Justin Graber Speaks at 2009 Elkhart Tax Day Tea Party
Here’s the YouTube links, and transcript:
Part 1:
Part 2:
Transcript:
“Please forgive me for working from notes here; my experience in public speaking prior to today is, well, zero and apparently teleprompters are in short supply these days.
A while back, presidential candidate John Edwards often spoke about two Americas. I’m beginning to think he may have been right.
It seems to many in Washington, America is to blame for every wrong that has happened around the world. It is a dreadful, dismal place in inevitable decline, full of victims of every affliction known to man; helpless, hapless souls who are locked in poverty because of evil greedy people hoarding ill-gotten gains.
And we’re told bigger, more intrusive government, is the only thing that can save it.
That seems to be their America. But that’s not our America. It’s not the America of We the People.
Our America is what Thomas Sowell called “the greatest, freest and most decent society in existence. It is an oasis of goodness in a desert of cynicism and barbarism.” We say that not to boast, but in a humble, fervent awe of the blessing we’ve been given and a desire that all people can one day receive the bounties of liberty.
In little more than 200 years our America rose to become the lone super power in the world; not because of our government, but because of the limits on our government.
In our America, We the People rule Washington; not the other way around.
In our America, the constitution is a sacred contract that has out lasted all others for good reason. It is not a living document open to the whims of whoever is currently in office. There is a process to change it, but it doesn’t involve a judge with an agenda.
We’ve grown tired of self-serving bureaucrats telling us what we can and can’t drive, where we can and can’t live, and what we can and cannot think. We’re sick of the tax code, endless regulations, and earmarks being used to pick winners and losers and control peoples’ lives. It’s none of Washington’s business where we choose to spend our hard earned dollars!
In our America, we already pay too many taxes. We pay Federal Income Tax, Corporate Income Tax, Capital Gains Tax, State Income Tax, Local Income Tax, Property Tax, Sales Tax, Federal Unemployment Tax, Gasoline Tax, Inheritance Tax, Medicare Tax, Social Security Tax, State Unemployment Tax, Workers’ Compensation Tax and on and on and on and on.
Memo to congress: we’ve had enough.
And speaking of taxes, in our America, tax cheats are prosecuted, not given high level government positions.
In our America, we can add and subtract. We have sense enough to know you can’t possibly balance a trillion dollar deficit on the backs of 5% of Americans. And you certainly can’t borrow and spend your way out of problem caused in part by too much borrowing and spending.
In our America, sometimes budgets and jobs have to be cut. We’d prefer those cuts be in the bloated, inefficient government bureaucracies, and many in the halls of congress.
In our America, a government sponsored crisis is not an opportunity for a big government power grab. We expect officials to admit their mistakes and fix the bad policy that contributed to this mess; then deregulate, quit spending, get out of the way, and let us go to work.
In our America, socialism is no virtue and freedom is no vice.
We don’t care about Washington’s good intentions, we care about results. Government doesn’t create jobs; it steals them from the private sector. Every dollar that flows through Washington is less freedom for We the People. The dollars they spend must be ripped from the hands of the people who earned it and more accurately, from those yet to be born.
In our America, we love people and want the best for them.
We believe every person has unlimited potential and promise. We believe that all are created equal. But, no government can guarantee equality of outcome. For to do so, they must enslave fellow citizens. We didn’t fight so long and so hard for so many years to rid ourselves of slavery only to return to it. This is not a plantation and we will not submit to government masters.
In our America, achievement isn’t something to be punished and poverty isn’t something to be encouraged. We don’t demonize profitable business. We don’t hate the rich. Most earned it by hard honest work and innovation; providing valuable goods and services that have improved all our lives. We’d like to keep that motivation in place for those who right now are perfecting the next technological revolution.
In our America, whether you do it yourself or by proxy via elected officials, stealing is wrong. It’s wrong to take hard earned dollars from a person to whom it belongs in order to give it to someone to whom it does not belong. The moment people get the idea it does no good to work because somebody else is going to take what they work for, that my dear friend is the end of an economy.
