The sovereign citizen movement IS very dangerous because (sadly) younger, less educated folks can fall for it in the hopes of something better.

Killing police officers is certainly the most heinous, but it isn’t the only kind of criminal activity the sovereigns engage in. The SPLC has reported on numerous instances of plain old-fashioned scams and frauds these yoyos have perpetrated. Economic sabotage can be just as destructive as the kind that involves TNT.

As for the appeal to statistics, if someone shoots at you 100 times and only hits you once, are you going to say, “Well, but they missed me 99 percent of the time”?

Should we have brushed off AL Qaeda as “not that big a problem” because prior to 9/11 there was very little statistical history that made them a threat “when put into proportion” with other acts of violence against American citizens?

Did you read the FBI report? It’s the job of the FBI to alert other law enforcement agencies of rising movements and potential problems that may develop out of the ideological teachings, recruitment, and actions of such groups. And it is the job of the president, as Commander in Chief (like any other member of the U.S. Armed Forces) “to support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic;”.

If you (or Beck) are defending these people, you are condoning anti-American activity and should rightfully be considered enemies of the state – regardless how “right” you think your radical views or “beliefs” might be.

Beck and other conservatives tend to defend these people because they are white, middle class types. It’s just like the way conservative radio hosts defended Randy Weaver back in the 90’s. None of them were going to come out in support of his beliefs of course, but by portraying him as a victim it was a dog whistle to all white people who secretly harbor racial attitudes. In fact Randy Weaver was damned lucky the FBI exercised as much restraint as they did. Had that house been full of Islamic fundamentalists or otherwise non-white criminals, they most likely would have opened fire in a manner similar to the SLA shootout.

Let’s assume – and this is a pretty darn big leap, I confess – that Beck is telling the truth here. Imagine for a moment if a liberal or centrist journalist (a real journalist) said s/he didn’t know who the New Black Panther Party or some other extremist group on the left was. Now, imagine the right-wing freak out that would ensue.

Jointly, each of us holds 1/310 millionth of the sovereignty, and elect governments to make laws and exercise them on our behalf. Every “sovereign” who decides he is a law unto himself is usurping the sovereignty of the rest of us. That is not only arrogance, but potentially murderous arrogance. The polity has a right to defend itself from it, and to have its executors instructed in how to do so. That is all.