Posted on 03/23/2010 4:56:20 AM PDT by Kaslin
A terrible thing happened to America on Sunday, March 21, 2010.
The country took its biggest step ever down a road diametrically opposed to its original intent of keeping the state small so that the individual can be free and great.
Therefore, in this unprecedented crisis of values, this is what needs to be done:
1. Know and teach America's core values.
We got to this point solely because over the past few generations, Americans have forgotten the values that have made America distinctive and great. Even the "Greatest Generation" failed to communicate them.
In a nutshell, they are what I call the American Trinity: "In God we trust," "Liberty" and "E Pluribus Unum." The left has successfully made war on all three -- substituting secularism for God and religion in as much of American life as possible; substituting equality (of result) for liberty; and multiculturalism is the opposite of "E Pluribus Unum."
People who do not understand American ideals -- especially small government -- now dominate our schools, our entertainment media and our news media.
(My own contribution here is a video titled, "The American Trinity" at prageru.com. Please view it and forward it.)
2. Recognize that we are fighting the left, not liberals.
Conservatives and centrists are no longer fighting liberals. We are fighting the left.
Liberalism believed in American exceptionalism; the left not only does not believe in it, the left opposes it. President Obama, when asked if he believes in American exceptionalism, replied, "I believe in American exceptionalism, just as I suspect that the Brits believe in British exceptionalism, and the Greeks believe in Greek exceptionalism."
Liberalism believed in creating wealth; the left is interested in redistributing it.
Liberalism believed in a strong defense. The left believes in cutting defense and a strong United Nations.
3. Democrats should be referred to as Social Democrats. This is not meant to be cute, let alone as a slur. But calling Democrats Social Democrats is an effective way of reminding Americans that there is no longer any difference between what is now known as the Democratic Party and the Social Democratic parties of Europe. When the Democratic Party returns to its roots as a liberal, not a left-wing, party, we will happily resume calling the party by its original name. However, since no Democrat can cite a significant difference between the Democratic Party and the SD parties, there is no good reason not to use the more accurate nomenclature.
4. Work tirelessly to repeal the bill.
We must single-mindedly work to repeal the government health plan. We all know that it is difficult to repeal entitlements because they are like drugs and it is very difficult to wean people off drugs. But it is not impossible. We need to warn our fellow Americans that entitlements will do to America what drugs eventually do to addicts.
All Republicans must run for office on the "repeal" issue. Even when they lose, the difference between right and left, between Republicans and Social Democrats will have been made clear; and clarity is our best friend.
5. Our motto: "The bigger the government, the smaller the citizen."
I used this phrase in addressing the Republican members of Congress. It has become widely used, including by Rep. David Dreier, R-Calif., on the House floor during the Congressional debate on Sunday. It encapsulates this epic battle of American values versus leftist values. Every movement needs a motto. I nominate this.
6. Do not let other matters distract.
Neither Republicans nor conservatives are united on every issue facing America. Immigration is one example. But we are united on the big government vs. free individual issue, which, more than anything else, has defined America. If we allow any other domestic issue to divide us, we will lose.
And here's why: If Americans forget what America stands for, it won't help us if there is not one illegal immigrant here. And if we do remember what it means to be American, we can handle anything.
7. Acknowledge that we are in a non-violent civil war.
I write the words "civil war" with an ache in my heart. But we are in one.
Thank God this civil war is non-violent. But the fact is that the left and the rest of the country share almost no values. The American value system and the leftist value system are irreconcilable. If the left wins, America's values lose. If American values prevail, the left loses.
After Sunday's vote, for the first time in American history, one could no longer confidently believe that the American system will prevail. And if we don't fight for it, we don't deserve it.
WoW! A 12 year sleeper ZOT.
This unconstitutional piece of garbage is bringing them out of the woodwork!
Wow! Awesome!
Wonderful, but do you believe in our liberal courts, including SCOTUS that is at the whims of Judge Kennedy? I don't. Moreover, this is due process in a country of laws, shredded by progressives many times over.
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Indeed. Too bad we don't have a SCOTUS like the one that slammed FDR's New Deal overreach in 1935 (only to be partially "undone" a few years later).
Schechter Poultry Corp. v. United States argued 2–3 May 1935, decided 27 May 1935 by vote of 9 to 0.
Speaking to aides of Roosevelt, Justice Louis Brandeis remarked that, “This is the end of this business of centralization, and I want you to go back and tell the president that we're not going to let this government centralize everything.
The reason things are the way they are now is because:
1) too many ignorant people voted in 2008, and
2) too many good voters chose to be ideological purists and refused to vote for a candidate whom they didn’t like, but who was worlds better than the Marxist whom they allowed to win.
And the left wants it to stay that way.... for now at least.
No, but it is still one of our options.
Were we directed from Washington when to sow and when to reap, we should soon want bread." --Thomas Jefferson: Autobiography, 1821. ME 1:122
What country can preserve its liberties if its rulers are not warned from time to time that their people preserve the spirit of resistance? Let them take arms. The remedy is to set them right as to facts, pardon and pacify them."
