Dealing with the madness...

~~~~~~~

;)   Have a great day!

Sometimes...

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;)

Islamic appeasement...

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See link in previous post.  ;)

A lesson to be learned...

On immigration...

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/opinion/swedens-ugly-immigration-problem/article26338254/

Unfettered immigration can quickly become ugly...

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Boombox...

Cartoonist Diaz. The cartoonist Dixon Diaz can say more in a few little squares than the New York Times, the Wall Street Journal and the Kansas City Star can-- combined. 

  

Thanks for sharing, Clem...
~~~~~~~~

A human sized bunny...

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He is risen...

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Have a joyous Easter! 

Good Friday...

Psalm 22:14-15: "I am poured out like water, and all my bones are out of joint. My heart has turned to wax; it has melted away within me. My strength is dried up like a potsherd, and my tongue sticks to the roof of my mouth; you lay me in the dust of death."

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If you aren't familiar with the crucifixion of Christ and what he went through for you, here is an outline...

Peace.

 

Maundy Thursday...

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Be patient, ISIS...

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It could happen...  ;)

How far have we fallen...?

On this day in 1775, a member of Parliament rises and gives a speech in the British House of Commons. Edmund Burke urged members to reconcile with the American colonies, before it was too late. He spoke of the “anger and violence” that “prevailed every day more and more.” He feared that “things were hastening towards an incurable alienation of our colonies.”

Little did he know it, but many of his predictions would come true within a matter of weeks! Less than a month later, the first shots of the American Revolution were fired at Lexington and Concord.

But on that day in March 1775, Burke was still hoping for peace. He proposed that Parliament offer “simple peace.” He thought that the British government ought to take one very simple action: concede and give “permanent satisfaction to your people.” Give them the civil rights that they were demanding!

The reasons that he gave were purely pragmatic. He simply did not think that any other route was feasible. The American colonies were too large; their commerce was too important to England. Perhaps most importantly, he argued that the “temper and character” of Americans prevented them from accepting any other solution. Indeed, he noted, “a love of freedom is the predominating feature which marks and distinguishes the whole [of America].”

In other words, Americans were too freedom-minded to ever give up the fight! How, Burke asked, could they be anything else? After all, they “are descendants of Englishmen.”

This phrase would have meant something to his listeners. Remember, the English people had established their own rights against the British government. They had fought long and hard to have those rights recognized. Americans still considered themselves Englishmen, with all the rights and privileges of those at home in Great Britain. Naturally, they recoiled when the British government treated them as if they were inferior, with fewer rights than the citizens at home in England.

Burke concluded: “The temper and character which prevail in our colonies are, I am afraid, unalterable by any human art. We cannot, I fear, falsify the pedigree of this fierce people, and persuade them that they are not sprung from a nation in whose veins the blood of freedom circulates. . . . An Englishman is the unfittest person on earth to argue another Englishman into slavery.”

The best solution for Britain? Let the colonists be free! Ensure that they have all the civil rights of any other Englishman. He had several specific proposals along these lines. If this is done, Burke argues, “they will cling and grapple to you, and no force under heaven will be of power to tear them from their allegiance. But let it be once understood that your government may be one thing and their privileges another . . . the cement is gone, the cohesion is loosened, and everything hastens to decay and dissolution.” “Slavery they can have anywhere,” Burke concluded. “It is a weed that grows in every soil.”

In the end, Burke failed in his objective. He was unable to convince Parliament to accept his resolutions. But, even if Parliament had agreed to a simple concession, without any strings attached, the news would not have reached America in time to stop the shots at Lexington and Concord.

Ironically, Burke had cited the problems with this long traveling distance in his speech: “Three thousand miles of ocean lie between you and [America]. No contrivance can prevent the effect of this distance in weakening government.”

Apparently not.


From:  Tara Ross

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What do you get when you cross...?

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Brussels...

~~~~~~~

By French cartoonist Plantu...  Showing support to those affected by yesterday's bombings in Brussels...

Let's not forget about the victims of the recent attacks in Istanbul and Ankara either.

Or the entire world, really, which is affected by these acts.

And the solution is...? 

With Che in Cuba...

