Tea Party Speech: Damn the Torpedoes, Full Speed Ahead

Good morning Tea Partiers!

We have accomplished magnificent things in just two short years.  Nationally, we regained control of the U.S. House, and fired Nancy Pelosi as Speaker.  We won a record 680 new seats in state legislatures across America.  In Michigan, we took control of the governorship, the legislature, the Michigan Supreme Court, the attorney general’s office, and the secretary of state’s office.  In general, we reminded politicians that the U.S. Declaration of Independence and the U.S. Constitution contain the greatest political concepts in the history of the world.

Our message of limited government and frugal spending is starting to resonate across the country.  Many brave state governors are leading the charge, including Chris Christie in New Jersey, Rick Perry in Texas, and Scott Walker in Wisconsin.  Remarkably, we are even seeing signs of bold leadership from Rick Snyder in Michigan. 

Unfortunately, there is very little evidence of bold leadership at the federal level in Washington.  Our leaders in Washington claim they are cutting spending, but so far, they have only cut 1% of this year’s $3.7 trillion budget.  Cutting 1% out of a $3.7 trillion budget still leaves a $3.7 trillion budget.  Their cuts amount to little more than a rounding error.  And then they have the audacity to say that they can’t find anything else to cut!  What nonsense!  There are entire departments and agencies that are utterly useless and counterproductive.  Eliminate them!   There are 380,000 employees of the federal government who make over $100,000 per year, an increase of almost 50% in the last two years.  Downsize them!   The federal government has to stop spending money that it does not have!

Washington is borrowing five billion dollars per day.  The $38 billion that they so proudly cut last week only eliminates 8 days of borrowing!  It’s spit in the ocean and spit on our faces.  It’s like trying to put a wildfire out with a glass of water.  Let’s get real leaders in Washington who will take the responsibility of governing seriously!

Courageous political leadership will be necessary to solve our problems, particularly at the federal level.  At the state and local level, fiscal reality alone will force political leaders to address their spending problems, because state and local governments, unlike the federal government, can’t print money, nor can they borrow it indiscriminately.  Bankruptcy is a very real threat to state and local governments, if they do not get their financial houses in order.

Unfortunately, fiscal reality has not yet awakened in Washington.  This is the great threat to our republic, and the great challenge for our limited government movement.  I’m not afraid that the federal government will go bankrupt.  I’m afraid because it can’t.  Unlike our state governments, the federal government can continue to spend us into oblivion, until all of us taxpayers go bankrupt. 

Here’s why Washington can stick its head in the sand and pretend it doesn’t have a spending problem, at least in the short run:

First, Washington can borrow money indiscriminately.  So far, it has borrowed $14 trillion dollars, which is $40,000 of debt for every man, woman, and child.   Our leaders have the biggest credit card in the history of the world.  Unfortunately, the names on that gargantuan credit card are yours and mine and our children.    

Second, Washington can print money indiscriminately.  It has begun printing trillions of dollars out of thin air.  It then buys its own Treasury Bills with this monopoly money, in order to maintain the illusion that we can afford our government life style. 

But, the truth is that we can’t afford our federal government lifestyle.  Washington’s obscene spending will end badly for all Americans, unless we change course quickly and dramatically.  Here’s why:

1)                  This year’s budget is $3.7 trillion dollars.  However, we are only collecting $2.1 trillion in taxes.  We are borrowing the difference of $1.6 trillion.  Thus, we are borrowing almost 40% of our spending.  If the CEO of a private business did this, he would be fired.   If we didn’t borrow $1.6 trillion from the Chinese and from our children this year, taxes would have to increase 75% across the board to eliminate this year’s deficit.   That’s how far our spending is removed from reality.  Looked at another way, every single taxpayer would have to pay an additional $1,000 per month, every month of the year, to cover this year’s deficit.  That’s equivalent to a house payment, which is a good metaphor, because we have indeed mortgaged our future.

2)                  The worst is yet to come, because massive entitlement programs like Social Security, Medicare, and now ObamaCare have committed us to another $70 trillion dollars in future unfunded liabilities.   There is nothing in the Social Security Trust Fund today, except a useless pile of trillions of IOU’s.  The federal government has already borrowed and spent every penny of the Social Security trust fund on boondoggle programs.  Because of reckless politicians, our retirement security is now dependent on the willingness of future generations to tax themselves to replace our earlier social security contributions that the government has essentially stolen.

