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THE PRICE ONCE PAID
The sound of sirens pierced the early morning quiet, reminding me it would soon be dawn. My body was totally exhausted after running all night, I wished I was safe at home. Maybe I should have just kept quiet and not joined the others, as my family had urged me to do.
It’s too late now, I followed my heart, I’m sure my father would be proud of me. It’s first light now and I can hear the sounds of the search teams and their dogs, closing in on me. They had been on my trail since last night, when they broke up our protest march. The police used their new right of search and seizure to get our secret list of names.
Fear does strange things to a man. I watched helplessly as the dogs tore at the clothing of my fellow dissidents only a hundred feet away. I feel like a coward, what kind of man would stand ideally by, while his two closest friends were being dragged off. And yet, I didn’t make a sound. I laid motionless in the high grass as the two agents passed within a few feet of me.
I never thought I’d be a wanted man on the run, a yet I find myself hiding from the authorities here, in my own neighborhood. It’s only been a few months since the election and already our remaining rights are being stripped from us. They keep saying it’s necessary, and for the good of the country.
They keep telling everyone, don’t worry, we know what they are doing. The average citizen just does not have enough information to make an informed decision. Let them do their job…trust them, they know what’s best for us.
It hasn’t always been this way. When I was growing up, my father warned me about this, but I wouldn’t listen, I knew all the answers. We spent many hours talking about politics and the history of our great country. He spoke of the wars and sacrifices that made our nation great. He instilled in me the principles that the founding fathers, risked so much for. But also, in his long life, he watched as the people lost one right after the other, in a slow and insidious pattern. These once firmly ensconced rights, dissolved over time, not by war or foreign power, no..it was much more insidious than that.. it was due to our own indifference and apathy.
Dad, felt the turning point was the presidential elections of 2008. The electorate had been increasingly divided and apathetic. The politicians couched their real ambitions for the direction they wanted to take the country in. And now, only 32 years latter, in the first election without a popular vote, the super delegates have ushered the social-isolationist party into power.
I need to wait here until dark again and then try to re-group with my fellow freedom fighters. It’s illegal now for us to gather and discuss ideas that are contrary to the party line, I could pay with my life. Somehow it seems wrong that we have to pay again for the freedom that our forefathers had already sacrificed so much for. But, we let the freedom slip thru our fingers ..Never again, I swear….Never again
“THE PRICE OF FREEDOM IS ETERNAL VIGILANCE”
Freedom is never more than one generation away from extinction. We didn't pass it to our children in the bloodstream. It must be fought for, protected, and handed on for them to do the same, or one day we will spend our sunset years telling our children and our children's children what it was once like in the United States where men were free.
Ronald Reagan
Minute man P.I.B.
The sound of sirens pierced the early morning quiet, reminding me it would soon be dawn. My body was totally exhausted after running all night, I wished I was safe at home. Maybe I should have just kept quiet and not joined the others, as my family had urged me to do.
It’s too late now, I followed my heart, I’m sure my father would be proud of me. It’s first light now and I can hear the sounds of the search teams and their dogs, closing in on me. They had been on my trail since last night, when they broke up our protest march. The police used their new right of search and seizure to get our secret list of names.
Fear does strange things to a man. I watched helplessly as the dogs tore at the clothing of my fellow dissidents only a hundred feet away. I feel like a coward, what kind of man would stand ideally by, while his two closest friends were being dragged off. And yet, I didn’t make a sound. I laid motionless in the high grass as the two agents passed within a few feet of me.
I never thought I’d be a wanted man on the run, a yet I find myself hiding from the authorities here, in my own neighborhood. It’s only been a few months since the election and already our remaining rights are being stripped from us. They keep saying it’s necessary, and for the good of the country.
They keep telling everyone, don’t worry, we know what they are doing. The average citizen just does not have enough information to make an informed decision. Let them do their job…trust them, they know what’s best for us.
It hasn’t always been this way. When I was growing up, my father warned me about this, but I wouldn’t listen, I knew all the answers. We spent many hours talking about politics and the history of our great country. He spoke of the wars and sacrifices that made our nation great. He instilled in me the principles that the founding fathers, risked so much for. But also, in his long life, he watched as the people lost one right after the other, in a slow and insidious pattern. These once firmly ensconced rights, dissolved over time, not by war or foreign power, no..it was much more insidious than that.. it was due to our own indifference and apathy.
Dad, felt the turning point was the presidential elections of 2008. The electorate had been increasingly divided and apathetic. The politicians couched their real ambitions for the direction they wanted to take the country in. And now, only 32 years latter, in the first election without a popular vote, the super delegates have ushered the social-isolationist party into power.
I need to wait here until dark again and then try to re-group with my fellow freedom fighters. It’s illegal now for us to gather and discuss ideas that are contrary to the party line, I could pay with my life. Somehow it seems wrong that we have to pay again for the freedom that our forefathers had already sacrificed so much for. But, we let the freedom slip thru our fingers ..Never again, I swear….Never again
“THE PRICE OF FREEDOM IS ETERNAL VIGILANCE”
Freedom is never more than one generation away from extinction. We didn't pass it to our children in the bloodstream. It must be fought for, protected, and handed on for them to do the same, or one day we will spend our sunset years telling our children and our children's children what it was once like in the United States where men were free.
Ronald Reagan
Minute man P.I.B.
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