"If we run into such debts as that we must be taxed in our meat and in our drink, in our necessaries and our comforts, in our labors and our amusements, for our callings and our creeds, as the people of England are, our people, like them, must come to labor sixteen hours in the twenty-four, give the earnings of fifteen of these to the government for their debts and daily expenses, and the sixteenth being insufficient to afford us bread, we must live, as they now do, on oatmeal and potatoes, have no time to think, no means of calling the mismanagers to account, but be glad to obtain subsistence by hiring ourselves to rivet their chains on the necks of our fellow-sufferers."

"free government is founded in jealousy,and not in confidence;and that accordingly,the purpose of constitutions is to limit government,to bind down thise whom we are obliged to trust with power"

"What a country can presrerve it's liberties if their rulers are not warned from time to time that their people preserve the spirit of resistance?...The tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time with the blood of patriots and tyrants"

Well fellow doomers I guess we are in some fine company,these words are attributed to none other than Thomas Jefferson.The last quote may be somewhat off topic but self reliance these days seems to be interpeted as resistance. Tony C.

-- Tony C. (yo7@bellsouth.net), May 07, 1999

Answers

Well, I think it's safe to say that we will all have a little more "time to think," after Y2k hits. Let's hope we use at least some of it for that purpose.

Dano

-- Dano (bookem@blacksand.srf), May 07, 1999.

Wow. A fellow patriot. Put him away.

-- BigDog (BigDog@duffer.com), May 07, 1999.

Is there any actual evidence that the government will come and take our freedoms away? How about some articles on the topic. How about some books? Expert testimony on the matter?

-- Pat (BAMECW@aol.com), May 07, 1999.

Yes, Pat, there is a lot of evidence. It's called history. Read it and weep.

-- De (delewis@inetone.net), May 07, 1999.

Tony, great selections. I printed those out for later use.

-- Puddintame (achillesg@hotmail.com), May 07, 1999.

Pat, Maybe you have never read the Constitution or have been asleep for most of your adult life.

The republic that was set up originally bears NO resemblance to what we have now. It has slowly been eroded away to the point where people like you wonder if their liberties WILL be taken away when they ALREADY have.

Jefferson would be APPALLED if he were to see the levels of government regulation and taxation that are now functional. They BLED AND DIED to obtain what we have squandered.

-- Paul Milne (fedinfo@halifax.com), May 07, 1999.

"The republic that was set up originally bears NO resemblance to what we have now."

This is so true in so many ways. We no longer have an open frontier. We now face weapons that can wreak incredible longterm destruction from the opposite side of the Earth. We have orders of magnitude more people. We have had this industrial and silicon revolution. Common daily practices from those times would drown us in pollution today. We can now commit crimes and be a thousand miles away in two hours. The modern pace of change would be incomprehensible to Jefferson.

Moving to the boonies and pretending that everyone else lives such a life too (as most of them did at the time), and that therefore the mode and techniques of governances appropriate to those times are still applicable to vastly different times, is simply silly. The fact that so much of the structure and purpose set up by the Founding Fathers has remained largely intact is remarkable. Lamenting what we have lost while ignoring what we have gained is misanthropic. Our freedoms must be defended, but being an antedeluvian reactionary is a step backwards. Modern times call for modern defenses, and we have to play it where it lies, not where our romantic imaginations think it *used* to lie back during some mythical Middle Earth.

-- Flint (flintc@mindspring.com), May 07, 1999.

Paul, and I have history that the government did not come in and take all our freedoms away.

1930's-The Great Depression. Socialism did flourish, but did anyone have individual rights get taken?

1940's-World War 2. Besides economic problems with shortages, did the gov't come in and take a persons natural rights?

1960's-Did the gov't take the rights of Americans away during the Cuban Missle Crisis? Or because of the Vietnam War at the end of the decade?

1970s-Did the early 70's mark a time of gov't takeover? Did the energy crisis of the late 70's force gov't takeover of our lives?

1990's-How about the Gulf War, did you get any rights taken then? Or how about the Oklahoma City bombing? World Trade center bombing? The Waco incident?

