![\"TJ\"](\"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/01\/Thomas_Jefferson_by_Rembrandt_Peale_1800-e1548354870430.jpg\")
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Here’s our own Veritas Omnia Vincit, with some thoughts about Thomas Jefferson, and how things may have gone astray from his intent. Some are striving to change the course and this is met with stiff resistance by those grown too comfortable with the status quo.
\nEnough from me, here’s VoV:<\/p>\n
Malo periculosam, libertatem quam quietam servitutem<\/p>\n
Societies exist under three forms sufficiently distinguishable. <\/p>\n
1. Without government, as among our Indians. <\/p>\n
2. Under governments wherein the will of every one has a just influence, as is the case in England in a slight degree, and in our states in a great one. <\/p>\n
3. Under governments of force: as is the case in all other monarchies and in most of the other republics.<\/p>\n
To have an idea of the curse of existence under these last, they must be seen. It is a government of wolves over sheep. It is a problem, not clear in my mind, that the first condition is not the best. But I believe it to be inconsistent with any great degree of population. The second state has a great deal of good in it. The mass of mankind under that enjoys a precious degree of liberty and happiness. It has it’s evils too: the principal of which is the turbulence to which it is subject. But weigh this against the oppressions of monarchy, and it becomes nothing. Malo periculosam, libertatem quam quietam servitutem. Even this evil is productive of good. It prevents the degeneracy of government, and nourishes a general attention to the public affairs. I hold it that a little rebellion<\/a> now and then is a good thing, and as necessary in the political world as storms in the physical. – Jefferson to Madison, January 30, 1787.<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n
What does Jefferson mean by a \u201cdangerous freedom\u201d? I suspect we all have some slightly different ideas. I\u2019ve always felt that he meant true freedom was the freedom that didn\u2019t protect you from yourself, freedom that allowed your decisions to result in your demise or your success. The kind of freedom that kept the government out of the affairs of the governed until such time as there was a victim. Then the general welfare of the public kicks in and the government attempts to address the actions of that individual who created a victim. For Jefferson there was no crime without damage to a person or his property. He felt you should be free to live on your property in whatever fashion suited you until such time as your actions created a victim of your neighbors or their property.<\/p>\n
That\u2019s a fairly libertarian viewpoint, that you can do what you want with yourself on your property free from government interference. That the government had no business making laws where there not only wasn\u2019t a victim but the sole function of the law was to force people to behave or act in a certain manner. That government is anathema to Jefferson\u2019s view of good government. He considered those Republics as governments of force. I would be interested to hear his take today on our government which has very much become Jefferson\u2019s third definition over the last hundred years. Our government today is nothing if not a government of force.<\/p>\n
We now have hundreds of laws on the books that have no individual as the victim but merely the state as arbiter of what you are allowed or not allowed to do. Laws making it illegal to collect the water falling from the sky on your own property fall in this category, as do laws dictating how you must construct a window opening if you wish to change the size of the window openings in your home. Laws that mandate the wearing of safety equipment to ride a bike, or skate in a park, or drive a car. Once we decided we were okay with the government protecting us from ourselves the government was only too eager to jump in and direct every aspect of your life to keep you safe. We now have laws telling manufacturers of toasters that they must include labeling that indicates using the toaster in the bathtub or sink might kill the person making toast otherwise the dead moron\u2019s family can sue the manufacturer out of business. In the name of safety we\u2019ve given up most of our freedom to a government that doesn\u2019t view you as a citizen it views you as a commodity resource to be exploited for as long as possible and in as many ways as possible.<\/p>\n
We\u2019ve even convinced our fellow citizens they are in fact sheep, and the LEOs who protect them are the beneficial sheepdogs protecting the flock. It\u2019s a disgusting analogy when you consider the economics behind the analogy. What are sheep really? They are a commodity resource exploited by the farmer until they can\u2019t be exploited anymore at which point they are slaughtered and eaten. The sheep have no say in their existence or death and the sheep dog isn\u2019t their friend he\u2019s a tool of the rancher whose only purpose is to safeguard the resource for the farmer\u2019s economic benefit not for the benefit of the sheep that\u2019s simply a lucky coincidence for the moment because once the farmer decides a particular sheep has lost its value the farmer no longer cares if the dog protects it or not.<\/p>\n
The sheep are kept where the farmer wants them, not where the sheep want to go, they are moved around as it suits the farmer not the sheep. The sheep has zero say in how it lives its daily life, but that\u2019s the analogy the government has masterfully foisted on an ever less intelligent public. Sadly, more than a few LEOs also have bought into the analogy thinking they are protectors of the flock and not considering the reality of the analogy. Hell they\u2019ve even put the idea on T-Shirts to sell it to the masses\u2026Sheep are slaves to the rancher, in a free republic the government is supposed to govern with the consent of the governed. Sheep can\u2019t refuse to obey rancher\u2019s commands, in much the same way as we the people lack the ability to refuse to now obey our government.<\/p>\n
This brings me to the CinC again, people are tired of being compared to sheep and tired of being told to what to do by politicians pretending to be acting to protect the citizens. Even though I\u2019m not a big Trump fan I understand the appeal, more so with each passing day. Trump disrupts the operation of the tax farm, he\u2019s screwing with the status quo, he\u2019s making the power structure really uncomfortable. Trump is the first of \u201ca little rebellion\u201d that Jefferson talks about in his letter. Trump wasn\u2019t elected to be a peacemaker, he wasn\u2019t elected to make people happy and comfortable he was elected to be a disruptor, to break things and piss people off.<\/p>\n
The interesting part is that so many on the left have become so very comfortable wearing the yoke of \u201csafety\u201d that they can\u2019t stand Trump disrupting the status quo. When the Cool Black Guy was running the show the left was only too happy to stop all their protesting and become completely subservient to the government. Who knew it would be conservative evangelicals who would say it\u2019s time to blow it all up?<\/p>\n
In any event here\u2019s hoping we see a little more rebellion and a lot less status quo over the next ten years. The government is not now and never has been our friend or benefactor. Thomas Jefferson knew it almost 250 years ago, we should all heed his words and know it today.<\/p>\n
If we\u2019re going to fight for our freedoms it isn\u2019t some third world fundamentalists who are the biggest threat, and it\u2019s time we stop pretending they are and foment a bit more of Trumpian style rebellion.<\/p>\n
I\u2019ll leave you with a couple of thoughts from another favorite writer of mine, H. L. Mencken; 1) The whole aim of practical politics is to keep the populace alarmed (and hence clamoring to be led to safety) by menacing it with an endless series of hobgoblins, all of them imaginary\u2026.and 2) All government, of course, is against liberty.<\/p>\n
See you in the funny papers,<\/p>\n
VoV\n<\/p><\/blockquote>\n
Thanks again, V, for a couple reasons we discussed. Keep ’em coming; looking forward to your next offering.
\nAW1Ed <\/p>\nAlmost forget, Malo periculosam, libertatem quam quietam servitutem-
\n“I prefer dangerous freedom over peaceful slavery”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"