I heard it on…Princess Bride?
October 4, 2008 by Aspen Eggimann · 1 Comment
“Do you always begin conversations this way?”
The most humorous conversations are peppered with quotes from the classic movie Princess Bride. If you haven’t seen it, stop reading and go watch it. Like any good classic it gets better and more applicable each time seen.
What can we learn from this classic? Let me point out a few lessons that I think fit perfectly with our times.
1. When I hear our presidential candidates use the word “change” every couple of minutes, unfailingly Indigo’s voice comes into my head saying, “You keep using that word. I do not think it means what you think it means.”
Change is not being in Afghanistan versus Iraq, or visa versa. It is getting out of foreign nations we shouldn’t be in.
Change in education is not working on “No Child Left Behind” as was suggested in the VP Debate. Change would be getting the Federal Government out of education and and giving that power back to the parents and states.
2. As for the bailout just passed in Congress;
“Think it will work?”
“It would take a miracle.”
One senator, after changing his vote to yes on the economic bailout, said that the fear on Wall Street was going to affect Main Street.
Maybe it is time that Wall Street be afraid.
As a nation we cannot continue on in our current economic situation. We have become a nation that consumes more than it creates, spends more then it earns, and takes more then it gives.
Wall Street does affect Main Street, so let us start the process of changing our economic strategies as a nation. Having the government there to catch business when it falls only prolongs and extenuates the long range problems we will face.
3. Longfellow said our nation was a “ship of state” and that all humanity hung upon its fate. If that is the case where is the watchmen crying, “Look! The cliffs of insanity!”
4. I always get a funny feeling when I hear someone in government make statements about easing the burdens of the American people, having the government look out for the middle class and defending the common workers of America. For as the Dread Pirate Roberts said, “Life is pain… Anyone who says otherwise is selling something.”
It is human nature to tend to fall into a trap of wanting things to be easier, to not have to think about problems and to let someone else do the dirty work for us. But it is better to do the work then buy up the services of the government and let it run our lives.
In closing, “Let me explain — no there is to much — let me sum up.”
First, understand that the current debates between presidential candidates are not about change in policy; they are about change in approach.
Second, as uncertain as the future of our economy is right now, “bailouts” aren’t going to help. Ronald Reagan once said that you can talk to a child until you’re blue in the face about spending — or you can cut their allowance. Giving more money isn’t going to cure the mismanagement of it. Our $700 billion dollars is only a band aid on a gaping wound.
Third, lets listen to people who are telling us we are headed towards disaster.
Fourth, now is the time to reclaim the responsibility of self-governance and watch over our nation and communities. Lets stop abdicating our responsibility to others in exchange for convenience.
And next time you watch Princess Bride, think about government — I promise you’ll learn a lot.
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The Constitution: A Rallying Point
August 31, 2008 by Aspen Eggimann · Leave a Comment
“Where are we going from here?”
I’ve been wondering this a lot lately, in regards to America. I hear and read theories about the Information Age and what it will bring, I learn about historical cycles predicting what to expect in the future, and observe the numerous political agendas proposed for the nation, yet still this question remains in a large part unanswered.
It may be difficult or nearly impossible to answer with clarity exactly where we are going, or to make a prediction that would quiet the concerns for the future. While pondering the question I read the following quote from Thomas Jefferson:
“Though written constitutions may be violated in moments of passion or delusion, yet they furnish a text to which those who are watchful may again rally and recall the people.” –Thomas Jefferson to Joseph Priestley, 1802
A written document that immortalizes principles and provides ongoing direction for generations is essential to maintain a strong and free nation.
“The Constitution is a written instrument. As such, its meaning does not alter. That which it meant when it was adopted, it means now.”
– South Carolina v. United States, 199 U.S. 437, 448 (1905)
The principles remain fast in the document, though the actions of men may not follow those principles. The violation of a constitution was foreseen by the Founders as inevitable; men would lose their perspective and deviate from the Constitution in moments of passion — no matter how much the “chains of the Constitution” bound them down. Having a written constitution does more than bind men for a time, however; its real strength is that it provides a rallying point for the People to turn to when the nation flounders and when guidance is needed.
