When we speak of the United States we are
usually speaking about individual states united within the group of states.
When we speak about America we are speaking about things that are quite
different. Reagan metaphor was the shining city on the hill. Kenney metaphor
was a candle in the darkness.
When we decide to tell someone what America
is we realize why these two articulate presidents used metaphors. Concocted
with beliefs, human values, hope, dreams, national and individual freedoms,
unspoken promises, social trust, the hand of God. America is ephemeral. Nothing
you can put your finger on and say that's it!
Also, always interpreted by each of us in different ways. Although the
ideals are not tangible they are binding. They have given us strength to
persevere during the nations darkest times. They directed behavior…They give
purpose… They were guides… They were the underpinning of the American culture.
Our political system evolved out of this
culture. Our American culture today is being assaulted. Not by foreign
enemies or Islam terrorist…
"The smallest minority on
earth is the individual. Those who deny individual rights cannot claim to be
defenders of minorities."
Throughout the founding
documents the writers kept coming back over and over to the individual. Protecting his rights to
his property and his rights to speak and to act in ways that were important in
protecting his life and family. Before the ink was dried, every level of
government from town, city, state, federal government had the right to take his
property for unpaid taxes and turn him family out in the street. The position
states take is that the individual owns property nominally and only so long as
they are paid yearly rent...Southern history after the Civil War and the early
part of the last century was, for the most part, a unwritten history of this
abuse.
"The right to life is the
source of all rights -- and the right to property is their only implementation.
Without property rights, no other rights are possible. Since man has to sustain
his life by his own effort, the man who has no right to the product of his
effort has no means to sustain his life. The man who produces while others
dispose of his product, is a slave."
A question that might be asked
is have any of our readers ever been asked by one of their representatives if
it would be OK if they voted this way or that way on anything? Has anyone in
government every asked you how you want them to vote on a bill that raises your
taxes or burdens you with regulations? If the answer is 'no' then how is it
they represent you and your family's interest? The representatives query
doesn't have to be about taxes it could be about anything and everything that
impacts you as an individual. Always, if congress is considering a new bill or
passing a new law it will impact you one way of another and often in unforeseen
ways over time.
"Statism survives by looting; a free
country survives by production."
Jumping back a couple of
hundred years when congress met for only a few months out of the year, these
elected representatives when back home, worked their farms, or ran their businesses.
They interacted with their voters. They knew each other often growing up
together. Today the political class has, at best, only have clues as to who
they represent or what the people who elected them need or want. Worse still
they don't seem to care.
"The hardest thing to
explain is the glaringly evident which everybody had decided not to see."
Maybe we have moved so far from the
original guiding principles of the American experiment we can't get back. The
political class knows that going back reduces their power over the citizens.
The underclass that is supported by government doesn't want to go back for
reasons that are obvious. Also, a huge block of the electorate doesn't know
what the Tea folks are making all this fuss is about.
"The spread of evil is the
symptom of a vacuum. Whenever evil wins, it is only by default: by the moral
failure of those who evade the fact that there can be no compromise on basic
principles."
At its essence, culture is a shared set of
beliefs and common behaviors. Core values are the important element in the
belief set. In combination, these communal values, beliefs and behavior form a
unique organizational identity or ethos that guides how the people within a
society perceive one another, which in turn guides behavior and
decision-making….
The division within our American society
has never been about who has money or who doesn't have money. Or is this person
better educated than that person. Although there weren't necessarily social
ties between the groups they were attached through the shared values and
beliefs. Values in common such as raising children, working hard, not cheating,
lying, stealing, and certainly not killing one another.
A common culture.
In an interview on the news with the police
chief of New Orleans this morning he was distraught about the extent his
officers were corrupt and the fact that black young people were killing each
other daily. Memphis news each morning is about the killings the night before and
the failure of the school system. After generations of failures Memphis has
finally given up its school charter. Who will now run the education system is
up in the air. This is pretty much the news out of every city of any size in
our country.
"Pity for the guilty is
treason to the innocent."
We see this same culture breakdown in the
majority of our elected officials at every level of government. Three major
cities are in bankrupt court in California. How many more should be or will be?
How many states balance budgets each year by not funding their pension system.
Is this not a sleight of hand Mississippi has indulged in? The American culture
has always been unique. Rooted in beliefs and values of Christian teachings.
