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I like to go back in history to the creators of the United States Constitution. Back then, people lived under the yoke of tyranny, the tyranny of King George of England. The American colonists wanted independence, and above all, liberty. They wanted to freely exercise their rights to "life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness" without government in the way of that exercise. They struggled hard to be independent from big government, and to be free. They even fought the King army over freedom.

Now, today, we Americans are living the greed that the King, and those around him lived. We are paying for that too as greed comes with a price tag. For most of the 20th century, oil sustained our lifestyle. I remember as a kid, traveling through Texas and seeing those big oil horses sucking oil out of the earth. They were an awesome sight in the distance, and they were all over. Then, we found cheap petroleum elsewhere: the Middle East. We are paying for that fiasco. Now, there is an abundance of oil in Venezuela, northern Canada, and elsewhere. More greed is on the way, as oil means a glamorous lifestyle for many, but not for all. Some are left out of the oil wealth.

The early Americans could not imagine the wealth that oil would bring, the lavish lifestyle which most of us live today, when you compare today versus the periof of the early American colonists.

However, greed is expensive. We get government involved in energy, and before you know it, we have booms and busts as government mixes oil with monetary policy. When government subsidizes, and plays with our money, the result is inflation or deflation, now that we are not on the gold standard. Government, unless checked by "we the people" will have to get more involved in oil, since it is running out on earth, and will not last for ever. The costly wars fought over oil, yes, we will be paying for that policy for years; certainly our grandchildren will be paying for greed.

If we truly believe in the fundamental right of liberty, we need to reduce the size of government, and corporate power, so indeed, people can once again, be free. The early Americans were free because there was no big enterprise in the way of ingenuity, innovation, prosperity. The 19th century in the United States, was an era of prosperity. This was only possible because the citizens still loved liberty above all else, and defended it.

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