A good read.

[Griff]

There is more jammed into this little speech than modern righties and leftists willingly acknowlege. I like how he gores UG's military industrial complex along with tw's research sacred cow.


Transcript of President Dwight D. Eisenhower's Farewell Address (1961)
My fellow Americans:


Three days from now, after half a century in the service of our country, I shall lay down the responsibilities of office as, in traditional and solemn ceremony, the authority of the Presidency is vested in my successor.

This evening I come to you with a message of leave-taking and farewell, and to share a few final thoughts with you, my countrymen.

Like every other citizen, I wish the new President, and all who will labor with him, Godspeed. I pray that the coming years will be blessed with peace and prosperity for all.


Our people expect their President and the Congress to find essential agreement on issues of great moment, the wise resolution of which will better shape the future of the Nation.

My own relations with the Congress, which began on a remote and tenuous basis when, long ago, a member of the Senate appointed me to West Point, have since ranged to the intimate during the war and immediate post-war period, and, finally, to the mutually interdependent during these past eight years.

In this final relationship, the Congress and the Administration have, on most vital issues, cooperated well, to serve the national good rather than mere partisanship, and so have assured that the business of the Nation should go forward. So, my official relationship with the Congress ends in a feeling, on my part, of gratitude that we have been able to do so much together.



II

We now stand ten years past the midpoint of a century that has witnessed four major wars among great nations. Three of these involved our own country. Despite these holocausts America is today the strongest, the most influential and most productive nation in the world. Understandably proud of this pre-eminence, we yet realize that America's leadership and prestige depend, not merely upon our unmatched material progress, riches and military strength, but on how we use our power in the interests of world peace and human betterment.


III

Throughout America's adventure in free government, our basic purposes have been to keep the peace; to foster progress in human achievement, and to enhance liberty, dignity and integrity among people and among nations. To strive for less would be unworthy of a free and religious people. Any failure traceable to arrogance, or our lack of comprehension or readiness to sacrifice would inflict upon us grievous hurt both at home and abroad.

Progress toward these noble goals is persistently threatened by the conflict now engulfing the world. It commands our whole attention, absorbs our very beings. We face a hostile ideology-global in scope, atheistic in character, ruthless in purpose, and insidious in method. Unhappily the danger it poses promises to be of indefinite duration. To meet it successfully, there is called for, not so much the emotional and transitory sacrifices of crisis, but rather those which enable us to carry forward steadily, surely, and without complaint the burdens of a prolonged and complex struggle-with liberty at stake. Only thus shall we remain, despite every provocation, on our charted course toward permanent peace and human betterment.

Crises there will continue to be. In meeting them, whether foreign or domestic, great or small,there is a recurring temptation to feel that some spectacular and costly action could become the miraculous solution to all current difficulties. A huge increase in newer elements of our defense; development of unrealistic programs to cure every ill in agriculture; a dramatic expansion in basic and applied research-these and many other possibilities, each possibly promising in itself, may be suggested as the only way to the road we which to travel.

But each proposal must be weighed in the light of a broader consideration: the need to maintain balance in and among national programs-balance between the private and the public economy, balance between cost and hoped for advantage-balance between the clearly necessary and the comfortably desirable; balance between our essential requirements as a nation and the duties imposed by the nation upon the individual; balance between action of the moment and the national welfare of the future. Good judgment seeks balance and progress; lack of it eventually finds imbalance and frustration.

The record of many decades stands as proof that our people and their government have, in the main, understood these truths and have responded to them well, in the face of stress and threat. But threats, new in kind or degree, constantly arise. I mention two only.


IV

A vital element in keeping the peace is our military establishment. Our arms must be mighty, ready for instant action, so that no potential aggressor may be tempted to risk his own destruction.

Our military organization today bears little relation to that known by any of my predecessors in peace time, or indeed by the fighting men of World War II or Korea.

Until the latest of our world conflicts, the United States had no armaments industry. American makers of plowshares could, with time and as required, make swords as well. But now we can no longer risk emergency improvisation of national defense; we have been compelled to create a permanent armaments industry of vast proportions. Added to this, three and a half million men and women are directly engaged in the defense establishment. We annually spend on military security more than the net income of all United State corporations.

This conjunction of an immense military establishment and a large arms industry is new in the American experience. The total influence-economic, political, even spiritual-is felt in every city, every state house, every office of the Federal government. We recognize the imperative need for this development. Yet we must not fail to comprehend its grave implications. Our toil, resources and livelihood are all involved; so is the very structure of our society.

