Pick Your Poison...

"Our constitution was made for a moral and religious people; it is wholly inadequate for any other." -John Adams

"The less restraint shown from within the more must imposed from without." -Edmund Burke

I have long wondered... what the heck is fascism? I always pictured it pretty much like communism with a frowny face and wearing a military uniform.

(Post still in progress... busy reading about fascism)

Ok, I read a bit about fascism and apparently I am not the only one that has a problem placing it on the political spectrum. Rather than a particular world-view, the main similarity of fascist governments are their methods- creating national unity rallied behind a common enemy in response to a perceived threat to society, such as moral degradation by whatever means necessary, and totalitarian control... The ends justify the means! And the ends seems to be whatever the particular dictator thinks is the perfect society. For arguments sake, let's just consider it a right wing phenomenon, since that is usually where it is placed.

Anyway, the reason I was looking this up was not just some freak curiosity, but rather to help explain left -right politics a little bit and the dangers of big government on either side.

In our political parties today, we often see two big-government proponents arguing amongst themselves. Usually they spend most of their time ripping each other to shreds, and often these are the only times that they are telling the truth... One thing both the Nazis and Communists had right back in the 30's is that the other one sucked!!

There are extreme dangers of big government, whether left or right- civil liberties lost on the right, economic liberties lost on the left. Both our current administration and the previous one have taken away a little bit of both! They do not really seem to care which side of the political spectrum they grow on, as long as the direction is up!! (using the triangle graph above.)

Bush is infamous for the Patriot act and the wire taps, but also Medicare Part D and rampant spending and regulations!! Obama is infamous for Health care reform, big regulation, but also making the Patriot act permanent, continuing the wire taps and also passing the financial regulation bill will allow government access to your bank accounts.

Just as fascism, I have a hard time placing either of these political leaders on the left-right political spectrum.

I know Bush has always been characterized as extreme right, but I have a hard time placing him there based on the evidence. The only thing that could possibly place him on the right is his war-prone tendencies. Defense is about the only thing he was right-wing on at all, well... that and tax cuts. He was pro-amnesty for illegal immigrants, created medicare part D, and his daughter came out recently in support of the new health care bill and his wife is pro-gay marriage and abortion rights! He was a centrist big-government guy.

Now Obama, his friends seem to be leftist, but his policies just seem big all over the place. Big secrecy, big social programs, big business subsidies!

There are significant dangers of big government on either side of the political spectrum. The pressures we need to apply to our elected representatives these days is down, smaller is better. Whether left or right, we are far to close to the top of the triangle for comfort. We need to bring it back down, but the only way for our government to be able to scale down is for our society to become more self-sufficient.

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Articles

Religious Freedom and the First Amendment

... I, as an individual, choose to live by the teachings of Christianity and submit myself to the authority of God as the recognized Higher Authority... Now, if we, as a family, live in a community in which every individual and family has done as we have done, then a civil governance structure exists in which each chooses to live by the same moral and religious creed, respecting the rights of self and all others.

Under such a structure in which I choose to live by a moral and religious creed acceptable to the community, a limited form of government is all that is required as I, as an individual, and every other individual in the community, as well, have chosen to accept the responsibility of governing self according to a universally accepted moral and religious creed.

Now continue to build that structure from the community to the highest form of government and you have a nation of people, all living by the same moral and religious creed, establishing self-governance at every level, requiring a limited form of government to secure order, justice and liberty.

This is what John Adams referred to when he stated: "Our constitution was made for a moral and religious people; it is wholly inadequate for any other."