Sunday afternoon musings
Posted by tx on July 5, 2009 under Home Page, Principles and Values | 
Be the First to Comment
A news item which caught my attention this week was the nationwide cultural response to the death of entertainer Michael Jackson. He did not appear to be a person of exemplary moral character or even a person who gave of his wealth and his talent for the betterment of his nation or mankind as a whole. He led a solitary and unusual life. He was accused of being a pedophile – it was reported that his accusers were paid off financially to drop the charges against him. The entertainer’s actions were often puzzling to ordinary folks. He destroyed his natural appearance with plastic surgery and changed the color of his skin by bleaching it.
Hours of television time have been spent extolling the entertainer’s talent, describing the sadness of his life, the violence of his childhood. More than a million people have applied online for a lottery prize of tickets to attend the entertainer’s funeral. Some “scalpers” are offering to buy these tickets to re-sell them at a higher price. Two black politicians are feuding over who will speak the entertainer’s eulogy. Thousands of people have left memorials of flowers, teddy bears and messages at the entertainer’s home. Why the outpouring of grief for a man who hid from the public, who made millions from the sales of his music and then carelessly spent those millions until he was bankrupt? That the entertainer was a sad and lonely person, that he deserves our prayers is not the issue here.
I wonder if our culture has become one in which the passing of a celebrity is more important than the destruction of our way of life by a government which no longer adheres to the dictates of our Constitution? Do the millions who mourn the death of a financially and perhaps morally bankrupt celebrity no longer care about their freedom? Are these mourners even aware that their country and their freedom is being stolen away by their elected officials, that their individual rights are being stripped away by thieves in the government, that the freedoms which we all take for granted may soon cease to exist?
When the Constitution is no longer considered relevant, will these same mourners then cry for themselves or grieve for the nation that is gone? Will they place flowers and letters at the grave of our once glorious Constitution? When their own government rations their health care, tells them what they can or cannot eat, refuses to pay their rents, tells them how warm they may keep their personal residence, how many miles they may drive their cars or limits their access to life saving medicines — will the mourners then realize that something really important has died? Are the mourners so sated with the “entitlements” that are offered to them by their corrupt government that they will not even notice that a powerful elite will make all their future decisions for them? Will they care?
On this weekend when we gather in our communities to celebrate our Revolution which gave to all of us Independence from tyranny, is our own government very close to replacing those tyrannical chains on us? When the news media prefers to highlight the events surrounding an entertainer’s death instead of informing the citizens as to what their government is doing, are our freedoms already lost? Has our yearly celebration lost its meaning?
