The President Speaks: Labor Day

As we in Washington observe the Labor Day holiday, I cannot emphasize enough the contributions labor has made to the well-being of our nation. It is labor that pushed for a forty hour work week, time and a half for overtime and holiday pay.

It is labor that increased the standard of living for such a large percentage of Americans. It was members of labor unions who got killed, beaten and were not allowed to work so that business would share its profits and future workers would have a comfortable income.

These are turbulent times in America. But the turbulence is comfortable. Even without health insurance, Americans live well. Most people have plenty of food. Most people spend a lot of money on goods that are not necessary.

During the rise of organized labor in America, life was not comfortable. There was seldom plenty. There were no credit cards. If people wanted to buy something they had to pay cash. That means they had to save.

Saving was not only essential to a household. It was considered a religious obligation as taught in the Old Testament.

As those working people scrimped, struggled, hoped, feared, dreamed and planned they were angry that their employer made so much money, but paid poorly. The workers noticed that their employers were proponents of religion, but did not exemplify the generosity of the founder of their religion.

It wasn’t just toughness that allowed these labor leaders and their followers to organize, risk and strike. They were savers. They, if they could, had money in the bank so they could strike. If they all saved they could help each other. It was not only an obligation to save, but a religious duty to help each other, even if you get killed.

These workers followed their religion by sticking up for what’s right and by opposing greed. This religious sense of justice is gone from America. There is a sense of justice within various churches, but the American people do not have this sense of justice, this sense that their religion and the courage of its founders be taken into the workplace.

Why is this? One reason is because people generally, do not save. By refusing to save people are putting their desires before their future needs.

This means that they take themselves too seriously. It means that the bond they have with each other is one that emphasizes getting.

Getting is an unhealthy competition. It creates envy and resentment. People do not look upon each other as friends or neighbors, someone to ally oneself with, fight for justice with, get beat up for with.

If Americans expect to share in the increasing profits of America’s business, they will have to struggle for it. Americans must face the fact wealthy people are happier to the extent working people are poorer.

The nation needs to realize that all the comforts we have would have been created with or without labor unions, but that the sharing of these comforts to such a large extent is a result of the sacrifices of the people working between 1870 and 1930, not a result of generosity on the part of business.

There is an advantage business has today it did not have 100 years ago. People spend foolishly. This foolish spending combined with decreasing compensation has business sitting pretty.

Business knows Americans are selfish. Business knows that Americans only sacrifice to obtain a job that allows them to squander a lot of money every weekend.

Business knows Americans do not like or trust one another. Business knows Americans will jump up and down about a war, but are afraid to risk themselves for their family or each other. Business knows Americans today are soft and afraid and have only superficial religious beliefs.

My countrymen, America’s businesses are not being fair to you. 2/3 of our economy is what working people spend.

Your employers do not return 2/3 of their profits to you either through cash, improved health plans or safer and more relaxing work places. This should drive you absolutely wild. But it doesn’t.

Tomorrow I will meet with business leaders of our nation. They will frown at me for what I said today.

I will laugh. I will tell them that they have nothing to worry about.

I sincerely hope you, my fellow Americans, prove me wrong.

The President Speaks: The draft

Tonight I will speak to the nation about the proposal to draft young men and women 18 years old and older into the military. As it stands, I reject the proposal.

18 is too precious of an age to be sent to war. Women shouldn’t complain about the barbarism of men, then seek to be part of the barabarism.

It is unfortunate that middle age men prey upon young mens’ desire to be passionate, physical and of service to others by sending the young men to war. An 18 year old is too young to understand that he is being used. He is too proud to refuse to serve because he thinks everything will turn out well.

A proper minimum age for the draft is 25. At 25 a man knows when he is being used. He is able to judge if the war he is told to serve in is a legitimate war, or something undertaken to benefit rich people and distract Americans from issues such as poor wages and a lack of health insurance.

