| America As a Third Rate Nation By Dorothy Anne Seese
It's taken for granted. We're America, the United States of America, the world's only superpower, and we are the leaders of the free world. We are US. Flags fly, cars sport decals and bumper stickers. People wear lapel pins with our flag and perhaps a slogan. At important events, even the President can speak about God and prayer with impunity. The world is supposed to fear us, obey us, and allow us to lead, our military might is second to none. Our citizens are the world's free people. Now, can we get down to reality? The show is over, the stage is dark and the curtain is down. We have to go back outside and face the day, or the night. No nation with a sinking economy and continuing depletion of resources is a free nation. It is a dependent nation. No country where the unemployment is rising, costs and prices are rising, and businesses are moving to other countries can long call itself a free nation. It is an interdependent nation at best. No people who look to the government to solve their problems from cradle to grave can look in the mirror and call themselves a free people. At best they are dependents, at worst they are serfs. Any country that abandons its hard precious metal standards (gold and silver) as the United States did in 1934 and 1973, respectively, and operates on funny money cannot sustain either a free economy or a free country. Uneducated people who cannot think, regardless of the number of diplomas or degrees they obtain, can never be free. They can't handle freedom. A nation that must monitor every move of every citizen, using technology to keep people in captivity or fear of captivity, is not a nation of free people. Worse, when the people willingly surrender what basic freedoms they have in exchange for an IOU marked "security" they aren't even thinking like free people -- even if they are or were up to the signing of the exchange. Representatives of the people who willingly obey a mandate to approve bills drafted by the executive branch of government, abdicating their responsibility to be the legislators, are not free, and they do not represent a free people. Free people do not retain such false representatives, and free people do not allow the leader of one branch of government to dominate all others. That is espousing, condoning and upholding tyranny. A managed media does not represent a free people and free people do not tolerate a managed media. One of our basic First Amendment rights is to a free press. Free people never let any government official rise to the level of total control, because free people insist that the government work for them, not enslave them. And free people know the difference between the appearance of freedom, and true freedom. Is America a nation of free people by these standards? No. Is America a prosperous nation when it has corporations moving to every nation on earth to make goods at lower prices so that their American consumers don't have their former jobs to purchase the products? Yet Microsoft, the last "American Dream" company of a kid who worked on electronics becoming the richest man in America, is moving piece by piece to India, where labor is cheaper and in many cases the people have a better work ethic. No matter what familiar name brand you choose to buy -- from General Electric to Fruit of the Loom -- the goods are not made in America any longer. A few items may be made here, but look at the labels on the boxes (the kind of boxes that had to be re-labeled for a presidential appearance) because they read "Made in China." In the midst of the longest running recession in America's 227-year history, we're in an economic state that the government calls "slow recovery" and the Federal Reserve calls "soft spots." Those are nice words, but in reality, America is broke. Its people are feeling the pinch, living off the capital built up in days when things were brighter and better. Perhaps the last great rainbow to shine on America's economy was the dotcom explosion that left so many disenchanted investors and bankrupt capitalists and entrepreneurs in a heap of rubbish at the bottom of the rainbow. There was no gold there and in some cases there have been and will be prison bars. Our march away from the Constitution, the Bill of Rights and the founders' dreams is strewn with promises by government for more of everything for everyone. It can't be done. Other nations have tried it and failed. Once great colonial powers are now insignificant countries like the Netherlands, Spain and Portugal. And yes, the sun does set on the British Empire. China and India are claiming a large share of the technology business. Other countries are making textiles, shoes and appliances. We who live in the USA cannot afford to buy our own products. What does that tell you about the United States? We've outpriced our ability to afford ourselves. And we didn't see it coming. Most of what we produce in the US is either housing, automobiles, a few durable goods such as washers and dryers, but the big businesses here are service organizations. And we have the smaller businesses such as air conditioning and automotive repair. No nation can continue to exist when it does not produce for domestic consumption and exports. The US is still a major exporter of foodstuffs. For how long, who knows? We can now buy grapes in January because they come from Chile. And we buy them. Our trade deficit grows like those grapes. For all who expect great tax cuts, cheaper prices at the marketplaces, assistance with medical costs, government protection from boogie-men and terrorists without losing our Fourth Amendment right to privacy, let me say you cannot handle the truth. The truth is that we're in bad times, surveillance is everywhere, the Bill of Rights is used by liberal judges to take freedom from some and give to others, and our elected Congressional delegations of Representatives and Senators are looking for votes, not for the best interests of either the nation or the people. Congress is even willing to delegate its power ... its sole power ... to declare war, and give it to the office of the president. The lawmakers on Capitol Hill are busy protecting you from using your land to the detriment of plants and animals, worms and fishes when people need jobs. So we import our lumber and other goods, increasing our trade deficit. And if it is true that in 1967, then-president Lyndon B. Johnson emptied Fort Knox of our gold reserves, then all that needs to happen is for the European Union and its bankers to return to a gold standard and America will be left with a mint full of funny money equal to conch shells on the world trade market. An old song said "everybody wants to rule the world." That isn't quite the whole truth. Some want to own it, and those who do are well on their way to achieving that end. That's the truth we cannot face, particularly when we're sending our youths off to fight a war against "evil" when even The Shadow knew that evil lurks in the hearts of men. When we as a public can face these truths and make our government own up to them, we just might find a way back out of the mire and the muck, the morass and the manure. Otherwise, we can still say we're free because we know how to change channels on the remote. No person can be free when they cannot handle the truth, nor can lies ever be exposed and deficits corrected until we know the truth. If we cannot handle the truth, we cannot handle freedom.
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