It’s Independence Day 

What does it stand for in 2011? Are we still free?

July 4th, 1776 is considered by some to be the sort of official birthday of the good old US of A, but that would actually be July second.

But what the hell; why let a few facts get in the way of a good story, heh?

Its significance was so great that John Adams wrote this to his wife, “The second day of July, 1776, will be the most memorable epoch in the history of America”. Oops.

The effective date of the actual legal split of the 13 Colonies from Great Britain would have been the day the Second Continental Congress voted to adopt a resolution of independence. The Declaration of Independence was approved two days later, on the fourth.

We seem to have lost sight of the significance of the date and what it really means. It has evolved into a sort of summer festival and an excuse to string together as many days of drunken mayhem as possible.

In addition to the fingers that will be blown off, the grinding auto collisions, the houses burned down, drunken anger will lead to the requisite shootings, stabbings and assaults. And, because summer is softball season, there will be the sweet ping of high tech aluminum/titanium alloy striking bone. “When I say yer out…yer out, mother-fucker!”

And, of course, the men will be even worse.

Many young men will not be with us on the 5th of July and will achieve their life’s apex and garner a Darwin award. Their famous last words, “hold my beer and watch this.”

By Tuesday the jails will be overflowing with the ones not in the trauma unit or the coroners fridge.

Trust me; I’ll be celebrating my freedom to hunker down at home until all of the silliness blows over.

If we could only find a way to channel all of that reverence for our freedoms into some actual participation in the governing process maybe our beloved country wouldn’t have to fall into calamitous ruin.

But I am not too hopeful. My research for this article drew me to Swami’s, a great surfing beach and the garden of Parmahansa Yogananda’s former temple. The whole area has a sort of spiritual vibe to it and in addition to the positive energy I always feel around there, I wanted to talk to people about the meaning of the fourth of July.

Two surfers broke it down this way. They told me that freedom was ”righteous”, “rad” and “gnarly” and that the “pilgrim dudes” fought the red-coats and now we have fireworks.

But they hadn’t a clue about the Declaration of Independence so in case they skipped over this when you were in school; let’s review a highlight or two in light of our current predicament.

“We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.”

Our founding fathers believed we had an absolute right to the pursuit of happiness. Our current leaders believe they have the absolute right to do whatever they want regardless of how miserable it makes us.

“That to secure these rights, 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 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 affect their Safety and Happiness.”

The consent of the governed? Safety and happiness? Boy, these guys were obsessed. Can you name three elected officials who really care about us?

Our forefathers knew about oppressive self-serving governments and wanted to guard against the natural evolution toward totalitarianism. So, they did not advocate that governments should be overthrown as a matter of course but they recognized the possibility of the necessity.

“Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shewn, that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed.”

They even recognized that people are extremely reluctant to cast aside that to which they have become accustomed no matter how bad things get.

“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.”

They affirm that it is not only our right but our duty to overthrow bad government, and we really have bad government. Motive matters but the results speak for themselves. Whether they are dishonest or incompetent, we cannot afford to let them continue to run things.

What would Thomas Jefferson say about our situation?

“And what country can preserve its liberties, if its rulers are not warned from time to time, that this people preserve the spirit of resistance? Let them take arms. The tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time, with the blood of patriots and tyrants.”

Fast forward 235 years and the gap between what those guys obtained for us and what is left is a tale of neglect and indifference.

Investment banks created investments that their own research showed them would fail, sold them over and over again, and in each case made side bets that paid them when the investments predictably failed.

The most profitable companies pay zero taxes and get government subsidies to train workers in the third world to do our jobs for thirty-seven cents an hour. How fucking patriotic is that?

The result; record unemployment, record foreclosures, failing communities, and everything that is being done in response is exactly the wrong way to solve the problem.

No reasonable thinking person could honestly say that something hasn’t gone terribly wrong with our Democracy. Five hundred and thirty five people, most of them shameless pitch people for big business, control everything.

