When historians track the beginnings of the second American Revolution, their search will take them to Morristown, N.J., just like the first time.Also, from Dr. Jack Wheeler at Atlas Shrugs, "The Coming Second American Revolution":
And like the first, it will have started with a tax revolt, and anger at an unresponsive government.
Something is happening in this country. And it would be not only arrogant, but unwise, for our elected officials to ignore it.
In the past, movements like the July 4 national Tea Parties were usually sparsely populated by libertarians, radicals and reactionaries. This movement has them too, but with a whole lot more regular folks. The crowd Saturday at Morristown Green was sizable and made up of the put-upon American middle class. Instead of pitchforks and muskets, they were armed with signs, that if nothing else, show many still believe in the visions of the Founding Fathers ....
The Tea Party movement is becoming a national phenomenon. They started locally, in a few cities in a few states, just this year. But the idea is spreading as fast as the internet can take it. On April 15, tax day, there were 750 across the country. For July 4, there were 1,505. Now, a Sept. 12 taxpayer march on Washington is being planned. The number of local organizers running Tea Party groups has swelled to well over 2,000 throughout the 50 states. These could soon be the grassroots seeds of a third political party, one designed to reform government, and bring it back to basics.
Clearly, we are no longer living in a world of normal reality. For the first time in US history, we have a president who hates his own country. A president who is on the side of America's enemies, not on the side of America ...More at the link.
We have a media who reveres and worships as a demi-god a president who hates his, and their, country.
We have a government spending trillions of dollars it does not have in a seemingly determined effort to destroy everyone's life savings via inflation.
We have a Congress that passes the largest tax increase in the history of the world (literally) via a 1,300 page Climate Bill that no one has read and based on utterly fraudulent science.
We have a governor who goes so around the bend that he trashes his wife, four children, his career and life for some broad in Argentina.
We have a people who go completely bananas with grief over the suicide of a washed-up pedophilic fruitcake ex-rock star.
This is societal quantum weirdness, a dissociation from normal reality, of which additional examples could be endlessly provided. Yet extreme, unhinged, over-the-top weirdness is normally what you get when you get close to a tipping point, close to the bursting of a bubble.
Madnesses of crowds are most often economic, such as the dotcom craze or the housing bubble. A lot of folks lose a lot of money, and that's it. But when such a madness pervades an entire society, the consequences can be far more dramatic. Such a madness is often the runup to a revolution.
Revolutions are chaotic, dangerous things. We were blessed-by-Providence lucky in our first one in 1776. We got freedom and George Washington, while the French with theirs in 1789 got the guillotine and Napoleon. Which will we get in the coming Second American Revolution?
Added: From Heidi at Big Girl Pants, "Power Is Not a Means, It is an End. A Parable For Today."
Sure hope I wind up in the same camp as Dr. Wheeler, as he sounds like an interesting guy.
ReplyDeleteIf there is going to be a second American Revolution, it better happen soon.
This nation is literally standing on the bank of it's Rubicon, with its toes in the water, and beginning to lean precariously forward.
-Dave
That's why I am not so excited about a violent overthrow of the Obama unless we absolutely have to. Our revolution succeeded because we had local and colonial/state governments that remained intact through and after the war. It might not be that way this time.
ReplyDeleteit's a new dynamic, shoprat, but we have to figure out how to use this dynamic. i agree that violence may not work like it did last time, for the reasons you mentioned, but i believe we can still do it non-violently. but we MUST act now.
ReplyDeleteProfessor Douglas...
ReplyDeleteI find all of this talk of a second 'American Revolution' interesting. I will not be suprised to see it become more widespread as Americans who care to preserve this country find the whirlwind that is the radical leftist makeover develops into a tornado.
On Independence Day we celebrated the victory won in The War For American Independence. I never use the term 'American Revolution'. This was a war for the restoration of rights recently denied, not a revolution. Our struggle with the British was not in the same league as those revolutions that occurred in 1789 France, 1917/18 Russia, late 1940's China, or in any other such conflicts since. The war we fought was not a cause that sought to crush and destroy the existing order and The Permanent Things. The war we fought was for the restoration of our rights as free Englishmen. When the mother country refused to guarantee these basic rights, we had no choice but to declare our separation from it. The vast majority of those involved in this 'treason' did so reluctantly and most certainly with no desire to ravage the land and set the calendar to the Year One, as if our glorious English heritage had never existed.
