The Conservative Cave

It wasn't that long ago that we had "forest defenders" out in the Atlanta suburbs vowing that "cop city" would never be built. They engaged in a months-long campaign of threats, vandalism, arson, and in one case even shot a police officer before they were finally cleared out.

Something similar has been happening in a tiny corner of Arizona near the border for the past several months. A group of activists decided to set up a tent city to object to the construction of a section of border wall in Lochiel, AZ. Like the Atlanta protesters, the official reason for the protest was the removal of some trees, but the real reason was to block the construction of a double border wall.

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Kate Scott, co-founder of Madrean Archipelago Wildlife Center, was the first to notice contractors were cutting down the cottonwoods this summer. After speaking to a worker in June, and learning their plans to cut down all the trees, she gathered support and started sitting out near the tree. Eventually, with the support of Indigenous activists, the protesters in Lochiel started a morning prayer ritual. Every morning the group would hold a sunrise prayer for the land, Scott said. It was during that prayer ceremony that Border Patrol agents raided the camp on Monday...

On Sept. 14, three protesters wearing bird and jaguar costumes, representing the endangered species in the area, were arrested after entering the construction site.Those arrests encouraged more people from across the country to join the camp, Scott said.

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The "grandmother" tree is just a big tree along the path of the construction. The activists had created a perch in the tree and were doing a sit-in there for weeks. Today, authorities showed up, arrested 10 to 12 protesters and took the tree down.

Sophisticated biomedical devices subject to rigorous export controls due to their value in creating biological warfare weapons were nevertheless sold by officials at the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) and the Department of Agriculture (USDA) between 2022 and 2025.

Government Accountability Office (GAO) investigators said in a report made public October 1 that they “identified nine pieces of HHS and USDA laboratory equipment subject to export controls. Of the nine export-controlled items, seven belonged to HHS and two were from USDA. The nine export-controlled items that we identified included three freeze dryers and six mass spectrometers.”

“Freeze dryers can be used to preserve biological material such as viruses and toxins, as well as to produce powders for easier dissemination. Mass spectrometers are analytical instruments that can be used to identify and characterize proteins, and study their structures, functions, interactions, and modifications, such as how such proteins respond to viruses and treatments.”
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When, according to the report, GAO investigators reviewed the buyers of the nine pieces of export-controlled biomedical devices, they found reason to be concerned about their potential ties because “GSA data show that the purchasers of the HHS and USDA laboratory equipment included a range of recipients. For example, for the six items that were purchased by companies, three items were purchased by companies that appeared to be laboratory equipment resellers and the other three were purchased by companies that appeared to provide property disposal services, according to information available on the internet. Of the three individuals that bought export-controlled equipment, one was a professor at a university and two did not have any clear affiliation with a relevant entity.”

Any of the nine critical pieces that should not have been sold could end up in the wrong hands if the purchasers were not screening the recipients to whom they in turn sold the equipment. ...

This is what weaponization looks like.

The FBI investigating a mom because she is a gun owner and belonged to a “right-wing mom’s group.” Federal agents harassing a dad because he “rail[ed] against the government.”

Five years ago today, then-Attorney General Merrick Garland released his memorandum laying out what his corrupt Department of Justice could do to assist in investigating and prosecuting the parents accused of being “domestic terrorists” for speaking out against far-left initiatives and draconian Covid policies at school board meetings. The Democrat AG’s memo followed a National School Boards Association (NSBA) letter begging President Joe Biden and his politically-driven Department of Justice to recognize the “immediate threat” these parents posed to America’s public schools and their leaders. The letter urged Biden to treat the parents’ confrontational behavior like it was “equivalent to a form of domestic terrorism.”

We know that the NSBA, after a wave of criticism from affiliates, was forced to apologize for the letter from School Boards Association President Viola Garcia and interim CEO Chip Slaven. The association acknowledged “there was no justification for some of the language included in the letter” and that the executive office had not consulted with state affiliates.

Despite the NSBA’s admission, Garland stubbornly refused to rescind his memo, and federal law enforcement officials opened 25 preliminary assessment files — Guardian assessments — into spurious “school board threats.” Six of the assessments operated out of the FBI’s Counterterrorism Division, 17 involved the Criminal Investigations Division, and two involved the Weapons of Mass Destruction Directorate. It appears not a one of the targets was prosecuted.

Now, thanks to a new DOJ report, we know that the Biden White House was squarely behind Garland’s effort to find a federal “hook” to prosecute parents and school policy protesters with federal crimes. That finding contradicts a National School Boards Association independent review that found no collusion with the Biden administration.

MoonchildCA (1,350 posts)
10. Is that missing "bro?"
Because this actually did happen yesterday. There are plenty of stories and photos online.

orangecrush (33,427 posts)
36. Trump certainly can drive!
He's driving the whole country right off a cliff!

https://democraticunderground.com/100221544953

In September, the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health’s Center for Gun Violence Solutions published a tract titled “Extreme Risk Protection Orders: A Clergy Resource Guide” (extreme risk protection orders are the gun control advocates’ preferred term for red flag gun confiscation orders). The document was authored alongside groups including Faiths United to Prevent Gun Violence, Faith Leaders for Ending Gun Violence, and Jewish Women International.

Another author was the Presbyterian Office of Public Witness, which the document described as “the public policy information and advocacy office for the General Assembly of the Presbyterian Church (USA).” The “progressive” PCUSA currently hosts the guide on its website. Texas Democratic U.S. Senate candidate James Talarico, who has put his version of religion at the forefront of his campaign, trained at a PCUSA seminary.
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The guide seeks to inject gun control directly into the clergy-congregant relationship. The document encourages faith leaders to leverage the trust their congregants place in them, noting, “faith leaders are often trusted confidants. You may be among the first to hear when someone is experiencing crisis…”

Of course, the danger that a pastor may work to have the government strip a person of a fundamental right based on a private conversation will prompt some congregants to forego potentially beneficial pastoral services entirely.