Cluster Obituary

Liberty, R.I.P.

 

By Jeff Scott

 

Liberty used to be one of the founding principles of the United States.  After all, the Declaration of Independence says that one of the purposes of government is to protect liberty.  In the last 230 years, however, the government has used its power to destroy the liberty of its citizens.  The worst part is that the people are not only willing to allow the usurpation of their liberties; they are apathetic towards liberty and even complicit in the destruction of liberty.  The American people do not care about preserving individual liberties because they prefer to have the government take care of them like a parent.  They prefer to have the government make their lives easier by stealing money through taxation from those who are successful and redistributing it to themselves.

 

The American people started their transition from loving liberty and fearing government to fearing liberty and loving government during the Great Depression, when they incorrectly saw the free market and economic liberty as the cause of the Depression.  The citizens living in that era wanted the government to take over and help them; President Franklin Roosevelt was more than willing to subject the American people to servitude under government to gain popular support at liberty’s expense, at one point even going so far as proposing the almost complete government seizure of all income above $25,000.  Fortunately, this did not come to fruition.  Some of the other programs Roosevelt instituted, however, continue to plague the United States.  Social Security, which today constitutes a full one-third of the annual federal budget, is the largest program of mass redistribution of wealth in American history.  The government forcefully seizes 12.4% of every dollar you earn to pay for this program, with absolutely no guarantee that you will see any return on what they want you to perceive as your investment.  Unfortunately, the ignorant masses of Americans believe that they will be incapable of surviving without what they believe to be a guarantee of Social Security when they get old, so they unquestioningly accept the status quo.

 

The problem is truly that the American people desire freedom more than they love liberty.  I know many of you are thinking that the two are one in the same; however, I am using a different context.  The liberty that I love and desire is the right of every individual to do what they wish as long as it does not infringe on the life, liberty, or property of another individual.  Most Americans today prefer freedom from the hassles of life.  They want freedom from bills, from having to pay for their own health care, housing, retirement, food, gasoline, and other living expenses.  They want freedom from responsibility.  That is not liberty.  In fact, those who receive those government handouts become slaves to the government.  They are not self-reliant; they are fully dependent upon their government masters.  In exchange, they are willing to allow the government to forcefully confiscate their earnings and desire the same, to a much harsher degree, for those who are successful and earn more than they do.  They want the government to steal from them to pay for those programs which have become their masters.  This makes the taxpayers slaves to the government as well, as they work without pay because the government steals in many cases well over one-third of every dollar they earn.

 

Liberty is not only dead in terms of economic matters.  The federal government forbids you from putting certain things in your body which they deem harmful to you.  Government at all levels tells you what you can and cannot do with your own property.  They handcuff law-abiding citizens from defending themselves by telling them where they can and cannot carry a firearm.  They determine how much water your shower and toilet can use, and how much gasoline your car can use.  The state of California even now requires that the state have control over the thermostat in homes so that they can, in times of ill-defined “emergencies,” determine how warm or cool an individual’s house can be.  These are only some of the more obnoxious examples, but they illustrate the point that government has control over every facet of our lives.

 

So anytime you hear any politician talk about freedom or liberty, ask if they are willing to eliminate the welfare state, stop stealing from successful American people, and allow individuals the freedom to behave as they wish without government infringement.  If not, then that politician is no friend of liberty, only another politician looking to enslave the American people for his own personal gain.

 

So rest in peace, liberty.  You had a good run, but the American people are more interested in shirking responsibility than in having liberty.