Who indeed wants to think? And in case you don't, try reading a little of Solzhenitsyn's Gulag to get an idea of how far we have yet to fall. Who wants to consider the fundamental premises and ideas necessary to a free and a just society? Evidently, most of us don't think it's worth the time, if we even bother to think that much.
Peikoff's words should haunt you - the evidence and the proof of his premises is written in the historical record - and its playing itself out right in front of the dazed and bemused eyes of the walking dead who think they're free Americans.
As Peikoff said - "There is only one antidote to today’s trend: a new, pro-reason philosophy. Such a philosophy would have to offer for the first time a full statement and an unbreached defense of the fundamental ideas of America."
The foundation of this nation lay in the assumption that we were wise enough to control our own lives. Everything that the Founders wrote reflects this underlying assumption. They believed, without exception (even those with strong religious beliefs) that the Church should play no role in the conduct of government because of the Church's tendency to manipulate or otherwise usurp control of the populace's lives in ways the Founders found abhorrent. They were strongly pro-gun; firearms made it possible for a citizen to protect himself from encroachments upon his liberty, even by his own government. They desired a free press because they believed that as individuals, we were wise enough to make decisions that would ultimately be beneficial to the larger community. In short, the Founders produced the first nation ever in the history of the world based upon an idea – a philosophy, if you will - of freedom. Sadly, we are witness to its fall.
Now, the despicable and contemptible lot of political whores that we have voted and applauded into office speaks of party loyalty when they should be speaking of liberty.
They speak of unity when they should be speaking of independence and self-determination.
A mere handful uphold and defend of a set of values based upon reality and rationality.
Most of them are willing to compromise their principles for the sake of "getting along."
Virtually none of them demonstrate an understanding, much less a passion for the Constitution and the Bill of Rights - or the philosophical, metaphysical, and epistemological fundamentals upon which those documents are based.
Virtually none of them uphold the ideals of the Founding Fathers: individual freedom and the right to own the products of one’s labor based upon the rule of law - the only logical and proper conditions for a just and free society. Why? Because they don't believe in them! And they don't understand them!
Once a nation such as ours loses sight of the philosophical principles upon which it was founded, it is lost. Dwight D Eisenhower, in his 1953 inaugural address said, "A people that values its privileges over its principles soon loses both." A man without a firm grasp of unbreachable and intransigent moral principles based upon reason is a man disarmed. We are a nation disarmed - morally, ethically, and philosophically. The silence of our alleged representatives concerning the encroachment on our fundamental rights speaks more eloquently than anything I can write. Don't you suppose that the real reason for the 'silence of the damned' is simply because they have nothing to say?
"I heard no mention of the loss of personal freedom... Apparently this was not much of a sacrifice. They couldn't have cared less." This, from William Shirer, "Hitler and the Third Reich: First Impressions", from The Nightmare Years: 1930-1940 (Little, Brown, and Co., 1984)
You are evading the truth if you deny the reality of the systematic abrogation of the rule of law and the destruction of the Constitution and the Bill of Rights at the hands of both mainstream American political parties. Once it has become apparent that the rule of law no longer applies to the common man; once the application of existing law has become arbitrary and outcomes subject to the amount of money one can apply; once laws are made and applied in such a way that it becomes virtually impossible to exist without violating them - the party's over.
Some of us are willing to acknowledge the indisputable and incontrovertible evidence that the rule of law is all but dead, and that the political process as it now exists is irretrievably corrupt. The rest of you cling to the fiction that the rule of law still governs, and that the first principles of human freedom upon which our nation was founded are honored and upheld, much less understood. And that's the dirty secret, isn't it? Too many of us are willing to look the other way, to deny the evidence, to pretend that it doesn't matter. The loss of our freedom is akin to the crazy uncle locked up in the basement - we all know he's there; we just won't talk about it. But I will. I will remind you all from time to time of the good work your favorite - and not so favorite representatives are doing in the service of tyranny.
We ought to swing from the end of a rope any of our so-called leaders who fail to enthusiastically and articulately embrace and endorse these ideas. And before we do that, we've got to acquire that same rigor and habit of thought if we do not have it already. Those of us who do will be the ones to step forward and rebuild the Republic after we pay the butcher's bill that's coming due.
Hehehehe! Wow! A comment removed already.
This might be possible if America were actually practicing any of those fundamental ideals Mr. Piekoff writes of. Sadly, she isn't and hasn't in a very, very long time.
"I heard no mention of the loss of personal freedom... Apparently this was not much of a sacrifice. They couldn't have cared less." This, from William Shirer, "Hitler and the Third Reich: First Impressions", from The Nightmare Years: 1930-1940 (Little, Brown, and Co., 1984)
My younger brother is a big WWII buff. One time when we were having dinner he wondered aloud what it must have been like to live in Europe in the mid 1930s. I told him to take a good, hard look around and the parallels would become obvious.
