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Can the Government Keep Us Safe?
Andrew Napolitano
Campaign
For Liberty
Tuesday , January 12th, 2010
What a week we have all just endured! While the
Democrats were re-writing the federal takeover of healthcare
behind closed doors, the public face of the federal government
was fixated on denying and then explaining all the gaps in its
intelligence gathering. The Obama administration has been finger-pointing
over who in the government let a murderous thug on a plane in
Amsterdam that he tried to explode over Detroit. First, the
government said that the system worked. Then the President said
it didn't. Then he announced that the intelligence communities
and security people would start to talk to each other so the
bad guys could be kept out. Weren't they supposed to be doing
this all along?
At Newark Liberty Airport last Sunday, a TSA agent left his
post, and a young man walked past it to kiss his girlfriend
good-bye. Then the young man turned and left the secured area
and left the airport. So far no harm, no foul. But because the
government's surveillance cameras in the airport didn't work,
the feds panicked and ordered over 10,000 passengers to leave
the terminal, go out into the 15-degree Newark, NJ cold at night,
and then re-enter the airport. Flights were delayed and missed,
kids did not get to school on Monday morning, and soldiers were
listed as AWOL. All because the government overreacted to a
kiss. This humiliated the feds: New Jersey's 86-year-old senior
Senator Frank Lautenberg demanded that the guy who kissed his
gal be hunted down and prosecuted because of the chaos he caused.
He caused? Let's see; the government has cameras that watch
us every time we scratch our noses, and when those cameras don't
work, the government blames the person whose picture it was
supposed to be taking? Come on.
All this, of course, brings out the false argument of liberty
versus security. And we hear it from the Progressives that the
government must take our freedoms in order to keep us safe.
That's hogwash. Freedom is our birthright. It doesn't come from
the government; it is part of our humanity. America is the only
country in the history of the world dedicated to the truism
that we are endowed by our Creator, as Jefferson wrote, with
certain inalienable rights, and among these are life, liberty,
and the pursuit of happiness. The government has forgotten basic
civics: "Endowed by our Creator" means that our rights
come from God and not from the feds. "Inalienable"
means that we and our freedoms cannot be separated, unless and
until we are convicted by a jury of violating someone else's
rights. What is the value of being safe if we are not free?
Did our forefathers flee the kings and despots of Europe and
come here to be safe? Did Patrick Henry say "Give me safety
or give me death?" Here is the mistake that the Big Government
crowd wants to thrust upon us: They want to balance liberty
and safety. There is no such thing as balance when it comes
to freedom. We will not trade freedom for anything, or balance
it against anything, and we certainly won't give it up to the
TSA.
Can the government keep us safe? I don't think so. Airline
travel is safer today because pilots have guns, cockpit doors
are like bank vaults, and the passengers have become courageous.
All this was done by individuals in the private sector, not
by the government. I've said it before and I'll say it again,
if the feds had not stripped us of our natural rights to keep
ourselves safe -- by keeping and bearing arms -- 9/11 would
never have happened. How about letting the airlines decide who
gets on the planes, rather than a TSA worker who leaves his
post? When industry competes for your business, you fly where
you want to go, you get there in comfort and safety, and you
do all this at a competitive cost. When the government runs
the show, you stand in the cold night air for six hours because
of a kiss. The government can't deliver the mail, it can't operate
surveillance cameras at an airport; it can't pay back its debts;
it can't tell the truth. That would be the same government that
wants to manage your healthcare.
America, do you see what happens when we rely on the government
too much? It gets authoritarian and we get weak. Our children
grow to expect from the government what we once did for ourselves.
Government is a fearful master. It is not faithful to us; it
is not truthful to us; it can't produce for us. It doesn't obey
its own laws; it doesn't keep us safe; and it won't leave us
alone. It is mortgaging our futures, raising our taxes, and
treating us all like children.
What to do? Challenge it at every turn. Expose it to friend
and foe. Educate all you know about what you see and hear every
day on this show. And return no one to the government who has
stolen your freedom.
And one other thing: The God who gave us life also gave us
liberty. He loves us. Praise Him from the roof tops, and ask
Him to save us from a government that is out of control.
"When the people find they can vote themselves
money, that will herald the end of the republic."
- Fall Of The Republic - Buy
the DVD here
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INFOWARS:
BECAUSE THERE'S A WAR ON FOR YOUR MIND
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