I think it good that people are talking about such things as the two persons you quote write about. We may find in the future that our only option is in line with what The Founders felt compelled to do. My worry is that we will not understand the major differences between the American struggle of 1776 and those other ones I mentioned above.
You all cannot be serious!
ReplyDeleteShall we all just get so frustrated at our elected government officials that we all rush out and join a fringe group! Are you all conservatives carrying on about a revolution here? Stand with Americans for America, and stop the ridiculous talk of civil war. Way to divide the party and assure victory for the opposition. Let’s find a Republican leader instead of whining like a bunch of paranoid whackos!
I had the same thought when I read the first, third and fourth comments here, Rusty.
ReplyDeleteTo quote Jon Stewart: "I think you might be confusing tyranny with losing. And I feel for you because I've been there. A few times, in fact one of them was a bit of a nail biter. But see, when the guy that you disagree with gets elected, he's probably going to do things you disagree with. He could cut taxes on the wealthy, remove government's oversight capability, invade a country that you thought should not be invaded. That's not tyranny. That's democracy. See, now you're in the minority. It's supposed to taste like a shit taco. And by the way, if I remember correctly, when disagreement was expressed about that president's actions when y'all were in power, I believe the response was, "Why do you hate America?..."
JBW and I disagree on many things, but I cannot disagree with him here. That victim badge works for both parties, I guess - in fact, all three parties – and throw in races, and religions, and that guy that got the job you didn't, and everyday life. Hang “Victim” around your neck and it leads to frustration, bitterness and ceaseless whining.
ReplyDeleteRepublicans did not earn the right to be voted in last election – and I voted for McCain - he would be doing things differently. It is still our country. It is too early to tell about Obama’s cautious foreign policy methods and continued economic spending at this time; if John McCain were in I'd be saying the same thing. And guess what, this isn’t 19th Century France, we all get a vote every election.
The Republican party needs to do some very deep reassessment right now, as to core values and mistakes made in the past. I don’t think that has to be such a bitter pill. Every now and again every one should reassess their actions and behavior – just ask my wife. Joke. Lighten up. Obama was elected president, he isn’t Satan, and it is still: “my country ‘tis of thee, sweet land of liberty.” I suggest watching the Senate and House debates, it restores faith in this great government’s ability to find clarity.
...make that 17th Century France.
ReplyDeleteThe whole point of a Constitutional republic is to prohibit the winner of any election from robbing the loser of their political right, IE exceeding their constitutional delegated powers.
ReplyDeleteLosing an election any election doesn't give the winning side the right to invent brand new Federal Government powers over things like health care and cap in trade. Anymore then it removes Constitutional Federal responsibility as specified under article 1 section 8 like defense.
We are most deliberately not a democracy for very good reason as our founding fathers wrote volumes on explaining specifically in their rebottles of the French revolution. To sum them up: Democracies are self-destructive and tyrannical to the rights of the people.
It’s true they won an election, and thus get to weal the legitimate reins of powers of that government, but it are JUST that the legitimate reins of powers; they DO NOT have the right to exceed those powers. The U.S. Constitution does not give Congress the right to bail out private industry anymore then it gives congress the right to spend regulate carbon or our healthcare. These are rights inherently reserved to the people and their States, as the 10th amendment explicitly tells us. There have been a great many usurpations of our rights by both republicans and democrats on the federal level, and we have at last reached a tipping point where it has become intolerable.
It is long past time the people and their States take back all of theses rights which are rightfully theirs and explicitly denied the federal government which has abused them.
We have been Taxed enough already!
The government as a whole has failed. We the people have let them fail. It is our right if we do not like the way things are going to change them. What happened to "power to the people" instead we handed more and more power to the government. Why didn't we get to vote on all these bailouts or if we want government run healthcare. The power is ours and it is time to reclaim it. I sincerely hope this can be done peacefully but if not I am one who will die before i give up my freedoms to a socialist government.
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