3)                  Inflation will be the next major disaster because of the fake money that the government is printing to cover its reckless spending.  Inflation caused by government printing presses is a direct tax on our wealth.  The prices of food, gas, and other commodities have already started to spike, making us all worse off.  The dollar is falling in value around the world.  Even the Chinese, who are nervous because they have funded our outrageous spending with loans, recognize that we are on the edge of a cliff.  One Chinese scholar recently declared, “Great nations fall because they turn their back on the principles that made them great.”   America gave birth to the greatest political principles in history.  It’s a shame that the Chinese know that, but our leaders in Washington don’t.    

This is why things are incredibly challenging for our movement.  It is not enough to just elect Republicans instead of Democrats.  This is not about political parties.  This is about nominating and electing true champions of limited government who will have the courage to make brutally difficult decisions.  It would be a tragic mistake for us to become complacent and assume that America has been saved just because we elected some Republicans in 2010.   We have a long way to go, and we are still in grave danger. 

Our challenges ahead include electing more champions of limited government, like Rand Paul, to take control of the U.S. Senate in November, 2012.  We need to fire Harry Reid as the Senate majority leader!  We need to add more champions of limited government, like Paul Ryan and Michele Bachmann, to the U.S. House.  We must also fire Barack Obama, the Community Organizer in Chief, whose mission thus far has been to grow government, impede business, and move us closer to socialism.  We need to elect a champion of limited government into the White House in November 2012!

More than ever, America needs the energy and the vision of the Tea Party movement.  We champions of limited government cannot rest until the leaders who spend like drunken sailors in Washington and in state governments have been removed from office.  Some of our politicians got the message in 2010.  Sadly, many did not.  It is our mission over the next two years to make sure that every politician in America gets the message of limited government in 2012.  If they don’t, we need to make sure that they get involuntarily retired, regardless of which side of the aisle that they sit on.

As we pursue this sacred mission, the media will continue to target us.  Politicians who are frightened by the power of our movement will continue to target us.  They will call us racist, even though we welcome all Americans to our limited government movement.  They will call us extremists, even though we are simply advocating the fundamental compact of our country, the U.S. Constitution. 

Ironically, the one thing that they will not call us is right, even though that is what we are.  So, when the media and the frightened politicians attack us with outrageous untruths, let us draw courage and determination from the rightness of our cause.  Let us heed the Civil War battle cry of Admiral Farragut, who declared, “Damn the torpedoes, and full speed ahead.”

2012, here we come.

Thank you. 

Tea Party Speech: We Can Be Heroes

Fellow Patriots!

Since this is a Tea Party, I’m going to get you riled up.  Let’s start with this -- Federal government spending has increased 21% in the past two years.  Let me ask you, have you all gotten 21% raises?  Has the value of your house gone up 21%?  Have your investments increased 21%?   So tell me, are you ready to stop the insane spending by our government?

There are only 17 days until we begin the limited government revolution in America.  There are only 17 days until we fire Nancy Pelosi as Speaker of the House.  There are only 17 days until we patriots have a lot more to say about what goes on in Lansing and Washington!

This is a momentous time.  Just when we thought there were no more heroes, we discovered through the Tea Party movement that we the people are the heroes.  Our movement has accomplished extraordinary things.  We have fueled conservative activism and energy that seemed unimaginable just 18 months ago.  We have reintroduced the concept of limited government into mainstream political discussion.  We have taught nervous politicians that “We the People” is no longer a trite patriotic phrase, but rather the battle cry of an organized movement with tremendous clout.

And yet, the Tea Party movement has many important things left to do.  First, we all need to vote in 17 days.  Limited Government champions like Tim Walberg, Ruth Johnson, Bill Schuette, Bob Young, Marybeth Kelly, and Rob Steele need to get more votes than the Big Government apologists running against them.   After this election, we need to actively recruit and support the next wave of limited government champions for 2012 and beyond.  The Tea Party revolution is not just about one election; it is about fundamentally rejecting Big Government for generations to come.    

For almost two years, the Tea Party movement has been warning America that many of our government leaders are dragging us down a deadly path that is contrary to our Constitution and our founding principles.