At 25 soldiers might rise up against an order for an unnecessary war. That kind of threat to politicians, business owners, investors and the military is necessary to keep our leaders honest, to save taxpayers money and to prevent unnecessary grief for the many so a few can have unnecessary wealth.

Raising the age at which people can be eligible for the draft helps to do something that parents can’t seem to do or will not do. It keeps the youngest men out of war.

Parents rightfully want to be proud of their sons. Parents understandably do not want to encourage their sons to break the law. But parents should, and don’t, criticize war enough or risk the ire of their neighbors, employers or the government enough.

I am acting as a parent when I make this proposal. I am acting in the common interest of the country by saying the youngest men must be spared from military service so they can properly develop their hearts and minds through love relationships and education.

War must not be considered a good thing. It must be considered the worst way to serve your country and to prove your manhood.

By imposing this age restriction on the draft, boys out of high school can spend the next seven years proving things to themselves in ways that do no injury to others and do not entail mutilating themselves or giving themselves psychological damage.

There is much work to be done. America’s forests need to have the debris from logging removed. Trees need to be planted in the nation’s cities. Jobs should be established and reserved for this age group to use their bodies doing demanding tasks.

Young men can be encouraged to babysit, teach and coach four year olds, eight year olds, fifteen year olds, rather than go to another country to destroy children’s fathers and neighborhoods.

It amazes me that we are outraged at the violence of our young men at home, but have no problem sending them to kill people who are no threat to us. It amazes me that women fear to be on the street because of men, but demand the right to join the service and instill fear in foreign women.

Women cannot have it both ways. You cannot complain about rape and violence against women, then seek to wage war because you want equality with men. The logical things to do would be to stop complaining about violence if you want to be in the military, or refuse to join the military because of what war does to women and children, and to men too.

There is a double standard in this country. Men are discouraged from working with children because female policy makers say men cannot be trusted. Yet these policy makers have no qualms about women serving in the military and being indoctrinated to live in fear and to be violent.

One reason men commit violence against women is because men retaliate against being defined as criminals by nature. Another reason is men no longer see women as having a different and complementing role to men. Violence against women will not ebb as long as women adopt the worst characteristics of the male and men fear being accused of a sex crime when they exemplify the male’s best attributes.

What I am proposing to Congress is to set the minimum age of military service to 25, and to prevent women from being active in combat.

I am willing to have a draft because I think a draft keeps presidents and generals and politicians in check. As part of my draft bill, any time war is declared two members of the family of each senator and representative who voted for the war must serve as a combatant in the war. The same thing applies if the president supports the war.

To accompany this bill is a college funding proposal. Every young person in the country will have the opportunity to attend four years of college or career training at the expense of the federal government. An educated and prosperous work force will be more difficult to persuade that war is necessary than an uneducated poor work force.

Though war is something we must be willing to fight if necessary, we do not want America to be a war machine any longer. I highly encourage ministers, parents and teachers to tell their ministry, children and students that rich people benefit from war, not those who fight in it or have a war fought in their city.

I ask the nation to support me in this. When America gets back on track we will be able to breathe deeply, for more money will be going where it should have always gone, toward creating confident and principled young people.

The President Speaks: Re-elect me

Four months from now is the presidential election. As most of you know, I am eager to serve a second term.

Some of the things accomplished by my administration please me. The energy bill, the health plan, the infrastructure improvements, the cross-country bicycle and walking trails – these have made our country healthier and our travels faster and safer.

When I ran for president I hoped to make Americans freer. I hoped to reduce our lust for war and our fear of one another.

I have not waged war. But many people in Washington and in big business are eager for another one.

They do not want me re-elected. This is troubling, not because I fear defeat but because I fear the ruin of the country if we return to policies that were enacted at the beginning of the century.

Other things concern me. Advertising and the media continue to glorify violence. The media continues to instill fear.

Violence and fear are what I want to avoid. I was disappointed my proposal to establish free of charge no questions asked counseling clinics for those feeling violent, suicidal or depressed was rejected. I think it was a great plan to alleviate fear and to prevent violence that would create new fear.

