Americans have come full circle in 239 years

239 years ago, the majority of the citizens of what was then the 13 British colonies established in the New World had had enough – King George III had bullied, abused and neglected these hard working folks to the point that they could no longer tolerate the ‘Intolerable Acts’: their government had taxed them beyond any reasonable limits, it trampled on their dignity and was simply milking the industry created by risk takers, and squandering it on interests of the Crown, and to the detriment of the Colonies.

 

The revolution that ensued was one of a conservative nature.  They did not desire to throw out the western ways and freedoms granted initially by the Magna Carta some five centuries before, but merely to get the current oppressive Royal government off of their backs.

 

These virtuous, God fearing men and women of the Colonies simply wanted to live their lives the way they saw fit, free of the confiscatory taxes, brutal treatment by English soldiers and created a society based on their God given right to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.

 

Now, 239 years later, how has that society endured?  The Founding Fathers, who sacrificed their fortunes and sacred honor to make this new society a reality, would not recognize what America has now become.  Indeed, they are rolling over in their graves.

 

This latest ruling by the Supreme Court establishing a Constitutional ‘right’ for homosexuals to legally marry is just the latest of many destructive rulings coming down from on high from nine unelected judges.  Not only are gays and lesbians now demanding the same legal rights as traditional man/woman couples, they are demanding that their lifestyles command universal respect and acceptance.  Their formerly taboo behavior will no longer be looked down upon, and if someone voices disapproval of their deviancy, these activist homosexuals will demand that these people not only retract their opinion, but receive punishment for saying so.

 

Socialism was never part of the conversation in the creation of the new society by the Founding Fathers, and if it came up, it was certainly associated with evil.  Now, 239 years later, seemingly the majority of voters in the country are perfectly OK with socialism.  Only 50 years after the Constitution was ratified, a French observer saw the beginning of creeping socialism.  Alexis DeToqueville in the 1830’s predicted with amazing accuracy that once the common man discovered that he could, with a majority of like minded souls, vote himself a portion of the community treasury, without having to contribute a dime to the kitty, the end of the American experiment would follow.


Any benevolent system established by men to distribute common resources will always fail.  Always.  And this is due to one factor of human nature that will always be with us, forever into time untold: Free riders will at every opportunity sponge off the efforts of others.  Free riders have no shame, and feel no remorse gorging themselves on the bread of other men's tables.  The free riders in every benevolent system will inevitably bring the system down, for a number of obvious reasons. 

 

In 2012, approximately 47% of all working men and women paid no federal taxes whatsoever (free riders).  Many of them actually received money from the government each year in the form of the Earned Income Tax Credit, various welfare programs, Medicare, Medicaid and other giveaways.  And Social Security, once considered simply a supplemental form of aid to the elderly population, is now the main source of income for way too large a percentage of Americans who never saved a penny for their retirement.  Instead, they were convinced that the U.S. government would pay for their retirement, while they only contributed a paltry portion of their salaries towards this fund, supposedly preserved in a ‘lock box.’  These contributions of citizens towards the Social Security program have since been raided and spent down to zero and below zero by several generations of scalawag politicians of both parties.  That fictitious lock box has been empty now for decades. 

 

Although no data is available as of this writing, I would wager that perhaps half the country now pays no federal taxes, leaving the burden to the other half: the takers and the makers.  Our nation of takers, who vote virtually as a block for the Democrat party who panders to them by constantly promising them an ever increasing share of the common treasury in exchange for votes, is now on the brink of insolvency.

 

Although the GDP of the nation is still able to service our enormous debt incurred by drunken-sailor borrowing by politicians to service their promises of redistribution, at some point in the not-so-distant future, our ability to pay the interest on the approaching $20,000,000,000,000.00 (TWENTY TRILLION DOLLARS!!!) will wane.  Once that day comes, the chickens will come home to roost. 

 

As the old saying goes, socialism eventually fails because we run out of other people’s money.  Our Founding Fathers are not only rolling in their graves at this turn of events, they are positively spinning in their graves.

 

239 years ago, the citizens revolted over a government that was robbing them blind, and abusing their trust.  We have now come full circle.  These citizens of America are now looking at virtually the exact same circumstances they found themselves in 239 years ago.

 

When will we get to the point that we start reaching for our Brown Bess’s, sabers and pitchforks?  As one of our Founding Fathers, Thomas Jefferson once famously quipped, ‘a little revolution from time to time is a good thing.’