A friend of mine, who died 98 years before I was born, wrote a book called Walden. Within its pages, Henry exposed Truth about the world of Concord, Massachusetts as observed in the years 1845 to 1847. One great Truth he lived among was slavery: the pretended ownership by human beings of other human beings. That infamous crime enraged Thoreau to the point of his refusing to support (via taxation) the government that professed to have authority over him. Just as it is a citizen's duty to chastise, to reprimand, her or his government when it is in the wrong, it is the duty of every writer to be a social and political critic. The sweet blossom of sedition falls within the venue and duty of the writer. Since I am not like Henry David Thoreau, who wrote and published many essays compared to my few, I feel free to censure evil within everything I write, not merely with my every breath and every thought.
A patriot will readily and passionately criticize her or his government when it is evil, corrupt, and infamous; refusing to do so is treason. It is the duty of every citizen to criticize, censure and scourge the political fiends who pretend to serve the public when those villainous brutes serve only tyranny, greed, hatred, and prejudice.
I am told that one must not criticize the rogues currently running the country. "United we stand," my critics say: "We must present to our enemies the appearance of solidarity, least our enemies perceive discord as weakness." This is equal to insisting that one ignore a burning house while our lungs fill with smoke and the flaming roof falls down upon our heads. Surely it is the duty of every awake occupant to yell "The house is on fire!" to awaken those who slumber within. A dog would do no less.
Cowards cheer what heroes execrate. I choose to anathematize the diablerie systemic within American government.
The American "Ship of State" has been hijacked by an insane, ravenous pirate lacking scruples, sense, morality, ethics, and human empathy. This blood-lusting privateer is intent on selling America and all of its citizens upon the auction block of greed, hatred, and violence. In the name of "fighting terrorism," this picaroon engages in greater and more violent terrorism; in the name of "bringing terrorists to justice," this recreant butcher is actively, aggressively, happily giving birth to more terrorists. For every "terrorist" that American violence "brings to justice," a hundred more "terrorists" are given incentive to injure and kill Americans. If with one hand you hold a pistol to the head of a man fettered in chains, and beat him with a club with your other, what recourse has he but to attack you in secret, when your back is turned? America and Americans refuse to concede the fact that attacks against them by "terrorists" are not born out of vacuum, but, rather, are germinated and nurtured from the compost heap of American tyranny, imperialism, and international, wide-spread, liberal acts of butchery, despotism, and horror.
America sows swords in expectation of reaping roses, and wails in astonishment and dismay when the harvest is blood and carnage.
If America wishes to see a sharp decrease in the number of terrorist attacks throughout the world, it need merely cease engaging in terrorism. A pirate cannot see such a simple fact; victims of American terrorism see it every minute of every day.
When the towers of the World Trade Center were destroyed, several thousand Americans lost their lives. They did not die for their country: they died because of their country. The act of retribution against American citizens at the World Trade Center spawned wide-spread slaughter in foreign countries at the hands of American armed forces; in those battles, many Americans lost their lives--- none of whom died for their country. American police officers, emergency medical teams, and fire fighters often die for their country: when was the last time a member of America's armed services died in the defense of The United States? The last time was before most American citizens were born!
And yet American soldiers are still sent away to die in foreign lands, little understanding they are dying in defense of hatred, tyranny, greed, and the wealthy corporations back home. This is infamous! These Americans did not die at the hands of the people who killed them: they died at the hands of the people who sent them off to die. Did it occur to them, before they breathed their last, before they gushed the last pint of blood from their arteries, before their lungs collapsed and their hearts failed, that the people who insisted the battle be fought stayed at home, safe from harm? As their eyes dimmed and their hearing faded, did they perhaps come to realize they had been betrayed, dishonored, and victimized by their government?
One can, at the last, take pride in dying for the defense of one's country. There is no pride, no honor, in dying for the prejudice, hatred, and avarice of one's countrymen.
Upon the gibbet of apathy, justice hangs. If America were a Democracy, this abominable plight would never have been inflicted upon us: the citizenry of a Democracy would never have allowed such a nefarious, shameful state of affairs. Our current Oligarchy rests in comfort in their beds knowing that the American citizens are appeased, stupefied, placated, pacified, and rendered harmless by Bread and (televised) Circuses. 200,000 unwilling American citizens may be sent off to kill and die for the sake of acquiring oil fields for wealthy American corporations, and the American citizenry cheers; deny that cheering citizenry a "Superbowl Weekend" on their televisions, and see the nation rise up enrage at the felonious scoundrels responsible!
I write these sentences because I love my country and detest those who feign to govern me. My government commits evil under the pretense of doing so for my benefit: a nefarious sham that I denounce and repudiate whole-heartedly and resolutely. It is against my interests for my government to create enemies who wish me dead; it is a crime against my soul for my government to butcher babies at their mother's breast, slaughter children cowering in bomb shelters, and massacre old men cringing in fear under their beds. I deny the slander and libel that my government does these things for me, in my name! It does these things in the service of greed-ravenous men, not for me.