Too many of America’s politicians, business people and special interest groups continue to make people afraid. The military does it. Police departments do it. Anti-crime groups do it.

I have been trying to persuade the nation to be leary of the police and the Justice Department. I have been trying to get people to stop fearing almost every stranger.

I have made some progress in civi liberties. A man can no longer be arrested for rape without evidence he committed one. That was a tremendous battle.

There will be more tremendous battles. Our surveillance state is oppressive. There are too many cameras. Law enforcement agencies have too much information on people. Media web-sites post names of those who have been arrested.

This last fact is frightening because many people are arrested for minor violations or something they did not do. For three and one half years I have said that anybody might be arrested for anything.

You might report someone as a possible terrorist. The next day you may be stopped by the police because you looked around too much as you passed through a neighborhood.

Better laws will make people freer. With new laws people will be less afraid and therefore not need to be suspicious of others.

Americans must take it upon themselves to stop fearing almost everything. Americans must ask themselves if it is right and fair to mistrust so many people and want them stopped by the police or arrested.

I have been direct. There will be no un-necessary war while I am president.

I will continue to push for programs that will make people healthier and less stressed, so there is less of an impetus to live in fear and then feel a false sense of empowerment by reporting someone to the police.

My fellow Americans, freedom and confidence are the most important things a nation can have. I can provide the leadership to regain them.

With my re-election Americans will know someone at the top believes in freedom, is willing to risk his career and possibly more for it. Therefore, I ask for your vote in November.

The President Speaks: 4th of July

Good afternoon my fellow Americans. It’s been 250 years since our Founding Fathers declared themselves and our nation free from the oppressiveness of England and its king.

I know today we seem to be free. Slavery is outlawed. We can for the most part travel anywhere in the country.

Police departments have extensive public relations bureaus and neighborhood outreach programs. Still, I cannot help but feel that something is not right with America and freedom. There seems to be no realization that those who signed the Declaration of Independence were bigger men than we are.

There also seems to be no realization that though they were free in a lot of ways we are, the signers knew something was not right and were courageous for taking an unnecessary economic risk to attain what they passionately believed was the most important thing – political freedom.

Our Founding Fathers were grateful for the sacrifices their ancestors made for them. They considered the Pilgrims and Puritans superior to themselves.

We offer little gratitude to our Founding Fathers for being courageous, declaring their independence, lusting for liberty and creating our constitution. We feel that they were hypocrites. We feel Puritans were anal and Pilgrims somebody to laugh at for their strict religious beliefs.

We see mostly negative things in our history where our Founding Fathers saw mostly positive things in theirs. Each of the groups I mentioned had a mission to create a society where people are free from government interference.

We are not inspired by our Founding Fathers or their ancestors. We seem not to know or care that something is not right, that we will not be a source of inspiration to future Americans, if indeed America still stands.

What isn’t right is that because of our mobility, we are enslaved to frantic busyness and buying things. We are too busy to appreciate the frugality, hard work and faith of the Pilgrims and Puritans.

We are too fast moving and cynical to believe there is really such a thing as freedom, that those who believe in it are not naive but visionary, and that those who fight for it are not opportunists but courageous.

What is not right is that we do not realize that we need to take a risk, that like the Founding Fathers we are materially very comfortable and that like theirs, our liberties have eroded.

I know a lot of Americans feel patriotic. You say you fought in Vietnam or the first or second Iraq war or in Afghanistan. I know a lot of people patriotically supported our troops.

But those were wars of arrogance and greed. America was not threatened. We became a less free, greedier, more arrogant, more unhappy and more unhealthy nation following each of these wars.

Neither of these wars are something America should be proud of. We should feel ashamed of them.

There is another war we should feel ashamed of. It is the war against civil liberties which has been going on to a greater or lesser extent since the nation was founded. The war is usually waged by the federal government against the constitution.

Today a person cannot be stopped and beaten by police for being poor or not white. But when somebody puts their garbage can out for the next day’s pick up, it is legal for someone else to pilfer through the trash to obtrain the person’s discarded papers.