~~~~~~~

Che may be gone, but his memory lives on...

Looks like they may have gotten it right...

Supreme Court Vacates Massachusetts Ruling That Found Stun Guns Ineligible for 2nd Amendment Protections

SCOTUS rejects lower court ruling in Caetano v. Massachusetts.

In 2015 the Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts, that state's highest court, upheld the criminal conviction of a woman named Jaime Caetano for the crime of possessing a stun gun, which she obtained for purposes of self-defense against her violent and abusive ex-boyfriend. According to the Massachusetts high court, Caetano's conviction must stand because a stun gun "is not the type of weapon that is eligible for Second Amendment protection." Today the U.S. Supreme Court vacated that judgment and ordered the Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts to rehear the case.

At issue in Caetano v. Massachusetts is the reach of the Supreme Court's Second Amendment precedents District of Columbia v. Heller (2008) and McDonald v. Chicago (2010), which together recognize that the Second Amendment protects an individual right to keep and bear arms for purposes of self-defense, and that this right applies against legislative enactments by both the federal and state governments.

Read the entire article here.

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"...which together recognize that the Second Amendment protects an individual right to keep and bear arms for purposes of self-defense, and that this right applies against legislative enactments by both the federal and state governments."

I guess that means that my state (or any other state) cannot prohibit me from carrying in parks and schools, or any place else where I may need to protect myself, which could be anywhere?

None of the 8 surviving Supremes dissented.  Amazing.

 

I suppose...

~~~~~~~

Seems legit...

~~~~~~~

There will always be some rules... 

I never know what they are planning...

~~~~~~~

Who runs the show...?

~~~~~~~~

Sage advice...

~~~~~~~~

Changing tune...

~~~~~~~

We also have the mandate of 2014 where the electorate put Republicans in charge of both the House and the Senate.  Right, wrong, or otherwise, it appears that the congress may be listening to their constituents for a change.  You see, every Liberal thinks that there are more people who think like they do than there actually are, and they cannot accept that they lost control at the last election.  They don't yet realize that they are no longer in a position to make the rules...

It has been a while...

~~~~~~~

It's hard for you to understand...?

~~~~~~~

Twice.

