Posted by Dr. Robert Owens in Politics, Politiocal Philosophy, Religion.
Tags: Capitalism, democratic principles, Dr. Robert Owens, Free choice, free market capitalism, Obama’s agenda, Progressive agenda, Representative republic
In our current confrontation with Radical Islam the battle lines are portrayed as those between a secular society, us and a religious society, them. I reject this portrayal as a betrayal of the faith of our Founders and of those patriotic Americans who still hold fast to Jesus as God and Savior, we too are a religious people.
America was founded as a Christian country. Anyone who denies that has not studied enough History or has been sadly misled. Columbus accentuated his desire to spread the Christian faith to his patrons the King and Queen of Spain and in his log. The first thing the English did upon landing at Jamestown was set up a cross to dedicate their endeavor to Jesus their Savior. Were these early explorers and colonists always true to their faith? Did they always operate under principles derived from God’s Word? Sadly they did not. However, to say that the Christian faith was not an integral part of their motivation and worldview is simply not true.
In the latter part of the twentieth century Progressive leaders pushing a collectivist agenda decided to declare us a pluralistic society. They sought to detach the heavily Bible influenced Constitution into the dustbin of History by substituting what they call a living constitution for the rock-solid one the Framers bequeathed us. Mr. Obama, the quintessential Progressive in his speech to the Muslims of Egypt, Turkey, and many places spiced up his apology tours by asserting that America is not a Christian country. This statement of his belief and goal does not make it true.
All of these recent changes aside, most Americans still believe in God and the majority consider themselves Christians. As a Christian, an Historian, and a Political Scientist in response to numerous questions I would like to share my beliefs concerning government, economies, and the rights of man.
As far as a government goes the only Biblically correct one is that God is God and we are His people. He is the King and we are the sheep of His pasture. As concerning an economic system God’s economy knows no lack and is exceedingly abundantly provisioned by the owner of the cattle on a thousand hills.
This being true I do not believe that God mandates any type of human government or economic system as pre-ordained, sanctified, or holy. However, I do believe that humanity as God has created it does require certain governmental and economic conditions to develop and thrive as God intended.
God created us in His own image. He gave us the power to create and to choose. He gave us a mind open to learning and ever eager to improvise. He also gave us what I believe is the most crucial aspect of our make-up: our free will or the power to choose. We can choose to follow Him and do what He desires, or we can choose to follow the leadings not only of our thoughts but of our emotions also. In other words we can dwell within the Kingdom of God wherein He is our King and we are His people or we can choose to live in the Kingdom of man and become the subjects of either our own designs or of whoever manages to gain control of the physical world around us.
If God wanted slaves or robots He could have created slaves or robots. Instead He created us and gave us a mind to think and a will to choose because He wanted us to decide to love Him and follow Him freely without compulsion. Therefore I believe that since free thought and free choice are the foundation of man’s nature freedom is necessary if man is to live as God designed. This being the case I believe that any governmental or economic system that denies man’s freedom interferes with and attempts to supplant God’s plan, which is the definition of evil.
There are of course limits to freedom as expressed in the Ten Commandments. Beyond this we should be free to choose our own way. Will we follow God or will we follow man. Within these limits and building on the moral framework the Bible provides I believe that a republic based upon the commitment to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness using democratic principles is the governmental structure which most closely matches man’s God-given nature. I also believe that free market capitalism is the economic system which best allows man to develop and live as God intended. Conversely, when man rejects God and seeks to create his own utopia he builds some sort of centrally-planned command economy and the intrusive government needed to impose it upon others.
A free economy and the free government it requires allows the independent choices of many to produce the greatest prosperity for all as everyone seeks to do the best they can because they reap the rewards. In a socialist or any type of hybrid economy between capitalism and socialism bureaucrats make the decisions and stagnation is the inevitable result. As Gary North, a Christian economist expresses it, “The essence of democratic socialism is this re-written version of God’s commandment: ‘Thou shalt not steal, except by majority vote.’” Or as Winston Churchill observed, “Socialism is a philosophy of failure, the creed of ignorance, and the gospel of envy, its inherent virtue is the equal sharing of misery.” And that is not life as God intended.
If we look at History it is an outworking of the initial fall of man. In the beginning God created the world including man and it was all good. Then at the dawn of our existence we choose to go our own way instead of following God. We chose to follow the siren song of “You shall be like God” and ever since we have attempted to create heaven on earth. All we have succeeded in doing is to open the gates of Hell instead. A case in point would be the age-old question, if God is good why is there evil in the world followed by the age-old answer God gave us free choice and we chose evil.
With the help and guidance of those who seek to play god themselves humanity has often been convinced to surrender their freedom for security, to bargain away their God-given nature and assume the subservient nature of slaves.
In America the purveyors of socialism cloak their designs in the language of populism. They loudly proclaim that they seek a fair deal for everyone, except of course for the people they intend to loot. They want fair elections as long as nothing is done to stop fraudulent voting. They want equality enforced by unequal treatment. In other words they seek to build the kingdom of man where they can be king.
We have a mind to think and the capacity to make a free choice. As the day of reckoning draws near all I can recommend is, think and choose. We can choose to follow the path of redistribution, class warfare, and collectivist dependency or we can choose to at least attempt a return to limited government, personal liberty, and economic freedom. Don’t be fooled by the progressive media and their obvious bias. To be free is God’s design. For us to be a slave to dependency is man’s.
One of America’s most beloved troubadours told us, “The words of the prophets are written on the subway walls and tenement halls” and one of those secular prophets he was referring to reminded us “You’re gonna have to serve somebody, yes indeed You’re gonna have to serve somebody, Well, it may be the devil or it may be the Lord But you’re gonna have to serve somebody.”
Or as my favorite book says it, “And if it seems evil to you to serve the Lord, choose for yourselves this day whom you will serve, whether the gods which your fathers served that were on the other side of the River, or the gods of the Amorites, in whose land you dwell. But as for me and my house, we will serve the Lord.”
Dr. Owens teaches History, Political Science, and Religion. He is the Historian of the Future @ http://drrobertowens.com © 2018 Robert R. Owens drrobertowens@hotmail.com Follow Dr. Robert Owens on Facebook or Twitter @ Drrobertowens Edited by Dr. Rosalie Owens
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Posted by Dr. Robert Owens in Uncategorized.
Tags: Dr. Robert Owens, Obama’s agenda, socilaist agenda
I have long said that no one gets to live in the world they grew up in, change moves too fast to allow for that. However our governing elite and their indoctrinated followers seem dedicated to the proposition that we shouldn’t even get to live under the same rules or in the same culture.
Taking a look at a few things and how they have been upended and are now used to facilitate the transformation of America.
The Court and Congress:
The Supreme Court can reverse itself at any time. Today it can deliberate and decide the Constitution says green is green and tomorrow they can deliberate and say green is yellow. It gives our Constitution a fluid quality that matches perfectly with the Progressive advocates of a living document. In other words in our system as it has evolved (or progressed) the Constitution isn’t written in stone it is written in sand.
Or without re-interpreting themselves they can re-interpret Congress to declare constitutional what is clearly unconstitutional. The penalties in Obamacare were said by Congress not to be taxes so that it could pass the law, since the Senate cannot originate tax laws. Then the Supreme Court declared the penalties to be taxes to declare the law constitutional. Which should make the law unconstitutional on its face since all tax laws must begin in the House and this law was written in the Senate using slight-of-hand to pretend it started in the house.
