We need NOT worry about bin Laden because WE are letting our freedom go - what we have left are illusions of freedom. What we need to realise is that NO ONE can guarantee our safety and security on this Earth. We individually may die from a random act of terrorism (and in truth the odds are extremely high against this) but what is certain is that ALL of US will be MUCH worse off having to live without freedom. To live without freedom is to merely exist; you will live in fear of your government and today our government is governing us by playing on our fears.

As Benjamin Franklin said many years ago, "They that can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety."

A Requiem for Freedom

We live in a post-democratic time
yet continue to expound and export the process.
All power is being drained from the people,
either relinquished by apathy
or taken by blatant disenfranchisement.
Voters are required to maintain
the look of legitimacy
as non-verifiable electronics tally up the preset figures.
Only the shell of democratic institutions remain
and politicians play at games.
Courts capriciously interpret the Constitution,
subjecting us to their particular political beliefs.
News is fed to us on a need to know basis
we know little of the world and more of celebrities.
Children are educated in the narrow confines
of tests and intellectual curiosity is constrained.

We are divided for the conquest,
our humanity and commonality squashed
as we are manipulated by racism, ethnicity, religion
to keep us from connecting with our neighbor,
and regaining our collective power.
The stabilising force of a democratic society,
the Great Middle Class, is no longer required
and is systematically stripped of it's assets,
it's jobs shipped overseas,it's children's futures sold.
The rich hurry on to secure their positions
before the curtain drops.
How was freedom, so preciously won,
given up so casually by those who never paid the price?

(written by Syndi Holmes)