Let’s examine the cold, bitter reality of the predicament that these traitorous leaders have put our country in:

• ·        There is no money left in the Social Security trust fund.  Every penny has been given to the general fund of the government, and it has all been wastefully spent.  Now, the unfunded liabilities of Social Security and Medicare are greater than the GDP of the entire world!  As baby boomers start to retire, the government will have to either raise taxes or cut their benefits.   If the managers of a private pension fund did this, they would be thrown in jail.
• ·        The government is borrowing 43% of what it is spending this year.  It is clearly living beyond its means.  If a business did this, it would be declared bankrupt and its officers would be fired.   
• ·        The federal government has 380,000 employees who make over $100,000 per year, an increase of 50% since Obama took office.  We don’t need millions of overpaid bureaucrats in Washington watching over us and telling us what we can’t do.  My six year old son needs babysitting.  I don’t.     
• ·        The U6 unemployment rate, which includes workers who have simply stopped looking for work, is now at 17%.  It was 12% when Obama was elected.  So, after trillions in bailouts and stimulus spending, the U6 unemployment rate is five points worse.  The radicals are not only squandering our future, they are ruining our present.  Guess which city in America has the lowest unemployment rate?  Washington D.C.!  Guess which city has the richest suburbs?  Washington D.C.!  The only things booming in America are Big Government and the production of purple SEIU shirts.
• ·        In the year 2000, Michigan ranked 19^th among the states in per capita income.  Today, we rank 37^th.  In just ten years, we have become a national laughing stock, and businesses avoid our state like the plague.  Jennifer Granholm is probably grateful for term limits, because otherwise she would be fired by angry Michiganders in November.    
• ·        In just four years, Obama will accumulate more debt than the previous 43 presidents combined over 233 years.  His multi-year budget will leave us 20 trillion dollars in debt.  If you lined up 20 trillion one dollar bills end-to-end in a straight line, it would reach from the earth to the sun and back 20 times.
• ·        30% percent of personal income in America now comes from government transfer payments of some type.  America is becoming a nation of dependents and freeloaders.  Our radical leaders would rather have government bureaucrats handing out food stamps than business owners handing out paychecks.   Here’s what hope and change has gotten us so far:  A record 36 million Americans are now on food stamps, including 25% of all children. 
• ·        The government took over 17% of the economy with Obamacare.  The government also took over GM, Chrysler, and a large number of banks.  There are now more unionized government workers than unionized private sector workers.  This is socialism, and it has to stop!    
• ·        The radicals say they will only tax the rich, but if the government was required to balance its budget this year by raising taxes rather than borrowing from our children and from China, they would have to tax 100% of the income of everyone making $75,000 or more.  The radicals in Washington will eventually obliterate the middle class in order to implement socialism.

This is serious business.  We are facing the biggest political crisis in America since the Civil War.  On November 2^nd, we are going to choose the future identity of our country.  Our domestic enemies will vote for more socialism, bigger government, end-runs around the Constitution, bailing out failed businesses and irresponsible people, amnesty for illegal immigrants, and weakness abroad.  We patriots are going to vote for free markets, limited government, the rule of law based on the U.S. Constitution, personal responsibility, secure borders, and a strong national defense.  In other words, we are voting to protect and nurture the American Dream.

The choices we make as a country in the 2010 and 2012 elections will decide everything.  If we have not removed Obama, Pelosi, Reid, and the other radicals from office by 2012, then may our children forgive us, and may God have mercy on our souls.  If we fail, the America of Jefferson, Adams, Lincoln, and Reagan will no longer exist.

Our mission is clear.  In the next two elections, we need to replace Big Government apologists with limited government champions in at least 39 seats in the House, ten seats in the Senate, and one seat in the White House.  And then we need to hold every single politician in America accountable to the Constitution, no matter which side of the aisle they sit on. 

Month after month and year after year, our elected officials need to hear from us, clearly and loudly, that we will not tolerate backsliding toward Big Government.  It does us no good to elect false conservatives and RINO’s who will move us along toward socialism just a little bit slower than the liberals. 

The blessings of liberty require eternal vigilance by the people.   The Tea Party movement cannot be a passing fad; it must be a continuous way of life that defends our freedom from oppressive government.  The Tea Party movement is not just about winning one election; it is about defending liberty and the U.S. Constitution for the rest of time. 

I’m wearing my father’s paratrooper wings on my shirt today.  These wings are the greatest gift he left me.  They remind me that millions of brave men and women in the armed forces have risked their lives to defend America and its principles.  We cannot allow the bloodshed of our military heroes to be wasted.  Therefore, we must be political heroes.  As Reagan said, it is now up to us to save America and to preserve the freedom that our soldiers sacrificed so much for. 

