“Public virtue cannot exist in a nation without private, and public virtue is the only foundation of republics. There must be a positive passion for the public good, the public interest, honor, power and glory, established in the minds of the people, or there can be no republican government, nor any real liberty: and this public passion must be superior to all private passions.”

Socialism at its best.....

This is what has happened to our nation in the last 30 years. Prior to that time, the immigrants that came here, came primarily for opportunity. We did not have the womb to the tomb welfare state that we now have; so there was no reason to come for that. For many decades we had very little immigration. Prior to 1965 (and perhaps for a time after that) an immigrant needed a sponsor to insure that he/she would not become a burden on our society. If the immigrant became a deadbeat, the sponsor was responsible for the welfare of the person that he had guaranteed would become a contributing member of our society.
The sponsor honored the commitment made to other citizens not to tax them on behalf of his immigrant associate. Ours was a virtuous and generous society. Now we have Anchor Babies and chain migration and our corrupt dishonorable leaders refuse to stop it in order to create a Welfarian Sector, enslaved to entitlements, voting for its very existence with the power to take from others, like a cancer feeding on a body.
At the rates that we are and will be taxed to fund our burgeoning Welfarian Sector to the point where we will no longer be able to give much from our own free will as God intended and Jesus spoke about - there just won't be enough disposable income left.

These foreign invaders will never appreciate America for the miracle that it is - they had to do nothing to belong to our society or have been reared by taker parents who cannot impart to them our values. Add to that the revisionist history and socialism being pushed by the NEA in our schools and you have a recipe for a deadly toxin injected into our nation. Will an antidote (inspirational leader - halt to immigration - reform in our educational system) be found?

Certainly it is not the current occupant of the White House. He is typical of the problem. I do not profess to know where he was born - but that is not the problem. The problem is where he grew up (and where he is now). He grew up in other countries, raised in another religion that until 20 or 30 years ago was completely unknown in the U.S. and when he did come to America it was to Hawaii, which is about as close to a third world country as you are going to find in America. And actually, Islam is a political system masquerading as a religion. And one of its tenets is that a muslim is allowed to lie cheat steal or kill to further its spread. This entire administration is a masquerade. Check out how any muslims are in it and how many converts thee now are in it. Valerie Jarrett for example, was raised in Iran. Now do you understand why our national security was given away? Huma Abedin, who was 'tasked' with intercepting all of Hillary Clinton's emails while Secretary of State, could not receive even the most rudimentary security clearance due to her associations, not the least of which are her brother and late father being high up in the Muslim Brotherhood. Do you think the Secretary of State was read in on Ambassador Chris Stevens' plans and whereabouts regarding Ben Ghazi? He was begging Hillary for more security etc so Huma surely had eyes on those emails.

And it would be good to know if Hillary was in the loop on the activities of Seal Team Six. Bigmouth Biden outed that they had been the ones to dispatch Osama bin Laden to his room in hell; a month later 22 of them plus 8 others were lured to an ambush in Afghanistan.

A man of goodness, honor and virtue offered himself for the presidency in 2012 - apparently he should have offered freebies for the Welfarian Sector. That is what won the day, not the upstanding statesman.

Very informative H Reardon, but if you are speaking of Romney in2012 then you are only trying to select between the lessor of two evils. If only they had "None of the above" on the ballot.

A public anything can not exist without the private. Virtue, being a quality of courage, excellence, and valor, as measured by law, is a secular understanding of superior merit. Virtue, being the practice of morality and righteousness is an understanding of religion. Either way, virtue ultimately derives from the individual and as such, there is only a perceived public virtue as a practice of individuals united. There can be no "public" passion (superior or otherwise) with out private "passion" (in the minority / majority or any other measurement). The sentiment is excellent and absolutely correct - it was just poorly perceived (the collective is lawfully not superior to the individual). With out virtue, and a passion therefore, in all expressions of life (individual moral codes, politics, integrity, honesty, etc.), there will be no government of law (only man's tyranny, wars, poverty, etc.), neither will there be a progression of the noble being, 'man'. The occupying statist theocracy infesting this land is proof positive of the accuracy of the above sentiment.

Public virtue cannot be forced upon a people ! But must come from the Private Individual Sovereign. These virtues being Honor, Manliness, Self Reliance, Courage, MORAL integrity, and Hospitality originating from a closer relationship with God. The Ancient Philosophical roots of Agrarianism intertwined with the ancient laws of Liberty and Physiocracy,the first well developed theory of honest economics. Order out of chaos. We are Endowed by our Creator. This now 2015, the year of Jubilee. very befitting for uprising and revolt against usury and oppression practiced by the statist theocracy of socialism which grips the world. Saad Al Melik. This is parenthetical distinct truth based upon God's natural laws. " BHOLD WHAT manner of love the Father hath bestowed upon us, that we should be called the sons of God: therefore the world knoweth us not, because it knew not him. Marvel not, my brethren, if the world hate you. " ( I John 3:1,13 )

THANKS to all you wonderful writers, my semi-literate contributions here would pale by comparison! Suffice to say - we're JUKED. MainStreamMedia has washed-away all traditional values of our once-proud Republic, while our govt has been infiltrated, corrupted, and bought-off by NWO criminals. To paraphrase something I heard the other day - we are no longer a country with a govt; we are now a govt with a country. The new breed of narcissism now practiced by most "Americans" has supplanted and totally forgotten (never knew) the once-firm foundational principles of personal integrity, upon which we based our individual sovereignty, and depended upon to ensure our Liberty. Now our society more resembles a free-for-all, with millions of parasites demanding their "share" of largess, to be extracted from every working sovereign, against our rights and desires that we remain true to our founding. Then comes the Trumpster, fiddling to the debauched masses, appealing to debased "conservatives", who somehow see such a rascal as a would-be "savior" - disheartening and disgusting, all at once - sigh...