Tag Archives: founding fathers

Dec 8 2011

The Stuff of Tyranny

 

The stuff of tyrants

 

The pressure is on.  The intensity is rising and anxiety is mounting.  The sacred golden calf of environmentalists is beginning to creak and groan under the beat of the march of the “villagers”.  Yes, the “villagers”, those scabby little things that dare to own land in the far reaches of eastern and northern Maine.  Those scalawags who rape mother earth with tools that plant gardens, chainsaws that cut down trees and, worst of all, produce offspring that run like little vermin in and out of the pristine lakes and streams of the goddess’ green earth.  Eh gads, the fiends!  Who knows what bodily fluids those little monsters are emitting into the mother’s pools of purity. Ah….weeeell, all I can say is when this guy was a little guy there was no getting me out of the water….okay…..just saying.

While this sarcasm is a little over the top (hard to believe, I know), there is an underlying motive behind many of the left’s passionate arguments in defense of LURC, the Land Use Regulatory Commission.  Many of the more liberal persuasion simply do not believe in landowner rights or perhaps other landowners’ rights.  Amazingly, liberals always find a waiver for their own property, but I digress.  The Founding Father’s unwavering belief that a man’s land was his own to do with as he pleases flies directly in the face of the socialist belief that there are a certain select few who know what is best for everybody else.

A Mr. Ron Joseph recently penned an opinion article for the Bangor Daily.  In this piece, Mr. Joseph bemoans the fact that the hearings to review the effect of LURC on rural areas are being held in the rural areas that are affected by LURC.  Of course, to most of us, that would be common sense, but the retired State and Federal biologist fails to see the obvious here.

Mr. Joseph, in his defense of LURC, reveals the prevailing thought process that was the genesis of LURC. That is, landowners of the North and East wild lands are a danger to the land and cannot be trusted with the stewardship of their own lands; therefore, in order to protect the land at risk from these less than worthy landowners a government bureaucracy most be established that can super-impose the will of more earth-minded people upon the rights of those who own the land.  Mr. Joseph clearly states in his editorial that former members of LURC should be the ones deciding its fate.  He never once acknowledges that these are the very members who ignored the will of landowners in years past.  He refuses to admit that there is a reason that rural Maine has such a negative feeling towards this organization.  Rural Maine has suffered immeasurably under the tyranny of this organization.  The political establishment for years has ignored their cries for help.

Now comes a Governor who is determined to see that rural Maine has a voice.  Now the sacred environmental cow begins to feel the tremble of revolt.  But there is danger in this for the Governor.  If the obstructionist moderates within his own party block the abolishment of this hated commission, he and his party may feel backlash from the very ones who voted him in.

Mr. Joseph started his piece with a quote from Earnest Benn.  “Politics is the art of looking for trouble, finding it whether it exists or not, diagnosing it incorrectly, and applying the wrong remedy.”  I can’t think of a better description for formation of LURC.  A danger to the earth was created that never was.  LURC was formed to govern that which need not and should not be governed.  Now this behemoth of “government gone bad’ has done immense damage to the towns and villages of rural Maine and allows the persnickety, pompous and prudish elitist the power to dictate to landowners what they can and cannot do with their own property.  This is the stuff of tyranny and is why we cry “Abolish LURC and Set Maine Free”!

Oct 26 2011

Means nothing to you, means something to me.

Means nothing to you, means something to me.

 

What is fair?  How do you establish a government that gives every individual an opportunity for success?  Can you possibly protect the interests and hopes of every person?  Our founding fathers wrestled with these questions and more when they set out to lay the foundation of a new fledgling nation.  Not far removed from the violent travail, which gave birth to this new freedom, these wise men knew they could not take lightly the solemn responsibility to guard the future of a newborn nation, whose hopes they now held in their hands.

Fresh in their minds was the horrors of war and the stench of blood-soaked battlefields.  Stamped into their memories was the ultimate price so many had paid for the hope and dream of freedom.  Our Founding Fathers knew they had to get it right or this would be another bloody revolution that simply shifted the power of tyranny from one faction to another.

So they started with this basic premise; all men are created equal and endowed by their Creator with basic unalienable rights; life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.  It didn’t matter whether you were the majority or the minority, these basic rights could not be taken from you.  Next, the Founders grappled with how to insure this premise would be honored and protected.

These great men were keenly aware of the failure of government throughout history to be fair to every man.  So how could our government succeed were others had failed?  It couldn’t.  No government can.  The hopes, beliefs, and dreams of so many individuals offer a myriad of goals and intents that no government could ever guarantee.  Someone’s dreams inevitably would be set aside for others the government deemed more worthy of attention.  Perhaps the idea of government based on the belief that all men were created equal was simply folly.

Unless, that government was marginalized.  What if that government were confined and constrained to a small specific purpose?  What if that government feared the people because it feared the Creator of the people?  What if that government simply protected the nation from the threat of the invasion of a new tyranny?  What if that government was too small to provide an impediment to anyone’s life, liberty, and pursuit of happiness?  Then, perhaps, the aspirations of all American’s could have a hope of realization.

Government cannot understand the passions of the individual.  It simply cannot.  The human desire is a multi-faceted expression.  What matters little to you many be of utmost importance to another.  But each must be afforded an opportunity to pursue that passion.  This is the responsibility of the individual.  He or she alone knows what they value and desire.

Big government holds people helpless to its decisions.  The more it fails the more government reminds its people that it can’t please everyone.  Our Forefathers never intended Americans to look to government for answers.  It was not intended to please anyone, just function in its limited role.  They believed that every individual knew his own dream and that was none of government’s business.

Since the President and his Party have taken power, the private sector has lost 1.6 million jobs.  The government has grown by at least 105,000 jobs.  Senator Harry Reid has said the private sector is “doing just fine”.  He believes government jobs need to be protected.  If Mr. Reid were not a public servant, he would be entitled to his beliefs.  But while the loss of 1.6 million jobs is “just fine” with Democrats, the private sector does not agree.  Government is deciding whose hopes and futures are worth preserving.  Government is now right where our Founding Fathers did not want it to be, in the way.  Big government needs to be, once again, marginalized.  This government needs to be told that the “means nothing to you” means something to me and it is really none of your business, so get out of it.