{"id":3096,"date":"2012-08-30T14:35:26","date_gmt":"2012-08-30T22:35:26","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/private-person.com\/blog\/?p=3096"},"modified":"2012-08-30T14:37:33","modified_gmt":"2012-08-30T22:37:33","slug":"retroactive-tyranny-justification","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/private-person.com\/blog\/2012\/08\/retroactive-tyranny-justification\/","title":{"rendered":"Retroactive Tyranny Justification"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><iframe width=\"480\" height=\"360\" data-src=\"http:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/DNZV7TrWVX0?modestbranding=1&amp;rel=0\" frameborder=\"0\" allowfullscreen src=\"data:image\/svg+xml;base64,PHN2ZyB3aWR0aD0iMSIgaGVpZ2h0PSIxIiB4bWxucz0iaHR0cDovL3d3dy53My5vcmcvMjAwMC9zdmciPjwvc3ZnPg==\" class=\"lazyload\" data-load-mode=\"1\"><\/iframe><br \/>\n&nbsp;<\/p>\n<blockquote><p><a href=\"http:\/\/www.larkenrose.com\/blog\/1894-youre-not-the-boss-of-me.html\" target=\"_blank\">http:\/\/www.larkenrose.com\/blog\/1894-youre-not-the-boss-of-me.html<\/a><\/p>\n<h1><em>YOU&#8217;RE NOT THE BOSS OF ME!<\/em><\/h1>\n<p>[The following is a written adaption of a talk given by Larken Rose\u00a0in Philadelphia, in front of Independence Hall, on July 4th, 2009.]<\/p>\n<p>Two hundred and thirty-three years ago, in Philadelphia, a bunch of<br \/>\nguys got together and wrote a letter to their king. The letter was<br \/>\nvery eloquent, and well thought out, but it basically boiled down<br \/>\nto this:<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;Dear King George,<\/p>\n<p>You&#8217;re not the boss of us!<\/p>\n<p>Sincerely,<\/p>\n<p>A Bunch of Troublemakers&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>That&#8217;s essentially what the Declaration of Independence was: a<br \/>\nbunch of radicals declaring that they would no longer recognize the<br \/>\nright of their king to rule them, at all, ever again. They went on<br \/>\nto create a new boss, which turned into a new oppressor, but we&#8217;ll<br \/>\nget to that in a moment. First, <!--more-->let&#8217;s consider the essence of that<br \/>\nattitude: &#8220;You&#8217;re not the boss of me!&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>This July 4th, like every year, millions of Americans are<br \/>\ncelebrating Independence Day with various parades, picnics,<br \/>\nfireworks, and so on. But <strong>how many of those people celebrating have<\/strong><br \/>\n<strong> ever actually considered what the Declaration was actually about,<\/strong><br \/>\n<strong> and what the colonists actually did?<\/strong> The colonists did not merely<br \/>\nbeg the king to change his ways. In fact, the Declaration explains<br \/>\nhow they had tried that, to no avail. Instead, the colonists were<br \/>\ndoing something far more drastic.<\/p>\n<p>In short, they committed treason. They broke the law. They<br \/>\ndisobeyed their government. They were traitors, criminals and tax<br \/>\ncheats. The Boston Tea Party was not merely a tax protest, but open<br \/>\nlawlessness. Furthermore, truth be told, some of the colonists were<br \/>\neven cop-killers. At Lexington, when King George&#8217;s &#8220;law enforcers&#8221;<br \/>\ntold the colonists to lay down their guns, the colonists responded<br \/>\nwith, &#8220;No, you&#8217;re not the boss of us!&#8221; (Well, that was the meaning,<br \/>\nif not the exact verbiage.) And so we had &#8220;The Shot Heard &#8216;Round<br \/>\nthe World,&#8221; widely regarded as the beginning of the American<br \/>\nRevolution.<\/p>\n<p>Looking back now, we know the outcome. We know who eventually won,<br \/>\nand we don&#8217;t mind cheering for the rebels. But <strong>make no mistake:<\/strong><br \/>\n<strong> when you cheer for the founders of this country, you are cheering<\/strong><br \/>\n<strong> for law-breakers and traitors.<\/strong> As well you should. But, for all the<br \/>\nflag-waving and celebrating that goes on every July 4th, do<br \/>\nAmericans actually believe in what the colonists did? Do they<br \/>\nreally believe in the attitude expressed in the Declaration of<br \/>\nIndependence? Are they really still capable of supporting a mantra<br \/>\nof &#8220;You&#8217;re not the boss of me!&#8221;?