a little rebellion now and then

This post is sparked by DB's "Express yourself on November 2nd, 2004" compilation.

"I love my country so much, man, like an exasperating friend." -Mike Doughty

Love is so much more than hugs and encouragement, if you love someone you call them out on their shit - as RB might say.


"And I keep on fighting for the things I want, though I know that when you're dead you can't. But I'd rather be a free man in my grave than living as a puppet or a slave" -Jimmy Cliff: A one man Reggae Declaration of Independence.

Y'know - When in the course of human events, it becomes necessary for a people to flip the government the bird and break away as an independent entity, first they should explain why they are doing so. We and everyone on this planet accepts as truth that all of us are created equal and have certain unalienable rights, to name just a few: life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness - Duh. Government is created by us to enable us to exercise these rights. We consent to be goverened only so long as we are able to live, be free, and pursue what make us happy. When government can no longer do this for us, we have the right to change it or abolish it and create a new government more likely to bring happiness and safety. And while we don't do this for bullshit reasons but only under the most dire of cirumstances, when such circumstances are found it is our right and duty to overthrow the government and set up a new one. (Insert the long list of the ways the Brits have done us wrong.) We have expressed our horrible situation to the King and asked for assistance and for change but the governement has turn a deaf ear. We tried to no avail. So we're declaring ourselves free of our rulers. We declare ourselves independent states with all the powers and rights that are conferred on a state. And to this declaration, we mutually pledge to each other our Lives, our Fortunes and our sacred Honor. (I'm paraphrasing here, of course.)

"The harder they come, the harder they'll fall. One and all." -Jimmy Cliff

"I hold it that a little rebellion, now and then, is a good thing, and as necessary in the political world as storms are in the physical. Unsuccessful rebellions, indeed, generally establish the encroachments on the rights of the people, which have produced them ... It is medicine necessary to the sound health of government." - Thomas Jefferson

When someone tells you that it's wrong to dissent, that it's wrong to protest or criticize the government remind them from whence our nation came.