To win this political battle, we need to recruit the votes of every like-minded relative, friend, and co-worker.  In the name of everything that is exceptional about America, I am challenging you to convince the political fence-sitters to get off their asses and help us rescue America on November 2^nd!  Convince them that there is nothing more important to do than to join us in this political house cleaning!  It all comes down to this.  We the People can take a giant step toward saving this country in 17 days.  Not Glenn Beck.  Not Fox News.  Us!  You and I!  We are going to be the heroes!

And this election is just the beginning.  We need to continue our momentum and recruit more and more like-minded Americans into the Tea Party movement.  As the years unfold, we need to challenge ourselves and our fellow patriots to become precinct delegates, poll watchers, campaign volunteers, fund raisers, letter writers, e-mail generators, phone callers, and media monitors.  We need to be the defenders of liberty and the guardians of our sacred Constitution decade after decade.  We need to be the engine of a new America.  We patriots need to be the heroes responsible for saving this country! 

Thank you. 

(If you enjoyed this speech, please consider purchasing the author's new book by clicking on this link to "We've Been Had:  How Obama and the Radicals Conned Middle Class America".  You can also view the author's Facebook page by clicking on this link to We've Been Had.)

The Radical War on the Middle Class

Fellow Tea Partiers! 

We live in an extraordinary time. 

The sabotage of America by the radicals in Washington has awakened a sleeping giant in the Tea Party movement.  We now see with new eyes and hear with new ears.  We now see and hear with startling clarity that Washington is becoming a bottomless pit of trillion-dollar entitlements, waste, and corruption. 

As a result, millions of us Tea Partiers have been energized with passion to save America from destruction and to restore limited government.   

The radicals in Washington hate and fear the Tea Party movement.  Despite what they allege in public, they know we are primarily a middle class phenomenon, that we are hard-working soccer parents and grandparents. 

The radicals also know that they’re losing their political grip on the middle class.  So, they desperately try to discredit tea partiers by calling us tea baggers and extremists and racists, hoping against hope that our movement will not spread to the rest of the middle class.  Without middle class support, the radicals know they are doomed at the ballot box in 2010 and 2012. 

The radicals are terrified that the middle class has caught on to the massive con that they perpetrated in 2008.  They campaigned on two major deceptions.  First, they campaigned for “change”.   After 18 months, we now know exactly what “change” means.  It means bigger government.  It means higher taxes.  It means more job-killing regulations.  It means a staggering national debt that will impoverish whole generations.  In short, change means a transition to socialism.

I’ve spent 18 months doing the background check on Barack Obama that the dominant media failed to do in 2008.  I’ve learned, for example, that he is a disciple of Saul Alinsky, who was a socialist and the author of the book Rules for Radicals.  Obama was trained as a community organizer by Alinsky followers.  He worked for Alinsky-spawned organizations such as ACORN.  He taught Alinsky’s philosophy to young organizers.  Rules for Radicals is recommended reading for recruits into Obama’s own Organizing for America group.

Saul Alinsky was the first to popularize the cry for “change” that became Obama’s famous campaign deception in 2008.  Alinsky defined “change” as a euphemism for transitioning to socialism.  He knew that if politicians campaigned openly for socialism, they would never win.  So instead of campaigning openly for socialism, the radicals campaigned for change.  The changes that the radicals in Washington are implementing today are moving us toward Saul Alinsky’s socialist vision. 

Saul Alinsky was also the inspiration for the second deception of the radicals’ 2008 campaign, which was to bribe the middle class and sow the seeds for class warfare.  Alinsky knew that closet socialists couldn’t be elected unless the middle class was conned into supporting them.  He encouraged radicals to do whatever it took, including outright lying and deceit, to con the middle class into embracing socialism camouflaged as change. 

Today’s radicals learned their lessons well from Alinsky.  In the following quote from Alinsky, you can hear a foreshadowing of Obama’s elitist, arrogant, Ivy League disdain for the middle class.  You can also hear an admission that even though the radicals mock and despise the middle class, they recognize that they need the political support of the middle class.   What incredible arrogance!  Here’s the quote from Alinsky: 

“Our rebels have contemptuously rejected the values and the way of life of the middle class. The middle class is materialistic, decadent, degenerate, imperialistic, war-mongering, and corrupt. But, we must begin from where we are if we are to build power for change, and the power and the people are in the big middle class majority."

In other words, the radicals despise us, even though they need us at the ballot box.  One example of how Obama deceived the middle class was his campaign promise to give tax cuts to 95% of Americans.  Remember that one?  What a magnificent con!  That bribe will be impossible for him to follow through on.  His administration has accumulated so much debt that the middle class will instead see the biggest tax increases in history. 

