do with it is largely irrelevant.
The key is to have a group all willing to work together.
Once you have that knocked together, history demonstrates that the world is your oyster, whether you’re building pyramids, crossing the Alps on war elephants, throwing a cargo of tea in a harbor, or cutting a canal between continents.
Yup.
Acta, non verba, as they say
What percentage of attendees would be informants on somebody’s payroll, LOL?
Theres always one.
I never thought that exercising your rights and civic duties in America would be feared by so many people. Fear and lies are the only thing the Totalitarian State has to rule over us, and when we fear them, they have won. If you worry about being on a ‘list’, don’t, because anyone who frequents this site and comments is already on the ‘list’.
If you’re not on multiple lists by this point, you haven’t been trying, and you aren’t paying attention. 😉
There was a time when our biggest problem here was the Michigan Militia. Couldn’t go to a gun show without be harassed by these wannabes. They were using the Fulton State Game Area to do ” war games”. Or run maneuvers during the weekends. They were essentially a pain in the ass. I remember when I was working for the DMA and they actually approached the base commander about participation in war games on the weekends. Meaning Drill weekends. Most have left the state or disappeared. Think the leader ended up in Alaska doing shortwave broadcasts.