Chapter 2 Freedom

Freedom

We have said that axiom # 1 is that man is free. What does freedom mean?
Freedom is rights and responsibilities. When I was in middle school, we had to
take a course called �civics�. We were taught basic things about the various
forms of government, our U.S. constitution, and our rights and responsibilities
as citizens. You see, you can�t have rights without responsibilities. They go
together. They are mutually inclusive. Hmm, never heard that phrase, but I like
it. I have been told the public schools don�t teach civics anymore and I believe
it. It seems that all anyone remembers is that they have rights. They don�t know
what rights are, but they are pretty sure they have them. It is obvious they
don�t know what rights are because they say things like they have a right to a
job, or better yet, a good job; they have a right to health care, at my expense
no less. Of course it has to be at someone�s expense. These things aren�t free
no matter how much politicians lie about free health care or free anything for
that matter. Considering or even talking intelligently about these things has
been made more difficult because of the breakdown of language. These things are
no more rights, as defined, as there could be a war on drugs, poverty, or terror
for example. It just isn�t possible.

Firstly, let�s talk about the rights part. With freedom, you have the
right to do whatever you want, as long as you don�t infringe on another�s right
to do whatever he wants. For freedom to exist, one must be willing to allow
others whatever one claims for oneself. That, I think, is a tall order for some
busybodies. Think about that. You must be willing to permit others to do whatever
they want as long as they don�t infringe on your right to do whatever you want.
I can hear the silly arguments already. For instance, I want to live in a town
where everyone must do as I say. That isn�t possible because you infringe on
everyone else doing whatever they want. See how that doesn�t work?
This is an important principle to understand because there are only two choices;
Free or not free. Remember our first axiom. Ask yourself if we are as free as our
parents were, or our grandparents, or our founders. We are not, and we are
becoming a little less free every day. That is how it is done. They take a
little at a time. They are able to do this because people aren�t taught or don�t
care about principles. For example, people don�t protest government making
smoking in restaurants against the law. They probably don�t get all worked up
because they may not think it is their fight or they may even be glad of the
law because they don�t want people to smoke there while they are eating. But
it is their fight because the government is trampling a citizen�s right to use
his property in the way he thinks is best. The restaurant owner is the one with
the rights here, not the guy who wants to eat there (smoker or non-smoker). The
problem with these ways of thinking is that it takes all of us to stand up to
the government. This is how they got away with the no-smoking laws. Understand
that I am not talking about smoking here, but about property rights. The
government and the media get people to talking about smoking or not smoking,
when the issue is property rights. If you don�t stand up with the restaurateur,
then don�t complain when they outlaw something that violates your rights. And
that is how we all lose a little of our freedom. A little here, and a little
there and the beauracracy grows and grows until we have to ask permission from
the government to do things that do not harm anyone else.

Secondly, let�s talk about responsibilities. With freedom, you have the
responsibility for yourself and your actions. You are not responsible for me and
I am not responsible for you. Since I may not make a claim against you or your
property, unless you have agreed to be indebted to me of course, you may not
make a claim against me or my property. By extensioin, you can't hire someone
to claim my property in your stead. That is just theft by proxie, and it's still
theft and it's still illegal and immoral.

No one is born into debt in this country and no one becomes indebted
because he chooses to work. I don�t know about others and will not speak for them,
but I have lost what charitable feelings I had. I attribute, or blame this on my
fellow citizens getting the government to steal close to 1/3 of my production.
My thoughts are about trying to keep what they allow me to keep, and knowing that
there are so many programs out there giving my money away reinforces those
thoughts.
The only thing I have left that I want to give away now is my blood. It can only
be a matter of time before they want to start seizing that too!