When The S*** Hits the Fan

Archives for February 19, 2016

Sheriff Blocks Feds From Harassing Raw Milk Farmer: “Stem the Tide of Federal Overreach”

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sheriff-vs-FDA

While many are still reeling from the outrageous shooting of LaVoy Finicum, and the aftermath of the Oregon standoff and arrest of patriots linked to it, there are other battles against the feds taking place across the country.

Much less attention was paid to Sheriff Brad Rogers, of Elkhart County in Indiana, who just successfully concluded his own showdown with federal officials from the FDA. The scenario was quite different, but the principals involved strike a similar chord – burdensome overreach and tyranny on the part of the federal government and its swarm of agents.

As activists have seen in many other cases, the FDA has gone after raw milk farmers and raw food proponents with frightening force – carrying out SWAT raids, trumped up arrests and destruction of food – all with no valid reason, and plenty of appearance of outright harassment.

Sheriff Rogers investigated a complaint from a constituent farmer and found that he sided with his case – there was no justified cause for invasive inspections happening repeatedly since 2011 every couple of weeks.

Basically, they were just looking for a reason to shut the farmer down, and Rogers put a stop to it.

Off The Grid News reports on this inspiring development, and its implications for a winning strategy against what is going on in this country:

Federal agents subjected a farmer to harassment and warrantless searches simply for producing raw milk, but a county sheriff took the farmer’s side and blocked federal agents from the property – and the sheriff is now speaking out.

The US Food & Drug Administration (FDA) and Department of Justice (DOJ) took the actions four years ago simply because the farmer was providing raw milk to an organic food co-op. The story is receiving renewed coverage because the Indiana sheriff, Elkhart County’s Brad Rogers, wrote a 600-word explanation for a local newspaper as part of his “Ask The Sheriff” series. Off The Grid News previously reported on the dispute.

[…]

“Specifically, the FDA was inspecting his farm without a warrant as much as every two weeks,” Rogers wrote. “Typical inspections occur annually. The Department of Justice (DOJ) had subpoenaed him for a grand jury in Michigan in which he was to bring his production documents. The Feds wanted to make this farmer an example.

“My research,” Rogers added, “concluded that no one was getting sick from this distribution of this raw milk. It appeared to be harassment by the FDA and the DOJ, and making unconstitutional searches, in my opinion. The farmer told me that he no longer wished to cooperate with the inspections of his property.”

Reportedly, Sheriff Rogers than wrote to the Department of Justice and informed them of the actions he would take if federal inspectors did not have a signed warrant based upon probable cause over which to conduct their searches:

“I understand that you have made recent requests to (the farmer) for documents and to appear before a grand jury, and he has had a number of inspections and attempted inspections on his farm within Elkhart County. This is notice that any further attempts to inspect this farm without a warrant signed by a judge, based on probable cause, will result in federal inspectors’ removal or arrest for trespassing by my officers or I. In addition, if any further action is taken by the federal government on (the farmer), while he is in Elkhart County, I will expect that you or federal authorities contact my office prior to such action. I will expect you to forward this information to your federal associates, including the FDA.”

Shortly after the email was sent, the farmer received a certified letter from the DOJ that said his grand jury subpoena had been cancelled. No federal inspectors have visited the farm since 2011.

[…]

“Your local elected officials … can stem the tide of federal overreach if they apply just a little backbone in supporting and defending the Constitution. Expect it! Demand it!,” Rogers wrote. “Some bloggers and natural food writers have hailed me as a hero. I’m no hero. I’m just doing my job.

The public is waking up to the tyranny of countless federal agencies with little or no transparency and enough red tape to take over everything. Many law enforcement officials are waking up, too, and there are many great examples of them standing up for the Constitution and the rights of the people.

The actions taken by Sheriff Rogers are not only legal and right, but they are what the people should expect from their local (and especially elected) officials.

This same sheriff made news a few months ago when he vowed that he would ignore any gun control executive order:

Sheriffs just happen to be the most powerful and independent locally elected official, and can be a bulwark for resistance to federal encroachment.

