Two years ago today Jake Gardner took his own life. He’d been hounded to suicide by politicized, false charges of murder, for defending himself and his aged dad from a George Floyd rioter. The Stream is re-posting John Zmirak’s tribute to Gardner.

Apart from the one-of-a-kind national treasure Ann Coulter — so sane and courageous a patriot that she got banned by the diapered surrender monkeys at National Review a full 20 years ago — I’m one of the only people still writing about Jake Gardner. In fact, the thought of him haunts me. I think that God put him on my heart. Several times a week I remember that decorated US combat veteran and small business owner who was goaded to despair and suicide by Black Lives Marxists, LLC., and his own corrupted government.

Then I break down crying, as if we’d in fact been friends.

We All Know Jake Gardners, if We’re Lucky

And in a way, we have. I’ve met Jake Gardners all throughout my life. Our country used to be full of them. Those weary-looking Greeks — refugees from a dictatorship — who ran all-night diners in Astoria, Queens, where I grew up, and bought nice two-family houses whose front yards they kept immaculate. Then on Greek Easter they’d dress up and march through the streets carrying lilies and candles and icons to their churches. They were Jake Gardners, too.

The sweet old Jewish couple whose cousins had all been murdered in “the Old Country,” who ran the tiny Weber’s Department Store under the El train, and sold us the uniforms for our Catholic school. They kept a keen eye for shoplifters but were always kind to us kids. A Jake and a Jackie Gardner, absolutely. Or as they might have put it, they were “mensches.”  

The black and Korean and Latino business owners whose windows were smashed and property looted by mobs of welfare idlers and common street thugs, led by affluent white Marxists slumming in somebody else’s neighborhoods, ruining other people’s lives: Each of those storeowners was a Jake Gardner too, in his or her way. I pray they’ve managed to piece back their livelihoods, and that the resentful layabouts who robbed them, unpunished, rot in prison for the next crimes they commit.  

Frank Capra Heroes

A Jake Gardner is an American who busts his own chops, plays by the rules, keeps his word, breaks up fights, treats people fairly, fears God, distrusts the government, doesn’t envy his neighbors and stands up for his rights, but doesn’t pick on the weak. He’s not the sullen government worker who watches the clock and maxes out his sick days. He’s the teacher who stays late to tutor troubled students. Or the weary mom who volunteers 20 hours a week at the crisis pregnancy center, helping illegal immigrants or teenage moms to keep their babies instead of killing them. She’s a Jake Gardner, too.

We can’t make a Jake Gardner movie since Jimmy Stewart isn’t here to play him. Or better yet, Gary Cooper. The greatest political movie ever made was Meet John Doe, a Frank Capra epic where Cooper played “John Doe,” a pure-hearted Everyman whose life was broken by his circumstances. But he never lost his decency or sold his soul. In fact, when a wicked demagogue who hated our free America tried to use John Doe as a mouthpiece, Doe sacrificed all had to stop him. And he ended up on the roof of City Hall on Christmas Eve, deciding whether to jump.

Picking Off the Watchmen on the Wall

The Jake Gardners are what keeps any decent country running. So if you want to wreck the place and squat in the rubble, they are the people you need to target. To cow, intimidate, break, and batter into learned helplessness. So the next time a mob oozes down the street they won’t try to help their neighbors, as Kyle Rittenhouse did. They won’t even try to protect their own elderly dads, as Jake Gardner did. They’ll let felons hopped up on drugs loot their businesses right in front of them. As Jake Gardner wouldn’t, which is why our home-grown Bolsheviks knew that he must be destroyed. As a lesson to the others. The first rule of Kristallnacht is that victims don’t get to fight back on Kristallnacht. (That’s why you must disarm them first, as the Nazis disarmed their foes.)

The founder of modern Marxism, Nikolai Lenin, had a word for the Jake Gardners of Russia. He called them “kulaks,” and hated them to the point of genocide. Here’s what he wrote in a famous telegram of August 11, 1918 (but he might as well have been writing in August 2020):

Comrades! The uprising by the five kulak volosts [regions] must be mercilessly suppressed. The interest of the entire revolution demands this, for we are now facing everywhere the “final decisive battle” with the kulaks. We need to set an example.

1. You need to hang (hang without fail, so that the people see) no fewer than 100 of the notorious kulaks: the rich and the bloodsuckers.
2. Publish their names.
3. Take all their grain from them.
4. Appoint the hostages in accordance with yesterday’s telegram.

This needs to be done in such a way that the people for hundreds of versts around will see, tremble, know and shout. They are throttling, and they will throttle the bloodsucking kulaks.

Telegraph us concerning receipt and implementation.

Yours, Lenin.

P.S. Find tougher people.

That’s all you need to know about Marxism, right there — including its blackface version, Critical Race Theory.

A Million Kyle Rittenhouses Could Save the Country

If a million Jake Gardners or Kyle Rittenhouses had stepped forth in 2020, the riots that made Kamala Harris and Al Sharpton and George Soros titter would have stopped, dead in their tracks. Maybe all those judges who were spooked into ignoring the 2020 election fraud would have had a little more courage. We might have an honestly elected government today.

