America for Americans

By Lee Dobry

America for Americans is Dobry's attempt to explain some of the basic concepts of America, things that the schools are not allowed to teach nowadays. Basic things like what is the idea of America? What makes this country unique in the history of the world? Where does money come from, and who decides how much each country gets? We hear about everyone's "Constitutional Rights," but what are they? Why would anyone in their right mind want to destroy the Constitution, the one document that guarantees our protections against a tyrannical government. What is socialism, at least today's version of it? Can socialism really work long term in America? What is the cost of socialism? What is the socialist agenda? What is the conservative agenda? These are things that all Americans need to understand well, what we have and what we stand to lose. America is at a critical point right now. What we do in the 2020 elections will not only determine what kind of life we will have, but also what kind of life our children and grandchildren and their children will have, and we need to be keenly aware of that. Will they live free, or will they live as subjects under an all-controlling government? We need to consider that very carefully because your freedom is like your life: once you give it up, you won't get it back. We all need to be well-informed with the truth before we make decisions that will have irreversible consequences for the future generations of Americans. We have the right to throw away our own freedoms if we so choose. We do not have the right to throw away theirs. And it's not just about the 2020 elections. It won't end there. The fight to keep socialist forces from taking away Americans' freedom will go on until either they win or we defeat them. There can be no compromise between freedom and slavery. It's one or the other. There is no middle ground.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Christian Faith Publishing, Inc.
• Release date: Feb 21, 2020
• ISBN: 9781098014353

Book preview

What Is the Idea of America?

I admit that I am very biased, but I believe that America is the greatest country the world has ever known. I have been around the world about seven times and seen some of the oldest countries in the world during my time as merchant seaman. Too many people in America have never been outside this country and have no idea what the rest of the world is like. They are too willing to believe what they are told or what they see on TV. I have seen how people live in other countries in the world, the conditions that little children live and grow up in.

There have been many other great civilizations in the history of the world that have come and gone: the Chinese, Egyptian, Roman, Ottoman, British, you name them. But none of these great civilizations grew from nothing to be the greatest, most powerful, richest, and freest civilization in the world in a mere five hundred years. I admit that in my travels, I didn’t see a lot of the more advanced countries. Most of my voyages were to jungle countries and war zones. Old countries, but not what we consider modern civilizations. But from those travels, and from what I have learned through other channels, I know that there is NO country on earth to equal America. We are blessed to be the greatest country the world has ever known. But we are dangerously close to the tipping point and close to losing her forever. And if we do lose her, it will be no one’s fault but our own, and it will be nearly impossible to get her back.

So how did we get here? Where did we come from? We started out as several settlements in the New World, primarily by adventurers and people looking for a better life and willing to work hard for it. Most of them came from England, others from Spain, France, Portugal, and Italy. But no matter where they came from, they came from the same kind of society. A king or queen and their royal family ruled everyone’s lives and lived in luxury. They appointed lords and granted them titles and estates, and the lords paid a large yearly tax to support the royal family, and the royalty backed them up. All others were peasants who lived on and worked the land and turned over about half of what they produced to the lords. They owned nothing except the clothes on their backs and a few meager personal belongings, not even the hovels they lived in. They were essentially slaves to the lords and the royalty.

If the king decided to go to war, the peasants were pressed into the military to fight and die for the king. If they didn’t, their lord would kick them off their land and starve their families.

If you were born into royalty, you lived your life as royalty. If you were born into the propertied class, you lived as a lord. If you were born a peasant, you were a peasant for life. No way out, no matter how hard you worked. There was no such thing as upward mobility.

And there was nothing written anywhere that mandated or limited the power and authority of the crown. If the king wanted your property, he took it and gave it to whomever he pleased. If you offended him, he could just have you thrown in jail for as long as he wanted. You had no right to a fair trial before your peers. And if the king wanted to have you eliminated, all he had to do was give the order: OFF WITH HIS HEAD! And that was that. No lawyers filing appeals. No reprieves (unless the king changed his mind or something).

Those early pilgrims and settlers who came to the New World, came with the hope of being able to build a life for themselves and their children. All they wanted was the opportunity to make their own way and to keep the fruits of their own labor. No promises, no guarantees. Just the opportunity to make a new life, that’s all. But as with most colonial settlements, the ruling class extends their reach even across oceans to rule the lives of the commoners and exact their tribute, so even in the New World, the old rules still applied. Finally, when the pressure of oppression drove them to the breaking point, they rebelled, declared themselves a free and independent country, and fought British rule and the British army, and won their independence at the cost of much blood and suffering. But they felt it was worth the price they had to pay. Do we?