Once our historic culture is abandoned there isn't anything left to replace
it - except government.
"Watch
money. Money is the barometer of a society’s virtue. When you see that trading
is done, not by consent, but by compulsion — when you see that in order to
produce, you need to obtain permission from men who produce nothing — when you
see that money is flowing to those who deal, not in goods, but in favors — when
you see that men get richer by graft and by pull than by work, and your laws
don’t protect you against them, but protect them against you — when you see
corruption being rewarded and honesty becoming a self-sacrifice — you may know
that your society is doomed. Money is so noble a medium that it does not
compete with guns and it does not make terms with brutality. It will not permit
a country to survive as half-property, half-loot.".
In a capitalistic economy all
goods and services are denominated in dollars. Dollars are measures of value…
The work we do is measured within the economy in dollar amounts according to
the value of the kind of work we do. The same
measure is applied to a bag of peanuts or a dozen eggs. When and if
government decides that a dozen eggs are four dollars instead of two dollars
the entire system becomes distorted. The value of our work doesn't change but
our demand for more dollars for the same work adds to this distortion.
So, the argument is when
government through even the slightest law or regulation inserts itself into the
economic market a nail is driven into the American dream. If one man works and
is rewarded for his labor and another, who is able to work doesn't, and is
rewarded by government then we know all
values within the capitalistic economy become an empty skeleton of our
history for both the worker and the non-worker.
This America is an experiment
in self governing. The whole idea was that if people govern themselves as
citizens then they could have local and national governing bodies that governed
on their behalf. A simple idea… Governing starts and ends with people knowing and
doing what is right in their lives, their families, and communities. If done, then elected representatives would
take this same behavior into the various levels of government and govern with
the same basic principles. Lo-and-behold it once worked…. It worked for a long
time until something began to change. Not all at once but like a slow growing
cancer.
"We can
evade reality, but we cannot evade the consequences of evading reality."
This downward spiral in the
values and beliefs is seen daily with our elected and our citizens. The
restrictions and regulations the government has imposed tries to fills the gap
of created by the lack of responsibility of the citizens. In the process their
actions consolidate their power under the guise of stewardship. All of our always-to-be-reelected good old
boys in congress, going back to 1964, are the fathers of this change. Obama
election is a symptom of this change. His 2008 campaign was a clarion call for
a government directed economy as well as government directed citizens. Without
him this slowly evolving government control over every aspect of American life
may have gone on more or less unnoticed.
"The spread of evil is the
symptom of a vacuum. Whenever evil wins, it is only by default: by the moral
failure of those who evade the fact that there can be no compromise on basic
principles."
Basic principles have been
compromised. There is some percentage of our citizens who are no longer able or
willing to evade reality. Clearly Tea Party citizens are in this group and many
more not quite sure of what they need to do.
All of the quotes in italics
are from the mid fifties by Ayn Rand. So she along with others were able to see
the early stages of the changes in America and shouted out warnings.
96 days, 0 hours, 34 minutes
till the polls open in November. We are now below the 100 day mark and there
isn't much time but enough for us to make a difference once again.
Cruz in Texas has pulled ahead
and Mandel in Ohio is now within four points and closing on Brown. He needs
money really badly. Brown is seen as a must win for the Dems and their money is
flowing.
Obama is still way ahead of
Romney in likeability and more often than not that is the deciding factor in
how people vote. Romney is ahead in managing the economy which is what you
would think is the most important issue. However, in these times who knows what
voter will do?
The conservative voice was
heard in 2010 in the House but not clearly in the Senate. We need to focus on
the Senate. The senate races are crucial. Even more so should Obama a second
term.
I have great hopes that the
world may become a better, more peaceful, more equitable place in the
twenty-first century. From my own experience, at 16 I lost my freedom, at 24 I
lost my country and for the last more than 50 years have faced all sorts of
problems, but I have never given up hope. We have a Tibetan saying, ‘Nine times
fall down, Nine times pick yourself up.’
Dalai Lama
Before I hit the send key let me encourage
you to click on the link below and see one of new 2010 Congressman Mike Kelly
from Pennsylvania third district giving a speech on the House floor. (If you
know any way we can clone this new congressman please send me a note.)
Ron
No comments:
Post a Comment
Let us know what you think?