By Brandon Smith and originally posted at Alt-Market.us
One of the most interesting stories from the early days leading up to the American Revolution involves the events surrounding the Boston Massacre. On March 5th, 1770 the Stamp Act had just been repealed but British Soldiers were ever present in Boston as a show of force against the “rowdy” colonists. The British government, in order to save face, implemented the Townshend Acts instead as a means to continue taxing the colonies (without representation, of course). Anger was growing in the streets.
The presence of the Red Coats in the city added to the public fury and protests were sparked. One such protest was raging in front of the Custom House on King Street over a disagreement between wig maker Henry Knox and a soldier. The argument grew into what was later described as a riot. Allegedly, the crowd became violent and started throwing objects at the soldiers. One of the soldiers let off a shot and then someone yelled “Fire!”, causing all the Red Coats to shoot into the crowd killing five of them and injuring others.
The colonial justice system could have chosen to use their position to railroad the soldiers in question and make an ideological example out of them. Instead, in the first trial of Captain John Preston, ample legal representation was given (the lawyer was John Adams, who would later become the 2nd President of the US), along with a fair trial. Adams’ position that the soldiers believed they were under imminent danger of bodily harm convinced the jury and a not-guilty verdict was given for the majority of the soldiers, with manslaughter charges for two of them.
Adams felt that his victory in the defense of the British soldiers was actually a victory for the colonies and ultimately the Revolution. You see, the British looked upon the colonials as “insurrectionists” and barbarians. They did not think that a fair trial for a soldier in the colonies was even possible. By proving them wrong with grace, logic and objectivity, Adams and the jury destroyed a common lie perpetuated by the monarchy and the British establishment. The colonies had more honor than the British did.
This lack of honor among the British establishment became evident before and during the Revolutionary War when the “Star Chamber” became the defacto law of the monarchy in the colonies.
The Star Chamber was an elitist operated “justice system” or tribunal originally designed so that the British aristocracy was assured a fair trial whenever they actually faced a criminal charge. In other words, it was a special court for the power elites that was separate and superior to the courts used for average peasants. Publicly, it was also presented as a means for commoners to redress grievances against aristocrats, but it was well understood that the Star Chamber would rarely go against the nobility UNLESS they had also offended the king. If they went against the king, they would be black-bagged like anyone else.
During the unrest in the colonies, however, the Star Chamber was used in a different manner; it became a weapon to crush dissent among subjects that spoke out against the empire and sowed the seeds of “sedition”.
The dreaded court was highly secretive and the public was often obstructed from its proceedings. Its rulings were overseen by the establishment rather than a jury and in many cases those people being charged were never given a chance to defend themselves. They were sentenced before they ever entered a courtroom, if they entered a courtroom at all. Silence was often considered an admission of guilt rather than a right of the accused. Punishments were brutal, including torture and imprisonment under the worst possible conditions.
The death penalty was not allowed, but the court would instead place defendants in conditions so horrible that they tended to die on their own.
All of this was justified under the claim that every person charged was treasonous, and therefore they did not deserve a fair trial among their peers. After the war was over and the British were defeated, the Founding Fathers drafted large portions of the Constitution and the Bill of Rights in order to counter and prevent the same abuses they saw under the Star Chamber. The 5th Amendment in particular was directly inspired as a way to stop Star Chamber-like abuses of court power.
But lets leap ahead to current day, where we find that the Kyle Rittenhouse trial, now nearing its end, has beyond anything else revealed a vicious intention by the establishment to bring back the oppression of the Star Chamber through the media manipulated court of public opinion, mob rule as well as violations of well established constitutional law.
The political left could have chosen the path of reason, allowing justice to take its natural course through a display of objectivity and fairness as John Adams and the colonials did during the Boston Massacre trial. They have instead chosen to take the same route as the British, motivated by a “win at any cost” mentality, using lies, strategic omissions, censorship and threats of mob violence to turn the Rittenhouse trial into a political proxy war.
Here are just a handful of examples that show the establishment and the media are seeking to undermine centuries of normal constitutional protections including the right of self defense…
The Kenosha “Peaceful Protest” Misdirection
First, lets be clear that the media’s handling of the entire Kenosha incident was corrupt from the very beginning. Aside from refusing to call the riots that erupted what they were – RIOTS, the media has also consistently mischaracterized the police shooting as brutality against black suspect Jacob Blake. Blake, crippled by the incident, has been painted as a “victim and hero” in the news.
