Nov 6, 1940 Franklin Roosevelt re-elected president

This article is from Ed B. Thanks Ed.

Bruce

'Well this week we will see if the citizen (hopefully that will be who is actually voting) will determine if we will have four more years of the “progressive” agenda offered by “The Anointed One”; or if we return to a program that encourages personal initiative, personal responsibility and the rule of law as proscribed by our Constitution.

The progressive movement in the USA has its foothold being established by Woodrow Wilson and advanced significantly by FDR. Too bad we didn’t have a limitation on the number of terms one could be president back then, we might have been able to recover form FDR’s socialism programs. For some reason folks when faced with uncertainty and hardship always seems to look for Uncle Sam to bail them out. JFK/LBJ, Carter and to a lessor extent Nixon, Clinton and Bush (“W”) all advanced progressive agendas. They all felt that government had the right and responsibility to create programs to advance social justice. Social Justice is a code word for Socialism/Communism like systems. The Community Organizer currently residing at 1600 Penn Ave is more over the top than even FDR in believing that big government and its extended reach into our lives is the best solution to a fair society.

This social experiment that our fore fathers established has survived wars, natural disasters and ideological attacks from the left and the right. Progressivism is not a disease of just the left. The Nazis, the totalitarian rule of the Mullahs and the Japanese warlords all practice a form of progressivism. For at the root of progressivism is the belief that a central force (the government) is better and more capable of deciding how we should live our life. What choices we make e.g. how many children we should have, how much education we are allowed and what beliefs we should be allowed to have in order that society function in a fair and equitable way.

The progressivism of the right may be more harsh on the surface but the siren song offered by the left (free education, equal share) is just as constrictive and destructive to individual liberty.. Once you sign up for the “free lunch” you give up your liberty. Once you utter “why doesn’t the government make a law to deal with that” you give up liberty. Self reliance and self respect go together. Is it any wonder that we have become a society that seems to need daily does of Prozac? Once you become a servant of the government rather than the government being the servant of the people we no longer are a “free country”

The “European Model” of socialism has an intellectual appeal and the “good order and fairness” sound nice but put into practice we see a sub-optimized society. We seem more folks forgetting how to rely on their own initiatives and expecting hand outs. One other appealing tenet is that progressives feel no one should fail. Part of liberty is allowing everyone the right to venture into whatever they want and being allowed to fail. Failure produces knowledge every bit as important as what we learn from success and sometimes more beneficial since we see if we have the fortitude to get ourselves up and refocus our energy and do better the next time.

This week we have a choice and the test for the American voter is do we try to return to a country that fosters individual initiative, recognizes that each should have a right to success but that it isn’t guaranteed? Vote your conscience and may God guide your thinking, and may God Bless America . Vote for love of country do not vote for revenge as Obama has called for. Our country deserves better from you.

“I’m for Mitt and Paul -- I hope you will be too”'