Who Owns You?

"You are so weird!"
"Why do you act this way?"
"Nobody cares about the things you care about."
"If we are in a room with 100 people and you, 50 people would be with the Democrats, 50 people would be with the Republicans, they there would be you in the corner by yourself."
Some of the comments I have heard lately when I attempt answer the question of "Who are you going to vote for?"

I have tried to boil it down for people as to what my political and social philosophy is. I have tried to do it intellectually, citing Hobbs (Thomas Hobbs not the tiger), Madison (James Madison, not the mermaid), and Jefferson (Thomas Jefferson, not the ones in the Deluxe Apartment in the sky). The problem is that most people don't know who those men are, dismiss them as dead white guys or, just don't care to listen. I needed a new tactic. It boils down to one simple question: "Who owns you?"

Who does? Most people immediately respond, I own me. I reply, "Do you?" "Yes." They say, "What a stupid question." Then I begin to ask a series of questions:
If you own you, why does the Government intercept a percentage of your income before you get it?
Why does the Government dictate what you can and can not put into your body?
Why does the Government tell you how much money you can make?

Madison and Jefferson believed that you belonged to yourself. They framed the Constitution to ensure that the people of the United States would forever be owned by themselves... The problem is that the people of the United States no longer want to be owned by themselves. They wish to be owned by the Government. King George III gets the last laugh. The people who so violently threw off the yoke of tyranny, willingly and enthusiastically place the yoke back on their necks.