On the Declaration

The Declaration of Independence is exactly that. A declaration to a candid world that America is independent. Thomas Jefferson and the other draftsmen felt it necessary, prudent, decent and dignified to state the reasons why America was breaking away from the Kingdom of Great Britain:

The first sentence recognizes the severity of dissolving the political union and provides the impetus for the Declaration:

When in the Course of human events it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature's God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation.

Next, it is stated that Governments are formed to protect the rights of man that are vested by virtue of natural law:

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,

When Government stops securing the enumerated rights of man, the governed people have the right, and maybe the duty, to alter, abolish and form new governments:

That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness.

The right of the people to so change governments is a right that should be exercised with caution and only in extreme circumstances:

Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shewn that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security.

The colonies were victims of circumstances that rose to the level that prudence would dictate that Government should be changed:

Such has been the patient sufferance of these Colonies; and such is now the necessity which constrains them to alter their former Systems of Government. The history of the present King of Great Britain is a history of repeated injuries and usurpations, all having in direct object the establishment of an absolute Tyranny over these States. To prove this, let Facts be submitted to a candid world.
He has refused his Assent to Laws, the most wholesome and necessary for the public good.
He has forbidden his Governors to pass Laws of immediate and pressing importance, unless suspended in their operation till his Assent should be obtained; and when so suspended, he has utterly neglected to attend to them.
He has refused to pass other Laws for the accommodation of large districts of people, unless those people would relinquish the right of Representation in the Legislature, a right inestimable to them and formidable to tyrants only.
He has called together legislative bodies at places unusual, uncomfortable, and distant from the depository of their Public Records, for the sole purpose of fatiguing them into compliance with his measures.
He has dissolved Representative Houses repeatedly, for opposing with manly firmness his invasions on the rights of the people.
He has refused for a long time, after such dissolutions, to cause others to be elected, whereby the Legislative Powers, incapable of Annihilation, have returned to the People at large for their exercise; the State remaining in the mean time exposed to all the dangers of invasion from without, and convulsions within.
He has endeavoured to prevent the population of these States; for that purpose obstructing the Laws for Naturalization of Foreigners; refusing to pass others to encourage their migrations hither, and raising the conditions of new Appropriations of Lands.
He has obstructed the Administration of Justice by refusing his Assent to Laws for establishing Judiciary Powers.
He has made Judges dependent on his Will alone for the tenure of their offices, and the amount and payment of their salaries.
He has erected a multitude of New Offices, and sent hither swarms of Officers to harass our people and eat out their substance.
He has kept among us, in times of peace, Standing Armies without the Consent of our legislatures.
He has affected to render the Military independent of and superior to the Civil Power.
He has combined with others to subject us to a jurisdiction foreign to our constitution, and unacknowledged by our laws; giving his Assent to their Acts of pretended Legislation:
For quartering large bodies of armed troops among us:
For protecting them, by a mock Trial from punishment for any Murders which they should commit on the Inhabitants of these States:
For cutting off our Trade with all parts of the world:
For imposing Taxes on us without our Consent:
For depriving us in many cases, of the benefit of Trial by Jury:
For transporting us beyond Seas to be tried for pretended offences:
For abolishing the free System of English Laws in a neighbouring Province, establishing therein an Arbitrary government, and enlarging its Boundaries so as to render it at once an example and fit instrument for introducing the same absolute rule into these Colonies
For taking away our Charters, abolishing our most valuable Laws and altering fundamentally the Forms of our Governments:
For suspending our own Legislatures, and declaring themselves invested with power to legislate for us in all cases whatsoever.
He has abdicated Government here, by declaring us out of his Protection and waging War against us.
He has plundered our seas, ravaged our coasts, burnt our towns, and destroyed the lives of our people.
He is at this time transporting large Armies of foreign Mercenaries to compleat the works of death, desolation, and tyranny, already begun with circumstances of Cruelty & Perfidy scarcely paralleled in the most barbarous ages, and totally unworthy the Head of a civilized nation.
He has constrained our fellow Citizens taken Captive on the high Seas to bear Arms against their Country, to become the executioners of their friends and Brethren, or to fall themselves by their Hands.
He has excited domestic insurrections amongst us, and has endeavoured to bring on the inhabitants of our frontiers, the merciless Indian Savages whose known rule of warfare, is an undistinguished destruction of all ages, sexes and conditions.
In every stage of these Oppressions We have Petitioned for Redress in the most humble terms: Our repeated Petitions have been answered only by repeated injury. A Prince, whose character is thus marked by every act which may define a Tyrant, is unfit to be the ruler of a free people.
Nor have We been wanting in attentions to our British brethren. We have warned them from time to time of attempts by their legislature to extend an unwarrantable jurisdiction over us. We have reminded them of the circumstances of our emigration and settlement here. We have appealed to their native justice and magnanimity, and we have conjured them by the ties of our common kindred to disavow these usurpations, which would inevitably interrupt our connections and correspondence. They too have been deaf to the voice of justice and of consanguinity.