Currently a case is making its way to the Supreme Court saying that Obamacare is unconstitutional on the origination of tax clause. Let’s see how the Justices contort themselves to find the law constitutional this time.
Academia:
We have reached a point where our best and brightest at colleges across the country are actually demonstrating to limit free speech as they express their aggressively progressive ideals by demanding protection from microaggressions such someone expressing ideas that conflict with their indoctrination. College used to be a place where conflicting ideas came to compete in the marketplace of thought. Now it is a place where a rigid conformity to the party-line is choking out everything that does not salute the upside down flag of Transformed America.
How did we get here? So many I talk to disagree with what the government party is doing to transform America yet they continue to vote for those who are leading the charge. They fail to see how the very problems they complain about have been caused by the programs of the people they vote for. It always amazes me how many people think right, talk right, live right and vote left. In other words as opposed to what is sometimes necessary when driving on congested streets going left to get right doesn’t work in politics.
Dr. Owens teaches History, Political Science, and Religion. He is the Historian of the Future @ http://drrobertowens.com © 2015 Contact Dr. Owens drrobertowens@hotmail.com Follow Dr. Robert Owens on Facebook or Twitter @ Drrobertowens / Edited by Dr. Rosalie Owens
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Posted by Dr. Robert Owens in Politics.
Tags: amnesty, Charles Schumer, constitutional crisis, Dr. Robert Owens, dystopia, fundamentally transform America, Harry Reid, illegal aliens, Nancy Pelosi, Obama’s agenda, Obamacare for illegals, socialist agenda, tax and spend, the fall of America, the fall of the West
Now that BHO has decreed that deportations will cease and work permits and other privileges of legal immigration will be granted to those who chose to enter our country illegally what’s next?
In less time than it takes to say “Fundamentally transform America” the chorus of usual suspects, Charles Schumer, Nancy Pelosi, Harry Reid, and their fellow travelers will start saying “It isn’t fair for all these people to pay taxes and not receive the full benefits of Obamacare, and the rest of the social hammock. Then along comes voting. Of course thanks to President Clinton and his motor voter law if our newly legalized guests can drive they can vote already.
Here’s the plan: inundate Texas and Florida with imported voters and turn the electoral map blue for at least a generation. By then we will have a nanny-state bureaucratic yoke firmly in place on the neck of anyone crazy enough to continue producing anything that can be expropriated. Tax and spend will be refined into TAX and SPEND on steroids as what was once the land of the free and the home of the brave careens into the third world.
This reminds me of the people who will flee red tape strangulation and try to blend into their new found haven by demanding all the government services that were the catalyst of their previous State’s meltdown. As we discard our freedom for the shabby paternalistic embrace of a fuzzy warm Progressive dystopia our newly legalized guests will feel right at home. Our once super-successful nation will be that many steps closer to the failed states they have left.
For a long time the best practical advice I could give anyone asking how to succeed in America has been learn Spanish and get a government job. That may soon be progressed to change your name to Juan del Pueblo and get in line. Uncle Sugar is about to raise your standard of living for free while he charges John Doe to lower his.
Now don’t get me wrong I am in no way saying that the vast majority of Hispanic people are not hard working family people who want to better their lives. I love Hispanic culture and find español para ser un lenguaje muy hermoso, or Spanish is a beautiful language. However, there right ways to do things and wrong ways to do things. For those who have come here legally, welcome. For those who chose to come here anyway, not so much. It is the difference between inviting someone to dinner and how you feel about meeting their needs and making sure they are comfortable and how you would feel about someone who broke into your house sit themselves down at your dinner table and demanded to be served. As a matter of fact they want you to take the food off your own children’s plates and give it to them. That’s a big difference.
Just look at the imperial decree. It lists strictures on who this applies to and who it doesn’t apply to. If the Emperor has decreed that you must have been here for X number of years to qualify how many years do you think everyone will say they have been here? Since they were in the shadows, who knows, obviously we don’t.
Here’s a question that always bothers me, “If in order to gain citizenship you have to pass a written test on American History in English, why does anyone need a Spanish ballot?” Yet Spanish ballots are issued in all 50 states. Of course this is just like asking, “If you need a phot ID to get into the Democratic National Convention what is wrong with asking for a photo ID to vote?” If you ask either of these questions the Corporations Once Known as the Mainstream Media brand you as a racist and marginalize you as a denizen of the radical right-wing fringe.
Was BHO’s imperial decree unconstitutional? Everyone knows it is. Are his examples of other President’s executive orders relating to immigration fait comparisons? Everyone knows they aren’t. Will anything meaningful be done by the loyal opposition? No. They are too loyal to the Progressive big-government tax and spend agenda of the twin-headed bird of prey which is our degraded two-party system.
So what happens next? Anything BHO wants. Our system of constitutionally limited government has run aground on the rock of a bureaucratically dominated collectivist self-aggrandizing central government supported by an oligarchy of perpetually re-elected hacks and their crony capitalist friends. The descendants of the colonists the great grandchildren of the Founders and Framers have become the vassals of an egomaniacal narcissist and a gang of two-bit jesters riding on donkeys and elephants in a parade to the ash heap of History.
Dr. Owens teaches History, Political Science, and Religion. He is the Historian of the Future @ http://drrobertowens.com © 2014 Contact Dr. Owens drrobertowens@hotmail.com Follow Dr. Robert Owens on Facebook or Twitter @ Drrobertowens / Edited by Dr. Rosalie Owens
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Posted by Dr. Robert Owens in Politics, Politiocal Philosophy.
Tags: Anti-Law, Dr. Robert Owens, God’s Law, legal positivism, Natural Law, Obama’s agenda, Progressive agenda, Soviet legal theory
America was founded upon the principles of Natural Law. The Progressives led us into the realms of Legal Positivism. The vast government apparatus they have constructed has progressed into a dystopian fantasy land beyond law where faceless bureaucrats in an alphabet soup of departments create regulations with the force of law from thin air. Such is the journey from tyranny to tyranny in ten generations. Such is the journey from law to anti-law.
We built this Republic on the foundation of Natural Law:
The opening sentence of the Declaration of Independence is unarguably the most famous. Countless American students have memorized it, regurgitated it for exams, and many can still recite it many years later.
When in the Course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another, and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature’s God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation.
While many will point to this preamble as a statement of why the Declaration was made few in our present generation can define what Thomas Jefferson was referring to, which was a common term and a common understanding at the time of its composition, “the Laws of Nature and of Nature’s God.”
In his book, The Five Thousand Year Leap, by Dr. W. Cleon Skousen,he points out that “…the debates in the Constitutional Convention and the writings of the Founders reflect a far broader knowledge of religious, political, historical, economic, and philosophical studies.” He also states, “The thinking of Polybius, Cicero, Thomas Hooker, Coke, Montesquieu, Blackstone, John Locke, and Adam Smith salt-and-peppered their writings and their conversations. They were also careful students of the Bible, especially the Old Testament, and even though some did not belong to any Christian denomination, the teachings of Jesus were held in universal, respect and admiration.”
