"Your Silence Gives Consent" (Plato)

Senator John Cornyn posted on his Facebook page today a quote by Plato (429-347 BC) "Your silence gives consent."  It reminded me of this article I started back in April, but never fininshed.....

To stand by and do nothing or to do nothing but complain, changes nothing. To see change, we must act and we must convince those around us to act.

Obama, Pelosi and Reid lied, cheated, dealt in back rooms, bribed, and gouged their way through the laws, both Houses, and all but a handful of the Democrat party to get what they wanted in the healthcare bill that we didn't want. Obama waits until a holiday recess to appoint people that Congress doesn't want. He issues Executive Orders to put into law things Congress doesn't want to pass. He appoints czars that answer to no one in the three Executive Branches of Government. He and his political ilk have circumvented so many parts of the Constitution to get what they want. (Republican presidents have done some of these same things, but never to the degree this one has and I don't approve of them doing it either.)

If you support the U. S. Constitution as the basis of our Republic form of government, and you are tired of having big government shoved down your throats, then you will understand why it is so important to do your part as the people that are suppose to be the trunk holding up and supporting the branches of government, not the other way around. It is up to us to hold the government accountable to the people. It is us who should be determining what the President, Congress, and Judges are allowed to do and how far away from the Constitution they are allowed to stray. I say its time to get back to the original intent of the Constitution.

Does this have anything to do with local politics? With some of the office holders, no, not much. They have run on the Democrat ticket because that has been the only one to run on for so many years. They are productive members of our community, have accomplished good things and really do have conservative values, but it is time that we remember what our mothers told us and that is that we are judged by the company we keep. Either they start making sweeping changes in their party to get more in line with the conservative majority that is finally waking up in the United States or they switch parties and align themselves with the Republicans or at least Independents.  It's time they asked themselves exactly what their party stands for and do they want to agree with that platform. 
 
I think we all would be perfectly content working a good job, enjoying our families, putting a little money away for the kid's college fund and maybe a little retirement for ourselves, except that taxes already take so much of it, we can't afford to put money back and are forced into social security and medicare.  These two awesome wonderments of the government are broke.  They have spent the money on other things, that we were forced to put in them.  So now we don't have that or the money we could have been saving ourselves. 
 
The economic recession and near collaspe caused by ineptitude of our federal government has caused our IRAs and 401Ks to be worthless.  The stock market, yet another potential source for health or retirement money is still not solid and predicted not to be anytime soon.  China owns more of our debt than we do, yet we import most of the cheap stuff we're forced to buy from them.  Unemployment is predicted to remain high through the end of the year.  The government is guaranteeing huge morgages for people that do not make enough money to pay them...ever.  Unions are being given too much power.  Do we really want more of this? 
 
Healthcare will be the same way.  We can't afford health insurance because of taxes already levied, so the liberals in power ram through a bill that says we must buy insurance or pay even more taxes; we must buy insurance whether we want it or not; we must be in the Obamacare system even though Obama, his wife, his children, Congress and their familes, aides, Cabinet members and others are exempted; we must be in Obamacare even though Muslims, Scientologists, Amish, Christian Scientists and Native American Indians can opt out; our businesses must provide insurance for all employees whether we can afford it or not; abortion is included in the bill, even though an executive order took it out, the same kind of order that just has to be signed to get it back in when it's convenient for the most pro-abortion president in history; etc.

Now we are looking at treaties with other countries taking our guns away and possibly being taken around Congress without having to be ratified (another underhanded tactic); our borders are still not protected from the influx of illegal aliens and our president has publicly aligned himself with the President of Mexico against Arizona, even allowing him to speak to Congress about the laws of OUR land when he can't even improve on the conditions in his own country forcing the illegals to come here.

The embarrassment of the United States just doesn't seem to have an end in sight.  Our debt just keeps rising.  Our rights keep being ripped away.  Washington is out of control.

To change things we must join in with those that are trying to take our country back.  We must be part of the solution and not the problem.  We must speak out.  We must write letters to the editor.  We must blog.  We must fax, email, write or call our representatives at all levels of government.  We must participate at the grassroots level in our political party and man phone banks, get out into our neighborhoods and introduce our candidates or encourage people to vote for our best candidates.  We need to thoroughly vet or investigate each candidate to find out what they believe in and how they vote and how solid they are.  We must run for office.  We must become precinct chairs or volunteers.  We must attend the precinct, county, and state conventions.  We must be willing to hold others accountable by paying attention to exactly how good a job they are doing in representing us.  We must DO something. 

Apathy will destroy this country just as thoroughly as voting for the liberals to stay in power.  That's why you are seeing, as the "sleeping, apathetic giant" of "we, the people" wake up, the tea parties making a difference and scaring the fire out of the liberal movement and the Washington elite in general.  That's why you are seeing the liberal media always attacking Palin, Limbaugh, Hannity, Beck and Bachmann.  That's why you are seeing the biggest growth of the Republican Party that it has seen in years if ever.  People that are tired of the status quo are standing up and participating in the grassroots movement, either through the Republican Party or the tea parties.  They are doing something.  They have moved beyond apathy and are standing up for our Constitution and our personal rights.

If your silence (apathy) gives consent, imagine the change that could be brought about by millions more people that finally decide to speak out?  Let's take our country back....