"It was the best of times, it was the worst of times; it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness; it was the epoch of belief, it was the epoch of incredulity; it was the season of Light, it was the season of Darkness; it was the spring of hope, it was the winter of despair; we had everything before us, we had nothing before us; we were all going directly to Heaven, we were all going the other way." Charles Dickens
How fitting this old quote sums up our experience in living through 2009. We celebrated America electing our first black President, showing that we truly are a nation that racism, while it still exists in the minority is not a illness shared by most Americans. This was a very good thing. It was just such a shame that this young man was the wrong person for that job. America was sold a bill of goods with visions of Hope and Change and new directions for this country. What we got was old ideas rewarmed, there was nothing new here, just tired old Marxist ideas that have been proven to fail every time they have been tried throughout history.
We have seen something new, never before have we seen our elected officials so blatently ignoring the will of the people and so arrogantly doing whatever they want to do virtually giving the nation the finger in the process.
Maybe the best thing to happen in 2009 is that this year may go down in history as the Great Awakening. Never before in my lifetime have I seen the American people more aggitated, more involved, more concerned, more connected to each other in a "us against them" attitude. If this emotion can sustain itself, maybe, just maybe We the People will be able to take back our own government and start clipping their wings, reducing their power, and get back to sanity.
We the People have momentum, we must not allow it to be squandered. Too many people have taken to "throwing all the bums out" instead of really studying to who is on our side, and who is not. For us to actually achieve our goals, 2010 will be critical. We need to come together, we need to get behind conservative candidates to run and elect within the Republican party, doing as Ronald Reagan taught us to do.
"Is it a third party we need, or is it a new and revitalized second party, raising a banner of no pale pastels, but bold colors which make it unmistakably clear where we stand on all of the issues troubling the people?" Ronald Reagan
Reagan led us out of the darkness of the dispair that Carter brought us, and he can do it again, if we will but listen to his wisdom speaking from the past.
Let's together make sure that this Great Awakening captures the energy and takes America back to her promise, to her Freedoms, to our Liberties. The ball is rolling, now we have to make sure we come together on our issues we agree upon and defer those that separate us until after we win back the House, Senate, and White House.
Once we put out the fire of Marxist takeover, we can argue about what color to paint the dining room.
Thursday, December 31, 2009
Wednesday, December 30, 2009
The 8th Wonder of the World.
Albert Einstein told us that the eighth Wonder of the World was compounding interest. Compounding interest is either your very best friend if you are earning it, or your very worst enemy if you're paying it. If you have ever tried paying off a credit card with minimum payments you know of what I am speaking. This is the same if it is you personally paying or earning interest, if a company is, or if the government is. With our out of control government spending the interest is going to be frightening indeed.
The Rule of 72:
To be able to do compound interest problems in your head, the Rule of 72 gives you a lightning fast benchmark to determine how good (or not so good) a potential investment is likely to be.
The rule of 72 says that in order to find the number of years required to double your money at a given interest rate, you can just divide the interest rate into 72.
For example, if you want to know how long it will take to double your money at eight percent interest, divide 8 into 72 and get 9 years.
The rule of 72 is remarkably accurate, as long as the interest rate is less than twenty percent.
You can also run it backwards. If you want to double your money in six years, just divide 6 into 72 to find that it will require an interest rate of about 12 percent.
If you really want to see magic look at the below example.
If I were to offer you a special project for next month, and would either pay you 100,000.00 dollars for it, or give you a penny on day one and double it everyday which would you take?
1. .01
2. .02
3. .04
4. .08
5. .16
6. .32
7. .64
At the end of your first week you would earn 1.27.
8. 1.28
9. 2.56
10. 5.12
11. 10.24
12. 20.48
13. 40.96
14. 81.92
At the end of two weeks you would have earned 543.00.
15. 163.84
16. 327.68
17. 655.36
18. 1,310.72
19. 2,621.44
20. 5,242.88
21. 10,485.76
At the end of three weeks you would have earned 21,352.11.
22. 20,971.52
23. 41,943.04
24. 83,886.08
25. 167,772.16
26. 335,544.32
27. 671,066.64
28. 1,342,177.28
29. 2,684,354.56
30. 5,368,709.12
31. 10,737,418.24
At the end of the month you would have earned 21,475,192.00.
Hope this math is enlightening to you. Keep it in mind when you hear that we are going to borrow billions here, and trillions there.
The Rule of 72:
To be able to do compound interest problems in your head, the Rule of 72 gives you a lightning fast benchmark to determine how good (or not so good) a potential investment is likely to be.
The rule of 72 says that in order to find the number of years required to double your money at a given interest rate, you can just divide the interest rate into 72.
For example, if you want to know how long it will take to double your money at eight percent interest, divide 8 into 72 and get 9 years.
The rule of 72 is remarkably accurate, as long as the interest rate is less than twenty percent.
You can also run it backwards. If you want to double your money in six years, just divide 6 into 72 to find that it will require an interest rate of about 12 percent.
If you really want to see magic look at the below example.
If I were to offer you a special project for next month, and would either pay you 100,000.00 dollars for it, or give you a penny on day one and double it everyday which would you take?
1. .01
2. .02
3. .04
4. .08
5. .16
6. .32
7. .64
At the end of your first week you would earn 1.27.
8. 1.28
9. 2.56
10. 5.12
11. 10.24
12. 20.48
13. 40.96
14. 81.92
At the end of two weeks you would have earned 543.00.
15. 163.84
16. 327.68
17. 655.36
18. 1,310.72
19. 2,621.44
20. 5,242.88
21. 10,485.76
At the end of three weeks you would have earned 21,352.11.
22. 20,971.52
23. 41,943.04
24. 83,886.08
25. 167,772.16
26. 335,544.32
27. 671,066.64
28. 1,342,177.28
29. 2,684,354.56
30. 5,368,709.12
31. 10,737,418.24
At the end of the month you would have earned 21,475,192.00.
Hope this math is enlightening to you. Keep it in mind when you hear that we are going to borrow billions here, and trillions there.
Monday, December 28, 2009
Our First American Conflict With Muslim Terrorists
Was it under George H.W. Bush, Bill Clinton, or George W. Bush that we started fighting Muslim terrorists? Who was the first to use a preemtive war to go after them, George W. Bush, as we are told was the "Bush Doctrine" we all heard for the first time when Charlie Gibson asked Sarah Palin?
