"These are the times that try men's souls."
These words of Thomas Paine are even more fitting today than they were in 1776, for the darkness of tyranny has been descending over America ever since the Supreme Court appointed a new King George to rule over us. Faith in ourselves and courage in the face of endless adversity are all we have had to sustain us as this Rovian storm of madness has raged around us.
In his
Give Me Liberty or Give Me Death speech, Patrick Henry warned that "it is natural to man to indulge in the illusions of hope. We are apt to shut our eyes against a painful truth, and listen to the song of that siren till she transforms us into beasts."
Tens of millions of Americans have shut their eyes to the painful truth about this brutally stupid president and criminal Congress. Millions of Republicans have listened to the siren song of Rovian spin and have been transformed into beasts. Their howls are heard across this land: torture is not torture because the Beast-in-Chief says so, the ragheads want to kill us all, God hates fags, liberals are traitors. This is not rational political argument, it is the howling of beasts.
In 1776, Patrick Henry warned, "Our chains are forged. Their clanking may be heard on the plains of Boston." Today, our own chains have been forged. Their clanking may be heard in the Patriot Act, the Military Commissions Act, the new and improved Insurrection Act, in Bush's federalizing of the National Guard, in thousands of sinister Diebold, ES&S, and Sequoia voting machines, and across the airwaves controlled by Bush's corporate media Hessians.
Patrick Henry reminded Americans in 1776, "We have petitioned; we have remonstrated; we have supplicated; we have prostrated ourselves before the throne. Our petitions have been slighted; our remonstrances have produced additional violence and insult; our supplications have been disregarded; and we have been spurned, with contempt, from the foot of the throne!"
In our own time, an even more dangerous King George has ignored our petitions, disregarded our supplications, and has spurned with contempt our appeals. From his high and mighty throne, he proclaims his edicts and demands absolute obedience. He cloaks himself in the divine right of kings, is Lord and Master of all he surveys, and thinks he answers only to God.
He is about to discover otherwise.
In 1775 America had only one Paul Revere. Today, every Netroots activist is a Paul Revere. Our midnight ride began in the darkness of Florida six years ago and we've been spreading the alarm ever since. Finally, America is awakening and stirring from its long slumber, alarmed by the warnings we have delivered on our long journey towards the dawn of this Second American Revolution.
The social security privatization fight was our Battle of Bunker Hill. Yearly Kos was our Declaration of Independence. Ned Lamont's primary victory over Lieberman and his Beltway Redcoats was our stand at Concord Bridge, where we fired a shot heard `round the world. Jon Tester's march across red state Montana echoes Washington's crossing of the Delaware. Throughout all of these battles, Netroots activists have been the Minutemen of this Second American Revolution.
We are defending our liberty against a dangerous tyrant who has proclaimed himself king. We have fought for six long years. We have endured the isolation and hardship of more Valley Forges than we care to remember. But the spring of our victory is near. We have overcome the treachery of Benedict Lieberman and the sunshine patriot cowardice of Joe Biden and the DLC.
We are no longer the ragged militia we were six years ago, we have become a Continental Army of battle-hardened veterans. The pounding of our Netroots artillery is echoing across Midterms battlefields, Lord Rove's Redcoats are dropping like flies, and his once-arrogant army has become a desperate mob of wounded, bleeding survivors in headlong retreat. As they fled, they fired a last, wild volley at John Kerry, but now they're fresh out of musket balls. We have them trapped against a sea of investigations, just as Lord Cornwallis was trapped against the sea at Yorktown, Virginia.
It's time to detain these enemy combatants, Netroots Minutemen. We have PUBLIC trials to convene and PUBLIC verdicts to render.
Fix bayonets!
Fire when you see the whites of their beady eyes!
CHARGE!