Wednesday, July 20, 2011

Sacred Honor


   Years ago in my youth while reading the Declaration of Independence the last two words “Sacred Honor” jumped out at me like a lightening bolt and why would the founders of America, place that on an equal footing of importance with their very lives and fortunes. It was at that time certain that I realized I didn’t know what they meant, nor if I even possessed such a thing as my own sacred honor and how and where does one acquire such a personally valued thing.
   I set out on a quest to see if others questioned could explain what sacred honor meant to them and if they understood it in the same way, with the same degree of importance as our founders did. What I got was almost as varied as snow flakes from those I questioned. From some with strong religious faith, it was meant the same as the swearing of “so help me God’ in a court of law or pledge while still others thought of it as the honor of trust or responsibility bestowed on them by overall society that they viewed as sacred.
   As I grew older I became convinced that they were talking about truth, honesty and commitment not so much as it related to overall society but to ones own accumulated over time, “objective convictions” regarding their own individual selves. (Being true to ones, own self) living up to their own personal standards as established over time, completely absent what might be called self deceit. This I concluded by reading their own personal writings.
   The difference between public and personal where the personal was of paramount value that was not necessarily in tandem with public perceptions like the difference between a patriot or sunshine patriot that is the sacred honor they placed on par with life and/or fortune which can only be found within.
   Woe be-it onto the Americans of today that have no Sacred Honor on par with our founding fathers, but wallow only in the perceptions of and self deceit of faux public honors. GAP    

Sunday, June 5, 2011

The Hallmark of Freedom is Liberty


What’s all the current political controversy in America among the average citizens all about some may ask, while others say, Democrats, Republicans, the rich, the poor, jobs, spending, immigration, wars, Islam, corruption, rights, etc.. But all those things are but smoke clouding the minds of both those that consider themselves; as liberal or conservative and they both view themselves as Patriots.
  Like the old adage from the railroad industry “stop, look, listen” modern Americans have discarded the reason behind the words, while remembering the words only as old hat that does not apply anymore because we modern men/women are intellectually beyond such admonitions.
  Black Americans today equate slavery as the opposite of freedom, yet when given freedom without the liberty to individually exercise that freedom held them under the thumb and whims of the political élites, and all the rest of America has adopted the same point of view. It is not the words that matter but the true historical meaning and understanding of them when we use them.
  Anarchy benefits only the physically strong or those that can amass power through the collective. The collective benefits only those that rank among the elite, on the backs of the majority.
  In the lead up to America's original revolution; the call from the overwhelming majority was not for freedom from Great Britain; it was for “LIBERTY” we were already free, but freedom without liberty from the controlling civil authority, means only limited slavery as apposed to full fledged slavery like that imposed on most of America's blacks at the time. Individual liberty was at the very root purpose of our Constitution by limiting government as to its power to curtail or restrict our liberty to exercise our rights and freedoms given not by government but by our creator.
  In today’s modern America the same issue of “LIBERTY” is the motivating factor behind the so called TEA PARTY movement even though many among them don’t realize it and focus on the smoke.
GAP
"Guard with jealous attention the public liberty. Suspect every one who approaches that jewel. Unfortunately, nothing will preserve it but downright force. Whenever you give up that force, you are inevitably ruined."--Patrick Henry, speech in the Virginia Ratifying Convention, 5 June 1778
"It is natural to man to indulge in the illusions of hope. We are apt to shut our eyes against a painful truth -- and listen to the song of that syren, till she transforms us into beasts." --Patrick Henry

Monday, May 9, 2011

Freedom & Liberty

   In America three words standout in difference between each other, “Freedom”, “Liberty” and “rights”. This is no small matter as they apply to every individual that makes up our society. The more people having differing views of these words the more we disenfranchise each others place in our society.
   “RIGHTS”; Are prerequisite to our birth as humans and no authority created by man in this world, has the “RIGHT” to diminish or enhance them as they apply only to individuals, not! groups in society.
   “FREEDOM”; Equates as to its opposite “slavery”, where others assume the civil power do dictate every aspect of you individual life in society and you have no say in the matter other than your human right to rebel against them, you may lose, or you may gain your freedom but the question remains at what cost to you, asserting your right to rebel.
Mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed---declaration of independence

   LIBERTY”; is the civil authority allowing unencumbered exercise of individual freedom within the confines of society. Example; when the emancipation of slaves in America took place it gave freedom to the slaves but didn’t mandate it’s co-partner “liberty” and when we finally did enforce liberty it was called group civil rights which is not compatible with our Constitutional system of government which is founded on liberty of individuals not groups!
   Our failure to educate our own people as to the supremacy of our Constitution and the men, who so painstakingly crafted it, was and still is the only thing that has the capacity to destroy our way of life which will set all mankind on a collision course with the past failures of man.  GAP      

 "Without wishing to damp the ardor of curiosity or influence the freedom of inquiry, I will hazard a prediction that, after the most industrious and impartial researchers, the longest liver of you all will find no principles, institutions or systems of education more fit in general to be transmitted to your posterity than those you have received from your ancestors." --John Adams, letter to the young men of the Philadelphia, 7 May 1798

Thursday, April 21, 2011

Of the people, by the people, for the people!!

  Abraham Lincoln expressed with words the sum-total of the principles of Americans’ Constitutional government with; “of the people, by the people, for the people” within his Gettysburg address. His summary to Americas’ future has been forever after parsed and twisted by every succeeding generation, which has rendered it meaningless in present day America. Only the few enlightened citizens understood it, while at the same time everyone that heard or read the Gettysburg address knew it meant something most profound.
  Please allow me to explain; when the founders crafted our Constitution, the words they used could not be used to explain the intention (intent) behind their express usage without turning the document itself into a long story of explanations. That is why many of the founders wrote and spoke extensively before, during and after crafting the Constitution in order to explain in long form the intent behind every aspect of it, thus the document was the law of the land, not the explanations or intent for those laws, those can only be found in the writings and words of the founders themselves.
  To assist in explanation lets look at the words “regulate interstate commerce” within the context of the Constitution, commerce means; “business traffic”. It does not mean the business itself only the interstate trade and traffic of that business. The word commerce has been twisted to mean regulating the business, including the process of manufacture and/or the services of the business. When one reads what the founders had to say and why that clause was included, its intent becomes clear. It was put into the Constitution to prevent any one State from taking unjust advantage of any other State because of any factors not available to them like a sea port or mfg. base verses farming.
  Example; if you lived in a State that had oil resources, you could not charge the citizens of other states more for your oil than you charge the citizens of your own state, cost of transport excluded of course. Thus the commerce clause does not give the federal government absolute authority over how, what, where, when and why of any of the peoples business without showing just interstate cause for such intrusion of federal authority, and the federal government would otherwise be impudent as to the peoples business. While I’m at it I might also say that a State to tell a business in their State, like an insurance company, they cannot sell that insurance in any other State is likewise unconstitutional as a condition to operate within it. In the plain language of Lincoln, it’s all about of, by and for the people not of, by and for Government State or federal.
  The final part of understanding Lincoln's of, by and for the people is this; American government was intended to never compete civilly with any private business period and to do civilly only that, that the people could not to for themselves, not those things the people didn't want to do, but just couldn't do . That included even police, fire, parks & recreation, water, electric etc. only the military was exclusive along with weights &; measures and coinage post offices and roads, the courts etc. all else was to be of the people, by the people, for the people.  GAP