The U.S. government is borrowing over 40% of its budget in 2010.  They are clearly living beyond their means.  The poor won’t pay any of that debt back.  They can’t.  And the rich don’t collectively make enough to pay it back.  If we taxed 100% of the income of everyone making more than $75,000 per year, it would not cover our deficit this year.  The middle class is eventually going to be left holding the bag for this fiscal disaster.    

To make matter worse for the middle class, Obama is not only transferring our wealth to the poor, he’s transferring it to the rich!  He has given trillions in bailouts to bankers, Wall Street moguls, and other cronies.  Government workers themselves are becoming rich with lavish salaries and benefits.  There are now 380,000 government employees who make over $100,000 per year!   The suburbs of Washington are now the richest zip codes in the country.  Obama’s biggest campaign supporters were Goldman Sachs and other Wall Street firms.  His political godfather and money man is rogue billionaire George Soros, who now manipulates the puppet strings attached to Obama’s arms and legs. 

The middle class is going to be the biggest victim in this charade by Obama and the radicals.  Socialism has no place for a middle class, other than to serve as the oxen that wear the yoke of Big Government.  Socialist countries have two classes – the government elites and their cronies, and the poor.

In recent years, both major political parties jockeyed for the support of the middle class, ironically by promising to spend the wealth of the middle class.   Prior to each election, these politicians engaged in a bidding war for middle class votes.  After each election, they used their power to attack and devour the middle class.

The good news is that the middle class is the biggest block of voters, and we can choose to elect bold new leadership committed to limited government.  We need to remember that the first three words of our sacred Constitution are “We the People”.  We the people are the masters of every single bureaucrat and politician in America.  We can hire them and fire them, and a whole bunch of them deserve to be fired.    

We have two chances to take our country back – November 2010 and November 2012.  Find a way to become warriors in this battle.  Contribute money to sympathetic organizations.  Recruit family and friends to be fellow activists.  Convert fence-sitters to our cause.  Organize a car pool to get voters to the polls.  Use the internet to spread the message of limited government. 

Don’t passively wait for popular TV and radio personalities to save us.  This battle is ours to fight.  We the People are going to take back this country! 

In closing, I’ve chosen to fight this battle two ways.  First, I joined the Tea Party movement and I speak to those who are passionate about saving this country. 

Second, I wrote a book titled We’ve Been Had:  How Obama and the Radicals Conned Middle Class America.  It’s a hard-hitting compilation of Obama’s concealed life story.  It connects the dots between his radical past, his extremist philosophies, and the terrible impact his administration is having on the middle class.   

I proudly dedicated the book to the Tea Party movement.  I invite you to visit our booth and purchase an autographed copy.   

Thank you. 

Soros Presentation

Linked is a Powerpoint file that contains a presentation about George Soros, the anti-American socialist renegade.  Just click on the highlighted link at the beginning of this entry to go to the presentation.

TEA Party Speech: "Individual Rights versus Socialism"

Hello Plymouth Michigan!

It’s great to be here among so many enthusiastic fellow Patriots and TEA Partiers. 

TEA Partiers are often accused of being extremists.  The accusers intend it as an insult.  I wear it as a badge of honor. 

I embrace Barry Goldwater’s view of extremism.  He said, “Extremism in the defense of liberty is no vice, and moderation in the pursuit of justice is no virtue.”

Goldwater outlined our path in his book, Conscience of a Conservative.  He said, “I have little interest in streamlining government or in making it more efficient, for I mean to reduce its size.  I do not undertake to promote welfare, for I propose to extend freedom.  My aim is not to pass laws, but to repeal them.  It is not to inaugurate new programs, but to cancel old ones that do violence to the Constitution.”

Likewise, we TEA Partiers are extremists who insist on a limited government constrained by the U.S. Constitution.

We TEA Partiers are extremists who insist on holding our elected officials accountable to that Constitution.

We TEA Partiers are extremists who will take back our country on behalf of ‘We the People’!

Today, our country is at war.  Unlike other wars, we are not being attacked by foreign invaders.  We are being assaulted by domestic enemies, radicals who seek to take more and more of our wealth and liberty.  We will fight these radicals at the ballot box.  

The TEA Party movement is waging a political battle with these domestic aggressors in Washington and Lansing.  Our mission is to remove them from their offices, regardless of which side of the aisle that they sit on.  It is up to us to save America.  As Ronald Reagan said, “We are a nation that has a government, not the other way around.” 

