I debated long and hard on the title of this short op-ed. Nothing seemed fitting for a title as I tend to alternate between anger, disgust, and profound sadness. The following may be difficult to swallow for some – introspection is often an unpleasant task.
“All men are created equal: no one among us can rule the rest unless we give that person permission to rule. Like the principle of equality, consent of the governed is of fundamental importance for understanding the government of the United States.”
42 Governors have stepped into the role of king to rule us all and with the tool of fear and a playbook, doctored statistics, and pseudoscience by the CDC, with the support of the media, illegally put us all in house arrest. We need to take back our cities, states, and country. Even under the worst of conditions, never in our history have we responded to a crisis by removing fundamental constitutional rights.
We are sovereign citizens in a representative republic, we must occasionally remind ourselves and our representatives of that. Our governors have failed us and we must get off our asses and make them represent us, and if they don’t, remove them from office. People seem to have forgotten what it means to live in a constitutional republic.
“Man did not enter into society to become worse than he was before, nor to have fewer rights than he had before, but to have those rights better secured.”
”•Â Thomas Paine, Rights of ManÂ
The problem here is far more devastating than any short-sighted plan could ever compensate for. No matter what happens from this point on, the damage has already been done to the future of our country. Sure, we will more than likely rebound economically. However, the American spirit of freedom has been forever scarred. A horrible nationwide precedent has been set. Our children will grow up thinking it is completely normal to suspend constitutional rights due to a bad flu season – or whatever else has been deemed a “crisis”. Whether intentional or not, it is all part of the mindset that is currently being instilled. The mindset of the “new normal”.
With the current cult of fear and propaganda surrounding us, I feel all I can do is slowly watch my country die – and so few really seem to care at all. People have bought into the fear-porn, hook, line, and sinker. Rational thought has been obliterated and if you don’t “conform”, you are deemed hateful and somehow devoid of compassion. Benjamin Franklin masterfully expressed in the Silence Dogood letters, “Whoever would overthrow the liberty of a nation must begin by subduing the freedom of speech.” In other words, if it were possible to set people against one another for the free expression of ideas – as is happening now with the ridicule and hate flung at people who don’t want to cower in their homes or wear masks in public – then you’ve not only begun subduing the freedom of speech, but all other human freedoms as well.
My complete respect goes out to those individuals who have spoken up by means of organized protest, or by opening your businesses regardless of what local government demands. I personally believe our founders would have been dumping the tea weeks ago!
Unless something changes drastically, I give it one, possibly two generations from now and this country will be unrecognizable. Again, the damage has ALREADY been done. I fear the genie cannot be put back in the bottle. The concept of “dangerous freedom over peaceful slavery” has become a foreign ideal.
Is the America we all know finished? Do we truly come back from this? After 244 years of previous plagues, epidemics, a civil war, two world wars, the depression, earthquakes, floods, and famine – is THIS what takes us out? Is THIS what changes the American landscape forever? Tell me it isn’t so.
“To reason with governments, as they have existed for ages, is to argue with brutes. It is only from the nations themselves that reforms can be expected.”
”•Â Thomas Paine, Rights of ManÂ
Bill Pierce
Additional credits to: Â Howard Roark and Brian King
Join the Discussion
COMMENTS POLICY: We have no tolerance for messages of violence, racism, vulgarity, obscenity or other such discourteous behavior. Thank you for contributing to a respectful and useful online dialogue.
I am amazed that none have commented to this article (to this point). Have we become so subdued by the elitist of this nation that we can no longer stand for ourselves and our fellow American Citizens? How has tyranny been so far flung in the land of the free. The consent of the governed is dead, if we do not rise up; force the tyrannical policies to be thrown into the ash heap of history and reclaim the GOD given rights enumerated in the Constitution. The Constitution limits the scope and reach of the Federal Government, yet our elected officials have spent us into an abyss we may not be able to escape; they continue for decades as “professional politicians” rather than representatives of “We the People”, considering themselves the ruling class rather than being in service to this society founded on principals of freedom, personal responsibility and equal justice under the law. Our nation’s past is being used to defraud and defame us, but even with our failures this is the freest nation in human history. Will we each take a responsible role in re-establishing a free society or will we succumb to tyranny in search of security? May GOD help us to choose wisely.