by James Glaser
July 10, 2002

We always hear about freedom. The terrorists hate our freedom and soldiers died to protect our freedom, but just what is freedom? Americans have had freedom for so long, we were born with freedom and kind of take it for granted. Sure we are all free, but is that such a big thing?

I went to the store today and only brought some money. I had no wallet, nor drivers license, no ID of any kind. I could do that because America is a place of freedom and I know that no one will be asking me for my "papers." In fact it had been over five years since I have had to produce some identification and that was because of a speeding ticket which was not my fault. The radio station was playing "Radar Love" and I told this to the police officer, but he couldn't see it. There are just some songs that make you drive faster and that is one of them.

There are people today in America that are really trying to get us a national identification card. There are even those crazies that want to put a computer chip under your skin. Many countries have "papers" that people have to have with them all the time. Traveling in a foreign land teaches you to keep your passport safe and where you can find it.

Here in the United States we have always believed that a person is innocent until the state proves that they are guilty. With ID Cards a person will have to prove, by showing the card, that they are innocent. That they are who they say they are and have a right to be there, even if "there" is on their front lawn. Sure the police could take you home to find your card and you could then explain to your neighbors what was going on. Just maybe though, the police would take you "down town" and you would have to call some one to find your card. Don't forget about the FEE for the card and I am sure that there would be a expiration date so you would have to get a new card every so often, with a new fee.

What do you think happens if you dye your hair. That is a freedom we have here and so is plastic surgery. What happens if you no longer look like that person on the ID? You just know that you will need that card to vote, shop, open a bank account, and just about every thing you can think of. So that going to the store with only a few bucks in your pocket turns out to be a really important freedom.

You know what? I have this web page that you are reading and I am pretty much free to voice my opinion about anything I want. Heck, I have written and truly believe that George Bush and Donald Rumsfled are premeditated murderers because they have been responsible for killing so many little infants, women, and children in Afghanistan. They knew going in that these people would get killed because that has happened in every war. They feel that it is a cost of war and that our right to attack terrorists ranks higher that those little kid's, right to life. I am free to say that.

If I knew some military secrets, I would not have the right to print them. It is however my right to tell the world that we know that about 20% of all cluster bombs do not explode and they will go off if you play with them or maybe even pick one up. I can also tell the world that the food packets that we drop for the starving people in Afghanistan are about the same size and the same color as cluster bombs and we still drop these bombs, knowing that hungry little kids will pick them up. Little kids are killed and maimed by these bombs and we know that we are doing this to them. That is sick and I have the freedom in this country to say that.

In America I am able to vote for Jesse Ventura for Governor of Minnesota. There are a lot of political parties in our country and I can vote for any I want. I am even free to run for President of the United States, but common sense does come into play. It is true that two parties sort of have a lock on politics in America, but even within those two we can go all the way from right to left in thinking. Also the people still have the freedom to rise up and vote a new group in.

I have the right to own a gun or a rifle. I could apply for a concealed weapons permit to carry a pistol, but I don't need that. I think a weapon right out in the open is better. I have to tell you that I find it strange that Republicans will trust me to own a gun and Democrats want to take them away because they don't trust me. I used to think Democrats were all about liberty. Now I think that they are about nothing. The President could say that he was going to kill every third adult male in America to curb terrorism and the Democratic Congress would vote for it.

If I want to get out a prayer mat five times a day and pray, OK. If I want to roll around on the floor and speak in tongues, OK. If I don't want to do any thing as far as prayer goes, OK. There is no state religion in America and that is freedom.

In America I am free to drink until I wet my pants and lay in my own filth out on the street and can do this for years. I am not free though to smoke a joint at a military reunion. Go figure.

There are lots of things that are not free like driving, fishing, and hunting, trapping, and working for cash. These were all freedoms that our founders had. The increase in population, the fact that resources are finite, and just for safety sake, some of the things our ancestors took for granted are no longer free for us to do. Also, government has found a real source for revenue with license fees.

Government can't give us freedom as we had that before there was a government. Most people in America believe that our freedom is God given. Government can only curb freedom and only the citizens can guard and protect that freedom.

Today in this country the federal government believes that to protect us from harm, the government will have to take more of our freedoms away. Many in Washington believe that people that speak out and write about what they believe is right, some how hurts our country. Others in Washington believe that every American must be able to prove who they are and what right they have to be at a particular place twenty four hours a day. Thus the ID Card faction. There are many in our government that believe that each and every one of us must be watched all the time. There are now cameras every where you look in cities, the FBI can now read you E-mail, sit next to you in a public meeting, and again start those lists of Americans that maybe are not guilty, but look suspicious.

Washington has started a movement to make Americans distrustful of there fellow citizens. Constant warnings of terror attacks, the President urging Americans to be vigilant, and the move to get Americans to report what they think is suspicious. We are getting to the point, soon Americans will be told to turn in one faction or another. Kind of like turning in Jews, in Germany during the war.

All of this sounds so ominous and scary that many say that these things are not true and even if they want to take some rights and freedoms from us, it is only temporary. Kind of like that phone tax they put on in the Vietnam war, temporary. We only have so much freedom and less than our fathers and they had less than theirs. Every time we give something up to the government it closes that circle around us a little bit. Hitler went real slow to start, just as George is doing now. A few alarmists never hurt anyone. I am not calling "Fire" in a theater, but I am saying that I smell smoke.