What Happened to Americas Independence?

Is it me, or is July 4^th ever referred to as Independence Day? The typical American is so disconnected from our Constitutional past, for the fight for independence. We give great lip service and slogans of being free and put on great celebrations and make elaborate spectacles of ourselves. But, hardly is the 4^th of July referred to as Independence Day anymore. So, what is it that we're celebrating? Does anyone care? Is it too politically incorrect to say it? Or is that we don't want to furnish a lie? As we applaud soldiers in uniform on cue, place flags in our yards, and lip-sync the words to the national anthem at sporting events, give a thought to what is all for. Do we even know why we do it? Is it just something to do because we think that it is expected of us as eyes are all on us? Yet, if we should dare to make too much to-do about being American, like placing a flag on our desk at work, wearing Ol' Glory on our t-shirts at school, or demanding that American values and language be dominant, we risk great disfavor in this era of extreme political correctness and fear of "offending" someone.

As I look around I see little sign of Americans, less than America's, freedom or independence. Freedom and personal responsibility have become words that are spoken as times of "back when" and "in the old school days". Today we seem to be unwilling to take personal responsibility for our actions, which is the major consequence of personal independence and freedom. Today government is more involved in the lives of the American citizen than at any other time in the nation's history. Too many of us have grown weary of the burden of freedom. The notion of government entitlement is rampant. Government regulation of what we speak, what we think, and what we do with our time and money is at an all time high. There are more citizens working for the government and dependent on the government for our very existence then ever before. Our public/government school system is one that teaches not to be free-thinkers, entrepreneurs, or independent, but how to be workers, conformist, and to be dependent on it [the government]. The existing political currents seem to be hell-bent to make America so financially, intellectually, and morally destitute that we have no choice but to go to the world with cap in hand and prostitute ourselves to world's benefit and pleasure.

Over the past 16 years, U.S Administrations have sought fit to turn a nation that once was a world exporter and creditor, to one that is a world importer and debtor. Within the first 6 months of the current federal Administration, Mr. Obama has gone on a world tour apologizing for America's dominance and has established a policy capitulating to global consensus, via the United Nations, rather than first considerating America's best interest. Due to generations of mis-education, today the average college graduate is more able to recite David Letterman's Top 10 List than the first 10 Amendments to the Constitution. Today, children are taught that what is theirs rightfully belongs to the collective, or those "less fortunate". No longer do we teach Biblical principles such as, "reaping what you sew", or being rightfully able to enjoy the harvest of ones own labor. Unlike when I was growing up, when my parents bought me school supplies to take to school, it was not for the use of other kids who were "less fortunate", but for me to use.

In generations past, the issuance of credit was one that was used and given with respect and much forethought. And to be on welfare or be content to receive charity was worst then death itself. That was the way we thought back then. The psychological comfort that we today find with amassing hundreds, thousands, and trillions in debt, and social deviancy, both personally and via the government, has led us to accept a far lesser standard for not only ourselves, but our leaders. This has had grave consequences for our nation's independence and quality of living. To be free is to be independent in mind, to be producers and manufacturers of our destiny, and that of others. To be independent in mind, naturally leads one to be responsible for his actions. This type of mentality is in great contrast to one of group identity, one that has an entitlement mentality, and one that finds comfort in being servants and dependent on others for his very existence. Unfortunately we find ourselves resembling more of the latter then the former, as a nation.

We personally find ourselves serving more to the needs and wishes of either the banks or credit companies and now our nation is working for the benefit of countries such as, Communist China, due to the unprecedented financial debt that the U.S government owes to it. Adlai E. Stevenson may have said it best when he stated, "A hungry man is not a free man". Maybe he understood that a hungry man would more likely to accept spoiled meat, not noticing the chains being attached to his legs. And as a nation, it would be more willing to put itself at harm unable to defy the wishes and needs of the owners of its debt. No more than a junkie defying the demands of the drug pusher to satisfying his debt by selling his children into servitude. The unrealistic notion that we as a nation can use credit as true wealth, abandon the will to be self-sufficient, and being a military tiger with no moral and ethical foundation has come to slap us with a blistering towel of reality. A nation can not remain strong and independent as servants to the rest of the world. We can not be the masters of our future as those who are the manufacturers and developers of wealth. Alexander Hamilton rightfully stated that, "Not only the wealth, but the independence and security of a country, appear to be materially connected with the prosperity of manufactures...Every nation ought to endeavor to posses within itself all the essentials of a national supply. These comprise the means of subsistence, habitation, clothing and defense..." What kind of America is it that we seek to leave our next generations? Or is it all about the now, today, for us?

The Obama Administration, with its rhetoric of fear, has saddled each and every U.S taxpayer, adult and child, with nearly $700 Thousand Dollars in debt, due to its unparalleled spending and borrowing policy, for generations to come. At the same time the Administration seems to be unwilling to cease practices that cost the nation billions, financially and socially, such as, the importation of cheap transient labor who many have no loyalty to the country and have detrimental effect on the financial and social wellbeing of America, the deployment of America's sons and daughters to foreign lands, except in the defense of our clear and stated interest, the transfer of vital American infrastructure, technology, and manufacturing to foreign lands to our detriment, and create a tax system that rewards saving and investing that would make America the worlds greatest generator of real wealth, like the Fair Tax. All he can do is scream that we are in a crisis. Woooo! If we are in a crisis, it is one of national independence and sovereignty, and of real, honest leadership founded in American Constitutional integrity. Obama's predisposition of appreciation of socialistic principles is driving America to view itself through the lens of dependency, whether it to be dependent on nations such as Communist China for financing and goods, or Mexico for labor, or the foreign owned Federal Reserve Bank for financial regulation of American banks, or that Americans salvation can only come through the hands of government. Is this what our Forefathers, sons, and daughters, fought and died for?

America is abundant with natural resources, gas, oil, coal, as well as the greatest human resource that comes from people who are free to achieve greatness. Yet, we are not allowed to unleash our embedded greatness. We are given only choices between two negatives. A choice between chopping off both legs or one leg; even though you can still walk, though not run. There seems to be no real will of the people to demand that our elected servants seek to serve our interest, rather than that of other nations, or the "global community". Americans must reignite our love for independence and relinquish the notion of security for freedom, demand high standards and virtue for ourselves and for our government, rebut any notion of socialist or globalization and establish an "American First" policy, and retain the love and appreciation of how special it is to be living in America and to be an American. America and Americans are far from independent or freedom if we do not retreat from the edge we will descend into the abyss and forever relinquish our cherished covenant of freedom and independence.

The consequences of a peoples psychological disconnection from the history and respect of our nation's past struggles for freedom and independence makes a future of its seeds impossible due to the lack of knowing how to cultivate the soil for proper replenishment. Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, a 1749 German poet, stated one of the most fitting of quotes, "None are more hopelessly enslaved than those who falsely believe they are free." Today the question is whether or not we have come resigned to the fact that we are not free, just act as though we are?