Our America is overwhelmingly made up of hardworking responsible citizens who live within their means and save for the rainy days that always come. We don’t believe in paying the mortgages of those who were reckless and spent beyond their means. Doing so only encourages bad behavior. There’s nothing wrong with renting, and learning a valuable lesson in the process.
That being said, we know in Elkhart County better than anywhere, that good people do sometimes fall on hard times. In our America, our citizens are the most charitable people on earth and will bend over backwards to help a neighbor in need. We prefer to do so by freely choosing from among the thousands of effective private organizations and skip the bloated bureaucracy.
After all, government coercion robs the giver of a cheerful heart, and the receiver of thankful humbleness.
In our America we believe in common sense. We believe, as the Rev. William [Boat-ticker] did that:
You cannot bring about prosperity by discouraging thrift.
You cannot strengthen the weak by weakening the strong
You cannot help the poor man by destroying the rich.
You cannot further the brotherhood of man by inciting class hatred.
You cannot build character and courage by taking away man’s initiative and independence.
You cannot help small men by tearing down big men.
You cannot lift the wage earner by pulling down the wage payer.
You cannot keep out of trouble by spending more than your income.
You cannot establish security on borrowed money.
In our America, we’re no where close to giving up or giving in. But let there be no doubt, we believe in these words: “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.”
I often wonder what it must have been like for those living in the crutial points in American history – the struggle for independence from the British Crown, the fight to end slavery, the beginnings of the industrial revolution, the Great Depression, the war to end all wars. Did those individuals truly understand the momentous times they were living in?
I cannot shake the feeling that we are once again facing one of those pivotal moments. You obviously feel the same or you wouldn’t be here. For freedom loving patriots, it’s been hard to remain optimistic as of late. A recent Rasmussen poll suggests only 53% of Americans believe capitalism is better than socialism. For adults under 30, those numbers look even more bleak. Roughly one-third prefer capitalism, one-third socialism, and the last third are undecided or ambivalent.
Sounds pretty bad doesn’t it?
And yet ironically, a historian friend of mine recently passed along this tidbit about the political state of our country during the revolution. “As late as the spring and early summer of 1776, long after protests had given way to warfare, roughly one third of those living in the American colonies were for independence, one third remained loyal to the Crown, and the other third were sitting on the fence….waiting to be inspired one way or another.”
Sounds familiar doesn’t it?
We often have an idealized notion of those great moments in history - that the country was wholely united in this cause or that one. But in terms of political will, we face nothing today that our founders didn’t face all those years ago. Samuel Adams put it best, “It does not take a majority to prevail … but rather an irate, tireless minority, keen on setting brushfires of freedom in the minds of men.”
Look around you. You are that tireless minority. You are here at this time and this place for a reason, a purpose.
As for that other America; we welcome with open arms the people that leave that dreadful, dismal place so many in Washington see, and join us in ours. Our America survived the disasterous policies of FDR, Johnson and Carter; and by the grace of God we’ll make it through this. It will be “morning again” in America someday. America will be once again be that shining city on the hill, a beacon of light and freedom in a world of oppressive darkness.
In closing, when you go home this evening, and in the coming weeks, months and years, I ask four things of you:
One; when freedom is under assault, when government is expanding and liberty is contracting, do something about. Make a phone call. Write a letter. Form a protest. Be that vocal minority of the silent majority.
Two; educate yourself, your children and those around you. If the vast majority of Americans knew more about the America’s founding principles than American Idol, we wouldn’t be in this mess.
Three; get involved with a grass roots organizations like the Michiana 9/12 Project; groups whose central purpose is to protect and defend liberty, the Constitution and the limited government on which our freedom depends.
Four; pray for your country. Pray that we are not the generation to let this precious gift of limited government and unlimited potential slip through our fingers.
Thank you. May God bless you. And let freedom ring!
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