The Emotional Child's Guide...

~~~~~~~

This caught my eye this morning.  Must be the bright colors...

I think it represents a primer for Liberals.  Or something. 

Rubio out...

Marco Rubio is dropping out of the presidential race after losing the Florida primary to Donald Trump and failing to unite the Republican establishment against the billionaire front-runner.
"We live in a republic and our voters make these decisions," Rubio said in Miami Tuesday night as his supporters booed Trump's victory.
His speech was a thinly veiled rebuke of Trump's campaign tactics, as he warned that it would have been easier for him to exploit the anger and anxiety driving the race. He warned that the politics of division were going to leave America a "fractured nation."
"America is in the middle of a real political storm, a real tsunami and we should have seen this coming," Rubio said.
"While we are on the right side," he said," this year, we will not be on the winning side."
Rubio, the 44-year-old first-term senator, had positioned himself as the only person who could stop Trump, and had gone on the attack, memorably bringing up the size of the Trump's hands during a campaign rally and at a presidential debate.
His campaign slogan was "a new American century" -- as he tried to send the message that America needed a new generation of leadership that could deal with the challenges ahead. It was also a way to spin his relative youth, and short time in the U.S. Senate as an advantage.

Read the rest here.

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Agenda 21, and things...

Stop Latest Property Rights Outrage: HUD's AFFH Rule Many have already heard of Agenda 21, the world planners' agenda for taking control of mankind during the 21st century. The summarized goal of this United Nations-concocted scheme appears at the beginning of its 1,100 pages. It is there that environmental attorney Daniel Sitarz, who edited this enormous guide for bringing about the regimentation of mankind, boldly admits that it "proposes an array of actions which are intended to be implemented by every person on Earth." To make even clearer the totalitarian goals of Agenda 21, he wrote that the document "calls for specific changes in the activities of all people." That's scary enough, but those who mean to establish the UN's rule over everyone don't seem satisfied with having all of the 21st century to accomplish their totalitarian goals. Deciding that the overall goals included in Agenda 21 could use some boosting, they have produced a newer plan entitled Transforming Our World: the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development, also known simply as Agenda 2030. It aims to accomplish numerous steps in the area known as "sustainable development." In the Preamble to the Agenda 2030 plan, one learns that this new document has 17 "Sustainable Development Goals" and 169 "targets." These include ending poverty and hunger, ensuring good health, guaranteeing education and energy for all, building resilient infrastructure, combating climate change, and more. In order to accomplish all of this, the United Nations must be strengthened into an all-powerful world ruler. No one should discount the UN's role in all of this. So, the globalists continue to produce newer, more totalitarian steps to establish their ultimate takeover of everyone and everything. One of their latest creations is the Affirmatively Furthering Fair Housing rule (AFFH). Announced last July by Housing and Urban Development (HUD) Secretary Julian Castro (no relation to Fidel and Raul except that they have similar goals), the 377-page AFFH rule is a significant attack on private property, especially on home ownership. It's designed to relocate people from rural America and force them into cities, some of which would have to be built. Once the people are gathered into such structures, all the inhabitants can be carefully watched and craftily controlled. Creating this type of totalitarianism is already under way in China, where huge apartment complexes have been erected to house people who are being forced away from their farms and villages into high-rise buildings and a new, wholly different and unwelcome lifestyle. A major element of the AFFH scheme is its focus on the racial and ethnic makeup of neighborhoods. Local government authority will virtually cease to exist if the new federal AFFH rules replace local control of zoning, education, transportation and more. AFFH requires any local government receiving HUD funding to report the makeup of housing by race and ethnicity. Further requirements include a listing of schools, parks, transportation availability, employment trends, etc. The project is all encompassing. Congressman Paul Gosar (R-Ariz.) saw what AFFH rules would lead to. He introduced a measure designed to ban HUD's funding for AFFH. It won passage in the House by a vote of 229 to 193. A companion Senate bill (S. 1909, the Local Zoning Decisions Protection Act) has been introduced by Senator Mike Lee (R-Utah). Six Republicans have cosponsored this measure: Alabama's Jeff Sessions, Louisiana's David Vitter, Wyoming's Mike Enzi, Florida's Marco Rubio, Arkansas' Tom Cotton, and Montana's Steve Daines. Obviously, more cosponsors are needed. Standing in the way of efforts to block implementation of the AFFH rules are none other than House Speaker Paul Ryan and Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell. A recent attempt to cut funding for AFFH in HUD's budget failed when these two congressional leaders arranged to delete such action from the huge omnibus spending bill rammed through Congress last December. Instead of reducing HUD's budget and killing funding for the AFFH, the HUD appropriation was increased. Expectations that much-needed change would follow when Paul Ryan succeeded John Boehner are totally unrealistic. In summary, AFFH calls for destroying private property ownership, forcing people out of their homes, redistributing wealth, terminating local community control, and more. What to do about it? Right now, contacting senators is recommended. In past years, action requests have always centered on sending letters to legislators. That procedure has been overcome by the greater effectiveness of telephone calls and the greater speed of emails. So we urge all to call and email your senators and urge them to cosponsor and help to pass S. 1909, a bill designed to ban HUD's funding for AFFH. Phone your senators at 202-224-3121. Email your senators. Thanks. Your Friends at The John Birch Society (Click here to view this email alert as an article at JBS.org.)

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Gimme...

~~~~~~~

Hands out for the handouts.

Political fiction...

~~~~~~~

Preventing violent extremism in schools...

I don't know what to say.  At first glance it seems that the paranoia and desire to control run deep in this one...

https://info.publicintelligence.net/FBI-PreventingExtremismSchools.pdf

~~~~~~~~

What is wrong with America...

~~~~~~~

Not me. Us...

~~~~~~~

So it is...  ;)

It was always about control...

~~~~~~~

Captain Obvious, eh?  ;)

Thoughts from D.C. from another perspective...

