The Basis for a Strong Nation - Defending the United States Constitution

The Basis for a Strong Nation

By R.J. Godlewski
© November 10, 2008, All Rights Reserved

11. Defending the United States Constitution

    They say that there are only two absolutes in life: death and taxes. This is wrong, for there is a third, and it is the simple knowledge that as soon as a person lets his or her guard down there will be another individual quite willing to take advantage of the situation. This fact of life has remained intact well before the United States of America came into existence and it will remain intact well after our planet ceases to exist and humanity, presumably, has had enough foresight to figure a way off this fragile piece of silicon and iron.

    Our founding fathers, for all of their apparent antiquities, understood this fact of life. They knew of Cain and Abel, and they knew of the ongoing struggles across the Atlantic that led to the French Revolution. In fact, it was precisely because of the French Revolution that we possess our Bill of Rights for Thomas Jefferson understood the gravity of a situation in which a people demand “change” at all costs.

    The emergence of the crisis in eighteenth century France bears scrutiny for us Americans today.  In February 22, 1787, the First Assembly of Notables met to discuss the raising of taxes following the 1786 edict of the Controller General of Finances that the nation was suffering through a pending financial crisis of catastrophic proportions. The wealthy, however, fought against this solution. During 1788, hunger and further financial difficulties overwhelmed the masses.

    A new power within the government emerged following riots in which entrepreneurs were blamed for society’s ills and the Third Estate was formed, ultimately incorporating liberal members of the nobility and clergy into its ranks. Fearing the importance of the military and “outrages” over the conditions at the Bastille – where only seven prisoners were held – they became the symbol of authority run amok. The crowds decided against both authority and human rights. These horrible actions inspired passage of the Bill of Rights in America on September 25, 1789.

    On November 2, in France, a far different picture arose. Church property was confiscated. In December the “administrative authority” changed and much of what was left to individuals to manage was taken over by “departments”. Property once owned by the Church was now used to issue new notes in an effort to reduce the burden of the state.

    On February 13, 1790 the French abolished religious orders, prohibited monastic vows, and reduced the faith to nothing more than teaching  and charity. On July 12, the secular French government decided that it was in the best position to appoint Catholic clergy, not Rome, and the Civil Constitution of the Clergy effectively created a new state-controlled religion. Later, on November 27, all public officials and priests were required to sign an oath of allegiance to these “changes” which had challenged what had been French culture for as long as there had been French culture.

    On March 2, all requirements for entry into the artisan trades were abolished; everything was permissible as far as art was concerned, offering a facsimile to what we have today. Civil war was then in full swing even if it was locally contained. The ever present struggle between religion, the military, and the masses brought in the involvement of nearly every country on the continent. It did not matter.

    By 1792, serious inflation began and the masses began to riot en masse. The remainder of this story gets into a bit more detail than I care to report here. However, the short version of it was that France descended into chaos orchestrated by those who wanted to abolish religion, personal liberties, and military strength in favor of entitlements.

    Our nation has not witnessed such destruction because of our Constitution. Even during the horribly brutal Civil War, the Union remained intact and fought to remain strong. When the war ended, there was no creation of a new government. General Grant simply told his adversary, General Lee, to take his men and their guns and go home. The day after the war, the Confederates had the same Constitutional protections they held the day before the war began.

    The U.S. Constitution is therefore the very foundation for strength within our country. Its very first words are “We the People”. How much more effective can a government be? In France, they fought against religion, the military, the classes, and the government to find some equilibrium that would manage all to survive to the satisfaction of all. Here, in the United States, we began our nation with the belief that all people were equal. Our nation served to protect all of us whether we considered everyone to part of the clan or not.

    Today, we are witnessing a transformation that may parallel eighteenth century France more than what should be viewed as twenty-first century America. Already, our new government – a Democratic president presiding over a Democratic-controlled Senate and House, supported by a Democratic/Liberal media – is salivating over an opportunity to “change” America into something that has never existed beforehand. This is very dangerous water in which to tread.

    While the national economy takes center stage, two of the very first actions to be undertaken by the new administration have nothing to do with the economy but may very well destroy it in the process. First, the liberals are poised to reinstate the “Assault Weapons Ban” effectively banning thousands of jobs and millions from the U.S. economy while denying law-abiding citizens the right to purchase modern firearms. This would be like the government deciding to ban laptop computers, Blackberries, and point-and-shoot cameras. Why? Because they can spread the fear factor that “assault weapons” are evil. However, they are not.

