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Jon Roland: State of the Union, Jan. 28, 2014
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Jun 5, 2025
Jon Roland delivers his own State of the Union address, at Austin Constitution meetup, Jan. 28, 2014. Not quite like the one to be delivered by Obama later in the same evening.
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my fellow
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Americans thank you
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for
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attending this State of the Union
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Address on this date January
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28th 9
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2014 I'm John Rand no I am not the
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president of the United
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States although I'm eligible to be
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unlike some
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people uh I
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am going to speak to you tonight about
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the problems that confront our nation
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the state that it's in and how we can
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move forward to a better
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future first I need to give you the bad
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news uh we are in a very bad
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situation I think most of you know that
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most politicians won't tell you that at
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least not uh before just before an
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election they want to tell you that
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they've got things under control that
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they know what they're
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doing and I'm here to tell you that no
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we don't know what we're doing Congress
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doesn't know what it's doing the
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president doesn't know what he's doing
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the courts don't know what they're doing
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we're just winging it and hoping for the
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best the job of the president is
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expressed in his oath of office to
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preserve protect and defend the
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Constitution of the United States
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against all enemies foreign or
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demestic I have to regretfully inform
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you if you didn't already
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know that the current president and the
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previous uh several occupants of that
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office have not been fulfilling that
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Duty they have not been defending the
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Constitution as it was originally
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understood and
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meant they've allowed the practices of
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Congress the executive branch and the
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courts to
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wonderer far from the Constitution as it
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was intended to be uh
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enforced there are many reasons for
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that but unfortunately most of them come
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down to the fact that you the people
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have not done your job of demanding that
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your public servants comply with the
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Constitution you have not made it the
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leading issue in every
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election instead too many of you demand
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benefits from
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government usually without agree
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consenting to paying for any of
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them that has to
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stop and as president it would be my
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program to stop
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them uh many of you would not like that
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in in fact many of you would probably
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not vote for me for that reason well I'm
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not here to tell you why you should vote
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for me I'm here to tell you why you
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should support what I'm telling you and
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if you don't support it then you're
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going to be in a very bad way and so
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will the rest of
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us now the single biggest problem
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confronting our
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country is what is sometimes called the
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debt
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crisis it is sometimes misrepresented as
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merely a matter of of government
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deficits that's part of it it's the
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leading contributing
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factor but the main problem is that we
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have built an economy on the basis of
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debt we've been
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borrowing what we call money and it's
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not really money we just call it that
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that and people are foolish enough to
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accept it in payments for good and
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services but we've been borrowing it in
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and when we can't pay the loans back
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we've been creating more money out of
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thin air to pay the interest and the
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principle on those
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loans and we've been doing that it's not
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only government that's been doing that
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the private sector has been doing it as
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well and the private financial sector
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has been
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speculating
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creating highly complex speculative
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financial instruments which they
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trade and all of which are based upon
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debt that vastly exceeds what it will
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ever be possible to pay
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off they
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only are able to continue doing that
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because they create
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more
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currency out of thin air and pump it
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into the financial sector so that it can
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grow and seem to show a profit when in
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fact it's not showing a pro real profit
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at
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all because someday that process is
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going to falter and when it does it's
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all going to come crashing
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down I think most of you app understand
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that you may not want to think think
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about it but I'm here to encourage you
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to think about it because we are not
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going to get out of this one
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easily we are not going to tax our way
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out of it we're not going to spend our
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way out of it we're not going to borrow
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our way out of it and we're not going to
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grow our way out of
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it because the fundamental problem is
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not that there is not enough Capital to
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create enough jobs to employ everyone
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there's plenty of capital do to do that
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the problem is that it is not a good
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investment to invest that capital in
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creating jobs there are better ways to
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invested at a higher rate of return
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there are simply not enough ways to
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employ people to make things or make
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services that enough people are going to
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be willing to pay to
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buy if people won't pay for things it
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makes no sense to invest in producing
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them so for the foreseeable
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future we not only will probably not see
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sufficient growth in
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jobs but we may actually begin to see a
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decline the good news is that most of
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those offshore jobs are coming back the
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bad news is that when they do they will
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be done by
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machines we are making rapid
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progress with new
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technology that will displace human
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workers we
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automated
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farming we we mechanized mining we
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mechanize
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manufacturing we're increasingly
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mechanizing
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services including White Collar
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jobs what we are increasingly being left