There were no candlelight vigils for Jake. It’s not as if he’d been a felon shot while menacing a cop. No murals depicted him as a Christ figure, no rioters chanted Jake’s name before looting liquor stores. In fact, a Nebraska Democrat state senator went on Twitter to gloat about his death.

The indictment of Jake Gardner would never have happened without the community, the people, who stood up for justice and demanded action from city officials. Jake Gardner is gone, but the white supremacist attitudes that emboldened him are still with us today. https://t.co/IFw5ZXepAz

— Senator Megan Hunt 😷 (@NebraskaMegan) September 21, 2020

She paid no political price for that. Nobody cares about kulaks.

Except us other kulaks, the Jake Gardners of every race. We need to stick together. Because our enemies want us dead. 

Jake Gardner, as His Best Friend Knew Him

I’d like to close not with my words but with Jake’s. Sadly he left no testament behind. But I do have the obituary written for him by his best friend in the world — the man who found his body after our System broke him. (And then, in a brutal irony, gave him a hero’s grave in Arlington National Cemetery, for his combat service abroad.) We reprint it with the author’s permission, but not his name — his mother begged me to keep that private, so that the Bolsheviks don’t target him next.

Make what you will of the specific legal claims this obituary includes. I know on which Side I fight. I’m with the kulaks. I’m with Jake.

Obituary, Jacob “Superman” Gardner, November 14, 1981 – September 20, 2020

On July 8th, 2021 Jacob Gardner was laid to rest with full military honors at Arlington National Cemetery in Arlington, Virginia. About one hundred of his closest family and friends were in attendance. As the Marine rifle team fired their 21-gun salute, and the bugler played “Taps” there was not a dry eye among those 100 friends that had flown in to our nation’s capital to pay their last respects. The US Government and the United States Marine Corps gave him the honor in death, that he deserved in life from the City of Omaha. He now rests eternally among many other heroes of this nation at the hallowed grounds of Arlington. It is a final resting place that cannot be bought, only earned. Those that knew him, will always remember him as a hero.

A Christian Upbringing

On November 14, 1981, Jake Gardner was born in El Paso, Texas. He was bright-eyed, sharp, kind, funny, and inquisitive as a child. They were all aspects of his personality that followed him into adulthood. He attended the Northeast Christian Academy in El Paso from kindergarten to seventh grade. His childhood in Texas was spent shopping with his mother, enjoying her beef brisket and other wonderful dishes, watching movies with his dad, reading comic books with his younger brother, and attending church with his grandmother.

In 1995, the Gardners moved to Omaha, Nebraska. Jake attended Millard North Middle School. According to various sources he may have been partly responsible for a rather infamous cafeteria food fight on his last day of junior high. Jake then attended Millard West High School. He was known as an entertainer even in those years, hosting parties, and greeting those in attendance with a frosty beverage and a smile. After his senior year he spent one summer at home socializing with his high school friends.

Willing to Take a Bullet for His Country

In November 2000 Jake enlisted in the United States Marine Corps Infantry. Years later, while reminiscing on that time in his life he said, “It takes a special type of person who is willing to take a bullet for his country.” When Jake showed up to boot camp he weighed about 140 lbs. As his drill instructors soon found out, most of that weight was heart. While many wise recruits know that keeping a low profile during boot camp is a good policy, that was not the tactic Jake chose to employ. A few weeks before he shipped out to MCRD San Diego Jake had gotten a tattoo. As the platoon stood online shirtless for the first time his drill instructors’ eyes began to bulge out of their heads. His tattoo covered his chest, it was a full-size full color Superman emblem. From that moment on his nickname, “Superman,” was born.

After completing the School of Infantry, and the Light Armored Vehicle crewman course, Jake was sent to 2nd Light Armored Reconnaissance Battalion in Camp Lejeune, North Carolina. He was first assigned to the Weapons Company Mortar Platoon. Then to Bravo Company. March 20, 2003 the ground war in Iraq began. The Marines of 2nd LAR served as the tip of the spear of the RCT 1 invasion force. The unit received the Presidential Unit Citation for completing the longest sequence of coordinated overland attacks in Marine Corps history. While he served bravely in combat, many of his fellow Marines recall the way he used his humor to keep morale high even during the most tense of situations. After four months of continuous combat operations Jake returned to Camp Lejeune. His break from combat was short lived. He deployed as part of a quick reaction force to Haiti in February of 2004. It was in Haiti that Jake earned his second combat action ribbon.

A Man and His Service Dog

Jake Gardner was honorably discharged in November, 2004. He left the Marines with a long list of brothers in arms. Some he kept in contact with until his death, and some had already made the ultimate sacrifice whose memories he cherished until they met at the gates of heaven.

