I am tired…
I am just tired. I feel over-whelmed. Every day the incongruity of what I hear and
read is just impossible to comprehend.
For example, I read, “If you have to have ID to do any
of these activities…” I just want to
shout, “STOP RIGHT THERE! According to the 4th Amendment, you aren’t
required to have ID to do ANY of those things, so why aren’t you screaming
about these invasions of your privacy, instead of demanding that the government
require us to show it in yet another place???” The first part of the premise is
totally messed up, but, we are basing the second part of the statement on the
first part, and wonder why we shouldn’t also give up our 4th
Amendment right to vote? Doesn’t anyone else
get it?
As soon as my youngest daughter has her driver’s
license, I will refuse to carry my driver’s’ license. It is not an ID card and I simply refuse to
be forced to “Show my papers!” I don’t live in Communist Russia or Nazi
Germany! We have gotten so used to
having people tell us that we “need” identification that we don’t understand
how invasive and de-humanizing it is. Just think about this, when you go into a
Federal building and they demand to see your ID, it isn’t to determine who you
are, you could have any forged ID, it isn’t matched to any database (although
that is coming), it is simply to get you used to being required to show
it. It helps you to remember your place
in society.
I read, “Build a wall to keep our borders safe, and
keep people out!” Don’t we remember the Berlin
Wall, or if a wall can keep people out, it can also keep people in? I remember when we used to be proud that we
had two of the longest unguarded borders in the world. But good people don’t remember
that and are screaming for a wall to be built.
And what about the current draft system? It is no
longer in place to provide soldiers to fill our military, as it was explained
to me very earnestly by a government official. So, if it isn’t there to have quick access to
a database of possible soldiers, why do we still have it? The only reason I can think of is that it is
there to get our young men to understand that their government is watching them
and that they need to report their movements to the proper authorities and
there is a push to register all the young women, too. Why do we have this? The
fault lies squarely on my generation. We didn’t stand up and refuse to let the
government re-institute the draft after the Vietnam War. Less than a decade later and we had already forgotten.
We allowed the Supreme Court to legalize abortion and
have stood by and watched (and paid for) the murder of millions of our children
and have done nothing to stop it. We
haven’t held any elected official responsible for this national disgrace, and
then we wonder why our children don’t value life.
We didn’t hold our Representatives accountable when
they created the “gun-free” zones, we allowed the government to begin “commonsense”
legislation on gun control and to create a National Database on firearm and
background checks. We didn’t insist on
our children being taught how dangerous a government with absolute power is. We have allowed courts to create “Constitution
free” zones. We haven’t insisted that a study of the Constitution and why we
have it, being part of every American’s education, and then we wonder why our
young people don’t know enough of their rights, or how our government works to
understand that insisting that the government dismantle the Bill of Rights is a
bad thing. Ask most Americans today and they think the Bill of Rights was
written to give us rights, they don’t even know it was written to limit the
government’s power to violate the rights we already had. They are already in
the boiling pot, swimming around, being boiled to death and they don’t even
realize it.
And the fault is MY generation’s. We let Congress make
laws that trampled the Constitution. We
let the courts legislate from the bench. We let the Executive branch make rules
that were not legal. We didn’t insist
that law enforcement and social service workers and teachers be required to
learn and understand the Bill of Rights and act accordingly. We haven’t stood
up and said, ENOUGH! We didn’t hold the line. In the name of protecting us, we
allowed the Patriot Act which violates so many of our rights, it is
mind-blowing to think about. Yet where
is the outrage about that?
We already have more people imprisoned than any other
society in the history of mankind, mostly on drug related charges, and now our
government is pushing to make a whole other class of drugs illegal, and refuses
to allow natural options and the government agency in charge seems to be bought
and paid for by the pharmaceutical companies.
We have allowed corruption in high places and the rich
and powerful to bribe and steal to get what they want. We allow Monsanto to control
our government to the point that they can mandate private individual’s ability
to save the seeds from their crops to replant the next year. And our government working in collusion with
them, exported this immoral policy to other countries, ruining the
self-sufficiency of indigenous peoples that had lasted thousands of years and
we did nothing more than shrug.
We don’t think for ourselves, we define ourselves as
either Conservative or Liberal or Independent and blindly follow the agenda
given to us instead of doing the best for our country regardless of what others
think. We protest what others tell us to
protest, and don’t measure it against the truth or logic or even what is just basic
commonsense.
Oh, I’ve tried. In the 1990’s, when Congress passed
the “Defense of Marriage Act” I warned everyone that would listen that this
would destroy marriage. Why? because it
was NOT their job to define marriage, they were sticking their noses in where
they had no business being. Why? Because if the government could define
marriage, it could change the definition of marriage. And last year they did just that. I have personlly spoken to every person I have voted for to let them know that I expect them to uphold the constitution. I have called congress, the president, and those in power when I saw problems. I have spoken out. But it has been a losing battle.
I have seen the government use every threat to our
safety to enact further restrictions on our freedoms and seen my fellow countryman
follow blindly along and even demand more restrictions and I am tired of
fighting it. I won’t quit, because it is
too important, but I don’t know how much more I can do.
I have been fighting this fight since I was 15 years
old, when I stood up to my high school and insisted that I be allowed to carry
my Bible openly in school, defying those who insisted that violating my 1st
Amendment right to worship God as I choose, interfered with their misinterpretation
of the separation of church and state.
The trouble is, it may be too late. We may have already lost so many of our
freedoms that I wonder if we can ever go back.
And I predict that within a very short time, a message like this will
have me declared an enemy of the state, and people will applaud when those who dissent
are hauled away. Until, of course, it comes to their house and they will not be
able to resist because any means of resistance will have been made illegal when
people feared for their safety and insisted that their government step in to
protect them from themselves.
Like I said, I am tired, but yes it is worth it. I will live peaceably and lawfully, as I always have even when I disagree, but I a writing this to remind us of the liberty we once had and should continue to strive for, when we followed wisdom, honor, morality and valued freedom, when wewere that shining light on the hill.
