[David Kirkham]

Gents:

Thanks for all the comments! This is the text of my speech I gave. I worked on it for a week. Some guys here on the site even proofed it for me. I am deeply grateful for their commentary. I taped the speech, but I am so tired I can't download it right now.

6 March 09
Salt Lake Tea Party

Thank you all for coming: My name is David Kirkham. I thank you for the time I have to talk to you.

America is the Land of Opportunity. But today, America is in a hole. Small businesses that were thriving last year, today are struggling for air. We all know people who have lost their jobs. Some assert we can tax and spend or even print our way out of this hole with Wall Street Bailouts and Shovel-Ready projects. Yet our own common sense tells us, “When you find yourself trapped in a hole--stop digging.”

Congress just passed the largest deficit-spending package and governmental expansion in history. This ill-conceived plan will seal a “Cap” on the very hole we are trying to claw out of and “Trade” our freedoms for the sterile promise--government will pay our defaulted mortgages and fill our empty gas tanks. We chasten the frugal and reward the reckless behavior of those who are deemed by their lobbyists as "too big to fail." Is it any wonder the very men who write and enforce our tax laws fail to pay their own, feigning ignorance of the onerous regulations--written by their own hand.

I wish all Americans could see the predictable consequences of callous governmental control--along with its cruel effects on every day workers and their families. Perhaps our story is not so distant from what we see today.

Fifteen years ago my brother Thomas and I went to the Provo airport to look at an old jet fighter from Poland. One glance at the jet and my brother Thomas turned to me and said, "Those guys could make aluminum-bodied Cobras."

The world was an exciting place then: the Berlin Wall had fallen; Russia was imploding; and her satellite countries were throwing off the chains of long, dark years of political and economic oppression. Captivated by this once-in-a-lifetime opportunity, I packed my bags and left BYU and my dreams of medical school, behind. I landed in Poland with a toy model of a Cobra, a Polish-English dictionary, and a new dream.

There, I wandered through an enormous aircraft factory that produced 3 MiG's/day at the height of the Cold War. Times were tough and where once 60,000 men and women worked, only 24,000 remained. I walked past somber lathe and mill operators who stood behind silent machines in buildings, where the lights were turned off--because the Polish government could no longer afford to keep them on--even in their own defense industries.

Day after day on that first trip to Poland I saw the worry of an uncertain future etched on faces that were worn with far more years than they had passed on this earth. In time, my mother joined me on trips to Poland--only to be routinely mistaken as my wife--a wonderful compliment for her, yet a startling condemnation of the trials of life women in Poland endured.

We were at the factory in Poland the day over 20,000 of those 24,000 men and women lost their jobs. We watched as displaced workers wearily pedaled home through the cold--only to be greeted by anxious families and haunting memories of the specter of food rationing. The bailouts were bankrupt.

But the Polish people are resilient. They booted out Socialism and voted in a democracy that slashed taxes and offered land and buildings for sale. We bought buildings, we bought silent machinery, we bought land, and most importantly, we hired those anxious men and women. We provided jobs in a factory--where untold billions of government money had long been lavished on the rat-hole of squander.

These spending bills despoil us one feather at a time. Legislators deceive us by saying the only way out of this economic nightmare--of their own creation--is to impose a tsunami of stupefying government programs--each one with print so fine, those who sign it don't even bother to read it.

Politicians of both parties, like the Roman Senate of old, promise bread and circuses as they line their war chests with our children's money. Bush's bailout boondoggle and Obama's attempt to decorate the earth with dollar bills forebodes another haunting specter. Inflation lurks in this madness. We were in Poland when they chopped 4 zeros off of their currency to dispel the demons of inflation. One day the National credit card statement must arrive in each of our wallets. Sadly, that day has already fallen on far too many small businesses across our country.

We have seen people on both sides of the Atlantic loose their jobs in this economy. Yet, we have seen private investment and the entrepreneurial spirit pry open doors governments had long shielded from the sanitizing light of day. We have even seen a factory of war beaten into plowshares.

Some contend they must tax slices of pie from the rich to avenge slights of the poor. Yet, we have seen wealth destruction masquerade as wealth redistribution--with its 9000 "Bridges to Bondage"--slowly metastasize into trickle-down despair. We cheat our children's future--for a pot of porridge. If Congress spent more time baking pie--instead of stealing slices from others, perhaps hunger might even banish itself.

Will our children struggle with odious chains or will our children dream free? These bailouts and spending bills tax our children without representation. Personal responsibility has been humiliated in exchange for the pompous promises of government. How much longer will we borrow before we too are forced to turn out our own lights?

In times past, a canary was taken deep into coal mines. If the canary quit singing the men in the mine knew they had better get out before the deadly gases--which they could neither see nor smell--suffocated them. Everyone who came today is a canary in the mine...and we are running out of air.

Legislators, how many more canaries must die before your spending bills, polluted by the toxic brew of your arrogance and lard, must be cleaned up by the men and women of this country--and their children and grandchildren? Lower our taxes; quit spending our money; let us all bake more pie. Common sense tells us, when you find yourself trapped in a hole, stop digging. Mr. Obama, put down that shovel.

David V. Kirkham