Times that try men’s souls
Are the political tides endured in America today also such “times that try men’s souls?” This bold statement, first declared by Thomas Paine in his essay The American Crisis in 1776, echoes again in 2022. For many Americans, this era of unprecedented economic upheaval and political disillusionment is almost too much to bear, but one sobering fact remains: we must unite against the promotors of chaos and division if we are to survive as a nation, and we must turn to the pages of our history for guidance in doing so.
Published on December 23rd 1776, the first essay of Thomas Paine’s American Crisis chronicles his thoughts and experiences following in the footsteps of General George Washington’s men during their retreat from Fort Lee, New Jersey. What’s evident throughout is his strong disdain for Colonial “Tories,” another term for colonists who remained loyal to the British crown during the American Revolution. Tories sought peaceful submission to Great Britain as opposed to the pursuit of essential liberty, and believed it to be in their best interests to oppose the American Patriots standing in the way of royal rule over the thirteen colonies. Although we aren’t deep in a war of revolution ourselves, it stands to reason that our generation of Americans is facing a newer, more global breed of Tory plaguing our politics.
The events of the past few years, chiefly the civil unrest in cities such as Seattle, Washington, and Portland, Oregon, as well as the general rioting of 2020 and the lockdowns of the Covid-19 pandemic, have shed light on the traitors lurking about our political shadows. Their pretenses now shattered, we can better reflect on history in light of today’s trials to name these Benedict Arnolds, and stop them before too much more harm to our country can be done. As Thomas Paine wrote concerning such times of national crisis, these challenges offer ample opportunity for keen Patriots to weed out the wheat from the chaff:
“Their duration is always short; the mind soon grows through them, and acquires a firmer habit than before. But their peculiar advantage is, that they are the touchstones of sincerity and hypocrisy, and bring things and men to light, which might otherwise have lain forever undiscovered. In fact, they have the same effect on secret traitors, which an imaginary apparition would have upon a private murderer. They sift out the hidden thoughts of man, and hold them up in public to the world. Many a disguised Tory has lately shown his head, that shall penitentially solemnize with curses the day on which Howe arrived upon the Delaware.”
–Thomas Paine, The American Crisis, December 23rd, 1776
Secret Traitors
Today’s political climate, an ostensible crisis, offers ample opportunity for us to call out certain “secret traitors” for who they really are. Although it can be argued that many of our so-called “fellow Americans” no longer stand by the tenants of our war for independence in 1776, or the results of our Constitutional Convention of 1787, we will be focusing on those executive, legislative, and judicial leaders among us whose questionable allegiances make them prime candidates for public scrutiny.
The first group of “secret traitors” includes American politicians who are confirmed members of the World Economic Forum’s annual meeting, or who espouse WEF ideologies and talking points. A list of 2022 participants at the forum’s latest annual meeting can be obtained here. The World Economic Forum claims to hold no ties to political or national interests, and although this may be true, what it’s certainly effecting is globalist ideology. One principle the forum subscribes to is that of the “global citizen”, per their institutional brochure:
“…Global citizenship entails focusing on the “global space”, which is increasingly shaped by forces beyond the control of nation states. Global corporations have not only a licence to operate in this arena but also a civic duty to contribute to sustaining the world’s well-being in cooperation with governments and civil society. Global citizenship means engagement at the macro level on issues of importance to the world, such as climate change, water shortages, infectious diseases and terrorism. Other challenges include access to food, education and information technology; extreme poverty; transnational crime; corruption; failed states; and disaster response and relief. Each of these problems is global in scope, even if the solutions may be focused locally. The World Economic Forum plays a central role in these efforts. It aims to provide the foremost global multistakeholder platform for world leaders to come together in communities, inspire them with strategic insights and enable them to take action through initiatives…”
-World Economic Forum Institutional Brochure, Global Citizenship
The WEF is the very manifestation of the old adage “the road to Hell is paved with good intentions.” They assert that global issues require measures of control beyond the scope of traditional nationhood in order to be dealt with, and that they are playing a central role in efforts to unite corporate and political leadership to achieve these measures. The danger of such a philosophy is that it necessitates a greater order of authority beyond state sovereignty. Although the issues the WEF raises are indeed important, and in need of addressing, their proposed solution is to appropriate and supersede the governing power of nations to do so. For us to properly follow the WEF’s vision, we would have to make a “deal with the devil”, as it were: to ensure greater global security, we would be forced to relinquish our national liberty. And the reason for this is simple: how can we call ourselves a free, self-governing people if we’re bound hand and foot by globalist whims? Would we even have a nation anymore? A nation isn’t free, or even a nation at all, if it can’t decide its own direction.
