“Freedom’s natal day is here. Fire the guns and shout for freedom, See the flag above unfurled! Hail the stars and stripes forever, Dearest flag in all the world.” – Florence A. Jones
“Freedom’s natal day is here. Fire the guns and shout for freedom, See the flag above unfurled! Hail the stars and stripes forever, Dearest flag in all the world.” – Florence A. Jones
A Mrs. Powel of Philadelphia asked Benjamin Franklin, “Well, Doctor, what have we got, a republic or a monarchy?” With no hesitation whatsoever, Franklin responded, “A republic, if you can keep it.”
Good luck with keeping your Republic.
But first, a moment of silence for our Brothers and Sisters stuck in the Slave States
They just need to re-enact the signing and re-adoption of the Declaration of Independence to the heads of their State and set them straight.
240 years old. You don’t look a day over 235. It must be the clean living.
A “republic” is the idiotic idea that people are too evil and stupid to control their own lives and property, but are good and wise enough to choose other people to do it for them.
The declaration of independence actually only declared the independence of those “other people” rulers from the British king, and almost nothing about actual liberty for individual Americans. The “republic” has morphed into the inevitable police state, starting with the corrupt writers of the “constitution” and Gen. Washington’s campaign to collect whiskey tax… etc ad nausea. America has never actually been a free country.
Maybe what you say is true, but I have traveled to at least a dozen other countries and we’ve still got them all beat six ways to Sunday. Have a Happy Independence Day.
I suspect that animals in various zoos would say the same if they were to tour other zoos… And I have traveled plenty. Marine “brat” and a Navy wife… I don’t measure my freedom by the slavery of others.
True freedom means self ownership, self governorship, self control in voluntary association/cooperation with others. There will always be some who choose not to cooperate, and indeed will initiate force. The price of liberty is eternal vigilance, to spot those aggressors and meaningfully defend oneself, one’s family and community from them.
Human nature will see to it that this liberty is never perfect, and I don’t understand why so many people think it is supposed to. Most people do not expect perfection in any organization or endeavor, yet seem glad to excuse the incredibly criminal actions perpetrated on them by their “elected” rulers.
Liberty to live and let live, defending oneself at need, does not require any “rulers,” and most certainly doesn’t require a population of slaves paying tribute to those rulers… in exchange for ever more oppression, theft, murder and degradation.
Individual liberty: Not no “rules,” no RULERS, and no slaves.
Yeah, MamaLiberty, I understand the sentiment.
The government we have is bad, just every other government is worse.
So I can say I am a proud American, and we can do so much better.
Hopefully we will have enough that believe as strongly as those that we honor today that we will also give our lives, our fortunes and our sacred honor to not only keep, but increase what has been so dearly bought.
Thank you Mama Liberty. You took the words right out of my mouth. (Navy brat & former Navy) Don’t Tread On Me.
Eloquently and correctly said.
A hearty Amen of full agreement.
It’s a fine ideal, but unfortunately no more realistic than communism. If humanity were uniformly individualistic, it could work…
But unfortunately, human nature tends toward greed and laziness, and there’s a vast bulk of people who merely want to be led and provided for. And then there are those greedy for power, who will use the easily led as a giant hammer to smash everyone else, take their stuff, and distribute the spoils. Life for the unaffiliated individual in the original state of nature would indeed be nasty, brutish, and short.
So it behooves the individualists to organize. Unfortunately, peaceful government can fall prey to the same problems, wherein it’s easier to follow stronger people and help them take other people’s crap than it is to fend for yourself. Civilization seems to be a precarious balancing act. On one extreme, you’ve got warring factions, masters and slaves; on the other, stifling rules and predatory bureaucracy. Scylla and Charybdis.
Seems to me our nation’s founding was an inspired and ingenious attempt to steer between the two extremes. But human folly began eating away at the idea even before the second the founders put pen to paper, and we’ve been slowly sliding toward Charybdis ever since. Maybe we can steer this country away from the rocks and get back to the founding principles, but I’m not optimistic about the short term. Our kids and grandkids are going to go through some nasty stuff, I’m afraid.
Anyway, happy 4th of July! 🙂
>>America has never actually been a free country.<<
There can never be such a thing as a "truly free country." True freedom is only possible in anarchy. All laws, by their very existence, inhibit liberty. So true liberty can only exist in the absence of all laws. The very act of creating a "country" (which implies, at the very minimum, borders) infringes on someone's ultimate liberty.
So what is the point of your screed? No, America has never been a "free country" — but at its inception, it was vastly more free than its alternatives.* And in many ways it still is.
*unless, of course, you were a slave…
Oh don’t be so hard on Mama Liberty. She’s got a whole website/blog/interweb thing to defend Reality Check. And I don’t disagree with her in the main…it’s just that I live in “reality”. It looks like it’s time for a 2nd real American Revolution. Happy ID everyone…
🙂 -Walker… so, what part of your “reality” are you happy with? That “revolution” going to do it for you?
Revolutions are usually the product of some people getting serious about taking over the plunder and power from other “rulers.” It is very seldom actually about or leads to liberty or justice.
Liberty is found when people finally decide they don’t want to be ruled by others… and have NO desire to control anyone else. And that can only happen one individual at a time.
All five or six of my blog readers thank you for mentioning my vast “net” empire. LOL
“Liberty is found when people finally decide they don’t want to be ruled by others… and have NO desire to control anyone else.”
Ha Ha ROTFL, I don’t think there is anyone on this planet like that, because in order to not be ruled by others you must force the others who desire to control you to leave you alone, in other words you must “control them”.