    What the liberals try to tell you is that “assault weapons” are military weapons intended to kill. What they call “assault weapons” are merely weapons designed with modern technology – such as, for example, carbon fiber stocks – for survival within hazardous environments – such as, for example, desert, snow, rain, etc. Nobody likes to utilize ancient technology unless you are a collector or a historian.

    This effort is bad enough for it is in direct violation of the Second Amendment of the United States Constitution:

“…necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed.”

However, Barack Obama intends to take his anti-gun agenda to ever further atrocities. He wants to make it more difficult to purchase ammunition, even if that ammunition were to be used solely for hunting purposes. He understands that with 350 million guns in the country, that he is not going to be able to eliminate them. However, by raising taxes, banning sales, and making manufacturers criminally libel, Barack Obama will bankrupt an entire industry and send millions of people to the unemployment line. In addition, we all know now that he desires to bankrupt the coal industry for he believes that coal production is just another socially evil industry that has no basis in life.

    For all of you college-educated people out there, who somehow think that you are more “enlightened” than the rest of us, permit me to adapt you to reality. There is only one reason why any politician would want to ban firearms (of any type, make, or size). They do not believe in the U.S. Constitution. It is like taxes. They may say that they only want to tax the wealthy, but the question remains whose definition of “wealthy” are they going to use? Already Barack Obama has shifted from $250,0000 down to about $150,000 per year. In other words, a couple both employed moderately above the poverty level are now going to be taxed more heavily. And you thought that two wrongs didn’t make a right.

    If you have enough concern for our Constitution, whether you are Democrat, Republican, or Independent, you need to contact your representative and tell them to concentrate on defeating the bad guys, not honest Americans. If Barack Obama holds our very Constitution in such low regard as to categorize an entire industry as guilty before trial, how then can you trust him with anything?

    Last week’s election was supposed to be all about the economy. Now, Barack Obama wants to shutdown two entire industries, laying off hundreds of thousands of American workers, removing billions of dollars from our economy, and subject untold millions of citizens to the ravages of criminals. Why? Because Barack Obama, Nancy Pelosi, and Harry Reid do not give a damn about you or the Constitution of the United States of America. Otherwise they would not be trying to dispense with the second most important of our rights written so simple that a child could understand it. Of course, they have already trashed #1 – free speech (for every liberal who condemns this article, there are thousands who wish to deny your rights to “life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness").

    Fight back! Write, call, and email your congressperson, your senator, and President-elect Barack Obama and say “improve” the economy, do not sacrifice it to the whims of liberal elitists. Guns are a right of every law-abiding citizen in this country. They are not privileges entitled to a few who are not part of some backwoods culture that clings to guns and Bibles as security blankets. Our founding fathers worked in this fundamental right for they saw what happened in France when those who could not defend themselves were brutally beaten just for who they were. We cannot let that happen here.

“The highest manifestation of life consists in this: that a being governs its own actions. A thing which is always subject to the direction of another is somewhat of a dead thing.” Saint Thomas Aquinas

R.J. Godlewski is a member of the National Rifle Association, the National Military Intelligence Association, a veteran of the United States Navy, and a proponent of citizen responsibility in matters of national security.
   

* * *

Basis for a Strong Nation is a series, you can read installments 1 - 10:

 1. A Return to American basics

  2.  "What is an American?"

  3. "One Nation Without God?"

  4. "Duty and the Responsibility of Citizenship"

 5. Political Warfare and the Proliferation of the Vote

 6. "AN ARMED POPULATION IS A FREE POPULATION "

 7. "SECURE BORDERS, SECURE AMERICA"

 8. MILITARY DUTY AND RESPECT FOR OUR SERVICE PEOPLE,

  9. MARRIAGE AND FAMILY: WASTE NOT, WANT NOT

10. FOREIGN RELATIONS (THANK GOD I’M NOT RUNNING FOR PRESIDENT)

_____________________________________________________________________________

Trackposted to The Virtuous Republic, Blog @ MoreWhat.com, A Newt One- Hysterians masquerading as historians, Rosemary's Thoughts, Loyal Opposition My A**, DragonLady's World, Cao's Blog, Democrat=Socialist, , third world county, Faultline USA, Political Byline, The World According to Carl, Rosemary's News and Ideas, The Pink Flamingo, Celebrity Smack, A Newt One, and Gone Hollywood, thanks to Linkfest Haven Deluxe.

