Underlying Cause and Effects of Violence
Today I received a copy of the letter a family member wrote to the governor of Connecticut. It outlined some of the underlying cause and effects of violence and the political agendas within the movement of gun control. It mingled the precipice of gun control with the concept of sacrifice he and other soldiers made for the freedom to own guns.
And it is certainly a poignantly written letter in expressing the sacrifices of Americans in the wars and battles for freedom, and the concern for how that freedom is being eroded.
For me, the premise of this argument is also a testament regarding how this nation has been crippled and socially fragmented by nefarious agendas and the lack of a unified will within the social conscience of liberty. Points in the letter also reinforced the intellectual struggle which overall underpins the basic premise for the survival of democratically defined liberty and the rule of law.
Our Government Not Representing The People
My point in fact is that there is a public disconnect with politics and our political figures. Not only is our government not representing the people, but the public is not holding their politicians accountable. And this could lead us into the path of a revolution.
The simple fact is that the maintenance of freedom requires the metered force of a public interest to keep it working properly. Like a well-oiled machine, Freedom is more than just a concept. It is a tangible object of morality and intellectual honesty, built and operated by those who imagined it into existence. It is a functional instrument of life propagated by those who commit to keeping it alive by their involvement. Politics in a sense might be compared to a sports event where one has to attend the game to know who the players are and to support the team. Democracy is an event that takes the efforts of the whole team or the game is sacrificed by default.
There is always the complaint that politicians represent corporations and the elite. Politicians bow to powerful corporations and the elite against common rights, because ‘the people’ have fumbled the ball, expecting those they elected to protect their interests without remaining vigilant and placing them in check. Most of the people I have talked with about politics in the past decade vehemently complain about government, but can’t even name their state representatives or what these folks stand for.
People Have Lost Sight of Their Common Values
People have lost sight of their common values and have forgotten history. Frankly, we the people have lost our way. There’s the old adage, “if you aren’t doing something to determine your own future, somebody else will.” And that’s what is really happening in America. It’s been happening since the end of WWII, when Americans started to experience the good life.
Who would have predicted that little more than two centuries after the colonies declared independence from a despotic king across the sea (1776) that people here would be stock piling food and bullets while Homeland Security compiled activity data on every American?
I just wonder if people who stock pile bullets vote or support their own candidate for office. I wonder if any of them have ever voiced an opinion or sent a letter to a senator on how he or she should vote. Have any of them ever participated in a political demonstration in front of the state capitol or had taken the time to review tax proposals and spending agendas.
As long as people blame everything on their government, they’ll never do their part in shaping it.
Accept Responsibility for The Future
John F. Kennedy said; “Let us not seek the Republican answer or the Democratic answer, but the right answer. Let us not seek to fix the blame for the past. Let us accept our own responsibility for the future.”
It is a sham to live in a country that is the best, and allow it to be fleeced by the incompetence of greed. Whether Americans really care about freedom or even understand it, the effect of their actions or inaction will be realized around the world well into the distant future.
It is true that by false reasoning, greed and dishonesty, many of our highest leaders from the military to the White House have violated their solemn oaths to protect the Constitution from both external and internal enemies. Some of them have thus become the internal enemies of American sovereignty, whose actions have compromised the rule of law and the justice and civility that protects all freedom loving people from tyranny.
Millions of Americans have stood on the side lines for over a decade, watching the spectacle unfold as government and corporations have profited from foreign war and terrorist activity, which has increased many fold with the help of US policy.
Many of these people made their living working in weapons factories and other war related industries. Governors have been competing for war profiteering businesses to open in their state because of job loss.
economy Dependent on Perpetual War
Not only is our economy dependent on perpetual war, but unsurprisingly, terrorism, revolution and nuclear threats against the west have increased exponentially with the west’s preemptive attack protocol. A political misadventure designed to increase the necessity of war products
American gun culture is uniquely tied to the many facets of freedom. In reality, the concern that guns will be controlled pales in the light that assault weapons and munitions reach a fever pitch in terms of sales every time tragedy brings on another wave of liberal assaults on gun ownership.
When we look at the 2.3 million Iraqis and Afghans who perished, a person referring to himself as an American should also consider how the Bush family made millions on AK47s manufactured in their own factory – with investment capital from sources like King Abdullah (Royal family of Saudi Arabia) and the Bin Laden family. Here we have the ultimate collusion with common interests between political heads of state and indirect links to terrorism itself.
Legacy of Our Nation?
What is happening here that freedom loving people should be proud of, especially Americans? How does this scenario honor what we proclaim to be the legacy of our nation?
It appears that we have been blind-sided by the unique cultural ideology that associates guns and freedom. We have allowed ourselves to languish in political, moral ignorance and cerebral acquiescence to short term economic payoffs which has become a divisive snare.
Americans are clamoring about the wrong things in deceitful ethics. There is still time to reflect and change the course of the nation’s ardent path, if it begins soon.
The earth is littered with the ruins of once great civilizations that fell to the sword of moral and intellectual decay, expressed by political catastrophe.
There is little doubt that America is moving down the slippery slope of decline as the super power it once was. My hope is that good people will recognize it and have a realistic conversation about what this is all leading to and what can be done to turn it around.
New Revolution and a New America
Perhaps it is time for a new revolution and a new America. Not a revolution of guns, but a revolutionary paradigm of an internal, soul searching nature – truth and resolve.
“There are only two mistakes one can make along the road to truth; not going all the way, and not starting.” Buddha