Every day, it seems, brings us a fresh story about politicians trying to further erode our rights. Those rights that the Constitution, the “supreme law of the land,” the document that created this nation, the scrap of paper that sits at the top of a pile of laws and regulations whose scope is unknown and unknowable, and whose numbers are well into the hundreds of thousands. Those rights that include the phrases “shall make no law”, “shall not be infringed”, and “shall not be violated.” Today’s tidbit regards an effort to ban the making of undercover videos in California, an effort being pushed by Planned Parenthood in what we might presume is their reaction to last year’s controversy. It follows countless similar examples, stretching back decades.
Just recently, I noted that The Press was considered a vital part of a functioning republic by the Founding Fathers, prompting them to write specific protections into the Bill of Rights. Undercover journalism has long been a vital tool in the press’s arsenal, and journalists throughout history have put themselves at great risk to bring us the truth. But now, as if personal risk isn’t enough, California politicians want to expose journalists to personal liability for doing the job they’re expected to do, because a politically connected organization was embarrassed by what a journalist revealed. This latest move is a blatant and bald-faced attempt to abridge and infringe liberty, and it’s being cheered on by people who seem to only want liberty when it benefits their viewpoints.
The endless onslaught of infringements on our liberties by the government that’s supposed to protect them has gone beyond head scratching, head shaking, or face-palming. It is quite literally rage-inducing – rage born out of a feeling of helplessness. We are watching everything this nation has been built upon be dismantled, stick by stick, brick by brick, and there seems to be little we can do about it. Those few politicians who “get it,” who understand that liberty is both the bedrock of the nation and the only way that people can prosper and pursue happiness, are ignored, cast aside or denounced by those who would impose their will on the rest of us – politician and citizen alike.
It makes me wonder what James Madison, Alexander Hamilton, Thomas Jefferson, John Adams and the rest of the founding fathers would say if they could use a time machine to glimpse the state of the nation today. Would they quote H. G. Wells in The Time Machine and lament “What have you done?” Would they quote Robin Williams channeling Albert Einstein, “what are you doing with my formula? … you meshuggenah, you f*** it up like this?” Or would they embrace their inner Charlton Heston and scream “You maniacs! You blew it up! Ah, damn you! God damn you all to hell!”
I think, though, that these were men of will and conviction, and that they wouldn’t simply do the lonely man walk. They’d look at today’s citizens with disgust for letting thing get this bad, but they’d also resume the fight. To paraphrase the end of Terminator III:
They tried to tell us, but I didn’t want to hear it. Maybe the future has been written. I don’t know. All I know is what the Founding Fathers taught me. Never stop fighting. And I never will. The battle has just begun.
Benjamin Franklin warned us that we’d have to work to keep the Republic the Founders created. America had just beaten back monarchic rule and chose to govern herself in a radically new fashion. Today, however, we are steadily sliding back towards that monarchic rule. While we’re not going to suddenly establish a peerage system or elevate a king, we have been investing greater and greater power in the person at the top and in the structures he or she oversees. And, when we’re not cheering on the President’s expansion of executive branch power, we’re either accepting or demanding that government at all levels do more unto us.
Wake the hell up, and stop demanding that government fix this or that, do this or that, or ban this or that. If you want to live a good and free life, do so, but also extend that consideration to your fellow citizens instead of demanding that they be controlled or subjugated. Fight for your liberties and for the liberties of others. If you don’t, you’ll wake up one day and say, “what the hell happened?”
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