<\/p>\n<p>In, short, no. Imagine the equivalent of what the colonists did so<br \/>\nmany years ago, being done today. Imagine a group of people writing<br \/>\na letter to the United States government, sending a letter to<br \/>\nCongress and to the President, saying that they would no longer pay<br \/>\nfederal taxes, they would no longer obey federal laws, and that<br \/>\nthey would resist&#8211;by force, if necessary&#8211;any attempt by federal<br \/>\nagents to enforce those laws. How would a group which did such<br \/>\nthings be viewed today, by most Americans?<\/p>\n<p>They would be viewed as nut-cases, scofflaws and terrorists,<br \/>\ndespicable criminals and malcontents. They would be scorned as the<br \/>\nscum of the earth, despised by just about everyone who today<br \/>\ncelebrates Independence Day.<\/p>\n<p>How ironic.<\/p>\n<p>So why the double standard? Why would the American public today<br \/>\ncondemn the exact same attitudes and behaviors which they glorify<br \/>\nand praise in the context of the American Revolution? Quite simply,<br \/>\nit&#8217;s because, for all the proud talk of &#8220;land of the free and home<br \/>\nof the brave,&#8221; the spirit of resistance&#8211;<span style=\"color: #ff0000;\"><strong>the courage to say &#8220;You&#8217;re<\/strong><\/span><br \/>\n<span style=\"color: #ff0000;\"><strong> not the boss of us!&#8221;&#8211;has been trained out of the American people.<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n<h2>We have become a nation of wimps.<\/h2>\n<p>For years and years, in the churches and schools, on the news, in<br \/>\nthe media, and from everywhere around us, <strong>we have been taught one<\/strong><br \/>\n<strong> thing above all else: that obedience to authority is the highest<\/strong><br \/>\n<strong> virtue, and that disobedience is the worst sin.<\/strong> As a result, even<br \/>\nmost of those who now claim to be zealous advocates for individual<br \/>\nrights and personal liberty will almost always couch their<br \/>\n&#8220;demands&#8221; with disclaimers that, of course, their efforts for<br \/>\njustice will be done &#8220;within the system,&#8221; and that they would never<br \/>\nadvocate anything &#8220;illegal.&#8221; They claim to be devout proponents of<br \/>\nfreedom, and yet all they ever do is seek a political solution,<br \/>\nwhether through lobbying of politicians, elections, or other<br \/>\ngovernment-approved means.<\/p>\n<p>Of course, government never approves of anything which might<br \/>\nactually endanger government power. As the bumper-sticker says, &#8220;If<br \/>\nvoting made a difference, it would be illegal.&#8221; And why should<br \/>\ncivilized people assume that change must be done &#8220;legally&#8221; and<br \/>\n&#8220;within the system&#8221;? That is obviously NOT what the Declaration of<br \/>\nIndependence was about. <strong>In fact, the Declaration states quite<\/strong><br \/>\n<strong> plainly that when a government ceases to be a protector of<\/strong><br \/>\n<strong> individual liberty, it is not only the right, but the DUTY of the<\/strong><br \/>\n<strong> people to ALTER or ABOLISH that form of government.<\/strong><span style=\"color: #ff0000;\">In other words,\u00a0when the government becomes an oppressor, instead of a protector&#8211;<\/span><br \/>\n<span style=\"color: #ff0000;\"> as is obviously the case today&#8211;the people are morally obligated to<\/span><br \/>\n<span style=\"color: #ff0000;\"> adopt an attitude of, &#8220;You&#8217;re not the boss of us!&#8221;<\/span><\/p>\n<p>So how many Americans are doing that? Almost none. Instead, even<br \/>\nthe most vocal critics of corruption and injustice usually do<br \/>\nlittle more than banging their heads against a brick wall, begging,<br \/>\nin half a dozen different ways, for the tyrants to please be nicer<br \/>\nto us. (Meanwhile, they go to great lengths to distance themselves<br \/>\nfrom people like me, for fear of what the general public might<br \/>\nthink of them. As a result, I believe the general public, and those<br \/>\nin government, view them pretty much as I view them: as harmless<br \/>\nand irrelevant conformists, destined to forever beg for freedom,<br \/>\nand never achieve it.)<\/p>\n<p>Make no mistake, begging and whining is not what the Declaration of<br \/>\nIndependence was about. It was about breaking the law, when the law<br \/>\nis unjust. It was about committing treason, when the rulers became<br \/>\noppressive. It was about disobedience&#8211;civil disobedience, when<br \/>\neffective, and not-so-civil disobedience when necessary. It was<br \/>\nabout open resistance, including violent resistance when called<br \/>\nfor.