Actually it goes back a bit before any of the above were born. The first American conflict with Muslim terrorists were when several Muslim countries along the North African coast had estabilished the tradition of plundering ships of European and American merchants in the western Mediterranean and eastern Atlantic, capturing the crews and then demanding ransom from the respective governments for their release.
In a joint message to their superiors in Congress, John Adams and Thomas Jefferson described the audacity of these terrorist attacks, pirates leaping onto defenseless ships with daggers clenched in their teeth. Adams and Jefferson had asked the ambassador from Tripoli to explain on what grounds these outrageous acts of unbridled savagery could be justified: "The Ambassador answered us that it was founded on the Laws of the Prophet, that it was written in their Koran, that all nations who shuold not have acknowledged their authority were sinners, that it was their right and duty to make war upon them whereever they could be found, and to make slaves of all they could take as Prisoners..."
Jefferson found such unmitgated blackmail beyond his comprehnsion and beyond any recognized principle of law or justice. He initially proposed that the United States refuse to pay ransoms and instead dispatch a naval force to the Mediterranian to teach these outlaws of the sea a lesson. Later he supplemented his proposal with a comphrehensive scheme whereby the United States would organize an international task force comprised of all European nations whose shipping was being victimized. "Justice and Honor favor this course," he exclaimed to Adams, and it would probably cost less in the long run to boot.
Adams agreed that it was impossible to negotiate with the Barbary pirates; as he put it, "Avarice and Fear are the only Agents at Algiers..." But Jefferson's accounting, Adams observed, grossly underestimated the cost. It would require at least 500,000 pounds annually to sustain a naval force in the region. The Congress would never authorize such a sum, and the United States had nothing in the way of a navy to send over anyway. "From these Premises," he apprised Jefferson, "I conclude it to be wisest for us to negotiate and pay the necessary Sum, without loss of Time." Adams insisted that Jefferson's solution, while bold and wholly honorable in its own terms, was an idea whose time had not come. "Congress will never, or at least not for years, take any such Resolution," he reminded Jefferson, "and in the mean time our Trade and Honour suffers beyond Calculation. We ought not to fight them at all unless we determine to fight them forever."
Jefferson remained unconvinced but agreed that Adams's opinion should be the basis for the official American position: "You make the result differently from what I do" he wrote to Adams in London, but "it is of no consequence; as I have nothing to say in the decision."
It is possible to detect in Jefferson an early undertone of resentment toward Adams's realism, which consistently undercut Jefferson's own grander visions. Jefferson tried to go over Adams's head by having his own proposal for an international naval force presented to Congress by a third party, a ploy that failed when Congress rejected the scheme outright, as Adams predicted they would.
Those who want to try to revise history by claiming that our founding fathers didn't create America through their own Christian beliefs always use this quote from John Adams from the U.S. Treaty with Tripoli 1796 and 1797 as their "proof".
"Art. 11. As the Government of the United States of America is not, in any sense, founded on the Christian religion; as it has in itself no character of enmity against the laws, religion, or tranquillity, of Mussulmen; and, as the said States never entered into any war, or act of hostility against any Mahometan nation, it is declared by the parties, that no pretext arising from religious opinions, shall ever produce an interruption of the harmony existing between the two countries.
However, when taken in context to what it was as part of a national bribe to terrorists claiming that America wasn't a nation formed as a Theocracy is a long way from how it is being used today.
After a few years of paying these bribes, Jefferson finally got his way. After the pasha of Tripoli chopped down the flagpole at the U.S. consulate there, it was a direct affront and an act of war. In 1801, Jefferson slowed down the mothballing of the naval fleet and sent ships to blockade the port.
Operating only under a set of joint resolutions, not a declaration of war, Jefferson nevertheless informed all the Barbary States that the United States was at war with them. He sought to get an interenational coalition to help, but no European states wanted to alter their status quo. So, in 1804, Lieutenant Stephen Decatur went ashore with eight U.S. Marines; set fire to a captured frigate, the Philadelphia' and through an expedition across the desert led by William Eaton and Greek mercenaries, organized locals who detested the pasha.
The American desert army also threatened the pirates' lucrative slave trade, and the presence of the powerful British fleet not far away put even more teeth into this threat. This stick combined with a carrot of a small ransom for the Philadelphia's crew, sufficed to force the pirates down and after releasing the crew, they recognized American freedom to sail the high seas uninterrupted.
By dispatching even such a small body of men so far to secure American national interests, Jefferson put the world on notice that the United States intended to be a force, if only a minor one, in world affairs. It was a remarkably brazen display of preemptive war by a president usually held up as a model of a limited government, and it achieved its results.
Thomas Jefferson, not George W. Bush was the first American president to do a preemptive attack. Both against Muslim Terrorist states. As you can clearly see, there is nothing new here. This conflict started with America and Muslim terrorists even before our Constitution was ratified.
Actually it goes back a bit before any of the above were born. The first American conflict with Muslim terrorists were when several Muslim countries along the North African coast had estabilished the tradition of plundering ships of European and American merchants in the western Mediterranean and eastern Atlantic, capturing the crews and then demanding ransom from the respective governments for their release.
In a joint message to their superiors in Congress, John Adams and Thomas Jefferson described the audacity of these terrorist attacks, pirates leaping onto defenseless ships with daggers clenched in their teeth. Adams and Jefferson had asked the ambassador from Tripoli to explain on what grounds these outrageous acts of unbridled savagery could be justified: "The Ambassador answered us that it was founded on the Laws of the Prophet, that it was written in their Koran, that all nations who shuold not have acknowledged their authority were sinners, that it was their right and duty to make war upon them whereever they could be found, and to make slaves of all they could take as Prisoners..."
Jefferson found such unmitgated blackmail beyond his comprehnsion and beyond any recognized principle of law or justice. He initially proposed that the United States refuse to pay ransoms and instead dispatch a naval force to the Mediterranian to teach these outlaws of the sea a lesson. Later he supplemented his proposal with a comphrehensive scheme whereby the United States would organize an international task force comprised of all European nations whose shipping was being victimized. "Justice and Honor favor this course," he exclaimed to Adams, and it would probably cost less in the long run to boot.