It’s clear that we have deviated from the Constitution in many ways throughout our history, and recent years have been no different. From the repeal of habeas corpus for specified “enemy combatants” to the Patriot Act, we can see the distance we have come from the founding.
The governments’ disregard of our founding document was brought home to me when I read the following story from Ron Paul:
“In 2002, as war with Iraq loomed, I proposed that congress officially declare war against Iraq, making clear that I intended to oppose my own measure. The point was to underscore our constitutional responsibility to declare war before commencing major military operations, rather than leaving the decision to the president or passing resolutions that delegate to the president the decision-making power over war. The chairman of the International Relations Committee responded by saying, ‘There are things in the Constitution that have been overtaken by events, by time. Declaration of war is one of them. There are things no longer relevant to a modern society. We are saying to the president, use your judgment. [What you have proposed is] inappropriate, anachronistic; it isn’t done any more.’
What a relief that we have people in our government who will keep us posted on which constitution provisions they have decided are no longer ‘relevant!’” [Ron Paul; The Revolution: A Manifesto, pg 53]
As a nation that has disregarded its constitution and now strongly questions its stability and future freedom the question, “Where are we going from here?” demands our attention. We have, through fear and passion, given up much of our freedoms. But it need not continue. For we will decide what is next. By using the Constitution as a rallying point to recall a people we will regain the freedom and prosperity that the Founders fought for.
In the end our freedom and our future lie with those that are watchful, those that will take initiative in restoring the Constitution. As Thomas Edison said, “The strength of the Constitution, lies in the will of the people to defend it.”
If the question remains, “Where are we going from here?”, the answer is “Exactly where we take ourselves.” If Jefferson is right, if moments of passion will pass and those who are watching can rally the people, then let it be back to the Constitution.
Have YOU read and do you understand the Constitution? Will you become a constitutional scholar and help restore the American Republic?
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Copyright © 2008 by The Cause of Liberty. All rights reserved.
i Government
August 27, 2008 by Hyrum Lefler · 1 Comment
“Where, oh where, has my liberty gone?” we cry. Too often the answer is, “The ‘government’ stole it!”
One challenge we face as liberty-loving Americans is to bring politics and economics back into the first person. We speak of the “the government” and the “the economy” as if they were independent, conscious entities. The “government” is people, interacting with each other and operating according to forms and policies established by we the people and our duly elected representatives. Likewise, the “economy” is people (We the People!) interacting and acting according to economic forms and norms in the interest of bringing value to themselves and those they love.
Where has our liberty gone? It has gone into the oblivion of the third person — that third person being “i Government.” This is apparently a monster in D.C. that is ruining our lives.
The truth is that Liberty is not a product or even a state of being; it is a process and a lifestyle. It has always found its life and growth in history when people have lived it. It is not birthed or proliferated authentically through legislation or through civil disobedience in the streets.
This article could also be called “i Economy” based on the way we talk about the financial state of affairs in the nation. Has anyone ever seen “the economy?” Well, actually the answer is yes! You see him/her every day in the mirror, and you see economy in every relationship you have.
It is very easy for a nation looking for excuses to raise certain fearful illusions even to godlike status — with powerful abilities and magical powers for bestowing ease and power to its favorites. Unfortunately, this imagined god is also vengeful and will sometimes strike innocent people with undeserved punishments of poverty (against their will, of course). This imagined monster is blamed for stealing people’s liberty.
How To Make the Economy “First Person”
Families have become appendages in economy. They have become flies on the elephant, giving up their place as the central economic source of resources and growth in our economy. With the rise of the Industrial Revolution, and the massive economic shifts that the U.S. underwent in the first half of the 20th Century, came the rise of the consumer-finance industry. You may have heard of the original Sears and Robuck Magazines that came out in the 1920’s, offering American “consumers” (yet another identity that has risen) an array of products on credit. They swept the nation and are a symptom of the rising obsession with material products. A new economy rose; one that has been fueled, burned to charcoal, then burned again and again — on the fires of consumer whims.
