In the House of Wood

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July 6, 2012

In the House of Wood

No cause for celebration

Steve Woodhouse Journal-Express The Zope Gazette Fri Jul 06, 2012, 08:46 AM CDT

Knoxville —

“But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such government, and to provide new guards for their future security.” -The Declaration of Independence

The 56 men who signed the Declaration of Independence are probably spinning in their graves after this week. This is for a combination of reasons, the obvious of which, is the fact that nearly everyone in Washington, D.C., is ignoring the Constitution that many of them also helped draft. I think they're also flipping out over how eagerly and willingly we accept the way things are going in this country, which is exactly the opposite of what they envisioned.

I don't know if it's ignorance, stupidity, laziness, selfishness, a sense of entitlement or what, but too many of us have become complacent. We've forgotten that, as the Declaration also states, “governments are instituted among men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed.”

That means that just governments, as the United States is intended to be, can only do what they do if they have permission from the people they govern. If we don't like it, we do not have to, nor should we, stand for it.

I'm sure I've complained about our apathy before. I'm going to keep complaining about it, on occasion, until everyone starts to wake up and realize that the majority's indifference to governmental affairs are allowing those governments to run amok.

Once the run is over, so is America, and the lifestyle to which we have become accustomed will no longer exist anywhere in this world. If America falls, so does freedom and any hope of man ever having a place to reach his full potential.

It is not in our nature to be subservient to any government. The Founders knew this. We're just supposed to answer to God, not any other man.

The government has abused its power, and redistributes wealth in order to continue to purchase our loyalty, in exchange for our liberties. How have they gotten by with that? Because too many of us like the handouts, and these days, some people are too ignorant to realize that America is land of the free, home of the brave. Nor do they realize that the true American dream is living your life as you choose, or God has planned for you, without government interference.

Everyone in Washington must go if there's any hope for America. In watching the reaction by Republican House Speaker John Boehner on Sunday, regarding the “Obamacare” ruling, I was extraordinarily disappointed.

He was attacking it on political reasons, and did not state the need for its repeal because it is so indescribably un-American. Instead, he and the Republicans just want to find a way to repeal it, but find ways to reinstitute much of its idiotic, freedom-robbing components that freeloaders want, which could translate into votes.

Here's what Boehner should have told CBS' Nora O'Donnell:

“Well, Nora, given that this mandate was repeatedly denied to be a tax by its backers, including President Obama, and the fact that it includes provisions that do not treat the states equally, that it was passed when every poll showed that most Americans opposed its passage, that it was passed in the middle of the night without being read by the duly elected representatives of the people, the fact that it expands dependence on government at a time when we haven't had a budget in nearly three years, will add to our debt that will already be impossible to repay and that this is a free, Constitutional republic and not a European socialist 'utopia,' we will do away with it in its entirety and deal with the components that have already begun, while we search for a true SOLUTION, and not another burden to be placed on businesses and people in this country.”

Yeah, that's about how he should have put it. Maybe without the run-on sentence, but that pretty much sums it up. He probably would have done better in the interview if he'd had a cigarette.

I could go on about Obama's ongoing ignoring of the laws of this country regarding immigration, marriage, etc., his Justice Department's work to undermine the Second Amendment through Fast and Furious (a program that has led to entirely too many deaths) or Justice Roberts' decision that laws are made of modeling clay that can be manipulated any way he chooses to get them to fit his thinking, but I won't.

The bottom line is that this country, as it stands, is so FAR from that which was envisioned in the days the Declaration was written, that I was really too sad to celebrate Independence Day. Today's America is not independent, and July 4 is just a sad reminder of that, as well as what our country has lost and how it has devolved over time.

Take care of yourself and thank you for reading.

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In the House of Wood

No cause for celebration

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