In reality, Blake had a warrant out for his arrest including trespassing, disorderly conduct and sexual assault. The police were made aware of this before they attempted to detain him. Blake also had a history of resisting arrest, and of course attempted to do so again in Kenosha. Videos clearly show Blake trying to march away from officers and jump back into his vehicle.
The media claimed Blake was unarmed, yet he is also clearly holding a karambit style knife in the same videos, which the police ordered him to drop and he refused. The Wisconsin DOJ confirmed that Blake was armed and Blake himself admitted to having the knife. Officers were already on edge as Blake tried to reach into his car, or use his car to get away, or possibly use the car as a weapon.
Frankly, Blake’s history and behavior at the scene make him a criminal, not a hero or a victim. All this information was readily available within about a day of the event. The media attempted to hide these FACTS surrounding his shooting from the public and deliberately sowed seeds of unrest. And the ignorant and reactionary people within the BLM movement ate up the propaganda.
When violence broke out, the media portrayed the riots as “peaceful protests” for “racial justice”. Even though, just as with George Floyd, there was no evidence whatsoever that racial motivations had anything to do with it. The riots were based on lies from beginning to end, and this false narrative has bled into and tainted the handling of the Kyle Rittenhouse case – For even if Rittenhouse was defending himself from attackers, the attackers are still presented as the “good guys” because they were fighting for “racial justice”, which again, is simply not true.
The Kid Defending Himself Was Actually The Villain Because He Defended Himself?
The prosecution in the Rittenhouse case should have watched the widely available video evidence (and the secret FBI evidence) and seen that without a shadow of a doubt Rittenhouse was defending himself from an unprovoked attack by an unhinged mob. It is no coincidence that every person Rittenhouse was forced to shoot had a violent criminal record, including Joseph Rosenbaum who had multiple convictions for pedophilia including 11 counts of child molestation. These people were chasing Rittenhouse because they intended to do him harm just as they had done others harm.
The media and the prosecution offer a bizarrely disconnected view, in which Kyle Rittenhouse “provoked” the mob into attacking him simply because he was there and because he had a firearm. Multiple witnesses and FBI surveillance footage indicate Joseph Rosenbaum chased and then attacked Rittenhouse, trying to take his rifle by force, which was why he was shot. But this does not matter in the Star Chamber.
Lead Prosecutor Thomas Binger openly argued that Rittenhouse ‘lost his right to self defense because he was carrying a gun.’ Binger apparently overlooks the fact that one of Rittenhouse’s attackers, Gaige Grosskreutz, had a gun (illegally due to his felony record) and admitted in court that he ran at Rittenhouse with the weapon pointed at him when Rittenhouse shot him. But somehow, only Kyle’s gun was the cause of the violence and all his attackers were responding to the threatening presence of his weapon?
This has been the overarching crux of the prosecution’s case as well as the media narrative: They say Rittenhouse should be treated as an “active shooter” and that the leftist mob was leaping into action, bravely trying to stop him. This does not translate at all when we watch the video of the event; it is clear that Rittenhouse is being pursued by the mob and and they attack him from behind, causing him to fall to the ground. Only then does he defend himself with the rifle against his attackers, including Anthony Huber who tried to bash Kyle’s head in with a skateboard and Grosskreutz who ran at him with a Glock.
To clarify, because this may not be a widely understood factor, if someone is trying to get away from you, you cannot attack them and then legally claim “self defense” was your motive. Only police officers have the right to physically detain a person who is trying to escape.
Also, if Rittenhouse was an “active shooter” you would think he would have fired belligerently into the crowd, but he did not; he only fired on the people trying to hurt him.
The prosecution and media narratives are a blatant attack on the right of self defense in general. In closing arguments, the prosecution states that Rittenhouse was a “coward” that should have used his fists to fight off the angry mob instead of using his rifle; displaying a clear intent to undermine not just Rittenhouse’s character, but undermine the concept of overall gun rights. The case itself is obviously politically slanted against Rittenhouse because he is a conservative. Had this been a leftist shooting a mob of conservatives under the same circumstances at the Jan 6th riot I doubt it would have ever gone to trial.