After freedom was won, our forefathers spent many months debating how this new independent nation was going to be governed, instead of ruled. And they came up with the idea of America: a system of self-government, a system where the power to govern resides with the governed, a system where the government serves the people rather than the people serving a ruling class. The foundation of this completely new type of government is the Constitution of the United States and was unique in the history of the world. Some of the outstanding aspects of this New Type of system were:

Three separate branches of the government:

The Legislative Branch: representatives elected by the people that writes the laws we live by.

The Executive Branch elected by the people that carries out and enforces the laws.

The Judicial Branch appointed by the Executive and Legislative branches that administers justice and interprets the law and the Constitution.

In addition to these three branches being separate, they are equipped with a system of checks and balances to prevent any one branch from becoming too powerful. The Legislative branch has ways to keep the Executive and Judicial branches in check. The Executive branch keeps the Legislative and Judicial branches in check, and the Judicial branch keeps the Legislative and Executive branches in check. It was ingenious and unique in all the world.

Unlike the monarchs in the world, our Founding Fathers put a great effort into limiting and containing the power of the government rather than imposing and securing it. That also is unique.

And to make doubly sure that they and their descendants, all the way down to you and I and all our descendants, are assured those rights, they made the first ten amendments to that Constitution called the Bill of Rights, which specifically lays out the essential rights of all American citizens.

Those first ten amendments guarantee us the rights of:

Freedom of religion, free speech, freedom of the press, and freedom to assemble.

Freedom to keep and bear arms.

Freedom from having soldiers unlawfully enter your home.

Freedom from unlawful search and seizure.

Freedom from having to testify against oneself.

The Right to a fair and speedy trial by an impartial jury.

Freedom from double jeopardy.

Freedom from cruel or unusual punishment.

The Guarantee that these constitutional rights shall not be denied by other rights retained by the people.

Powers not specifically assigned to the federal government by the constitution are reserved to the states or the people.

Since then, seventeen more amendments have be added, further defining the powers of the government and guaranteeing the rights of American citizens.

In 1789, when the constitution of the United States was ratified, followed by the Bill of Rights in 1791, these freedoms were seen as absolutely essential for a free people who had always lived in tyranny. We take these rights for granted, but we should not.

Even as late as the twentieth century, the same civilized nation that we had freed ourselves from was still oppressing other countries with the same brutality they had used on us. In 1919, a crowd of nonviolent protesters and pilgrims in Amritsar, India, were fired upon by troops of the British Indian army under the command of Colonel Reginald Dyer, resulting in an estimated 1,500 casualties, over 1,000 of them fatal, because they had assembled peacefully in defiance of British rule.

Colonel Dyer was originally lauded as a hero, and although he was later censured and forced to retire, he was never held accountable for the deaths of over 1,000 innocent men women and children.

And even today in the twenty-first century, we see many millions of people around the world who still live in tyranny.

Our constitution guarantees our freedom from the evil of an oppressive and tyrannical government. How many of us have ever even read it? How many of us understand what it says? If you have not read it, you should. It is not that voluminous. The copy I printed out is only seventeen pages, but it is the basis for your freedom! There are forces in this country trying to destroy it! We must preserve, protect, and defend that constitution at all costs. If you are not familiar with it, get a copy of it and read it. You can go online, google it, and print it out so easily.

What Are an American Citizen’s Rights?

It’s hard to turn on the TV nowadays without seeing some group of people protesting for and demanding their rights. But what are our rights as US citizens? Our Declaration of Independence lists three of the most basic rights: Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Happiness. These truly are our rights, and according to that declaration, those rights are given to us by our creator and cannot be taken away.

But even these unalienable rights have conditions and limitations (as all rights do) particularly in that they must not infringe on the same rights of others. My right to life is contingent on my respecting your right to life. Conversely, my right to life may be forfeited if I take away your right to life (i.e., murder). My right to liberty depends on my respecting your right to liberty. My right to the pursuit of happiness does not include the right to rape your wife or molest your children for my own happiness. My freedom of religion requires that I respect yours also. My liberty in political opinion means that I have to tolerate yours even if I disagree with it. All my rights are contingent on acknowledging and respecting yours as well. As I am writing this (February 2017), political, religious, and ethnic tolerance seems to be at an all-time low because we are consumed with demanding our rights and completely disregarding the rights of others, especially of those with whom we disagree.

Rights vs. Goods

Our culture today seems to be one where I can get anything I want if I protest, demonstrate, and scream enough that something is my right. Health care is a right of all Americans. Education is a right of all Americans. Food is a right of all Americans. Water, housing, electricity, whatever. Well, that’s just not true. Those things are not rights; they are goods and services. Rights are things that can simply be declared and enforced by law. Besides the right to life liberty and the pursuit of happiness, as Americans we have the rights guaranteed to us in the Bill of Rights and later the amendments to the Constitution. They are:

Freedom of religion, speech, press, assembly, and petition.