A people obsessed with enjoying the fruits before performing the labor will sell even their liberty — indeed they will have to when their resources are depleted. The number one way for American families to bring “the economy” into the first person is for them to take back the direct responsibility and control of their economy. How do they do this? They must adopt economic forms that are conducive to liberty. This is where Georgics come in.
Citizens must learn and apply the timeless lesson that we reap what we sow, and apply it in their financial lives in the following ways:
- Never borrow to consume.
- Spend less than you earn.
- Plant the “seeds” of your capital by invest your savings into people and projects that will bring you the “harvest” of a financial return.
Making the Government First Person
The cliché answers are varied: “get involved,” “vote,” “write your Congressman,” watch the news,” and “speak out for what you believe.” The truth must be admitted: you are the government! I offer a challenge:
Name one person in this entire nation that has more direct responsibility for this nation’s happiness, future, policies, laws, and every other reality, than YOU.
Maybe you would say the President has more responsibility than you. Is that really true, when he is only our representative? If I grant a friend authority to do something for me, it is assumed that in that responsibility I hold the ultimate authority even though I have delegated some task or thing that I could not do myself. We cannot all be President of the United States at the same time, but we are all citizens. If we should not point the finger at anyone but ourselves for the state of the nation, then it is certainly childish to point the finger at our President for the state of our personal financial statements.
I recently listened to a program featured on National Public Radio where a woman called in on the subject of the housing foreclosure spike we are seeing currently. She made the point that she did not hear the media admitting the follies of the people who had signed their names for risky variable interest rate loans. The NPR host was polite at first, but ended up cutting the woman off saying, “Even irresponsible people suffer sometimes, Mam.”
That statement tripped me up for a few minutes. Clearly the host felt it effective to dismiss the truth of the caller’s words with mockery — hinting that this woman was some kind of conservative believer that there is no suffering, only consequences. The fact that the media will not address, let alone admit, the irresponsible financial actions of millions of Americans is another symptom of the upside down nature of our society; a society where courage fails and appeasement reigns. By lifting their audience above reproach, for popularity reasons, the media contributes to their slavery.
The term “i Government” is an interesting mixture of humor and irony. We have formed this identity to shift responsibility from ourselves, and yet the term also makes one ponder the concept of personal governance. Unfortunately, the former interpretation of the phrase is a more accurate description of our contemporary perceptions of the source of responsibility and liberty.
Have you ever considered that it is Americans that have (through their Representatives) laid taxes on other Americans to finance desired benefits? As Benjamin Franklin said, “When the people find that they can vote themselves money, that will herald the end of the republic.” Americans are selling their liberties in exchange for other Americans’ goods and at the expense of their fellow Americans!
Is YOUR palm open facing up, asking for an ear of corn… or facing down, grappling a metaphorical hoe, as you till the ground to plant seeds of production? Are “YOU the Government” taxing or producing?
Move the Cause of Liberty by (1) subscribing to the Sentinel, a free weekly newsletter boldly illuminating the principles of freedom in a darkening nation, and (2) pledging your Life, Liberty, and Sacred Honor to the Cause by signing the Declaration of Dependence.
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Question #7: What are “legitimate foundation” and “legitimate authority” in political philosophy?
June 24, 2008 by Stephen Palmer · Leave a Comment
| 10 Foundational Questions | Introduction | Question #1 | Question #2 | Question #3 | Question #4 | Question #5 | Question #6 |
“The fabric of American empire ought to rest on the solid basis of the consent of the people. The streams of national power ought to flow immediately from that pure, original fountain of all legitimate authority. –Alexander Hamilton
Simply put, legitimate foundation means the will of the People at large, while legitimate authority is the express permission granted by the People to the government to perform some function.
Put together, they form the philosophical foundation of the powerful idea that man does not exist for the state, but that the state exists for man.
