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Peace Begins with Me
For decades, we've heard the folk singers and the obsequious
Left talk about how "peace begins with me," and how we should
all just "learn to get along." This is confession
time. I agree.
But let's expand on that a bit. Peace is not the product of merely
giving "the world a song, of love and harmony." Peace is
the result of a combination of factors in which potential peace-breakers
think better of it, and just don't do it.
One of those factors is a moral society, where people have a firm grip on
the difference between right and wrong. (The Left will not pass
this test, particularly the folk singers of the Sixties. Today
those hedonists have migrated from communal orgies to a more mature level
of "if it feels good, do it." And today they interrupt
their government jobs to join lobbying organizations to demand more and
more government aid for all their medical problems associated with aging
-- and immoral behavior.)
Another of those factors is that the penalties for crime are too severe
to contemplate, and the probability of getting caught is too high to
gamble with it. Unfortunately, today, we have crime as a lifestyle
and the chances of getting caught are simply not high enough to deter the
would-be criminal. (The injustice of our "criminal justice
system" will have to wait for another column.)
A third factor is the undeniable truth that "an armed society is a
polite society." In the hands of a moral society, the presence
of weapons is not a danger, it is a guarantor of peace. It's called
"responsible behavior."
Our Founding Fathers understood this. They considered it
unthinkable that a man in a frontier setting might be disarmed by
government at any level. But they themselves were laboring under
British arms-control laws. And their inclusion into the Bill of
Rights the mention of the "right to keep and bear arms" was not
aimed at protecting citizens from Indians and bad men, but from
government which had already tried to prevent their owning weapons
for many years. Keeping weapons out of the hands of the citizens is
the first rule of every Tyrant. (Which is why we teach our children
about history.)
Does all this peace have a price? You betcha. It's called,
"eternal vigilance." And there are two big reasons why we
don't let children play with guns.
- First, we teach them to respect the gun as a deadly tool, to never
touch one without adult supervision, to not even point toy guns at
anyone, etc.
- And second, we teach them to shoot straight and to keep their weapons
in good mechanical order. Because we believe that the
"blessings of of Liberty to our posterity" includes peace, love
and harmony. And that is both purchased and maintained with a safe
weapon in the hands of all responsible citizens.
Now why do you suppose that government bureaucrats and politicians
don't want citizens to be armed?
Perhaps their education is inadequate. Here's a suggestion.
Let's sponsor shooting matches all over the state, with children and
adults participating. Any time you get enough potential voters in
one spot, politicians will want to come. Invite your candidates to
fire a few rounds, and get his picture doing it. Publish it.
Vote for him.
If he won't touch the rifle, shotgun or pistol, vote against him, and run
against him. No matter how good his voting record is on other
issues. This is a litmus test.
To paraphrase Mao Tse-tung, "Peace comes from the barrel of a
gun." (So does Freedom, but that's next month.)
Daniel D. New, Chairman
Central Regional
(C) 2002, Constitution Party of Texas, and Daniel
New
Daniel New's Bio.
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