In two sentences, America then declares its Independence:

We must, therefore, acquiesce in the necessity, which denounces our Separation, and hold them, as we hold the rest of mankind, Enemies in War, in Peace Friends.

We, therefore, the Representatives of the united States of America, in General Congress, Assembled, appealing to the Supreme Judge of the world for the rectitude of our intentions, do, in the Name, and by Authority of the good People of these Colonies, solemnly publish and declare, That these united Colonies are, and of Right ought to be Free and Independent States, that they are Absolved from all Allegiance to the British Crown, and that all political connection between them and the State of Great Britain, is and ought to be totally dissolved; and that as Free and Independent States, they have full Power to levy War, conclude Peace, contract Alliances, establish Commerce, and to do all other Acts and Things which Independent States may of right do.

The signers then pledge their loyalty to the cause and to each other.

And for the support of this Declaration, with a firm reliance on the protection of Divine Providence, we mutually pledge to each other our Lives, our Fortunes, and our sacred Honor.

We, the generations unknown to Thomas Jefferson, are the beneficiaries of this document and the courage of all our Founding Fathers.

Happy Birthday, America.

I believe that our Heavenly Father invented man
because he was disappointed in the monkey

Mark Twain

As summer fast approaches, I think about one of the major contributions to the decline, fall and demise of being a good neighbor.

Central Air Conditioning.

How often do we take the time to stop as we make the long journey from the car door to our front door?

How often do we sit on our front porches, on our stoops or in our front yards?

How often do we join the people who occupy the houses on our right and our left and watch the sun go down?

Never.

We don’t.

Not at All.

Because we are too busy running inside to dead bolt our front door behind us as we indulge in air conditioned rooms and reruns of the Desperate Housewives of Bucksnort Tennessee.

As we spend more time poring over the screens of our I phones, Blackberries and I pads, we spend less time talking, shaking hands and just getting to know each other.

The more we connect through technology the farther we grow apart as people.

We are not a Facebook Page, a Tweet or an Avatar.

We are emotional, unpredictable, creative and strong human beings that can’t be digitized, replicated or copied.

For those as you who know me, I’m as guilty as anyone. I live in a sea of emails and instant messages.

But I am trying.

I am trying to reconnect with my neighbors with a conversation and not a text message.

Trying to take the time to ask, “How are you?” and not just send “HAGD”.

More importantly, to listen to the answer and not be able to shut off the smart phone.

Most importantly, to really laugh with another person and not just send “LOL”.

This summer, let’s take some time to turn around on our way to our front door and watch the sunset.

Pretty soon the front porches of your neighbors may also be filled.

Mark Twain also said, “In discarding the monkey and substituting man, our Father in Heaven did the monkey an undeserved injustice”.

Let's prove him wrong.

You can't always get what you want
And if you try sometime you just might find
You get what you need

Who knew that Keith and Mick were writing the quintessential balancing test for government?

If only we would listen.

We can’t always get what we want. We cannot have brand new roads, beautiful parks, free health care, salsa lessons without an increase in governmental revenue. Something has to give.

When a municipality is growing, and vacant land is being converted to ratable property (such as homes, offices or stores) government's revenue increases without raising individual property taxes. When expansion ceases, the supply of revenue slows to a trickle.

At that point, government must cut back on services or find additional sources of revenue. Government’s divining rod points to one reliable, yet politically unpalatable, source of revenue: raising taxes.

Cutting services and raising taxes force us back to the words of Messrs. Jagger and Richards. We must decide what we need, and not just we want. As Thomas Jefferson so eloquently pointed out - servicing the needs of a constituency is the principal reason we have governments. “ That to secure [unalienable rights], governments are instituted among men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed.”

Governments cannot maintain all services (the “wants of the people”) without finding additional revenue to fund the basket of wants.

Instead, we need to identify the needs, efficiently address the needs through municipal cooperation and effective consolidation and then find the revenue to fund the needs of the people.

We need to encourage smart development and go vertical where vertical is not antithetical to the essence of suburbia.

We need to become energy intelligent and not depend on energy sources that are wasteful, redundant and inefficient.

We need to charge the users of services without burdening the populace for the needs of the few.

Lastly, we need to take political risk and stride with bold steps to save government from collapsing in a pile of financial chaos resulting from the pressure of political expediency.

Cherry Red should not be the color of our balance sheets.

It should be the color of Mr. Jimmy’s favorite flavor.

Now in the place where he was crucified there was a garden; and in the garden a new tomb wherein was never man yet laid. There then because of the Jews' Preparation (for the tomb was nigh at hand) they laid Jesus. Now on the first day of the week cometh Mary Magdalene early, while it was yet dark, unto the tomb, and seeth the stone taken away from the tomb.

