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Obama calls for reforms in Independence Day address
US President Barack Obama urged Americans, who celebrated Independence Day on Saturday, to implement broad economic and social reforms, expressing confidence the country will be able to overcome the challenges it is facing. A particularly fitting call for Independence Day. We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal,But that some get special treatment. Procrustes considered that all men were equal, and if they didn't fit his theory he made them fit... that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights,Which are subject to abrogation and curtailment by the State in an emergency, or in the name of the common good, or to protect you from yourself, or to avoid offending anybody ... that among these are life,But not the right to be born, nor the right to live out all your days if you are old, feeble, or cost the public too much to keep going libertyWhich is the right to be left to do as you please unless the State decides it's not good for you or not good for itself. and the pursuit of happiness.Always within approved boundaries, of course. And as long as you pay your taxes. And no smoking! And watch your cholesterol. That to secure these rights, governments are instituted among men,"All men have governments, therefore all governments are similar. That's logic," said Humpty Dumpty... deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed.The governed are there to pay their taxes and to vote in blocs... That whenever any form of government becomes destructive to these ends, it is the right of the people to alter or to abolish it,This can go the way of storming the Winter Palace or it can come by way of Hindenberg appointing a new chancellor. Sometimes it comes by way of chopping the king and queens' heads off -- a minor variation on storming the Winter Palace -- or of the man with the most artillery stepping in to restore order. Seldom does it come by way of thoughtful men throwing off the bonds of oppression and then attempting to guarantee "life, liberty, and pursuit of happiness" for their fellow men and their descendants. and to institute new government,Most new governments are much like the old governments, only with different faces making all the decisions, except for those cases where the new governments turn out to be worse. As a general rule, unless they're the Khmer Rouge governments are much like wine: they tend to mellow, to get better with age, until eventually they turn sour and have to be disposed of. As a general rule, you can't use a used-up government in salad dressing. laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their safety and happiness.Most governments involve high-sounding phrases and most of that number are headed by men with an eye on the main chance and a hand in the till. Prudence, indeed, will dictate that governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes;For one thing, you never know what the new one's going to be like until the second or third election -- if there is one. and accordingly all experience hath shown that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed.No government is perfect, and politicians are least of all perfect. Probably the only thing less perfect than a politician is a revolutionary. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such government, and to provide new guards for their future security.Eventually the breaking point comes. Eventually government slips by degrees into oligarchy, hereditary princes, and unrestrained rapacity. Eventually the barricades will come out, and no one knows what life will be like when the firing squads have finished their work. Nor does anyone know for sure which side's going to be looking through the sights and which side's going to be counting muzzle blasts. "We are facing an array of challenges on a scale unseen in our time," the president said in his weekly radio address. "We are waging two wars. We are battling a deep recession." The president said that in order to lay the foundation of growth and prosperity, Americans would have to revamp their education system and build schools that would prepare every child to compete with workers around the world. ... and unrestrained rapacity ... He pointed out that the United States also needed to reform its health care system, bringing down medical costs for all Americans. ... and unrestrained rapacity ... Obama also urged Americans to make clean energy the profitable kind of energy "so that we can end our dependence on foreign oil". ... and unrestrained rapacity ... "We are not a people who fear the future," the president concluded, reminding Americans of the spirit of the country's founding fathers. "We are a people who make it. And on this July 4th, we need to summon that spirit once more." "When in the course of human events..." Posted by: Fred 2009-07-05 |
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