If an adult works with children, the adult fears being accused of a sex crime they did not committ, knowing the burden of proof is on them to prove their innocence not the accuser to prove guilt.

Each of these instances is unconstitutional. Our Founding Fathers valued privacy and they believed in innocence until guilt is proven.

It seems these issues follow upon our warmongering. For war breeds fear, suspicion, secrecy, spying, lies and the passion to destroy others.

We have feared and distrusted each other increasingly since Vietnam. We built more prisons in the 80s and 90s. Rape consciousness has been preached at the universities and in the media since the 80s.

Then, after the attacks in New York and Washington at the beginning of this century, my predecessors created and supported the Patriot Act. The act could not have passed if Americans had not accepted more prisons and believed that boys and men are to be feared not respected.

The act built upon and expanded our fear of each other. This is not the attitude that makes for a free nation or a great nation, but a foolish and cowardly nation.

When Thomas Paine wrote Common Sense he knew the timing was right for a rebellion because Americans had an enthusiastic rapport with one another. Now the timing is terrible for a rebellion against our police and surveillance state. We fear each other and envy each other.

But still there is hope. Our Founding Fathers believed that ordinary people can acquire and preserve freedom if they read and if they speak up.

Before the revolution, John Adams wrote, and I paraphrase: We colonists aren’t as free or happy as we used to be. We will speak up if directly confronted, but while we slowly lose our liberties we are too polite or afraid or embarrassed to say anything or write anything critical of England’s police state. But we must read and speak and write and take a big risk.

When I was elected I was thrilled because I felt there was a mandate that America wanted to be free and great and proud again. I have done my part.

My countrymen, you must speak. If you will not trust your neighbors or fellow citizens, at least trust yourself. Tell yourself you are tired of feeling shame and fear. Tell yourself you are being surveilled with a smile and it is slowly killing you.

America. Declare your independence.

Speak and write and demand and fight until you are not considered criminals and perverts and terroriosts, until you are once again free, until you have restored trust in yourself and reaffirmed your faith in each other.

The President Speaks: Custer

I’m standing in the rolling hills of the Little Big Horn in Montana. 147 years ago, Lt. Col. George Armstrong Custer went down here in the most famous defeat in America’s history.

The nation was shocked. How could a man with such confidence, talent, stamina, courage and luck be defeated? How could a man so in love with life and America, a man who personified the energy and optimism of our nation be defeated? America was on the rise, but the man with the greatest spirit and the free flowing hair was dead.

Unfortunately, today’s Americans are cynical. Many people are glad Custer was killed. They see arrogance rather than courage. They see selfishness rather than patriotism. Not only are these people glad Custer was killed, they are glad America is degenerating and cannot wait to see it defeated or decompose.

This troubles me. We, as a nation and as individuals, can and must learn from Custer’s big headedness. Up to now we have not seen it as an omen of what can happen to a nation because of the overconfidence of a president or Cabinet member. It is imperative that we move cautiously through the world and that as the nation’s leader, I do not have the hubris that has been recently exemplified.

Even so, Custer is one of America’s great men. Nobody loved being a soldier to the extent he did. This created envy among his colleagues who joined the Army to please their family or to avoid working.

Doesn’t that sound familiar? We work at jobs we cannot stand, only to be envious of our colleagues or bosses who love being there. In all our clamor for meaningful work, we should admire Custer for his love of soldiering before fulfilling careers were fashionable.

Another reason I think people love to denigrate Custer is because he was free. Americans today do not feel free, especially on the left. Someone who really does feel free, like Custer, who loves America and will die for it like Custer, is a threat to millions of unhapy Americans.

I know a lot of people criticize America’s Indian policy. They say Custer deserved to be killed and that nobody should complain. I am not complaining about his death. Neither would he.

What I am pointing out is that he was to people in the east in the 1870s what baseball players were to Americans in the 1910s. He had a job in a mythical arena, pursing a career most people did not have the ability to pursue.

