Greetings, brother.

I don't use the term brother in a religious sense either. We are brothers because we are in the same fight and for the same reasons. Your testimony above reveals quite a journey on your part. Congratulations for making it as far as you have. As you already know, there is no end. We just keep evolving.

I wrote down some notes while reading through your post. If you don't mind, I will address them:

You mentioned the US Constitution. I'm more of a fan of the Virginia Declaration of Rights. It was written well before the US Constitution. For the real meaning behind 2A for example, all one needs to do is point people to Section 13 of the Virginia Declaration of Rights. Sure, it is a document written for a state government, but the meaning behind the declaration is what is important--not the document itself.

Documents can and are changed by majorities of idiots. I do not depend on them to defend my natural liberties and rights. The government we have today mostly ignores our US Constitution anyway, so why even reference it? None of us signed that contract either, right? It is meaningless. I still carry a copy on me though, but it is for reference only. The document has no power. It cannot resist with deadly force as a last resort. Tyrants will always ignore it as they always have with all documents going back to the joke of the Magna Carta.

You mentioned the bible many times as well. I am a deist, and my god is energy. It doesn't take faith to believe in my god. We are all energy and connected because of it. I don't need a Christian or other god to be moral either. It is simply common sense to not harm others or their property and to keep your word. That is what common law is all about, and we don't need a government to enforce it either.

Volunteers from communities would form those courts, and anyone rejecting them would then lose the protection of the same court. Most people are already peaceful and interact voluntarily. The small minority who do not will be killed or outcast. They'll have no protections and would be rejected from civil society as they rightly should be (opposed to today when they are not and left to prey on more people in the future).

I'm a firm believer in the full body of people being the militia. I have Viera's book, but it was too painfully written to finish it. The man does not have a very engaging way of writing unfortunately. Again, all one needs to do is look a the Section 13 of the Virginia Bill of Rights for the original meaning of the militia. It was all of us trained to arms in defense of our loved ones and the communities we live within. By keeping it local too, corruption is made nearly impossible. First responders will gladly give their lives to defend the people too opposed to the current model where police will hide behind fire trucks and "just go home safely at night" while madmen on SSRI drugs shoot and kill our children without resistance.

You've come a very long way. I have too. My main objective in life is to further individual liberty for myself, my children, and for everyone else. I cannot sit idly by and watch this march towards totalitarianism and do nothing. It is my duty to resist. Liberty, to me at least, is worth any cost as well. I will die fighting fascists as my grandfather Lowell Cornelison did, if needed. Before I do though, I'm going to do my part...as he did his I'm sure.

It is a pleasure to meet another friend. I call us Liberty Professionals. You will find many friends here. Relax. Isn't it a good feeling to know you're among so many friends? I know it feels good to me!

Webpages

There are a ton of other webpages to help you with Steemit. Here are some of the best for beginners:

https://steemian.info/signup-faq (This site is by @drakos and has a ton of good information for new users to help them get started.)

https://steemd.com/ (This site is used to keep track of your voting power and other stats. You do not want to run out of voting power, and you only get so much per day. I keep my voting power around 80% for example. Also use it to look at the coding for other people's posts. If you see a formatting trick they use, you'll see the code for that trick within the post details on steemd.)

https://steem.makerwannabe.com/ (This site will tell you who follows you, who unfollows you, and who mutes you. It is great for meeting new people too. I regularly check it to see who has followed me to see if I should follow them back.)

https://steemit.chat/ (This site is the official chat webpage for Steemit. There are Discord channels too, but I usually stick to the official site. Come in to network and meet new friends. You can directly message people there too, so it makes it easier to communicate with your closest friends.)

http://steemtools.com/ (This site is a comprehensive list of valuable tools.)

Bots

There are a lot of bots on Steemit. Some are useful and good, and others are not. If you see a cookie cutter reply, especially to your intro post, it is almost certainly a bot. Check the account's reputation. If it is low, I would recommend just ignoring them. Everything is public on Steemit, so you can go look at an account's comments and replies. Are they all the same? It's a bot.