Legitimate Foundation
The idea that the government should exist according to the will of the People and solely to benefit the People at large was revolutionary in the 18th Century. Previously, governments primarily benefited those governing, or special interests.
The American Founders taught that the will of the People, as expressed through constitutional means, is the only solid, sustainable, and legitimate foundation of republican government.
This does not mean, however, that they were referring simply to the concept of majority rule alone, as we learn from Federalist Paper #51; the idea is to guide the nation by the will of the majority, while protecting minority rights (i.e. preventing the majority from taking private property).
Legitimate Authority
Thomas Jefferson spoke of legitimate authority in the Declaration of Independence when he wrote, “…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…”
The United States Constitution was the first (and to my knowledge the only) constitution to be instigated by, or to have originated in, the People, then ratified by the People. In other words, the People, through their colonial representatives, called for the Constitutional Convention of 1787. Representatives at the Convention represented the People within their respective territories–not the government itself.
They were authorized by the People to do the will of the People. Our Constitution was initiated and created from the bottom up, rather than dictated from the top down. Then, after its creation by the representatives of the People, the Constitution was taken back to the People–once again through their colonial representatives–to be ratified, or accepted.
Previously, the historical norm was for the government–whether through a monarchy, aristocracy, or other form of ruler’s law–to dictate from the top down the laws and constitutional forms that the People must obey. As David Hume wrote in 1752, “Almost all the governments which exist at present, or of which there remains any record in story, have been founded originally either on usurpation or conquest or both, without any pretense of a fair consent or voluntary subjection of the people.”
Why It Matters
To drive the point home with these critical concepts, think of Read more
Question #5: What are the four foundations of freedom?
June 16, 2008 by Stephen Palmer · Leave a Comment
| 10 Foundational Questions | Introduction | Question #1 | Question #2 | Question #3 | Question #4 |
The Four Foundations of Freedom are:
- Private Virtue
- Public Virtue
- Widespread Education
- Auxiliary Precautions
The Founders consistently taught that, in the absence of these foundations, no society can survive, or at least maintain its freedom.
Private virtue means being a person of integrity; being honest in your dealings with others, being faithful in your duties to your family, controlling your appetites, etc.
Public virtue means to voluntarily sacrifice personal benefit for the good of society. For example, George Washington served two terms as President even when, as he was accepting the post, he wrote that it “would be the greatest sacrifice of my personal feelings and wishes that ever I have been called upon to make.”
Contrary to our modern conception of education, widespread education to the Founders didn’t mean job training; it meant classical, liberal education designed to teach individuals how to think, not what to think (see A Thomas Jefferson Education by Oliver DeMille).
And finally, auxiliary precautions are a society’s forms of government that ideally protect life, liberty, property, and the pursuit of happiness. Auxiliary precautions include Legitimate Foundation, Legitimate Authority, Legitimate Role, Separation of Powers, Checks, Balances, Federalism, Written Constitution, Enumerated Limited Powers, Periodic Elections, Electoral College, and Factionalization.
Why It Matters
What matters most about the four foundations is their order of importance. The Founders understood that no free government, however enlightened, can survive unless the people that it governs are moral and virtuous.
Constitutional government is nothing but words on paper unless its principles are alive in the souls of the people; free nations get the government that they deserve. When a free people fails to internalize and exhibit public and private virtue, no government on earth can keep them from destroying themselves. On the other hand, people who cultivate and maintain virtue and value their principles above their privileges enjoy unlimited prosperity, peace, and happiness.
As Benjamin Franklin said, “Only a virtuous people are capable of freedom. As nations become corrupt and vicious, they have more need of masters.”
James Madison added, “We have staked the whole future of American civilization, not upon the power of government, far from it. We have staked the future of all our political institutions upon the capacity of mankind for self-government, upon the capacity of each and all of us to govern ourselves, to control ourselves, to sustain ourselves according to the Ten Commandments of God.”
In a free government, the People get the government that they deserve. The only way to maintain freedom is to maintain private and public virtue. This leads to the next question…
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