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with is only a few low skill jobs that
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uh
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pay not enough to support a
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family or jobs for highly paid
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professionals we are eliminating the
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jobs in between
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and with it with the middle
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class A lot of politicians will tell you
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that they're going to try to protect the
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middle class well
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unfortunately they're not going to be
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able to do that and they're lying to you
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if they say that you need to face the
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fact
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that unless you own a machine in the
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future you're not going to have a
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Revenue
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stream that's just the way it
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is and you're probably not going to own
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a
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machine
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so uh we are facing a grim
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future and it's not going to get better
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for your children or
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grandchildren uh we
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have reached what is probably the PE of
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prosperity as far as ordinary human
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beings are
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concerned now that doesn't mean there
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won't be economic growth by several
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measures the economy however can go on
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and grow by itself and leave human
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beings
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behind can leave them in the dust leave
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them to try to make a living by scaming
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through
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uh solid waste
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dumps but not to live in a man
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that most people would consider
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satisfactory now of course as long as
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the economy is producing a surplus there
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will be demands and some
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capability to meet the demand for
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consumption by simply subsidizing people
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that's what we've been increasingly
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doing a large part of the people of of
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this country are being subsidized even
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those who have jobs are being subsidized
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in
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part so it's not just a matter of
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47% or some other such number of those
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who are dependent on government to one
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extent or another almost all of us are
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dependent on
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government and un and government is not
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going to be able to continue to do
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that uh if
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it can pay its bills by printing more
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money but when that money fails to
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continue to inflate the financial sector
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the financial sector is going to
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collapse and all that money is going to
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come flooding into the commodity sector
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the equity sector and inflate all the
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prices for everything else we
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need so don't be too surprised if uh
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tomorrow morning you wake up and the
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your bank will no longer honor any of
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your checks or allow you to make any
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cash
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withdrawals and suddenly there's a run
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on the banks on the supermarkets and on
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everything else around you people
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scrambling to uh get the last remaining
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supplies that they need to survive
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and discover that they run out within a
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few weeks never to have those supplies
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replenished again except through
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barter it's going to be very important
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to have personal control over your own
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wealth that means land it means tools it
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means the solid things you can put your
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hands on that you can store that you can
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carry that you can trade with because we
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human beings are going to be going to a
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barter
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economy we I can't say how soon that
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will happen but it's very likely to
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break loose within the next four
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years hopefully it could take longer it
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could happen tomorrow we just don't know
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and no one knows anyone who tells you he
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knows is a fool or a
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liar
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so what do we do about
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this well first of all all the things
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that we would needed would have needed
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to do to avoid this situation needed to
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have been done more than 40 years
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ago uh we are past the point where uh we
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can
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simply but through some combination of
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magical uh policy
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decisions uh escap escape from
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it uh we are like the Taron character Wy
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coyote who runs off the edge of the
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cliff and who hangs in midair for a
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while before looking down and
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discovering that there's nothing
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supporting him at which point he
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plummets to the canyon
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below we are all in the position of Wy
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coyote we have already run off the cliff
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we just don't know it
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yet and if you take seriously what I'm
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telling you here
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tonight you will in fact fall off that
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position of floating in midair along
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with everyone else so I am sorry to say
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this speech taken seriously is likely to
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precipitate the very disaster that we're
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facing but the fact is that that is
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better to precipitate it now than to
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drag it out until the point where it
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will be even
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worse uh we face not only another great
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depression but remember that the last
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Great Depression resulted in a world
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war and we didn't have nuclear weapons
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until the very end of that war now we
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have more almost 20 countries with
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nuclear weap weapons varying numbers of
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them and you have to ask yourself what
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are the odds that if there's another
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depression worse than the one of the 30s
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what are the odds that no Nation will
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ever use any of those nuclear
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weapons and if one does what are the
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odds that they won't suddenly all break
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loose and send everything they've got at
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everyone they think might be a threat
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so this is not just a matter of economic
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well-being this is a matter of
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survival we could easily lose more than
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6 billion of the 7 billion people now on
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the planet and that would mostly be
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people in the de so-called developed
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countries so uh uh it's going to be
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rough if that
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happens and the preppers are right you
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need to
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prepare uh and you won't be able to
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prepare for everything so uh better to
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get started
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now
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now this is the situation in which we
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find
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ourselves let's examine some of the
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other problems that result from failing
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to comply with the
