Tyranny Busters - Introduction

    The Tyranny Busters books are written with the purpose of freeing minds from tyranny. Thomas Jefferson’s quote below caused me to give this subject a long, hard look. I have been enlightened by this simple quote of Jefferson’s, and I hope that I may enlighten others as he continues to do throughout the ages.

     What did Thomas Jefferson mean when he wrote, “I have sworn upon the altar of God, eternal hostility against every form of tyranny over the mind of man.”? Why did he say “...over the mind of man”?

     Did he conceive tyranny to mean only despotic rule? If so, why did he say “...every form of tyranny”?

    He was speaking of tyranny over the mind, not over the body. Why? Why was this kind of tyranny so disagreeable to him? In ancient Greece, tyranny referred to a government that took power without the right to do so—to rule without right, whether benevolent or despotic. To control a person’s mind without their awareness is, in my opinion, the ultimate tyranny. It is this form of tyranny that I wish to address.

    Controlling minds through fraud is a common practice of governments. This fraud is accomplished through propaganda and with repeated lies. Today, our government has almost convinced us that we would starve if not for its benevolent care. The tyranny I address in this book is the so-called Federal “Income” Tax. Our government has convinced us that we must, in effect, subject ourselves to slavery in order to be free. What a tyranny this is upon our minds!

    To stimulate your brain a little, ask yourself these questions: “Do you, as an individual, have inalienable rights? Do you have the inalienable ‘right’ to the preservation of life and liberty? Do you own yourself? Does the ‘right’ to the preservation of life depend on the permission or control of government? Does the government have the power to deter- mine how much of your labor will be forfeited to the state? Can a ‘right’ be taxed? Do you have a ‘right’ to your own sanity?”

    What is sanity? We know that when people are deemed to be insane, they are thought to be not responsible for their actions. So, those who are responsible for their actions must therefore be ’sane’. If there is tyranny over a mind, then that mind is neither sane, nor free, nor responsible for itself.

    Think about this concept for a minute: when this country began, the people were neither dependent on the government for their existence, nor was their labor confiscated by the government. This country began with the premise that we all had an inalienable right to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness, and that those rights could not be taken from us – in whole or part.

    In the Declaration of Independence, Jefferson wrote that governments were instituted among men to secure our rights. Is that what our government does today, when it requires that many of us give up great portions of their property and/or labor for the benefit of those whom politicians deem fit to reward?

    It is time to remove some tyranny from our minds and to restore personal liberty and individual responsibility to our fair land.

Mike Benoit, Author