All I Want for Christmas…
by Karen Kwiatkowski
Recently by Karen Kwiatkowski: A Thanksgiving Promise
There’s a fine juxtaposition between Thanksgiving and Christmas here in the United States. We’ve just celebrated – in food and in service – all that we have, all that we cherish and that for which we are truly undeserving.
Then, before we’ve even cleared the dishes and packed away the leftovers, we are out looking for all of the things we didn’t have yesterday, and need now, everything we want for Christmas, and at a price that feels good.
This is the beautiful way of the marketplace. Buyers and sellers meeting each others’ needs, without coercion, force or intimidation. It exists, it thrives, and it doesn’t need permission or regulation by the state to work at its maximum potential. And all I want for Christmas is a free and peaceful market.
The persistent protesters in cities all over the country have been ridiculed and pepper-sprayed. Yet, there is a great goodness in standing up against fascism. Believe it or not, fascism is what we see in America today. It’s been evolving here for some time.
In 1944, John T. Flynn put forth eight points that he considered the main marks of the fascist state. They include: 1) government acknowledges no restraint on its powers, 2) government is a de facto dictatorship, with one sector dominating, 2) a capitalist system is administered by the government using an immense bureaucracy, 4) Producers are organized into cartels with special politically-granted privileges (syndicalism), 5) Economic planning is based on autarky (requiring extremely large territory and trade hegemony), 6) Economic life is sustained through spending and borrowing, 7) Militarism is the mainstay of government spending, and
Military spending has imperialist (global) aims.
How does this apply to the United States today, 67 years of rapid government growth, spending, borrowing, and warfighting later? Well, the restraining force of the Constitution is dead, and we live at the command of an executive state, with a politically obedient judiciary and a supine and corrupt Congress. Most American production and service corporations, including financial services and banking, are cartelized and enjoy tax-funded subsidy and periodic government bailouts. We constantly hear the twin political parties speak of self-sufficiency in energy, food, materials, justifying continental economic zones, global wars for resources, and the occupation of weak energy-producing countries. Military spending is excessive, yet it is broadly justified as necessary for both security and industrialism, and to maintain global influence.
It’s fascism. The pepper spraying jackbooted thugs in state uniform are just icing on the cake.
All I want for Christmas is for more people to see American fascism for what it is, and start thinking about defunding it and rejecting it.
This time of year is ripe for reflection, for reading a good book, studying something new, and thinking about what we have learned, and what we want to learn. Many Americans are ready to learn new things, and to throw out some old assumptions about the economy, government, their own career paths, and the usefulness and appropriateness of their life choices. I hope that the external pressures on many Americans today – the appearance of stubborn and demoralizing financial constraint, lost opportunities, and wasted educations – will cause us to search for answers in new places – from our friends, families and communities, from the very old and from the very young, from knowledge centers that are outside of and far beyond government-stamped and state media approved messages.
All I want for Christmas is a new storyline of sweet liberty and proud independence, to be heard by a hundred million jaded Americans, of all ages, for the first time.
Christmas is a Christian celebration, but it is truly something that should be celebrated each day, in peace, in forbearance, in humble joy and gratefulness for God’s love, His generosity and His guidance. I’d like to think that we Christians might someday be able to show that Gandhi was wrong about us – that we do indeed follow the Prince of Peace in our daily lives, in our relationships at home and at work, and through our participation in politics. It is impossible for a true Christian to cheer war, to celebrate death, disease, destruction and poverty, to wish ill on others. It is downright devilish for Christians to claim their faith while exalting human governments that seek war on the basis of lies, that sow fear and loathing in the name of empire or government survival, and governments that would steal the very future from their own children in the name of patriotism. All I want for Christmas is a glimpse of real Christianity, in our lives and in our politics.
It may be too much to ask that Americans rediscover liberty and newly cherish the freedom to buy and sell, to trade and to create. It would require a certain measure of courage for Americans, in the millions, to rise up, denounce the fascist state and refuse to support it any longer. To wake up on Christmas morning and find that Americans thinking for themselves would be an astonishing gift. To witness Christians all over the country following Jesus in the way He asked us would be a wonderful gift, and would lead to a fundamental and rapid change for the better in our economy and our government.
God knows what we need even before we ask Him, so I’ve been taught. That being the case, maybe I should see to it that I love liberty more passionately. I’ll add a grain of pure courage to my morning coffee, and I will try to think more independently, and step away from the party lines. I’ll see if I can live my Christianity in a more honest way. All that would make for a lovely Christmas, and it would be more than enough.
But Santa, if there is room for one more gift, please give me the opportunity to vote Ron Paul for President in 2012. Merry Christmas, America!
This originally appeared on Freedom's Phoenix's e-Zine December 2, 2011.
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