January 1, 2011 10:10 AM
Resolutions for American Citizens
Resolutions For The American Citizen
We all have some promises to keep.
by John Hayward
12/31/2010Yesterday Jedediah Bila had some great suggestions for New Year's resolutions the 112th Congress should make. I have some ideas for resolutions the American citizen should make.
Above all, we must resolve to remember. Politicians count on past betrayals and failures to vanish behind the blizzard of current events. Remember who voted to inflict horrors like ObamaCare on us, and who stood up for us when it counted. It shouldn't be that hard to do, since the Internet is taking notes for us.
We should resolve to fully respect each other's liberty. This is a fantastically difficult concept, which no generation has mastered since the Founders described it. True respect for freedom does not diminish with circumstance. Both contempt and envy are enemies of liberty. A "right" for one free citizen cannot exist in concert with an obligation against another. We should be resolute in our distrust of those who would presume to measure rights against each other.
Americans should be determined to avoid calling for both fiscal sanity and sustenance from their government. It does little good to call for an end to unsustainable spending if each of us clings to a different little piece of the government we are unwilling to surrender. Understand that everyone who makes demands of the State will end as a beggar. Both cradles and prison cells have bars that need breaking.
We should promise to judge each person as an individual. Nothing is said more loudly by our culture, or practiced more poorly. No one is guilty for the sins of others who share his blood or skin.
We should abandon our attempts to rule failure out of existence - an impossible quest that comes at the expense of success. Failure is an indispensable component of risk. To promise that no one can fail is to forbid everyone from taking risk in the pursuit of reward. You cannot respect someone without respecting their right to take a chance. In the mandated equality of outcome lies the acceptance of the merely adequate, and people will only accept the adequate when they have learned to despise excellence.
We should accept that no vision of modern Utopia is worth burdening future generations with a debt they never have a chance to refuse. A democracy that cannot respect the right of citizens yet unborn to pursue their own search for opportunity is limiting its own lifespan. It dies on the day its citizens are made a promise the future cannot pay for.
Make a commitment to look beyond the borders of your own state and town as you consider your votes in the next election, and remember that what happens in 2011 should be counted as heavily as the final events of summer 2012.
Read more at Human Events
HT: Thoughts from a Conservative Mom
Posted in Conservatism | Permalink
Comments
This is really a good article. Thank you for posting it. I shared a link back to the article at my blog.
I came across your blog sometime last year and subscribed to the RSS Feed but have never taken the time to comment. Just wanted to say hello and wish you a happy new year. I enjoy your blog!
Lynn
Posted by: Lynn | January 1, 2011 10:27 PM