Adams agreed that it was impossible to negotiate with the Barbary pirates; as he put it, "Avarice and Fear are the only Agents at Algiers..." But Jefferson's accounting, Adams observed, grossly underestimated the cost. It would require at least 500,000 pounds annually to sustain a naval force in the region. The Congress would never authorize such a sum, and the United States had nothing in the way of a navy to send over anyway. "From these Premises," he apprised Jefferson, "I conclude it to be wisest for us to negotiate and pay the necessary Sum, without loss of Time." Adams insisted that Jefferson's solution, while bold and wholly honorable in its own terms, was an idea whose time had not come. "Congress will never, or at least not for years, take any such Resolution," he reminded Jefferson, "and in the mean time our Trade and Honour suffers beyond Calculation. We ought not to fight them at all unless we determine to fight them forever."
Jefferson remained unconvinced but agreed that Adams's opinion should be the basis for the official American position: "You make the result differently from what I do" he wrote to Adams in London, but "it is of no consequence; as I have nothing to say in the decision."
It is possible to detect in Jefferson an early undertone of resentment toward Adams's realism, which consistently undercut Jefferson's own grander visions. Jefferson tried to go over Adams's head by having his own proposal for an international naval force presented to Congress by a third party, a ploy that failed when Congress rejected the scheme outright, as Adams predicted they would.
Those who want to try to revise history by claiming that our founding fathers didn't create America through their own Christian beliefs always use this quote from John Adams from the U.S. Treaty with Tripoli 1796 and 1797 as their "proof".
"Art. 11. As the Government of the United States of America is not, in any sense, founded on the Christian religion; as it has in itself no character of enmity against the laws, religion, or tranquillity, of Mussulmen; and, as the said States never entered into any war, or act of hostility against any Mahometan nation, it is declared by the parties, that no pretext arising from religious opinions, shall ever produce an interruption of the harmony existing between the two countries.
However, when taken in context to what it was as part of a national bribe to terrorists claiming that America wasn't a nation formed as a Theocracy is a long way from how it is being used today.
After a few years of paying these bribes, Jefferson finally got his way. After the pasha of Tripoli chopped down the flagpole at the U.S. consulate there, it was a direct affront and an act of war. In 1801, Jefferson slowed down the mothballing of the naval fleet and sent ships to blockade the port.
Operating only under a set of joint resolutions, not a declaration of war, Jefferson nevertheless informed all the Barbary States that the United States was at war with them. He sought to get an interenational coalition to help, but no European states wanted to alter their status quo. So, in 1804, Lieutenant Stephen Decatur went ashore with eight U.S. Marines; set fire to a captured frigate, the Philadelphia' and through an expedition across the desert led by William Eaton and Greek mercenaries, organized locals who detested the pasha.
The American desert army also threatened the pirates' lucrative slave trade, and the presence of the powerful British fleet not far away put even more teeth into this threat. This stick combined with a carrot of a small ransom for the Philadelphia's crew, sufficed to force the pirates down and after releasing the crew, they recognized American freedom to sail the high seas uninterrupted.
By dispatching even such a small body of men so far to secure American national interests, Jefferson put the world on notice that the United States intended to be a force, if only a minor one, in world affairs. It was a remarkably brazen display of preemptive war by a president usually held up as a model of a limited government, and it achieved its results.
Thomas Jefferson, not George W. Bush was the first American president to do a preemptive attack. Both against Muslim Terrorist states. As you can clearly see, there is nothing new here. This conflict started with America and Muslim terrorists even before our Constitution was ratified.
Saturday, December 26, 2009
Could Obamacare Be Our Dred Scott Decision?
Could the Democrat Health Care Bill be our generation's Dred Scott Decision? We the people are being ignored by the "ruling" party as they ram through a nation changing bill that the large majority of Americans have openly rejected, without regard to the overwhelming feelings of their constituents. This is governance by arrogance of government, not by will of the people. How can they not expect a backlash?
Before the Civil War in the ongoing battle over slavery an arrogant decision by a pro-slavery Supreme Court Chief Justice ignited a backlash that swept the new Republican party into power.
After his 1856 election victory, James Buchanan, gave an inaugural speech stating that the slavery question "belongs to the Supreme Court of the United States, before whom it is now pending, and will, it is understood, be speedily and finally settled." It is widely rumored that Buchanan had already been informed by the Chief Justice what his decision would be. At the very least, it was a terminal case of wishful thinking.
The case Buchanan was talking about had been brought on behalf of Dred Scott, the slave of John Emerson, an army doctor from Missouri. Scott had been taken to different army posts in the United States and the western territories, and having spent two years in the free territory of Minnesota, he claimed he was no longer a slave under the Missouri Compromise. Backed by abolitionists, Scott sued for his freedom in 1846 after failing to purchase his and his wife's freedom from Emerson's widow.
This began an eleven-year legal battle that changed American history. New York abolitionist John F. A. Sanford bought Dred Scott in order to take the case to court. )Sandford's name was misspelled as the other party in Dred Scott v Sandford.) The case went through a number of lower courts, all but one ruling against Scott, until 1855, when it reached the Supreme Court. The case was argued by Montgomery Blair, the son of prominent Democratic politician and later Lincoln's Postmaster General. The Chief Justice, Roger B. Taney, was an eighty-year-old Marylander, Andrew Jackson, appointee to fill the vacancy left by the death of the legendary John Marshall. Taney had freed his own slaves in 1818, but believed passionately that slavery was necessary. The Court's decision came right after Buchanan's inaugural in a 7-2 vote. (seven Democratic justices were opposed by two Republican justices) This was a huge blow to the hopes of anti-slavery factions. Although nine different opinions were issued, Taney's were the most far reaching.
First, Taney said that no black man, free or slave, was a U.S. citizen: therefore a black man had o right to sue in federal court. He could have stopped there without further comment, but he seemed bent on the complete destruction of every piece of anti-slavery legislation ever passed, going back to the Northwest Ordinance. Taney, speaking for the court, then ruled that Congress never had the right to ban slavery in territories because the Constitution protected people from being deprived of life, liberty, and property. According to Taney, slaves, like cows or goats, were property and could be taken anywhere under U.S. jurisdiction.
