"Yes, We Can" ... Learn to Do What's Right and Reaffirm That the Pursuit of Self Reliance is the American Way of Life

We need a renewed understanding and emphasis on why self reliance and the pursuit of freedom based opportunity is the American way of life. It's also what makes our nation the place where people from throughout the world want to come to pursue their individual dreams and make a better life for their families. American Exceptionalism is real. But it's always being tested, and we're going through a tough time of testing now.

As a self governing society, we're always being challenged to identify and define what exactly it is that we want to be and do "when we grow up." Because as critical pieces of the greatest self governing experiment the world has ever known, We the People are always in control of our own destiny, both individually and as a whole.

In that regard, during the next few years we will learn much about ourselves both as individuals and in our roles as members of communities, individual states and the nation as a whole. The American experiment in self governance continues.

Both economically and in the pursuit of global peace, the times are now and will remain tough, and many difficult choices will have to be made. The days of can kicking and 'pretend prosperity' as a statewide and national sport are abruptly coming to an end. It had to happen sometime, and that sometime is now.

And in this ongoing process of self governing experimentation, we'll be able to observe what's working and what's not working. We'll also realize that governments have no answers. and the answers lie within We the People. Because the government is like the emperor -- he has no clothes.

And just how will all of this knowledge come to pass? Well, as Yogi Berra once said, "You can see a lot just by watching."

But now let's listen to what Republican Governor Mitch Daniels of Indiana has to say about the coming lessons of ObamaCare and the link between opportunity, individual morality and freedom of choice.

Notable & Quotable contains a brief excerpt from his recent speech on the topic:

"Over the next few years and maybe just months, the debts we have accumulated and that this presidency has doubled will begin to assert themselves. We must hope and work to see that an easily imaginable panic and economic ruin does not result. At best, economic circumstances will remain difficult.

Even if reserve currency status and the absence of alternatives continues to protect us a while longer, the ObamaCare legislation will take effect. Its implementation will likely be a nightmare of missed deadlines, public confusion, inconsistent exceptions, and dashed expectations. Every claim made for the bill will be shown to have been false: health care costs will go up, not down; government spending and debt will go up, not down; the economy will be injured, not benefited; people by the millions will in fact lose the health insurance they have and like. Indeed, these calamities are already evident.

These failures, abetted by the natural tendency of Americans to swing the pendulum every so often, set the stage for a powerful restoration of an architecture of liberty. Freedom's friends must be ready, not just with cerebral prescriptions for better policy, but with a moral argument that affirms the God-given dignity of each of us, that says "Yes, you can" to everyone. . . .

In 1980, a Wyoming single mother mystified a New York Times reporter by stating that yes, absolutely she supported candidate Reagan's proposed income tax cuts. "But, why?" the reporter spluttered. "You don't make enough money to pay income taxes!" The woman's reply was "One day I will." Freedom's friends must shape their words and actions, when the opportunity for action arrives, in ways that say emphatically "Yes, you can" and "One day you will.""

SUMMING UP

It's always darkest before the dawn

America is awakening to its many challenges and many politicians like Indiana's Governor Mitch Daniels will help their individual states focus on doing the right things right. Others will keep doing the wrong things wrong, and Americans will notice both.

Albeit painful and at times very frustrating, this process will lead us to see more clearly the opportunities and obligations we have to chart a better course for America and Americans.

Through this effective and time tested method of trial and error, we'll discover if something works to make things better, and if it does, we'll keep doing it. But if it doesn't, we'll change direction.

That's one huge benefit in having fifty individual state governments as laboratories for democracy. We can learn from the experiences of each and all of them, both what works and what doesn't.

Crisis begets opportunity. Out of crisis we get the chance to correct things and set ourselves and future generations on a better path.

That's what freedom in a self governing nation of equals is all about.

Not class warfare, not government redistribution programs and not taxing others so government bureaucrats can "save the middle class."

My guess is that we're going to have many opportunities to relearn the value and validity of all these time tested truths during the next few years.

Politicians and government are about to disclose, even if they don't want to, who they are and what they can't do.

Then We the People will take the reins again, and our nation of equals will be an even better place.

Thanks. Bob.