~~~~~~~

Not sure he could be any worse than what we have now or worse than either of the "old white guys" that the Dems are running this time around.

Further, the opinions of the lobbyists and the bankers and the men with money have been held in higher regard than yours or mine for many, many years now...  ;)

Behind the scenes...

~~~~~~~

Everyone here is smart enough to know...  ;)

If sheep could vote...

~~~~~~~

On Hillary Clinton...

Hillary's Victories Mean Painful Legal Choices for DOJ, WH By Charles Lipson

February 29, 2016

Few jobs are as demanding as the U.S. attorney general’s. The AG’s popularity peaks at the swearing-in ceremony and goes downhill from there. It’s not just the hard cases on the docket. It’s that attorneys general have two mandates that sometimes conflict. Do they follow their responsibilities as the nation’s chief law enforcement officer, wherever those responsibilities lead? Or do they act as the president’s top appointee in law enforcement and do his bidding?
AGs do not keep their jobs unless they know which mandate takes priority. They serve at the president’s pleasure.

This bedrock choice between blind justice and political calculation is almost certain to confront Loretta Lynch once the FBI concludes its investigation into Hillary Clinton, her top aides, and the Clinton Foundation.

Her choice just got tougher now that the former secretary of state is sure to win the Democratic nomination. She effectively clinched that prize with an unheard-of 50-point victory over Bernie Sanders in Saturday’s South Carolina primary, on the heels of a solid victory in Nevada last Tuesday. Clinton's victory in the Palmetto State portends big wins all across the South, leaving Sanders with no realistic path to the nomination. After months of enthusiastic “Feel the Bern” rallies, the Democrats are now back where they started. As one prankster, who managed to photo-bomb a Clinton campaign rally, put it on his tee-shirt: “Settle for Hillary.”

Before Democrats officially settle, though, Clinton, Lynch, and Barack Obama have a treacherous bridge to cross

Clinton voters are oblivious to the dangers. Polls show they no longer consider her “honest and trustworthy,” but they still don’t think she has committed any crimes. Countless Clinton supporters have told me, “These investigations won’t find anything. The Benghazi hearings proved it. This is simply a partisan witch hunt.”

They are half right. The Benghazi hearings proved, once again, that Congress has the investigative prowess of Homer Simpson. They are right that Republicans hate her. Divided as the GOP is, it is united in thinking Bill and Hillary are corrupt, self-serving liars.

But the GOP is not leading the criminal investigation. The FBI is. The bureau is not partisan, and it is not on a witch hunt. Despite the obvious risks of investigating the presumptive Democratic nominee during a Democratic administration, its agents are sorting through mountains of evidence pointing to serious, deliberate crimes.

What are the key legal dangers facing Clinton and her aides? Here are just a few.
* Hillary Clinton deliberately set up a private email server for herself and her top State Department aides. She used it to store over 1,800 documents now deemed classified, some highly classified. The sheer bulk of the security violations is extraordinary. Intelligence professionals agree the server was almost certainly hacked by foreign agencies—probably by several.

* Secretary Clinton specifically instructed aides to send her classified materials on that insecure network. We know of at least one such instruction. We don’t know how many others were redacted by the State Department.

* Because her server was private, the State Department’s records did not include its contents when responding to Freedom of Information Act requests. The department wrongly told FOIA applicants that no such materials existed. Not only did the materials exist (on Clinton’s server), senior officials knew it and allowed false denials to be made.

* Some documents on the Clinton server contained the intelligence-gathering methods, the names of undercover agents, and real-time disclosures of top officials’ movements. Aside from the nuclear launch codes, these are the most closely guarded secrets in the U.S. government. That material is “classified at birth,” as Clinton, Mills, Abedin, and Sullivan certainly knew. To avoid any misunderstanding, they had all taken mandatory training in the proper treatment of sensitive and classified materials.

* Some of the classified materials on Clinton’s server originated in intelligence agencies outside the State Department and came into the department on a secure, classified network. They were marked as such. They could only be transferred to Clinton’s unsecured network by hand. Each occurrence was a felony. Since the server has now been recovered, the FBI and intelligence agencies know who sent those messages and who received them at the State Department.