If they can be stopped here, they can be stopped elsewhere, too, and freedom can return to the lives of Americans.

The feds cannot take over if the people educate themselves and stand up – peacefully, but with a firm defensive posture – and take no guff from a bully.

Read more:

Texas Police Chief Warns Obama That Gun Control Will “Cause A Revolution… You’re Not Our Potentate, Sir”

New Legislation Targets FDA Raids: “We Have Too Many Armed Federal Agencies and We Need to Put an End to This”

Outrage: Government Forces Private Citizens to Pour Bleach on Home-Grown Organic Food *Video*

Feds Preparing “Multi-Agency” Action In Oregon As Patriot Militia Says They Are “Willing To Kill And Be Killed”

Gov SWAT Teams Target “Rugged Individuals” Who Grow Their Own Food, Produce Their Own Electricity

SHTFplan and Mac Slavo www.shtfplan.com

Warning: You May Be Next: 400,000 People Just Had Their Pensions Cut By 50%: “Going to Happen To The Rest Of Pensions in the United States”

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piggybank-breaks

In 2014 a new Federal law made it possible for pension funds to cut benefits for their recipients. Much to the protest of pensioners, the government and numerous unions supporting the change cited pension plans that were in imminent danger of collapse, saying that the only way to save the funds was to cut benefits to potentially millions of recipients. Six months later, the U.S. Supreme Court took things a step further when they opined that the government has the right to fully seize 401(k) and pension funds that were being poorly managed.

Of course, most Americans were either not paying attention or completely ignored the ramifications of the new rules set forth by their government because, well, anyone who talks about the potential for a collapse of pension funds or the economy is, as President Barack Obama so eloquently noted in his recent State of the Union Speech, “peddling fiction.”

Except in October of last year the canary in the coal mine fell over and died when Illinois announced that the State was posting pension payments because it ran out of money.

Fast forward a few more months and things have been taken to the next level. The Central State pension fund in Kansas became the first such fund to take advantage of the 2014 law as 400,000 Americans who depend on their monthly pension income to pay for such things as their mortgage, groceries and medical expenses saw an average of $1,400 per month sliced of their monthly benefits.

Dale Dorsey isn’t happy.

After working 33 years, he’s facing a 55% cut to his pension benefits, a blow which he says will “cripple” his family and imperil the livelihood of his two children, one of whom is in the fourth grade and one of whom is just entering high school.

Dorsey attended a town hall meeting in Kansas City on Tuesday where retirees turned out for a discussion on “massive” pension cuts proposed by the Central States Pension Fund, which covers 400,000 participants, and which will almost certainly go broke within the next decade.

“A controversial 2014 law allowed the pension to propose [deep] cuts, many of them by half or more, as a way to perhaps save the fund,” The Kansas City Star wrote earlier this week adding that “two much smaller pensions also have sought similar relief under the law, and still more pensions are significantly underfunded.”

And if you think this is the end of it, consider the words of long time teamster member Jay Perry who says the writing is on the wal:

“What’s happening to us is a microcosm of what’s going to happen to the rest of the pensions in the United States”

It was all fun and games during the boom times when governments and companies promised pensioners exorbitant retirements based on an unlimited growth rate model. Now reality is setting in.

And keep in mind that this is just the first part of the coming retirement fund destruction. As we noted above, the Supreme Court ruling gives the government the “right” to step in and seize these underperforming funds.

So, the first step is to give pension funds the ability to cut benefits, which we are seeing now and will continue to see going forward as funds all over the country struggle to keep the benefits flowing. Next, the government will identify these funds as under-performing and mismanaged, at which point they will outright seize the entire industry just as they did with health care.

The pain is coming, America. You’d better be prepared to deal with the fallout.

