Wrap Me Up In The Red, White And Blue! or Color Me Patriotic!

First of all, I want to know: what idiot sent the Iraqi Army home with their weapons?

What can you say about a bonehead move like that? How can you not expect that they'd use them? Against YOU?

I cannot understand the workings of these people's minds. I listen to them speak. One guy was outraged at the outrage? Where did he grow up? I was taught that this is the land of the free. I do not recognize the country these republicans are from. It's not mine, that's for sure.

I went to grade school in Maine. Up there we were taught to be proud of our abolishionist history. Of our fight to be independent from Massachusetts. Proud of our heritage and high moral constitution.

There were no muggings in my town. Not like those in New York. We were sitting on our throne, looking south. (means you are not worried about your enemies attacking from the north - a very auspicious position, since you obviously have no enemies.) Anyhow, we were an agrarian state, proud of our taters, berries, apples and maple syrup. We were a seafaring state, with a vibrant economy in seafood and shipbuilding.

I was a proud American back then. I was about 10.

Through my teenage years, I developed a contrary attitude. The word patriotism lost all meaning and I was definitely against the state of affairs in Washington. I have long been active in direct action for environmental, social and economic issues and went through phases of anarchism, socialism and despotism (if I was dictator, things would change a lot, I'll tell you that!).

I even went right for a while. But not really. The laize-faire economic policy squawked out of the republican party during the 80's (Reaganomics!) rang true to me. Lower the barriers to entry into new markets. Lower taxes. Keep government regulation out of the marketplace. What they truly wanted were laws written to protect their share of the market and let them grow into omnipotent multi-national conglomerates.

Today we have NBC Universal. I don't even know what to think about that. I know it means something bad for me. What I'm driving at here is that the laws will never go away (sorry to the anarchists, but get over it - move to Montana and wait for the world to end, like the millenarian) I'm going to live my life, and seek to change the laws I think are wrong. Break down the system by participating and changing it.

When my free market turned out to be an illusion, I looked at other things, like government intrusion into my private life. It seemed to me that the republicans favor sticking their noses everywhere! And they are always wrong!

Two strikes. Banning everything you find threatening and rewriting economic laws to favor your billion dollar business are not conservative moves. They sound kind of like they're meant to shore up the ruling class and stop the masses from doing their thing.

Marx is one strike away from winning. The final strike against the GOP comes from the environment. Is it not obvious? Conserve ye conservative, no? No. Waste resources, liberally.

The funny thing is, I don't really think about these things differently today than I did then, I just come to remarkably different conclusions. The day I realized conservative means ignorant when it comes to the republicans was a sad day. That was when I really began to hate the government and studied up on socialism, anarchy, libertarianism and all those other wing-nut philosophies. Now, I have a much clearer picture.

My nation made it possible. Can it be that I love the United States? I am a born-again Patriot. And, yes, I have been a Pats fan for going on 30 years. And I hate what is happening to our nation. Liars, thieves, evil villains and perhaps even satan himself are in charge. Bush has us headed down the path of top-down control!

Not in MY country! Maybe I'm still not the firmest believer in Democracy, but that just makes my faith stronger that we will wake up and take charge of our government. It is OURS!

I am proud of our Constitution and our Nation and I want it back! I want to be the best country with the best values and the best people. We are now close to the worst, as a whole. The atrocities were supposed to be what we were going to stop. MY Army will not torture anyone. In fact, my Army should be expert in bringing about peace by ending the fighting with as few deaths on either side as possible. This truths we believe to be self-evident: by hook or crook, Bush has got to go. Do not let him steal another election - vote early and often for John Kerry.