While some liberty activists may be despondent over recent developments in our country including the coming one-party power in Washington, D.C., there are reasons to be hopeful about the prospects for liberty in the age of Biden.
First, despite what many in the media are saying, the Democrats do not have an unstoppable majority.
Even after picking up two Senate seats as a result of the Georgia elections, the Senate will be “tied” at 50-50, giving Democrats a majority of one thanks to incoming Vice-President Kamala Harris’s holding the tie-breaking vote.
You and I can still block bad legislation from passing the Senate, even if Senate Democrats succeed in abolishing the legislative filibuster. For what it’s worth, West Virginia Senator Joe Manchin has said he will not vote to get rid of the filibuster, so the filibuster may survive.
Manchin and other Democrats from “purple” states like Kyrsten Sinema and Mark Kelly of Arizona and John Tester of Montana (a state President Trump won and that returned Republican Steve Daines to the Senate even though Daines was a top target of the Democrats and had millions spent against him), will possibly oppose many of the radical measures pushed by the Bernie Sanders-AOC wing of the Democratic party and even some of the Biden Administration’s more extreme measures.
In addition, the fact that some House Democrats are blaming the party’s loss of House seats on the prominence of self-described socialists like Bernie Sanders and the “Squad” gives us an opportunity to pressure “moderate” democrats to vote against radical measures like the Green New Deal and Medicare for All.
The continuing danger is that “moderate” Republicans — like Susan Collins of Maine, Mitt Romney of Utah, and Lisa Murkowski of Alaska — and so-called moderate Democrats will be tempted to “compromise” on smaller steps toward socialism, hoping to show moderate and centrist voters they can cooperate to “get things done,” while telling liberty activists they are doing all they can to stave off the socialist hordes.
The January 6 riot at the Capitol makes the danger all the more pronounced as Republicans will feel pressure to “unify” and “put the current divisions” behind us. Meanwhile, there will be continued efforts to silence critics of the Democrats' agenda by claiming they are somehow tied to “obstructionists.” This pressure will make some Republicans even more eager to make a deal with the Democrats to distance themselves from the “insurrectionists.”
The slim Democrat majority in the Senate means any “bipartisan” groups of “moderates” or “centrists” could easily hold the balance of power over what legislation passes, unless there is a countervailing force pushing against compromises that advance the statist agenda.
This makes it imperative that we stand firm and make sure the politicians of both parties know we expect them to reject any attempt to compromise away our liberties.
If we put pressure on Congress, we can keep a critical mass of Representatives and Senators from caving into the pressure from “the swamp” to agree to a “consensus” deal that advances statism.
Many pro-liberty groups and activists will fall for the line peddled by the moderates and the GOP establishment that they are doing the best they can, and that we need to be “realistic” in accepting compromises. This makes it all the more important that Campaign for Liberty stand firm and let them know they are being unrealistic if they think the authoritarians will be satisfied with their compromises.
Instead, they will be back for more—unless we stop them.
The left’s modus operandi was summed up by Lenin: “Probe with bayonets, if you encounter mush proceed; if you encounter steel, withdraw.” We must make sure statist authoritarians of all parties encounter steel when they try to take our liberties.
Let’s see how this plays out by looking at some key issues.
The major issue will remain the continued assaults of liberty in the name of stopping COVID. Some think with Donald Trump’s defeat, the political class will declare the COVID emergency over so life will return to normal. I think this theory overlooks how the political class benefits from continuing the COVID panic.
Authoritarians benefit from keeping people in a state of fear: fear of terrorists, fear of mass shooters, fear of economic instability, and now fear of virus. When people are afraid, their natural impulse is to look for safety. And who is always there with false promises of safety? Our “friend,” the state. Therefore, I expect to see the COVID panic extended and used to justify ever more onerous restrictions on our freedom.
Even worse, much of those restrictions will receive “bipartisan” support. Look at the “debate” over the coronavirus spending bills. While opposing the spending levels, few Republicans objected to the content of the bills — including the money for tracking and tracing. We can expect more bipartisan compromises in the war on COVID.
Speaking of spending bills, Biden has already proposed a $1.9 trillion Coronavirus “relief” spending proposal. Included in the proposal is $20 billion for vaccine delivery. Biden’s plan envisions setting up vaccination centers at schools, libraries, community centers, and churches. He also proposes creating a Federal Public Health Corps of 100,000 (as a starting point) individuals to assist with making sure everyone gets vaccinated and is properly tracked and traced.
