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Excessive, unreasonable taxation led
to the rebellion that formed our great nation by Larry Hatch There is a special place which I feel the concept of Independence more than any other. If you have never been there, and ever have the opportunity, you must go. About an hour North of Virginia Beach is a place called Yorktown, Virginia. There, amongst the echoes of history, lie gravestones of young men who gave their lives for a concept which they had never experienced - freedom. As you stand and gaze out in every direction you find yourself standing on holy ground. Those young men, in the prime of their lives, farmers, family men, simple men. They came from hundreds of miles away, from locales which were at the time sovereign states, to fight, and die, for their children to live without oppression - to live free. "We hold these truths to be self evident..." was more than just a political statement to them. They had lived their entire lives under the boot of tyranny. In fact, for nearly 200 years their ancestors had lived under the all - powerful weight and control of the king's representatives on the North American continent. These young men knew no other way of life. There was no America to model themselves after. There was only a deeply held belief that men, endowed by their Creator, longed to live free and deservedly so. For that they were willing to take up arms against the mightiest armed force the world had ever known. For that they died by the thousands. Many never identified, buried in graves with more than one body. Most forgotten. The spark which led to this long and costly war? Taxation. Excessive taxation which was drawing the life blood out of each of the individual "nations" which existed here at the time. Taxation which was so high that it began to destroy the economy of the "nations" and the individuals who toiled away on the land contained in each of them. The kind began to tax everything that moved in the economy including documents - pieces of paper! When the hard working farmers and business people of each of these "nations" had had enough they rebelled. They gave the oppressors every chance to back off and let them alone, but to avail. The king determined his own fate by moving ahead with plans to destroy the "rebels" and continue his oppressive plans. Freedom is born in the heart and soul of every man and woman. For freedom - true freedom - we will fight and die. Today we find ourselves in what I believe to be the most serious fight we have ever been in. The fight against the oppressive cult of radical Islamic philosophy. Islam is not a religion. Go to the library and read for yourself what it truly is. It is a cult of Mohammed. Pure and simple. Read the history and see how the cult took over entire nations and tribes. Learn the truth. It is the oppression of this cult with membership which probably exceed 2 billion worldwide which our nation's young fighting men and women are dying for today. Western Europe is right now in the fight to keep the cult of Mohammed from becoming a political and cultural force. If it becomes a majority there it will surely turn European nations into Islamic states just like those in the Middle East. If Muslims were to gain political power in the United States we will suffer the same fate. Those young men and women buried in Yorktown are calling out to us to never exchange the tyranny they fought against for the tyranny of the "cult of Mohammed". While we celebrate with fireworks and celebration, remember, at this moment men and women are standing their ground in Afghanistan and other places in the world, tired, lonely, missing home, and longing to be home where they belong, against the single most potent threat to American freedom since those young men were buried in Yorktown. Do not be mislead by the media propaganda machine which is afraid to offend. This is going to be a long and costly stand and many more lives will be lost. But in July of 1776 we proved to the world that a small fighting force, ill equipped, fighting for the concept of true freedom, could stand against the mightiest Goliath - and pass to us standard of freedom which we must always hold high and never take for granted. Some day you just have to go to Yorktown and read those gravestones and kneel down pray in humble gratitude that they knew what real freedom meant. God bless, |