Rise to Rebellion

Hello, this is Darrell Castle with today’s Castle Report. Today I will talk about the Rebellion of the people of the Commonwealth of Virginia to the new Democrat Governor’s and Legislature’s actual and proposed anti-self-defense laws.

Prelude to rebellion – the gun control agenda in Virginia

The people of Virginia recently elected Democrat majorities in both houses of the legislature. Two years earlier they elected Democrat Governor Ralph Northam. The Democrats promised to move for stricter gun regulations, including possible confiscation for non-compliance. And once in office they attempted to fulfill their promises.

Senate Bill 16 (by Senator Richard Saslaw) was the prize example. It would impose five years imprisonment on law-abiding citizens who possess some of the most common firearms in America. Under this proposed new law, people otherwise guilty of no crime, would be sentenced to five years in prison. And this for doing something protected by and enshrined in the Bill of Rights.

Motive for rebellion: government cannot legally take away our rights

The rights listed in the Bill of Rights, as Mr. Jefferson told us in the Declaration, come to us from God. The rights are inalienable. That means none can legally take them, and we cannot legally cede them to others. Government is not the creator of these rights and therefore has no legal right to remove them from the people. Government must, in fact, protect those rights. For that is the very reason that “governments are instituted among men”; that is, to protect our God-given rights.

So, to carry Mr. Jefferson’s ideas one step further, we the people form governments because we know that power abhors a vacuum and that if we don’t, someone else will. We, therefore, make the government weak and divided, and separate the powers into separate branches. So government cannot legally become tyrannical. We tell government that its primary reason for existing is to protect our God-given rights. The nature of government, however, is to grow and become more powerful. Powerful enough to destroy the very rights it exists to protect.

Majority does not rule

You may say that the people of Virginia elected this Democrat majority to their positions of lawmaker. Therefore, majority rules, so they are entitled to what they voted for. However, that’s not the way it works in America. This is not a majority rules government but instead it is a republican form of government. The President must guarantee to the states a republican form of government. That term has nothing to do with political parties but instead it refers to representative government with minority rights.

A duty for rebellion

Minority rights are to be respected even above the collective because no majority has the power to deny the individual rights enshrined in the Constitution. For example, Amendment Six grants criminal defendants the right to trial be jury, no matter what the majority says. Therefore, any new law criminalizing the right of the people to defend themselves violates the U.S. and Virginia Constitutions. Such a law should have no force. The people have a duty to resist and to rise in rebellion against such a tyrannical act by government.

Governor Northam asks for funds to quell a rebellion

Governor Northam is apparently quite serious about enforcing the new law, however. He has asked the Virginia legislature for an additional $250,000 to fund the incarceration of Virginians who refuse to surrender their arms. The most alarming thing is his request for $4.8 million to fund an 18 member SWAT Unit. That Special Weapons Assault Team would dedicate itself to the forceful confiscation of arms, when necessary.

I use the term arms instead of guns because I want to emphasize that the issue is not hunting but the basic human right of self-defense. The Virginia government apparently does not want its citizens to be able to defend themselves against the tyranny of armed criminals and against a tyrannical government. Jefferson told us that every 20 years there would have to be a rebellion. Government’s tendency would be to grow stronger and usurp the people’s rights.

Sanctuary communities: the (thus far) form of this rebellion

In this case, rebellion means that in 91 out of Virginia’s 96 counties sanctuary measures¹ have passed to resist the State’s new laws. Becoming a 2^nd Amendment sanctuary means a locality will not use its law enforcement resources to prosecute the State’s new gun laws. In other words, the sheriffs and other law enforcement officials plan to refuse enforcement of the confiscation law, if passed in its present form. The sheriffs have been threatened with arrest for their position, so perhaps we will see what happens when a SWAT team comes to arrest the County Sheriff.

The great VCDL/GOA Lobby Day: visible form of rebellion

Last Monday, January 20th, saw a rally at the state capitol. 22,000 people² showed up to peacefully express their support for the 2^nd Amendment. These people and the people in the sanctuary counties and cities are trying to send the Governor a peaceful message. Which is: back off and don’t push this. You are about to encroach on very basic and very personal territory, which we will not surrender without a fight. I hope the Governor of Virginia listens to them.³

The issue is self-defense, not hunting

As I said earlier this is not a proposed ban on hunting, it’s a ban on self-defense. It starts out as a ban on what the government chooses to label “assault weapons.” Then it gravitates to all semi-automatics, which is most handguns and rifles, then inevitably all guns. Making the right of self-defense illegal is a U.N. mandate. Governments around the world from local to national are moving in that direction. Why would our own government seek to disarm us? That’s a very interesting and legitimate question. I offer just a few possible explanations, but you probably have many others.

The radical subsumption of the Democratic Party

The Democrat Party has been infiltrated and conquered by radicals such as AOC and Ilhan Omar, as well as old line Soviet-style socialists such as Bernie Sanders. They are completely devoid of any concern for individual rights and private property. In fact they care nothing for your liberty and property, only their own. They have the globalist world system in mind and desire the collectivization of all rights and property. In order to achieve their objective completely they need their opponents disarmed and defenseless. This Party and its views have come very close, and perhaps already has reached, permanent majority status. If it has not, then it inevitably soon will. About 52% of the population now receives some government benefit each month. Another 6% of the population works for the government. So that’s 58%.

