Freedom Lost

Freedom Lost

Bill O'Reilly
Thursday, Jan 10, 2013

If you see Kris Kristofferson around, please tell him thanks for writing the line, "freedom's just another word for nothing left to lose" in his song "Me and Bobby McGee." That thought is sage, and very appropriate for America in the year 2013.

In California, Governor Jerry Brown has signed into law an astounding 876 new mandates. They all took effect last week. Now in the Golden State you cannot do the following:

- Hunt a bear using trained dogs. Untrained canines are okay, I guess. And how would the authorities be able to tell? Would the dog have to take a test in the forest?

- Sit in an off road vehicle without being in a seat. You can't sit on the floor. Or on the roof. Do off road vehicles even have roofs? I don't know.

- Use a boat in a "freshwater body" without paying a separate fee. That's to raise money to control the influx of "invasive mussels." I thought that was a 1950s monster movie.

- Drive a party bus without a special license. Can't wait to see that test. Do you know the words to "Celebrate" by Kool and the Gang?

The list of new laws is almost endless, and it is clear that Governor Brown and the California legislature have been very busy thinking up ways to control every aspect of people's lives. And that's what's basically happening throughout this country. Politicians, some of them well-meaning, are trying to legislate everything.

New York's Mayor Bloomberg doesn't want us to be chubby, so he's trying to ban soft drinks in large cups. If a child rides his bike, he often looks like a Roman Gladiator with all the protective gear. Drive through a yellow light, and you may be ticketed thanks to a camera tied onto a pole. Everybody's watching everything. And then sending it out to the world via email.

The more laws that governments pass, the less individual freedom there is. Any student of history will tell you that. Totalitarian countries ban pretty much everything. The Taliban whipped people in public for dancing. Mao would execute you for saying a prayer. Hitler would send you to a concentrate camp if he thought you were gay.

We Americans need to stop this nanny state stuff. Reasonable protections are fine. It should be a crime to text while driving. But in California it is now against the law to park at a broken meter for more time than you could if said meter were working. I can just see the cops standing there with a stopwatch.

I consider myself a law-abiding person. But I'm exhausted. I don't know where to put the bottles, newspapers, cans, and other stuff for garbage pickup outside my house. The rules are so thick you need someone from M.I.T. to explain them.

So here's my pitch to Jerry Brown and other elected officials. Relax. The bears will be fine. The mussels will invade no matter what you do. The parking meter deal isn't important.

Okay?

Bottles and cans go into the container labeled "bottles, cans and glass", newspapers go in the container labeleb "Paper", plastic and other recyclable stuff goes into the blue recycling bin and the rest goes into the trash.
And if you don't know where to throw your motor oil and batteries by now then there's no hope anyways...

Is it really that hard?

What kind of license do you have to have to drive the party bus? A license for operating oversized vehicles?

Is it really that offensive to expect a little honesty from people? Those parking meters are there for a reason, and most of the time it is to make sure that people don't block that parking space all day long, which would in the long run hurt businesses around those places. I wouldn't want to go to a store where I know I have to park 3 miles down the road because the same people always block the parking spots all day.

BubbleBliss wrote:Bottles and cans go into the container labeled "bottles, cans and glass", newspapers go in the container labeleb "Paper", plastic and other recyclable stuff goes into the blue recycling bin and the rest goes into the trash.

I think he was being facetious with that comment.

BubbleBliss wrote:And if you don't know where to throw your motor oil and batteries by now then there's no hope anyways...

Is it really that hard?

Nobody said otherwise.

BubbleBliss wrote:What kind of license do you have to have to drive the party bus? A license for operating oversized vehicles?

Then why do people driving RV's just have to have a regular license?

BubbleBliss wrote:Is it really that offensive to expect a little honesty from people? Those parking meters are there for a reason, and most of the time it is to make sure that people don't block that parking space all day long, which would in the long run hurt businesses around those places. I wouldn't want to go to a store where I know I have to park 3 miles down the road because the same people always block the parking spots all day.

How about the city fixing the damn thing to start with instead of making a stupid law?

Where is the response I posted to this yesterday?

dblboggie wrote:Where is the response I posted to this yesterday?

It was deleted. I know how you feel about all this and I share your views. You (and others) have to remember that this place is ultimately governed by Forumotion and if someone decides they want to make it an issue, this place would (and can) disappear in a flash.

I'm serious. I was in their forum the other day and I saw cases where that literally happened. They give no warning. Their opinion of TOS violations differs from mine.

We can state our opinions without being over-the-top. I banned NextPrez for his repeated violations of the rules. I have to be fair.

On top of that, you guys are my friends. It puts me in a delicate situation.

And what precisely was the problem with my post? All of it was true.

dblboggie wrote:And what precisely was the problem with my post? All of it was true.

Language.

Just the profanity, or was it the pejoratives as well?

dblboggie wrote:Just the profanity, or was it the pejoratives as well?

I would go with both.

I would hope you understand where I'm coming from.

Does this mean I can't call Obama what he is, an anti-American Marxist thug and wannabe dictator?

And yes, I do understand where you're coming from, but let's face it, there aren't enough profane and pejorative words in the English language (or any other for that matter) to do justice in describing just how horrible a human being Obama truly is.

dblboggie wrote:Does this mean I can't call Obama what he is, an anti-American Marxist thug and wannabe dictator?

And yes, I do understand where you're coming from, but let's face it, there aren't enough profane and pejorative words in the English language (or any other for that matter) to do justice in describing just how horrible a human being Obama truly is.

Agreed, how people can like this guy, and treated like some type of god is beyond me, I don't know or understand it and never will.

Well we see eye-to-eye on that.

The fact remains that O'Reilly is a tool for making light of this and clearly does not grasp that the re-election of someone with as horrific a record as Obama's, someone as blatantly unqualified and anti-American as he is, only illustrates all too plainly that this republic is lost. Nothing can save us with a population stupid enough to elect a creature as disgusting as Obama.