The implications of this are far reaching. If Rittenhouse is found guilty despite all the evidence to the contrary, the assertion will then be that self defense is no longer a protected right for anyone with the wrong politics. It will be seen as open season on conservatives at any such events in the future and all defense law will come into question, especially any defense law that involves gun rights.
The 5th Amendment Attack And The Strategy Of Subverting A Trial
Various establishment institutions have been trying to undermine the 5th Amendment and the right to remain silent for decades now. Once again, we saw this evidenced in the Rittenhouse trial when prosecutors sought to attack the defendant on potential evidence that was ostensibly dismissed before the trial by the judge. The prosecution asked questions related to the evidence anyway. The judge removed the jury from the room and then chastised Binger, who then proceeded to question Rittenhouse’s right to remain silent on the issue.
This may seem to be overly complicated legal jousting, but this action by the prosecution was an aggressive attempt to taint the jury with misconceptions of the defendant as a violent “vigilante” rather than the victim of a mob attack. Also, questioning a defendant’s right to remain silent is belligerent to say the least. But beyond that, the faux pas by the prosecution could have led to an immediate mistrial declared.
Keep in mind that the prosecution had already suffered numerous failures and the case was going downhill for them. I suspect that this may have been an attempt by Binger to deliberately cause a mistrial and to retry Rittenhouse at a later date, undoing his many mistakes and getting another opportunity to bury Rittenhouse despite his innocence. This is how the Star Chamber begins – When you can be tried over and over again until the establishment gets the outcome they wanted. Furthermore, if the right to remain silent comes into question, then any refusal to answer questions could become an assumed admission of guilt.
Silencing The Alternative Media And Obstructing Honest Reporting
Perhaps the most blatant act by the establishment has been to use Big Tech to censor various elements and observations of the Rittenhouse trial. Facebook and Twitter have been policing Rittenhouse related posts, and YouTube blocked the majority of independent streamers covering the live closing arguments of the case. The mainstream media has completely avoided any mention of this decision, but of course they would; it makes them the only source for case coverage and their narrative the only narrative.
And how about that thermal surveillance evidence from the FBI that only saw the light of day in the middle of the trail? Withholding evidence is a direct obstruction of justice but also a direct attempt to undermine public insight into the case. The narrative is easier to fabricate if one filters out any evidence that contradicts it.
This control of the narrative has led to widespread disinformation in the Rittenhouse case. There are still many leftists out there that actually think the people Kyle shot were black and that Rittenhouse is a “racist.” The media has asserted for the past year that Rittenhouse’s self defense was somehow related to “white supremacy.” Media hacks like CNN’s Don Lemon have also insinuated that the judge in the case is biased and possibly racist.
The media has asserted that if Rittenhouse is not found guilty that riots will erupt once again to provide punishment where the courts “failed.” If riots do explode, it will be because of the misleading and poisonous lies constantly spread by the same mainstream media. But let’s think about the consequences of this for a moment…
The Star Chamber is an ideal tyrannical tool, but the establishment and leftists do not have it in hand yet. They want it badly, and their behavior during the Rittenhouse case makes this clear. I REPEAT: The Star Chamber is not upon us yet, but it is coming soon if these people get their way.
Rule by the mob goes well beyond the effects of the Star Chamber, but this could be by design. Think of it this way: Say Rittenhouse is found Not Guilty, and BLM mobs burn down Kenosha in response. Future courts and future juries in similar cases might then decide it’s easier to ignore facts and evidence so that mob violence is avoided and the leftists are appeased. The Star Chamber will return because it will be seen as a preferable alternative to national riots. The Star Chamber will become a mechanism for the “greater good” and the establishment will get what it wanted all along.
This cannot be allowed to happen. The Rittenhouse trial does not represent a singular shooting event and an isolated case for self defense, it represents a fulcrum point for the very fabric of our society and what justice will actually mean in the years to come. If an obviously innocent kid is convicted of murder merely because of his political beliefs, or if the mob is allowed to burn and destroy swaths of a city because the verdict is Not Guilty, then every effort the Founding Fathers made to stop the creation of another Star Chamber will be erased.
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