It has come to the point in this country where merely the threat of a lawsuit is enough for you to give up your freedom. The cost to defend yourself is a right enjoyed by the rich and powerful in this country and worst of all, it often comes from legally-recognized beings that have no morals, no concern for ethics, no stated purpose other than to make money in any and as many ways possible: Corporations.

Our founding fathers built this country on the idea that people should be free from oppression by their governments, but in the past 50 years or so that dream has been eroded by a few simple changes in our laws. Some by way of the legislature, some by way of the executive, and some by way of the judicial branches.

What we need to do is break up corporations that go astray with our freedom. That act unethically. That lay off thousands upon thousands of citizens for the sole purpose of reporting better earnings in the next quarter. That loot our economy and distribute it to their rich owners over seas. That force our citizens to train their replacements in foreign countries that have no environmental regulations, child labor laws, or even basic human rights.

When it comes to exporting democracy over seas–it may be possible, but I’ve yet to see any of our ideals lighting a fire in the hearts and minds of the presently occupied. Perhaps it is because we didn’t export democracy. Perhaps it is because the only thing we brought was death, destruction, and a willingness to accept whatever government they formed as long as we could keep that oil flowing and selling them our guns.

We shouldn’t have rushed the forming of their constitution. We shouldn’t have accepted a government with an official religion. We shouldn’t have allowed a people who have never known democracy to rule themselves without a basic instruction in what that means. We should have demanded separation of mosque and state.

The fighting going on is sectarian–which is just a fancy word for “religious”. Religious fighting is the reason why the Puritans left England to come to America. It is the knife that repeatedly stabs people in the back and regresses cultures back into the middle ages.

Maybe we didn’t demand separation of church and state because the guy who started this mess doesn’t believe in it. Our present leader, in one of his very first acts, created the Office of Faith-based initiatives–which might as well have been the Office of Exclusionary Politics… Those who don’t believe need not apply.

-Riskable
http://riskable.com
“No person is free until they can tell the truth without retaliation, live without debt, and change their mind without disaffection. This is freedom from religion, freedom from inequity, and freedom from dogma.”