Dakota Beacon

I have been annoyed for years that whenever we hear a Marxist talk of his plans to “level the playing field” or “redistribute the wealth” or take what the wealthy have either earned or inherited and hand it out to the “needy”, it's referred to as a “Robin Hood” scheme.

I happen to have grown up on the legend of Robin Hood and I loved him! (Never mind the part about King Richard, who, in my opinion, upon later review, leaves much to be desired.) Robin Hood returned from the Crusades to find his father's property seized and his countrymen under the boot of Prince John (again, I think he was unfairly demonized) and especially the boot of the Sheriff of Nottingham. Let's just stipulate to the part of the legend where he came back to find his people and country in disarray and oppressed. A man was executed for killing a deer to feed his family or taking firewood to keep warm.

The farmers worked as tenants to earn their keep and their work product was confiscated for exhorbitant taxation to make government bigwigs comfortable. This sounds more like Democrats and Socialists than capitalist success stories. Today we have much the same. The working man finds his earnings carried off for taxes and mandates against his will by government. You might say that Obamacare is the new Sheriff of Nottingham and we even have a usurper in the White House, much as the character of Prince John was acting in the Robin Hood legend without legitimacy.

It might be a small thing, but I resent having one of my childhood heroes – the guy who rode in and championed the victims of this confiscation and helped the real producers of the wealth recover what was rightfully theirs and do what he could to put an end to government spending and confiscation of wealth of earners thus slandered. If he were really here today he'd look upon the extravagances of Michelle and Barack Obama and their entourage much as Robin looked upon the Sheriff of Nottingham – living on the backs of other's labor, redistributing his father's legacy to people such as Sir Roger DeLisle. I think he'd be on our side – not Obama's.