From the June 2004 Idaho Observer:

Last Call for Liberty

by Patrick Henry and Hari Heath

No one thinks more highly than I do of the patriotism, as well as abilities, of the very worthy people who have been challenging the tyranny in our nation. But different people often see the same subject in different lights and, therefore, I hope it will not be thought disrespectful to them if I entertain opinions of a character differing to theirs. I shall speak forth my sentiments freely and without reserve.

This is no time for ceremony. The question before us is one of awful moment to this country. For my own part, I consider it as nothing less than a question of freedom or slavery; and in proportion to the magnitude of the subject ought to be the freedom of the debate. It is only in this way that we can hope to arrive at truth, and fulfill the great responsibility which we hold to God and our country.

Should I keep back my opinions at such a time, through fear of giving offense, I should consider myself as guilty of treason towards my country, and of an act of disloyalty toward the Majesty of Heaven, which I revere above all earthly things.

Dear Americans, it is natural for us to indulge in the illusions of hope. We are apt to shut our eyes against a painful truth, for denial is an easier course than facing the challenge before us. And worse; we are inclined to believe in the false religion of government; to give our faith and allegiance to those who lie and deceive us.

Will we accept the challenge and endure the costs for those who engage in the great and arduous struggle for liberty? Or are we disposed to be those who, having eyes, see not, and, having ears, hear not, the things which so greatly concern our present condition? For my part, whatever anguish of spirit it may cost, I am willing to know the whole truth; to know the worst, and to provide for it.

I have but one lamp by which my feet are guided, and that is the lamp of experience. I know of no way of judging the future but by the past. And judging by the past, I wish to know what there has been in the conduct of the general government for the last ten years and more, to justify any hopes which our people have for remedy and redress. Is it that insidious smile on the face of our corrupted judges, when we seek to have our Constitution and rights restored to us? Will it come from the hordes of agencies who pretend to act as executors of the people's will, and whom grant us their services, whether we asked for them or not, for the price of evermore taxes? Can we petition Congress for relief only to find their accountability ends on the ledger sheets of their campaign contributions?

Trust it not; it will prove a snare to your feet. Suffer not yourselves to be betrayed with a kiss. Your efforts will be wasted if you seek, by humble petition and civil protest, to rectify the wrongs inflicted upon you and your nation. The prostitutes in Congress, the executive, and the judiciary serve another master. They have no interest in your affairs and cherished values, save what their lust for power can seize for their own enrichment. Your peaceful protests and petitions will continue to be shunned.

Ask yourselves how government's pretension at providing for your security comports with those warlike preparations which cover our waters and darken our land and sky.

The War on Terrorism; on drugs; on crime; the war on anything government can find or create as an enemy is, in reality, a war on the Constitution and the Bill of Rights itself; a War on you!

Our rights have been methodically stripped by a host of Executive Orders and congressional edicts for decades. And now we have the so-called PATRIOT Act and its pending successor legislation to usher in the final wave of the federal fascist police state, so that everything in the fabric of our lives can be confiscated or controlled.

And this fascist shadow government does not stop at our borders. It is operated by the military industrial complex which has expanded its theater of operations. Consent of the governed is no longer necessary. Their media will inform us of what we will consent to, while stifling dissent and suppressing truth by overt omission and false news.

For decades, clandestine operations, acting under the guise of national security, have fueled both sides of little wars all over the world, with profits generated from the sale of drugs to our children. Simultaneously, our military has abandoned its national post to meddle in the affairs of other nations, leaving in its wake an image of America as the enemy of the world.

The War on Terrorism and manufactured enemies like al-CIA-da has shifted gears from the low crawl of clandestine operations to overdrive with an afterburner. The “Shock and Awe” of the opening salvo in Iraq has progressed to an occupation that leaves us shocked and awed by a gallery of torture and murder.

Have the Iraqi people been liberated yet? Is the “evil” dictator Saddam Hussein, whom the U. S. helped rise to power, any worse than the horrors of Halliburton and the military it now commands?

While the horrendous conduct of the U. S. corporate state abroad defiles our national standing in the world, what have we here at home?

Agents of government commit numerous felonies, including treason, and remain in office operating a government that has devolved into a monster, hell-bent on reducing our former sovereign selves to slave status -- all while people naively await federal justice, to be dispensed from federal determinations, after federal investigations, of federal government transgressions.

State governments, once an autonomous power, now cower under a dictatorial federal control.

And the federal government has made no secret of its elaborate and despotic plans to subvert our individual liberties with a national emergency. This federal regime has repeatedly shown no moral restraint as it bombs buildings for political expediency; burns men, women and children after gassing them for no apparent misconduct of their own; sends sniper teams to assassinate freedom loving Americans after surrounding them and precluding their escape -- because it can -- with impunity!

