My Speech at Lynchburg Tax Day Tea Party today...

(From April 15, 2009)

We are gathered here today to protest the function that our form of government has undertaken. Alexis de Tocqueville said, “In a Democracy, the people get the government they deserve.” We are here to demand that we deserve better than the cesspool of corruption, backbiting and excuses that we currently have in Washington.

The role of Government is to facilitate, not annihilate, the growth of small businesses. It is to accelerate, not incinerate, the ability of people to put their hard earned money into savings. And exaggerate, not eliminate, the ability of people to start their own businesses and pursue their own dreams.

There is something dreadfully wrong when the average state and local government job pays nearly 30 percent more than private jobs.

There’s no incentive for increased productivity or accountability as government expands. The government essentially forces the private sector to pay more via taxes to fund the ever growing pay gap. Government is an insatiable glutton of the public’s money. A black hole swallowing the light of responsibility, common sense and virtue.

Our tax money is used for reprehensible purposes. “To compel a man to furnish funds for the propagation of ideas he disbelieves and abhors is sinful and tyrannical.” – Thomas Jefferson

Public taxpayer money to fund abortions overseas, publicly fund embryonic stem cell research when adult stem cell research has just as much – if not more – promise. Our money is used to kill the unborn.

Our tax money is used to provide the lazy with the very things we work hard for. The more people are successful, the more they are taxed. Meanwhile those who do not work, receive benefits off of the backs of the hardworking among us. They are the leeches of society who shall soon enough suck us all dry and leave us a shriveled husk, drying in the winds of time, a stark warning for those after us in history, a non-event for those that would not heed the mistakes we have made – just as we have not heeded the mistakes made by others.

“The democracy will cease to exist when you take away from those who are willing to work and give to those who would not.” - Thomas Jefferson

Our present tax system chokes the engine of the economy. Taxing the so-called “rich” among us merely serves to weaken our resolve to be successful by breeding envy among us towards our neighbors, rather than to foster our own desire to succeed and reach our potential. This is not acceptable in a free society.

There is no denying that taxes are necessary for any government to raise revenue. However, it is unconscionable to be treated in the manner proscribed by the government. As tax payers we are taxed when we earn money, taxed when we spend it, taxed on top of that if we eat in the city, taxed if we keep what we bought, taxed if we sell it, taxed if we give it away and then taxed when we die with it. Ironically, criminals can only be made to pay once for their crimes, but tax payers can be made to pay every second of every day for the crime of being productive and earning money to follow their American Dream.

It is not acceptable to merely complain about a problem and not offer a solution. The solution to this problem is the fair tax. It is a consumption tax that taxes everyone according to what they buy, not what they earn. It provides incentive to save money and not rely on credit. It forces drug dealers and welfare recipients to suddenly contribute money to the very coffers from which they draw their benefits. In this miniscule way they are at least appearing to be contributing members of the economy and society as a whole. Criminal aliens likewise would suddenly be supporting the very coffers from which they currently steal our hard earned tax dollars in the form of benefits.

Businesses and the stock market are free to operate apart from the heavy chains of taxation weighing them down from reaching their potential The result is more and higher paying jobs, a higher GDP and standard of living, as well as a reduced or eliminated trade deficit.

There are those among us that seek to pay the criminal immigrant for sneaking into our country, bypassing the legal manner to set forth in which to join our country and our fold. The Speaker of the House thinks it’s unpatriotic to enforce our immigration laws. 12 million criminals take our jobs, kill our citizens, strain our police forces, take benefits paid for by our tax dollars and provide nothing in return. They demand the benefits of our country while refusing to be bound by its rules. In short, they are the whining sniveling neighborhood brats that could have everything they want by going about it correctly but refuse to do so – preferring instead to take what is not theirs, enjoy the fruits of our labor and thumb their noses at our laws and common decency while deriding us as less than human for the audacity of demanding that our laws be obeyed by those in our country.

To add insult to injury, our elected officials raise our taxes and pin us under never ending debt to provide more benefits for not only these unwelcome invaders, but also their cousins - the lazy non-contributors among us receiving their government benefits at the expense of the hard working members of society everywhere. Thomas Jefferson said, “I think we have more machinery of government than is necessary, too many parasites living on the labor of the industrious.”

Jefferson also said, “I place economy among the first and most important virtues, and public debt as the greatest of dangers to be feared. To preserve our independence, we must not let our rulers load us with perpetual debt. If we run into such debts, we must be taxed in our meat and drink, in our necessities and in our comforts, in our labor and in our amusements. If we can prevent the government from wasting the labor of the people, under the pretense of caring for them, they will be happy.”