They are Congress. If they say they want a balanced budget, why don’t we have one? If they say they want quality health care for all Americans, why don’t we have it? Who the hell is stopping them? The truth is that they want none of that. Just look at the gap between the rhetoric and the results.

And it didn’t happen overnight. We lost interest in it. It came too cheaply to succeeding generations and our totems evolved from noble ideas about the human condition to Bud Lites, big pick-ups, and television shows that feature people working at jobs that hardly exist anymore.

Real Patriotism has been replaced by unquestioned jingoism. If you think a war is a bad idea, you can’t be patriotic.

Real tangible rights have been replaced by slogans and symbols.

The flag is a symbol. It is not freedom. It doesn’t represent the freedom of self-expression if it is illegal to burn it. I’m not advocating flag burning but let’s remember that we do not need a right to self-expression if we only do and say things that are popular. Our rights mean less than the symbols that represents them. And many people buy that absurdity.

Flags are made of cloth. They wear out. I’ve gone thru quite a few of them. Do you know the prescribed method of disposing of a tattered Old Glory? They’re harder to light than you think.

Sharper Image used to burn holes in flags and sell them as battle-scarred replicas from grand old wars gone by. If you can make a buck on it, no one cares.

Rather than being symbols of freedom, they are really symbols of conformity.

Controversy is created where none would have existed.

Keeping us divided and scrapping over petty issues is the goal of both sides of the political spectrum. They have no answers to any legitimate questions so they keep us distracted with nonsense.

For example, a couple of weeks ago a television network, showing a golf tournament, broadcast The Pledge of Allegiance absent the word God.

Imagine. God loves golf. He was probably watching in 3D.

Turns out that the only reason he didn’t unleash Armageddon is that he wasn’t offended that his name was left out of our Pledge.

God has a longer memory than talk show hosts. Absent from all of the outrage was the truth. The Pledge was written in 1892, ironically by a Baptist Minister, and the word God wasn’t in it.

In 1953, I attended Kindergarten at Taconite Elementary School on the Mesabi Iron Range. The first thing I ever deliberately memorized was, “I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America, and to the republic for which it stands, one nation, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.”

Blasphemy, you say? Not at all. My memory is pretty good too. I recited it every school day for two years. The American Legion lobbied Congress to have “under god” added to the pledge which occurred late in 1954. How the hell are they going to reprogram me after all the time that has passed? Good thing I don’t announce golf tournaments.

This is what passes for political discourse. The Pledge during the telecast of a golf tournament? How do they keep a straight face behind all that phony bluster?

It is the politics of divide and conquer. As a result, our nation is weaker today than it was at its birth.

And be careful what you say about that. The Supreme Court recently made warrantless searches the law of the land.

If a rich guy wants you waterfront property, kiss it goodbye. Ask Susette Kelo or Ahmad Mesdaq about eminent domain.

Police across the country are arresting citizens for videotaping them performing their public duties, as public employees, in public. Ask Emily Good about the reality of living in a police state.

Why let the people who destroyed our former Republic get away with it? If the appropriate agencies won’t act, it is because they are bought and paid for.

Somehow, people have gotten the idea that it isn’t possible to overthrow our government by force, but apparently Thomas Jefferson was not among them.

Remember those guns we’ve been stockpiling since 1776? Isn’t this what all the Second Amendment advocates say we’ve been keeping them for?

So in the true spirit of Independence Day, I think it is fitting to take a moment and ask an important question; as corrupt and dysfunctional as our government has become, are you Patriotic enough to do what Jefferson would do? Well are you?

George W. Mantor
The Real Estate Professor
Founder, American Foreclosure Resistance Movement
http://www.realtown.com/gwmantor/blog
http://www.gwmantor.hersid.com/

“First they ignore you, then they ridicule you, then they fight you, then you win.”  —  Mahatma Gandhi

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