The ancient Roman Cicero was a victim of turbulent power politics and eventually killed for writing against the dictatorship of Caesar, but in his writings On the Republic and On the Laws he spoke about Natural Law. He spoke of it as True Law or Right Law. “True law is right reason in agreement with nature; it is of universal application, unchanging and everlasting;…It is a sin to try to alter this law, nor is it allowable to repeal any part of it, and it is impossible to abolish it entirely. We cannot be freed from its obligations by senate or people…one eternal and unchangeable law will be valid for all nations and all times, and there will be one master and ruler, that is God, over us all, for he is the author of this law,…”
Introduced in 1766, Blackstone’s became the law book of the Founding Fathers. In fact, political scientists have shown that Blackstone was one of two most frequently invoked political authorities of the Founders. Like Cicero more than a thousand years before Blackstone recognized Natural Law as the sure foundation of human society when he stated, “Upon these two foundations, the law of nature and the law of revelation (the law of nature’s God), depend all the human laws; that is to say, no human laws should be suffered to contradict these.”
In essence what all this means is that there are laws greater than any laws man can make therefore there are areas which are beyond legislation. In America we attempted to safeguard those areas such as individual liberty, personal freedom, and economic opportunity with a constitution. This Constitution was written to limit the power of government to those powers and only those powers which had been specifically delegated to it.
The final amendment in the Bill of Rights reads, “The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the states, are reserved to the states respectively, or to the people.” It would be hard to be more clear. However this amendment has been interpreted into irrelevancy as the Progressives made their long march to power.
The Progressives nudged us into Legal Positivism:
Throughout the last twenty five years if we spoke of “the laws of nature” many Americans would think we are speaking of doing whatever comes naturally as typified in the saying, “If it feels good do it.” Most seem not to consider the relevance or even the existence of absolute truth or God’s Law.
To the leaders of today and the compliant populace they and their government controlled schools have indoctrinated man’s law as supreme. The epitome of this is extolled in the belief in a “Living Constitution.” One in which everything is constantly evolving, and where people, legislatures, and courts do not seem to be concerned with a constitution meant to limit the power of government. Instead they say relevance and necessity drives them to interpret a constitution which empowers government to do anything it decides is necessary.
This brings us to the legal philosophy which undergirds this assault upon traditional American law: Legal Positivism.
This legal philosophy posits that law consists exclusively of that which is created and directed by the human will. In other words with the limiting guide of Natural Law removed the appropriateness of government action becomes a question of mere legality. Anything which has become law is acceptable. The Final Solution of the Third Reich was legal. The purges of Stalin were legal.
As one German professor intellectually paving the way for the Nazi dictatorship stated in his analysis of the death of limited government after World War One, “fundamentally irretrievable liberty of the individual … gradually recedes into the background and the liberty of the social collective occupies the front of the stage.” He further notes that this change in the emphasis of freedom from the individual to the collective signaled the “emancipation od democratism from liberalism.” Remember that in this context Liberalism had its original meaning, which is advocating liberty, and not its corrupted American meaning, advocating for exactly what the good professor was describing.
This newly liberated democracy equates the state with the legal code. Whatever the majority decides is legal is right. This leads inevitably to the position that there are no limits to the power of the legislator. There are no natural rights and no fundamental and inviolable liberties.
Turning traditional reasoning on its head the proponents of Legal Positivism advanced the position that when a state is bound by law it is an unfree prisoner of the law. They reasoned that in order for a state to act with true justice it must be free of the law. Since personal freedom and the rule of law are inseparable as Legal Positivism overtakes a state, personal freedom becomes progressively more proscribed until the individual is enmeshed in a bewildering web of laws.
By the end of the twentieth century America was tangled in law after law. The Federal laws alone fill more volumes than anyone could carry: libraries full of laws written by lawyers often weighing out the gnat while swallowing the camel. There were laws about this and laws about that until finally there were laws about everything. Until even those we have elected to protect and defend the Constitution believe, as one Congressman said, “The Federal Government can do most anything in this country.”
Today we are entering the rule of Anti-Law.
With the prevalence of omnibus bills numbering thousands of pages written to read like telephone books with addendums and commentaries in insurance speak, the legislature has abdicated its power to bureaucrats who fill in the blanks.
The situation is typified by statements by some of the leaders of the post-constitutional Obama Congress. From the former Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi’s famous, “We’ve got to pass the bill to find out what’s in the bill,” to perpetual incumbent Congressman Conyers outburst, “I love these members, they get up and say, ‘Read the bill.’ What good is reading the bill if it’s a thousand pages and you don’t have two days and two lawyers to find out what it means after you read the bill?”
The philosophical position of the rule of bureaucracy has been best stated by Soviet political theorists attempting to explain and justify that great prison of nations: the USSR. One put it this way, “Since it is impossible to distinguish between laws and administrative regulations, this contrast is a mere fiction of bourgeois theory and practice.” Perhaps the best description of the Soviet position is from another Russian, “What distinguishes the Soviet system from all other despotic governments is that … it represents an attempt to found the state on principles which are the opposite of those of the rule of law .. and it has evolved a theory which exempts the rulers from every obligation or limitation.”
Or as a Communist Theorist summed it up, “The fundamental principle of our legislation and our private laws, which the bourgeois theorist will never recognize is: everything is prohibited which is not specifically permitted.”
Here we are in a land strangled by regulation. Our elected officials pass laws they don’t read about things they don’t understand and unelected bureaucrats fill in the gaps. As can be seen in the IRS scandal they see themselves as above the law and there seems to be no way to make them accountable. Like a runaway train involved in a slow motion wreck the citizens stand helplessly by as our nation implodes. We can vote for one of the parties of power; however, they are merely two heads on the same bird of prey. No matter which one is in power the government grows and grows.
How do we end this death spiral? How did Washington, Jefferson, and Adams do it? We started with the Declaration of Independence so we might as well end there,
We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.–That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, –That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to affect their Safety and Happiness.
These were dangerous words then, and they are dangerous words now. Let each citizen swear to do and be whatever is necessary to preserve, protect, and defend the Constitution. God bless America.
Keep the faith. Keep the peace. We shall overcome.
Dr. Owens teaches History, Political Science, and Religion. He is the Historian of the Future @ http://drrobertowens.com © 2014 Contact Dr. Owens drrobertowens@hotmail.com Follow Dr. Robert Owens on Facebook or Twitter @ Drrobertowens / Edited by Dr. Rosalie Owens
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Posted by Dr. Robert Owens in Politics, Politiocal Philosophy.
Tags: Declaration of Independence, Dr. Robert Owens, legal positivism, Natural Law, Obama’s agenda, Progressive agenda, socialist agenda
How can a law be illegitimate? Isn’t this an oxymoronic question? It is a question that brings us to the concept that there can be a difference between what is legal and what is right. This is the debate between those who believe in Legal Positivism and those who believe in Natural Rights.
Legal positivists “believe that the only legitimate sources of law are those written rules, regulations, and principles that have been expressly enacted, adopted, or recognized by a governmental entity or political institution, including administrative, executive, legislative, and judicial bodies.” In other words whatever the government says is legal is right.
While those who believe in Natural Law believe “all written laws must be informed by, or made to comport with, universal principles of morality, religion, and justice, such that a law that is not fair and just may not rightly be called law.” Any law which is contrary to Natural Law is not a legitimate law. For example a law that says it is legal to murder others would be seen by all to be illegitimate in amoral sense even though it would be technically legal.
