Two Visions of America – My Tea Party Speeches in Santa Ana and Yorba Linda, CA

The great Roman philosopher and statesman Marcus Tullius Cicero said that “freedom is participation in power.” What I want to ask you today is if the current administration has allowed you to freely participate in this republic over the past fifteen months? Or has the will of the people been shut out?

On August 4, 1961, a child was born, presumably, in the state of Hawaii, in the midst of the civil rights era. That child, named Barack Hussein Obama, is now the President of the United States, which was unthinkable during those times. But just two days prior to the birth of Barack Obama, on August 2, another child was born to a lower middle-class family in Richmond, VA, which was once the capital of the Confederacy. That child is now a man standing before you as a deeply concerned citizen regarding the events of the past fifteen months. While thousands of miles apart, both Obama and I grew up during the turbulent years of the 60s and the 70s with the expectancy that the dream of Dr. Martin Luther King would be realized in our lifetime, where one day we would be judged not on the color of our skin, but by the content of our character. Though this dream has been largely realized, somehow things took an awful turn for this child from Hawaii through poorly chosen associations over the years (and yes, I’m talking Bill Ayers, Rev. Jeremiah Wright, and Father Michael Pfleger). Due to influences such as these, Obama now has the distinct ambition and wherewithal to fundamentally change America as we know it based on a flawed and poisonous worldview that is anti-capitalist and socialistic at its core. His vision of America is distinctly different from my vision of America, and my fear is that if his agenda is not stopped, the America we now know and love will cease to exist as we know it within our lifetime.

Our country was founded on the self-evident truths that all men (and women) are created equal, and are endowed by their creator with unalienable rights to life, liberty, and pursuit of happiness, as codified in the Declaration of Independence. As such, the framers enshrined in our Constitution limited, enumerated powers to be given to the federal government in order to prevent a soft tyranny, with all other powers given to the states. Yet Barack Obama, supposedly a constitutional scholar, has bought into the false and damaging “progressive” idea that the federal government knows what’s best for its citizens, and believes that the very Constitution he swore to uphold and protect is an outmoded document that wrongly constrains the scope and reach of the federal government. Are we going to put up with that? I think not! Ironically, that very document, which through the wisdom of our Founding Fathers was written to guarantee the rights deferred so long to people of color like me and Obama, is now being shredded under foot by this Harvard trained lawyer and a radically left-wing Congressional majority.

Obama’s vision of America is one in which we are trading one form of past oppression for another through intentional class and race warfare. The Democratic party realized that since it could no longer oppress minorities through Jim Crow laws, thanks to the civil rights gains championed by the Republican Party, it could come up with a strategy to use those same minorities to accomplish the even greater goal of creating a society of entitlement and dependence through greater government control of every aspect of human life. This means redistribution of wealth from the productive of society to the unproductive in exchange for cheap and loyal votes. The current strategy is that if the policies of their progressive agenda are opposed, those in opposition will be branded as racist, bigoted or violent with no supporting evidence. And the liberal media is all too willing to participate in this morally bankrupt strategy because when core principles are lacking, the means always justifies the stated end no matter how nefarious the means and how “noble” the end. Nonetheless, I’m here to ask that you not let these tactics deter your efforts to speak up for our country, as we are in a fight for the very heart and soul of this nation. Obama may have been carried into the White House on a wave of sentiment partly based on the color of his skin, but I can say assuredly that the current opposition is about the content of his character, or, shall I say, lack thereof. This is a big government president who has been weighed, measured, and found wanting!

I have attended many tea parties over the past year. Never have I felt more welcomed and made so many new acquaintances with like-minded people who so love their country and have such a deep desire to protect her at all costs. Each one of you are here because you’re fed up with the unbridled growth of a federal government that doesn’t listen to the will of the people, and speaks derisively and degradingly of its own citizens in the Tea Party movement as a clan of radical right-wing racists, which couldn’t be further from the truth. I know from my many interactions that you, indeed we, are hardworking citizens who simply want our borders protected, a secure nation, limited government, and the dynamic economy we have always enjoyed that creates private sector jobs. Instead, we have “stimulus” from a government that is taxing and spending this country into bankruptcy, shouldering our children and their children yet to be born with crushing debt financed by foreign countries. So don’t let anyone call you a racist or a bigot, because the only reason they are doing so is because they are desperate, unprincipled people and we are not going to be quiet now or any time soon until we get our country back! The very people making these charges are from the party of slavery and obstruction that resisted the civil rights movement that allowed Obama to ultimately become president of the United States! And now he aligns himself with these kinds of people. What irony!

It appears Obama’s vision of America is that of a weak and unexceptional social democracy patterned after European countries which saps personal initiative and responsibility in exchange for acquiescence to the state. I don’t share this vision, and will fight to the death to protect this great constitutional republic that we call the United States of America, and advocate that we continue to promote peace through strength. We do not need federal bureaucrats doing for us what we should do for ourselves, or interfering with the free markets that have brought us prosperity that is the envy of the world, and we do not want 51% of the country voting a largesse for itself at the expense of the other 49% as the Democrats would like so they can rule permanently as an elite class of bureaucrats controlling even the most personal of decisions. And yes, I do believe in repeal and replace of that monstrous and fraudulent healthcare bill!

I received an email this week titled “Which side of the fence” that I think expresses key differences between liberal and conservative thought. While this is amusing, it unfortunately reflects the current divide. So if you have ever wondered which side of the fence you sit on, this is a great test:

• If a conservative doesn’t like guns, he doesn’t buy one.
• If a liberal doesn’t like guns, he wants all guns outlawed.
• If a conservative is a vegetarian, he just doesn’t eat meat.
• If a liberal is a vegetarian, he wants all meat products banned for everyone.
• If a conservative is down-and-out, he thinks about how to better his situation.
• If a liberal is down-and-out, he wonders who is going to take care of him.
• If a conservative doesn’t like a talk show host, he switches channels.
• If a liberal doesn’t like a talk show host, he demands that those they don’t like be shut down, while all the while crying about “diversity,” but only for those who they agree with.
• If a conservative is a non-believer, he doesn’t go to church, whereas a liberal non-believer wants any mention of God and religion silenced, unless it’s a foreign religion, of course!
• If a conservative decides he needs health care, he goes about shopping for it, or may choose a job that provides it. Yet a liberal demands that the rest of us pay for his.

What is imperative is that in November 2010, we reclaim our country from those doing untold damage to our economy and way of life, those who seek to fundamentally transform America into something that it was never intended to be. Thus, we must vote true conservatives into Congress. And in November 2012, let’s finish the job by voting Obama out, making him a one-term president. I’m certain he can take his brand of change to France or Denmark where he can have a long and bright career as their type of politician, and I say good riddance, because he is not the type of politician that honors and respects the American Constitution since he sees it is an inconvenience to his radical socialist agenda. That’s why we need to get the word out to all of our friends, family, and colleagues who will listen that this November is the beginning of getting back to our roots as our Founding Fathers intended. This is a great Republic, but it’s up to us to keep it. So let me hear a shout from all those who are promising today to keep this republic. May God bless my fellow patriots here today, and may God Bless America!