Posted on 07/15/2011 6:28:05 AM PDT by shortstop
The light bulb is dead.
The incandescent bulb which has pushed back the night since an American named Thomas Edison invented it, will soon be no more. It was killed, like the innovation it symbolizes, by the federal government.
In one more demonstration of the we-know-better-than-you arrogance which has come to define Washington, the switch has been flipped on the light bulb’s last chance at life.
In a vote earlier this week, 233 voted to keep the bulb and 193 voted to get rid of it, but in the new-math world of parliamentary procedure, the bulb still lost.
Actually, the bulb didn’t lose anything.
It is an inanimate object, a thing we hold in our hands, a product we use in our homes.
The real loser is us.
And what we’ve lost is freedom.
In the steady chipping away of anything that resembles liberty, the all-powerful federal masters even dictate how we light our homes.
They tell us what light bulbs are legal, how much water can be in our toilet, how much ethanol must be in our gasoline, how many ounces can be in a paint can. They say, “Jump” and we say, “How high?”
The notion of the people controlling the government is forgotten, neither taught in classrooms nor understood in society. We are subjects, not citizens, the government is sovereign, not servile. And none of that is good.
It is like the taming of a wild horse.
It runs free, living as it will, until it is brought into a corral. Once habituated to being penned in, the cowboy lays a blanket over its back, which it at first kicks off, but ultimately accepts.
Then a touch, then a bridle, then a bit, then a saddle, then a spur.
And before you know it, step by step, in tiny increments, the once-free horse is waltzing around the arena like a Lipizzaner.
That’s about where we are.
We were given a country of liberty, and we have allowed it to be turned into a kingdom of bureaucrats and politicians. The government plans and often pays for our children’s meals. The government determines how many miles per gallon our cars must travel. The government rules and we obey.
And somehow, sometime we have to stop it.
Because somewhere in our future, by ballot or bullet, this will once again be a free country. History would suggest that there will first be a long and insufferable reign of oppression. But someday, in some American breast, there will burn again the passion for liberty, and the shackles will be thrown off.
Better that we avoid that reign of oppression by throwing it off now, by standing up to it and demanding that we be allowed to live our lives.
A micro-managing government is an oppressive government, regardless of the ostensible motive. Protecting us – or the environment or the children or the economy or whatever else they’re protecting – is not justification for enslaving us.
And government cannot protect you without enslaving you. It cannot protect you from the consequences of your choices without taking away you ability to make those choices.
And so we must wear seat belts and motorcycle helmets and ban transfats and cell phones in cars. Fries can’t have too much salt and cigarettes must carry pictures of cancers and people who buy guns must show picture ID and wait five days. We have to buy insurance and we can't buy fireworks and from zoning rules to city ordinances to state and federal laws, the government seems to see its primary function as putting its boot on our necks.
But you can't succeed unless you can also fail, and you can't be free unless you are left to face the consequences of your freedom. The government needs to learn that, and so do we.
We need to stop being complicit in our own enslavement. We must stop expecting the government to meet our every need and kiss our every booboo. We must accept personal responsibility for our wellbeing and support. We must realize that life isn't fair, we don't all make the same amount of money, the storms do rage and the earth does quake, and that we can't take a government handout without accepting a government restraint.
This country wasn't formed to make us safe, it was formed to make us free. The purpose of government is not to oversee our lives, it is to safeguard our liberties.
Both we and the government must learn its place.
And it must learnt to keep its nose out of our business.
Remember back when Bork said”we have half our constitution left”?
Now with these bastards we have 10% left, time is coming fast, to hit the reset button.
Speak for yourself. We say "f-ck you." and they do it anyway.
This also serves of an example of how business/gov’t collude.
G&E and Phillips actually don’t support repealing the ban because they have already shifted their manufacturing.
You see, they were large enough businesses to handle this kind of retooling. That results in “little gys” going out of business.
This kind of regulation not only serves to oppress us, but to ensure the market share of big players at the expense of the smaller ones.
I'm inclined to agree with the many emails my former pastor sent me before the 2010 election.
Vote them ALL out and start with entirely new Conservative candidates. Thank you to the good ones, you'll get a very nice pension, but perhaps we need to start clean.
Good one from Bob Lonsberry. Thanks for posting.
Yes, we need to protect the little guys.
I think medium and especially small business is good for America in almost every way. you have watch out for the mega-monsters like GE. They seem to be the type that give money to the Dems and support bad ideas like the AGW scam.
Think about this: If “we” couldn’t even repeal this stupid light bulb law, how the hell will we ever be able to get rid of Obamacare? We won’t, that’s how.
Here’s a great article on this type of regulation from American Thinker
“The Soft Dictatorship”
http://www.americanthinker.com/2011/07/the_soft_dictatorship.html
Couple of days ago with the temp in the HIGH 90’s my air-conditioner burped, coughed twice and gave it all up. Time for a new one. Saw exactly what I needed, capacity wise and physical size wise. Oh, Oh...it was a GE(!!!)
Bought same physical/capacity of another make.
Personally I’ve demoted GENERAL Electric down to PRIVATE Electric. Held my own courtmartial.
Ballot box, we try and try, but keep getting the same results, meaning none....CHECK
Bullet box, we are way too civilized to actually fight to the death to defend our own wives and children from pedophiles, how are we supposed to do so from an amorphous enemy like govt? "We the people" clearly do not have the guts .......FAIL.
There may be some wackos out there that have the insanity within them to commit murder in the name of some cause, but to band together and DEMAND that the govt get back within its constraints, or be prepared to be forcibly restrained.....give me a break. We only need 25% or so, but everyone is too busy making money, paying bills, and watching sports.
OUR LIVES, OUR FORTUNES, and OUR SACRED HONOR, will not be pledged. Heck, people will not even risk jail by refusing to fund this "beast" by withholding taxes. That should be the very first step. Everyone is too afraid to even put their name to such a tactic. How else can you defeat an enemy, if not first taking away their treasure?
Shame on the Rats who made this either filibuster or non-override of Obama possible. Shame on them. And I say that as a personal aficionado of the fluorescent bulb. The other day, in a home improvement store with a scanty, at best, complement of 100 watt bulbs, they actually had Edison bulb replicas which delivers the lighting equivalent of a night light bulb with 60 watts (but it looks oh so cool and atmospheric). Why is Congress not bent out of shape over “blasphemies” like this?
I went to the White House web-site and went room by room. The place is filled with chandeliers and NONE of them have the curly cue light bulbs that the rest of us must be using soon.
In some cases, the only thing GE gets is a few pennies’ royalty for the usage of its name. The actual item is built by some other mass market commodity house.
With the O-bomb-economy, they seem to be doing a fair job of taking their own treasure away.
And I bet the reason is that every single one of those chandeliers is on a dimmer. Dimmer-capable curlies exist, but they do not track well to one another.
And let's not forget that the imperial government is also mandating increased miles per gallon ratings on cars that happen to be using fuel with fewer BTU per gallon, another case of the government mandating things that it knows nothing about, part of the beauty of centralized management that is the goal of socialists and communists world wide.
Mark
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