I too can say that the gov't won't take our rights away from looking at history. But Thomas Jefferson also notes that a unjust government is one that takes away the "Natural Rights" in which is instilled by God. And the rights to property has yet to be infringed, I can still work at my job, Im still going to school.

Please Paul, give specific examples of what events mirror times that would warrant a gov't takeover. Not a very obscure and round about answer. History is a very long period of time, and in about one second after I post this, this post as well will be a part of history.

-- Pat (BAMECW@aol.com), May 07, 1999.

1939-1947 War Powers and Production Boards::: Controlled (and I do mean CONTROLLED) planting, harvesting, meat production, factory production, prices, quantity to be sold, quantity to be bought by any individual or family, of almost EVERYTHING. Someone posted the exerpts from the rationing book. Please repost it??

Also, Pat, the right to property is only if you don't happen to want to fill in the wet spot in the corner of your land and build on it. The EPA and federal wildlife agencies have enough rulings in their favor that you can buy a couple hundred acres of land, and theyu can tell you that in no way are you going to drain and fill in the land inquestion. period, no appeal, no reversal, no recompense, you are out the purchase price. THis has been documented ad nauseum.

Chuck

ps the board names are not exact but the functions are.

-- chuck, a Night Driver (rienzoo@en.com), May 08, 1999.

Have you bought a gun or looked at your pay stub lately? Been watching the news? HEY!! Are you awake? !$$@#@^$#Communist@#%$#^*$^% Sonofa!@#%$@^@%)*(&&^)(*(*^&$#@%(*&%#%)&_+(**^&*%^%#$#!$)&)_*_%*&^$$%@ $#@(&_&&%&^$$#%%))^^$&$$)){&^^%#$%(Y%U^%$^%#$!Q@(){)&^$*&^#^#O*$%#% @&*%^&$%$(*%^%$#%$(&^^%%$#^&^)((&^%^%#$%@&)(()_)(^%$^&^#%@*(&^^))&*^%^ #!#$*^&$#^#*)(&_)_%^&&^$%$#*&%^#$@&*(%$%!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

-- Nikoli Krushev (doomsday@y2000.com), May 08, 1999.

Pat,YES there is actual evidence that the government DOES come and take our freedoms away.There are articles and books that examine and expose many of these crimes.Some examples are;

Property rights are infringed when the I.R.S is allowed to stormtroop into a residence,sieze it and it's contents even before a conviction,let alone the killing of anyone and everything in their path while doing so.

What do you call it when the government is allowed to go on land grabs under the guise of EPA guidelines or some save the spider ruse,only to later give it to the UN as part of their diversity plan or mine it themselves.

Creates departments of this and that not enumerated for in the constitution.

Takes us off the gold and silver standard.

Uses cohersive taxation.

Manipulates the electorate.

So far we have only witnessed the slow erosion of our freedoms and rights (slow boil is probably a better description) but an outright takeover is not an impossibility given the nature of our government over the past 60 years and the stated socialist/marxist ideology of our president and the Washington/World elite.Y2K may be a prime opportunity to take a bigger chunk than has been possible in the past,for all we really know they might want it to crash just so they can be our saviours and embark us upon a new era of utopian coexistance.I do not know this to be a fact,but given what they have demonstrated in the past there is more than a little room for ample concern.But if we are prepared for Y2K we are prepared for them as well, BECAUSE WE WON'T NEED THEM. Tony C.

"Were we directed from Washington when to sow and when to reap, we should soon want bread" Thomas Jefferson

-- Tony C. (yo7@bellsouth.net), May 08, 1999.

That's anted"i"luvian, Fleck (sic), since the proximity of the "e" and "i" on my keyboard leave little doubt as to your inept attempt to impress us, I'll simply assume that you're not the sharpest tool in the shed.

Since we're here, might as well dispell some more of your repulsive diatribe. Oh screw it, I'd just be wasting good bandwidth.

Maybe I should have said "...assume you don't have both oars in the water" since you were probably referring to some water reference.

-- spun@lright (mikeymac@uswest.net), May 08, 1999.