He dealt with death yes. But death and violence are what make myths and stories and heroes. People love to look up to violent heroes or to heroes killed by violence.

Custer is heroic because he was free in one of the most unfree organizations: the military. He was a rebel who paid dearly for his rebellion during his career.

Freedom and rebellion no matter what the price is what made Custer great. It is also what should inspire we Americans to remember him, to mythologize him, to grow our hair long and wild, to live with relentless freedom and purpose.

The President Speaks: Father’s Day

I want to say Happy Father’s Day to Americas’s fathers. The most rewarding thing for most men is to have a wife he loves and who loves him, then bring that love to fruition by having children he loves dearly. He hopes his children love and admire him.

This is a difficult time to be a father. So many men have failed in their responsibilities. That failure has cast a harrowing shadow over men and fatherhood.

This is also a difficult time to be a man. Men are looked upon as being potential child molestors and rapists.

Men are expected to perform some of the traditional tasks of being a father – making enough money to support the family and devoting time and constructive energy to his children.

The most important task that the father had was to be the authority in the family, to have power over his family, to love his daughter and set an example of how girls and women should be treated, to tell his daughter not to confuse sex with love and a fashionable boy with a substantial boy.

The traditional father set an example for his son of manliness. Father instilled integrity and fairness into son. He told his son to fight for what you believe in and to admit when you are wrong.

The traditional father told his son not to take advantage of people. If the son stole or lied, he would be punished. If the son was a bully the father would hit his son so that the son would not bully anybody again.

This is fear. The son was supposed to fear his father. This fear carried over to school and social activities. The son feared to be a smart aleck at school because he knew what would happen if dad found out.

Fear is still here. Society fears obnoxious young people. Women fear men. Men fear to discipline their children because they might be reported or arrested for assault or child abuse.

Almost everyone agrees society is falling apart. Most people say children need fathers. But nobody says fathers have lost their power and that this power needs to be restored.

Nobody is saying that men need something meaningful to do and that boys need something meaningful to look forward to. Traditionally this has meant marriage and raising children.

In the 1980s women longed for men to take an interest in children. If not a man’s own, his nephews and nieces. Or a man could volunteer to work with children.

Following the disastrous neglect of children by their fathers between 1967 and 1980, women hoped men would see the light. One of the interesting things said was that children in hospitals needed to sit in the lap of a man.

All that has changed. A man is in danger if he lets his light shine. If he is affectionate with children he risks being accused of perversion. If he disciplines his rowdy son, he is accused of being violent against a child.

Women love to destroy the power, rights and confidence of men. Women with political power would rather a boy go to jail for grabbing a girl’s breast then be hit by his father for doing it. It’s okay for a boy to experience the violence of jail, but not an appropriate painful punishment from his father.

At the same time men are being destroyed by feminists and the government, our society is being destroyed because fathers have no role or power and men resort to crime and promiscuity, or succumb to alcoholism or drug addiction.

Fathers must fight for their place in the family and in society. You must fight for yourself even more vehemently than women have fought for the right to be promiscuous, have abortions, allow 14 year olds to have babies and receive day care at school, and to have you arrested because they think an act they do not like is a rape.

Men of America, you are not allowed to love being a man to the extent feminists love to destroy you. Our society desperately needs love, but you have to watch your moves. Love in America has been stifled.

As president, I am doing my best to provide men the political safety to love being a man, to risk your soul for a woman and to risk having children.

I am working with Congress to repeal the current sexual harrassment and rape laws. One or two of your senators and representatives are proposing legislation that will require somebody who accuses a man of a rape he is found innocent of to serve the sentence he would have served and to sign her assets to him.

My Education Secretary is suggesting that all elementary schools have 1/3 male teachers and that all high schools have one half male teachers. This should be an attainable goal if the other proposals are enacted.

This is an important start. Right now America is morally failing. It is failing its men, fathers and itself.