Self-evident: no citizenry ever benefited by its government being its greatest enemy.
Self-evident: a government worthy of loyalty will receive it without prompting; a government that demands loyalty doesn't deserve it. The investiture of a loyalty oath is the surest sign of a government unworthy of respect, let alone loyalty.
Self-evident: a government that demands military service from the citizenry, wielding the threat of violence, economic ruin, and imprisonment against such heroic men and women of good conscience who refuse, has by that villainous act conceded the fact that it is engaging in flagitious behavior worthy of opposition.
Self-evident: a patriot will refuse to kill and die in an unjust, immoral, war.
Self-evident: cowards will march off to kill and die when ordered to fight an unjust, criminal war; the courageous, the brave, the bold will refuse.
The Oval Office Despot wishes to force the very best of the citizenry (those of noble and just conscience) to engage in military "service" (foreign wars to liberate foreign wealth) against their wills. This is a convincing confession by the White House that it is engaging in criminal, unjust military tyranny: if America were under real threat by a foreign power, a hundred million people of good, honest, bold conscience would rush to Her aid uncompelled (and historically have always done so). The "need" to terrorize, intimidate, and extort Americans into killing and dying is proof positive that there is no valid justification for them to engage in the war. The White House Dictator believes the American citizenry are subjects to be commanded; in a Democracy it is the citizenry who commands, and the government that obeys.
Rebellion is sustenance to the human soul. The lust for personal autarky is coded in the human DNA; it is one of many divine traits humanity possesses. Only pathology can mask the human need for liberty. Tyranny makes sedition flower; justice makes contumacy extraneous, irrelevant, obsolete. Only death ends a human being's craving for liberty. It is the guillotine, not fetters and manacles, that vanquishes the human need for sovereignty of the self. Insolence is the proper reply to petty despotism; insurrection is the correct retort to tyranny. It is therefore every American citizen's duty to their country and their selfhood to refuse to fight a criminal, unjust war when required to do so by the State.
With the pretense of "security," liberty is assassinated. What profits a society when it must place every citizen behind iron bars and concrete walls to feel itself safe? To defend themselves against their countless imaginary enemies, the American citizenry cheerfully shackles itself in fetters to the dungeon wall, and then hands the keys to gangsters, cutthroats, butchers, and thieves. We defend ourselves against enemies that do not exist, and ignore the fiends who crack our bones to feed upon our marrow.
American citizens face a choice: they may choose to be loyal to their country, or they may choose to be loyal to the government. Current governing madmen have made it impossible for a decent human being to choose both. As for me, I choose loyalty to my country; I pledge sedition to the government.
Certainly, when a government refuses to defend the weak, the just, the innocent, it falls upon the citizenry to do that worthy, necessary task. And yet what the perdition do we have a government for when it not only refuses that great work, but aggressively, violently opposes those whom it has forced to take up that burden? A valid, just government would hold civil and human rights sacrosanct: each and every individual citizen would not be forced, one after the other, to petition the government to recognize her and his rights. Rather, a just, valid government petitions the citizenry; it is the citizenry's job to approve or deny governmental petitions.
When the government turns to lawlessness, the burden of upholding and defending the law falls upon the citizenry. It is the burden of the citizenry to place itself between the oppressors and the oppressed. No freedom has ever been gained, no liberty has ever been secured, by forcing people to participate in death and destruction; no citizen owes allegiance to such a government. I will fight to the death in the defense of my country; I will fight to the death a government that feigns the authority to force me to defend its wealthy corporations and oil barons. Show me that my country needs me in her defense and I will come running, with a willing heart and gun in my hand.
Some will ask me "Since you detest the current government administration so much, why don't you leave the country?" My answer is, "If someone you love gets bone cancer, do you abandon that person? Do you stop loving someone who gets tuberculosis?" I do not hate America because she has a criminal government; I hate the criminal government because it has America. Surely this is obvious. Tens of millions of American citizens loathe the current administration: why should they "leave the country?" Hundreds of millions of people throughout the world match that loathing: should they "leave the planet?" No! One defends what one loves, and begs, pleads, prays for a cure. One does not wander off silently and leave a loved one to her fate.
Concerning rumors of mandating military service ("the draft"): no government has the right to do such an incomprehensibly abominable act as force people to kill and die; no USA administration has ever justified such criminal behavior! In a country originally designed to be run by the people, for the common support, well-being, and defense of the people, a government that abuses, injures, and kills the people is a treasonous government; harvesting the citizenry like a farmer harvests crops--- to fight in unjust, unnecessary, criminal wars and invasions! Every citizen of the world can hope and pray that rumors of the USA implementing "the draft" are as false as they appear to be.