There's one good bot worth mentioning for new users. It is called GINAbot, and you can use it to keep track of things the makerwannabe site above cannot easily do. For example, GINAbot will tell you when a key phrase is used, when you or someone else is mentioned by account name, or even if someone deletes a comment. The bot is extremely powerful and free. Simply add the following Discord server:

https://discord.gg/x9Empcm

When you connect to it, it will ask you to register and verify your account with a .0001 SBD or STEEM transfer. Then you will get a direct message from the bot with a private link to your configuration page. Go there to setup your options. The entire process takes 5 minutes, and it will be up and running. You can tweak the settings as you go too. I highly recommend people use it for networking purposes.

I have mine set to look for phrases like "residential security" and "private investigator" as two examples. Then I never miss out on content related to those, and it makes going there to engage in those conversations much easier. Without GINAbot, I would never have had the opportunity either! Check it out, and ask if you have any questions.

Sourcing and Adding Photos

Adding photos to your account as a new Steemian may be confusing at first too. The easiest way it to click to "Submit a Story." Once in there, use the built in Steemit tool to upload an image from your computer. Below the posting window, you will see "Insert images by dragging & dropping, pasting from the clipboard, or by selecting them." Click on the blue text. Once the image is uploaded, you can copy and paste the link into your account settings.

Here's a link to a Google Document I made to help with the coding:

https://docs.google.com/document/d/1NlAoGnP8q7ZAxGsEnvza-qotUGkoaae4SwXdubAhi2g/edit?usp=sharing

Graphics, Badges, Signature Blocks, and Banners

There are many skilled and talented graphic artists on Steemit. One of them is a close friend, @grow-pro. He designed my signature gif, badges, divider lines, business cards, and more. You can check out his work further on your own. If you are looking for a graphic artist to help improve your posting images and formatting, he offers low cost services here on Steemit. Look him up!

Account Verification

Verifying your identity is very important because it will get you more support and people will trust you more. The best way to verify is to link back to your Steemit account by using another public social media account.

For example, I share my Steemit posts on my @finnianGC Twitter account. Another way would be to add your Steemit information to your Facebook account. Some people will even post a video of themselves writing out their account information since that cannot be Photoshopped.

The more famous a person is and the more valuable their content is, the more important it is that they verify.

Security

Do not use your owner key to log into Steemit.com to post. Use your private posting key instead. Keep your owner key offline as much as possible, and only use it when you must.

Per the advice given by Arcanage, you should only use your owner key to:

1. Recover your account.
2. Change the other keys.
3. Give a present to your children a few minutes before dying.

There have been some scams in the past. If you click a link to a site that prompts you to log into it, be extra careful. Double and triple check the address to make sure it is really steemit.com. A recent scam was using "lsteemit" as the domain name, and people were entering their owner keys to log into it. That allowed the scammers to take those user's accounts, empty the money from them, and then ruin their reputation by using the newly hacked accounts to further the scam.

If you find or suspect a scam, please report it in the #steemitabuse channel on steemit.chat.

Don't Lose Your Content

Make sure you are copying and pasting your post content often as you write it, and put the data into another document to avoid losing it. I'll copy and paste my content into a Google document as just one example. Some people use Markup editors to do the same.

Definitely keep a backup copy right before you post it too, for some people have come back the next day to see half or the entire post missing even though the day before it displayed correctly. Make sure you copy and backup your long replies as well, for they can vanish immediately after clicking to post them.

Engagement and Authored Posts

In the beginning, unless you purchase some Steem Power, your account will be extremely limited in bandwidth. You can see the bandwidth you have on the steemd.com site. Since you only have limited amounts, it is best to use your bandwidth to engage others instead of authoring long and detailed posts. Once you have more SP in your account and more followers, then I recommend people start authoring more. Never stop engaging other people though through replies. It is the best way to gain followers and build your network with quality people.

Again, welcome! If you have any questions about getting started, look me up on the chat site or reply to this post.