That this is the concept under which the United States was first formulated is self-evident when we read that incomparable document which was issued by the Continental Congress as a justification for its war and its purpose: the Declaration of Independence. In its opening paragraph, the preamble which all school children once memorized, this document explains itself thus: “When in the Course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another, and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature’s God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation.”
This brings us to the first debate of this essay. Is God supreme and consequently His laws binding upon all people and all nations? Or is man supreme and all nations amendable to his will and purpose and all his laws supreme until they are changed?
When they decided to adopt the phrase “Laws of Nature and of Nature’s God” the fifty six signers of the Declaration based the foundation of our country on a legal standard of freedom. They sought to impress this mold into all the various forms of government to follow. This legal standard of freedom they adopted was that God’s law was supreme and that this law inherently gives man freedom. The phrase “Laws of Nature and of Nature’s God” referred to the laws that God as the Creator of the universe established for the governance of people, nations, and nature. Throughout History these laws have been described as the laws of Creation, God’s Creation laws, or as the Founders of our nation chose to call them, the laws of nature and of nature’s God. These laws, whatever they are called, are ascertained through an examination of God’s creation, the text of the Bible, and instinct or reason.
The decision of the Founders to expressly rely upon God’s law was not a casual one. The debate concerning the basis of law had raged on both sides of the Atlantic for many years before and after the Declaration was drafted. After years of reflection on the Declaration of Independence, its principle author, Thomas Jefferson, stated in 1825 that its central point was “not to find out new principles, or new arguments, never before thought of, not merely to say things which had never been said before; but to place before mankind the common sense of the subject.”
That this is a generally accepted theory has been affirmed by the world in the universal acceptance of the correctness of the Nuremberg Trials after World War II. The Nazis who were on trial universally sought to defend themselves on the grounds that everything they did was legal and that they were just following the orders of the legally constituted government. This defense was universally rejected. The world came together and said in effect there is a higher law.
In America today it is the accepted practice that our federal legislature enacts laws which direct the apparatus of government as to how it should operate. It is also accepted practice that the same body enacts laws which establish rules for how ordinary individuals should live their lives. This duality obscures the truth that though it is necessary and proper for the government to administer the labor of those who have been hired to carry out its will this does not translate into an objective right to administer the individual efforts of its citizens.
The distinguishing characteristic between a free societyand a command society is that in a free society there is a recognized sphere of personal action which stands apart from the public sphere. In a free society it is recognized that within the private sphere an individual cannot be ordered about at the whim of government bureaucrats. It is also recognized that in the public sphere individuals should only be required to obey laws which are generally applicable to all. It used to be the proud declaration of free people that as long as they kept within the bounds of known law they didn’t need to ask by your leave of anyone, they were sovereign of their own life.
This however was a declaration grounded on the belief that laws should be of a general nature; they should be clearly stated and knowable.
Today our Progressive leaders pass laws composed of thousands of pages written in the clear and precise language of government new-speak insurance papers by saying, “We have to pass it to know what’s in it.” We also have the spectacle of the man who was in charge of writing the tax code for decades when he is caught cheating on his taxes saying, “I personally feel that I have done nothing morally wrong.” While Mr. Rangle was never indicted for tax evasion since he is above the laws he passes he was found guilty of violating the rules of the House for the same charges.
There is little that is more important to a free society than laws being clear and certain. If people do not know what the law is there will be paralysis. In totalitarian societies people never know when they might be accused of breaking a law or rule that they may not even be aware of. In authoritarian and totalitarian societies the apparatus of government is not used merely to operate the necessary functions of civil administration it is used to coerce citizens to obey.
Article 2 section 1 of the Articles of Impeachment filed against President Nixon was about the abuse of power. It stated, “He has, acting personally and through his subordinated and agents, endeavored to obtain from the Internal Revenue Service, in violation of the constitutional rights of citizens, confidential information contained in income tax returns for purposes not authorized by law, and to cause, in violation of the constitutional rights of citizens, income tax audits or other income tax investigation to be initiated or conducted in a discriminatory manner.”
Nixon “endeavored to obtain from the Internal Revenue Service, in violation of the constitutional rights of citizens, confidential information.” He “endeavored to obtain,” but he never did obtain this information. The IRS turned him down and turned him in. Today the Obama regime after years of hiding documents and sending their operatives to Congress to either mislead, lie, or plead the fifth has finally been exposed by documents obtained through a Freedom of Information request that was enforced by a judge. It has definitively been learned that the IRS persecution of conservative groups was not the work of a few rogue agents in a district office. The targeting of the Tea Party groups was directed by the IRS Headquarters in Washington.
We have come full circle. From a nation founded upon the Laws of Nature and of Nature’s God we have allowed the Progressives and their Living Document to lead us to a land governed by the laws of man. The children of the Founders and the descendants of the Framers now cower before an all-powerful corporate state that passes laws no one reads, regulates everything, and employs armies of bureaucrats to harass us into obedience and conformity.
Looking at the contradiction between what we were created to be and what we have become, the question why do we obey comes to mind. Is it that we are too timid to follow in the footsteps of Washington, Jefferson, and Henry? Is it that we have developed a habit of following the directions of our leaders? Or is it that we have a respect for the rule of law?
In the face of continued abuse the timid grow bold, old habits are broken, and when respect is lost it is not easily regained.
One day there will be one abuse too many. And in that day the people of America will recall that the same people who based our society onthe Laws of Nature and of Nature’s God also said, “We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.–That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, –That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to affect their Safety and Happiness. Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shown, that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. 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.”
Why do we obey? Ask yourself, why do I obey, and you will have the answer, because We the People is merely you and I waiting to recall who we are, how we got here, and what we are supposed to be.
Dr. Owens teaches History, Political Science, and Religion. He is the Historian of the Future @ http://drrobertowens.com © 2014 Contact Dr. Owens drrobertowens@hotmail.com Follow Dr. Robert Owens on Facebook or Twitter @ Drrobertowens / Edited by Dr. Rosalie Owens
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Posted by Dr. Robert Owens in Politics, Politiocal Philosophy.
Tags: amnesty, Cathy McMorris Rodgers, Dr. Robert Owens, Immigration Reform, John Boehner, Obama’s agenda, Obamacare, Progressive agenda, Republican betrayal, socialist agenda
With what could be a wave election on the horizon in November due to the unpopularity of Obamacare, why is the Republican leadership raising the white flag? With the end result being a perpetual Democrat lock on the White House if amnesty brings tens of million illegals out of the shadows and into the voter booths, why is the Republican leadership ridiculing those who oppose it and working to implement it daily?
This is like the captain of the Titanic steering his ship into the iceberg on purpose. It seems so inexplicable yet at the same time it appears so obvious. A Progressive is a Progressive no matter whether there is a D or an R after their name. Or to put it another way, a chameleon may change its colors but you can always tell a leopard by its spots.
With the best government money can buy leading the way like the Pied Piper we are flowing like lemmings towards a cliff. We learned nothing from watching the USSR disappear overnight. One day after generations of nightmarish oppression we woke up and it was there and by the time we went to bed it was gone. This great jailhouse of nations spent itself into oblivion chasing centrally-planned visions of utopia and bled itself to death in Afghanistan. Now we are whistling in the wind as our Progressive regime and its counterfeit conservative fellow-travelers dance to the K-Street tune of crony capitalists more concerned with purloined profits than with patriotism.
