debs

Ask the average American if he or she recognizes the name Vanderbilt, Astor, Rockefeller, Carnegie, Sinclair, and Ford, to name a few of the more common entrepreneurs of U.S. history. Like as not they do. They know that these folks made millions of dollars; that their offspring still live in comfort, that products and institutions bear their names, and that their ingenuity and entrepreneurship helped make America what it once was, until our country's leaders lost their sense of direction and led the nation into its second Great Depression.

Granted these pioneers have been branded by some as robber barons, cut throats, and exploiters, but where would America be, for example, had the Vanderbilts not built the railroads that allowed this country to expand from a few colonies to 50 states?

Then ask how many can recall the name: Eugene Victor Debs. Unless they're students of American history, like as not you'll draw a blank. Mr. Debs was a union organizer back in the early years of the 20th Century. (Community organizers hadn't been invented then.) He also ran for president in 1912, and lost miserably. And his socialist activities landed him in prison in 1918. That should tell you something. Unlike the movers and shakers mentioned above, Mr. Debs today is but a footnote in American history texts.

Mirroring the spirit that drove America in its formative years Calvin Coolidge once remarked that "The business of America is business."

Unfortunately, our nation got a bit off track in the early 1900s, and in 1929, was plunged into the Great Depression. But along came the government. Under Mr. Roosevelt's watch the New Deal came into being and with it the Reconstruction Finance Corp., or as some called it, the "Millionaire's Dole." During this time the federal government became the largest single business on Earth, and bureaucratic meddling ran rampant. Sound familiar?

Had World War II not erupted there's no telling what might have become of the United States.

But, American business and the innate ingenuity of the American people emerged and the United States truly emerged as "The Greatest Nation on Earth," and the "Leader of the free world."

Today, unfortunately, America resembles post-war France and Charles De Gaulle who still thought they were living in the age of Napoleon. Our national treasure has been squandered by the foxes we put in charge of guarding the hen house and the socialist lion is licking its chops in anticipation of devouring us.

As we can see from Vietnam and the Mideast, war will not be our salvation this time, only our destruction.