Also Read:

13 Urgent Reports To Help You Collapse-Proof Your Life

Prepare For Economic Collapse And Other Disasters: The Prepper’s Blueprint

New Federal Law Targets Retirement Benefit Cuts: “We Thought Our Pension Was Secure”

Coming for Your Funds: Supremes “Justify Seizure of Pension Funds to PROTECT Pensioners”

Peter Schiff Warns: “The Whole Economy Has Imploded… Collapse Is Coming”

7 Jobs That Are Going to Survive the Next Economic Crash

Mark Levin: Government Is “Simulating the Collapse of Our Financial System, the Collapse of Our Society and the Potential for Widespread Violence”

SHTFplan and Mac Slavo www.shtfplan.com

This Is The Collapse: Discount Grocery Store Serving Poor Cleaned Out: “Bargain-Hungry Shoppers Emptied the Shelves”

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Belarus Crisis

This article was written by Michaela Whitton and originally published at The Anti-Media.org.

Editor’s Comment: This story isn’t quite what you might think at first if you just scanned over it, but it still demonstrates an alarming trend:  namely, just how desperate so many have become.

Basically, it amounts to riot-prone and often struggling people fighting over bargain-basement junk food after it was put on sale. But what does this level of reaction say about society and the level of economic crisis the world has reached? Basically, that almost anything can make things come unhinged.

If people are reacting this strongly over undercutting food prices, it suggests how much food insecurity exists, and how difficult it has become for most to pay the bills. Food banks have been overwhelmed nearly everywhere. In fact, this grocery chain found the problem to be big enough to create this cheap food marketing niche – which will now need to rethink its business strategy. What happens when the food isn’t just cheap, but unavailable? Multiplied against the whole environment of economic stress, there is every reason to think things are practically just falling apart.

Grocery Store Forced to Review Trading Rules After Shelves Go Empty

by Michaela Whitton

London’s new EasyFoodstore has been forced to review its trading rules after it had to close temporarily when bargain-hungry shoppers emptied the shelves. The mega-discount food store is the latest venture of EasyJet entrepreneur, Stelios Haji-Ioannou.

The millionaire businessman was inspired by the idea after seeing the widespread use of food banks in Britain. “This is another way the Easy brand can serve the less well-off,” the budget airline owner said.

Easy on the wallet

With a weekly shop for a family of four costing just £15.75, it’s no surprise the store rapidly became a victim of its own success. After a promotional offer charging just 25p for everyday food items generated so much publicity, hundreds of bargain-hunters cleared the shelves and the store had no choice but to close until it was able to re-stock.

The recently opened food shop in Park Royal, north-west London, carries a basic range of 76 cheap and cheerful items including pizza, tea, coffee and tinned goods. It has been quickly forced to bring in a 10 item purchasing limit to deter its competition from stockpiling products.

In her brilliant opinion piece for the Guardian, Joanna Blythman says the EasyFoodstore is in a different league from the “no frills” food shopping that she claims is now such a familiar feature of the British retail scene. She adds that poverty is a money problem, not a food problem, and won’t be cured by artificially “cheap,” nutritionally impoverished, lowest-common-denominator food.

“Surely no society on earth can ultimately afford food this cheap? If we factor in the hidden costs to society, from grave public health issues to climate change, it most certainly doesn’t constitute a bargain,” she said.

The predictions are that EasyFoodstore products are to rise from 25p to 50p after February. However, with Foodbank use in austerity Britain at record levels, is it any wonder that rationing is required?

SHTFplan and Mac Slavo www.shtfplan.com

Rich Tech Guy Wants ‘Riff Raff’ Off the Streets: “I Shouldn’t Have to See Despair of Homeless”

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Detroit Area Economy Worsens As Big Three Automakers Face Dire Crisis

It has long been a debate as to whether social reformers should fight to end poverty, or simply rid the world of poor people.

Many elitists have dreamed of depopulating the hopeless and destitute, or found realistic ways of sending them to forgotten places. But most of these kinds of people stopped publicly saying such things many decades ago.

But with an ever-widening wealth gap, and many failed policies, the homeless and the poor are growing in size and represent the tip of the iceberg for tens of millions of people who are beyond struggling in this country.