The two-party system has evolved into a strangle-hold on power by a twin headed bird of prey that makes Mexico’s PRI look like a pale imitation of an oligarchy masquerading as a representative republic. An obviously biased major media ranges from a thinly disguised front for the DNC over at MSNBC to an almost blatant mouthpiece for the RNC at Fox. The populace has been dumbed down by generations of educational malpractice and is lulled to sleep with the bread and circus routine of government support and 24/7 sports addiction.
It is a well-known truism that if you tax something you get less of it and if you subsidize something you get more of it. In America today we aggressively and progressively tax the income of producers while we pay more to those who do less. A culture of entitlement has ensnared a majority of the population. Those who complain about their grandchildren getting trophies for showing up eagerly accept Social Security checks even though they should know the money they paid in was flushed down the Washington maw before they sent it in. A war on poverty has cost trillions and produced no change. A war on racism has produced an entire industry that exists to perpetuate racism in set asides and quotas. Endless wars for peace have only brought more wars as anonymous drone strikes produce as many new enemies as they kill current ones.
Something has gone drastically wrong with the greatest experiment in human freedom the world has ever seen. While we worked to produce food for our families those we had entrusted to be the caretakers of freedom sold our birthright for a bowl of porridge. And now the opposition, the very ones we have elected to reverse these trends,proposes to snatch defeat from the jaws of victory by conceding on Obamacare and passing amnesty.
To imagine that they are misguided is I believe misguided. Mistakes of this magnitude are not made innocently. There is no way our pretend protectors haven’t known since Obamacare passed that no entitlement has ever been repealed. And I predict even if the Republicans win both houses of Congress and the Whitehouse they still would not repeal Obamacare, but they would instead “fix” it. Likewise, there is no way these RINOs don’t know that if they pass amnesty Texas will suddenly face the possibility to returning to the Democratic tent which means a perpetual Democrat lock on the Electoral College.
The Republican leadership knows these things yet what do we see? John Boehner, the Speaker of the House mocking those who oppose amnesty and Cathy McMorris Rodgers, the House Republican Conference Chair saying, “We need to look at reforming [Obamacare’s] exchanges.” I have always felt and continue to feel that raising a white flag is not an effective way to lead a charge. Even though like roaches when you turn on the light these “leaders” will skittle back for cover once their enraged followers shoot down these trial balloons this is how they want to reach across the aisle and shove the knife in their own back.
We can’t really say there isn’t a dime’s worth of difference between the two parties. The Democrats seem to be in the business of managing America’s decline by retreating from the role of policeman of the world while the Republicans led by their Neo-Con wing would have us in wars in Syria and possibly Europe. They may divide on foreign policy from surrender to attack; however, on domestic policy no matter what they say they are both for bigger government, crony capitalism, and socialized everything else.
If the everyday working people whatever their gender, whatever their color, whatever their religion want even a shot at regaining control of the ship of state we need to come up out of the boiler room that is keeping this thing moving, demand to be heard, and take all these perpetually re-elected despots for a perp-walk to the dustbin of History.
The big question is how?
Tune out the propaganda machine of the major media, organize a viable opposition party, give of our time, talent and treasure, and most importantly vote against them all. Don’t re-elect anyone. Turn the whole lot of them out and bring in a new batch. We would do better if we just drafted the first 537 people from any telephone book to be the representatives, senators, vice president, and president. They couldn’t do any worse than spend more than we make and at least there would be someone in there who might actually work for a living.
The Committees of Correspondence, the Sons of Liberty and other organizations fueled and supported the Revolution that made us free. Without organization nothing of importance is ever accomplished. To restore limited government, personal liberty and economic freedom organization is needed or we will continue our drift into a centrally-planned surveillance state that still calls itself the land of the free and the home of the brave.
So why are the Republicans committing suicide? It isn’t because it is the only honorable thing left to do since they have betrayed the trust of their supporters. It isn’t because they see no other way out like the zealots at Masada. It is because the spirit of limited government they once represented is already dead and we just don’t know it. It all makes sense to me now, so can we please wake up and do something about it?
Dr. Owens teaches History, Political Science, and Religion. He is the Historian of the Future @ http://drrobertowens.com © 2014 Contact Dr. Owens drrobertowens@hotmail.com Follow Dr. Robert Owens on Facebook or Twitter @ Drrobertowens / Edited by Dr. Rosalie Owens
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Posted by Dr. Robert Owens in Politics, Politiocal Philosophy.
Tags: Anti-Federalists, Constitution, Dr. Robert Owens, Federalists, Obama’s agenda, Progressive agenda, ratify the constitution
We the People are the opening words of the preamble to the Constitution. Many patriots glory in that name, “We the People” holding it aloft as a banner against the encroachments of an ever expanding central government. In the minds of many it is connected somehow to Lincoln’s famous description of America’s government, “Of the People, by the people and for the people.”
Both of these were revolutionary terms when first spoken.
The people of the founding generation did not think of themselves as “Americans,” instead they saw themselves as citizens of their respective States. The thirteen colonies, with the singular exception of North and South Carolina, were each founded as separate entities. Each had its own history and relationship with the crown. They banded together for the Revolution during which they established the Continental Congress under the Articles of Confederation. This established a confederation composed of thirteen independent States.
When the secretly drafted Constitution was finally revealed to the public many of the leading lights of the Revolution were enraged by what they saw as a counter-revolution seeking to supplant the legally constituted Confederation of States in favor of a consolidated central government. Some of them say the truth was revealed in the first three words, “We the People.”
Every school child can recite the most famous words of Patrick Henry, “Give me liberty or give me death.” You probably said those words in your head before you read them once you saw his name. He is synonymous with America’s defiance to tyranny. While these famous words ring in the heads of all, few know his opinion on the Constitution.
At the Virginia Ratification Convention in 1788, Patrick Henry said,
And here I would make this inquiry of those worthy characters who composed a part of the late federal Convention. I am sure they were fully impressed with the necessity of forming a great consolidated government, instead of a confederation. That this is a consolidated government is demonstrably clear; and the danger of such a government is, to my mind, very striking. I have the highest veneration for those gentlemen; but, sir, give me leave to demand, What right had they to say, We, the people? My political curiosity, exclusive of my anxious solicitude for the public welfare, leads me to ask, Who authorized them to speak the language of, We, the people, instead of, We, the states? States are the characteristics and the soul of a confederation. If the states be not the agents of this compact, it must be one great, consolidated, national government, of the people of all the states.
Ever since the Civil War fatally warped the original federal structure and We the People became a reality the central government of the United States has assumed more and more power until today totalitarianism appears to be within its grasp. I am not referring to the crude overt totalitarianism of a Nazi Germany or a Soviet Russia instead I am referring to a soft totalitarianism, a kind of nanny state smothering of individual freedom, personal liberty and economic opportunity. After the complete subjugation of the States to the central government by the Lincoln administration combined with the increased mobility of the modern era, we the people actually became the way most people think of themselves.