* The Clinton Foundation and some private businesses were deeply involved in the State Department’s business. The lines were blurred between Hillary Clinton’s official role as secretary of state and her unofficial role at a major foundation, headed by her husband, that was showered with money from people and companies working with the State Department. At best, the arrangements were sleazy. At worst, they were criminal “pay to play.”

* Hillary’s closest aide, Huma Abedin, had blurred roles, too. While working at State, she was also employed by a private company whose clients did business with her department and the government.
One major feature of FBI investigations has been completely ignored. The bureau normally interviews all the key participants, and it knows the answers before it asks the questions. That should mean closed-door sessions with Abedin, Mills, Sullivan, and, ultimately, Hillary Clinton and perhaps Bill Clinton (if the foundation’s activities are at issue). Failing to interview them would replicate the botched Benghazi investigation by Adm. Mike Mullin and Ambassador Thomas Pickering. The FBI won’t repeat that mistake or subject itself to the withering criticism.

These interviews are deadly serious. Former Speaker of the House Dennis Hastert learned that the hard way. When the FBI asked why he had withdrawn cash from his bank account, he lied. He was caught and, last October, plead guilty to a felony.

So, will Abedin, Mills, or Sullivan answer fully and truth fully or invoke their Fifth Amendment rights? If they did, would it become known and hurt Hillary politically? If she refuses to testify herself, her political career is over. She won’t do that unless she fears indictment is certain, and she would have to drop out of the presidential race anyway.

If FBI Director Comey does recommend criminal charges, he will put DOJ and the White House in a very tight box. First, as a seasoned prosecutor, he will present only strong, winnable cases. Second, he won’t present one or two charges. He will present evidence of dozens and dozens of felonies. AG Lynch and her career attorneys won’t be able to say, “On the whole, there’s just not enough here to convict.” They will have to say that over and over, on each charge. Indictment on even a few felonies is a torpedo beneath the waterline for Clinton. Third, it is clear that CIA and FBI investigators already fear an administration whitewash and have leaked damaging information to the press.

If insiders think the administration is engaged in a full-fledged cover-up, they will resign, led by Comey. They won’t go quietly. They will spill the beans. And two hours later, it won’t smell good.
Knowing that, Lynch and her political bosses, Barack Obama and his closest adviser, Valerie Jarrett, will have to decide which is worse, indicting their party’s presumptive nominee or risking their own Watergate?

Whichever they choose, the White House will not want its fingerprints on the decision. They will want White House spokesman Josh Ernest to say, with a straight face, “This decision was made entirely by respected, career professionals at the Department of Justice.”

If the FBI recommends felony charges, as is likely, the DOJ’s choices are damned-if-you-do, damned-if-you-don’t. For Loretta Lynch, it will make for a painful final year. For her party, the stakes are the presidency. For her country, they are the impartial rule of law.

RCP contributor Charles Lipson is the Peter B. Ritzma Professor of Political Science and the founder and director of the Program on International Politics, Economics and Security at the University of Chicago.

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My point all along has been that if they weren't classified when she received them, they should have been.  They all knew that.  

Pick one, or the other...

~~~~~~~

Silly.  Leave it on one or the other year round.

It was a planned attack...

Excellent snark from Governor Huckabee...




~~~~~~~

James M. Kemper says:   When you have paid professional protesters that get bussed in, with anti Trump t-shirts screaming the same rhetoric in all different areas outside to people waiting in line. Now that's spontaneous.

Pat Monahan says:  typical liberal b.s. 

Greg Gaertner responds:   Oh, really? So you are either blind to the right wing doing exactly this very thing but not able to tolerate it when the tables are turned. Typical right wing bs.

