Would Paul Ryan Have Signed The Declaration Of Independence?

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From the moment I started blogging here in July of 2006, I knew Paul Ryan and others with the same ideological bent were destroyers of American exceptionalism and on a collision course with our nation's social compact that was initially forged with the last sentence in the Declaration of Independence. It reads...

— And for the support of this Declaration, with a firm reliance on the protection of Divine Providence, we mutually pledge to each other our Lives, our Fortunes, and our sacred Honor.

Many economic experts have warned that our national debt today has the immediate potential of destroying America financially and otherwise. There has been a steady stream of references and slogans describing our nations' debt as "entering the abyss," "doomsday," an "economic apocalypse," "heading off a cliff," and we're at the "final crossroads." I think Congressman Ryan would even agree with those assessments.

Yet, when our Founding Fathers stood at the abyss against the King of England during the birth of our nation, they laid out in exact and certain terms what the proper course of action is expected from the colonies. They knew individual sacrifices must be made and that wealth would be confiscated and destroyed. When Lewis Morris of New York was about to sign the Declaration of Independence, story has it that his brother strongly advised against it, warning that he could lose all of his property and wealth for the sake of others with much less to lose. But Morris told his brother, "Damn the consequences, give me the pen."

The Founders did not have to take that route. Many of these men were relatively wealthy in their own right with businesses and property for the times. They could have listened to Morris's brother and kept their worldly possessions in exchange for capitulating to the king. Or they could have declared their independence without that last sentence "mutually pledging their lives and fortunes." They could have said we're a nation of individuals, it's "every man for himself" and may the best man win. They easily could have. But they did not.

Being the last sentence in the Declaration of Independence makes it even more important as the shaping stone for the coming Constitution. THAT is the foundation of our country and that is why I strongly believe today that many of the Tea Party Republicans following the doctrine of Ayn Rand, and that includes Paul Ryan, would never sign that document of independence.

Those words "we mutually pledge" to each other our Lives, our Fortunes, and our sacred Honor when they were standing at the abyss, are not the words of cowardly men with their tail between their legs who exist for their own sake, that his responsibility is only to himself, or that he must not sacrifice himself for others. They didn't say we pledged enough already. Yet, what would the founders think of us today if they knew that they were willing to give their lives and fortunes for the birth of a country that two hundred years later would face a debt crisis where its inhabitants would not mutually pledge those selfless virtues again to defend or stop the nation from entering another abyss?

Heck, we have congressmen who won't even eliminate tax loopholes on the wealthiest individuals and corporations even if it would keep us from going over the fiscal cliff, unless they drop the tax rates to loopholed levels. They're willing to pledge less - that's the extent of their sacrifice.

Ayn Rand's retarded ideology along with Ryan's attempt to reshape our government and its purpose of existence away from the founders compact and into an abstract creation based on Rand's novels are not only anti-Christian but also inherently un-American. We are a compassionate country built on sharing and sacrifice, not by choice, but by declaration.