The Right to keep and bear arms.

Freedom from quartering soldiers.

Freedom from unreasonable search and seizures.

Right to due process of law, freedom from self-incrimination and double jeopardy.

Right to a speedy and public trial.

Right to a trial by jury.

Freedom from excessive bail, cruel, and unusual punishment.

Other rights of the people.

Freedom from slavery or involuntary servitude.

Civil rights

The right of all citizens eighteen years of age and older to vote, regardless of race, color sex, or previous condition of servitude.

These things are our rights as American citizens.

Products and services can’t just be demanded or granted. They are things that have to be produced or provided by the labor of others. It’s not a matter of whether I need it or think that I somehow deserve it. I am entitled to demand my rights. I am NOT entitled to demand your labor, free of charge. That would constitute involuntary servitude for you, in violation of your rights under the thirteenth amendment.

For example, for me to receive food, a farmer has to raise it, and harvest it. Processors have to process it. Truck drivers have to deliver it, grocers have to stock it in their stores. Should all those people have to do that for free? Of course not. They deserve to be paid for their labor and their investment. Someone has to pay a fair price for their labor; if not me, then someone else. The knee-jerk answer for the democratic socialists is that it should be provided by the government.

Problem! The government doesn’t produce anything. The government can only do two things:

Take it away from you, to give it to me, which violates your rights under the thirteenth amendment.

Or tax you and use the money to buy the food and give it to me, which is just a less obvious way of doing the same thing, but it still violates my rights under the thirteenth amendment.

Either way, it’s still the same. Your right to enjoy the fruits of your hard work are being violated in order to give me something that I did not work for. It is unfair, it is un-American, and it is unconstitutional, but it is done every day through programs like welfare, food stamps, government-assisted housing Medicaid, and others like them.

If you talk about putting limits or reasonable conditions on welfare or food stamps, the immediate response you get from the socialists is that would be violating their constitutional rights. Show me where the constitution gives anyone the right to welfare payments, free food, free health care free housing, or free anything else.

If our esteemed socialist congressmen and women want to go out and raise crops themselves with the work of their own hands, harvest them, and deliver them to the needy, that is their right to do. If they choose to use their money to buy food for the poor, that is their right also, and I defend it. It is NOT their right to steal my money to give to someone else.

You have a right to have dinner in a nice restaurant, and I defend that right no matter what your race, religion, gender, or sexual preference. Just because I don’t pick up your check doesn’t mean that I am denying you your rights. It IS your right to have dinner in a nice restaurant. It is also your responsibility to pay the check, not mine!

The second amendment guarantees your right to own a gun. That doesn’t mean that I have to buy one for you. It is your right to own a gun. It is also your responsibility to buy it, not mine!

Health care is the big issue now. As I write this, the Affordable Care Act (aka Obamacare) is in the process of being changed (to remove the individual mandate) and hopefully replaced with another piece of legislation to help ensure (not force) health care for those who want it. I agree that adequate health care for everyone is a good thing, just as adequate food, water, clothing, and shelter are good things, but they are not rights. They are goods and services that must be paid for. Your labor to provide some of those things for me must be balanced by my labor to provide some of those things for you. No one has the right to sit back and get what they want or need for free, while others are required to work to provide for their own needs and the needs of everyone else. That’s just not fair, and NOWHERE in the Constitution are they required or guaranteed.

For you to have health care, people who spent many years in school and many thousands of dollars to get their education and skills have to get up in the morning and go to work in an office or hospital to take care of you. Don’t they deserve something for that? Wouldn’t you? Those people need things too. Food, clothing, shelter, the same things you and I need. Don’t they deserve their fair share too? Things that other people have to work to produce are not rights; they are goods and services that require labor to produce and therefore must be earned. If you consume them, you should pay for them. If you don’t, someone else who did not receive them had to pay for them, and that’s not fair. I don’t have a right to the fruits of someone else’s hard work just because I want it, or need it, or because I think I have a right to it.

President Obama is, in my opinion, a genius, especially when it comes to political skills. He is a great and inspiring orator and a master of the false argument. For example, when he was running into resistance to the Affordable Care Act by Republicans, his response to the news media was always I don’t understand why republicans are against people being able to buy affordable health care?

No republican ever argued against people being able to buy affordable health care! That was a completely false argument!

Republicans argued against people being:

Forced to buy health care.

Forced to buy the health care that the government decides they should buy.

Forced to pay for their own health care, plus having to pay for health care for someone else (through their taxes) who is not paying their fair share.

