"Those who would give up essential liberty to purchase a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety."
- Benjamin Franklin
First, it is an honor to be asked to be a contributor to this blog. Thank you to Briefs and whoever else deemed me worthy to opine herein!
The guy on the bottom left is me while in basic training MANY moons ago (1972, actually). As the Spirit song suggests, I have since become much too fat and a little too long. In order to avoid losing readership I will not post a current picture lest we scare off the faint of heart.
For many years I have faithfully followed state and national elections and voted whenever November came around. I often just blew off the primaries and decided to let the parties decide the candidates and then I would choose between them. I was dead wrong!
As I look upon the wreckage that was our economy and the hideously huge monstrosity we call the Federal Government I now repent of my former ways. I allowed this to happen by not caring enough and not learning enough and not involving myself in the process of candidate selection and also local governance!
That was then, this is now.
"The U.S. Constitution doesn't guarantee happiness, only the pursuit of it. Your have to catch up with it yourself."
So allow me to make my first post a plea to everyone. Governance is not the job of guys with 500 dollar haircuts and 3,000 dollar suits! You and I and him and her together make up The People and We have been asleep at the wheel!
Every local party organization needs people who want to get involved to select the best candidates if they are not crooks themselves. City, town and county government doesn't just magically take place. Perhaps you yourself would be an asset to a school board or a town council or a wastewater board, etc? Local government works better when more people lend a hand.
"As government expands, liberty contracts" -Ronald Reagan
I promote primarily local events and meetings on this blog. The focus is on Cedar Lake and the surrounding area as well as county and statewide elections. You will find bloggers who have something to say about your area, all you have to do is poke around various blog links to find them.
Every primary is a chance to pick the best of the lot before November. Right now various Tea Party and 912 and Patriot and Resist.net and Grassfire and other such groups are actively promoting meetings and candidate debates and demonstrations against big government and big spending. Find at least one of them and join in! Google key words for your town or county with tea party, for instance. Comment on this blog, there are writers from around the area that could help point you in the right direction.
You are the key to a new direction in 2010. I am already in the fight, as are the other contributors on this blog. The fact that you are reading this indicates you are at least interested in what is happening. Go one more step and make something happen! If you are the shy, retiring type you could sit in the back at a meeting and just put out a yard sign. Everybody can do something.
Money talks and, well, you know the rest...
May I also say that giving money to a national party is akin to driving downtown and randomly tossing bills out the window. Somebody will probably get it, sure, but will it do much good? Please give your money to individual candidates and not the national party!!!
So summing up my personal opinion concerning the primaries and elections of 2010:
1) Be informed
2) Join with others who care
3) Find ways to be part of the local scene
4) Select and support candidates before the May Indiana Primary Election takes place
5) Vote in the primary
6) Give money to individual campaigns instead of large organizations
7) Don't be afraid to ask questions of NWI Pundit writers. We do not all agree on everything but I think we do all agree that freedom is worth fighting for and, if not protected, it will be lost.
"The Constitution is not an instrument for the government to restrain the people, it is an instrument for the people to restrain the government."
AMEN!
