Wednesday, November 25, 2009

The "Nanny State" Expands

Our esteemed representatives are currently working very hard, we are told, to achieve a solution for the so-called "crisis" in health care (or is it insurance?). With myriad bills in the Senate and the House, we have come to accept the realization that the majority of our so-called representatives have not read, nor intend to read, the documents. We are, however, exhorted to accept their word that these bills are best for the country as a whole as well as for each individual American citizen simply because they have told us so.

As difficult as it is for many of us to admit, our current government was elected based on their being our caretakers, our "Nannies."  The winning campaign spent much time explaining to us what we needed (whether we realized it or not) and how the government they offered would be there to provide us with everything we need . . . as long as the government alone decides what it is we need. We are, as the majority of We the People tacitly admitted by our votes, apparently incapable of deciding for ourselves what is best for us as individuals or as a country.

Those of us who disagreed with that premise were not loud enough nor forceful enough to counter the intensity of the "Nanny State" campaign. We were apathetic and allowed ourselves to be beaten into submission by the variety of weapons employed by those offering the "Nanny State" style of government.

Those weapons included insults (all disagreement was, during the campaign, and is, now more than ever, "racist"), threats of physical violence (the supposedly 'new' Black Panthers supposedly providing 'security' at voting places), and intense use of character assassination as a means to an end (the stridently hateful attacks on Joe Wurzelbacher and Sarah Palin and her family to silence and discredit).

The majority of We the People stood by with hardly a dissenting word or protest. (Whether from fear, apathy, or disgust, I will never understand.) This silence, apathy, or fear -- whatever it was -- brought us the "Nanny State" in which we find ourselves.

Thankfully, we have slowly started to react.

Loud, active protests throughout the country by a very broad cross-section of citizens have expressed the will of the people clearly and distinctly. We have unmistakably stated we do not want the government to be our caretakers. Regardless, our selected representatives have taken it upon themselves to decide for all of us what we will say when we speak (“Hate-crimes” legislation), who will be permitted to say what they think (new FCC regulations aimed at Conservative talk radio) and, most recently and frighteningly, how and to what extent we will be permitted to have our health taken care of.

Despite the ongoing, ever-expanding “Tea Party Protests,” our esteemed congressional representatives insist the protests are representative of only a small, inconsequential group of people, and should not be taken seriously. To the disgust of many honest Americans, Ms. Pelosi has even attempted to align the protesters with murderers such as those who killed Harvey Milk.  (Hopefully, her hypocrisy and crododile tears did not inffluence many.) 

It has become very clear that We the People committed many errors in recent years, exemplified by our current representation, from the President right through to most of the Congress, as reflected in Mr. Reid and Ms. Pelosi.

This result has been directly caused by our years-long apathy towards anything “political.”

It is time this apathy stop. It is time for We the People to accept our responsibility as citizens of this country and elect the right candidates to represent what the majority of us believe and want. It is time for We the People to accept our responsibility as citizens of this country and ensure that those whom we have selected to represent us do the work the majority of We the People want them to do.

Starting with the mid-term elections of 2010, We the People must secede from the Nanny State and become once again the strong, self-sufficient, independent citizenry on which this country was created.

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