<\/p>\n<p>So where is that attitude today? Where is the candidate advocating<br \/>\nsuch a thing? Patrick Henry, Thomas Paine, Samuel Adams&#8211;where are<br \/>\nthe modern equivalents? For all the whining about extremists, where<br \/>\nare those willing to openly resist injustice? Not only don&#8217;t most<br \/>\nAmericans believe in resisting tyranny, they feel extremely<br \/>\nuncomfortable just hearing others talk about it, even in abstract<br \/>\nterms (like this).<\/p>\n<p>Maybe it&#8217;s just that we&#8217;re not quite at the level of oppression to<br \/>\njustify resistance. Is that it? Hardly. <strong>If two or three percent<\/strong><br \/>\n<strong> taxation justified rebellion in 1776, why doesn&#8217;t fifty percent<\/strong><br \/>\n<strong> taxation justify it now?<\/strong> If a few puny excise taxes on tea and<br \/>\npieces of paper justified it then, why don&#8217;t the myriad of<br \/>\nunavoidable, crushing taxes at all levels, and the hordes of<br \/>\ncallous, vindictive tax collectors justify it now? If the<br \/>\nrelatively unusual cases of Redcoats abusing colonists justified it<br \/>\nthen, why doesn&#8217;t it justify it when American police see no problem<br \/>\nwith randomly stopping, detaining, interrogating and searching<br \/>\nanyone they want, whenever they want, for any reason or no reason<br \/>\nat all?<\/p>\n<p>Does anyone think Thomas Jefferson, if he were alive today, would<br \/>\nquietly allow himself to be strip-searched, and allow his<br \/>\nbelongings to be rummaged through, by some brain-dead TSA thug?<br \/>\nRead the Fourth Amendment. They had a revolution over that sort of<br \/>\nthing.<\/p>\n<p>Does anyone think that Patrick Henry would take kindly to<br \/>\nbeing robbed blind to pay for whatever war-mongering the<br \/>\npoliticians wanted to engage in this week?<\/p>\n<p>Read what the Founders\u00a0said about standing armies. They had a revolution over that sort of\u00a0thing. Think James Madison would go along with being disarmed, by<br \/>\nthe various state and federal control freaks? Read the Second<br \/>\nAmendment. They had a revolution over that sort of thing.<\/p>\n<p>Think\u00a0George Washington would be happy to have both his earnings and<br \/>\nsavings constantly looted by a parasite class, to pay for all<br \/>\nmanner of wealth redistribution, political handouts and other<br \/>\nsocialist garbage?<\/p>\n<p>Think Thomas Paine would gladly be extorted to\u00a0give all his money\u00a0to some giant, failed corporation or some huge\u00a0international bank?<\/p>\n<p>Think the founders would have quietly gone<br \/>\nalong with what this country has become today?<\/p>\n<p><strong>Think they would\u00a0have done nothing more than vote, or whine?<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>Well, the founders are dead. And, unfortunately, so is their spirit<br \/>\nof resistance. In short, just about all of the flag-waving and<br \/>\ncelebrating that happens every July 4th is nothing but empty<br \/>\nhypocrisy. How many Americans today can say, loudly and proudly,<br \/>\nlike they mean it, &#8220;Give me liberty or give me death!&#8221;? Or, at<br \/>\nleast, in the modern vernacular, &#8220;You&#8217;re not the boss of me!&#8221;?<br \/>\nAnyone? In this nation that imagines itself to be the land of the<br \/>\nfree and the home of the brave, where are those who dare to resist,<br \/>\nor even dare to talk about it? And I don&#8217;t mean voting, or whining<br \/>\nto your congressman, or begging your masters to not whip you so<br \/>\nhard. I&#8217;m talking about resisting, refusing to obey.<\/p>\n<p>America, where is your Independence Day pride now? Exactly what are<br \/>\nyou proud of? I have a message for you, from a guy named Sam.<br \/>\nSamuel Adams, that is. Yeah, the beer guy. But he did a little more<br \/>\nfor this country than make beer. Here is his message:<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;If ye love wealth better than liberty, the tranquility of<br \/>\nservitude better than the animating contest of freedom, go home<br \/>\nfrom us in peace. We ask not your counsels or arms. Crouch down and<br \/>\nlick the hands which feed you. May your chains set lightly upon<br \/>\nyou, and may posterity forget that ye were our countrymen.