We have had great successes in this war already.  In just one year, the TEA Party movement has gone from being a laughingstock, to being a force that many politicians are clearly frightened of.  The TEA Party movement has a higher favorability rating than Congress, the President, and both major political parties.  Our movement helped retake the governorship in Virginia.  Our movement helped retake the governorship in New Jersey.  And in one of the most glorious of all victories, our movement helped take Ted Kennedy’s seat in Massachusetts.  Scott Brown instantly became a hero when he reminded voters that the office he was seeking did not belong to Ted Kennedy, it did not belong to a particular party, it belonged to the people!  And the people took it!

The first three words of our sacred Constitution are “We the People”.  We the people are the masters of every single bureaucrat and politician in America.  We can hire them and fire them, and a whole bunch of them deserve to be fired. 

In the coming elections, we must assert our will.  To firm our resolve, let’s review some horrific threats to our Republic:

A)                  Our leaders are mocking us:

1. Florida Congressman Alcee Hastings said, “There ain’t no rules here.  We make ‘em up as we go along.”  Ironically, he is a member of the Rules Committee.  He apparently is not aware of the U.S. Constitution.  But we are.  And we are going to hold all of them accountable to it!
2. Speaker Nancy Pelosi said of the health care bill: “We have to pass the bill so that you can find out what’s in it.”  In November, Pelosi is going to find out that she has been fired as Speaker of the U.S. House of Representatives.
3. Barack Obama said in his state of the union address that he was concerned about reckless government spending and the soaring deficit.  One week later, he introduced the biggest budget in U.S. history, with a deficit four times bigger than any other in history!  I wonder what color the sky is on his planet…

B)   Let’s talk about the spending in Washington:

1. Obama’s new budget totals $3.6 trillion.   It is 1600 pages thick.  How many of our leaders do you think actually read it?
2. Washington just passed a government takeover of health care.  This will cost another $1 trillion over ten years, but only if you believe pigs can fly.  No new government entitlement program has ever come close to its initial cost estimates.
3. The good news is that Fidel Castro congratulated us on our government takeover of healthcare.  The bad news is that Cuba recently announced they are cutting back health care services, because they cannot afford them.  America, meet your future.

C)    Washington’s spending is causing massive debt:

1. The budget deficit in 2010 of $1.6 trillion is 44% of the total budget.  In other words, almost half of what the government is spending, it is borrowing.  Explain that to your kids carefully, because they’re the ones who are going to pay it back.  Also, remind them that their generation supported Obama.   
2. In the next decade, the government is going to add $9 trillion to the national debt.  Half of it will be just interest expense on earlier debt.  We will borrow $4.8 trillion in the next ten years just to pay interest! 
3. In ten years, our debt will be $20 trillion.  That’s $67,000 for every man, woman, and child in the U.S.  For a family of five, that’s $335,000 of debt.  If you took 20 trillion one dollar bills and lined them end to end in a straight line, it would stretch from the earth to the sun – 20 times!

D)   All of this spending and debt will cause tremendous pressure to raise taxes.  Here is what is likely to happen:

1. Some or all of the Bush tax cuts will expire.
2. A Value Added Tax is actively being considered by Obama’s Deficit Commission.
3. Capital gains taxes will go up.
4. Health care taxes will be imposed, long before benefits are available.
5. Cap and trade taxes will be imposed.
6. The cap on social security taxes will be raised, and benefit eligibility dates will be moved out even more.
7. State and local governments will push for tax increases to make up for revenue lost during the recession. 
8. Everybody will be affected by some or all of these tax increases, not just the rich.

Last Thursday, the Congressional Budget Office made this announcement:  “U.S. fiscal policy is unsustainable, to an extent that it can’t be solved through minor changes.  It’s a matter of arithmetic.”

Why is this happening to our country? 

There is a great moral conflict underlying this disaster.  Our society does not agree on our basic social compact.  Specifically, we do not agree on what a right is.

What really constitutes a right?  Do we all have a right to a free house?  Do we all have a right to a free car?  Do we all have a right to free food?  Do we all have a right to free health care?

Some say our rights are granted by God.  Others say our rights are inherent in nature.   Others say our rights are created by social convention, such as a constitution. 

These are all powerful arguments.  They inspired Thomas Jefferson’s famous statement in the Declaration of Independence:  “We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights, that among these are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.”

These unalienable rights not only have to be respected by individual citizens, they have to be respected by our government.  Jefferson told us, “Moral laws are as compelling on whole nations as they are on individual citizens.” 

