The Federal Observer

“fol·ly” –noun,
1.  the state or quality of being foolish; lack of understanding or sense.
2.  a foolish action, practice, idea, etc.; absurdity:
3.  a costly and foolish undertaking; unwise investment or expenditure.

Every single definition for the word “folly”, fully describes what is transpiring in the great United States of America, purveyor of freedom and liberty and the shining beacon of hope to the rest of the world ….. well it used to be.  Purveyor of freedom and liberty?  Really!  Shining beacon of hope?  Hardly!   Never has a culture worked so hard to tear itself apart.  One might think that America and the American people have a death wish, or are out to commit seppuku. (look it up)  If ever the phrase “stupid is, as stupid does” was relevant, it sure applies in the case of an America out to do injury to itself.  If it wasn’t so serious, it would be funny.  A Shakespearean tragedy at best.

Who would invent such a machine that had the capability, as it grew older, of throwing its own monkey wrenches it makes, into its own gears, bringing the machine to a screeching halt, while spitting gear teeth in all directions?  Or could it be that the machine was well designed in the first place, but outside forces were throwing the monkey wrenches, not the machine itself?  The latter makes much more sense.

A while back we wrote an article about fly wheels and centrifugal force.  In it we described an actual incident that happened to this author’s father a long time ago.  It went like this:  “Years ago, my father used to make the rounds of sawmills in Western Washington.  I’m not sure why.  At one of the larger sawmills along the Washington coast, the power to cut giant logs into lumber was provided by a huge steam engine.  Attached to the shaft of the steam engine was a massive fly wheel to smooth out the pulsing action of the steam pistons and to provide constant inertia to the saw blade.  This particular steam engine came with a governor to keep the engine from literally running away and destroying itself.  At the sawmill my father was visiting at the time, the governor failed and the steam engine started to runaway.  Meanwhile, the fly wheel was accelerating faster and faster.   Not being able to shut the engine down in time to prevent a runaway, everyone in the vicinity of the engine started running for cover in all directions, including my father, knowing full well what the final outcome would be.   Finally, the quantum “glue” holding the atoms and molecules together in the fly wheel, gave up and it came apart in thousands of pieces, small and large, many of which exited through the walls and the roof.  Some pieces landed over a mile from the mill.  Other pieces were buried several feet in the ground.  The steam engine, with the sudden release of the fly wheel, disintegrated.”

So let’s draw an analogy from this experience.  We’ll call the fly wheel the “system” and we’ll call the governor the “constitution” that keeps the ”system” spinning at a manageable speed and prevents it from “running away”.   The folly is folks, someone has been messing with the “governor” and the “system” is headed for a ”runaway”, that is, if we can’t wrest control of the “governor” from those who are “monkeying” with it.

One might ask why these “someones” are “monkeying” with our governor, but the why isn’t important.  We only know that gaining control of the governor is imperative, or our well-designed ”system” will most certainly disintegrate, while we run for cover.  The truth is, we can’t afford “folly” any more.  We can’t afford “stupid is, as stupid does” by allowing those who are “tweaking”, or are throwing monkey wrenches (Progressivism, Socialism, Marxism, Communism, etc.) into our “governor”.

Gaining control of the “governor” is not that hard in principle, provided those who are attempting to gain control, “are of one mind”.  After all, there are over 300 million of us and only 545 of them.  However, in practice, Americans are anything but “of one mind” and we have been performing the ritual of ”stupid is, as stupid does” for over 100 years now.  Until the “consent of the governed” can agree on some simple principles that will draw them together as “one mind”, gaining control of the “governor” is problematic.  The principles were laid out for us 233 years ago, but we let outside forces mess with our “governor” and they have purposely perverted the principles of our “system”, for their own ends.

And the perpetrators who were “tweaking” the “governor”, were really smart.  They used money they don’t own, but take by force, to buy off people they have no authority to control, to obtain votes in order to perpetuate their hold on power and their control of the “governor”.  Now, those who have been bought off, fight amongst themselves for their share of the money they have no right to possess in the first place.  Meanwhile, the “tweakers” are laughing hysterically at “us”, from behind our backs.

However, it appears that the laughing is beginning to subside as more and more Americans wake from a nap they should have never taken.  If the “governor” controlling those Americans, many in a state of fury, is not brought under control, the inertia of waking Americans could end up in a “runaway” and take us where we don’t want to go ….. anarchy.  The trick today is to start coalescing Americans into “one mind”, based on the solid foundation of American liberty and leave this “Season to be Folly”, behind.  Any other course of action is sure to fail.

© Copyright February 24, 2010 - All Rights Reserved

~ The Author ~
Ron Ewart is the President of The National Association of Rural Landowners and nationally recognized author on freedom and property rights issues. Ron may reached for comment via email at r.ewart@comcast.net.

In addition, Ron can usually be heard each Tuesday evening from 7:00 to 8:00 p.m. (ET) on Perspectives on America on The Micro Effect broadcasting network, as either Jeffrey Bennett’s guest or Guest Host. Tune in - you’ll be glad you did.

Perspectives on America can be heard from 6:00 until 8:00 p.m. (ET) Monday through Friday on The Micro Effect.

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This entry was posted by The Publisher on Tuesday, February 23rd, 2010 at 11:36 PM and is filed under • Guest Commentary. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.