I hope that before my presidency expires, we are a nation of proud men and proud powerful fathers, that love has been restored between men and women and America is once again a blessed country.

The President Speaks: Nuclear arms

I want to take this opportunity today to address one of the most controversial issues regarding foreign policy. That issue is what countries should be allowed to have nuclear weapons?

Most countries do not develop nuclear weapons with the intention to strike first. The weapons are usually developed for defensive purposes.

With so many countries developing nuclear weapons, we must ask why is there so much mistrust between countries? What is each country doing that scares other countries?

Americans usually address this issue in the wrong way. We ask why are so many little countries developing nuclear weapons?

Part of the reason is they want to use them against each other. But a bigger reason is to protect themselves from the United States. They have perceived us as eager to take over the world, or at least prevent them from governing themselves without American intimidation.

Is America justified when we intimidate other countries? No we are not. Can we justifiably complain when other countries seek or are developing nuclear weapons? No we can’t. Should America be concerned that so many countries are as eager to develop nuclear weapons as we have been to control the world? Yes we should.

But it is important for us to remember that now we know how they feel. We still have more nuclear weapons than the rest of the world combined. Yet we always worry that someone will have what we have, though we have plenty, or someone will take back what we’ve stolen, though we will still have plenty.

We should worry that these countries will use their weapons, if not against us, then against some other country. The environmental disaster would be great. There is the possibility that the United States would become involved.

They might start something that we will finish. Then there will be no world for anyone to govern.

We cannot say that only we have the right to have and use nuclear weapons. When we do, other countries fear us and do not appreciate having to live in fear of us.

America must admit that we have far more nuclear weapons than we need. I have begun a disarmament policy with the Pentagon. The United States will reduce its nuclear arsenal to 10% of what we have.

90% of our nuclear weapons will be dismantled and recycled. We will still have plenty of weapons to defend ourselves from any nation trying to invade us or trying to physically take over the world like we have tried to financially control the world.

This means we will also reduce research funding for weapons by the same amount. A lot of people claim that if we reduce funding for weapons research, we will be vulnerable to another more ambitious country.

Yet America is so rich and has so many first rate research facililties, we could reignite a weapons program if we have to. But we won’t have to.

We won’t have to because if we cut our arsenal and our research we will be showing that we are fearless and have good intentions. Other countries will not fear us.

They can forget their plans to attain nuclear arms or stop the expansion of their programs. Our country and theirs willl be able to direct money from weapons of death to useful things for life.

But death is only part of what the world’s lust for weapons is about. The other aspect is fear.

Building so many nuclear weapons breeds fear. The increase in fear means that people or goverments will want more weapons to compensate for their fear.

This fear building makes people afraid to speak out against government policy. When they do speak out, it spreads animosity among Americans – one group saying the other group is aching for a fight, the second group claiming the people in the first group are naive or cowards. People lose the trust in each other that democracies are supposed to encourage.

Though it isn’t the image Americans have of ourselves, we have traditionally been aching for a fight. Most of the times our actions were cowardly. We are naive to think other nations do not have the right to protect themselves from us.

What I have done with my disarmament program is show that America no longer aches for a fight, that we will take the chance that other powers and nations be allowed to develop as they see fit.

But most importantly, I want America to be happy to the extent we are wealthy. It would be nice to spend money on hospitals, railroads, public transit, airports and seaports that went to researching and constructing nuclear weapons.

Our prosperity will increase noticeably. What will increase drastically is the trust, openness and good will that have been dormant for so long in America.

The President Speaks: Walt Whitman’s Birthday

Today we celebrate the birthday of Walt Whitman, America’s greatest poet. He is the poet who most believed in America and Americans, who loved his countrymen the way Tupac Shakur loved black people.

His love of America and its people was love founded upon the promise of democracy and the promise of America. What a combination.

Democracy allows people freedom. America allowed people a continent to be free in. You could find yourself in America, or you could invent yourself. The important thing to Whitman was everybody be genuine, love being genuine, demand others be genuine.