In America today we have a president who in a 2001 interview expressed his inner most thoughts about the Constitution,
If you look at the victories and failures of the civil rights movement and its litigation strategy in the court. I think where it succeeded was to invest formal rights in previously dispossessed people, so that now I would have the right to vote. I would now be able to sit at the lunch counter and order as long as I could pay for it I’d be o.k. But, the Supreme Court never ventured into the issues of redistribution of wealth, and of more basic issues such as political and economic justice in society. To that extent, as radical as I think people try to characterize the Warren Court, it wasn’t that radical. It didn’t break free from the essential constraints that were placed by the founding fathers in the Constitution, at least as its been interpreted and Warren Court interpreted in the same way, that generally the Constitution is a charter of negative liberties. Says what the states can’t do to you. Says what the Federal government can’t do to you, but doesn’t say what the Federal government or State government must do on your behalf, and that hasn’t shifted and one of the, I think, tragedies of the civil rights movement was, um, because the civil rights movement became so court focused I think there was a tendency to lose track of the political and community organizing and activities on the ground that are able to put together the actual coalition of powers through which you bring about redistributive change. In some ways we still suffer from that.
That is as clear a statement of the way our Progressive leaders view America’s founding document, a charter of negative liberties. A charter that they believe needs to be expanded with a second bill of rights first proposed by FDR in his 1944 State of the Union Address,
- A realistic tax law—which will tax all unreasonable profits, both individual and corporate, and reduce the ultimate cost of the war to our sons and daughters. The tax bill now under consideration by the Congress does not begin to meet this test.
- A continuation of the law for the renegotiation of war contracts—which will prevent exorbitant profits and assure fair prices to the Government. For two long years I have pleaded with the Congress to take undue profits out of war.
- A cost of food law—which will enable the Government (a) to place a reasonable floor under the prices the farmer may expect for his production; and (b) to place a ceiling on the prices a consumer will have to pay for the food he buys. This should apply to necessities only; and will require public funds to carry out. It will cost in appropriations about one percent of the present annual cost of the war.
- Early reenactment of the stabilization statute of October, 1942. This expires June 30, 1944, and if it is not extended well in advance, the country might just as well expect price chaos by summer. We cannot have stabilization by wishful thinking. We must take positive action to maintain the integrity of the American dollar.
- A national service law—which, for the duration of the war, will prevent strikes, and, with certain appropriate exceptions, will make available for war production or for any other essential services every able-bodied adult in this Nation.
According to Cass R. Sunstein, the former administrator of the White House Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs, President Obama not only believes in FDR’s Second Bill of Rights he seeks to implement them,
As the actions of his first term made clear, and as his second inaugural address declared, President Barack Obama is committed to a distinctive vision of American government. It emphasizes the importance of free enterprise, and firmly rejects “equality of result,” but it is simultaneously committed to ensuring both fair opportunity and decent security for all.
In these respects, Obama is updating Franklin Delano Roosevelt’s Second Bill of Rights.
We are in the grip of the Federalists on steroids bent on redistributing their way to total power. The question before us today is, “Would we the people ratify the Constitution today?”
Even Conservatives believe in a safety net. Everyone contributes to and hopes to receive from Social Security. No one wants people dying in the streets because they can’t get medical care so Medicaid is available to the uninsured. Of course Medicare is considered a right for anyone over 65. Unemployment is an accepted part of the safety net as are food stamps. If you add up what is already accepted and expected then throw Obamacare into the mix and you see we have become a society addicted to entitlements all of which would fail the test of a strict interpretation of the Constitution.
The 10th Amendment says, “The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people.” The power to do any of these entitlements is not delegated anywhere in the document as it is written, only as it is interpreted.
So would we the people ratify the Constitution as it is written today? I think not. A living document has turned the Constitution into a dead letter and the entitlements we have all accepted have turned the descendants of the Founders, Framers, and Pioneers into supplicants standing before the federal throne waiting for a check.
Only a re-birth of self-reliance, a renaissance of historical perspective and renewed political activity have a chance to bring about a rebirth of liberty in the land of the free and the home of the brave.
Keep the faith. Keep the peace. We shall overcome.
Dr. Owens teaches History, Political Science, and Religion. He is the Historian of the Future @ http://drrobertowens.com © 2014 Contact Dr. Owens drrobertowens@hotmail.com Follow Dr. Robert Owens on Facebook or Twitter @ Drrobertowens / Edited by Dr. Rosalie Owens
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Posted by Dr. Robert Owens in Politics, Politiocal Philosophy.
Tags: Capitalism, Dr. Robert Owens, economic opportunity, Fascism, freedom, liberty, Obama’s agenda, private property, Progressive agenda, progressive education, Progressivism, socialism
Even for someone who learned at their grandmother’s knee that what’s mine is mine and what’s yours is negotiable the knowledge that some things are mine and some things aren’t came early. The whole idea of freedom rests upon the idea that within the wider world which is society there is a smaller circle that outlines what is personal and what is communal. Even in monasteries where monks have taken vows of poverty they refer to my cell, my candle and my prayers.
Private property is an essential ingredient of a free society.
Two of the greatest rewards derived from the study of History are the ability to build upon the achievements of others and the opportunity to learn from the mistakes of others. One of the greatest calamities caused by the failure to study History is a lack of context.
Most people live their lives as if History began the day they were born and they forever live in a constantly flowing and ever changing now. George Orwell said in his epic dystopian novel 1984 that, “He who controls the past controls the future. He who controls the present controls the past.”
The Progressives captured the majority of American education long ago and have taught generations of Americans that capitalism is bad and socialism is good. They have also taught children since at least the 1950s that America has been a grasping imperialistic power that has prospered by taking from others. We are seeing the fruits of this propaganda today.
Instead of memorizing the Declaration of Independence, our children have memorized the outlandish theories of Al Gore. Instead of learning the truth they have been indoctrinated with an inconvenient truth that is inconvenient because it isn’t true. They have been taught from History books that have more about Nelson Mandela than they do about George Washington. And this is not a new thing. I am in my 60s and I was thrown out of public schools for standing up for capitalism by people who were pushing socialism.
If we want to recapture the future we have to recapture the present so we can recapture the past. Today those of us who believe in limited government, individual freedom and economic opportunity live as subjects in a land dominated and occupied by people who act as if America should pay a penalty or do penance for being the greatest country to have ever existed. We must regain and preserve our heritage of knowledge by regaining knowledge of our History or it will be erased from the consciousness of our children and replaced with the inconvenient lies of a shabby Progressive future. A future where the sun is setting for the West rising in the East, and a paternal government seeks to take the place of god.
If we want to save America we must begin at the beginning. Most people think the Constitution is the beginning. Even though our Progressive masters seek to reinterpret it to bring about our end it wasn’t our beginning. Before the Constitution came The Declaration of Independence. This is the seminal document proclaiming to the world a new nation not ruled by kings had appeared upon the stage. This Declaration did not spring freshly from the imagination of Thomas Jefferson. It was not born in a vacuum. Jefferson was a student of Philosophy and History.
When Jefferson wrote the Declaration of Independence he built many of the ideas on the works of John Locke one of the greatest influences on the Framers. Locke had written in The Second Treatise of Civil Government, “The state of nature has a law of nature to govern it, which obliges every one: and reason, which is that law, teaches all mankind, who will but consult it, that being all equal and independent, no one ought to harm another in his life, health, liberty, or possessions…”
This in turn inspired George Mason to write in The Virginia Declaration of Rights which was published just before the Declaration of Independence in 1776, “That all men are by nature equally free and independent, and have certain inherent rights, of which, when they enter into a state of society, they cannot, by any compact, deprive or divest their posterity; namely, the enjoyment of life and liberty, with the means of acquiring and possessing property, and pursuing and obtaining happiness and safety.”