Gee I said I “mostly” agree Mama Liberty-I just don’t live in bum-fluck Wyoming-I live in all too real Illinois…I can’t run around like a cowboy(or girl),open carry or hunt deer outside my house in Cook Co. But I’d like to :)…
LOL, well then… if you’d like to do those things, there’s plenty of room left in Wyoming. Come on over. 🙂
According to the Founders themselves in the Declaration of Independence, the purpose of creating a government is to protect rights. Without a government, other humans will be the ones infringing on your rights. You’ll have to worry about other people, other tribes/bands/gangs/etc…trying to kill you and your family. So people create a government so as to protect their rights and also to have a civilized way to settle disputes.
Being that the government has a monopoly on force however, this creates the problem in that the government itself can become tyrannical and remove people’s rights. To check this, the government has to be created as a form of representative government (democratic) with various checks and balances in place, and ideally the people be educated and vigilant. Also the people must possess arms as an ultimate check.
Full freedom can never exist. If you don’t want to pay taxes to the government, then you’ll be paying “taxes” to the group that takes its place, i.e. a mafia or cartel or tribal leader.
That’s not what a republic is nor is it idiotic. Our form of republic is based on the idea that the people should rule themselves for the most part, but that certain checks need to be put into place so that it isn’t mob rule, so that policy ideas get thought through and the details worked out, so that people’s rights don’t get trampled on by mob rule, and so that the rights of the people don’t get trampled on by elitist politicians. We originally tried the Articles of Confederation, but that turned out to be unworkable. So we created a new federal government in which the government’s power was divided into three branches with various checks and balances put into place. In order that the federal government properly represent the people, the people elect representatives to it.
The design fully takes into account that people can be too stupid to realize what or who they’re voting for, or even that if they’re smart and educated, they can still be lied to by power-hungry politicians, hence the bicameral legislature. The House responds to the popular passions and concerns of the people. The members serve two year terms and the representatives from each state are numbered to reflect the popular will overall (more members from more populous states). The Senate is to consider the longer-term ramifications of legislation, and as such acts as a check on the House. The members serve six year terms, so as not to be as subject to the popular will, and originally, Senators were not even directly elected by the people. The popular direct election of Senators came about later on (whether this was ultimately better or a mistake is another debate altogether). Also the number of Senators from each state is equal, two for each state.
Then there’s the executive branch, with the President. Legislation that makes it through both houses of Congress thus has been through a system meant to check popular passions but also check big-government elitism. Then the President can veto legislation to check the legislature. The legislature can then override the President’s veto if they have a two-thirds majority in each house, so it’s a check on the President’s check, if you will. Then there’s the courts, culminating in the Supreme Court.
And then there’s the division between federal and state power, with states rights and federalism. And the Electoral College that makes it where there is proper representation in voting for the president, so that the candidates don’t just campaign in the most populous states and ignore the rest. And then there are the various methods to amend the Constitution.
You are most welcome to all of it. I want no part of it, and nobody can “represent” me if I do not consent. I’ll leave you alone if you’ll leave me alone.
So how is all that working out for you? Patrick Henry had this game pegged a long time ago.
Spot on.
Considering this is the most economically prosperous country in the history of the world, I’d say pretty darn well. Of course it isn’t perfect, nor does the government function perfectly, but if you can show me a design for a government that functions better, I’m all ears.
@Kyle: If your only yardstick is economically, it isn’t going all that bad but that won’t last forever. Look at the national debt. Our economy is living on borrowed time. However, that isn’t really the yardstick for our country, now is it? The exercise of individual liberty is the yardstick and it can’t be compared to other countries by that metric. The individual is rapidly losing the lawful ability to exercise rights. That is undeniable. Government has grown too powerful. The Constitution has been painfully ignored over and over and over again in this country. Individual liberty is what made this country prosperous and the erosion of individual liberty is what will destroy that prosperity.
A “republic” is the idiotic idea that people are too evil and stupid to control their own lives and property, but are good and wise enough to choose other people to do it for them.
The big problem is the wise elite elected usually are very good at controlling the lives and property of the people who elected them for the benefit of the elected elite.
Our form of government is the worst, except for all the rest. It’s just time to change the diaper, and change the frequency with which we change the diaper.
Happy Independence Day!
I call today, “Happy F@&$ the British Day”. Gives it a little humor spin and makes people think about what today is really about.
The Brits just declared independence from the EU. I for one welcome them to taste the freedom!
Brits I knew referred to today as rebel independence day
Damn proud to be an American…and that’s saying a lot these past 7 1/2 years….
Happy Independence Day to all.
‘Happy Irony Day’
A day where people who live in a nation where there are routine:
Warrant-less searches, indefinite detention without counsel or habeus corpus, massive voter fraud, NDAA, endless wars, staged created ‘terrorism, a police state, a surveillance state, the un ‘Patriot Act’, all manner of textually unconstitutional gun laws, secret lists, a usurper SC’R’OTUS abrogating the Constitution by judicial fiat, a rogue Executive Branch, a complicit Legislative Branch, a host of regulatory bureaucratic agencies that have been given administrative law-making powers and also policing/enforcement powers, almost total abrogation of the Bill of Rights, Globalism with a drive toward killing American Sovereignty and instituting a world-state, and on and on and on….
…celebrate their ‘Freedom and Independence’.
Yep…’Happy Irony Day’
I can’t bring myself to celebrate today. There’s just too much broken.
The following is an excerpt from Remarks by President B.H. Obama at the Fourth of July Celebration at the White House, 2016:
“But it’s important to remember what a miracle this country is. How incredible — how incredibly lucky we are that people, generations ago, were willing to take up arms and fight for our freedom.”
The rest of his remarks were blathering about inequality. I would like to remind the President, that we are not “lucky” because of those people from generations ago. Luck had nothing to do with it. I also want to point out; whose “arms” did the people take up to fight for our freedoms? I bet they were not the government’s arms.
God bless what is left of our nation.
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