“Those who would give up essential Liberty, to purchase a little temporary Safety, deserve neither Liberty nor Safety…”
-Benjamin Franklin, the Pennsylvania Assembly: Reply to the Governor, November 11, 1755
How can we as Americans pursue the excellence of our nation when our resources, our leaders, and our industries are being exploited by foreign assemblies and organizations who don’t have our best interests at heart? Any of our elected representatives, therefore, who partake in this “global citizen” model the World Economic Forum advocates, may be considered a traitor to our Constitution. One can’t be both a good global citizen and a good American citizen in tandem; “you will either love the one and hate the other, or hate the one and love the other.” We cannot serve two competing interests without sacrificing one for the other. The choice is ours to make: we either abide by the authority of our Constitution, which enumerates and guarantees our God-given rights, or we submit to the edicts of a global government, which denies natural rights, and prefers equity and security above equality and liberty. If we wisely choose the former, then we must carefully monitor the actions of our representatives, and scrutinize every dollar they spend. If it’s found that they’re using the fruit of American labor to advance their own interests, or those of the globalists, we must act urgently to cast them out from their place among our Congress, and into the hall of traitors.
The second group of “secret traitors” is similar to the first, but more judicial in nature. It includes all district attorneys and politicians who have received foreign aid, specifically from wealthy benefactors such as George Soros, and the Political Action Committees they finance, such as the Justice and Public Safety PAC. For years now, foreign billionaires such as Soros have spent their vast sums of wealth funding PACs to wage electoral warfare against the American people, or more specifically, to help install district attorneys and elect officials whose politics conform to the desires of the hand which feeds them. What good have they done for the cities and municipalities in which they’ve been installed? Have they not released dangerous criminals back onto the streets to further harm the people, and have they not allowed political agitators to riot and destroy property unchecked, whereas their rivals have been kept under lock and key? These faux Americans, funded by foreign money and engrossed in foreign ideology, hope that no one will notice their true intentions so that an unconstitutional takeover of our government may commence unopposed. Needless to say, every American should rightly question why foreign money is allowed to play such a prominent role in any aspect of our politics.
American Exceptionalism
I consider myself to be an American citizen, and not a global one. Not every nation enjoys such liberties as we do, and neither do many honor or respect them; there are even members of our own society who abhor and regard as worthless our essential liberties. No nation is identical, and no nation can be forced to coexist with or benefit others who hate them. How can a global authority respect our freedom and independence if it decides the fate of the entire planet? Most assuredly, it would forsake our liberty for what it deems appropriate for global equity. Our nation is unique in world history, and we ought not to take our American exception for granted. When our forefathers broke away from Great Britain in 1776 so that they could separate themselves and posterity from the tyranny they’d endured, it’s doubtful they envisioned a future where we would discard their sacrifice and abandon the nation they forged. I refuse to dishonor prior generations of Americans, who fought to preserve our unique way of life, by bowing to globalist demagogues and accepting their authoritarian rule. Nothing could be more unamerican, or cowardly, than for us to submit willingly to authorities outside the scope of our sovereignty, and the Constitution our states ratified together. We, the people, are America; for any group such as the World Economic Forum to suggest that we surrender even a single iota of our form of government, and our very liberty, for their concept of how the world should be governed, is the worst insult we could ever endure as a free people. It’s up to us to preserve our heritage as Americans, and summarily repudiate globalist efforts to steal our sovereign power.
21st Century Tories
We can conclude that these past years have indeed done justice for Mr. Paine’s thesis; feeling emboldened by recent crises, secret traitors have come crawling out from bureaucratic mires to inspire and support sedition from the shadows. Truly, these are trying times for our nation. Should the traitors in our midst be symbolically tarred and feathered as British Tories actually were during the American Revolution? Common decency suggests that such a practice shouldn’t be seriously entertained, but certainly the American people must proactively run these traitors out of their seats of power before they do too much damage to our government. May the humiliation and disgrace they suffer from being publicly ousted prove sufficient! The only benefit we gain from the turmoil they create is that friend can be better distinguished from foe, allowing for opposition to America-hating officials to be organized. Unless we defy the globalists’ plan for us, and unite to save the foundations of our freedom, we will lose our country and the contest for liberty. It’s not a question of “if” anymore, it’s a matter of “when.” If Thomas Paine and other early Patriots could recognize Tories for their two-faced treachery in 1776, then let us unmask them again in our generation, and stop them from undermining our rights. Will we stand for America, or bend a knee to would-be tyrants? I know not about you, but as for me, I choose to stand. A people who refuse to stand for their liberty have forfeit it already.
“THESE are the times that try men’s souls. The summer soldier and the sunshine patriot will, in this crisis, shrink from the service of their country; but he that stands by it now, deserves the love and thanks of man and woman. Tyranny, like hell, is not easily conquered; yet we have this consolation with us, that the harder the conflict, the more glorious the triumph. What we obtain too cheap, we esteem too lightly: it is dearness only that gives every thing its value. Heaven knows how to put a proper price upon its goods; and it would be strange indeed if so celestial an article as FREEDOM should not be highly rated…”
–Thomas Paine, The American Crisis, December 23rd, 1776