Speaking of tracking, big tech companies including Microsoft, are working to develop a vaccine passport.
The idea is this will allow you to prove that your vaccines are up to date. Look for increased federal involvement in funding the development of these passports and look for those who refuse the vaccines to be denied access to public buildings, airports, schools, and maybe even bars, restaurants, and movie theaters. We will be told the vaccines and passports are “voluntary” because you can choose to comply, or you can choose to stay at home for the rest of your life.
The Biden proposal represents a major step toward nationalizing medicine by putting the federal government in charge of delivering vaccines. This precedent will be expanded to other treatments.
Even after the coronavirus crisis ends, we will still be continuously told we must remain “vigilant” regarding vaccinations, tracking, and testing, or else COVID cases will surge, requiring another shutdown of the economy.
Just like the PATRIOT Act was used for purposes unrelated to terrorism, the new monitoring and tracking system will almost certainly be used to monitor our compliance with health mandates unrelated to COVID. These may even apply to personal lifestyle choices like whether to smoke cigarettes, eat fried foods, or drink raw milk. It may even extend to gun ownership and political views as part of the push to define “excessive” gun ownership and holding of certain political views as signs of a mental illness.
Fortunately, there is a growing mass of people fed up with “Coronaparanoia.” They are defying the lockdowns and mask mandates, and they are prepared to resist any vaccination mandates. Campaign for Liberty will work to harness this growing discontent and resistance into an effective force that can make the politicians stop using phantom fears of the virus to take away our real liberties.
We can also expect further attacks on free speech this year. In fact, this Congress’ H.R. 1, which is reserved for the Speaker and reflects the leadership’s priorities, is campaign finance “reform” legislation. The legislation includes the DISCLOSE Act. The purpose of this is to intimidate donors from continuing to support liberty causes for fear of being the next victim of the “cancel culture.”
We can expect a huge push on gun control from President Biden and the House Democrats as well.
Remember in the fall of 2019, President Trump and Congressional Republicans were on the verge of making a deal with Democrats on gun control before Speaker Pelosi decided to launch the impeachment inquiry. Again, the danger is not that the Republicans will sign off on the most extreme version of gun control, but rather will accept a compromise on guns.
Joe Manchin also has a horrible history of supporting “compromise” gun control. We will have to put extra pressure on the Senate when the gun control battle inevitably heats up this year.
There are some issues where Republicans will not compromise with Biden and the Democratic establishment. Instead, they will agree on their position or push them to go further.
The most obvious of these areas is foreign policy, where war hawk Biden will be pushed by many Republicans to be more hawkish (and spend more on “defense”). The fact that Biden’s pick for Defense Secretary is a board member of a leading defense contractor is not a good sign for anyone still naïve enough to hope that a Democrat Administration would be different than a Republican on war and peace.
Many Republicans will also go along with what is sure to be a massive push by the Bidden administration to renew the expired provisions of the USA FREEDOM Act and otherwise expand the surveillance state.
Expect any surveillance legislation to give the government new powers to go after “domestic” and “right-wing” terrorists, including anyone who objects to the welfare-warfare state and the fiat money system that undermines it.
In addition to fighting defensive battles, we must also renew our push to Audit the Fed. Those who doubt we will have any success on this issue should consider we had great success in getting a majority of a Democratic-controlled House to cosponsor Audit the Fed in 2009-2010. With the economy on the verge of another major economic meltdown, combined with a challenge to the dollar’s world reserve’s currency status, there could be more attention paid to the Fed, giving us an opportunity to gain major support for the Audit bill.
The forthcoming age of Biden presents us with numerous opportunities and challenges. The major challenge is the danger of compromise by people who should be our allies. The key to stopping this is for liberty-loving Americans to keep the heat on their elected representatives and let them know they must never compromise away our liberties. These battles — particularly the continuing fight against COVID-19 tyranny — give us the opportunities to grow our numbers and spread the message of liberty, thus laying the groundwork for future victories.
With your help, Campaign for Liberty will do all we can to mobilize pro-liberty Americans and attract new recruits to our cause.
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