He got real quiet after that.
. Once it has become apparent that the rule of law no longer applies to the common man; once the application of existing law has become arbitrary and outcomes subject to the amount of money one can apply; once laws are made and applied in such a way that it becomes virtually impossible to exist without violating them - the party's over.
I recently got a C & R license from the ATF. (Yea, I know....) As a 'courtesy' they sent me a copy of all the Federal Firearms Laws and associated Regulations. Just for fun I put the documents on our kitchen scale.
The combined weight is over two pounds. Think about that. Two pounds of paper 'regulating' what is supposed to be a fundamental Constitutional right. And that's only the Federal stuff.
Most of the 'problems' we're facing in this country can be traced directly to the loss of individual freedoms. Just name one and chances are there's some completely un-Constitutional Government Program designed to fix this 'problem' that has demonstrably failed to ameliorate said problem. What each and every one of them has done is limit human freedom in ways our grandparents would never have stood for.
Most people here won't believe it, but the list of Federal crimes is staggeringly long now. Do you take medication regularly and remove it from the container your pharmacist gave you and put it in one of those daily reminder things?
Felony.
Travel with a large amount of cash?
Expect to have it confiscated without charge, indictment, or trial.
Some people say the world has changed since 9-11 and we must now surrender just a bit more of our freedoms.
If we were a truly free people, 9-11 would never have happened.
Up until the mid 1960s one could board an aircraft armed and not violate any laws. Well, in order to 'solve' a problem the Government outlawed that. As a result no one on any of those airplanes had access to the simple tools that could have saved thousands of lives.
And those 19 asshats who murdered all those people? They were here on US Government 'education' visas. Some of them even got us, the US Taxpayer, to fund their little jaunt at flight school.
To add insult to injury the State Dept. actually approved some of the murderers visas months after they were identified as hijackers. Yep. Your tax dollars at work.
We ought to swing from the end of a rope any of our so-called leaders who fail to enthusiastically and articulately embrace and endorse these ideas
It's far too late for that my friend. Any one seriously proposing such a course of action would be looking at a long prison stretch at the very least and quite possibly a sudden and violent end of their days at the hands of government 'law enforcement'.
As the inestimable Claire Wolfe put it: "America is at that akward stage. It's too late to work within the system and too early to shoot the bastards."
The Federal Government is, or was designed to be, Constitutionally bound to do about 4 things. Mostly because the Founders understood that those things were about all it would be able to do at all, much less do well.
IN short those things are:
1. Control the borders and set a rational immigration policy.-Failing miserably at both.
2. Run a functioning fair and open Court system.-Not doing really well with this one.
3. Defend the citizens of the US and their property from foreign invaders.-9/11 showed how pathetically inept the Feds really are at that.
4. See that the States don't get into trade wars with each other.-One could argue this point either way.
As to the rest of those myriad things the Feds are busying themselves doing? Miserable failures mostly.
War On Poverty? 40 years and we've still got poor people.
War On Drugs? 30 years and we've still got drugs. More than ever in fact.
As little as 100 years ago people would have dragged this current bunch of poseur Congresscritters into the streets and ridden them out of Washington on a rail, no matter what their party affiliation.
We're now fighting a War On Terror. That makes about as much sense as Roosevelt declaring on Dec. 8, 1941 that we were fighting a "War On Aviation" because the enemy used planes to attack us.
We're led by fools, charlatans, and worse.
We're going to pay very dearly for that.
Very dearly indeed.
L
Impressive post, Noumenon. I have a personally autographed copy of The Ominous Parallels. The chapter on America ranks as one of the most memorable tributes to our country I've ever read. And Peikoff is from Canada! Also the chapter on the camps is so utterly horrifying that I've been unable to read anything more about that genocide since. The best history of the camps I've read, probably because he explains the true cause of the Nazi's brutality.
The primary responsibility, and power, resides in each of us.
By 1980 it was becoming clearer that philosophy had kind of stopped moving forward and was bifurcating and ramifying into narrow interest groups. It currently is pretty much a cable that has totally frayed at the end. But, by the principle of evolution it is possible that one of these frayed threads will find it likes the world it is in and will thicken and become robust and become a new cable in itself. There are several unexamined threads even now.
Now, the despicable and contemptible lot of political whores that we have voted and applauded into office speaks of party loyalty when they should be speaking of liberty.
They speak of unity when they should be speaking of independence and self-determination.
A mere handful uphold and defend of a set of values based upon reality and rationality.
Most of them are willing to compromise their principles for the sake of "getting along."
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Newt was such a philospher and he was destroyed by the socialist pimp media as recently as 1999. What did we do? We watched his destruction and moved along.
That is prescient.
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