Independence Day 2009

As a good patriot, today I am celebrating the 4th of July like every American should- displaying my patriotism with flags and fireworks, improving my property by mowing my lawn and trimming the bushes, enhancing the quality of my life by eating great food and spending time with my family, and remembering my liberty by re-reading our founding documents. If you haven't done so already, make sure you take a minute of your time today to reflect and read the Declaration of Independence, and don't feel silly about reading it before the BBQ or as the bedtime story for your kids tonight.
In particular, read and think about the first part of it:

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. That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed. That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it...

Those lines mean something, to me, conservatives, Republicans, and America, and we should always remember how revolutionary those ideas are, how incredible it is to actually believe them, and how much of a leap of faith you must make to follow them.

Those ideas needed to be fought for back in 1776- but they still need to be fought for today. Our liberties have been rationalized away by our leaders. Our legislators spend us into servitude and seize our own property to do so. The 2nd Amendment needed a controversial U.S. Supreme Court decision just be be affirmed.. Our courts regularly mock the Constitution and believe it to be a dead thing.

You and I will always been free and independent- no government can take that away from us- but every day, our free and independent condition is lessened- with each new dollar taken from us, with each new exception to our rights made, with each life lessened, as a nation we dishonor our Founding Fathers and what they fought for.

So on this Independence Day, rededicate yourself to our founding ideas.