define freedom?

The dictionary defines freedom as the quality or state of being free: as the absence of necessity, coercion, or constraint in choice or action: liberation from slavery or restraint or from the power of another: or, the ability to live life as one pleases, so long as no injury is done to others. But in today's America, freedom has come to be interpreted as the ability to do whatever has not yet been ruled illegal by your government. By this standard we are free to drive to the grocery store, send our children to public schools, elect local leaders to office, and many other highly regulated activities. The point being, most every aspect of our so called freedom does not really fall under the true definition of freedom. Take a moment and try to drum up one thing you do during the day that isn't taxed, penalized, regulated, enforced, levied, fined, or imposed in one way or another by some form of bureaucracy, civil organization, establishment, or administration. Let's see, I wake up and drink my orange juice or eat my cereal which was approved safe for consumption by the FDA, drive to work in my car that I pay yearly taxes on, with gasoline which is also taxed, on roads which were built with fees charged through another tax, to my job which pays me about half of what I actually earn because of more taxes, which are required to keep the FDA in business so to keep me safe from tainted orange juice. As you can see, with a little imagination, the snowball quickly turns into an iceberg which threatens to envelope us all. The hard truth is that we are not free to do as we wish. Our democracy, which originally started out as a republic, has grown into a farce of incredible proportion. Our government, particularly the two party system or two sides of the same coin, has become the inescapable hand of legalized theft. "Theft," you exclaim? Fine. Let's go back to definitions. Theft is the act of stealing; specifically: the felonious taking and removing of personal property with intent to deprive the rightful owner of it: an unlawful taking of property. If you bought something with money you earned from your own labor, do you not rightfully own it? If you disagree then I assume you are a proponent of slavery. Don't bother reading any further. When did we, as a society and as individuals, decide it was okay to collectively steal from one another, and call it something more pleasant like tax? The word probably doesn't bother you. To you tax just means paying your share, right? Perhaps I don't feel like giving away half of my earnings to the rest of society. Wait, the rest of society would be alright with me, but giving it to government to disburse as they see fit doesn't fit well with me at all. Well, for fun, try a little experiment and stop paying your income taxes. How we have become accustomed to giving over what is rightfully ours at gunpoint?

On November 4th take into consideration those people and propositions you vote for. Consider the fact that every government job, every legislation signed into law, yea, every aspect of the state allows, even requires, the legalized plunder of every American citizen.