Slaveholders rejoiced and felt relief and vindication. One newspaper reported, "The Southern opinion upon the subject of Southern slavery... is now the supreme law of the land." Suddenly, the issue was not only non-extension of slavery, but the removal of all laws limiting or prohibiting slavery. Bills to reopen the African slave trade were offered in Congress.
Abolitionists, and moderate "non-extensionists" like Abraham Lincoln, were outraged. Journalists and poet William Cullen Byrant, an abolitionist and Republican party organizer, wrote that slavery was now "a Federal institution...Hereafter, whenever our..flag floats, it is the flag of slavery."
The irony is that the decision actually aided the anti-slavery cause. The new Republican party gained strength when many fence-sitters joined the ranks of those more passionately opposed to slavery. The decision also widened the divisions over slavery within the Democrat party. The Dred Scott decision went a long way toward building the foundation for a Republican victory in 1860.
Will Obamacare be that same catalyst for the rise of the Republican party and political suicide of the Democrats once again?
Before the Civil War in the ongoing battle over slavery an arrogant decision by a pro-slavery Supreme Court Chief Justice ignited a backlash that swept the new Republican party into power.
After his 1856 election victory, James Buchanan, gave an inaugural speech stating that the slavery question "belongs to the Supreme Court of the United States, before whom it is now pending, and will, it is understood, be speedily and finally settled." It is widely rumored that Buchanan had already been informed by the Chief Justice what his decision would be. At the very least, it was a terminal case of wishful thinking.
The case Buchanan was talking about had been brought on behalf of Dred Scott, the slave of John Emerson, an army doctor from Missouri. Scott had been taken to different army posts in the United States and the western territories, and having spent two years in the free territory of Minnesota, he claimed he was no longer a slave under the Missouri Compromise. Backed by abolitionists, Scott sued for his freedom in 1846 after failing to purchase his and his wife's freedom from Emerson's widow.
This began an eleven-year legal battle that changed American history. New York abolitionist John F. A. Sanford bought Dred Scott in order to take the case to court. )Sandford's name was misspelled as the other party in Dred Scott v Sandford.) The case went through a number of lower courts, all but one ruling against Scott, until 1855, when it reached the Supreme Court. The case was argued by Montgomery Blair, the son of prominent Democratic politician and later Lincoln's Postmaster General. The Chief Justice, Roger B. Taney, was an eighty-year-old Marylander, Andrew Jackson, appointee to fill the vacancy left by the death of the legendary John Marshall. Taney had freed his own slaves in 1818, but believed passionately that slavery was necessary. The Court's decision came right after Buchanan's inaugural in a 7-2 vote. (seven Democratic justices were opposed by two Republican justices) This was a huge blow to the hopes of anti-slavery factions. Although nine different opinions were issued, Taney's were the most far reaching.
First, Taney said that no black man, free or slave, was a U.S. citizen: therefore a black man had o right to sue in federal court. He could have stopped there without further comment, but he seemed bent on the complete destruction of every piece of anti-slavery legislation ever passed, going back to the Northwest Ordinance. Taney, speaking for the court, then ruled that Congress never had the right to ban slavery in territories because the Constitution protected people from being deprived of life, liberty, and property. According to Taney, slaves, like cows or goats, were property and could be taken anywhere under U.S. jurisdiction.
Slaveholders rejoiced and felt relief and vindication. One newspaper reported, "The Southern opinion upon the subject of Southern slavery... is now the supreme law of the land." Suddenly, the issue was not only non-extension of slavery, but the removal of all laws limiting or prohibiting slavery. Bills to reopen the African slave trade were offered in Congress.
Abolitionists, and moderate "non-extensionists" like Abraham Lincoln, were outraged. Journalists and poet William Cullen Byrant, an abolitionist and Republican party organizer, wrote that slavery was now "a Federal institution...Hereafter, whenever our..flag floats, it is the flag of slavery."
The irony is that the decision actually aided the anti-slavery cause. The new Republican party gained strength when many fence-sitters joined the ranks of those more passionately opposed to slavery. The decision also widened the divisions over slavery within the Democrat party. The Dred Scott decision went a long way toward building the foundation for a Republican victory in 1860.
Will Obamacare be that same catalyst for the rise of the Republican party and political suicide of the Democrats once again?
Wednesday, December 23, 2009
What Child is This?
Who was that child in the manger? Was he God born as man, the Son of God, or a prophet, or teacher? Was he who the Bible tells us he is, or something more human?
First let's recap the story.
Luke Chapter 2:
1In those days Caesar Augustus issued a decree that a census should be taken of the entire Roman world. 2(This was the first census that took place while Quirinius was governor of Syria.) 3And everyone went to his own town to register.
4So Joseph also went up from the town of Nazareth in Galilee to Judea, to Bethlehem the town of David, because he belonged to the house and line of David. 5He went there to register with Mary, who was pledged to be married to him and was expecting a child. 6While they were there, the time came for the baby to be born, 7and she gave birth to her firstborn, a son. She wrapped him in cloths and placed him in a manger, because there was no room for them in the inn.
8And there were shepherds living out in the fields nearby, keeping watch over their flocks at night. 9An angel of the Lord appeared to them, and the glory of the Lord shone around them, and they were terrified. 10But the angel said to them, "Do not be afraid. I bring you good news of great joy that will be for all the people. 11Today in the town of David a Savior has been born to you; he is Christ[a] the Lord. 12This will be a sign to you: You will find a baby wrapped in cloths and lying in a manger."
13Suddenly a great company of the heavenly host appeared with the angel, praising God and saying,
14"Glory to God in the highest,and on earth peace to men on whom his favor rests."
Joseph and Mary were not poor waifs who were in the manger because they were homeless, and without government health care, they arrived in the city that was overflowing with travelers who by edict had to come for the census. Everyone had to go back to the town of their birth to be counted, Bethlehem didn't have a huge tourist trade with accompanying travel lodge industry. Joseph was a businessman, he was a carpenter, while not rich, surely wasn't a vagrant.
The Bible tells us that Jesus was God born as a man, was born to fulfill God's promise to man to give us a Saviour to live as a man, to live a sinless life, and then to die for our own sins to purchase our redemption through his sacrifice.
