Fait accompli

fait ac·com·pli/ˌfed əkämˈplē,ˌfād əkämˈplē/ noun: fait accompli; plural noun: faits accomplis

a thing that has already happened or been decided before those affected hear about it, leaving them with no option but to accept it.

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The phrase is from the French and probably originated around the mid-19th century. That’s fitting (or, as the French themselves may say, apropos). It was around that time that the government in France changed with the same degree of frequency usually reserved for cheap transistor radios. The monarchy was overthrown. Then the republic. Then Napoleon. Then the next republic. Then the next Napoleon . . .

You get the point.

The great majority of Americans don’t realize it, but the fait accompli of their lives is the disappearance of their liberty, both personal and political.

They have no option but to accept it. Their parents and grandparents sealed their fate with tolerating income taxes and praising Social Security and accepting dozens of illegitimate, unconstitutional Supreme Court decisions without so much as a whimper.

Liberty is a funny thing. Unless someone is willing to fight for it, it dies. And, sometimes, that death is brutal and slow. Places like Hong Kong and Venezuela take a long time to kill liberty because it was really only a seedling concept in those places.

Fighting for liberty doesn’t always mean death to the individual fighter, although that is possible. And it’s a price someone must be prepared to pay for the successful defense of liberty. Defending liberty, however, can mean something as tempered as speaking at a meeting or writing a letter. These are options Americans have that other nations like Cuba and North Korea will never experience.

But, America is different. It was founded on liberty bedrock. The holes were drilled and the pillars were sunk straight into it. Liberty was so deep a part of the United States that citizens didn’t believe it could ever be separated.

What we have learned is that regardless of the foundation, the inhabitants of a house can destroy it from the inside. And they have. We have.

We – and by “we,” I mean “me” – rolled over passively at the disgusting and ridiculous suggestion that we/I were “killing grandparents” with COVID-19. We donned masks to shield ourselves when we knew full well it was useless. We didn’t question the information being fed to us despite the fact that the FIRST obligation of freedom is to educate yourselves.

Now, we have masked mobs raging the urban streets, unidentifiable through tools the government itself mandated. They murder and kill as indiscriminately as coronavirus ever did, probably more so. Their outrage is as false as the pandemic that was forgotten the moment they threw the first conveniently-placed brick.

As Americans, we had traditionally been united by our mutual love for liberty. That is to say, our desire to remain unoppressed by a government – ANY government – was shared by every American of every political orientation. Democrats wanted collective money with local authority. Republicans wanted local money with collective apathy. Both concepts were untenable and wrong.

So, here we are in 2020. Everyone wanting the government to “do something’ . . . “fix this.”

It can’t. It is the Frankenstein American citizens created. It is only capable of more destruction. We place feeble chains on our monster, yet we ask it to do more for us. And when it breaks those shackles and runs amok in our cities’ streets, we act betrayed or outraged.

Americans disgust me. I disgust me.

The United States of America is dead. Fait accompli.