Politics
Out of context: Reply #5623
- Started
- Last post
- 33,773 Responses
- TheBlueOne0
You know the US Constitution, in it's preamble, specifically says of the reasons the country exists at all is to "establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defense, promote the general Welfare".
We have witnessed the slow erosion of any idea of the Commons in this country, especially in the last thity years. Sometimes protecting the health of the whole is the best route for protecting everyone one of us as individuals. And since when did the concept of "freedom" come to mean only the ability to grab as much stuff before your neighbor grabs it? (See Plumber, Joe Theory Of America). And you know, maybe "insuring domestic tranquility" is accomplished by making sure that wealth and it's attending ability to distort the power of the government isn't concentrated into too few hands. We had a goddamn revolution to make sure a few men couldn't rule over all, yet it seems like America just wants to sit back and let the power get more and more concentrated in fewer and fewer hands. And the minute someone starts saying "Hey, this ain't right.." the whole "You must be a communist/socialist! Unamerican!"
really? There is two hundred years of history of good, red blooded americans who have given up life and limb to make sure that the Commons isn't handed over to the monied and the powerful, that the poor have justice, that the defense is for everyone and not to protect merely the property of the rich, and that the general welfare remains more general than specific.
These aren't "socialist" values. They are American values. Old, sturdy, plain and simple. But just like how it took a Civil War and a Lincoln to make us realize that either all men truly are free, or none of us are. Just like establishing justice and tranquility and caring about the common welfare actually is fucking american and not "socialist" or whatever..
Now if you think that by sacrificing a bit of my money to ensure my fellow citizen can be healthy and strong is a slippery slope to tyranny, well, you have the right to think that. But I would say you're wrong.
But go on and call these values "socialist"..there's always been a royalist/elitist strain in the US, from the Torries on down..they've been trying to roll back the rights and powers of Free men to attend to their own government since the beginning. If you think that a government of free men voting for policies to protect the weakest among us, so they can come to rise and stand with us protecting liberty is equal to the tyranny of kings or the evil of dictators, I'd say you've been deluded and corrupted.
- +1 True American PatriotMirpour
- snap!DrBombay
- I don't cotton too much to the word "patriot". Kinda leaves a bad taste in my mouth. I like citizen.TheBlueOne
- fair enough citizen it is!Mirpour