He believed when people were genuine, America would be glorious. He assumed everyone has a divine spark, that one is individual and a great person when you let yourself shine. He believed America would produce the world’s freest and greatest people because of our spiritual potential.

Whitman’s faith and exuberance is often considered naive. After all they say, we had slavery. We also had murder of Indians and slums of immigrants.

It is encouraging to know somebody had the faith and wisdom, no matter how naive, to believe in the ideals of America. It shows the power of faith, the power of the word Freedom, and the promise of democracy that Whitman could live America’s mantras.

Hardly anybody has done that. That is the challenge he poses, and also the hope.

Can we avoid the bad side of democracy like Whitman did? Can we, from here on out, reject the relentless pursit of money and materialism inherent in democracy that has prevented us from shining, from being genuine, from being beautiful?

We talk about too much stress. In his time artists bragged about having melancholia – that century’s term for depression. He rebelled against melancholia. He felt great and was going to shout to the world about it.

Whitman dares us to give up our stress, our conformity, our greed. The exhortations to be yourself – to seek others to show your real self off to, to marvel at their real self – have never been more timely.

That would destroy most of our stress. Our inflated sense of importance and struggle would be released.

We have failed Whitman. We love America but mainly because we are rich. We do not love each other.

Poets have failed Whitman and America. They have utilized their right to free speech, but not to praise the essence of America or demand and inspire Americans to be relentlessly true to what is great in them.

We have never known the great self in us. This is one of America’s worst tragedies. Slavery and the destruction of Indians could have been forgiven had we produced a nation of beautiful people living with a divine spark.

Parts of America have sung. Individuals in America have sung. But we as a nation have not sung.

As our industrial might and financial might diminishes, the rest of the world will be imitating our worst habits. We have an opportunity to fulfill Whitman’s vision, to grow up now that we’ve had everything that is frivilous and dangerous.

We, I hope, will love being who we are at the same time we love each other. I hope too, that people throughout the world see radiant faces and twinkling eyes in America, and that they say with envy: America has arrived.

The President Speaks: Memorial Day

This afternoon we commemorate Memorial Day.

Originally we observed Memorial Day to honor those who died in the Civil War. But as America engaged in more wars, it became our obligation to remember the militrary personnel who died in them.

I want first to talk about the Civil War. It was the event that shattered America’s image of itself. One historian wrote that people who had been raised to ask God for the grace to be a martyr, to die for His goodness without being violent, were called upon to be killers.

It was no longer just plantation owners and professional soldiers who were violent but one million or more men. As so many people said afterward, we lost our innocence, the belief that nothing bad could happen to us – especially something caused by ourselves.

Think what wars do. The Civil War made us realize we had stooped to the barbarism we always associated with Europe.

World War I destroyed the freeedom of movement between countries. In the United States civil liberties were removed. If you criticized the war or America’s foreign policy, you were arrested.

After World War II, rather than glory in our freedom we continued to wage war. Criticism of the mililtary and of foreign policy was dangerous. One could be branded a traitor for criticizing the nuclear arms race.

Our prosperity allowed us to forget the government’s suspicion of us. We trusted each other. We did not live in fear.

With Vietnam came division among us we had not experienced since the 1860s. The Vietnam War made America feel that we failed, that not only did we lose, we were wrong and we deserved to lose.

We became confident in the wrong way. We glorified drugs and cheap sex. We disrespected authority.

We felt that since the war was lost and also unjust, the government would learn its lesson.

While the government was supposedly learning its lesson, Americans abused personal freedom with as few qualms as those who waged the Vietnam War.

Then two Iraq wars revealed that we as a nation had not learned either a moral lesson, a political lesson or a constitutional lesson from Vietnam. Americans embraced each Iraq war, though each was unnecessary.

The sad thing about the Iraq wars was that our consumerism could not cancel out the government’s disrespect and mistrust of us. We lost our trust in each other at the same time we lost most of our civil liberties.

We were not able to see that if the government does not want you to be free, the next step is it won’t want you to be comfortable. The government that wants you afraid will eventually want you hungry.