Here is an example of what he meant.  Your right to your private property is inherent in your right to life and liberty, because it is what your life and liberty produces.  If you do not have a right to the property and wealth that your life produces, then your right to life and liberty are an illusion.  There is general agreement about this in our society, up to a certain point.  For instance, we all agree that one person stealing your property is a criminal.  Ten people stealing your property is a gang of criminals.  We all agree on that.  A thousand people stealing your property is organized crime.  We all agree on that. 

A million robbers stealing your property is socialism.  Sadly, we do not have agreement in our society about whether a million socialist robbers stealing your property is good or bad. 

Let me be clear on where I stand.  Socialism, which is nothing more than millions of robbers stealing your property with the force of government, is morally wrong.  It is as criminal as one robber stealing your property.  It doesn’t matter how many people gather together to steal your property, theft is an assault on your unalienable right to life.  It doesn’t matter if 51% of the citizens vote to steal your property.  It is still immoral. 

Would we accept 51% voting the remaining 49% into slavery?  Of course not!  The notion is morally repugnant to almost everyone.  Then why would we accept the premise of socialism?  Socialism is nothing more than theft of your life in bits and pieces, under the guise of “the greater good”.   It is a form of gradual slavery.  It is involuntary servitude in the form of a thousand bureaucratic chain links. 

The socialist philosophy is morally bankrupt.  The socialist claims, for example, that we all have a right to free health care.  But who will fulfill that right?  Is health care readily available in nature, like air or water?  It is not.  It has to be provided by doctors and nurses and ambulance drivers, along with a large supporting cast.  For someone to claim the service of these people by absolute right, is the same as staking an absolute claim to their lives and their labor, or the lives and labor of others who will be forced to pay for their services on behalf of those who won’t.  When someone stakes an absolute claim to your life and labor, they have made you a slave.       

We are appalled by slavery, and rightly so.  We are appalled because it violates a person’s unalienable right to life and liberty.  Socialism is slavery too, dressed up in fancy words and dime store semantics.  Socialism is not the slavery of whips and chains.  Rather, it is the slavery of stealing your life hour by hour, day by day.  Nationalized health care?  To pay for it, you owe the state 30 days of hard labor.  Cap and trade?  To pay for it, you owe the state another 30 days of hard labor.  Trillions for bailing out irresponsible people and failed businesses?  You owe the state 6o days of hard labor. 

We are $13 trillion dollars in debt and counting.  We are incurring unfunded liabilities in Social Security, Medicare, and now nationalized health care, the likes of which the world has never seen before.  We have allowed ourselves to be sold into slavery to this debt.  Worse yet, we have allowed our children to be sold into slavery.

The socialists will say that our servitude is necessitated by “the will of the people” or “the greater good”.  No “will of the people” can make a slave of another person!  There is no “greater good” than protecting the right to life and liberty of every single person in our society!  Our government was instituted to protect our lives and property, not to enslave us and to steal our property!  That is precisely why we have a Constitution.  It is our fundamental pact to protect individuals from the tyranny of the majority.

Once we grant everyone the “right” to health care, what will stop claims for other so-called “rights”?  What is the difference between the right to health care and the rights to housing, food, transportation, education, clothing, energy, and iPods?  There is no difference.  Once you accept being a slave to one of these so-called rights, you have accepted being a slave to them all.   This is the slippery slope that we are on right now.  There is simply no end to what the socialists will try to grab, when the concept of rights has become so diminished. 

Vice President Joe Biden actually pointed this out, in his own stupid way.  During the health care “summit”, he alleged that we all agree government has a role in health care, and that we’re just talking about how much of a role.  He clarified the issue perfectly – if we grant that the government has a moral right to take over health care, then all we are arguing about is to what degree will all be made slaves to that right.  If we grant to the government such authority, then we have ceded the whole argument to the socialists, and the game is over for our Constitution and our way of life. 

If we surrender our fundamental rights to the government in this manner, then we deserve the scathing words of Sam Adams, who said, “May your chains sit lightly upon you, and may posterity forget that you were our countrymen.”

Jefferson’s words in the Declaration of Independence are the most morally profound words ever crafted in a political document.  We have a right to our life and liberty.  We do not have a right to the life and liberty of our neighbors.   This fundamental social compact has made us the greatest society in the history of the world, and the most moral society in the history of the world.   