What does Jesus say about who he was and is? We must read His own words as to who he said that He was. When you do you will find an uncomfortable moment, you must be honest with yourself as to who you say He is. Once you read what Jesus said about who H was, and what He came to do, you are only left with one of two choices. Jesus was either exactly who He said he was, or he was either insane, or a con-man. You can't find that comfortable option of a teacher or prophet.
"The Jews therefore said to Him, "You are not yet fifty years old, and have You seen Abraham?" Jesus said to them, "Truly, truly, I say to you, before Abraham was born, I am." Therefore they picked up stones to throw at Him; but Jesus hid Himself, and went out of the temple." (John 8:57-59)
"I and the Father are one." The Jews took up stones again to stone Him. Jesus answered them, "I showed you many good works from the Father; for which of them are you stoning Me?" The Jews answered Him, "For a good work we do not stone You, but for blasphemy; and because You, being a man, make Yourself out to be God." (John 10:30-33)
And Jesus cried out and said, "He who believes in Me does not believe in Me, but in Him who sent Me. And he who beholds Me beholds the One who sent Me. I have come as light into the world, that everyone who believes in Me may not remain in darkness." (John 12:44-46)
"And so when He had washed their feet, and taken His garments, and reclined at the table again, He said to them, "Do you know what I have done to you? You call Me Teacher and Lord; and you are right, for I am. If I then, the Lord and the Teacher, washed your feet, you also ought to wash one another's feet." (John 13:12-14)
"Jesus said to him, "I am the way, and the truth, and the life; no one comes to the Father, but through Me. If you had known Me, you would have known My Father also; from now on you know Him, and have seen Him." Philip said to Him, "Lord, show us the Father, and it is enough for us." Jesus said to him, "Have I been so long with you, and yet you have not come to know Me, Philip? He who has seen Me has seen the Father; how do you say, 'Show us the Father'?" (John 14:6-9)
Jesus therefore said to them, "Truly, truly, I say to you, it is not Moses who has given you the bread out of heaven, but it is My Father who gives you the true bread out of heaven. For the bread of God is that which comes down out of heaven, and gives life to the world." They said therefore to Him, "Lord, evermore give us this bread." Jesus said to them, "I am the bread of life; he who comes to Me shall not hunger, and he who believes in Me shall never thirst." (John 6:32-35)
Again therefore Jesus spoke to them, saying, "I am the light of the world; he who follows Me shall not walk in the darkness, but shall have the light of life." The Pharisees therefore said to Him, "You are bearing witness of Yourself; Your witness is not true." Jesus answered and said to them, "Even if I bear witness of Myself, My witness is true; for I know where I came from, and where I am going; but you do not know where I come from, or where I am going." (John 8:12-14)
Jesus therefore said to them again, "Truly, truly, I say to you, I am the door of the sheep. All who came before Me are thieves and robbers, but the sheep did not hear them. I am the door; if anyone enters through Me, he shall be saved, and shall go in and out, and find pasture. The thief comes only to steal, and kill, and destroy; I came that they might have life, and might have it abundantly. I am the good shepherd; the good shepherd lays down His life for the sheep." (John 10:7-11)
Martha therefore said to Jesus, "Lord, if You had been here, my brother would not have died. Even now I know that whatever You ask of God, God will give You." Jesus said to her, "Your brother shall rise again." Martha said to Him, "I know that he will rise again in the resurrection on the last day." Jesus said to her, "I am the resurrection and the life; he who believes in Me shall live even if he dies, and everyone who lives and believes in Me shall never die. Do you believe this?" She said to Him, "Yes, Lord; I have believed that You are the Christ, the Son of God, even He who comes into the world." (John 11:21-27)
But Jesus called them to Himself, and said, "You know that the rulers of the Gentiles lord it over them, and their great men exercise authority over them. It is not so among you, but whoever wishes to become great among you shall be your servant, and whoever wishes to be first among you shall be your slave; just as the Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve, and to give His life a ransom for many." (Matthew 20:25-28)
For He was teaching His disciples and telling them, "The Son of Man is to be delivered into the hands of men, and they will kill Him; and when He has been killed, He will rise three days later." But they did not understand this statement, and they were afraid to ask Him. (Mark 9:31-32)
"For God so loved the world, that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish, but have eternal life. For God did not send the Son into the world to judge the world, but that the world should be saved through Him. He who believes in Him is not judged; he who does not believe has been judged already, because he has not believed in the name of the only begotten Son of God." (John 3:16-18)
"All that the Father gives Me shall come to Me, and the one who comes to Me I will certainly not cast out. For I have come down from heaven, not to do My own will, but the will of Him who sent Me. And this is the will of Him who sent Me, that of all that He has given Me I lose nothing, but raise it up on the last day. For this is the will of My Father, that everyone who beholds the Son and believes in Him, may have eternal life; and I Myself will raise him up on the last day." (John 6:37-40)
Jesus was very clear who he said and believed himself to be. He was by his own words either the one and only Son of God, or a lunatic. We have been given free will to decide for ourselves, I have made my decision who about you?
First let's recap the story.
Luke Chapter 2:
1In those days Caesar Augustus issued a decree that a census should be taken of the entire Roman world. 2(This was the first census that took place while Quirinius was governor of Syria.) 3And everyone went to his own town to register.
4So Joseph also went up from the town of Nazareth in Galilee to Judea, to Bethlehem the town of David, because he belonged to the house and line of David. 5He went there to register with Mary, who was pledged to be married to him and was expecting a child. 6While they were there, the time came for the baby to be born, 7and she gave birth to her firstborn, a son. She wrapped him in cloths and placed him in a manger, because there was no room for them in the inn.
8And there were shepherds living out in the fields nearby, keeping watch over their flocks at night. 9An angel of the Lord appeared to them, and the glory of the Lord shone around them, and they were terrified. 10But the angel said to them, "Do not be afraid. I bring you good news of great joy that will be for all the people. 11Today in the town of David a Savior has been born to you; he is Christ[a] the Lord. 12This will be a sign to you: You will find a baby wrapped in cloths and lying in a manger."
13Suddenly a great company of the heavenly host appeared with the angel, praising God and saying,
14"Glory to God in the highest,and on earth peace to men on whom his favor rests."
