Obamacare – Liberty or Death?Two hundred and thirty-five years ago, on March 23, 1775, Patrick Henry stood before his fellow delegates in St. John's Church at Richmond, Virginia and delivered a speech that has echoed around the world ever since, a speech that is every bit as relevant today as it was to the colonies that were seeking freedom and human dignity on that day in March over two centuries ago. The health care bill that was just passed into law through chicanery, deceit, bribery, and duress is no less an assault on our liberty than was the encampment of British troops in Boston, and in fact is far more pernicious and insidious. At least the British were overt and forthright. This is tiptoeing totalitarianism pretending to be help. This is tyranny masquerading as democracy. This is an overthrow of America's most treasured principles falsely proclaimed as some kind of victory for Americans. It is astonishing to the point of alarm to see hour after hour, column after column of media coverage and opinions absorbed almost exclusively with minutia and details, supposedly weighing possible pros and cons of 2,000 pages of a law whose entire purpose is to strip away the most fundamental human right ever granted by God: the power of choice. It is akin to watching passengers debate the interior decor of a train that has plunged over a cliff and is plummeting toward the rocks below. Even more astonishing, even more alarming, is the media obsession with preaching to opponents of this abomination how they should conduct themselves with "politically correct" manners and language. Perhaps these pundits should read Patrick Henry's speech again: "This is no time for ceremony." – Patrick Henry It is no more time for ceremony now than it was then, or than it is when invaders are smashing in your door to ransack your home at gunpoint, and control you, and steal your property. This is not a question of "liberal vs. conservative" or "Democrat vs. Republican" or "Medicare cuts vs. increased taxes." Listen to Patrick Henry: "For my own part I consider it as nothing less than a question of freedom or slavery." Yet the best advice that the progressives and Congressional leaders and the White House and the lapdog media can give us in the face of this historical outrage that overthrows our most basic human rights is for us to comport ourselves according to some "politically correct" moral code of etiquette. Well, what about Patrick Henry? Personally, I think he had just exactly right: "Should I keep back my opinions at such a time, through fear of giving offense, I should consider myself as guilty of treason towards my country, and of an act of disloyalty towards the majesty of heaven, which I revere above all earthly kings." "Oh," the liberals say, "but President Obama is giving the nation what he promised: hope." And Patrick Henry said on that fateful day: "Mr. President, it is natural to man to indulge in the illusions of hope. We are apt to shut our eyes against a painful truth, and listen to the song of that siren, till she transforms us into beasts." Should we shut our eyes and shut our mouths, too? Will freedom of speech now follow power of choice into the grave that has been dug for it while we stand mutely by and watch? Patrick Henry wrestled with very similar questions on a similar day in March long ago: "And what have we to oppose to them? Shall we try argument? Sir, we have been trying that for the last ten years. Have we anything new to offer on the subject? Nothing. . . . We have done everything that could be done to avert the storm which is now coming on. We have petitioned; we have remonstrated; we have supplicated. . . .Shall we gather strength by irresolution and inaction? Shall we acquire the means of effectual resistance, by lying supinely on our backs, and hugging the delusive phantom of hope, until our enemies shall have bound us hand and foot?" Shall we? Shall we put "political correctness" above the millions of gallons of American blood that have been shed since the time of Patrick Henry to preserve our power of choice, our freedom, our liberty, our very nation? What price is your own liberty? What price is your children's freedom and power of choice by the dictates of their own conscience and will, rather than the dictates of an oppressive and coercive government bureaucracy paid for with your own dollars to administer your slavery and theirs? Is there really any decision to make? Patrick Henry made his: "Why stand we here idle? What is it that gentlemen wish? What would they have? 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!" What is your course? Vijay Kumar |