Fb link here, if you are so inclined.
~~~~~~~

I can't remember anyone from the "right wing" shutting down a politician like the Left is doing to Trump.  They are incredibly rude.  They appear to be well organized and well funded.  Maybe the Right has done it before?  I just don't recall it happening.   

We have become a society without much class.  We can't stand to hear what the other side says so we now believe it is OK to shut them down completely.  The Left has proven time and again that we can't have an adult conversation with them.  There will be no compromise with them.  There will be no government as it was designed to operate, dependent upon mature thoughtful adults for success.

Starting to smell the fear.   The fear caused by the incredible success of someone who isn't an "establishment" politician.  Someone who has the potential to turn the whole country, hell, the whole world as we know it, upside down ;)  Hell, he isn't even a politician, in the generally accepted sense of the word.  And he is "winning".

I have to admit that I am loving this, watching the fear. 

If Trump becomes President...

~~~~~~~

Buh bye...  ;)

Looking for free stuff...

~~~~~~~

They are just looking for a place to stay until the hostilities in their homelands cease.  When folks are done fighting, they will all go back home.  Or something.

Comparing the great Democratic Socialists...

~~~~~~~~

They are making that comparison now?

Apparently Democratic Socialism, like Liberalism, is a mental disorder...

Lets play Bernopoly...

~~~~~~~

A couple of comments from Fb supporting Bernie the Sandman and his push for "Democratic Socialism"...

"Everyone do know Bernie is not advocating for total socialism right? He never once said that. Social democracy is nothing more than a mix of capitalism and socialism, which is a system we already live in, and have been for more than 100 years ."

Total Socialism? He says it like its a bad thing.  LOL.  ;)  Sandman is going to protect us from Total Socialism with his version of Democratic Socialism.  Or Something.

"So many people don't understand the difference between communism and Democratic Socialism. It is not detrimental to free enterprise. Democratic socialism is a safeguard against complete fascist control of government. Fascists are against anything that helps the people like unions, overtime, vacations, minimum wage, social security. Capitalism is only motivated by profits. They will pay their employees as little as they can get away with. The only thing standing between them crapping all over us is government. So when we finally get a candidate like Bernie who wants to thwart the fascist takeover, you might want to take a closer look at who is really drinking the kool aid."

Fascists are against anything that helps the people...   Bernie is going to protect us from Fascists.  And from ourselves.  I think.

Socialism Kills...

Democratic socialism may seem like the cool new thing on the street, but as Matt Kibbe explains, it comes with a cost: millions of lives.
Posted by Conservative Review on Wednesday, March 9, 2016

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Food for thought.

Nobody who works 40 hours a week should live in poverty...

~~~~~~~

Yeah, I know...  It's not that simple.  Or is it?

White Rose...

White Rose: The German Anti-Nazi Activists Beheaded in 1943

Across Germany and especially in Munich, the city where they were most active, people remember and honor, by  naming streets, monuments, even a top literary prize after the Scholl siblings and their bold protest group White Rose. To many Germans and to many other people around the world now, they are a symbol of bravery and moral conviction in the face of  immensely powerful oppressors like the Nazi government of Germany.

They wouldn’t be complicit, they couldn’t be silent. They called out evil, brutality, and the blind, deluded fascism of the Third Reich right up until the moment the guillotine finally ended their cries for reason, peace, and freedom.

Secretly, a handful of students and one professor from the Ludwig Maximilian University of Munich and a few other supporters wrote seven leaflets (five distributed by the group, one after their capture, and one unpublished) stating the horrors of the Nazi Government and demanding that the German people recognize and to stop the Nazi terror. The group used bold language to denounce the government as seen below, “For through his apathetic behaviour he gives these evil men the opportunity to act as they do…. he himself is to blame for the fact that it came about at all! Each man wants to be exonerated ….But he cannot be exonerated; he is guilty, guilty, guilty!… now that we have recognized [the Nazis] for what they are, it must be the sole and first duty, the holiest duty of every German to destroy these beasts” (Source: wikipedia.org).

This is a quote from the second leaflet written, printed, and distributed by the White Rose. It shows the intensity with which they opposed the Nazi regime and their demand that Germans see beyond the  propaganda and see the truth.