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>When&#8217;s the last time you heard a modern so-called &#8220;statesman&#8221; say<br \/>\nsomething like that?<\/p>\n<p>So what happened? When did Americans lose their ability to say,<br \/>\n&#8220;You&#8217;re not the boss of me,&#8221; and why? Yes, most people are scared,<br \/>\nand for good reason. With the capacity for violence of the current<br \/>\npolice state, and the willingness of the politicians and their<br \/>\nthugs to crush anyone who threatens their power, everyone has to<br \/>\nchoose his battles carefully, and decide for himself what he&#8217;s<br \/>\nwilling to risk, what is worth fighting for and what isn&#8217;t.<\/p>\n<p><strong>That makes sense, but there is more to it than just fear. Because<\/strong><br \/>\n<strong> not only won&#8217;t most Americans resist, but they will condemn anyone<\/strong><br \/>\n<strong> who does.<\/strong> If you do what the founders did, most people in this<br \/>\ncountry would call you a tax cheat, a malcontent, a criminal, a<br \/>\ntraitor, even a terrorist. Why? Why do Americans now vehemently<br \/>\ncondemn those who say and do exactly what the Founders did a couple<br \/>\nhundred years ago? When did our priorities and view of the world<br \/>\nchange so drastically, and why?<\/p>\n<p>I&#8217;ll tell you why. Gradually, and very systematically, we have been<br \/>\ntrained to measure our own worth, not by what we produce, not by<br \/>\nhow we treat other people, but by how well we obey authority.<br \/>\nConsider the term, &#8220;law abiding taxpayer.&#8221; How many people wear<br \/>\nthat label as a badge of honor? &#8220;I am a law-abiding taxpayer!&#8221; When<br \/>\nthey say that, they mean, &#8220;I&#8217;m a good person.&#8221; But is that what it<br \/>\nreally means?<\/p>\n<p>Well, &#8220;law-abiding&#8221; just means that you do whatever the politicians<br \/>\ntell you to do. We speak with great reverence of this thing called<br \/>\n&#8220;the law,&#8221; as if it is the decree of the gods, which no decent<br \/>\nhuman being would dare to disobey. But what is it really? It&#8217;s<br \/>\nwhatever the politicians decide to command you to do. Why on earth<br \/>\nwould anyone think that obedience to a bunch of liars and crooks is<br \/>\nsome profound moral obligation? Is there any reason for us to treat<br \/>\nwith reverence such commands and demands? No rational reason, no.<br \/>\nThe only reason we do it is because we have been trained to do it.<\/p>\n<p>Some might point out that obeying the laws against theft and murder<br \/>\nis a good thing to do. Well, yes and no. It is good to refrain from<br \/>\ncommitting theft and murder, but it is NOT because &#8220;the law&#8221; says<br \/>\nso. It is because theft and murder are inherently wrong, as they<br \/>\ninfringe upon the rights of others. And that was true before any<br \/>\npolitician passed a &#8220;law&#8221; about it, and will be true even if they<br \/>\n&#8220;legalize&#8221; theft and murder (as every government has done, in the<br \/>\nname of &#8220;taxation&#8221; and &#8220;war&#8221;). What is right and wrong does not at<br \/>\nall depend upon what is &#8220;legal&#8221; or &#8220;illegal.&#8221; <strong>And if you need<\/strong><br \/>\n<strong> POLITICIANS to tell you what is right and what is wrong, you need<\/strong><br \/>\n<strong> your head examined. Instead, you should judge the validity of so-<\/strong><br \/>\n<strong> called &#8220;laws&#8221; by whether they match what is inherently right and<\/strong><br \/>\n<strong> wrong.<\/strong> Thomas Jefferson put it this way:<\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #ff0000;\">&#8220;Rightful liberty is unobstructed action according to our will<\/span><br \/>\n<span style=\"color: #ff0000;\"> within limits drawn around us by the equal rights of others. I do<\/span><br \/>\n<span style=\"color: #ff0000;\"> not add &#8216;within the limits of the law,&#8217; because the law is often<\/span><br \/>\n<span style=\"color: #ff0000;\"> but the tyrant&#8217;s will, and always so when it violates the rights of<\/span><br \/>\n<span style=\"color: #ff0000;\"> the individual.