Is It War?
Deborah Venable
01/04/10
You
decide. Is it a War On Terror or a War
On Tyranny that we are fighting?
Others
have postulated the concept of a war on tyranny before me, but it seems to have
been prompted by the former administration’s declarations against tyranny in
the world, and not so much concentrated on defining America’s internal
struggles. Indeed, Bush’s attempts to
expand democracy in the world and lead America on a mission of “nation
building” that would not only bolster this country’s image, but also offer the
taste of freedom to people in bondage everywhere was ambitious to say the
least. For many commenting on this effort, the idea of shifting focus from a war on
terror to a war on tyranny seemed to leave a bad taste in their mouths.
Let’s
face it, though, there is no war on terror being waged now, or is there likely
to be in the future. Political
correctness won’t allow us to get the descriptive verbiage right, much less
define the enemy. If “terror” were the
only enemy we are fighting, the war would have been over almost immediately.
The
face on the enemy in a war on terror is an inept, bungling, misguided, ruthless
piece of human garbage. He’ll trip
himself up more times than not, and ignorance is the only thing that paves his
path to success - other people’s ignorance.
One doesn’t have to war with terror – one only needs to defeat the human
failing that allows it to exist.
The
war on tyranny, however, is a much more formidable undertaking. Defeat that enemy and terror has no
foothold.
The
American colonists went kicking and screaming into battle against tyranny for
the first time about 234 years ago. As
others have pointed out, they fought the American Revolution for perhaps much
less provocation than modern American patriots have today, but they had a
single face to paint on their enemy – the king of England, George III.
He
was an obvious tyrant and held the reins of the most powerful (and feared)
nation on earth. The colonists were not
free to pursue their own happiness until they fought that war and broke those
reins of power over them. It was almost
an impossible undertaking to fight such a war, and a modern type opinion poll
taken at that time would have probably voted against it.
One
of the best dramatic performances depicting America’s Revolutionary War
occurred in the movie, “The Patriot” starring Mel Gibson as the fictional
character, Benjamin Martin. You may
remember a scene early in the movie where Martin is called to the state house
in Charleston where the decision is pending on whether or not to levy a tax to
fund the war. Because Martin is a
widowed father with seven children as well as a war worn veteran of the French
and Indian War, he has no intention of getting in the fight, so he addresses
the meeting with a simple question:
''Why should I trade a tyrant 3,000 miles away for 3,000 tyrants
one mile away?''
Of
course the levy passed and the war was fought, (with our fictional character
playing the hero’s role all the way to the end) and with many more than 3,000
real heroes spilling their blood for our inheritance of freedom.
That
question, though, posed all these years later by a fictional character in a
depiction of that war, remains unanswered.
Why, indeed, trade tyrants? And
is that what we have truly done?
While
we are busy putting a face on the enemy, what would that face look like if we
come to the conclusion that this war on tyranny is a reality? Some would say the politicians who are
pushing unconstitutional legislation, trying to control every aspect of our
lives and fortunes, would wear that face.
Others may proclaim that the tyrants we should be most concerned with
are those leaders of regimes all over the world who see us as infidels, Satin,
or meddlesome imperialists.
America
didn’t used to fear those outside forces – we merely chose to battle and defeat
them. Now, however, we no longer speak and
act with one unified voice – rather we quake in our own indecisiveness. Leaders and scholars in this country hold
such tyrants in high regard, and praise them as good examples for mankind to
follow!
Is
it war? American soldiers are killing
and being killed on foreign battlefields while the politicians that have sent
them there proceed to tie their hands and saddle them with impossible rules of
engagement and threats of punishment for not treating the enemy “fairly.” Whatever happened to the old admonishment
about fairness in love and war?
Civilian
Americans are also fighting their own war with much the same constraints.
I
believe America is once more embroiled in a War On Tyranny. That is to say that there are those inside
our own government, within every institution of society, and within every
community that would seek to wield absolute power over the so-called free
society of individuals that make up America.
It
is a war of hideous consequence if individual sovereignty loses. The biggest problem we face is educating the
heretofore ill-educated bulk of the electorate to recognize and understand the
term, “individual sovereignty.” It’s
tough to do in a declining moral society that does not accept that they may
have a Creator to answer to one day and that the Founders relied on knowledge
of and faith in that Creator as they set about to protect our unalienable
rights in the government they set up.
Without the belief that we actually have these rights, sovereignty will
be forfeited.
How
can anyone believe in individual sovereignty and unalienable rights who also
believe that any human or group of humans should exercise absolute power over
others?
Admiring
or trading tyrants will not see us through this war on tyranny. We have the right and duty to demand that
our elected representatives are not tyrants.
As I see it, neither major political party nor any of the lesser
splinter parties or proposed “new” parties will insure this. We can keep trading one party for the other
every election year, or voting in so-called “independents” (who always seem to
choose one of the parties to caucus with anyway), watch them buy and sell their
votes to the highest bidders, allow them to completely ignore their
constituents to build their own “careers” or we can demand that they remember
that they serve us – not the other way around.
It
is long past time to demand term limits. This
is an issue that will be hard to win, no doubt, because we are literally asking
tyrants in Washington and state houses to slit their own throats – or it will
certainly seem so to many of them. This recent
article
examines the issue quite succinctly.
I
can’t say whether or not this will ever happen, but I can say with absolute
certainty that if it doesn’t, America will never be free of tyrants in close
proximity, and therefore, we will never be free.