The ruling class has evolved to the point where it is now an entirely separate society with its own rules. It has its own moral code and feels no need to recognize ours.

Are Republicans any better?

In opposition to this group we have Republicans who are basically nihilists who don’t believe in anything except power, money and how to get them and keep them. They will allow the Democrat destruction of our civilization to happen, but they would prefer that it go more slowly. Of course, you also have a few radicals who would prefer a return to the Constitution and the Rule of Law.

An armed society is a free society

Why do we need arms? Why are guns so important to us that we would resist confiscation with armed force? Arms are symbolic of a free people. Free people are armed, but slaves are disarmed. It recalls images of the defeated army marching by the conquering general to stack their arms in front of him. We also need guns to defend ourselves against armed criminals so that we are individually accountable. According to the Rape, Abuse, and Incest National Network (RAINN), one out of six women will be raped or have rape attempted sometime in their lives. There are 433,648 victims of sexual assault each year and about 90% are female. The most alarming statistic is that there are about 130,000 actual rapes committed in America each year.

The right message…

Wouldn’t it make sense for Governor Northam to tell the women of Virginia: look ladies this is terrible, and I feel your pain so arm yourselves and train, train, train with your weapon until using it is second nature. The State of Virginia will give a tax credit if you take a course from a certified instructor. I cannot put a police officer beside you 24/7 but you can take responsibility for your own safety. Individual responsibility is the key to this because rapists aren’t looking for a gunfight, they are looking for a victim so don’t give them one.

…and the wrong message

Instead Governor Northam says I want to send all the rapists a message; the women of Virginia are fair game so help yourselves. He seems to have the same mentality as many of the European government leaders and bureaucrats, which won’t even defend their own children from rape and abuse. You ladies just go on back to the Democrat plantation and leave the thinking to us because you know we will empower women so they can overcome.

Who attends rallies like Lobby Day?

People who attend rallies such as the one I just mentioned are usually referred to by the press, and especially the Democrat press, as racist, white supremacist, homophobic, xenophobic, toothless hillbillies, etc. But the truth is quite different. The attendance at Virginia was apparently quite diverse. I saw interviews with several black people who had signs saying “Black Guns Matter”. Those people have committed to defense of their dignity and their person because if they don’t defend it who will? Oh yes, now I remember, the government will do it. The government’s armed officers will be there a little after you are raped or murdered to clean up the mess. So just go on back home and leave the thinking to us.

About those mass shooting events

A favorite tactic of the anti-self-defense media and government is to publish reports of incidents of gun violence in which innocent people are killed.⁴ But they ignore the incidents in which law-abiding people defend themselves with guns and thus avoid injury and death. According to the NRA, which keeps statistics on self-defense incidents, there are from 500,000 to 3 million incidents of successful armed self-defense in America each year, and about 40,000 firearm deaths each year. In most cases the gun is not even fired, because its mere presence is enough.

Surrender or rebellion

I’m not advising anybody to break the law and risk arrest. But surrender or resistance is always the choice before us. I ask myself from time to time which side will the police take, what about the National Guard, etc. But the real question is whose side will the U.S. military take? Will they obey their masters and bear their swords against their own people? If they do, then all is lost, but if they don’t then we can prevail for a while.

Virginia: test case for rebellion

Virginia is a test case for the new America because it is symbolic. It is also majority Democrat, at least in the law-making bodies. The home of Patrick Henry, Thomas Jefferson, George Washington, it was the cradle of liberty. Virginia serves now as a canary in a coal mine for the rest of us. If the people of Virginia surrender others will follow quickly like lemmings off a cliff.

Unite and support the sanctuary movement

What can ordinary people do? First, we’re all ordinary, and self-defense cuts across all political divides, all races, and all genders. In other words, we are all in this together and the faster we start to see government for what it really is, the better off we will be. Sanctuary for the 2^nd Amendment groups are springing up across the country everywhere. Go on social media and find one in your area and join it and participate. It’s a start and the growing numbers will send the correct message to the Ralph Northams of the world.

Finally, folks: When you give up your arms you are no longer free, and you have become the property of the one to whom you surrendered your weapons.

At least that’s the way I see it,

Until next time folks,

This is Darrell Castle.

Editor’s Notes

1 In fact, the full list of sanctuary communities includes 91 counties, 15 cities, and 30 towns. Incredibly this includes Virginia Beach. That city, in 2019, saw the mass-shooting event Governor Northam cites as his excuse. See the Virginia Citizens Defense League <https://vcdl.org>.

2 That crowd estimate comes from The Roanoke Times, who placed two reporters aboard a bus from Roanoke County. VCDL (see link above) estimates the crowd at at least 30,000 and as many as 70,000. Your editor drove to the rally from his home in Ashland, Virginia and snapped the cover image.

3 Rep. Donald McEachin (D-Va.-4th) called on Governor Northam to call out the National Guard to enforce confiscation. The Adjutant General of Virginia at once put his office into crisis mode. (Video)

4 Some or all these incidents could be false-flag pseudo-operations. This tweet from a reporter who interviewed a witness at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School (Parkland, Fla.) raises that question. No one in authority has ever given a satisfactory answer.