&#8221;<\/span><\/p>\n<p>So why should anyone be proud of being &#8220;law-abiding,&#8221; when all it<br \/>\nmeans is blindly obeying whatever arbitrary commands the parasite<br \/>\nclass spews out this week? And pride in being a &#8220;taxpayer&#8221; is no<br \/>\nbetter, since all that phrase means is that you give the<br \/>\npoliticians lots of money. When, exactly, did obeying politicians<br \/>\nand giving them money become the measure of whether you&#8217;re a good<br \/>\nperson?<\/p>\n<p>Consider Nazi Germany. Were the law-abiding taxpayers in Nazi<br \/>\nGermany the good guys? No. By obeying the so-called &#8220;laws&#8221; of that<br \/>\ntime, the majority allowed, or even assisted in, a nearly<br \/>\nincomprehensible level of evil. And by being &#8220;taxpayers,&#8221; they<br \/>\nprovided the funding for it. No, the good people in Germany were<br \/>\nthe criminals and tax cheats, who refused to assist, even<br \/>\npassively, in the oppressions done in the name of &#8220;government.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>The same is true under the regimes of Stalin, Lenin, Mao, Pol Pot,<br \/>\nCastro&#8211;you can go right down the list (and it&#8217;s a very long list).<br \/>\nUnder every nasty regime in history, the obedient subjects, who<br \/>\nquietly did as they were told, the law-abiding taxpayers, were not<br \/>\nthe good guys. The law-breakers and rebels, the so-called traitors<br \/>\nand terrorists, those were the good guys. How about in this<br \/>\ncountry, when slavery was legal? The cowards were the ones obeying<br \/>\nthe law, while the good guys broke it.<\/p>\n<p>How about here, today? Is it good to fund what the government is<br \/>\ndoing? Do you have some moral obligation to give your &#8220;fair share&#8221;<br \/>\nof however many thousands of dollars, so Obama can give it to his<br \/>\nbanker buddies? Is it noble to fund whatever war the politicians<br \/>\ndecide to engage in this week? Do you like paying for the detention<br \/>\nand torture of people who haven&#8217;t been convicted, or even charged<br \/>\nwith any crime? (By the way, instead of doing away with that, Obama<br \/>\njust gave it a new name: preventative detention.) Is it some great<br \/>\nvirtue to have helped to finance the police state growing up all<br \/>\naround you, on both the federal and state levels? In short, is<br \/>\nbeing a &#8220;law-abiding taxpayer&#8221; really something you should be proud<br \/>\nof, or is it something you should be ashamed of?<\/p>\n<p>Over time we have forgotten a very important secret&#8211;a secret the<br \/>\ncontrol freaks don&#8217;t want you to know; a secret some of the<br \/>\nFounders hinted at, though even most of them didn&#8217;t seem to fully<br \/>\ngrasp it. Ready for it?<\/p>\n<p>You own yourself.<\/p>\n<p><strong>You are not the property of the politicians, or anyone else.<\/strong> I own<br \/>\nme, and you own you. Each of you owns himself. Sounds simple<br \/>\nenough, right? And most people respond with, &#8220;Well duh, of course.<br \/>\nThat&#8217;s no secret. We knew that.&#8221; But in reality most people don&#8217;t<br \/>\nknow that.<\/p>\n<p>If you own yourself, would anyone have the right to take, without<br \/>\nyour consent, the fruits of your labor? What you earn, with your<br \/>\ntime and effort, does anyone have the right to take that from you<br \/>\nby force? Of course not, most will answer. Really? And what if they<br \/>\ncall it &#8220;taxation&#8221;? &#8220;Oh, well, that&#8217;s different.&#8221; No, it isn&#8217;t.<\/p>\n<p>If you own yourself, would anyone have the right to force you to<br \/>\npay rent for a house you already paid for, under threat of taking<br \/>\nyour house away? Of course not. What if they call it &#8220;property<br \/>\ntaxes&#8221;? Oh, that&#8217;s different. No, it isn&#8217;t. And you can go right<br \/>\ndown the list: if you truly own yourself, the vast majority of so-<br \/>\ncalled &#8220;laws,&#8221; at all levels, are absolutely illegitimate. As<br \/>\nJefferson put it, ANY so-called &#8220;law&#8221; that infringes upon<br \/>\nindividual liberty&#8211;which is dang near all of them&#8211;is inherently<br \/>\nbogus.