Today the concept of private property is out of fashion as our collectivist rulers try to build a classless society on such misunderstood and elastic phrases as the Pursuit of Happiness and the Necessary and Proper Clause.
Looking at the works and words of our founders and of those who framed the Constitution it is plain to see that the phrase Pursuit of Happiness was everywhere used as meaning the right to own, control and use private property which brings us to economics.
In a capitalistic system people own, control and use their own private property for their own devices. The opposite of that is Communism which advocates the state ownership of all property. Portraying itself as half way in between is Socialism which seeks to extract a portion of the rewards of private property for the benefit of those who do not own it. A malignant form of socialism with a capitalist veneer, Fascism advocates private ownership and total state control of its use.
Looking at capitalism we see the miracle that was the United States. In just a little over 150 years we rose from being 13 impoverished, war ravaged states loosely bound together into a colossus that strode upon the world stage saving freedom first from fascism and then from communism.
One of the founders of the Soviet nightmare Leon Trotsky said of the communistic system he helped create, “In a country where the sole employer is the state. Opposition means death by slow starvation. The old principle, he who does not work shall not eat, has been replaced by a new one: who does not obey shall not eat.”
And although Socialists try to play the part of sentimental reformers who are only out to help the children their ultimate agenda shows that they are in reality merely a stalking horse for their communist big brother. One socialist site puts it this way, “In Socialism, the laborer is the direct manager of their means of production, and receives the whole of their production. In Capitalism, the laborer is dominated by a Capitalist, who directs production and sets wages.”
As for the Fascists their program may sound familiar, “We ask that government undertake the obligation above all of providing citizens with adequate opportunity for employment and earning a living. The activities of the individual must not be allowed to clash with the interests of the community, but must take place within the confines and be for the good of all. Therefore, we demand: … an end to the power of financial interest. We demand profit sharing in big business. We demand a broad extension of care for the aged. We demand … the greatest possible consideration of small business in the purchases of the national, state, and municipal governments. In order to make possible to every capable and industrious [citizen] the attainment of higher education and thus the achievement of a post of leadership, the government must provide an all-around enlargement of our system of public education…. We demand the education at government expense of gifted children of poor parents…. The government must undertake the improvement of public health — by protecting mother and child, by prohibiting child labor — by the greatest possible support for all groups concerned with the physical education of youth. [W]e combat the … materialistic spirit within and without us, and are convinced that a permanent recovery of our people can only proceed from within on the foundation of The Common Good Before the Individual Good.”
Ask yourself where are we today? The government issues regulations at the mind numbing rate of 68 per day. According to a study by the American Action Forum, regulations that went into effect in 2013 cost Americans $112 billion – or $447 million for each of the 251 days the federal government was open. This study also predicts that the regulatory burden will increase to $143 billion in 2014. Who controls the property you own? Who reaps the benefit of your labor? Tax Freedom Day, the day after which you have worked enough to pay your taxes and can now start working for yourself gets later each year. In 2013 it was April 18th, five days later than it was in 2012.
F. A. Hayek tells us in The Constitution of Liberty, “True coercion occurs when armed bands of conquerors make the subject people toil for them, when organized gangsters extort a levy for ‘protection,’ when the knower of an evil secret blackmails his victim, and, of course, when the state threatens to inflict punishment and to employ physical force to make us obey its commands.”
John Locke told us, “Every man has a property in his own person. This nobody has a right to, but himself.” He also said, “All wealth is the product of labor,” and “Government has no other end, but the preservation of property.” These are the bedrocks upon which our system was originally built. The next time you receive your pay look at the deductions. Ask yourself for whose benefit do you toil? Then look around you and think of the taxes you pay, the regulations you must follow, and the rules you must obey; then ask yourself, whose property is it?
Dr. Owens teaches History, Political Science, and Religion. He is the Historian of the Future @ http://drrobertowens.com © 2014 Contact Dr. Owens drrobertowens@hotmail.com Follow Dr. Robert Owens on Facebook or Twitter @ Drrobertowens / Edited by Dr. Rosalie Owens
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Posted by Dr. Robert Owens in Politics, Politiocal Philosophy.
Tags: Capitalism, Dr. Robert Owens, entrepreneur, federal regulations, government control, Obama’s agenda, private ownership, private property, Progressive agenda, Progressivism, redistribution, socialism, spread the wealth around
At one time in America most people were financially independent. I don’t mean by this that most people were wealthy. What I mean is that they worked for themselves as opposed to working for someone else as a hired laborer. People were farmers, or craftsmen, trappers, or frontiersmen. Thomas Jefferson pictured America as a republic based upon the yeoman farmer.
That day has passed. Today most people who work are employed by someone and draw a wage. As a matter of fact in America today it is not overstating the matter to say that of those who earn their own living the vast majority are exclusively wage earners.
Combine this with the reality of our modern infatuation with democracy and it is no wonder that the majority of voters continue to elect people who are pro-worker and anti-free enterprise. This is aptly reflected in our labor laws and the radicalized National Labor Relations Board. It is also reflected in the progressive income tax, the fact that corporate income is taxed twice, once as income to the corporation and secondly as income when the same money is distributed to shareholders. It is further manifested in the bewildering array of regulations that spew forth from Washington strangling business in red tape.
The masses of wage earners have fallen prey to the siren songs of demagogues. These pied pipers point to the visible difference between the rewards earned by those who risk their capital and their personal efforts to start and build an enterprise and those who earn wages to work for those enterprises. These differences in reward are labeled as unfair. It is either intimated or stated directly that those who start enterprises and build their bigger reward have done so by taking from those who earn a smaller reward by working for the enterprises they build.
We hear endlessly about a fair deal, a level playing field and building ladders to the middle class. Government control is offered as a gateway to utopia where those who earn too much give to those who earn too little; from each according to their ability to each according to their need. The Svengalis of redistribution seek to mesmerize people removed from anything except doing a proscribed task for an agreed upon amount. They teach that free enterprise is the cause of the unfairness portrayed as America’s legacy. Our state controlled schools drum the same message into our children until it become to them common sense. The subservient media sing the same song in movies, on TV and in the news.
Building upon this multipronged barrage of propaganda the worship of democracy kicks in to warp our Republic. When we combine those who succumb to the collectivist delusion among the wage earners with government workers and those who are living off the dole and we have a solid majority dedicated to restricting freedom to gain security. A bargain our Founders warned us leads to having neither.
This is where we stand today. The entrepreneur is looked down upon as a parasite on the economic life of the wage earners. Entrepreneurs are portrayed in movies, on TV, and by our leaders as grasping schemers who care nothing for the environment or their fellow man, and the only reason they aren’t throwing grandma off the cliff is because someone is watching. Try to remember the last time Outside of an Ayn Rand novel or movie that you saw capitalists portrayed as anything positive in America. It is generally believed by the low information voters that the only way people get rich is to steal from the poor.