An East German stamp from 1961 honoring Hans and Sophie Scholl

The members of this group were Hans and Sophie Scholl, and Christoph Probst (the first members to be put on trial and executed), Kurt Huber, Hans Conrad Leipelt and Alex Schmorell, (who were also executed), Rudi Alt, Helmut Bauer, Lieselotte Berndl, Heinrich Bollinger, Harald Dohrn, Manfred Eickemeyer, Hubert Furtwängler, Wilhelm Geyer, Willi Graf, Heinrich Guter, Falk Harnack, Marie-Luise Jahn, Wolfgang Jaeger, Traute Lafrenz, Gisela Schertling, Katharina Schüddekopf, Josef Söhngen, and Jürgen Wittenstein.

They were Catholic, Orthodox, Lutheran, Buddhist, some inspired by anthroposophy, Eastern philosophies or by the terror of time spent fighting at Stalingrad. Alexander Schmorell, who wrote much of the group’s material, was even canonized as a New Martyr by the Orthodox Church, his holy image depicting a cross and a white rose in his hand.

Alexander Schmorell depicted as a Martyr

The first leaflet the group published was the text of a sermon by the Bishop August von Galen which Hans Scholl had read in 1941 and which Sophie Scholl had acquired permission to use. The Bishop wrote scathingly of the Nazis, especially for their practices of euthanasia for the sake of eugenics and the belief that they were improving the German race. White Rose published their first piece in the summer of 1942. Over the next year, they published four more leaflets, leaving them in public phone booths, mailing them to academic colleagues and sending them to other universities across the country.

Several group members served on the Eastern front. Graf had seen the Jewish Ghettos set up by the Nazis in Poland. Schmorell, who spoke fluent Russian, was able to hear stories from Russians and other Slavs of war crimes and the inhumane violence of the German Army and Waffen SS. All these experiences added to the moral conviction of the Group and explains the fiery rhetoric of their leaflets.



In January 1943, White Rose printed between 6,000 and 9,000 copies of their fifth leaflet. On February 18^th of that year, Hans and Sophie placed stacks of this literature around their university just before classes  ended. As Sophie pushed a stack off of a top banister into the open Atrium below, she was spotted by a janitor. She and Hans were reported and arrested by the Gestapo. A quick investigation into items on their person and in their home lead to the arrests of most of the other members.

In a time in Germany where free speech was not a right, when dissent was forbidden, when Total War was the only acceptable mindset, these young students and activists knew what they faced.
On February 22^nd, 1943, the Scholls and Probst stood trial in the Volksgericht, in a “people’s court” for political offenses. It was a show trial to make an example of them.
They were quickly found guilty and, the very same day, all three were beheaded by guillotine. They were committed idealists and true believers until their last.

As the blade dropped, Hans shouted, “let freedom live!”

How can we expect righteousness to prevail when there is hardly anyone willing to give himself up individually to a righteous cause. Such a fine, sunny day, and I have to go, but what does my death matter, if through us, thousands of people are awakened and stirred to action?

-Sophie Scholl’s last words (source: wikipedia.org)

Schmorell and Professor Huber were beheaded on July 13^th, 1943. Leipelt suffered the same fate on January 29^th, 1945 after being caught distributing the group’s sixth leaflet in Hamburg. Huber’s wife was sent a bill for 600 marks. The charge was for “wear of the guillotine.”

Professor Kurt Huber

The sixth leaflet Leipelt had been distributing had been smuggled out of Germany after the trials and into the hands of the Allied forces. They proceeded to airdrop millions of copies over Germany as an anti-Nazi propaganda campaign preceding their invasion. The Group recognized the  inevitability of a German defeat who saw the increasing power of the Soviet Union, Britain and America and the limits of Germany’s war machine.

Through plays, operas, books, films, and the hearts and minds of the German people, the legacy of White Rose lives on as a great inspiration. For example, Hans and Sophie Scholl were voted some of the greatest Germans to have ever lived.

The 2005 film Sophie School: Die Letzten Tage(the final days), based on witness interviews and official transcripts, is a compelling  look at the investigation and trials. It is currently on Youtube.

By Colin Fraser for War History Online
All photos sourced from wikipedia.org

 
Source. 

~~~~~~~