A Commentary by J. D. Longstreet
*******************
Sometime
ago I mused:
Change is not always good. This “changed” America is
definitely not as good as the America we had before we decided to
exchange freedom for socialism. Today, Americans are just beginning to awaken and learn the nightmare they are experiencing is not a nightmare one experiences during REM sleep. In fact, they learn, to their utter surprise, they are NOT sleeping. This nightmare is NO DREAM. It is REAL. And, Americans who THOUGHT they wanted, and yes, even NEEDED change brought it on.
Many of the votes that were cast for “change” back in 2008 were votes from young people who had no idea what they were trading and what they were getting for the trade. They are the product of a public education system in America now almost totally ruled over by the political left, which still seeks the Nirvana of Utopia through socialism. After 12, or more, years in the public education system, then 2, 4, or 6 more years in those bastions of liberalism/socialism we refer to as colleges and universities, is it any wonder their Pavlovian response in the voting booth was to pull all the levers by the names of the candidates who were decidedly left-wing candidates? Hardly! They were simply reacting to the stimuli implanted in their malleable minds as they made their way through an education system designed to do just that.
And now we are watching our country collapse around us. Those of us who knew socialism’s sad story of lies, deceit, and destruction are not surprised at America’s perilous position today. We knew it would happen. We have watched socialism nearly from its birth. We watched socialism’s struggle to grow as it murdered its host countries all the while. Like a physician trying to heal a patient, by draining the patient’s body of all its blood, socialism drains a nation of its life-giving force and leaves it a broken shell of its former self. Even as robust a nation as Russia required assistance from former enemies, just to survive, after throwing off the bonds of socialism a few short years ago.
Pope Pius XI once said: “It is wrong to withdraw from the individual and commit to the community at large what private enterprise and industry can accomplish. So, too, it is an injustice, a grave evil, and a disturbance of right order for a larger and higher organization to arrogate to itself functions which can be performed efficiently by smaller and lower bodies.”
Now we are observing this “wrong,” and this “injustice,” Pope Pius XI warned of, play out right before our eyes right here in America.
The “old” America was truly “something else!” She was a dream. She was a land of unlimited opportunities and horizons that went on forever. She was the envy of the world!
Americans were optimistic people who threw themselves into the task of firing the furnace of the engine of democracy and delighting in the rewards of their own labor. The “American Dream” was so big and so multi-faceted that no one could even describe it!
One British author, John Keegan, described America this way:
“Left to themselves, Americans build, cultivate, bridge, dam, canalize, invent, teach, manufacture, think, write, lock themselves in struggle with the eternal challenges that man has chosen to confront, and with an intensity not known elsewhere on the globe.
Bidden to make “War” their work, Americans shoulder the burden with intimidating purpose. If I were obliged to define the American mystery, I would say it is the ethos - masculine, pervasive, unrelenting - of work as an end in itself. War is a form of work, and America makes war in a particularly workmanlike way. I do not love war; but I love America!” - John Keegan, author of “Fields of Battle: The Wars for North America,” a British military historian, lecturer, and journalist.
Mr. Keegan had it right This is what America used to be like. And for those of us who STILL remember her, as she was, today’s “changed” America is a bitter pill to swallow!
Theodore Roosevelt said: "The things that will destroy America are prosperity-at-any-price, peace-at-any-price, safety-first instead of duty-first, the love of soft living, and the get-rich-quick theory of life."
The renown men above speak of an America hardly recognized today. We have forgotten as President Dwight D. Eisenhower said: " Here in America we are descended in blood and in spirit from revolutionists and rebels - men and women who dare to dissent from accepted doctrine."
We have forgotten as President Harry Truman once said: "America was not built on fear. America was built on courage, on imagination and an unbeatable determination to do the job at hand."
Where is our revolutionist spirit, our rebellious spirit? Where is our courage, our imagination, our determination? Where is it?
We have forgotten that we are the off-spring, the children, of heroes -- not mythological heroes but real, flesh and blood, men and women who stood, head and shoulders, above the remainder of the human population on this earth.
Former Presidential Candidate, Mitt Romney , during the latest presidential campaign said: "And the American people are the greatest people in the world. What makes America the greatest nation in the world is the heart of the American people: hardworking, innovative, risk-taking, God- loving, family-oriented American people."
Well, Mr. Romney, we USED to be! That's why you lost the election, sir.
It has taken, literally, generations to wipe the collective memory of America of any useful recollection of its roots. People who remember the "blood of heroes courses through their veins" do not lie down and roll over when adversity strikes. If they fall back at all-- it is only to fall back to that "steely resolve" instilled in them by heir hero forbearers.
The edifice that is America may be crumbling and in a state of great disrepair -- but our foundation is intact! And today that foundation is under continuous, incessant, attack by the forces that would wipe America from the face of the earth.
Our founding documents -- the Declaration of Independence, the Constitution, and the Bill of Rights remain as a bulwark against every effort the enemies of America have thrown at them -- so far. They have withstood every campaign against them to date. But they need our help.
It is said that today we are living in a "Post-Constitution America." We are told the constitution is simply too old to apply anymore. We are told the constitution is a living, breathing, document with the malleability to be twisted and contorted into any shape necessary to fit any agenda our political leaders are attempting to foist on the citizens of America on any given day.
Of course -- it's a lie!
The constitution says what it means -- and means what it says -- plain and simple. The US Supreme Court is tasked with determining exactly what the Constitution means when asked. Now, however, Americans no longer trust their Supreme Court!
I recently saw a video clip of a gentleman offering a petition to passers-by on a beach boardwalk that petitioned the President of the US to repeal the Bill of Rights! My jaw dropped as I watched them all but line up to sign away their freedom and liberty! It was mind-blowing! It served to remind me of just how little value is placed on individual liberty in America today. Basically -- NONE!
Lady Liberty is being gang-raped by the political left today while the sons and daughters of America's early heroes are standing by and, in some cases, cheering on the assault on their freedom.
Just as God's Spirit "will not always strive with man," neither will the spirit of freedom and liberty always strive with Americans. It can be quenched. Much of America has already become tone-deaf to liberty's call.
For America to survive, we must reclaim that which is ours by birthright.
Alexis de Tocqueville said of America: "The greatness of America lies not in being more enlightened than any other nation, but rather in her ability to repair her faults."
It is long past time for us, as Americans, to employ that inherent ability to heal ourselves, to repair our faults, to restore that which is good and right about our country. There is not a moment to waste. We must reach down deep inside and tap the reservoir of revolutionist and rebellious spirits that each of us received as blood-bought gifts from our forbearers. Along with our faith that God will not abandon a country with yet a remnant of the faithful, THIS will be our source of strength for the struggle to restore America to her former greatness.
© J. D. Longstreet*****************
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