In the councils of government, we must guard against the acquisition of unwarranted influence, whether sought or unsought, by the military-industrial complex. The potential for the disastrous rise of misplaced power exists and will persist.

We must never let the weight of this combination endanger our liberties or democratic processes. We should take nothing for granted only an alert and knowledgeable citizenry can compel the proper meshing of huge industrial and military machinery of defense with our peaceful methods and goals, so that security and liberty may prosper together.

Akin to, and largely responsible for the sweeping changes in our industrial-military posture, has been the technological revolution during recent decades.

In this revolution, research has become central; it also becomes more formalized, complex, and costly. A steadily increasing share is conducted for, by, or at the direction of, the Federal government.

Today, the solitary inventor, tinkering in his shop, has been over shadowed by task forces of scientists in laboratories and testing fields. In the same fashion, the free university, historically the fountainhead of free ideas and scientific discovery, has experienced a revolution in the conduct of research. Partly because of the huge costs involved, a government contract becomes virtually a substitute for intellectual curiosity. For every old blackboard there are now hundreds of new electronic computers.

The prospect of domination of the nation's scholars by Federal employment, project allocations, and the power of money is ever present and is gravely to be regarded.

Yet, in holding scientific research and discovery in respect, as we should, we must also be alert to the equal and opposite danger that public policy could itself become the captive of a scientific-technological elite.

It is the task of statesmanship to mold, to balance, and to integrate these and other forces, new and old, within the principles of our democratic system-ever aiming toward the supreme goals of our free society.



V

Another factor in maintaining balance involves the element of time. As we peer into society's future, we-you and I, and our government-must avoid the impulse to live only for today, plundering, for our own ease and convenience, the precious resources of tomorrow. We cannot mortgage the material assets of our grandchildren without risking the loss also of their political and spiritual heritage. We want democracy to survive for all generations to come, not to become the insolvent phantom of tomorrow.

[Griff]

VI

Down the long lane of the history yet to be written America knows that this world of ours, ever growing smaller, must avoid becoming a community of dreadful fear and hate, and be, instead, a proud confederation of mutual trust and respect.

Such a confederation must be one of equals. The weakest must come to the conference table with the same confidence as do we, protected as we are by our moral, economic, and military strength. That table, though scarred by many past frustrations, cannot be abandoned for the certain agony of the battlefield.

Disarmament, with mutual honor and confidence, is a continuing imperative. Together we must learn how to compose difference, not with arms, but with intellect and decent purpose. Because this need is so sharp and apparent I confess that I lay down my official responsibilities in this field with a definite sense of disappointment. As one who has witnessed the horror and the lingering sadness of war-as one who knows that another war could utterly destroy this civilization which has been so slowly and painfully built over thousands of years-I wish I could say tonight that a lasting peace is in sight.

Happily, I can say that war has been avoided. Steady progress toward our ultimate goal has been made. But, so much remains to be done. As a private citizen, I shall never cease to do what little I can to help the world advance along that road.



VII

So-in this my last good night to you as your President-I thank you for the many opportunities you have given me for public service in war and peace. I trust that in that service you find somethings worthy; as for the rest of it, I know you will find ways to improve performance in the future.

You and I-my fellow citizens-need to be strong in our faith that all nations, under God, will reach the goal of peace with justice. May we be ever unswerving in devotion to principle, confident but humble with power, diligent in pursuit of the Nation's great goals.

To all the peoples of the world, I once more give expression to America's prayerful and continuing inspiration:

We pray that peoples of all faiths, all races, all nations, may have their great human needs satisfied; that those now denied opportunity shall come to enjoy it to the full; that all who yearn for freedom may experience its spiritual blessings; that those who have freedom will understand, also, its heavy responsibilities; that all who are insensitive to the needs of others will learn charity; that the scourges of poverty, disease and ignorance will be made to disappear from the earth, and that, in the goodness of time, all peoples will come to live together in a peace guaranteed by the binding force of mutual respect and love.

[BigV]

Excellent, Griff. HoF entry underway.

For a fuller experience, click here.

[xoxoxoBruce]

I remember that speech. We were assigned to listen to it for Civics class.
The tone of the class discussion was.....well, duh. Everything Ike said was just common sense.

