The Stresses of Recurring Letdowns From Being an Individualist Amongst the Mainstream Masses

After reading what I just wrote below, this is sort of a disjointed non-cohesive writing.  I appreciate your indulgence should you choose to proceed. Thanks in advance – Robert 🙂

Super Tuesday has come and gone.  This is one of the busier days of the primary season leading up to the November 2012 general and presidential election.  This is the second consecutive presidential election campaign cycle that I have supported Ron Paul.

In between these two election cycles, I spent some of my free time attempting to be efficiently politically active in relating to my opposition to various congressional activities that are eroding freedom in the U.S.A.

Most people reading these words would agree that beyond the 2010 Republican house cleaning, not much seems to have changed in the “Big Brother and Big Government” landscape.  I am so very much looking forward to the Supreme Court of the U.S.A  giving Obamacare its day in court.  That noted, I know I am also setting myself up for a let down, because I find it almost a no-brainer that the Patient Protection – Affordable Health Care act is a Constitutional abomination.  If I see it as clearly being a no-no from a constitutional perspective, then I believe the liberal appointees to the Court will rule it as permissible.  Hence the let down.

A problem with the judiciary process as it stands today seems to be the issue of bad case law being allowed to remain in effect.  Previous judicial opinions set precedent upon which future decisions are handed down from other courts.  I could never quite wrap my mind around the issue of what if decisions that are delivered are wrong – even if the final decision is upheld on appeal?   That then leaves future courts to lean on these erroneous decisions, until at some point further into the future, all court cases have their decisions based on faulty application of the law.  What I am describing is a domino effect built on case law that gets further and further away from proper application of constitutional interpretation.   This seems to have been happening for the last 70 years.

Let me be clear that I know I am not a lawyer and will gladly cede superiority in this regard to the constitutional scholars.  But I am confident that the interpretation of the law will continue to be misconstrued and applied the more errant decisions are allowed to stand and serve as bulwark for future decisions.  That is why the Supreme Court nominating process is so important to conservatives.  We need a qualified judiciary to protect our constitutional rights from being trampled through erroneous legislative and regulatory outcomes.

Coming back from the sidetrack musing, it appears that my candidate Ron Paul is not doing well in the popular vote process that will lead to the GOP nomination for the 2012 presidential nomination.  That noted, the key is to seat delegates, and the mainstream media is not even reporting much on the dedicated base that Ron Paul has working at the grass roots level to secure delegates at the various local, district, and national GOP  conventions.  With providential intervention, perhaps we can get some influence in the process.  I was left feeling defeated after the 2008 campaign.

So while we wait to see how this campaign process plays out, I will get a “fix” on repairing the damage from Obamacare by tracking the Supreme Court hearing and sending out Tweets, emails, and posting my thoughts here on this blog.

Lately though, all of my energy and action put towards this effort of trying to remain free has exacted somewhat of a toll on me.  I know I can’t be alone in this regard.  There are hundreds of thousands of people who are supporting Ron Paul and the cause for saving Liberty.  If you find yourself feeling alone and frustrated and stressed out at the recurring letdowns that your efforts to push back big government are not yielding the results that you would like to see, then it might be time to try something different.

I decided to take a few weeks off from it.  I wanted to clear my head and spirit.  So I read a fiction book and tried to distance myself as much as I could from the politics and news.  Coming back from that, I am thinking I want to try a different tact and just share my thoughts with others. In support of that, I am also trying to introduce more people to an two organizations that can help by carrying the load, allowing me to be reminded that I am not alone.  These organizations are The Campaign For Liberty and Downsize DC.

I am glad that I am blessed to have the mind and personality to not fall in lockstep with the masses and that I can think and act on my own accord. But sometimes that can stress the heck out of you and derail you from wanting to continue.  A good way to recover from the stresses of this worldview is to connect with like minded individuals who share your viewpoints.  We are not alone.  The passions that fan the flames of freedom lie within all of us and we are all inextinguishable.  Stay strong and stay passionate.

Sovereign Citizens, the Watchful Eye of the FBI, and the Founding Fathers

Recent news accounts like this of the FBI’s announcement that it has concerns with people who claim themselves to be Sovereign Citizens evokes thoughts of our country’s founding.  The patriots who were associated with country’s founding fathers had to consider the threat of apprehension by the authorities when they were contemplating whether or not to break free from the rule of King George and Great Britain.  It is no small thing to break free from an established government.  That is why the American Revolution was so historic in the annals of human history.

Sovereign Citizens have taken a different interpretation of current prevailing viewpoints of what it means to be an American and living in the United States. In essence, they seem to want to separate themselves from the current laws of the land and live by a different set of rules from the mainstream citizens.  They appear to describe the current laws as illegitimate when pitted against the rights American are described as having as written in the Constitution.  In the video that runs on their website, the woman makes a reference to the USA as a corporation to which the Sovereign Citizens do not want to participate.  I have come across other references about this Corporation over the years and have been interested in learning more about it but then abandoning the issue altogether due to time constraints and thoughts about what does it really matter any way?  Maybe the Sovereign Citizens just had more time and interest in seeing what it is all about.  I am not sure.

Today in the year 2012, the vast majority of citizens are law abiding taxpayers of which many have serious concerns and objections about how our elected / appointed representatives are managing our national, state, and local governments.  It would be members of this segment of American society who organized the Tea Party and /or might be active in the Libertarian political party.  Many people who follow the current rules of the  electoral and political system have expended a good many years of their lives and personal resources to try and get more Constitutionally compliant leaders into government at all levels.

Anybody who has followed American political events over the past 70 years knows that the Republicans and Democrats backed by highly financed special interest groups have claimed wins in most if not all major political campaigns for public office.  It would be very frustrating for any normal person to begin to think that there has to be a better way to push back the problem of the wrong people being elected to run the government because they have what appears to be an inappropriate ability to wield greater influence than a majority of most individual citizens in the election.

Maybe that is what led to this group that calls themselves Sovereign Citizens.  When I think of them and why they do what they do, there is a part of me that can sort of relate and understand and maybe even agree with the rationale as to why they would want to “not play by the rules” of the prevailing form of government.

Let me be clear, I do not condone violence and aggression against other people including the lawful authorities.  That noted, for purposes of trying to understand their behavior and actions so as to learn and maybe improve the situation that is causing the FBI to escalate their surveillance of this group, perhaps Sovereign Citizens simply have more courage to push back and defend themselves from the government in a fashion that based on their political beliefs, can lead to what looks like violence and aggression against the State.

Obviously there is a stigma that mainstream society attaches to people who are members of such fringe groups.  But I get a sense that the fringe is growing.  Maybe the Sovereign Citizens are just an early version, a way-out in-front organized group ahead of the game.  Sooner or later it seems inevitable that more and more supposedly Free People who have become frustrated with their government run amok would form in this coalesced fashion if unable to realize the changes they see as being needed to save their way of life because of a corrupted and unconstitutional electoral and political system and government.

What I wrote above does not seem to differ much with what Thomas Jefferson and the Founders had to wrestle with when they decided to break free from Great Britain.  On the outset of the Revolutionary War, they wrote and affirmed with sacred honor the Declaration of Independence.  The words below from that historic document tied to our country’s founding seem to mimic in some part at least, to what might be compelling the Sovereign Citizens to opt out of the current rule of law.

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.

Framed in this light, are the Sovereign Citizens really that bad or just that misunderstood by the current authorities?