This is a trap; a trap that swallowed Russia and held it captive for generations, and a trap that impoverished Eastern Europe and turned China into one big internment camp. Those who spent most of the 20th century sitting in the dirt eating leaves as a result of their campaign against free enterprise have broken their chains and are today the Tigers of East Asia and the power houses made of BRIC.
Entrepreneurs are necessary. They are the engine that makes the wheels of innovation turn. They are the ones willing to take a risk. They will turn away from the guaranteed wage and the benefits all our parents taught us were necessary for a good life. They are the ones willing to take the chance and hazard their all for something others can’t see. They are the ones who build the organizations for others to work within. Without them economies stagnate, suffocate, and die.
If the government were to take over every business in America and ensure that every wage earner could continue to earn their daily bread does anyone think this would be the America that we have known? Does anyone believe it would be the America that grew from thirteen impoverished war weary states on the edge of civilization into the greatest power the world has ever known? This has been tried before and everywhere it has ever been tried it has failed. Don’t believe the political savants who tell us this time it will work. The ones who say they will do it differently and whose every program proves they are doing it the same.
In Russia the government actually took ownership of everything, and then ran it all into the ground. In Italy and Germany they tried it another way. They allowed for private ownership but with strict government control. Here in our American version we are following the Italian and German path with crony capitalism building fortunes on political access. Our stock market does not move in response to innovation and enterprise it moves in tandem with government policies. The Too-Big-to-Fails make the cronies at the top wealthy as they plunder the assets, buy back the stock, and enrich their friends with options. All while making sizable campaign donations along the way to those who make it all legal. Then when the bubbles burst they get bailed out and the tax payers foot the bill.
If we are to survive let alone thrive we have got to open the way for the innovator. We have got to once again encourage the risk taker, quit punishing success, and stop subsidizing failure.
To give a good day’s work for a day’s wage is an honorable thing. To be a faithful and responsible employee is something we can teach our children. However without the new energy and markets created by innovative entrepreneurs the system will eventually stop growing. When the pie stops growing everyone ends up fighting over the size of their piece. When the pie stops growing and the population keeps growing everyone’s piece must get smaller, except of course for those who do the dividing.
Why do we need capitalists? So that everyone else can have a job.
Dr. Owens teaches History, Political Science, and Religion. He is the Historian of the Future @ http://drrobertowens.com © 2014 Contact Dr. Owens drrobertowens@hotmail.com Follow Dr. Robert Owens on Facebook or Twitter @ Drrobertowens / Edited by Dr. Rosalie Owens
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Posted by Dr. Robert Owens in Politics.
Tags: Dr. Robert Owens, equality, equality of outcome, Federal Reserve, freedom, income inequality, liberty, Obama’s agenda, Progressive agenda, progressive tax, redistribution, socialist agenda, wealth redistribution
From each according to their ability to each according to their need was the hollow promise of the Soviet Union. It was long known to be merely the cover for a ruthless Communist Party that pretended to build a worker’s paradise while in fact enslaving a nation for its own gain.
Today this infamous lie has been resurrected in America as the war against income inequality.
The war on poverty has failed. After decades of propaganda, trillions of dollars, and tens of thousands of regulations there is no less poverty in America than when LBJ sounded the charge of the contrite brigade. Of course it was a shell game all along. The idea that you could take money out of one pocket and put it in another while dropping some along the way aptly describes the effort to tax the rich to alleviate poverty. If all the money that has been expropriated to end poverty had been given directly to the poor we would have ended poverty.
However this isn’t what happened. It was never what was intended to happen. It will never happen because instead of a direct wealth transfer the loot is filtered through politicians, programs and bureaucrats who all siphon off enough to make sure the pennies that eventually dribble out of the welfare pipeline have little resemblance to the dollars that went in. They certainly don’t want to actually eliminate the poor since their campaign slogans and their jobs would evaporate with them.
Anyone who has ever stood hat-in-hand at a welfare office knows the scorn dished out with the meager fare always makes the meal a little less satisfying than imagined. Jesus told us that “The poor will always be with you.” Yet somehow the political savants who hold sway are always able to convince the low information voters that they will end poverty, or as we call it today, income inequality.
The only equality that is compatible with freedom is equality before the law. By this I mean that whenever society, as expressed through government, makes rules they should apply to everyone the same. In other words if a millionaire commits murder and a homeless person commits murder they should both stand before the same tribunal charged with the same crime. Or if a tax is passed everyone should pay the same percentage. We know that in the first case the difference between a dream team of lawyers and a public defender may mitigate the equality just as in the second case a progressive tax system will distort it. However, this goal of equality before the law is the only one where actual equality is what is required to make it work.
All other types of equality, of income or opportunity or outcome require inequality. If this sounds like circular thinking don’t be surprised; it is.
Since people are obviously not equal in talents, abilities, resources or nature the only way to make everyone start in the same place and end up in the same place is to treat them differently. Some must be slowed down and some must be artificially pushed forward. Some must get less than they earn so that some can get more. This is the dirty little secret hidden behind the campaign slogan to end income inequality. In reality it is just another way to describe income redistribution or as our president calls it, “Spread the wealth around.”
Those who make their living selling these illusions are supported by those who make their livings distributing the loot and by all those who think they will get something for nothing. Unfortunately after generations of Progressive education, incremental socialism, and the sloth that is the bread by the bread and circus culture of the couch potato this may now be a majority of the votes counted.
Having sunk beneath the contempt of the Russian people and drown in the red capitalism of the Chinese it seems as if the infection of class envy co-joined to state power has emerged from the faculty lounge and fastened its death grip on America. In the 2012 election the campaign slogan, “GM is alive and Bin Laden is dead” trumped a devastated economy to re-elect the inspiration of the IRS and the excuser of Benghazi. If the war against income inequality proves the media enhanced key to return Nancy Pelosi to the Speakership and retain Harry Reid as the agenda setting leader of the Senate the Progressives will know they have two years to seal the deal.
We will still call it the United States of America. We will still tell ourselves we are free, prosperous, and powerful however we may all be whistling in the wind. Our politicians may win their war to end income inequality as they seek an American version of a worker’s paradise. The comatose voters may even notice that things aren’t quite like they used to be, but then half-time will be over and that will be that.
Look at the results of the 2012 election. GM is moving overseas after ripping off the American tax payers. Al-Qaeda is marching to victory. Think about the pledge that gained passage for Obamacare, “If you like you plan you can keep your plan. Period.” Reflect on this swindle and ask yourself how equal will anything be if we swallow the next big lie: ending income inequality. Ask yourself who will win the war against income inequality. The answer is those who distribute the loot will keep the lion’s share.
As an added bonus this war against income inequality as a campaign tool to fool the masses is leading us further into the unconstitutional waters our president has sailed for so long. Brazenly saying, “We’re not just going to be waiting for legislation in order to make sure that we’re providing Americans the kind of help they need. I’ve got a pen and I’ve got a phone.”
The question here is, “Will anyone in the House have the courage to do something about it?”
Dr. Owens teaches History, Political Science, and Religion. He is the Historian of the Future @ http://drrobertowens.com © 2014 Contact Dr. Owens drrobertowens@hotmail.com Follow Dr. Robert Owens on Facebook or Twitter @ Drrobertowens / Edited by Dr. Rosalie Owens
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Dr. Robert Owens Chronicles the History of the Future 