#12: USA 1776 & Taiwan 1895 INDEPENDENCE. 07.7.4=3 10:00pm.

I. Taiwan Independence Proclaimed: 5/23/1895:

" Resisting the betrayal and abandonment by the signing of Sino-Japan Shimonosheiki Treaty of 1895, Taiwanese established an independent Republic of Democratic Taiwan with its own Congress, flag and postage stamps, the very first country did such things in Asia.

In 1936, China's Mao publicly supported the idea of a restoration of Taiwan's independence, as reported by writer Egar Snow in his book "Redstar Over China".

In 1952, SFPT affirmed Taiwan's status as being freed and independent from its former colonial powers, China and Japan, and to be under the U.S. Military Government's protection, a case under court proceedings in Washington DC since 2006.

Your positive and constructive comments and advices will be earnestly appreciated.

Sincerely,

C. C.
Sacramento, Ca"

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II. USA:

A. 'Recapturing the Spirit of Independence', by Ron Paul :
http://www.lewrockwell.com/paul/paul395.html

"This week Americans will gather around the grill, attend parades and watch fireworks displays, all in the celebration of the signing of our Declaration of Independence. At the same time, we will have thousands of bureaucrats, troops and agents stationed in countries across the globe being paid by American tax dollars.

On the anniversary of our declaring our own independence from the British, it is certainly appropriate that we reflect on the nature and spirit of independent nationhood. While our founding fathers were individual men in a historically unique situation, they posited that the principles upon which they rested our national independence were timeless.

If we truly honor the men who brought about Independence Day, we would do well to spend at least as much time reflecting on the Declaration of Independence, and the principles upon which it is based, " ... ... "many of the nation’s elite – or what we used to call the Eastern Establishment.

I believe there is no way to square our nation’s traditions and reverence for independence with the globalist policies these elites are currently pursuing. The American concept of independent nationhood inscribed in our Declaration cannot be maintained if we are going to pursue a policy that undermines the independence of other nations. National independence is an idea, and the erosion of the independence of other nations only serves to erode that idea."
... ...
"In addition, as our founding fathers understood, the idea of national independence is inseparable from that of constitutional republicanism. Only the safeguards and limitations that are enshrined in a constitutionally-limited republic can prohibit a nation from lurching toward empire. Recognizing these same protections is also the very best way to eliminate the need for civil wars and the violence of civil strife.

Moreover, this constitutional republicanism is essential to protecting the individual rights and self-determination that is at the heart of our Declaration. As we celebrate the 231ist anniversary of our nation’s birth, I hope every person who reads or hears this will take the time to go back and read the Declaration of Independence. Only by recapturing the spirit of independence can we ensure our government never resembles the one from which the American States declared their separation."
... ...
"July 4, 2007
Dr. Ron Paul is a Republican member of Congress from Texas."

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B. 'The Case for Independence', by Anthony Gregory :
http://www.lewrockwell.com/gregory/gregory138.html

"On July 4th libertarians celebrate the rejection of empire. Politicians more likely see it as the US government’s birthday. If they’re right, we should think it a tragic commemoration indeed.

No, I see the Fourth as an independence celebration to which our government has no rightful claim. Seventeen seventy-six was, after all, five years before they ratified the Articles of Confederation and a full eleven years before the Constitution was completed. As our national mythos goes, it was on this day that America declared its separation from the British state. This is a day to remember liberation, disunion, the idea that a house divided might be more civil, peaceful and secure than one kept together by force.

In light of this heritage and Jefferson’s wonderful declaration, I believe we should consider the possible benefits were the American people to reclaim the spirit of 1776 and apply its principles to the present day. I believe we should contemplate the possibility that what Americans and foreigners need is independence from the empire. "
... ...
"Today, the US empire is everything the British empire was: It claims the banner of constitutional justice at home, it feigns interest in freedom abroad, it poses as the embodiment of liberty itself. But it treats those in its clutches, especially those in its remote grasp, as dispensable means to an imperial end. It slaughters civilians with no regard for the number. It enforces martial law in its exploits abroad. It is the champion and vindicator, not of foreign liberty, but of theocracies and socialist states everywhere. In the course of its reign, it has laid waste to millions of lives.

