June 25, 2009 – For those of you who have become accustomed to reading my articles on a regular basis I regretfully apologize for the sudden drought of writings on my part. I was engrossed in a book, and then, when I had just about finished it, my wife suffered an injury at work which caused her to temporarily lose the use of her right hand. So I have been a bit overloaded with chores and making sure she is comfortable.

As some of you may know, the book I was reading was Atlas Shrugged, by Ayn Rand. Although it is a work of fiction I found that much of the story closely parallels what is going on in this country at this time.

Over the course of reading Atlas Shrugged I have become burdened with this tremendous sense of futility. Many of the people I work with, and some who read my articles, are under the assumption that I think I have all the answers because I understand the Constitution better than they do.

I hate to be the bearer of bad news, but things are not going to get better. In fact, they are going to get much worse.

I have long believed that although the government is the cause of most of the problems that this country faces, it is we the people who hold the ultimate blame for all that is wrong in America.

Far too many people in this country don’t know, or don’t care, what the purpose of their government is, or what principles our nation was founded upon. They look to their government to solve all our countries problems. They look to their government to take care of them when they do not achieve the success they believe they are entitled to. Basically they refuse to accept responsibility for anything, even the fact that their government has usurped powers it was never intended they have, and taken away liberties they never had the power to take.

In the book Atlas Shrugged, there was a phrase that aptly describes what is missing in this country. It was, “I swear- by my life and my love of it- that I will never live for the sake of another man, nor ask another man to live for mine.”

I believe that there is but a small fraction of the people who call themselves Americans, who understand the true meaning of liberty, and the responsibilities that go along with it.

To be truly free, one cannot have government imposing limitations upon your rights, to tax you for the benefit of others. That is not liberty, that is enslavement. Yet for too many, that is the role they see for their government.

For instance, when you ask, no, expect your government to take money from someone because they have it, to subsidize, i.e. give it to someone who doesn’t, that is not liberty. It is not liberty for the person whom the government robs to feed another, and it is not liberty for the person who becomes a slave to the government for their sustenance.

Thomas Jefferson once said, “To take from one, because it is thought his own industry and that of his fathers has acquired too much, in order to spare to others, who, or whose fathers, have not exercised equal industry and skill, is to violate arbitrarily the first principle of association, the guarantee to everyone the free exercise of his industry and the fruits acquired by it.”

Charity is fine, the Scriptures abound with references to the Godliness of giving to those in need. However mandated charity does not involve giving of your own means to aid those in need. Mandated charity only makes slaves of us all.

That is just one example of how our government, and we the people, have strayed from the principles upon which this nation was founded. Our morals have degraded to the point where we are inundated with filth and perversion, and we are expected to tolerate it.

If we speak out against this evil that pervades society we are labeled as hateful and intolerant. If we expect people to work for a living, to abide by our laws, we are told we have no sympathy.

Thomas Paine

Our government has turned into this huge monster that invades our privacy, infringes upon our rights, and we sit back like a bunch of spineless idiots, expecting them to fix things?

Right now we have a man who occupies the Oval Office who is on a steady course to assume control of the private sector of our economy, even though the authority to do so is nowhere to be found in the Constitution.

At the same time our Congress sit by allowing this man to do so without so much as a whimper of protest.

There was a line from the movie Gladiator that aptly fits politics in America these days. During the movie, Senator Gracchus states, “Rome is the mob. He’ll conjure magic and they’ll be distracted. He’ll take away their freedoms and still they’ll roar.”

Our president promises us miracles and we applaud him, then we go back to our lives, not once taking the time to see what exactly it is he is doing, and at what it will cost this country in the long run.

It is our apathy concerning the affairs of our government, our ignorance about their true function, and our fear of speaking out against what we see going on that has gotten us to this point.

Unless these things change, I see no way to restore this country to greatness. Until enough people develop a spine and refuse to give another inch to their government, until enough people refuse to surrender one more right, and until enough people hold those whom the elect accountable to their oath to uphold the Constitution, not ONE DAMN THING IS GOING TO CHANGE!

And that is why I feel such despair and an overwhelming sense of futility. I just don’t see the people of this country pulling their heads out of their asses and thinking on their own for a change.

That is why I titled this as I did, as Thomas Paine once said, “These are the times that try men’s souls.” It is taking all that I have to not just give in and await the downfall of this once great land.

It is only my love of what America stood for, a beacon of liberty, that I continue to write. As long as my fellow countrymen place their faith in their government to fix things, I will have nothing but contempt for them.

Thomas Jefferson predicted what would happen to this nation when he said, “The natural progress of things is for liberty to yield and government to gain ground.”

However, as Robert Ingersoll once said, “We need men with moral courage to speak and write their real thoughts, and to stand by their convictions, even to the very death.”

That is all that keeps me going, my convictions. If it means that I die in standing up for them, so be it. For as Patrick Henry once said, “Give me liberty, or give me death.”

Live your life in such a way that when your feet hit the floor in the morning, Satan shudders and says “OH SHIT!!…. HE’S AWAKE!!”

“Is life so dear, or peace so sweet, as to be purchased at the price of chains and slavery?“

~ The Author ~
Neal Ross can be reached for comments at bonsai@syix.com. Visit Neal’s Blog at http://www.zombie-slayer.com/neal