How little we knew.

[BigV]

Originally Posted by BigV

Excellent, Griff. HoF entry underway.

For a fuller experience, click here.

This is done. Good job, Griff.

[Ike]

Thanks for the hand up, Griff. Here is another good read. Glad to see some of you are still wary half a century later. Read it and heed it.

Freedom Of The Press
posted February 28, 2006

Freedom of the press. What does that mean? I’m talking about within the context of the First Amendment to the Constitution. Why was freedom of the press so important to those people back then?

Put yourself in their place. There would not have been an American Revolution without the press.

The only way to gather a group and continue to expand that group to the point where it’s large enough to stand up and declare its independence from the mother country and its government is to give them a reason to do it.

Without information there is no reason for the people to do anything or think anything outside the daily grind of their miserable lives as individuals just trying to get by.

It takes information to bring the people together as a group. People have a natural desire to know the news. “What’s going on?” That’s the question. It’s the responsibility of a free press to provide that answer.

Of course delivering the news is only part of it. It is also the responsibility of the press to stir up the pure mind. In my opinion, the greatest single figure of the American Revolution was the pamphleteer, Thomas Paine.

If I had to name the true father of this country, it would be him. He stirred up the pure mind with ideas and argued for complete independence from England before it became mainstream thinking. He electrified the countryside with his words that were read in the churches and town squares and sold on the street corners.

His pamphlets, his reasoning and his common sense arguments for revolution and freedom inspired George Washington to the extent that he asked Paine to write one for his soldiers. It was the first of the Crisis pamphlets, the “Winter Soldiers” speech with the line, “These are the times that try men’s souls.” Washington ordered it read to the army in the field.

So Washington and the other Founding Fathers went on to glory and Paine went on to die alone and destitute.

But that doesn’t change it for me. I still believe that it was Paine and the power of his pen that was the driving force that turned the people into revolutionaries and brought them together in a big bunch crying out for freedom, risking their lives and whatever fortunes they had in order to gain their independence from England.

I don’t think Paine has ever gotten the true credit he deserves, but I believe the Founding Fathers knew how important he was to the revolution, and how important the press was in general with helping to bring about the revolution and helping the people maintain their freedom once it had been achieved and victory won.

That’s why freedom of the press is listed in the First Amendment, prohibiting Congress from making any laws that would abridge that freedom or the freedom of speech.

The press was that important, not only in bringing about the revolution but in maintaining the freedoms won by the revolution, such as those other First Amendment rights prohibiting Congress from making any law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise of it, the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the government for a redress of grievances.

The thing that made Thomas Paine such a powerful force in the establishment of America was his ability to articulate the desire of the human heart to be free. His eloquence was so pure and simple, it spoke to the high and low, from the richest man in the country to the poorest dirt farmer. He stirred the hearts of men and women, the young and the old.

Besides a great mind, Paine had a great heart and great courage and a great ability to make people think and realize the simple truth that if they wanted to be free they would have to free themselves, as a group, even at the cost of their lives, by fighting the British and winning their liberty.

The man himself may have died alone and penniless and unsung but his song is still being sung. Freedom is still the song of America and it is still the hope of America. The Revolution that Paine struck a match to has never really gone out, but still burns in the individual hearts of those who are not free, both here and around the world.

The desire for freedom still burns in the hearts of those Americans who can see the rusting away and corrosion of their freedoms. It burns in the hearts of those who want more freedom and it burns in the hearts of those who have been denied their equal freedoms as human beings along with the rest.

continued below.

[Ike]

part two

Paine didn’t invent the idea of freedom, he articulated the common sense need for it and pointed out that there would never be a better opportunity for the people to free themselves from the bonds of England than right then, while the iron was hot.

All they had to do was put their courage to the sticking place. After all hadn’t they dug out a living and developed a sustainable economy while fighting off the Indians and the French?

Had their parents and grandparents not given them this opportunity by their sweat and blood and their willingness to fight for the land which they had wrested out of the wilderness?

Inspired by the thinking and reasoning and writings and speeches of Thomas Paine and the other revolutionary leaders and speakers, a significant number of the people came together as a group with a single vision - freedom. The rest is history.

But history is still in the making. History changes. The idea of freedom changes. The idea of freedom of speech and the press, and freedom of religion, the freedom to peaceably assemble and petition the government for a redress of grievances changes.

