Happy 4th . . . and

[Brett Dikeman]

At 11:40 AM -0400 7/5/03, Michael Riebs / AudiV8 wrote:

>Some of us take these liberties so much for granted, but we shouldn't.
>
>So, take a few minutes while enjoying your 4th of July holiday and
>silently thank these patriots.
>   It's not much to ask for the price they paid.

...and after that, take a few minutes to mourn for all the freedom
and privacy you have lost in the last 2 years.  Then feel the guilt
of having so easily allowed yourself to allow your freedom and
privacy to be stripped from you.


>Remember: freedom is never free!

...and remember, there are plenty of people who are more than happy
to strip your personal liberty  from you in the name of preserving it.

   They are cowards, liars, sensationalists...and they are your
current president, vice president, and congress.  They are the people
who have created legislation like the "PATRIOT" act which requires
your librarians and bookstores to secretly divulge your reading
habits.  Allows you to be held indefinitely in secret, "tried",
convicted, and punished without a single constitutional protection,
even if you are a US Citizen.  Allows virtually limitless wiretapping
by agencies which have continuously shown themselves incapable of
restraining their activities.  Want to scare yourself silly?  Go down
to your local library and read the PATRIOT act; most have a copy, and
most librarians will be more than happy to help you find it.  Then,
write a letter to your congressional representatives and give them a
piece of your mind for not having the backbone to stand up to
legislation which is so blatantly unconstitutional a child could see
it.

That danger is almost as insidious as the danger presented by those
who are complacent in exchanging personal privacy and freedom for
"security"; those who accept each new increasingly absurd "security
measure" as "understandable", "necessary"...or worse, take false
comfort in it.  Those sheep will wake up one morning, and realize
they have no freedom or privacy left for all those laws to protect.

>It's time we get the word out that patriotism is NOT a sin

It's time we got the word out that true patriotism means recognizing
freedom means risk- risk that your fellow Americans, or yes, even
outsiders, will abuse the freedom you enjoy.  So be it; there is no
such thing as a free lunch, and risk is the price we must pay for
being free.  Don't you dare strip MY freedom and privacy for YOUR
perceived safety!

-B
--
----
"They that give up essential liberty to obtain temporary
safety deserve neither liberty nor safety." - Ben Franklin
http://www.users.cloud9.net/~brett/