No Mr Clinton, We the People Will Not Be Quiet

Apparently, ex-President Clinton feels that US citizens are "disoriented" if they feel that government must be stopped from bankrupting the country, by encouraging citizens to use peaceful and democratic means to demonstrate and “vote the bums out”. Our ex-President said, "I realized that there were lot of parallels between the early '90s and now, both in the feeling of economic dislocation, the level of uncertainty people felt, the rise of kind of identity politics, the rise of the militia movements and right-wing talk radio, with a lot of what's going on in the blogosphere now, and in the right-wing media." Here, our ex-President attempts to rewrite history and mitigate the responsibility he and Janet Reno have never accepted for Oklahoma City; namely Ruby Ridge and Waco. What the US faced in the “mid-‘90s”, was an overzealous ATF and FBI, who felt it was their responsibility to root out Second Amendment advocates that mistrusted the government enough to hold up in some out of the way place and tell the Feds to go away and not bother them. While most Americans know little about these two incidents, those with more interest know they ended very badly with the blame placed squarely on then President Clinton and his Attorney General, Janet Reno. Ruby Ridge was later determined by court hearings, to be the result of an out of control ATF, FBI and by proxy, the federal government. WACO was also shown to be mainly the fault of over zealousness and and impatient law enforcement, chasing hypothetical criminal activity. Dick Morse said later that Janet Reno blackmailed President Clinton to re-appoint her as the US Attorney General, or she would released, “the truth about Waco”.

So, when comparing the current Tea Party demonstrations, there are no parallels with the mid-90’s and Oklahoma City. The Tea Party movement is a constitutionally grounded movement, demonstrating for restrained and limited government, accountability and the rule of law. The incidents leading up to the Oklahoma City bombing, is like a countdown toward anti-government violence; 1992- Ruby Ridge, 1993- Waco, 1994- federal assault weapons ban, 1995- the Oklahoma City bombing. The first events threatened a small group of armed and extremely anti-government individuals, that resulted in the domestic terrorist bombing we know as Oklahoma City. No Mr President, there is no parallels here, only your attempts to silence those protesting our corrupt unresponsive government.

Ex-President Clinton said, "Fifteen years ago, the line was crossed in Oklahoma City. In the current climate, with so many threats against the president, members of Congress and other public servants, we owe it to the victims of Oklahoma City, and those who survived and responded so bravely, not to cross it again." The truth is of course, that we owe it to the victims of Oklahoma City, to maintain our First Amendment Rights, and to utilize our right to free speech when we disagree with your government; allowing rigorous and robust disagreement with the government is the very reason the First Amendment exists in our Constitution. No line was crossed, because our Constitution prevents the government from ever drawing such a line.

Finally Clinton warned "there is a big difference between criticizing a policy or a politician and demonizing the government that guarantees our freedoms and the public servants who enforce our laws." Again no, No Mr President! There is no difference! During the Bush (43) administration there were daily threats against the president; with books, movies and signs, calling for his assassination. Interestingly there was no call for restraint from Clinton, or any other Left leaning politician. Only when a group of peaceful Americans, with all polls showing them mirroring the beliefs of the majority of the county, use demonstrations to protest the policies of President Obama and the Democrat run Congress, has some line been crossed. Again I say No, there is no line here! The Tea Party is the physical manifestation of the American spirit, espousing its god given rights to freedom and liberty. Mr Clinton, the First Amendment says the government can not infringe on the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances. In this great country, the people are the government and have not only the right but the obligation to take back their government when they deem it necessary.