Dear Kossacks,
Earlier today, while sitting in my corner and scratching my head over the GOP senators' utterly disturbing behavior of obstruction of government to the degree that they would even reject their own projects if it is going to prevent the president of the United States from serving to the people who elected him, I began to think of a time, a time not too long ago, in terms of human history, 1776 respectively. And with that thought, came the document, the Declaration of Independence, into my mind. I wondered how it was back then...and if there were any parallels. So I did an experiment in which I copied an excerpt from the document and replaced the words pertaining to King George with today's GOP members of the congress. My word replacements are bolded. I also added few thought brackets.
The result is below. I am going to leave it to you to decide for yourself if there are any resemblances between 1776 and today's political events...or not.
"The history of the present GOP members of the congress is a history of repeated injuries and usurpations, all having in direct object the establishment of an absolute Tyranny over these States. To prove this, let Facts be submitted to a candid world.
They have refused their Assent to Laws, the most wholesome and necessary for the public good.
They have forbidden their Governors to pass Laws of immediate and pressing importance, unless suspended in their operation till their Assent should be obtained; and when so suspended, they have utterly neglected to attend to them.
They have refused to pass other Laws for the accommodation of large districts of people, unless those people would relinquish the right of Representation in the Legislature, a right inestimable to them and formidable to tyrants only.
They have called together legislative bodies at places unusual, uncomfortable, and distant from the depository of their Public Records, for the sole purpose of fatiguing them into compliance with their measures.
They have dissolved Representative Houses repeatedly, for opposing with manly firmness their invasions on the rights of the people.
They have refused for a long time, after such dissolutions, to cause others to be elected, whereby the Legislative Powers, incapable of Annihilation, have returned to the People at large for their exercise; the State remaining in the mean time exposed to all the dangers of invasion from without, and convulsions within.
They have endeavoured to prevent the population of these States; for that purpose obstructing the Laws for Naturalization of Foreigners; refusing to pass others to encourage their migrations hither, and raising the conditions of new Appropriations of Lands.
They have obstructed the Administration of Justice by refusing their Assent to Laws for establishing Judiciary Powers.
They have made Judges dependent on their Will alone for the tenure of their offices, and the amount and payment of their salaries.
They have erected a multitude of New Offices, and sent hither swarms of Officers to harass our people and eat out their substance.
They have kept among us, in times of peace, Standing Armies without the Consent of our legislatures.
They have affected to render the Military independent of and superior to the Civil Power.
They have combined with others to subject us to a jurisdiction foreign to our constitution, and unacknowledged by our laws; giving their Assent to their Acts of pretended Legislation:
For quartering large bodies of armed troops among us:
For protecting them, by a mock Trial from punishment for any Murders which they should commit on the Inhabitants of these States:
For cutting off our Trade with all parts of the world:
For imposing Taxes on us without our Consent [if the wealthy gets the tax cut, guess who will end up paying for it in the long run?]:
For depriving us in many cases, of the benefit of Trial by Jury:
For transporting us beyond Seas to be tried for pretended offences:
For abolishing the free System of English Laws in a neighbouring Province [Guantanamo?], establishing therein an Arbitrary government, and enlarging its Boundaries so as to render it at once an example and fit instrument for introducing the same absolute rule into these Colonies
For taking away our Charters, abolishing our most valuable Laws and altering fundamentally the Forms of our Governments:
For suspending our own Legislatures, and declaring themselves invested with power to legislate for us in all cases whatsoever.
They have abdicated Government here, by declaring us out of their Protection and waging War against us.
They have plundered our seas, ravaged our coasts, burnt our towns, and destroyed the lives of our people.
They are at this time transporting large Armies of foreign Mercenaries to compleat the works of death, desolation, and tyranny, already begun with circumstances of Cruelty & Perfidy scarcely paralleled in the most barbarous ages, and totally unworthy the Head of a civilized nation.
They have constrained our fellow Citizens taken Captive on the high Seas to bear Arms against their Country, to become the executioners of their friends and Brethren, or to fall themselves by their Hands.
They have excited domestic insurrections amongst us [Tea Party wingnuts?], and has endeavoured to bring on the inhabitants of our frontiers, the merciless Indian Savages [ Ouch! I guess we evolved a bit since then, so we weren't perfect either] whose known rule of warfare, is an undistinguished destruction of all ages, sexes and conditions.
In every stage of these Oppressions We have Petitioned for Redress in the most humble terms: Our repeated Petitions have been answered only by repeated injury. A political party like GOP, whose character is thus marked by every act which may define a Tyrant, is unfit to be the ruler of a free people."
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