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Constitution it's not just the that we
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get big government that is too large to
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be supervised too large to
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manage it is that we get mounting
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Injustice of all
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kinds by government abusing people's
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rights and not and denying them remedies
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for those
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abuses we
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have hundreds perhaps thousands
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depending on how you count them
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of Federal Criminal statutes that are
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not authorized by the
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Constitution 95% of all the
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legislation passed by Congress in the
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last 20 years is
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unconstitutional and as president I will
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not enforce it and if Congress or the
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courts uh insist that I do so I will
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ignore them
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because I have to make my own judgments
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as to what is and is not constitutional
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and if I find that a statute is or even
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a court order is
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unconstitutional I will ignore it and I
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will do what the Constitution requires
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not what they
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require so that's going to produce a
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very controversial
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situation now
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what is the need that we have for the
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public in this situation well first of
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all you're going to need to support my
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efforts to return us to constitutional
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compliance you have to put aside your
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private concerns about making a living
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and unite in helping to govern this
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country you're going to have to rep
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replace most of the people who are now
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in government in every Branch at every
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level the ones that are in government
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now are too entrenched they're too
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devoted to their own uh interests and
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those of their cronies to ever
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reform they might reform later after
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they've been out of power for a while
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and we could consider them on a Case by
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case basis at that time but in the
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meantime
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almost all the positions in government
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are going to have to be
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replaced that means that with few
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exceptions you need to elect complete
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new set of members of
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Congress uh you need to elect new
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Governors new state
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legislators you need to elect complete
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new set of almost everyone and don't be
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fooled by people who tell you that they
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are devoted to the
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Constitution they need to at least be
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able to demonstrate that they know what
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the Constitution requires of us and what
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it forbids of us and if they cannot
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engage in a competent detailed
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discussion of the every provision of the
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Constitution then you should not vote
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for
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them so everyone needs to get the books
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to understand the Constitution
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as it was understood and meant and that
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is not going to be easy it has taken me
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more than 50 years it's going to take
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almost anyone at least
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20 it's not going to happen overnight
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but we have to get on with
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it
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so what is the first thing we need to
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do
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well on I several
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websites which I personally
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maintain in which I've set forth the
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Constitutional Amendments that need to
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be made the bills that need to be passed
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in
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Congress
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detailed bills that I need your support
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to in get introduced and to
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pass you'll notice that these are on my
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personal websites
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or at least my private organization's
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websites because I don't trust the
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government to maintain a
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website and you shouldn't
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either so you look for them on my
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websites constitution.org
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John roland. net that's j n r o n
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d.net look for proposed bills and you
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can see the actual legislation ready to
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drop in the
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Hopper now you're going to have to get
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after your members of Congress to
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introduce that legislation and to manage
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its way through
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Congress some of those bills are to
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introduce Constitutional
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Amendments similar bills can be written
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and need to be written for each
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state so it's going to be a lot to do
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for us over the next several months and
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years
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years but if we get on with
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it if by moving forward on the needed
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reforms we have to make we may in fact
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Stave off the collapse that I'm warning
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about because if enough people feel that
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they have a work to do to turn the
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situation around as enough people did
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when World War II started started when
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World War II started it was not the
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spending on armaments or War material or
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the actual conduct of War operations
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that turned around the
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economy it was people with a
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mission they now had a mission to fight
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the war and having that mission they
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turned the economy
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around so what we need now is for all of
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you to develop a sense of
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mission that can turn the situation
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around simply by changing expectations
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changing
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demands and changing the way we work
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together
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so that is the plan I have laid out for
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you remember you won't find this on a
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government website you find it on my
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websites
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at least until the some government
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agency tries to shut them
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down so I I'm done now you'll notice
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that I am not speaking from a
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teleprompter I don't need a
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teleprompter I speak
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extemporaneously which means that all of
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you who were may have been expecting to
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see a printed a speech before the this
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address is being given are just going to
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have have to wait until you see a
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printed version taken from this oral
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version that's the way I do
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things and I encourage everyone else to
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learn how to do the same
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because the day when we simply read what
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other people have written it needs to
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end we need to do our own thinking our
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own writing and we need to get it right
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so with that I B you good evening and uh
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good luck to us all thank you
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