The progressive scale of terrorist acts, from Ruby Ridge, to Waco, to the Oklahoma City Bombing is natural for an amoral regime with an insatiable lust for power. Should we be surprised when it orchestrates a grand scheme like the events of September 11 to fulfill its agenda? And as the scale of the terrorizing act increases, so must its cover-up.

It is folly to believe that 19 Arabs boarded four airliners, without any record of their boarding; that they took over the flights with one-inch knives; that such unskilled pilots could maneuver along flight paths creating G-forces that would cause most humans to pass out; That the “brave heroes” of Flight 93 wrestled control and crashed their plane into the ground to save others, yet left an engine over a mile from the crash site; that NORAD stood down and allowed the most protected airspace in the world to go unprotected for over an hour; that an airliner hit the Pentagon, yet did not leave a hole the size of an airliner, nor any airliner debris; that mere fire, already diminishing, caused the near perfect implosion of each of the two towers; that the 47-story WTC building 7 was “pulled” in a controlled demolition several hours after the “attack” and while it was still on fire, without the use of preset charges; and that while all of this was occurring, the president continued to read a goat story, to school children, fifteen minutes after he was informed of the crisis.

Yet the media recites the tale over and over until the fable becomes legend; myth becomes fact.

But the “attack” on our nation is not always so overt. The government has created trade agreements with foreign nations which are destroying our national economy and our independent sovereign existence. Our borders are left open allowing illegal immigrants to compete in the workplace, while its corporate partners “outsource” our opportunities. And foolishly, we acquire our abundance with the purchase of foreign goods produced for multinational corporations at near slave wages.

Multiply this with a fractional reserve (i.e., no real reserves) banking system that perpetuates a debt-based economy, and we have an equation for exponential fraud. With a monetary unit that is literally loaned into existence, the federal power can literally spend as much as it can borrow and borrow as much as it can spend. This unchecked power of federal spending; the power to fund any program or operation, is a recipe for unmitigated disaster. And it is looming.

Globally and domestically we have been subjugated by a baseless financial force; conquest by commerce.

And by what path do we hope to reverse the course of such conquest and repair our liberty? Is there a course we can follow to remedy our condition?

The outcome of elections has long been a managed affair. Controlled media, the spin of political machinery and campaign finance inequities have delivered our people's government to a ruling elite; a new oligarchy. But our digital age brings with it a previously unimaginable ballot fraud. The devious methods of ballot box stuffing, miscounts, redistricting and voter list manipulation are now unnecessary with black box vote counting machines. Diebold and other defense industry owned companies now manage our elective process with touch screen paperless voting machines and electronic ballot counting machines which can alter election results by changing a chip or computer code. And who controls the code? The military industrial complex can now ensure their dominance of our nation through a digital back door.

Once elected, does your congressman represent you? As digital vote fraud progresses to become the norm, they will know to whom they must answer to get re-elected. Those who control the count at election will have their ear, not you.

Does this not explain the tendency of Congress to pass evermore draconian laws, in defiance of constitutional limitations, so as to appease those in the real seat of power? Can we expect Congress to put our cherished values ahead of corporate government's bald rush to power? Do campaign promises ever come true? Trust it not. There will be no remedies from Congress.

And will the executive branch ever be anything but the mouthpiece for the treason which now governs America; the perpe-traitors of our national demise? Can we count on a president to restore the Constitution to its full force and effect? Will the agencies under his wing ever reduce their regulatory powers to those lawfully authorized? Our many petitions have fallen on deaf ears, and worse; those who have dared to petition and remonstrate for just causes have been imprisoned for pretended offenses, by a Department of “Justice.”

The judicial branch, which should be one of the checks and balances in our republic is not held to account by any effective means. Their lawlessness has become a law unto itself by doctrines; by self made rules to govern their own conduct; by the vile notion of “absolute immunity” for any misconduct; by limiting the people's counsel to “members” at bar; by acting in concert with prosecutors to allow corrupted evidence and testimony and deny a fair defense; by intimidating juries and interfering with their sovereign right to know the whole truth and render their decisions on both the law and the facts; and by defying the fundamental principles of our Constitution at every turn. Such lawlessness denies the people any judicial remedy for the treason in our land.

Our liberty teeth, privately held weapons, are the last remedy for tyranny. Our unalienable right to keep and bear arms, has suffered decades of infringement. The ultimate goal of gun control, is to preclude the people's final option for remedy; to give security to tyranny.

Can you argue that there are still remedies left to us? Is there a course that has not been blocked; a possibility that has not been explored by the many dedicated patriots in this land? I see it not. The path returning to our rightful state of liberty is barred, at every turn, by a maniacal regime of power.

But the greatest challenge for those who would fight to restore liberty is not our enemy, the fascist state. America suffers from an indolent, ignorant, arrogant, self-absorbed and obese citizenry. A plague of false affluenza has swept the land. And worse; the mind control programs laid by media and the public education/indoctrination system have worked. A robotically-minded citizenry has been rendered clueless with a sophisticated disinformation system.

