Okay, in Parts 1, and 2, and 3 of this series, I painted a pretty dark picture. There’s no point in pulling punches. But the last thing we need in desperate times is to succumb to “learned helplessness,” like those beagles Anthony Fauci tortured until they just lay limp in their metal cages.

We must be ready to fight on an intellectual, spiritual, and purely practical level. Obviously, the subject of how to resist an antifragile, global, elite conspiracy against freedom deserves an entire book. Let me offer you here, distilled, the action points with which such a book would conclude.

Free Your Mind

First, you must avoid falling for the various disinformation campaigns, psy-ops, and moral panics our cynical, self-chosen masters are deploying to control us. That means being suspicious, if not exactly paranoid, about whatever story the Mainstream Media are shoving into our heads at a given moment. I need not tell you not to entirely believe what you encounter on Yahoo News, CNN, or your local newspaper (which is probably owned and operated from New York by the New York Times). In fact, it usually is safe to suspect the opposite of whatever they’re reporting.

Fox News isn’t just part of the Mainstream Media; it is the leverage point our enemies use to deliver whatever soothing, confusing, or outright misleading message they want to send to the Deplorables they fear so much. Remember that Fox was first to call the corrupt Arizona 2020 presidential vote for Joe Biden. That wasn’t an accident or a one-off. It was a glitch in the Matrix, a “tell” on the part of a company that had Paul Ryan on its board. There were good people at Fox in 2020; most of them now are gone. They didn’t fit in, wouldn’t play the part of controlled opposition. I’d honestly trust MSNBC a little more than Fox at this point, since it’s not the sharp end of the Deep State’s wedge. It sometimes tells the truth, if only out of incompetence.

Instead of the chewed-up agitprop that Fox spits into our mouths, take nourishment from the dissidents the Deep State keeps trying to imprison, censor, and silence: Real America’s Voice, especially Steve Bannon’s War Room; FrankSpeech, run by Mike Lindell; commentators such as David Clements, Emerald Robinson, Naomi Wolf, Eric Metaxas, Alex Jones (yes, him!) and Tucker Carlson. Websites such as Citizen Free Press, Revolver News, Gateway Pundit, and Conservative Tree House, and magazines such as Chronicles. While you may not agree with every point this pundits and publications make, you can believe that they are making a good-faith effort to tell the truth through the lens of reality.

Trust No One in Power

The same organizations and institutions that lied us into the Iraq War, the COVID lockdown, the George Floyd riots, the election fraud, and the persecution of the January 6 protestors don’t deserve to be trusted now. If they tell you, “The sky is blue,” you should go outside and check for yourself.

Remember that none of the institutions you grew up trusting can be wholly relied upon now. Not the Vatican, Christianity Today, or the organs of the Southern Baptist Convention. Probably not the sermons you hear on Sundays some of the time, either.

If you grew up thinking of the CIA and FBI as institutions that protect us, think again. After the passage of the Patriot Act, those agencies morphed during the Obama years into political secret police of the kind that once controlled Eastern Europe. If (God forbid) you ever have to deal with an agent from the FBI or any other law enforcement agency (including your local police), there is only one word you should say to them: “Lawyer.” Say it over and over again, and in fact I suggest you sing it, to the tune of Beethoven’s “Ode to Joy” from his 9^th Symphony:

Lawyer-lawyer, lawyer-lawyer

Lawyer-lawyer, lawyer-lawyer, lawyer law

Lawyer-lawyer, lawyer-lawyer

Lawyer-lawyer, lawyer-lawyer, lawyer law!

Pray and Fast, Fast and Pray

I’m no expert on this, but The Stream has found people who are and currently is presenting a whole series on how to pray and fast for the protection of our country. Our first installment ran a few days ago. Whether your fast means bread and water, giving up meat, or maybe even “less bourbon, OK?” (each of us knows his own limits), remember: It wasn’t just George Washington and Abraham Lincoln who advised prayer and fasting. Jesus Himself did it in the desert, as part of His battle against the demons who came to tempt Him.