Is it just my imagination or is flint a total dickhead ? Or should I say a government dickhead ? Or a communist dickhead ? Or all three ?

-- Nikoli Krushev (doomsday@y2000.com), May 08, 1999.

Pat:

The most well documented case of lost freedoms is to be found in John Ross's book "Unintended Consequences." In this book he documents the incremental loss of 2nd amendment rights during this century in this country. Ross shows how this has been so incremental that most folks have not realized what they have lost.

It has been the universal lesson of history that no government at any place at any time has voluntarily given up any of its power. The founding fathers were all too well aware of this, hence the separation of powers and the bill of rights. Sad to say, polls have shown that if today the bill of rights is presented to Americans as proposed amendments to the Constitution, most do not recognize them, and only about 25% of folks would agree with the statement "these amendments should be part of the Constitution."

-- Tennessean (holladayl@aol.com), May 08, 1999.

spun@lright,

I'm thinking "Half a bubble off plumb" describes him. Mr. Flint knows how to ask questions and generate confusion, but he certainly has no answers. Too much hyperbole, unjustified inferences and irrelevancies for rational conversation. James 1:8.

-- Elbow Grease (Elbow_Grease@AutoShop.com), May 08, 1999.

Pat: or try Gerry Spence's "From Freedom to Slavery," or any book by James Bovard. Your question is asinine. For a taste of freedom, go try to organize a tax protest at your workplace, or in your community. See what happens.

-- Spidey (in@jam.com), May 08, 1999.

To Pat:

If you want to discuss property rights (or the lack thereof) talk to the people that had land that had been in their family for over 100 years confiscated to build the now defunct Super Collider near Waxahachie, Texas.

-- Nadine Zint (nadine@hillsboro.net), May 08, 1999.

Don't try to think Pat, it's just too late.

You are already a slave. You are already a slave. You are already a slave.

Continue kneeling before your master.

-- Jim the Window Washer (Rational@man.com), May 08, 1999.

Not to mention loss of medical freedom - which was probably SO self- evident, that the founding fathers never wrote it in - but should have.

-- Debbie (dbspence@usa.net), May 08, 1999.

Well. I for one am glad they passed a law to prevent all this kvetching. Imagine how annoying it would be if everyone were free to complain about their loss of freedom. Not to mention self- contradictory.

-- Flint (flintc@mindspring.com), May 08, 1999.

Why are you giving Patty-cake your valuable time? PC is another inmate from Der Boonkah, you know, where Double Decker went to play with Poo-poo, Sparkless Flint and The Smallest Muthah of All, et al., where they refer to Ed as Yourdung and forumites as Turds. Here's a tyical post from Patty-cake after Poo-poo heh-heh'd Ed requesting information for his Senate testimony:

http://www.InsideTheWeb.com/messageboard/mbs.cgi?acct=mb237006&MyNum=9 26175003&P=Yes&TL=926146478

(I haven't hot-linked, Poo-poo will do that. He has nothing better to do than follow me around and heat up my URLs.)

Debunking Y2k webboard

Re: WOW like I care Saturday, 08-May-1999 10:50:03

205.188.197.151 writes:

My advice to Ed that can sum up what would be the best to say:

Senator Bennett: Mr. Yourdon, you may take the floor.

Yourdon walks up to the podium, holding copies of his book and video.

Ed Yourdon: Buy my book and video to learn how to survive the coming chaos. Thank you

Stepping down from the podium, Yourdon walks back and sits in his seat

Pat

-- OutingsR (us@here.yar), May 08, 1999.

you may also want to do a search on the white house website: www.whitehouse.com for an Executive Order signed in June, 1996. i think the number was 13012, or something close to that. it details HOW the gov't can take EVERYTHING -- food (all production and equipment aspects), transportation (again ALL equipment-yes, your family car, too), land, all property, etc., and even details how the population would be rounded up, put in camps, families can be seperated, and people shipped to work where the gov't decides for NO compensation. you definitely should not take my word for. please go read it at the W.H. site; it's a real eye-opener.

-- sarah (qubr@aol.com), May 09, 1999.