WHERE ARE WE GOING?

I realize that this is an older video (July 1, 2009) but it is just fun watching Helen Thomas go after the Obama administration. Of course, after the events of the last few days here in St. Louis, she might want to watch her back.

"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."

The Declaration of Independence

Where are we going? Very few in this country would argue that it is time to throw off our government in its entirety but it seems that a large percentage are beginning to believe that at least some of it needs to go.

I think that we are coming to the end of that long train of abuses and usurpations, the constant expansion of government at the expense of our liberty. When even Helen Thomas starts to turn on this administration it becomes evident that something is changing, that we are living in a pivotal moment in history. Regardless of political persuasion Americans can sense that our government has become something that was never intended by the founders.

"...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 effect their safety and happiness."

The Declaration of Independence

Am I alone in sensing the disconnect between the powers that our government is assuming to itself and the powers that were granted by "we the people"? Through our representatives we have consented to allow government to grow far beyond its design limits. We have no one but ourselves to blame for the current state of affairs. However, government seems to have taken unto itself powers that most of us never intended it to have; the power to monitor our spending, our medical decisions, our travel, our communications, what we eat and through manipulation of the financial system, the value of our labor and so much more that is just the background noise of our daily lives.

Assuming that most Americans don't want to see our country collapse in violent revolution, how best do we change the system from the inside? How do we come together to decide the extent of change we desire? At this point a loose confederation of people with similar concerns have been bound together through the Tea Parties. Is there some sort of central authority that is coalescing in this movement to create a force with true national ramifications? Or will they just continue to protest without the ability to cause any real systemic change? Once the media gets tired of this and moves onto something else the Tea Parties will loose all effectiveness.

Where are our Jeffersons, Adams' and Franklins? We need leaders. Not just flashy, charismatic, self serving politician types, but people of vision, that understand where we have been, where we need to go and that have the intellectual capacity to make the arguments supporting their, and our, beliefs.

Are there people today willing to risk everything, even death, to secure for the people of this country the freedoms that are our birthright, the freedoms that have been usurped and abused? I pray to God that there are, and that they stand up soon. We must make this time in history our time, else the forces of darkness will assume it for their own.

Our Founders understood the risk. Do we?

"..And for the support of this declaration, with a firm reliance on the protection of Divine Providence, we mutually pledge to each other our lives, our fortunes, and our sacred honor."

The Declaration of Independence