Does history actually repeat itself? At first glance, it would certainly seem that occasionally it does. On the surface, it appears that the Obama administration is offering a  Progressive agenda very similar to that which Franklin Delano Roosevelt imposed upon this nation. The proposed healthcare legislation does seem to be an expansion of the socialist programs which FDR saddled us with half a century ago. Throwing taxpayer money at problems best left to the private sector to solve was also a favorite tactic of that era, as was the concept that government should be thought of, and looked to, as the solution to almost every problem. So, yes, it would seem that history could indeed repeat itself, except for a couple of new twists that may be the key to saving us from ourselves.

First of all, we have access to a great deal of information about the consequences of all those Progressive programs. We can look at the statistics and see that instead of making things better, all the make-work programs, the welfare handouts, the redistribution of wealth, the confiscatory tax rates, and the government's attempt to control the economy and the banking system made things worse, deepened and extended the depression and slowed the recovery of the private sector. So, we know from history that the Progressive road simply leads us off a cliff and leaves us to make our own way back out of the abyss.

The other thing we have going for us that we didn't have back before WWII is talk radio, cable TV and the internet. With these tools, we have the ability to access information and communicate with each other at speeds and levels that only science-fiction writers envisioned. We can instantly research and verify almost anything we are told by our government, and when we find that what we are being told is less than true and less than factual, we can report on what we've found broadly and immediately.

If we use the tools we have, our knowledge of history, our ability to obtain information and our ability to communicate, we can make the truth known and nullify any would-be propaganda effort our government might attempt to use. We can call into question the personal histories of the people involved, we can show the actions of government as opposed to the words that flow from our alleged representatives, we can turn over the rocks and we can shine lights into the dark hidden places. In the United States of America, we can turn back the forces that would oppress us, shout at those who would silence us, and create our own bright future. We can look at our founding documents and insist that our leaders hold them sacred and apply them in the manner in which they were intended to be applied, to limit and hold in check the very government that our founders established. Our Founding Fathers knew that governments tend to expand and take more and more control of the people's lives. They gave us a Constitution as an attempt to prevent that expansion and maintain the freedoms so dearly won. That is our best tool, the Constitution. It's up to us to see that our country returns to the foundations upon which it was built. It is our Country to keep, our freedoms to maintain, or ours to lose.