Age of Ethics and Consciousness

A patriot loves his country, not its government. The truth is that it is the protesters, it is the dissidents, it is the millions of peaceful marchers and citizens here at home on American soil who fight the honorable fight each day to defend our liberties. The best way to defend and keep your rights is to exercise and use them. The demonstrators are making sacrifices, they are risking injury from an increasingly threatening and deliberately unaccountable police state, they risk their personal liberty, safety and even their very lives to speak out in defense of our liberties and our Constitution. They deserve our highest respect and protection.

The truth is, every American citizen supports our country and defends our liberties right along side our military each day by working hard, living within the law, producing the goods and services we all depend on, and exercising our Constitutional rights. Every fireman, every plumber, every carpenter, everyone is sacrificing every day, some risking their lives as well. We sacrifice when our pockets are picked by a regime increasingly willing to transfer more of our dollars to an increasingly wealthy few, a non-working class. We sacrifice when there is not enough money for our schools and decent health care for every American because our hard earned tax dollars are appropriated to build weapons of mass destruction, to wage unjust war and to provide bribes to coerce the rest of the world to support us. We sacrifice when our leaders make us less safe by inflaming hatred against Americans and then offering us duct tape and plastic sheets to protect ourselves. We sacrifice when our government commits terrorism in our name. We sacrifice each time our government kills in our name. We sacrifice when our government becomes arrogant and acts as if it were above the law.

Yes we all sacrifice. In return, all we expect and demand from our leaders, to whom we grant our enormous power, is that they serve us and not rule us. This why we became America in the first place. Although it is doubtful he ever knew it to begin with, Mr. Bush has apparently forgotten his place. Our government apparently has forgotten it's place as well but it should have known better. When our government is committing unjustified, immoral acts, when our government itself threatens the very freedoms we all live, fight and die for, when our government stops listening to us and starts lying to us, it is our duty as Americans to speak out. It is our duty to protest. It is our duty to do whatever it takes to defend our country. Only a fool could doubt the patriotism and honor of that sacrifice.

- Bruce Kelton, Poulsbo Newspaper, 2003