Rhodes News

Is this an appropriate display of the American flag? Some might argue it is totally inappropriate. After all, The U.S. Code, Section 285b of Title 2 outlines the protocol for our American flag. Paragraph 176 states:

The flag should never be displayed with the union (blue field and stars) down, except as a signal of dire distress in instances of extreme danger to life or property. [Emphasis added.]

The use of this signal is a part of our American heritage. During the Revolutionary War, our naval vessels used this method to signal distress to friendly ships within line of sight.

At this point in time in the progression of the American experiment, our nation has fallen under a grim dictatorship: A dictatorship comprised of a self-serving coalition of corrupt, wealthy, special interests, and a small group of self-anointed individuals who believe they know better than the average citizen about how we ought to live our lives.

For example, our budget deficit grew four-fold in the first eight months of this year alone. The Federal Reserve doubled our money supply in an attempt to monetize our massive $11 trillion debt. (Try to imagine this: one trillion equals a million, million.) Most of this money (under the guise of the term “bailouts”) fills the pockets of special interests who roam the halls of Congress.

Making matters worse is that China, one of our nation’s primary adversaries both militarily and economically, is buying up our debt by the cargo-ship-load, weakening our position on the world stage. As our currency printing presses run at record speed, steep inflation looms on the horizon.

Unemployment rates are approaching double-digits, and are 17 to 25 percent in some sectors. That does not include workers who have accepted wage cuts, hourly cuts, settled for a lower-paying jobs, or simply gave up looking for work altogether.  The New York Times recently reported we haven't experienced an economy this harsh since the end of World War II, and if the economy slides any further, it will be the worst downturn since the Great Depression.

Forty years ago we passed the Civil Rights Act, and enacted Great Society programs and "the War on Poverty."  Now, some $9 trillion later, we are no closer to ending poverty within our borders.  A sizable portion of our Africa-American population still languish, imprisoned in the slums of  segregated ghettos across our landscape. They are denied upward mobility, stuck inside no-alternative-choice school districts that are at the bottom-of-the-barrel amongst an already deplorable nation-wide   educational system.

We send our defense forces around the globe where our sons and daughters fight, die, get maimed for life, or come back never the same. We send them for purposes that neither we, nor our soldiers can accurately explain.

Meanwhile, as our defense forces are overseas meddling in other people’s affairs, we neglect the defense of our own sovereign border where we are importing poverty by the millions.  We welcome illegal aliens, drug traffickers, gang members, and career criminals with a wink and a nod (and even grant them legal immunity to prosecute against our own gatekeepers).  In turn, we reward illegals with drivers licenses, business loans, free education for their children, in-state tuition, college pell grants, mortgages, and free health care at any emergency room.   And not-so-incidentally, illegals now comprise half of California’s prison population.

Our taxes, combined at the federal, state and municipal levels currently approach fifty percent.   Now add to that the intangible tax of business regulation, which has grown completely out of control.  We have placed such a heavy regulatory burden on our domestic industrial product that it has handicapped our global competitiveness.  Economists in Sacramento have has released a study showing that government regulations cost California a third of the state’s domestic product (nearly $500 billion). Extrapolate that across the country and we have tax rates that approach 70 to 80 percent.

But wait.  We’re not done yet.  Now add to that the inflation tax we pay as the value of our paychecks diminish due to currency devaluation by our Federal Reserve (an unconstitutional entity, in itself) and we see that the overall tax rate balloons even higher.

Despite our insatiable spending at record levels, we cannot even tend to the basics.  Medicare and Social Security are both insolvent while our infrastructure crumbles from decay and neglect.  For example, the maintenance of our power grid and highway system languish in a shameful state of disrepair when compared to Europe and Asia.

And finally, the self-anointed seem determined to destroy one of the last refuges of America's greatness:  our state-of-the-art health care system.  Despite rising costs, (perhaps because of them) our system has become the envy of the world.   Yet  Congress’ plan will result in less choice, fewer health care providers, longer waits, deterioration of quality, and yes, higher overall costs.

Together the coalition of the corrupt and self-anointed operate in unison to dupe the third leg of this dictatorship, the ignorant masses.  Our education system has been dumbed down--and for some educators this act has been quite deliberate.  We have become so ignorant that most voters haven’t a clue about the heritage of our nation, our core values, and our God-endowed rights secured to us by the sacred bloodshed of past generations.

To illustrate this point, two-thirds of Americans believe that Karl Marx’s axiom “from each according to his ability, to each according to his needs,” is written into our Constitution.    Two thirds. How can such an ignorant and uneducated populace defend its rights, against tyrannical and self-serving leaders, if it doesn’t even know such rights exist?  Imagine, these people are walking into our voting booths.

So I return to the original question at hand: is it appropriate to display the American symbol of distress?  Decide for yourself.  As for me, I'll continue to fly my distress signal until we unite as a people and take our country back by a peaceful, and entirely American revolution.