The Loss of Freedoms List (Vanity Post)

Cornpone | 25 Jan 2005 | Cornpone

[Cornpone]

Dear Freepers,

I'm getting old and perhaps a little wacky but as I look back over my life I continue to try and understand how my country hasn't quite turned out the way my mother and father brought me up to believe it should be and what it was I was always raised to defend. So I've started making a list of those things that just seem to represent a betrayal of what I always thought America is about...freedom. Its a short list, I'm still working on it and I know many, if not most, will not agree with everything on it. But I'm sure everyone has something to add to it...like the state of medical care in this country which I haven't even begun to think about. Anyway, they are simple things that individually don't amount to much. But, taken together they represent a fundamental change in our culture if you think about it. Please help me add to this list. I don't know what I will do with it. Perhaps I'll just go nail it on the doors of Congress..not likely. I'd rather nail it on the doors of the White House except we can't really go there anymore...another freedom lost.

• Mandatory motorcycle helmet laws

• Mandatory automobile seatbelt laws

• Mandatory boating lifejacket laws

• Increasing erosion of property rights

• Increasing regulation of alcohol consumption, tobacco use and firearms possession

• Virtual elimination of the right to self defense

• Denial of the right to carry a weapon for self defense

• Hate crime laws that ridiculously imply that the murder of one human being is more heinous than the murder of another based on some politically motivated criteria

• Encroachment on the constitutional right to assembly

• Increasing attempts to limit our constitutional right to free speech through hate speech laws that seek to dampen dissident opinions

• Increasing restrictions on demonstrations of personal faith with a bias against Christians

• Increasing restrictions on hunting

• Increasing restrictions on fishing

• Increasing restrictions on the traditional use of fireworks

• Increasing restrictions on traditional methods of outdoor cooking

• Increasing restrictions on water rights and usage

• Increasing government incursion and attempts to regulate the possession of domestic animals which in all cases don’t happen to be ‘pets’

• Unfair taxation to fund social practices abhorrent to most Americans

• Government advocacy of socially deviant lifestyles

• Government attempts to redefine millennia-old family relationships and bonds, i.e., gay marriage

• Affirmative action laws and policies that unjustly punish and deny opportunity to current generations based on the shortcomings of generations long past

• Ridiculous product liability judgments that seek to limit access and deny choice through judicial activism rather than legislative debate

Add your thoughts to the list please.

God Bless our Forefathers and God Bless You

[Dan Evans]

Even if true, that's no loss to your freedom or rights.

Taxation is a loss of freedom. It's money you are no longer free to spend.

"Their is not greater tyranny than to force a man to pay for something he does not want simply because you think it is good for him" -- Robert A. Heinlein.

[Southack]

"Taxation is a loss of freedom. It's money you are no longer free to spend."

Indeed. And you'll notice that we've lowered the top tax bracket from 70% under JFK down to almost half that today.

Thanks to the 3 federal income tax cuts under President Bush so far, a family of four earning $40,000 per year only pays fourty-eight Dollars ($48) in annual federal income taxes now (a Tax Freedom Day of January 1).

The estate tax is now dead, again thanks to President Bush. No longer do families have to sell their father's farm simply to pay their estate tax bill.

The double-tax on dividends is almost completely gone now, too.

Thus, we are moving in the correct direction on the tax issue, just as we are gaining back our gun rights, gold rights, voting rights, Internet rights, etc.

[Dan Evans]

Restrictions on *companies* are very different beasts than are restrictions on individual human freedoms.

Nevertheless, the manufacturers lost some freedom to decide what kind of cars they will manufacture. And the rest of us suffer because of it.

[Dan Evans]

Indeed. And you'll notice that we've lowered the top tax bracket from 70% under JFK down to almost half that today.

But governments still collect about as much as they always did. Inflation continually drives us into upper brackets. Tax codes are so complex that it is meaningless to cite one statistic in marginal income tax rates.

The best way to gauge how much they tax us is to look at how much they spend.

[Southack]

"The best way to gauge how much they tax us is to look at how much they spend."

Only if the population hasn't grown, and only if there hasn't been any inflation.

[Dan Evans]

Yes, and the 1st Amendment allows us the freedom to disrobe in public, not just in our homes or private vehicles.

Maybe a few horny judges think nudity is the same thing as free speech but most sober people don't think so.

[Centurion2000]

So yes, we are substantially more free today than in 1890, 1934, or even 2002.

Try to own a modern produced howitzer, tank or attack helicopter. In 1890-1933 you had EVERY right to own every weapon the US Army and Navy had.

[Dan Evans]

Compared to being able to trade stocks over the Internet today versus going to jail for so doing if you made those Internet trades in the 1980's?

Of course, today, you can go to jail for selling a stock if you had information that the public didn't have. It doesn't do you much good to be able to trade stocks if you aren't free to use information.

[Dan Evans]

Discrimination implies the right to choose..nothing more. We should all have the right to choose our associations in our private lives.

Yes, giving people the right to discriminate may bring back segregated lunch counters in some towns, but society and the free market has ways to deal with that.

But, as you say, it is much more important that people have the right to choose their associations because it is one of the best ways that free people can manage evil. And it is the best mechanism for the free market to maintain efficiency. A man should not have to worry about being sued because he has too many white males employed on his engineering staff.

[rdb3]

Are you actually trying to imply that we have more gun rights now than before? Prior to 1934, there were no gun control laws whatsoever.

---

Yeah, but it didn't apply to everyone.

Real men don't whine.

[rdb3]

But I would rather that the 14th amendment were repealed because it gives way too much power to the federal government. We have state constitutions with their own bill of rights.

---

I don't think so. This nation has been down that road before. We can study the results.

No thank you.

Real men don't whine.

[freepatriot32]

the complete and total elimination of the 4th,5th,9th and 10th amendments to the constitution

[freepatriot32]

Libertarian ping.To be added or removed from my ping list freepmail me or post a message here.

[freepatriot32]

number of gun control laws in 1792 when the constitution was ratified 0 number of gun control laws in 2005

20,000 any questions?

[E.G.C.]

BTTT!!!!!!

[freepatriot32]

Likewise, prior to 1986, you could be arrested for merely passing through a city or county that forbade guns...even if your own guns were stored in the trunk of your car.

Got a challenge for you get some guns and put them in the trunk of your car then drive through the city o f chicago and let me know when you do so i can call the police and you can see first hand how free you are to carry guns through citys that have outlawed them.

[thoughtomator]

I don't have the freedom to discriminate against homosexuals even though I have every moral and health reason to do so.

[lbmorris11]

Encroachment on the constitutional right to assembly

Examples please.

Churches having to hire homosexuals. No male only clubs although females fortunately still have this freedom. Attempts to ban Christian clubs on public schools. How many examples do you want?

[lbmorris11]

I don't worry about responsibility Al Gore said he'd take care of me.

[lbmorris11]

I am 27 and I agree we are losing our freedoms.