Ron Paul's Farewell Address
Ron Paul retires from Congress at the end of the current session. He served for over 20 years. I realize many have already posted and commented on this and in our age of two minute attention spans this may seem like old news, but it's important news. It's important because I believe Ron Paul has been the single most important member of Congress in our time. He's important because he stood virtually alone in a crusade to restore adherence to the Constitution and the system of liberty established by our Founding Fathers, which includes a restoration of sound money. And if you're not all lit up by the crusade to restore the Constitution, maybe you can focus your attention on the "sound money" theme. My contention here is that if we don't restore sound money, we're not getting out of our current crisis anytime soon. Not only that, but we'll probably head into a period where our economy falls apart and our society continues to unravel, to what extent I can't say, but to whatever extent, surely a most unpleasant prospect.
In any event, here's my two cents regarding Congressman Paul.
When I began my efforts to understand our monetary system, which included various studies about the nature of money as well as the history of central banks, I came across statements from Congressman Paul. I didn't consider myself a Libertarian, and didn't have any knowledge of or particular affinity for Austrian economics, but his published commentaries always impressed me both in their content and their clarity. How different these were from the comments that slip or drip out of the mouths of most politicians!
It was years before I ever heard him speak. I simply read his published commentaries, and read them carefully and with great relish. Ron Paul's writings helped me to better understand not only our current monetary system and the role of the Fed, but also the Constitution and the concept of liberty which inspired our Founding Fathers' efforts such that they were willing to fight and die for their freedom from England, which they saw as an oppressor of their liberty.
I also began to understand the nature and extent of the erosion of our liberty in our times. I saw how, while liberty had certainly come under attack before the establishment of the Fed and the individual income tax in 1913, these two pieces of legislation that created the Fed and our current income tax accelerated the decline of our liberty as the power of central government grew.
And so with Ron Paul's retirement, we face the future without his voice in Congress. But I suspect (certainly I hope) that there are many of us who understand, as does Ron Paul, that the fundamental cause of our current economic crisis lies in the moral crisis caused by an abandonment of personal responsibility in favor of the supposed security and entitlements provided by the state. It would seem some of us - or rather many or us, perhaps even a majority of us - are willing to give up taking personal responsibility for our lives in exchange for a false sense of security and a free lunch.
Looking to the future, here are some proposed areas which may provide common cause for those who recognize that a mindless belief in false security and an untoward attraction to entitlements (the free lunch folks) leads only to slavery - political and personal. We can and should work together to:
Well, there it is, my two cents, and here's Ron Paul's speech:
In any event, here's my two cents regarding Congressman Paul.
When I began my efforts to understand our monetary system, which included various studies about the nature of money as well as the history of central banks, I came across statements from Congressman Paul. I didn't consider myself a Libertarian, and didn't have any knowledge of or particular affinity for Austrian economics, but his published commentaries always impressed me both in their content and their clarity. How different these were from the comments that slip or drip out of the mouths of most politicians!
It was years before I ever heard him speak. I simply read his published commentaries, and read them carefully and with great relish. Ron Paul's writings helped me to better understand not only our current monetary system and the role of the Fed, but also the Constitution and the concept of liberty which inspired our Founding Fathers' efforts such that they were willing to fight and die for their freedom from England, which they saw as an oppressor of their liberty.
I also began to understand the nature and extent of the erosion of our liberty in our times. I saw how, while liberty had certainly come under attack before the establishment of the Fed and the individual income tax in 1913, these two pieces of legislation that created the Fed and our current income tax accelerated the decline of our liberty as the power of central government grew.
And so with Ron Paul's retirement, we face the future without his voice in Congress. But I suspect (certainly I hope) that there are many of us who understand, as does Ron Paul, that the fundamental cause of our current economic crisis lies in the moral crisis caused by an abandonment of personal responsibility in favor of the supposed security and entitlements provided by the state. It would seem some of us - or rather many or us, perhaps even a majority of us - are willing to give up taking personal responsibility for our lives in exchange for a false sense of security and a free lunch.
Looking to the future, here are some proposed areas which may provide common cause for those who recognize that a mindless belief in false security and an untoward attraction to entitlements (the free lunch folks) leads only to slavery - political and personal. We can and should work together to:
- Reduce - massively reduce - the size and power of central government
- Reduce - possibly eliminate - the public school system that has served as the propaganda machine for big government. (Yes, I know how many of us believe that public education is critical to an informed and literate people, but just look around you and you'll see how public education has failed us.)
- Along the same lines, eliminate federal subsidies for "higher" education.
- Close down the Federal Reserve System as the first step in stripping power from the banking cartel that has used the system to aggrandize power.
- Eliminate the individual income tax.
- To do this, we can:
- Vote for representatives who are familiar with and believe in the Constitution, and its support of liberty and sound money. (And it does clearly and specifically call for sound money.)
- Educate ourselves in areas where we are lacking, in order to provide leadership in the struggle.
- Order our own lives spiritually and materially to increase our religious sensibility (religion, specifically a belief in God, being the true and only sure foundation for a moral society), intellectual power and material well-being. This would provide the strength and endurance needed to persist in the struggle.
Well, there it is, my two cents, and here's Ron Paul's speech:
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