And if you recall, He won.

I’m not one to oversell the benefits of suffering. I wrote a whole column here on all the profound spiritual dangers that would face us, in addition to the material misery we will endure if the Deep State somehow clings to power after November. But in order to prepare ourselves for the very real possibility of living under a government that openly plans to persecute us, it does help to remember that the Church was born under a hostile dictatorship. It spread under those conditions, and finally triumphed. It endures today in Communist China, jihad-afflicted Africa, and even in tiny corners of lavender Catholic seminaries.

The regime we face right here in America today is driven by spirits as wicked as those that drove the Mongols to conquer Eurasia, the French Revolutionaries to slaughter clergy and declare war on Europe, the Soviets to orchestrate the Ukrainian famine, and the Nazis to hunt the Jews. Enormous suffering happens and God allows it; He even uses it sanctify us. But all those evil regimes have one thing in common: They passed, they’re distant nightmares, and the Church outlasted them all. We have almighty God and the Natural Law He wrote in our hearts on our side, which will weather every storm. And we have a mighty Father who will welcome us if we serve Him.

Protect Your Vote and Preserve Your Family

No matter what the functionaries at the RINO-dominated Republican National Committee are telling you, do not vote early. It just tells Dominion, other evil companies, and corrupt election officials how many Republican votes they need to cancel out with fake votes. I trust David Clements, who wrecked his career and turned his life upside-down fighting election fraud, on this one. Here’s his sober advice:

Vote on Election Day, in person, no matter how long you must stand in line. Early voting just tells the fraudsters how many Republican votes they need to cancel out with fake ones.

Bring your own blue ballpoint pen, and use it instead of whatever marker they hand you. That makes your vote harder for computer printers to change.

Here’s a snippet from Clements’s amazing film Let My People Go, where he explains why these steps are necessary:

Praise the Lord, and Hoard that Ammunition

This is a genuinely perilous time for our country, perhaps the worst since 1983 — when the Soviet Union mistook NATO exercises in Europe for a full-on invasion plan and came within minutes of obliterating us all with a massive nuclear first strike. If it does look like Donald Trump will win so overwhelmingly that no election fraud can be plausible, that might be the most dangerous situation of all. Thousands of powerful people in our defense and intelligence establishment know they really belong in prison; they fear that Trump might put them there, that this time in office he can’t be paralyzed, back-stabbed, or fooled.

These people have no consciences, no patriotism, no love for their fellow citizens. They’re capable of anything. Of manufacturing a full-on war with Russia. Or fake terrorist attacks from Iran. Or other horrors that my imagination can’t furnish.

Remember what our rulers did to us in 2020. Remember that Democrat governors dumped COVID patients in nursing homes, killing thousands, then used those needless deaths to rationalize their useless lockdown and corrupt mail-in balloting so they could steal the election. They thought it was worth it. And most Republicans thought it wasn’t worth the risk of fighting them. Think of Mike Pence, Bill Barr, and Georgia Governor Brian Kemp. There’s no cavalry to save you, but at least we still have Calvary.

So I’d say to stockpile food (including pet food!), potable water, and ammo. These are things you will need, as shortages of all kinds are likely in the weeks ahead (or perhaps even sooner, if the longshoremen who help bring goods from overseas into our ports go on strike today). But more importantly than that: Tighten your connections in the faith community — both to the Father and to His other children. In times like these, you have to know who your people are; lean on them and let them lean on you.

A strong Body of Christ that can go from defense to offense is our only hope of defeating the darkness, and the shelter underneath His wings is the only truly safe place to be found.

John Zmirak is a senior editor at The Stream and author or coauthor of 10 books, including The Politically Incorrect Guide to Immigration and The Politically Incorrect Guide to Catholicism. His newest book is No Second Amendment, No First.