The founding fathers were equally, if not more so opposed to providing charity from the public trust.

James Madison said, “[T]he government of the United States is a definite government, confined to specified objects. It is not like the state governments, whose powers are more general. Charity is no part of the legislative duty of the government.”

He also said, “I cannot undertake to lay my finger on that article of the Constitution which granted a right to Congress of expending, on objects of benevolence, the money of their constituents.”

Ben Franklin said, “When the people find that they can vote themselves money, that will herald the end of the republic.”

I also find it interesting that those that scream the loudest that morality should not be LEGISLATED by the government, are among the first to howl their derision that providing charity to those who cannot provide for themselves is a moral obligation to be FULFILLED by the government.

Perhaps a wise Virginian named Thomas Jefferson said it best: “I predict future happiness for Americans if they can prevent the government from wasting the labors of the people under the pretense of taking care of them.”

It seems each day brings news of the dire straits those in government have led us into.

First it was apologizing for the so-called arrogance of Americans. The woman in the White House said we are a mean country.

Isn’t it funny how the rest of world eagerly pays millions in ransom to third world pirates, but Americans actually take back their ship. THEY cower in fear at the threat of violence, but Americans FIX THE PROBLEM.

The man in the White House says we are arrogant! Yes, we are arrogant. Arrogant enough to believe that freedom is worth fighting for. Arrogant enough to believe that we should stand against evil. And arrogant enough to believe that - Yes! We CAN - make a difference in the world and be a shining beacon of freedom to a world enslaved by those in power.

Pirates are nothing new to Americans. Marines proudly sing, “To the shores of Tripoli!” Yes, history tells us we once had a pirate problem off the shores of Africa. Likewise, the rest of the world paid tribute while America fought back. A few American ships and a mere handful of Marines swept the pirates from the seas, routed them on land and forced them to their knees.

Today came the news that we are being watched by the Department of Homeland Security for “right-wing extremist and terrorist activity.” This does not include just racist or hate groups, but also groups that reject federal authority in favor of state or local authority. It may include groups and individuals that are dedicated to a single-issue, such as opposition to abortion, immigration or gun-control. The report was distributed to local police and sheriff departments across the U.S. so that they could keep a close local eye on possible right-wing extremists, including military personnel returning from overseas. I cannot think of anything more insulting than to return from serving your country overseas only to be put on a watch list of possible terrorists upon returning home.

Apparently there is a phenomenon of violent right-wing radicalization here in the U.S., despite the fact that they admit that they don’t have any information about any groups that are currently planning any attacks. The bottom line is that if you oppose what’s going on in Washington, you will be labeled a possible terrorist and will be under surveillance. This is not America as it should be, this is 1939 Nazi Germany as it was. This is Communist Russia, Communist China, Iran, Iraq and all the nations of the world with oppressive regimes that our countrymen have shed their blood to crush.

Today is about more than high taxes, and wasteful government. Today is about the very survival of our freedom and the country as we know it and our founding fathers imagined for it to be.

There is no room for retreat. If we do not stand and fight now, there will be no place to retreat to. We have not stood up to the ever-expanding despot that is the nature of government. Our Founding Fathers told us this day would come and we have put it off until now. We cannot delay, we cannot falter. We have no choice but to push forward now or to face life as citizens in a prison of our own making. The Greeks at Thermopolae realized that it is better to die on your feet than to live on your knees.

In closing, Thomas Jefferson said, “Timid men prefer the calm of despotism to the tempestuous sea of Liberty.”

Samuel Adams once told his fellow countrymen, "If you love wealth more than liberty, the tranquility of servitude better than the animating contest of freedom, depart from us in peace. We ask not your counsel, nor your arms. Crouch down and lick the hand that feeds you. May your chains rest lightly upon you and may posterity forget that you were our countrymen."

A firey Virginian named Patrick Henry said, “Is life so dear or peace so sweet as to be purchased at the price of chains and slavery? Forbid it, Almighty God! I know not what course others may take, but as for me, give me liberty or give me death!"

A distinguished man named Ronald Reagan said not too long ago that government is not the solution to the problem; government IS the problem.

This nation was founded as a government Of the people, By the people and For the people. All that’s required for evil to flourish is for good men to do nothing. This land was created by “We the People” - to be secured and given to the People’s children and their children’s children as a blessing of liberty. I don’t claim to be a good man, and I’m certainly not a great man, but I refuse to do nothing. I AM “We the People,” and I’m taking my country back.