Comments

[Stanford Matthews]

This particular post in your series rightly adds to recent comments by notable personalities of the concern over some of 'our leaders' and French or European style socialism. The public may only have pondered that in terms of current events rather than history.

This post as well as others here and on Perri Nelson's website reinforce my recent plans to focus more on things that matter now that the 2008 election is over. While not abandoning political coverage or commentary there will be more emphasis on this nation's founding, the ideals put forward in critically important documents and the core values of conservative thought as well as the better angels present in earlier 'liberal' thought both of which have been abused by current practitioners in both major political parties.

The public needs as many sources as we can muster to present important issues of the day in a format not dominated by the self-serving nature of the MSM. The recent run on gun sales in response to a concern over expected executive orders forthcoming from the President-elect signals at least some in the general public are paying attention however the Presidential election results indicate too many have either been duped by the empty message or are willing to surrender their freedom for a nanny state devoid of principle.

[Marion Valentine]

Way to go R. J. I agree with you, and have posted a lot of the same on my site. If you visit my site, take anything you can use and spread it around.

[md4palin]

Obama was proposing MANDATORY "community service" for everyone.
(or requiring it to get financial aid, etc.)
When the blogsphere started commenting Obama scrubbed his website of these proposals.

Obama had scrubbed his website of his anti-surge objections and support from controversial buddies Ayers, Wright and Pfleger.

I was not alive in 1933. However my grandparents came to the US from Russia and Poland around that time. Obama is an egotistical dictator in the making.

Keep up the good fight. We need to make conservatives understand the battle is being fought on the internet now. The socialist liberals control the MSM and college campusues.

[Debbie]

md4palin:

Ben Evans is absolutely correct in what he says. I do not understand why we need more than our military and our national guard.

It is very telling that Obama things he needs a personal, new, national security force.

Comparisons to Hitler's youth and Hitler's special troops. Comparisons also to Hitler's hold over the people. It does not look good for Americans.

It's like they are mesmerized, they don't questions anything he does or says.

[md4palin]

Georgia congressman warns of Obama dictatorship
By BEN EVANS – 2 hours ago

WASHINGTON (AP) — A Republican congressman from Georgia said Monday he fears that President-elect Obama will establish a Gestapo-like security force to impose a Marxist or fascist dictatorship.

"It may sound a bit crazy and off base, but the thing is, he's the one who proposed this national security force," Rep. Paul Broun said of Obama in an interview Monday with The Associated Press. "I'm just trying to bring attention to the fact that we may — may not, I hope not — but we may have a problem with that type of philosophy of radical socialism or Marxism."

Broun cited a July speech by Obama that has circulated on the Internet in which the then-Democratic presidential candidate called for a civilian force to take some of the national security burden off the military.

"That's exactly what Hitler did in Nazi Germany and it's exactly what the Soviet Union did," Broun said. "When he's proposing to have a national security force that's answering to him, that is as strong as the U.S. military, he's showing me signs of being Marxist."

Obama's comments about a national security force came during a speech in Colorado about building a new civil service corps. Among other things, he called for expanding the nation's foreign service and doubling the size of the Peace Corps "to renew our diplomacy."

"We cannot continue to rely only on our military in order to achieve the national security objectives that we've set," Obama said in July. "We've got to have a civilian national security force that's just as powerful, just as strong, just as well-funded."

Broun said he also believes Obama likely will move to ban gun ownership if he does build a national police force.

Obama has said he respects the Second Amendment right to bear arms and favors "common sense" gun laws. Gun rights advocates interpret that as meaning he'll at least enact curbs on ownership of assault weapons and concealed weapons. As an Illinois state lawmaker, Obama supported a ban on semiautomatic weapons and tighter restrictions on firearms generally.

"We can't be lulled into complacency," Broun said. "You have to remember that Adolf Hitler was elected in a democratic Germany. I'm not comparing him to Adolf Hitler. What I'm saying is there is the potential."

Obama's transition office did not respond immediately to Broun's remarks.

Thank God for men like Paul Broun! Telling it like it is.

[Katie]

Considering that on Jan. 20th Obama will be taking an oath of uphold and defend the Constitution and that breaking that oath is grounds for impeachment, I would suggest that he move very slowly.

He and the Donkeycrats must really be fools if they think that the American people will give up their guns and ammo. This will not cause another civil war.

[Layla]

Excellent post. I agree with you on every point. But right now I have no faith in one politician, not one.

I do not believe in singing to the choir.