After the Military, Jake enrolled at Metro Community college in Omaha, before moving to Arcata, California to attend Humboldt State University. It was there on the beaches of the redwood coast that Jake found some much needed peace. It was much needed, and well deserved after his experiences overseas. In 2009, he returned back to Omaha with his trusty Czech Shepherd service dog Lebron, named after Jake’s favorite basketball player. Lebron accompanied Jake everywhere, including five NBA final’s games.

An aspiring entrepreneur, he started his first business in 2009. A lawn care business called Amerigreen. In 2010 he started bartending, and in 2011 he opened his first bar, the Hive lounge. Jake didn’t look at bar ownership the same way as many other owners in the industry. Instead of just serving drinks, Jake strove to throw the best party he could every night. The Hive hosted Omaha’s first reggae night, and years later he added salsa dance night as well.

In 2014 he met a woman that became the love of his life. They travelled, laughed, took pictures, watched movies, walked their dogs, and cared dearly for one another until his end and beyond.

Make Every Woman Feel Safe

His business thrived, when asked what the secret to his success was, he responded simply. “Make every woman that walks through the door feel safe, and only play music that people want to dance to.”

When the scourge of the Coronavirus took hold of the country, Jake’s business ground to a halt. On May 30, 2020 he was busy preparing for his business to reopen the following week. Tragically, that night violent rioters committed assaults and property damage in downtown Omaha. Jake’s plan was simple: protect his business from being burned, pull the fire alarm and call the police when the windows were broken. The windows were broken, and Jake called the police and pulled the fire alarm. After the crowd of destructive rioters cleared the street, Jake and his father went out on the sidewalk to survey the damage.

Fighting for His Dad and His Livelihood

Unfortunately the property damage was not enough to appease the violent mob, and many rioters returned to find more targets of opportunity. More windows began to be broken and Jake’s father told the rioters responsible to leave. Then the surveillance video shows his father was violently attacked. Jake did not see the assault on his father, but ran up the street and positioned himself in between the advancing violent mob and his downed father. For over 50 feet Jake walked backwards trying to deescalate the situation.

In the final moments of the altercation Jake was tackled by multiple assailants. With his back on the concrete, as a last resort, he discharged one warning shot in the air with the pistol he was legally allowed to possess in that situation under Nebraska state Law. Jake’s original attackers fled and Jake rolled over on his hands and knees to try to get up. At that moment another assailant jumped on Jake’s back and put him in a rear naked choke. It was a technique designed to try to kill Jake Gardner.

The incident marked the third time that evening that Jake’s current assailant had attacked the business. Jake’s final assailant was a violent career criminal, who had already been convicted of an armed home invasion, and the beating of a pregnant woman, his own child’s mother. The assailant was trying to choke Jake to death. Jake can be heard pleading with his assailant on the video evidence, “Get off me, get off me, please get off me.” To save his own life, Jake Gardner was forced to reach over his shoulder, then shoot and kill his attacker.

Mob Justice Wins

The following day, Omaha DA Don Klein had a press conference where he showed the video exonerating Jake Gardner of any wrong doing, and announced Jake would not be charged. Sadly, after 36 days of protests outside his house the DA caved to the will of the mob, and appointed Fred Franklin as a special prosecutor. Fred Franklin convened a grand jury, then engaged in the falsifying of evidence and other unlawful conduct. Franklin’s motives are undoubtedly nefarious, but according to a US attorney that worked with Franklin one stands out, greed.

By trying a man whom Franklin knew to be innocent, it is speculated that he may have been hoping to be involved in a high-profile case and make money selling a book about it. Jake faced possible terms of 94 years in prison for unjust charges. This for having the courage to defend his own life from a violent multiple felon who was actively trying to choke him to death, all of which was captured on high resolution video. As Jake once remarked, “It’s hard to know what someone looks like when they jump on your back in the middle of the night and try to choke you to death.”

Buried by the Country He’d Served

After the corrupt decision of the grand jury based on falsified evidence was revealed, Jake lost all hope in the legal system and tragically ended his own life on September 20, 2020. Jake Gardner was laid to rest among other heroes of this great nation in Arlington, Virginia, with full military honors.

Those that knew and loved Jake are people that represent different races, cultures, and creeds. All will remember Jake’s smile, his character, his dedication to defend the Constitution, his wit, his intellect, and his willingness to help those in need. He was a man that fought valiantly against terrorism and violent extremism in Iraq, Haiti, and Omaha. He was, truly, a Superman. We pray that he has found eternal peace among the sound of lapping waves on heaven’s beach.

Instead of flowers or donations, the family asks that anyone concerned with having the truth revealed to write Governor Pete Ricketts and request that the grand jury transcripts be unsealed, so that those that falsified evidence and bore false witness against an innocent American hero can be held accountable.

Office of the Governor
PO Box 94848
Lincoln, NE 68509-4848
Office Email: [email protected]

 

John Zmirak is a senior editor at The Stream and author or co-author of ten books, including The Politically Incorrect Guide to Immigration and The Politically Incorrect Guide to Catholicism. He is co-author with Jason Jones of “God, Guns, & the Government.”