Now, a software entrepreneur in San Francisco has made waves across the Internet after writing an open letter calling on the mayor and police chief to effectively sweep the homeless populations and “riff raff” off the streets. As CBS San Francisco:

A San Francisco tech entrepreneur’s lament over homeless and drug-addicted “riff raff” plaguing his adopted city has earned him some international notoriety as a tone-deaf tech bro.

Justin Keller, described on his LinkedIn profile as the founder of server software firm Command.io, published what he called an open letter to Mayor Ed Lee and Police Chief Greg Suhr. In it, Keller described how encounters with homeless people ruined his recent get-togethers with his parents and girlfriend.

[Keller wrote]

The city needs to tackle this problem head on, it can no longer ignore it and let people do whatever they want in the city. I don’t have a magic solution… It is a very difficult and complex situation, but somehow during Super Bowl, almost all of the homeless and riff raff seem to up and vanish. I’m willing to bet that was not a coincidence. Money and political pressure can make change. So it is time to start making progress, or we as citizens will make a change in leadership and elect new officials who can.

I know people are frustrated about gentrification happening in the city, but the reality is, we live in a free market society. The wealthy working people have earned their right to live in the city. They went out, got an education, work hard, and earned it. I shouldn’t have to worry about being accosted. I shouldn’t have to see the pain, struggle, and despair of homeless people to and from my way to work every day.

San Francisco’s burgeoning tech industry has been blamed for skyrocketing rents and exacerbating an already intractable homeless problem.

Indeed, it is this Bay Area tech bubble that has increased home and rental prices so much, that some have gone so far as to rent out a tent on AirBNB for an outrageous $1,000/month in a guy’s backyard that offers bathroom access and a good commute route to work.

Tech entrepreneur Justin Keller became the latest social media target for blowback, after expressing the sensitivity of the “Affluenza” teen – a rich kids whose lawyers used his disaffected feelings for the struggles of ordinary people as a defense in the drunk driving killing of four, for which he showed no remorse.

Moreover, Keller has become another sign of the times – of the great divide that is splitting America economically down the middle, and casting aside the have-nots systematically, and without regard.

As his letter mentioned, this is exactly what happened in the area during Super Bowl 50, which had game day on February 7. The Guardian reports:

“They chase us out like cattle,” the 62-year-old Stagg said, as his hangouts disappeared under metal bandstands and banners heralding Super Bowl 50. “We’re not allowed to be here when the rich people come around? I don’t believe in that.”

Angering Stagg were comments made last summer by San Francisco’s mayor, Ed Lee, when asked what he planned to do about the highly visible homeless problem come the Super Bowl.

“They are going to have to leave,” Lee said of those sleeping along the city’s Embarcadero. […] “It’s just a further example of the inequity in the city,” said supervisor Jane Kim.

It is hardly a problem of just San Francisco, or the West Coast. Gov. Andrew Cuomo came under fire in New York for ordering the homeless to be forced into shelters and picked up off the streets during freezing weather.

One gets the sense that this is just the beginning. The strong arm tactics being used to remove homeless people from the streets to clear out the blight are just the visible part of a subtle movement to “deal with” less fortunate people… mostly getting them out of the way, out of sight, and minimizing the presence of their struggle.

The rich are not only concentrating their wealth, but the rest of the country is getting shafted in the process, as a predatory brand of finance destroys opportunity, ships jobs offshore and uses currency as a weapon to undermine the many. Will the media take up their struggle, or will they do what they always have done – and read the teleprompter script as the focus shifts to other distractions, and great stagnation and malaise takes over the land.

Read more:

No Housing Bubble? Man Rents out Tent for $1000 a Month in CA

Nowhere to Go: 85% of College Graduates Will Return Home Jobless

“Affluenza” Teen — Who Got Away After Killing 4 with the “Rich, Spoiled Brat Defense” — Dodges Probation

SHTFplan and Mac Slavo www.shtfplan.com