My Dearest Son:

As you know from my past letters I am becoming more incensed. Correction, I am outraged that our leadership rewards those who are the cause of our misery. Everything is disproportionate with taxation and wealth distribution. The middle- and lower-income classes are losing power and have little say in running the country. They are the groups that pay the most tax while the elite and high-income bracketed impose edicts enabling themselves to escape assessments. Property seizures are reaching all-time records, farmers who produce the crops are becoming fewer because of excess taxation and regulations. More of the newly created factory workers, artisans, and journeymen are unemployed as demand for their goods and services shrink.

Meanwhile methods of communication are expanding and news spreads more rapidly informing the populace of the inequities between the wage-earner and those higher on the income scale. There appears an impending class division and the rumblings of discontent grow each day. The increasing ranks of the middle and lower echelons feel they have no say in running the country. I fear that soon there will not be enough income for the government to do its job.

The government has spent an extraordinary amount of money on that unpopular overseas war, and the new president is having a difficult time adjusting to and coping with these situations. He will probably be unable to restore to our treasury the huge deficits we now have and which continue to increase. The heads of state claim they are trying to right the shortfall they inherited from their predecessors. The banking system is not able to cope with the fiscal problems to which they themselves contributed.

Terrorism is the feared outcome if we are not wary. Some of the most radical fanatics are preaching “virtue without terror is impotent” and seek to incite hostilities on the leaders who do not think the way they do. They have new methods and weapons of killing. There is much trepidation that they will try to impose their radical new order on the infuriated citizenry.

Tomorrow we rally at the Bastille. I know not the outcome, but whatever happens, know well that you are always in my heart.

Your father, André Paris July 13, 1789

Dear Great-great-great-grandfather,

I read your final letter from our family archive. It has been 220 years, things have changed, yet much has not. Allow me expound on your comments and their modern counterparts.

You speak of the monarchy, nobility and the clergy who were the taxing and tithing powers. Taxes now are levied only by elected governments (local, state, federal). You mentioned getting the news from north to south in a matter of days instead of weeks, due to your new roads and pamphlet printing. Today worldly events are conveyed and seen globally within moments by the press of a button.

The war you financed helped gain America’s independence from Britain and our new President Washington was untested in many areas. He proved to be a farsighted leader establishing many precedents. France later gave him citizenship.

The improved weapons you referenced were cannons, muskets, pistols, along with new battlefield tactics and the introduction of the guillotine. Now current arsenals can annihilate human existence if left unfettered of proliferation and regulation.

The Reign of Terror you experienced has descended upon us many-fold and continues to wreak chaos worldwide. It is contained by mighty forces constantly vigilant. Security is the No. 1 priority in major nations.

A minority of world citizens and fanatics seek an uprising such as yours, they too want to punish those whom they feel are responsible for their hardships. Your lessons have taught us that change through anarchy does not last as long as change through the ballot box.

Economically, in contrast to the government policies you experienced, we now have more safeguards in place. The bread you bought cost at lease a half-day’s wage; now it is had for less than an hour’s pay. Federal insurance, stimulus packages, unemployment benefits, tax incentives and specified bailouts (even with some excesses), help cushion our crisis.

We like to consider ourselves, with modesty, more enlightened, benevolent, tolerant, compassionate and worldly when perusing your history. I hope this is so.

May this message brings you solace along with my love.

Your great-great-great-grandson, Andy Fairhope May 13, 2009

Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it.

~ George Santayana

Herb Kandel is an entrepreneur and a former human resources executive who now lives in Fairhope. He can be contacted at hekan@mail.com.Tri-O’s