Our greatest problem is the masses whom adamantly refuse to perceive that there is a problem. Any person or truth which challenges their self-absorbed lifestyle is perceived as a threat. They serve their master -- the socialism and debt-based economy that makes their self-indulgence possible. Those of us who demand honesty, justice and liberty will be perceived as their enemy, for in truth, that master which they serve, has become ours.

And the enemies of liberty surround us. The Homeland Security forces are now poised to send hither swarms of officers in our final wave of enslavement. Are a host of armed agents necessary to a work of love and reconciliation? Have we shown ourselves so unwilling to be reconciled that force must be called in to win back our love?

Let us not deceive ourselves. These are the implements of war and subjugation; the last arguments to which tyrants resort. I ask the American people what means this martial array, if its purpose be not to force us to submission? Can we assign any other possible motive for it? Have we become such an enemy in our own land that we must be surrounded by swarms of officers, and multitudes of agencies, commanding every turn in the road of our lives? What have we done to necessitate this suffocating socialism where we are no longer allowed to tend to our own affairs? And what has called for all this accumulation of armaments and mechanisms of control? Is there any other purpose but the destruction of the land of liberty; the subjugation of a free people into slavery? They are meant for us: they can be meant for no other. They are sent to bind and rivet upon us those chains which the overlords of government have been so long forging.

And what have we to oppose to them? Shall we try argument? We have been trying that for the last ten years and more. Have we anything new to offer upon the subject? Nothing. We have held the subject of our liberty up in every light of which it is capable; but it has been all in vain. Shall we resort to further petitions and humble supplication? What terms shall we find which have not been already exhausted? Let us not deceive ourselves people, we have done everything that could be done to avert the storm which is now coming on. We have petitioned; we have remonstrated; we have litigated; we have prostrated ourselves before the throne of government, and we have implored it to arrest the tyrannical hands of its rogue agents. Our petitions have been slighted; our remonstrances have produced additional violence and insult; our litigations have been disregarded; we have been shot, gassed, burned, and poisoned with biological and chemical weapons engineered with our own tax dollars; and we have been fined and jailed for pretended offenses while the tyrant impostor government destroys our homes and families!

In vain, after these things, may we indulge the fond hope of peace and reconciliation. There is no longer any room for hope. If we wish to be free; if we mean to preserve inviolate those inestimable rights for which we have been so long contending; if we desire not to abandon the noble struggle in which we have been so long engaged, and which we have pledged ourselves never to abandon until the glorious object of our contest shall be obtained, we must fight! I repeat it, we must fight! An appeal to arms and to the God of hosts is all that is left us!

They tell us that we are weak; unable to cope with so formidable an adversary. But when shall we be stronger? Will it be the next week, or the next year? Will it be when we are totally disarmed by the false pretenses of gun control? When Homeland Security agents or UN troops shall be stationed in every town in a manufactured emergency? Shall we gather strength by irresolution and inaction?

Shall we acquire the means of effectual resistance by lying supinely on our backs and hugging the delusive phantom of hope, until our enemies shall have bound us hand and foot? We are not weak if we make a proper use of those means which the God of nature hath placed in our power. Millions of people, armed in the holy cause of liberty, and in such a country as that which we possess, are invincible by any force which our enemy, the federal fascist state can send against us.

Besides, we shall not fight our battles alone. There is a just God who presides over the destinies of nations, and who will raise up friends to fight our battles with us. The battle is not to the strong alone; it is to the vigilant, the active, the brave. We have no choice. It is now too late to retire from the contest. There is no retreat but in submission and slavery!

Our chains are forged! Their clanking may be heard on the plains of America! The war is inevitable -- and let it come! I repeat, let it come.

It is in vain to extenuate the matter. We may cry, Peace, Peace -- but there is no peace. The war has already begun! The next gale that sweeps from the north will bring to our ears the clash of resounding arms! Our brethren are already in the field!

Why stand we here idle? What is it that you wish? What would you have? Is life so dear, or peace so sweet, as to be purchased at the price of chains and slavery? Forbid it, Almighty God! I know not what course others may take but as for me: Give me liberty or give me death!

Will you stand for liberty and pledge your life, your fortune and your sacred honor? Will you join your brethren and take the field for a real independence day? This awful moment in our country is the last call for liberty; a final contest between freedom and slavery. Will you join the fight for the return of our republic?

***

“If ye love wealth better than liberty; the tranquility of servitude better than the animating contest of freedom, go home from us in peace. We ask not your counsel, nor your arms. Crouch down and lick the hands which feed you; may your chains set lightly upon you; and may posterity forget that ye were our countrymen!”

~Samuel Adams