After Sundown

During the day we go through our routines attending to the myriad of details that merge together to form a mini summary of whom we are. The jobs we do the tasks we perform and the people we touch are what will define our lives. The same is true of nations. Were they warlike conquerors? Industrious, prosperous and peaceful? Despotic or tyrannical? Democratic and law-abiding or a democratic anarchic mob? Did they practice “peace through strength” or belligerence through weakness and covetousness? For people as well as nations actions do speak louder than words. What we do and how we act are more illustrative about us than what we say.

Character is sometimes described as the way one behaves when no one is looking. That definition works for nations as well as individuals. Put another way…character is defined by how we act when the revealing sunlight is gone…how we behave after sundown. When we observe a political event on television or in person, we are often prompted by the speaker to celebrate a certain national character. For example when we listen to the President of Iran, Ahmadinejad, during one his tirades, he praises the purity of his nation while denouncing Israel and the United States in apocalyptic terms. Instantly we can assess the character of a country that allows such a hateful person to represent it. We get the sense that the Iranian leadership is unhinged and volatile. People more familiar with the Persian culture caution us that hyperbolic overstatement is a societal norm for the region, and that we should not be too alarmed. Nevertheless our skeptical antennae go up, and our level of mistrust increases because we assume that what is pondered after sundown is much worse than what is openly proclaimed.  

Maybe it’s a residue of our staid Victorian era that causes us to assume that most people or nations are hypocritical. We conclude that the unseen and unknown are generally worse than the open and visible. It’s probably human nature combined with nationalism that causes us to lower our shields of distrust when our own national leaders discuss our nation. Our fearless political leaders continually describe our nation as “the greatest nation in the history of the world,” or as “the most free nation on earth.” Are they being truthful? Or are they rubbing us with a blob of feel-good salve? If they are speaking historically, they are telling us the truth. If referring to the present time, they are not.

According to Freedomexistence.org our exalted and extolled position as most free is not the case:

Rank Nation            Overall    Property   Taxes      Speech     Ltd Govt   Guns   Drugs   Corruption Inflation  Business  

1    Switzerland       75         90         68         94         69         60         35         87         84         80        

2    Hong Kong         75         90         93         88         90         15         20         84         87         99        

3    Chile             74         85         78         100        87         47         45         72         78         67        

4    Canada            73         90         78         100        53         20         50         89         79         96        

5    Australia         73         90         61         100        65         20         55         87         85         90        

6    United States     73         85         68         100        55         80         15         71         77         91        

7    New Zealand       72         95         65         100        49         20         30         93         85         100       

8    Finland           71         90         65         100        26         40         45         92         81         95        

9    Netherlands       71         90         51         100        37         25         85         88         83         82        

10   Singapore         71         90         91         56         91         15         10         93         86         98        

Based on the nine criteria listed in the chart above the United States is ranked sixth (6^th) in overall freedom. Given the intensity with which the Administration is pursuing a Big Government agenda and the relative ineffectiveness of Congress, it is possible that we may have slipped even further down the chart. The last update was in June of this year and we’ve had an additional erosion of our liberty since then….including the just passed HR 1540 and S. 1867…an alarming restraint of our freedom and our rights. I’m not particularly disturbed that our politicians claim we are “most free” or “best” when we are not. Politicians frequently lie. I am distraught when those very same lying politicians unceasingly labor to make us less free. What they proclaim in the sunlight, they undo in the darkness. Sunshine patriots become freedom’s thieves after sundown…while we sleep and are unaware.

So why did I write this depressing column? We all agree that we have lost significant freedom in our lifetimes, but I wanted to illustrate just how far we have slipped. We continue to fall….perhaps into a free fall. This column was prompted by the GOP contest for presidential standard bearer. They discuss issues when they should be addressing principles and national character. They speak of cutting when they should eliminate unconstitutional agencies, departments and bureaus. They talk about too many regulations when they should defend liberty. Almost all of them appear to be somewhat cozy with the big statist government apparatus….after sundown. All of them that is….except one.

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