Joseph and Mary were not poor waifs who were in the manger because they were homeless, and without government health care, they arrived in the city that was overflowing with travelers who by edict had to come for the census. Everyone had to go back to the town of their birth to be counted, Bethlehem didn't have a huge tourist trade with accompanying travel lodge industry. Joseph was a businessman, he was a carpenter, while not rich, surely wasn't a vagrant.
The Bible tells us that Jesus was God born as a man, was born to fulfill God's promise to man to give us a Saviour to live as a man, to live a sinless life, and then to die for our own sins to purchase our redemption through his sacrifice.
What does Jesus say about who he was and is? We must read His own words as to who he said that He was. When you do you will find an uncomfortable moment, you must be honest with yourself as to who you say He is. Once you read what Jesus said about who H was, and what He came to do, you are only left with one of two choices. Jesus was either exactly who He said he was, or he was either insane, or a con-man. You can't find that comfortable option of a teacher or prophet.
"The Jews therefore said to Him, "You are not yet fifty years old, and have You seen Abraham?" Jesus said to them, "Truly, truly, I say to you, before Abraham was born, I am." Therefore they picked up stones to throw at Him; but Jesus hid Himself, and went out of the temple." (John 8:57-59)
"I and the Father are one." The Jews took up stones again to stone Him. Jesus answered them, "I showed you many good works from the Father; for which of them are you stoning Me?" The Jews answered Him, "For a good work we do not stone You, but for blasphemy; and because You, being a man, make Yourself out to be God." (John 10:30-33)
And Jesus cried out and said, "He who believes in Me does not believe in Me, but in Him who sent Me. And he who beholds Me beholds the One who sent Me. I have come as light into the world, that everyone who believes in Me may not remain in darkness." (John 12:44-46)
"And so when He had washed their feet, and taken His garments, and reclined at the table again, He said to them, "Do you know what I have done to you? You call Me Teacher and Lord; and you are right, for I am. If I then, the Lord and the Teacher, washed your feet, you also ought to wash one another's feet." (John 13:12-14)
"Jesus said to him, "I am the way, and the truth, and the life; no one comes to the Father, but through Me. If you had known Me, you would have known My Father also; from now on you know Him, and have seen Him." Philip said to Him, "Lord, show us the Father, and it is enough for us." Jesus said to him, "Have I been so long with you, and yet you have not come to know Me, Philip? He who has seen Me has seen the Father; how do you say, 'Show us the Father'?" (John 14:6-9)
Jesus therefore said to them, "Truly, truly, I say to you, it is not Moses who has given you the bread out of heaven, but it is My Father who gives you the true bread out of heaven. For the bread of God is that which comes down out of heaven, and gives life to the world." They said therefore to Him, "Lord, evermore give us this bread." Jesus said to them, "I am the bread of life; he who comes to Me shall not hunger, and he who believes in Me shall never thirst." (John 6:32-35)
Again therefore Jesus spoke to them, saying, "I am the light of the world; he who follows Me shall not walk in the darkness, but shall have the light of life." The Pharisees therefore said to Him, "You are bearing witness of Yourself; Your witness is not true." Jesus answered and said to them, "Even if I bear witness of Myself, My witness is true; for I know where I came from, and where I am going; but you do not know where I come from, or where I am going." (John 8:12-14)
Jesus therefore said to them again, "Truly, truly, I say to you, I am the door of the sheep. All who came before Me are thieves and robbers, but the sheep did not hear them. I am the door; if anyone enters through Me, he shall be saved, and shall go in and out, and find pasture. The thief comes only to steal, and kill, and destroy; I came that they might have life, and might have it abundantly. I am the good shepherd; the good shepherd lays down His life for the sheep." (John 10:7-11)
Martha therefore said to Jesus, "Lord, if You had been here, my brother would not have died. Even now I know that whatever You ask of God, God will give You." Jesus said to her, "Your brother shall rise again." Martha said to Him, "I know that he will rise again in the resurrection on the last day." Jesus said to her, "I am the resurrection and the life; he who believes in Me shall live even if he dies, and everyone who lives and believes in Me shall never die. Do you believe this?" She said to Him, "Yes, Lord; I have believed that You are the Christ, the Son of God, even He who comes into the world." (John 11:21-27)
But Jesus called them to Himself, and said, "You know that the rulers of the Gentiles lord it over them, and their great men exercise authority over them. It is not so among you, but whoever wishes to become great among you shall be your servant, and whoever wishes to be first among you shall be your slave; just as the Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve, and to give His life a ransom for many." (Matthew 20:25-28)
For He was teaching His disciples and telling them, "The Son of Man is to be delivered into the hands of men, and they will kill Him; and when He has been killed, He will rise three days later." But they did not understand this statement, and they were afraid to ask Him. (Mark 9:31-32)
"For God so loved the world, that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish, but have eternal life. For God did not send the Son into the world to judge the world, but that the world should be saved through Him. He who believes in Him is not judged; he who does not believe has been judged already, because he has not believed in the name of the only begotten Son of God." (John 3:16-18)
"All that the Father gives Me shall come to Me, and the one who comes to Me I will certainly not cast out. For I have come down from heaven, not to do My own will, but the will of Him who sent Me. And this is the will of Him who sent Me, that of all that He has given Me I lose nothing, but raise it up on the last day. For this is the will of My Father, that everyone who beholds the Son and believes in Him, may have eternal life; and I Myself will raise him up on the last day." (John 6:37-40)
Jesus was very clear who he said and believed himself to be. He was by his own words either the one and only Son of God, or a lunatic. We have been given free will to decide for ourselves, I have made my decision who about you?
Tuesday, December 22, 2009
We Need To Reach The Middle's Radar
This week gave me a new insight into the biggest problem we face in turning America around from this Marxist onslaught brought forth by the Obama administration and the Democrats. I saw where one of my Facebook friends posted that Brittany Murphy died at 32. My first thought was that she must have been someone this poster knew personally. Then seeing more comments I realized that she was some sort of celebrity. I asked my wife who she was, she handles all the entertainment industry news for our family, so she started trying to tell me where I would know her. What I found was that I had truly never heard of her before, and had never seen her in anything she had ever done. She simply was never on my radar until her death notice.