The statement Hilary Clinton, Bernie Sanders, Alexandria Ocasio Cortez, and a host of other socialists throw out repeatedly "Health care is a basic right of all Americans" is a false argument! Nowhere in the constitution or the bill of rights does it grant anyone free health care (or free anything!) But the socialists believes that if they keep saying it often enough and with enough authority and enthusiasm, eventually people will believe it. And to some degree, they are right. They are not stupid, especially when it comes to manipulative skills. Well, they keep saying it, so I guess it must be true. No it’s not! Show it to me in the Constitution. The only way free health care will become a right is if Congress passes a law that makes it so.

Wait a minute, isn’t that what Affordable Care Act (Obamacare) did?

NO! Obamacare, passed by a democratic socialist Congress that didn’t even read it, and exempted themselves from it, didn’t grant anyone the right to health care. It forced it on us all. And it was based entirely on lies: If you like your doctor, you can keep your doctor. If you like your health care plan, you can keep your health care plan. The average family will save $2,500 a year. All lies. And because of that, the American people elected a president who promised (among other things) to repeal and replace Obamacare. It won’t be easy. The democratic socialists will fight it tooth and nail because coming up with a plan that will truly help people get more affordable health care would give those people more control over their lives and their decisions. That is NOT the objective of the democratic socialists. Their objective is to Force you into their program in order to Control You! There is a world of difference!

Republicans all agree that I should be able to purchase affordable health care and that it is MY responsibility to pay for it, not yours.

There are things that all Americans need to pay for collectively. They include our military and border defense, and our duly elected government representatives, and other services for the common good that we as individuals cannot provide individually. But things (i.e., goods and services) that can be provided for by individuals should be. When we talk about fair share, one of the fair shares that we need to consider is that all Americans should pay their fair share of the tax burden for the common good of the country: defense, interstate highways, and the administration of our government.

As it is now, there are too many people demanding their rights to all kinds of free stuff, and too few taxpayers carrying the burden to pay for them. Whatever happened to what a former great Democratic president said: "Ask not what your country can do for you. Ask what you can do for your country"? The Democratic party has changed a lot since 1961.

As an American, What Is Your Fair Share?

Former president Barack Obama made it a big part of his campaign: He is going to make sure that everyone gets their Fair Share. Well, who can argue with that? Of course, everyone deserves their Fair Share, don’t they? But here’s the catch: how do you define your Fair Share? Who determines what your Fair Share is?

For President Obama, the answer is the government determines what your fair share should be. Barak Obama or Hillary Clinton will take what you have in taxes, and they and their socialist party will decide what you should have (i.e., Your Fair share).

My definition of your fair share is a little different. Your Fair Share is what you earn, period. Whether it is a lot, or a little, or nothing! What you earn is what you should get. Everyone deserves the opportunity to determine and earn their fair share, but not to have it given to them, or taken away.

This was part of what the original settlers and pioneers in the New World came looking for. Not a place where the sovereign lord determines your station in society and what you should or should not have. They were looking for a place where each person has the freedom to determine their own lot in life by how hard they were willing to work, what risks they were willing to take, and how they were willing to use their God-given creativity and imagination. That is how America grew to be the greatest, freest, and wealthiest nation the earth has ever known. One of the things that can hang people up is that with freedom comes risk. When you live in a land where you are free to be all that you can be, to take a gamble, to do something new or something great, there also comes the opportunity to fail. Is the risk of failure bad? Failure is often just a part of the learning process that leads to ultimate success. Political liberals will try to sell us on their ideal world where there is no risk of failure. An all-benevolent government ensures that everyone gets their fair share, no risk of failure, everyone gets the same government allotted share (except, of course, the politicians and the elite class. More about that later.)

The problem with this no risk idealistic society that the socialists try to sell us is that if there is no risk, there is no opportunity for success, only existence. There are some people who will settle for that, and that’s their right. It is NOT their right to force it on me.

Actually, people who want to live in that kind of society have lots of options. They don’t have to try to change America for all of us. You can go to any communist country—Russia, China, North Korea—and live a life that is completely controlled by the government. You do what you are told, and you get what you are given. Or if you want to stay in America, just commit a serious crime and go to jail. You’ll have your utopia! You don’t have to work; you get three good meals every day. If you get sick, you get free medical care; get a cavity, the dentist fills it for free. Best of all, you will never have to decide what to do about anything! You will be told what to do every day of your life. But you lose your FREEDOM! That’s the price you pay for this carefree, responsibility-free, risk-free utopia. You lose your Freedom. You can’t have both: a totally carefree, no-risk, all-paid for life and still have Freedom. The two are mutually exclusive.

Back in the days of slavery in this country, slave owners and other proponents of slavery actually claimed that slavery was a Good thing, not just for the plantation owners, but also for the slaves! After all, slaves were given their food every day (or slop, maybe even some of what was left over from the master’s table).

Slaves were provided with free housing—shacks really. Unless you worked in the big house, then you might even