Somebody just shouted, What’s the point? This.

War destroys civil liberties. It creates mistrust and cynicism. Our wars are claimed to be fought for freedom, but with each war people become less free.

In these cynical times it is easy to dismiss those who died for freedom because now we have little freedom. It is tempting to say their deaths have been a waste.

Likewise, those who passionately celebrate Memorial Day refuse to recognize how unfree America is. It is very difficult for my administration to try to bring freedom back to America and to keep the hawks in check.

We need to realize that battlefields are only one place where freedom is defended. The function of a battlefield is to protect freedom from foreign armies. Our heroes did their part.

We must do ours.

Fight for freedom at city council meetings, at the state legislature, at the offices of senators and representatives. Tell them you do not want to take loyalty oaths or be filmed all the time.

Meet with police departments and justice departments. Tell the officials their officers will be shot if they enter your house because they think you are suspicious. Tell them you will not answer questions about your neighbors.

But it isn’t just confrontation that preserves freedom. It is also lilfestyles. Our way of life does not preserve and encourage freedom. I read in a financial newspaper that democracies only work when citizens are not greedy.

I take this to mean if citizens are greedy, they do not pay attention to government.

When we decrease our shopping, as well as our fear of each other, we will start to feel what it’s like to be free. Then we will realize the military and law enforcement have attained too much power, that we foolishly assumed more laws and surveillance would protect us, that we are more afraid every year.

On this Memorial Day I want you my fellow citizens, to think about our heroes in a different way. If diplomacy fails to restore freedom, you owe it to them to dismantle our police state – physically, even if you have to strangle your brother who is an officer for Homeland Security or your sister who sells surveillance equipment to DHS.

The nation is in a crisis. There is no innocence to lose. Only gullibililty, deception and constant cowering.

If we do not rise against this police state, America will have failed, and will have failed with great cowardice, our courageous heroes.

The President Speaks: The Family

This evening I want to talk about the American family. A lot has happened in the last fifty years.

Families are not as big. The rate of divorce is high. Parents worry about their kids more. Fathers are often out of the picture.

There is a good thing though. Parents are not considered the enemy to the extent they were fifty years ago. Thanks to cell phones parents and kids can always communicate. Kids can call their mother for help. Mothers can call their kids to see how things are going.

But where is love? A lot of women have children without any intention of marrying the child’s father. Men do not seem to mind being on the periphery, to have no power and influence over their kids, to not live under the same roof as their kids and be a unit with the child’s mother.

America needs more love between men and women. America needs more couples marrying and having kids so we do not disappear from the map and Western culture does not disappear from the world.

It’s funny. People in their twenties have pets not children. Pornography viewing is astoundingly high. Sex with another man is the choice of an incredible number of men.

This lifestyle is celebrated throughout America. But this lifestyle does not produce children.

What can be done to make Americans want to have more kids? Some people say rent and loans to buy a house are too high for most people to plan to have children. Other people say health care is too expensive and wages are too low.

But there is more to it than this. Sex became a hobby over the last fifty years. People ridiculed marriage and men. Americans stopped believing in God. Too many Americans lost faith in their country and in Western culture.

My administration is pushing for rent control, more housing construction, cheaper home loans. We in Washington push for higher wages and affordable health insurance.

But if I succeed in all of these will Americans have more children? Our hedonism is ingrained in us. A hatred of Western culture is so deep and enjoyable for those who hate it, it’s as if they want our civilzation to disappear. If all of my administration’s economic measures became law, I doubt if there would be a large increase in the number of children.

I try to be optimistic but I am unable to be. A way to get Americans to have more children is for poiticians and movie stars to have 4-5 children so the rest of America is inspired by its leaders and heroes to create a populous America where parks are filled with children and streets and sidewalks are filled with kids playing outside.

In closing, it is a heartbreaker for me that my countrymen have no lust to have children, that our men are uninspiring.

We lust for the wrong things.

Good night.