With this I thought back to all the holiday family get togethers over the years where my relatives would be having these discussions of television programs, and the characters on them, and I would be sitting there clueless of what they were talking about. I have never been interested in network programing. Sports yes, television shows no. Never knew who shot J.R. and didn't care. The only show I have ever allowed myself to watch is "24." My son has tried to get me to watch "House", but just seeing the trailers makes me avoid it, it looks like something I would like and could get hooked on. I have no interest in being committed to watching a show.
This isn't a condemnation on those who do, it was just never part of my world. What it did teach me is I now understand those blank stares I get when I talk politics, economics, civics, and history, which are the topics I enjoy and read, study, and watch things about. These are topics that are not on most people's radars, and are things that make many feel like their eyes are glazing over.
So if that is how it is, how do we reach those who are not interested in politics, who are more interested in what is happening on their favorite sitcom, or American Idol? This is going to be key in winning back America, is getting the attention of the masses. Right now we are having a heated battle between the 10% who are passionately on the right, and the 10% who are passionately on the left, and we are gaining the attention of 20-30%.
The key to success is to capture the hearts and minds of those who are independent, or in the middle politically. John Adams taught us that in any war 1/3 of Americans would be passionately for it, another 1/3 would be passionately against any war, and the real battle ground is for the hearts and minds of the 1/3 in the middle.
So how do we do it? How do we get their attention? Once they are paying attention, how do we package a message that will captivate someone who has spent their life not paying attention to politics and hasn't a lot of understanding of it?
Something that I have sent to the GOP on several occasions is an idea that I think might work. Instead of spending our campaign advertising money to run ads that attack our opponents that tend to sound just like the ones our opponents use to attack us, how about using that money to educate?
Imagine if you will an ad campaign that uses the same teaching style that "School House Rocks" used to. Where a catchy song is used to teach about one of our platform issues, where the listener would find it stuck in their heads, but would have a new understanding of how something works, and why.
The democrats require an uneducated, ignorant electorate to have any chance of moving their agenda forward. The conservatives have to have an educated electorate who understands the consequences of different approaches to an issue to win. The schools have not educated, and our society doesn't watch the news, doesn't read the paper, and has almost no understanding of economics, history, civics, or politics. How can we hope that they will understand our message unless we package it in fun 30 second jingles? It is worth a try.
With this I thought back to all the holiday family get togethers over the years where my relatives would be having these discussions of television programs, and the characters on them, and I would be sitting there clueless of what they were talking about. I have never been interested in network programing. Sports yes, television shows no. Never knew who shot J.R. and didn't care. The only show I have ever allowed myself to watch is "24." My son has tried to get me to watch "House", but just seeing the trailers makes me avoid it, it looks like something I would like and could get hooked on. I have no interest in being committed to watching a show.
This isn't a condemnation on those who do, it was just never part of my world. What it did teach me is I now understand those blank stares I get when I talk politics, economics, civics, and history, which are the topics I enjoy and read, study, and watch things about. These are topics that are not on most people's radars, and are things that make many feel like their eyes are glazing over.
So if that is how it is, how do we reach those who are not interested in politics, who are more interested in what is happening on their favorite sitcom, or American Idol? This is going to be key in winning back America, is getting the attention of the masses. Right now we are having a heated battle between the 10% who are passionately on the right, and the 10% who are passionately on the left, and we are gaining the attention of 20-30%.
The key to success is to capture the hearts and minds of those who are independent, or in the middle politically. John Adams taught us that in any war 1/3 of Americans would be passionately for it, another 1/3 would be passionately against any war, and the real battle ground is for the hearts and minds of the 1/3 in the middle.
So how do we do it? How do we get their attention? Once they are paying attention, how do we package a message that will captivate someone who has spent their life not paying attention to politics and hasn't a lot of understanding of it?
Something that I have sent to the GOP on several occasions is an idea that I think might work. Instead of spending our campaign advertising money to run ads that attack our opponents that tend to sound just like the ones our opponents use to attack us, how about using that money to educate?
Imagine if you will an ad campaign that uses the same teaching style that "School House Rocks" used to. Where a catchy song is used to teach about one of our platform issues, where the listener would find it stuck in their heads, but would have a new understanding of how something works, and why.
The democrats require an uneducated, ignorant electorate to have any chance of moving their agenda forward. The conservatives have to have an educated electorate who understands the consequences of different approaches to an issue to win. The schools have not educated, and our society doesn't watch the news, doesn't read the paper, and has almost no understanding of economics, history, civics, or politics. How can we hope that they will understand our message unless we package it in fun 30 second jingles? It is worth a try.
Saturday, December 19, 2009
Tea Party Candidate???
A recent poll suggests that a unnamed Tea Party candidate would beat an unnamed Republican candidate for president if election was held now. The most important message in that poll was more people chose the Tea Party and GOP combined than did the Democrat, however, in a three way unnamed race the Tea Party and GOP split the votes giving the Democrat the win.
This is exactly the dynamics that a third party candidate gives to a presidential race, and for that matter a Congressional and Senate race. It splits those who most agree and gives the candidate that the least voters agree with the win.
The most recent examples were the 1992 election where the wild card of Ross Perot, the populist independent candidate who would have been the darling of the Tea Partiers. It ended with Clinton getting 43.01% of the vote, George H.W.Bush with 37.45%, and Ross Perot with 18.91%. Those who voted for Perot would have overwhelmingly gone Bush if Perot wouldn't have been in the race. Clinton won reelection with less only 49% as Perot still carried a little over 8% in 1996 as well.
The end result of a third party candidate can be dire to America. In 2012 it would mean another term for Obama and his regime. Back in 1840 a third party candidate may well have caused the Civil War.
James Gillespie Birney, a slaveholder from Kentucky, who converted to abolitionism. He, like many religious converts, became a zealot for his cause. He gave up a lucrative law practice in Alabama to become an agent of the American Colonization Society, which supported political actions to end slavery and resettle freed slaves in Africa and the Caribbean. After he freed his inherited slaves, Birney began to publish an abolitionist newspaper, the Philanthropist, in Cincinnati and became executive director of Garrison's American Anti-Slavery Society. In the presidential elections of 1840 and 1844 he was the candidate for the Liberty Party, which advocated the abolition of slavery by moral persuasion and political action.