George W. Bush is a far greater tyrant than King George ever was. He claims the right to seize anyone in all the world – his designated battlefield in the war on terror – and deprive him of liberty or life without anything approaching due process, without a right to an attorney, without habeas corpus. Under recent presidents and especially today’s, the US has become just what John Quincy Adams warned it might: The Dictatress of the World."
... ...
"As for the American people, we should consider independence, too. For starters, half our income is taxed away and we have the biggest prison population on the planet. American government is much worse for American liberty than the British empire was, to an almost obscene degree.

Open up Common Sense and notice the radical insights about being governed from afar. There is simply no sense or justice in the same central state ruling everybody from Hawaii to Virginia, from Arizona to Vermont. The American Republic was a half-decent experiment, as far as such political experiments go, but it didn’t guarantee liberty even when the American population was 2% the size it is today.

American freedom and international peace will always be a mirage so long as the beast in Washington, DC, lords it over everyone on earth. There have always been Americans who saw no limits to the US government’s power, but let us once and for all tell these Hamiltonians and Wilsonians that we are sick of their crazed expansions and invasions and want some peace and freedom for a change.

Americans make particularly terrible imperialists. We are a people who prefer privacy and liberty in our own lives. We are a people with independence and rebellion in our national heritage. Ours is thus an even more hypocritical empire than that of the British. It’s long past time Americans stopped trampling across the globe as conquerors. As long as we pursue such conquests, we ourselves will remain conquered, shackled by our own chains. Edmund Burke’s rebuke of his nation’s imperial policy and his defense of American independence apply today as never before.

Our government, the biggest in human history, is the greatest threat to our freedom, drain on our wealth, and fomenter of international conflict. We cannot keep empire if we want liberty. We cannot be free if we seek to boss all of mankind around. To have the freedom that Jefferson described, we must let go of our foreign satellites and allow our compatriots and international brothers and sisters the freedom we want for ourselves.

Is such independence possible? Absolutely. Empires crumble. In 1775, few thought the Americans would soon be their own nation. The British empire suffered from pretensions to eternal life. The US empire may in some ways be unique, but it is no more permanent than any other. In stark contrast, the principles of human nature declared to the world from a small Philadelphia gathering 231years ago were true then, years before the US empire was born, and will remain true long after the US empire collapses.

July 4, 2007
Anthony Gregory [send him mail] is a writer and musician who lives in Berkeley, California. He is a research analyst at the Independent Institute. See his webpage for more articles and personal information.
Copyright © 2007 LewRockwell.com"

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C. 'Does Freedom Come With Responsibilities?', by Wilton D. Alston :
http://www.lewrockwell.com/alston/alston24.html

... ...
... ... "When will we see an end to the coercive state? When will a critical mass of society embrace what Rothbard called "methodological individualism"? Maybe even more importantly, am I doing all I can to bring us closer to that point, sooner versus later?
That last question springs from my history in activism, the tried-and-true belief that one can do something, that one should do something, to help the process along. No one wants to find himself repeating Pastor Niemöller’s lament! " ... ...
... ...
"My endurance is waning. How about yours?

July 4, 2007
Wilt Alston [send him mail] lives in Rochester, NY, with his wife and three children. When he’s not training for a marathon or furthering his part-time study of libertarian philosophy, he works as a principal research scientist in transportation safety, focusing primarily on the safety of subway and freight train control systems.
Copyright © 2007 LewRockwell.com"

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D. "Neocon Lies About Lincoln":

'Party Hacks, Propagandists and Apologists', by Thomas J. DiLorenzo :
http://www.lewrockwell.com/dilorenzo/dilorenzo124.html