Ironically – this being a government of, for and by the people – the great, grazing masses have become corrupt and full of hypocrisy, greed, selfishness, self-righteousness and have taken plain old-fashioned dumbness to a place that the Founding Fathers could never have contemplated.

We need a Thomas Paine today to get the word out and to reason with the people and make them think and take a look around. The freedom of the press, which is to say the freedom of the watchdog and guardian of our liberties, has been seriously abridged, both from the inside and out.

That became obvious after 9/11 when the press failed to provide the proper leadership and guidance to the people. It was as if the press had given up its responsibility and joined the grazing masses. The press should have been calling for restraint and wisdom and proper conduct in the class instead of going along with the national drive for revenge - regardless of who was bombed or how many had to be killed.

It became even more obvious in the days leading up to our illegal attack on Iraq, when the press, led by the great New York Times, turned themselves into secretaries and public relations people for the government by feeding the people exactly what the government wanted fed to the great grazing masses, without question.

In fact, it is becoming more and more obvious every day that the free press is not free. How can it be free if it has given up its most important duties? To give the people the truth and nothing but the truth, no matter how hard they have to dig for it, work for it, suffer for it or risk their lives for it.

I always thought that freedom of the press and duty of the press meant the same thing. What good is freedom if you’re not going to do your duty? And what is your duty if it’s not telling the truth and speaking out for the truth.

The press is the greatest weapon in the creation of freedom and in the defense and maintenance of freedom than all the military weapons in the world combined. When doing its duty it is a great two-horned beast that cannot be withstood.

One horn is used in delivering the facts, especially about those things that people need to know, and to deliver those facts with clarity and intelligence, with no other duty except to provide the truth.

The second horn is the horn that Thomas Paine blew.

We need some Thomas Paines today. We need to get through to the great, grazing masses that we can’t be free unless we free ourselves. And the only way to free ourselves is to stop our numb-minded grazing on hypocrisy, self-righteousness, selfishness and greed.

Somehow we have to shake the people up from their sleep and make them think and realize that there are only two choices and two outcomes. The world will either come together in peace or it will go out together through war.

The same way that we have come this far in our struggle for freedom – and we are not all equally free, ask the Indian that we took the land from, ask the people of color, ask the poor people – is too slow a way for today because time is moving too quick toward nuclear war.

We can’t afford anymore of this trial and error stuff. We can’t afford to spend our time and lives and money and resources on waging illegal war around the world, while the poor continue to become poorer and the rich become richer, while the grazing herd grazes and the great power of America is in the hands of a bunch of neotards.

Freedom requires respect between both parties. Freedom requires respect, and equal respect, between all nations, not just the nations we like and can count on to help us in our pursuit of more wealth and more power, but even the nations we don’t like because of their beliefs and the type of government that the people live under, or because of their riches and resources.

We are not showing our own people equal respect and we are not showing other nations and other peoples equal respect. Don’t we realize even yet that there can be no freedom and no peace without equal respect? How can it be that that notion is so hard for the great, grazing masses to grasp?

Are the great, grazing masses so stupid as to believe that the only way to gain respect is by the sword? Is that the cud they are still chewing after all these years? Do they not understand the words of their own Bible which they claim so loudly to believe in? That those who live by the sword shall die by the sword?

It is time to replace the sword of war with the bugle of peace. That bugle is the free press. But, for some reason, it has become silent. And when it does manage a toot once in a while, it is not loud enough or often enough to grab the attention of the masses that continue to graze in ignorance even as they are herded toward the slaughter houses.


It’s time for a Thomas Paine to address the masses. It’s time for the free press to do its duty and prove that there is still such a thing as freedom of the press and that someone needs to sound a warning that the struggle for freedom has taken a turn for the worse and that the greatest threat to America and peace in the world is coming from within America itself, in the form of the great, grazing masses and their representatives, led by the powerful, religious, war-mongering, capitalists and neotards.

It’s time for the free press to start blowing its horn. It’s time for the people to realize that the American Revolution was never over and it will never be over until mutual respect and the right to freedom becomes a true thing, not only among individual Americans but for nations all over the world – including the right to be left alone to make their own choices and not to be taken over, bullied and pistol whipped into obedience by an America that has drifted off course and decided that there will be no freedom and no peace until it rules the world.

Naman Crowe
namancrowe@yahoo.com

[Harlan]

Excellent post. What a great man. Thanks for posting it.