Losing our unalienable rights to life and liberty is a moral tragedy by itself.  But, there are other hidden moral hazards if we lose these rights.  Dr. Adrian Rogers said:  “What one person receives without working for, another person must work for without receiving.  The government cannot give to anybody anything that the government does not first take from someone else.  When half of the people get the idea that they do not have to work because the other half is going to take care of them, and when the other half gets the idea that it does no good to work because somebody else is going to get what they worked for, that my dear friend, is about the end of any nation.”  

It is the end of any nation, because socialism, which is what Dr. Rogers was describing, will inevitably result in lost incentive, class warfare, generational dependency and carelessness.  We have seen a microcosm of this in action very near to us.  If you want to see where Obama’s vision of hope and change is leading us, look no further than Detroit.  Detroit is the moral hazard of socialism.

Socialists believe that government should force citizens to do the work of an altruistic god they call the state.  However, altruism forced by government can never be the work of any God, it can only be destructive of individual rights and liberty.  Transfers of wealth forced by the state are not charity, they are theft on the grandest of scales.

The beauty of our Constitution is that it allows the exercise of individual liberty, including altruistic behavior, without the evil of state compulsion and confiscation.  Our Constitution creates the opportunity for moral redemption, in whatever form each individual seeks.  Socialism, on the other hand, obliterates morality with guns and tax collectors.  Ayn Rand said “morality ends where the barrel of a gun begins.”  Force is the opposite of morality, because moral behavior is inherently an exercise of free will.

Who among us has the absolute authority to mandate how each of us should allocate our time and wealth?  For anyone to claim such authority is a moral abomination.  It is tantamount to claiming that one person’s wish is superior to another person’s, and that this superiority can be manifested forcibly.  Such claims are the source of slavery and concentration camps, of gulags and re-education programs, of dictators and tyrants.  Such claims ignore the most fundamental right in our society—our right to our lives and the results of our efforts.

We cannot go half way with the socialists.  It is not possible to be half free, at least not for long.  The state has the force of guns and the very real power to confiscate wealth.  If we allow the government to decide how much liberty we can have, it will be like a wolf having dinner with a sheep.  We all know what will be on the menu.

To be sure, we have an obligation to pay taxes to fund the legitimate functions of government, which are limited and defined by the Constitution.  We do not have a moral obligation to pay taxes just to transfer wealth from one citizen to another.

Two centuries ago, we fought a military revolution over this moral issue.  We are now engaged in a political revolution to save this moral principle.  Our unalienable right to life has been defended with the blood of patriots for over two centuries.  Millions of brave men and women have sacrificed their very lives to protect this sacred principle.  I ask you, are we now going to allow socialist politicians to legislate and tax it away?   Over my dead body!

Japanese admiral Yamamoto said after the Pearl Harbor attack, “I fear that all we have done is to awaken a sleeping giant and fill him with a terrible resolve.”  If we can thank President Obama for one thing, it is this.  He has awakened us to the harsh reality of what our politicians have been doing to America for a long time.  He has awakened the TEA Party movement.  He has awakened a sleeping giant.  He has awakened the people of America. 

It is time for another revolution.  Not a revolution of bombs and bullets, but a revolution of leadership and moral conviction.   Revolutions can happen through the ballot box as much as they can with pitchforks.

If what is happening to America doesn’t make your blood boil, you don’t have American blood in your veins.  The elections of 2010 and 2012 will decide everything.  We American patriots need to exert our political will at every level of government and on every issue critical to restoring limited government.  If we have not removed Obama, Pelosi, and Reid from power by 2012, then may our children forgive us, and may God have mercy on our souls.  There is nothing more important during the next two years than working to remove these radicals and their cohorts from office.

Politicians across America, please understand us.  We do not care whether you are Republican, Democrat, or Independent.  We only care that you faithfully represent the Constitution of the United States.  We only care that you embrace the principle of limited government.  We only care that you stop intruding in our lives.  We only care that you keep your hands off our wallets and our families. 

Edmund Burke said, “The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing.” 

The good men and women of America have been pushed too far.  Here’s a message for all of the politicians who have pushed us too far.  We the people are coming for you in November.  We the people will be coming for you in 2012.  We the people are going to fire you.

This great country does not belong to you politicians.  It belongs to us! 

Thank you. 

(If you enjoyed reading this speech, please consider reading my new book, "We've Been Had:  How Obama and the Radicals Conned Middle Class America."  For information about the book, click on the highlighted book title in this paragraph.)  Also, click on this link to view the author's Facebook page.