<\/p>\n<p>But let&#8217;s take it one step further. If you own yourself&#8211;your life,<br \/>\nliberty and property&#8211;doesn&#8217;t that imply that you have the right to<br \/>\ndefend those things from any and all aggressors? Yes. What if the<br \/>\naggressors call themselves &#8220;government&#8221; and call their attacks and<br \/>\nrobberies &#8220;law&#8221; and &#8220;taxes&#8221;? You still have the right. Changing the<br \/>\nname of an act cannot make something bad into something good. And<br \/>\nif you have the right to defend your life, liberty and property<br \/>\nfrom all aggressors, it stands to reason that you have the right to<br \/>\nequip yourself to do so. In other words, you have the right to be<br \/>\narmed&#8211;the right to possess the equipment to exert whatever force<br \/>\nis necessary to repel any attempts to infringe upon your rights to<br \/>\nlife, liberty and property.<\/p>\n<p>But, once again, even most people who claim to be vehemently pro-<br \/>\nfreedom, don&#8217;t like to talk about what that really means. Many &#8220;gun<br \/>\nrights&#8221; organizations, for example, go to great lengths to beg the<br \/>\npoliticians to LET them remain armed. Why? At Lexington, when the<br \/>\nBritish troops told the colonists to lay down their weapons, what<br \/>\nwas the response? Did the colonists say, &#8220;Awe, can&#8217;t we keep them,<br \/>\npretty please?&#8221;? No, they had a very different attitude, something<br \/>\nalone the lines of, &#8220;You&#8217;re not the boss of us!&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>If you own yourself&#8211;and this is a big one&#8211;it is not only your<br \/>\nright, but your most profound obligation as a human being, to judge<br \/>\nfor yourself what is right and wrong, and to act accordingly. But<br \/>\nwhat if people claiming to be &#8220;authority&#8221; want to force you to do<br \/>\nsomething contrary to what you deem to be right? Do you have an<br \/>\nobligation to obey them, and ignore your own conscience? No. What<br \/>\nif their threats are called &#8220;legislation&#8221;? It makes no difference.<\/p>\n<p>You are always, at all times, in every situation, obligated to do<br \/>\nwhat you deem right, no matter what so-called &#8220;government&#8221; and<br \/>\n&#8220;authority&#8221; and &#8220;law&#8221; have to say about it. And when the tyrants<br \/>\nand control freaks, authoritarian thugs and megalomaniacs, try to<br \/>\ntell you that are an evil, nasty, despicable criminal and traitor<br \/>\nfor daring to think for yourself, you have a right and duty to<br \/>\nstand firm, and say, with confidence, &#8220;You are not the boss of me!&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>Larken Rose<br \/>\n<a title=\"http:\/\/www.larkenrose.com\" href=\"http:\/\/www.larkenrose.com\" target=\"_blank\">http:\/\/www.larkenrose.com<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>hmmmm. food for thought?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>&nbsp; http:\/\/www.larkenrose.com\/blog\/1894-youre-not-the-boss-of-me.html YOU&#8217;RE NOT THE BOSS OF ME! [The following is a written adaption of a talk given by Larken Rose\u00a0in Philadelphia, in front of Independence Hall, on July 4th, 2009.] Two hundred and thirty-three years ago, in Philadelphia, a bunch of guys got together and wrote a letter to their king. The letter was&#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":184,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[56,73],"tags":[11,34,29,33,60,13],"class_list":["post-3096","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-ideas","category-training-2","tag-defending-your-rights","tag-know-your-rights","tag-law","tag-philosophy","tag-propaganda","tag-usa","no-featured-image","loop-entry clr"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/private-person.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3096","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/private-person.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/private-person.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/private-person.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/184"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/private-person.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3096"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/private-person.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3096\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/private-person.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3096"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/private-person.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3096"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/private-person.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3096"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}