--Thomas Jefferson to William Stephens Smith, 1787. ME 6:373, Papers 12:356
"The spirit of resistance to government is so valuable on certain occasions, that I wish it to be always kept alive. It will often be exercised when wrong, but better so than not to be exercised at all. I like a little rebellion now and then. It is like a storm in the atmosphere." --Thomas Jefferson to Abigail Adams, 1787.
"I hold it that a little rebellion, now and then, is a good thing, and as necessary in the political world as storms are in the physical. Unsuccessful rebellions, indeed, generally establish the encroachments on the rights of the people, which have produced them. An observation of this truth should render honest republican governors so mild in their punishment of rebellions, as not to discourage them too much. It is medicine necessary for the sound health of government." --Thomas Jefferson to James Madison, 1787. ME 6:65
"What signify a few lives lost in a century or two? The tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time with the blood of patriots and tyrants. It is its natural manure." --Thomas Jefferson to William Stephens Smith, 1787. ME 6:373, Papers 12:356
And finally
"Prudence, indeed, will dictate that governments long established, should not be changed for light and transient causes; and, accordingly, all experience [has] shown that mankind are more disposed to suffer while evils are sufferable than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But, when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same object, evinces a design to reduce [the people] under absolute despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such government, and to provide new guards for their future security." --Thomas Jefferson: Declaration of Independence, 1776. ME 1:29, Papers 1:429
So they think. This says otherwise:
A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed.
And in the last 18 months or so, we have been exercising at least the "keep" part of that to the hilt. To the point where waits for ammunition are measured in months, and the orders measured in the several hundreds to a few thousands of rounds. We've bought enough guns to equip every memember of the Chinese and Indian armies, the two largest in the world, with a brand new firearm. Plus many were already quite well armed before that.
The whole compact of government is that by ceding the monopoly on the use of force to a government, it is supposed to use that force to protect us.
Americans, save a few deep red states, have never ceded a monopoly on the use of force to the government. It's just that in the past that private force has been used against other private individuals, such as thieves, rapists and (would be) murderers.
Age means nothing. Some of the oldest trolls are the best trolls. Don’t look at the sign up date, look at the past posts here on FR. They always give themselves away. They may fly under the radar and be subtle, but they still give themselves away if you dig deep enough into their past postings.
Also, keep in mind, 12 years is a long time. Things change. People may get a divorce, marry a liberal. Maybe they changed jobs, moved, became pals with libs and changed their views. Age means nothing. NOTHING unless they are known to other FReepers or the owners of this site.
Not if they see our society falling apart and a chance to remake it in their own image.
Yes, but what works against the British (India) does not work against the Soviets or the Nazis.
Last count I heard, 14 states' Attorneys General have filed suit to stop this madness. If they are unsuccessfull...
If one person does that, you're right. If a half million, or even 50,000 do it, well that's a bit different.
But the left only does if they don't have to fight it. If the "enemy" hates America then they hate war, even if they don't have to fight it themselves.
I hope the hell not. But I fear he is. Details aside of course. I don't think the New Madrid fault will cut loose anytime soon. But...perhaps... the Ice Age Cometh.
Last count I heard, 14 states' Attorneys General have filed suit to stop this madness. If they are unsuccessfull...
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What would be VERY interesting, is if the various legal challenges to Barrycare fail...and those states file either a lawsuit with SCOTUS as having original jurisdiction and/or a QW suit in the DC district court challenging Barry's authority to sign the "legislation" into law, claiming that someone born the subject to the crown of her majesty the Queen of England could not be a NBC of the United States and therefore not eligible to be POTUS.
Some day, soon hopefully, those in a position of power will actually grow a pair and start asking/investigating those questions. The honeymoon is loooooong over (not that there ever was one for many of us).
I know men who still won't talk about all that bloodless fun they had in Vietnam, although one finally did, at least to me. As did my Uncle, who did his thing in WW-II, and a former co-worker who "worked" Ted Williams as they jointly rained hell on the ChiComs in Korea, which haunted him until the Alzheimer's got him. (Never thought of that aspect of the disease, at least he can't remember all that any more). But in each case, other friends and relatives were amazed, but "He never would talk about that". I don't know why they felt they could talk to me about it. My uncle had 3 sons, the Korean War Marine had about that many too, although only one that he had regular contact with from his second marriage. The Vietnam corpsman was from my home state, but I'm pretty sure he had sons and brothers to talk to.
They can do the former, not out of a right, but out of power which they grabbed for themselves.
If the IRS comes for you with guns pointed, give them your guns, bullets first.
"And how we burned in the camps later, thinking: What would things have been like if every Security operative, when he went out at night to make an arrest, had been uncertain whether he would return alive and had to say goodbye to his family? Or if, during periods of mass arrests, as for example in Leningrad, when they arrested a quarter of the entire city, people had not simply sat there in their lairs, paling in terror at every bang of the downstairs door and at every step on the staircase, but had understood they had nothing left to lose and had boldly set up in the downstairs hall an ambush of half a dozen people with axes, hammers, pokers, or whatever else was at hand. The Organs would very quickly have suffered a shortage of officers and transport and, notwithstanding all of Stalin's thirst; the cursed machine would have ground to a halt!"
- Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn, The Gulag Archipelago
We have a lot more than "axes, hammers and pokers".
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