Won The Battle, Losing The War

Don't you feel a stirring of pride when you remember President Reagan saying back in 1987, "Mr Gorbachov, tear down this wall!" ? Don't we all look back at this as the point when the tide was turned in the Cold War against Communism? Does anybody else think today that maybe we started doing the victory lap just a little bit early? 

 Oh I'm not talking about Putin and his nonsense in Georgia. That's important issue of its own and should be of great concern to us, but there is a far graver situation, far closer to home that should be drawing our attention. While we have been fighting the battles to promote Democracy around the world, it seems to me that we have been losing the war promoting it in the US. I can come to no other conclusion after looking at the handling of recent events in the financial markets. 

With barely a dissenting voice to be heard, the Federal government has in a very short space in time, acquired or all but acquired a huge stake in the financial market. With little debate and in the dead of night (or over the weekend), THE BUREAUCRACY in Washington has all but nationalized the mortgage industry with the acquisition of Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac and and the impending one of AIG. Not only is such an action one that the federal government is not empowered to do under the Constitution, but this gross misappropriation of power has been taken by officials who were elected to no office and are responsible to no voter. 

While Congress hides behind ignorance (and apparently, stupidity), confusion, and the need for time to run campaigns to keep the jobs that they refuse to perform; they have turned over the reigns of power to political appointees and bureaucrats. These backroom generals in turn, while telling us that it is for our own good, have quietly surrendered to strategies right out of the teachings of Karl Marx. 

In the name of the very Democratic government which employs them, they betray the principles on which that government was founded by their actions. In violation of everything that we hold sacred and that they are empowered to defend, these bottom dwelling pencil pushers steal the very freedoms that our government was created to protect. Without public debate or discussion, these slaves to the bureaucratic mentality seek to enslave not only us but future generations, with a crushing burden of debt the like of which has never been seen before. 

What next for these betrayers of Democratic principles and free-market economies? The auto industry is already holding its hand out for subsidies and loans. The airline industry appears to be not far behind if their business does not change substantially. Even Newspapers, fast approaching a potential financial oblivion of their own, could be on the list for a government bailout. 

Will this government, flush from the massive intrusion into the world economy just made, seek new conquests? Will a federal bureaucracy, who for many years has had a goal of expansion and intrusion into the everyday lives of Americans, be allowed to continue on this path without check by a Congress that has shown itself to have a backbone that comes off poorly in comparison with a well cooked bit of fettuccine? Will either politician seeking the highest office in the land stand up against this betrayal of the very democracy that they seek to lead? 

Thomas Jefferson warned us about such dangers, stating: "I sincerely believe, with you, that banking establishments are more dangerous than standing armies; and that the principle of spending money to be paid by posterity, under the name of funding, is but swindling futurity on a large scale." I believe that we have all but proved him right in recent days. And as the casualties in this failing battle to defend Democratic principles against the encroachment of Socialism at home mount, we must ask ourselves how many battles we are willing to lose in this war.