I’m a Southerner and proud of it; born in Birmingham, citizen of the Volunteer State, and Tennessee Delegate to the Southern National Congress. While it’s a fine thing to be proud of our Southern roots, we shouldn’t be so proud or close-minded that we can’t learn from folks of other backgrounds; like my grandfather, for example.

My grandfather was Carl M. Parise of Reno, Nevada. He was named Nevada's Inventor of the Year in 1994 in recognition of his patents that had brought America and the world steam-cleaning for carpets, wet/dry vacs, and other related tools and products. He started his company in 1971 with a mere $400 and a dream. Over the next twenty-five years it became a multi-million dollar, family-owned-and-operated business.

During the early years of his company, most widely recognized under the trade name Thermax, Carl, a World War II combat veteran, came to understand the weaknesses and strengths his local government in Washoe County and at the State and federal levels as well. After an unsuccessful bid for local office, Carl founded "Registered Voters of Washoe County, Inc." His organization grew, and soon, with the help of area voters who contributed not only money but time and expertise, Registered Voters of Washoe County Inc. brought about real changes in Reno, including getting a crooked judge removed from the bench and saving the county in excess of $300,000 per year.

Soon Carl found himself planning for an expanded Registered Voters of America Inc. His idea was to duplicate the success in Washoe County across America on a localized basis, as well as developing a team to take on the so-called "leaders" in Washington.

In a meeting in San Diego in the late 1970's with a retired Navy admiral and another national figure, my grandfather was told that his ideas and strategies were indeed good ones, but they were too late in the offering. Carl recalled the admiral as saying, "If you were ten years earlier, perhaps your plan would work. But it's too late in the game." The admiral and the other individual both indicated that they were looking to retire outside the U.S. because in their view, America was on a course for certain economic disaster. Remember, this was in the late 1970's. A decade later my grandfather would tell me that although he had not wanted to believe the opinions of these men, he had sought them out for their input and possibly their support because he knew their views were sound. Their warnings led him to focus more closely on his business and less on trying to fix “un-fixable” America.

Validating their prophecy, the 1980's, 1990's, and the onset of the new Millennium have witnessed a mass exodus of American companies to foreign shores. Singer Sewing Machines, a name as synonymous with America as baseball or apple pie and made here for over a century, long ago departed for Mexico. Levi Strauss jeans, another American staple made in the USA since the 1870's, are now made in Mexico and Guatemala. The Western boot industry has completely abandoned its American heritage for the shores of China and Mexico. These are just a few examples of how our once great nation has lost her greatness that was her industrial strength. It seems we went from a nation that exported goods to the rest of the world to a nation that exported all of its jobs as well.

This fiasco continues today. Go ahead, call customer service for your "local" cable company, phone service, utility or any number of similar providers. See how often you end up speaking with someone in the Philippines or India.

Americans lose nearly a half million jobs per month, and the big companies so well represented by Washington lawmakers, companies who seem eager to squeeze the American consumer ever tighter in as many new ways as possible, ship more and more jobs to foreign countries as we all watch America die, business by small business, family by decimated family, home by foreclosed home. Today my late grandfather's State of Nevada leads the country in foreclosures, with over half of the State’s homes in peril. Nationwide, over 19 million homes stand empty.

State by State, America is dying. And where is "President" Obama? He's in Paris dining with the First Lady. He's in Arabia kissing the hands of foreign heads of state. He's in Russia sharing a bottle of vodka and a pack of American smokes with Putin. He's in Venezuela kissing the ear and perhaps the cheeks (the cheeks of a lower part of the anatomy) of a rogue dictator named Chavez.

As evidenced by the actions of a certain South Carolina Governor recently, it’s safe to assume that at the State level, many of our leaders are away from the helm or asleep at the switch. State by bleeding State, with Big Brother Washington leading the way, our governments refuse to act with fiscal responsibility in innumerable areas. Instead of representing the interests of their constituents (that's you and me, folks) our so-called leaders at State, federal and even local levels clearly serve only the highest bidders, wealthy elites like the Wall Street bankers.

We have been here before. In April 1774, after several years of letter writing among themselves through Committees of Correspondence, fifty-five patriots gathered in Philadelphia to seek alternatives, before it came down to the only choice left -- revolution. The Crown-appointed governors were the “recognized” government at the time. However, they clearly represented the interests of the British ruling class and dismissed the concerns of the People of the colonies. This “government” would wring their taxes from the People but would give them no voice in decisions that affected them, hence the complaint of “taxation without representation.”

Finally, when Crown and Parliament had contemptuously rejected all peaceful appeals, remonstrances, and petitions for redress of grievances, patriot Americans took the only course left to them aside from subjugation and slavery. They declared their independence; they seceded from the British Empire. At great risk of prosecution for treason, they rose from their knees to their feet, sacrificing their blood and treasure to give birth to a new nation and provide Americans with a government “of the People, by the People, and for the People.”

Once more the time has come for real American patriots to interpose themselves between the People and the regime in Washington that oppresses them (with the help of all too many State and local governments). A few of these new American patriots may come from legislative bodies. But, as it was in 1774, it’s far more likely that the "Neo-Patriots" as they might be called today, will come from the rubble of broken American businesses, towns, and neighborhoods as angry, everyday Americans finally say "Enough is enough!"

The Southern National Congress is a quasi-legislative endeavor involving over 100 such Neo-Patriots from the fourteen Southern states. This group of dedicated and courageous men and women are forging a new path to freedom and restored American liberty for the People of the South. Following in the successful footsteps of the patriots of 1774, the SNC is providing a forum for the voices of the People to be heard in a way clearly foreclosed to us in Washington. When DC stops listening to “We the People,” it’s indeed time for real change, change of historic proportions.

Left unchecked, the regime in Washington will soon complete the very ends that Thomas Jefferson warned about in 1802:

I believe that banking institutions are more dangerous to our liberties than standing armies. If the American people ever allow private banks to control the issue of their currency, first by inflation, then by deflation, the banks and corporations that will grow up around the banks will deprive the people of all property until their children wake-up homeless on the continent their fathers conquered.

How much longer will we the American People sit on our hands watching quietly while our unborn grandchildren are raped of their livelihoods even before they begin their lives?

Where are the George Washingtons, Ben Franklins, Thomas Jeffersons, James Madisons and Thomas Paines of today? Does the South that once produced the country’s best leaders still have a Jefferson Davis, a Judah P. Benjamin, a George Trenholm?

Are there still men and women in our midst, who will, given the right circumstances (or wrong ones, depending upon your point of view) do more than simply complain that "this ain't right"?

Will the real American patriots please stand up?

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