Lance Fairchok

Radio & Freedom: Socialism's Totalitarian Tendency II
March 20, 2009
 

Second Amendment: A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed.

Newsweek magazines Feb 16th cover story announced: “We Are All Socialists Now.” Its teaser saying “In many ways our economy already resembles a European one. As boomers age and spending grows, we will become even more French.” Not good news for those who have lived in Europe and follow events there. European governments continue to grow as do taxes and restrictions on individual liberties. Political correctness curtails freedom of speech and expression and there is no right to self defense. In some European countries it is against the law to defend your property by violence, even if you fear violence will be done to you.

In England and Australia, when the law abiding citizens lost their right to defense and arms, crime has skyrocketed. In Holland the police will not even respond to theft or vandalism crimes, insisting the citizen come to the police station to file a report. Insurance will cover it, so why worry? The ever increasing power of the state does nothing to reduce crime, and the tax burden on the citizen to fund entitlements, healthcare and welfare leads to inevitable cuts in law enforcement. Criminals grow bolder. We now travel down that same road.

The inevitable tension between the government’s propensity to restrict freedoms and the citizen’s inalienable right to keep them as defined in the constitution has been the secret to our success as a nation. The Second Amendment is the lynch pin to America enduring as a free democracy, where the citizen assumes the responsibility of defense, and it ensures that when government seeks absolute power over the lives of its citizens the citizens can fight back. The right to bear arms reminds the power hungry that the citizenry is the master of government, not the other way around. Far from encouraging the “violence of the mob” it makes the citizen a share holder, a responsible participant. That distinction is lost on the left.

The citizen is not a subject or a thrall, but an equal participant, regardless of race, creed, sex or party. Citizenship carries responsibilities, it is not an entitlement. It must be earned and fought for. In America the government works for us, “Of the people, by the people, for the people” is not a campaign slogan, it is the heart of our system where the people reserve the right to overthrow the government should it become a tyranny. Our armed forces swear an oath to the constitution; it is the supreme law of the land, above party or president. We forget this at our peril.

President Obama and his minions represent the largest potential loss of freedoms for the citizen in the history of our nation. Americans are noticing. The reasonable assumption that we will loose our rights pervades every town and village in the heartland. There is a sense of inevitable confrontation and as the stimulus outrage expands one hears “enough is enough” more and more frequently. Guns sales have skyrocketed. The press, as usual misreads the reason for that trend. It is not fear; it is the fierce independence and self reliance found deep in American bones. When trouble is brewing, you defend home and hearth; you protect your neighbors and your community. You don’t wait for the government and you don’t sit around and complain. You do what need to be done. Americans sense trouble and it’s a good bet its coming.

In January I went a local gun show and was surprised to see the line to enter all the way down the block. Even more surprising was the makeup of that line. Where I had expected mostly male hunters and sportsman I saw a large representation of women of all ages, and families of all colors and economic brackets. I asked people why they were there. Their answers were at once sobering and inspiring. Everyone talked of freedom and resistance to excessive government power and corruption.

One woman in particular articulated what people were saying in a clear and simple way. She was in her early seventies, recently widowed and was registering for a concealed carry permit. She also planned to buy a revolver, something ladylike, preferably small. When I asked her why she was doing this now she said; “I have never owned a gun, though my husband did. I am using my right as an American to buy one now so if they try and take it away from me I have something to defend it with.” Those nearby clapped, and woman with two teenage daughters echoed her remarks; “I want my daughters to have every freedom I had. I don’t want anyone taking them away.” She was not just talking about the second amendment. The Obama effect is strong in the heartland. Though Obama promises a great many things, talk is cheap, and the people that actually work for a living can spot a huckster.

During the campaign in 2008 Obama spoke to a group of his wealthy Golden State backers at a San Francisco fund-raiser

 “You go into some of these small towns in Pennsylvania, and like a lot of small towns in the Midwest, the jobs have been gone now for 25 years and nothing’s replaced them,” Obama said. “And they fell through the Clinton Administration, and the Bush Administration, and each successive administration has said that somehow these communities are gonna [sic] regenerate and they have not. And it’s not surprising then they get bitter, they cling to guns or religion or antipathy to people who aren’t like them or anti-immigrant sentiment or anti-trade sentiment as a way to explain their frustrations.”

It is obvious that President Obama does not know people that believe in America, that truly love it, that would fight for it and what it represents. Their fervor is a mystery to him. We must remember that President Obama is a man who was bred into socialism, who was mentored as a boy by communists and their sympathizers, and who was drawn to Marxists and radicals his whole life. He is not a centrist, nor is he even truly American as most of us define it. He does not esteem our foundational values, but looks to them as oppressive. Those that believe in those values are a caricature, rubes that elites titter about over expensive drinks at cocktail parties. Although he presents himself as an everyday American, with all our worries and aspirations; it is a façade, a ruse and a tool to gain the power that he will now uses to deconstruct us.

Jean Francois Revel quotes the great orator Demosthenes in his seminal work “How Democracies Perish.” Demosthenes warned about the intentions of Philip of Macedon to the Athenians:

“For he knows very well that even if he became master of all the rest, nothing would be solidly in his grasp as long as you are a democracy…First of all then, hold him to be an enemy of our Constitution, the irreconcilable adversary of democracy; for if this conviction is not seated deep in your souls, you will not give events all the attention they demand.” – Oration on the State of the Chersonesus, pars. 41 & 43

The totalitarian tendencies of the brand of socialism that Obama and the Democrats work so very hard to implement are quickly coming to the surface. They cannot help themselves. This was the party in power when the atrocities at Ruby Ridge and Waco occurred, how long will it take for the far more radical ideologues in the Obama administration to use similar methods? Conservatives defend America, and work to preserve her. The left demeans and attacks it from within and try to change her. Their America is a nasty greedy place populated with ignorant citizens, wracked with injustice, desperately in need of enlightened rescue. These are the people who would overthrow the Republic, rewrite our constitution, reinvent our institutions and redefine who we are to fit their vision of utopia.

This is a world filled with violence and corruption, fanaticism and hatred, where the naive and timid perish. We are at a nexus in history, a dangerous place where the decisions this President makes will affect the world for generations, where the far-reaching consequences of American weakness will be profound and the lives of countless innocents changed worldwide. It is a time where the possibility of a nuclear device delivered by terrorists or a rogue state detonating in New York or Tel Aviv is very real; much of the world would applaud, as many quietly applauded 9/11.

A great many Americans sense, at a gut level what will be coming if our President and his party succeed.

They are concerned and growing angry, and they are watching very carefully. As the US Congress squanders trillions and embraces dictatorships and terrorist regimes in Cuba, Iran and Syria, and sends 900 million to support Palestinians in Gaza and attends anti-US and anti-Semitic hate conferences in Durbin South Africa, they wonder, if it is this bad after a few months, what will a year bring? At the end of the first decade of the 22^nd century, more than 200 years after the founders penned the first and second amendments; we find that they are more important than ever before.