And so it began.

With these words, the Evangelist John changed the human race and the history of mankind.

No matter the nature of our faith or the name of the god to whom we pray, we are forever affected by the historical life and the message of Easter Sunday, just as we are shaped by the Pentateuch, the Pali Tripitaka, the Qu'ran, the Bhagavad Gita and all writings of the world's religions.

The Easter Sunday message to me is simple: Hope.

The metaphor of the the tomb speaks volumes.

Just as the stone was taken away from the tomb, so too is darkness taken away from what we want to make of the gift of our lives. For life is indeed a precious gift and we have an obligation to make the most of what we are given.

We can choose to lead or follow.

We can choose to inspire change or sit back and complain.

We can choose leave this world better than we found it or we can leave behind a legacy of waste and destruction.

As elected officials, we have the duty to lead, to evoke change and to make better our world, whatever the name of our political party.

Failing that, we have no right to govern for we have then betrayed our call to leadership.

The current environment in our nation's capital and in state and local centers of government across our great country gives me pause.

Are our leaders doing what we have entrusted them to do?

Are we seeing leadership or political theatre?

Are we being led or betrayed?

What we are seeing through the lens of the internet, 24 hour new and the print media is muddled, garbled and layered with misdirection and spin.

One thing, however, is crystal clear.

What we are seeing sure betrays the message of the Man who left the tomb.

Just received this over the internet. Read it and Listen.

No matter what our kids and the new generation think about us,
WE ARE AWESOME !!!!
OUR LIFE IS LIVING PROOF !!!!
To Those of Us Born
1920 - 1979
At the end of this email is a quote of the month by Jay Leno.. If you don't read anything else, please
read what he said.
Very well stated, Mr. Leno.
TO ALL THE KIDS WHO SURVIVED THE 1920's, 1930's, 40's, 50's,60's and 70's!!
First, we survived being born to mothers who smoked and/or drank while they were pregnant.
They took aspirin, ate blue cheese dressing, tuna from a can and didn't get tested for diabetes.
Then after that trauma, we were put to sleep on our tummies in baby cribs covered
with bright colored lead-base paints.
We had no childproof lids on medicine bottles, locks on doors or cabinets and when we rode our bikes,
we had baseball caps
not helmets on our heads.
As infants & children, we would ride in cars with no car seats, no booster seats, no seat belts, no air bags, bald tires and sometimes no brakes.
Riding in the back of a pick- up truck on a warm day was always a special treat.
We drank water from the garden hose and not from a bottle.
We shared one soft drink with four friends, from one bottle and no one actually died from this.
We ate cupcakes, white bread, real butter and bacon. We drank Kool-Aid made with real white sugar. And, we weren't overweight.. WHY?
Because we were always outside playing...that's why!
We would leave home in the morning and play all day, as long as we were back when the streetlights came on..
No one was able to reach us all day. And, we were OKAY.
We would spend hours building our go-carts out of scraps
and then ride them down the hill,
only to find out we forgot the brakes. After running into the bushes a few times, we learned to solve the problem
We did not have Play stations, Nintendo's and X-boxes. There were no video games, no 150 channels on cable, no video movies or DVD's,
no surround-sound or CD's,
no cell phones,
no personal computers,
no Internet and no chat rooms.
WE HAD FRIENDS and we went outside and found them!

We fell out of trees, got cut, broke bones and teeth and there were no lawsuits from these accidents.
We would get spankings with wooden spoons, switches, ping pong paddles, or just a bare hand and no one would call child services to report abuse.

We ate worms and mud pies
made from dirt, and
the worms did not live in us forever.
We were given BB guns for our 10th birthdays, made up games with sticks and tennis balls and, although we were told it would happen, we did not poke out very many eyes.

We rode bikes or walked to a friend's house and knocked on the door or rang the bell, or just walked in and talked to them.

Little League had tryouts and not everyone made the team.
Those who didn't had to learn
to deal with disappointment.
Imagine that!!
The idea of a parent bailing us out if we broke the law was unheard of. They actually sided with the law!
These generations have produced some of the best
risk-takers, problem solvers and inventors ever.
The past 50 years have been an explosion of innovation and new ideas.
We had freedom, failure, success and responsibility, and we learned how to deal with it all.
If YOU are one of them, CONGRATULATIONS!
You might want to share this with others who have had the luck to grow up as kids, before the lawyers and the government regulated so much of our lives for our own good.
While you are at it, forward it to your kids so they will know how brave and lucky their parents were.
Kind of makes you want to run through the house with scissors, doesn't it ?
~ The quote of the month is by
Jay Leno:
'With hurricanes, tornados, fires out of control, mud slides, flooding, severe thunderstorms tearing up the country from one end to another, and with the threat of bird flu and terrorist attacks, are we sure this is a good time to take God out of the Pledge of Allegiance?