Tax Day Tea Party Thoughts
“A nation that is afraid to let its people judge the truth and falsehood in an open market is a nation that is afraid of its people.” -John F. Kennedy
“Any people anywhere, being inclined and having the power, have the right to rise up, and shake off the existing government, and form a new one that suits them better. This is most valuable – a most sacred right – a right, which we hope and believe, is to liberate the world”
-Abraham Lincoln
Will add more as they occur to me, I find them and/or I have time.
Just let me say this. Speaking this on the internet is one thing. Gathering together and saying it with people who agree with you is another thing. Trying to inform someone who isn’t already part of the choir…. a whole different story. It takes balls because of the possibility of confrontation. Do I have them? I’m honestly not sure. I tend to talk to folks who are in the choir and folks who are no further back than the 5th pew. The ones outside? Not so much. I do believe that unless we all find the balls to risk confrontation in order to inform people of both sides of an issue, we will eventually lose the right to do so.
“The person who has nothing for which he is willing to fight, nothing which is more important than his own personal safety, is a miserable creature and has no chance of being free unless made and kept so by the exertions of better men than himself.” -John Stuart Mill
“When liberty is taken away by force it can be restored by force. When it is relinquished voluntarily by default it can never be recovered.” -Dorothy Thompson
“It is not the fact of liberty but the way in which liberty is exercised that ultimately determines whether liberty itself survives.” -Dorothy Thompson
UPDATE: A gut punch of a reminder from Bill Whittle over at Eject!Eject!Eject!:
These men signed a document knowing that was their death sentence, should their ramshackle collection of farmers and brewers and smiths fail to prevail against the most powerful military force the world had ever seen. A death sentence. They did that, not because they craved money, or social position, or political power – as with all revolutions before or since. Most of them had that in abundance. This was a risk they took not to gain everything, but to lose it.
They did it because they believed that men should be free: free from the petty tyrannies of other people telling you what to do for your own good. They risked their lives, their fortunes and their sacred honor for you. If we cannot take two hours out of work to repay that debt, then we deserve everything that is coming to us.
So how was it?
I wish I knew. I had decided to go for sure after work and then the other tech got sick and had to go after lunch and we had 2 hard and fast deadlines yesterday. So I was the only one and was at work till about 5:45 pm instead of 4 like normal. The thing was supposed to wrap at 6 and it takes me 15 minutes to get there from work. so, sad panda. After all my posting here, I didn’t end up going. Keyboard warrior and all that, I guess. I see from reading other sites that some of the turnouts were pretty high – 10k in St. Louis, for example.