His third party candidacy in 1844 was particularly significant, because he drew enough popular votes to allow the Democrat candidate, James K. Polk, to win the election, defeating the Whig candidate, Henry Clay. An adroit politician and master of the art of compromise, he was known as "The Great Compromiser." Clay was a slaveholder who was dedicated to the Union and looked for an end of slavery. Ironically, he might have been the strong president who could have found a political solution to end slavery, and ending the very thing that caused the Civil War seventeen years later.
Third parties may have good people in them, they may have great intentions, but they never win, and often cause great loss to America.
This is exactly the dynamics that a third party candidate gives to a presidential race, and for that matter a Congressional and Senate race. It splits those who most agree and gives the candidate that the least voters agree with the win.
The most recent examples were the 1992 election where the wild card of Ross Perot, the populist independent candidate who would have been the darling of the Tea Partiers. It ended with Clinton getting 43.01% of the vote, George H.W.Bush with 37.45%, and Ross Perot with 18.91%. Those who voted for Perot would have overwhelmingly gone Bush if Perot wouldn't have been in the race. Clinton won reelection with less only 49% as Perot still carried a little over 8% in 1996 as well.
The end result of a third party candidate can be dire to America. In 2012 it would mean another term for Obama and his regime. Back in 1840 a third party candidate may well have caused the Civil War.
James Gillespie Birney, a slaveholder from Kentucky, who converted to abolitionism. He, like many religious converts, became a zealot for his cause. He gave up a lucrative law practice in Alabama to become an agent of the American Colonization Society, which supported political actions to end slavery and resettle freed slaves in Africa and the Caribbean. After he freed his inherited slaves, Birney began to publish an abolitionist newspaper, the Philanthropist, in Cincinnati and became executive director of Garrison's American Anti-Slavery Society. In the presidential elections of 1840 and 1844 he was the candidate for the Liberty Party, which advocated the abolition of slavery by moral persuasion and political action.
His third party candidacy in 1844 was particularly significant, because he drew enough popular votes to allow the Democrat candidate, James K. Polk, to win the election, defeating the Whig candidate, Henry Clay. An adroit politician and master of the art of compromise, he was known as "The Great Compromiser." Clay was a slaveholder who was dedicated to the Union and looked for an end of slavery. Ironically, he might have been the strong president who could have found a political solution to end slavery, and ending the very thing that caused the Civil War seventeen years later.
Third parties may have good people in them, they may have great intentions, but they never win, and often cause great loss to America.
Be Careful What You Wish For.
There is a storm brewing, more and more there are those who are calling for nullification by their state against the rules being written in Congress under Obama. Emotionally, I completely understand and on principle find agreement in telling them to stuff their UN-Constitutional power grabs. However I caution be very careful what you wish for.
Wal-Mart and other sporting goods stores are finding it difficult to keep ammunition on their shelves as people nearly meet the trucks and purchase it to stock up their home supplies. There is an undercurrent advocating, or at least preparing for a new civil war in America. If articles written in Europe are to be believed the Obama Administration is taking it seriously and preparing for it as well, if not instigating it. Again, I caution be very careful what you wish for.
As difficult as it is to watch an out of control political class run roughshod over the will of the people, and our Constitutional liberties, we need to work within the system to change it. Our opponents are not allowing themselves to be restrained by our Constitution, they have open contempt for it, and see it at most a hindrance to be ignored. We have to go no no further than the words of our current president that our Constitution is "nothing but a list of negative rules." He has surrounded himself with like believes who have even written books on how our Bill of Rights needs to be dismantled and rewritten. Cas Sunstein wrote "The Second Bill of Rights: FDR's Unfinished Revolution and Why We Need it More Than Ever." This parrots Obama's own words quoted a few years ago. Obviously We The People are under an assault of our Liberty and Rights unlike anything we have seen before.
Let's look at the history of the idea of Nullification. What is nullification? It is the theoretical right of a state to suspend the operation of a federal law within it's boundaries. It goes back to the very beginning of our Republic, after the loose Articles of Confederation had proved ineffective. Although the states definitely feared a tyrannical central government, they had agreed to yield certain powers to the federal government under the Constitution. The principles of nullification was supported by many of the founders, including James Madison and Thomas Jefferson. It has also been used by slavery opponents as a justification for failing to enforce the fugitive slave laws, which compelled the return of runaway slaves.
In 1828 a reluctant John Quincy Adams signed the largest tariff in American history at the insistence of Northern merchants, who wanted to protect their products by making European imports more expensive. This enraged the South, led by John Caldwell Calhoun, who holds the unusual distinction of being Vice President under two consecutive terms of John Quincy Adams, and then Andrew Jackson. Jackson and Calhoun were extreme political rivals, and became dueling politically over the issue of federal power.
Calhoun labeled it the "Tariff of Abominations." An angry Calhoun anonymously wrote an essay in 1828, "The South Carolina Exposition and Protest." Calling the tariff "unconstitutional, oppressive and unjust," he began to lay legal groundwork for the right of the states to "nullify" federal laws. In 1831 Calhoun made a clean break with Jackson, publicly issuing an address that made it clear he stood with the "nullifiers." In 1832 he became the first man to resign from the Vice Presidency, leaving when he won a seat from South Carolina in the Senate.
On November 24th, 1832, a South Carolina state convention issued an Ordinance of Nullification, which declared "null, void, and no law" the high protective tariff. President Jackson was not amused. He wrote to one of his generals, "Can any one of common sense believe the absurdity that a faction of any state, or a state, has a right to secede and destroy this union and the liberty of our country with it; or nullify laws of the union; then indeed is our Constitution a rope of sand; under such I would not live...The union must be preserved, and it will now be tested, by the support I get from the people. I will die for this union."
Jackson threatened to send fifty thousand troops to enforce the tariff in the port of Charleston when he said, "Disunion by armed force is treason. Are you really ready to incur this guilt?" The Governor and legislator of South Carolina stood defiant and called for ten thousand militiaman to repel any "invasion" by federal troops. America was on the verge of civil war. Faced with the prospects of warfare over the tariff, Calhoun joined forces with Henry Clay to reconcile the claims of South Carolina with those of the federal government. The results were the Compromise Tariff of 1833 which gradually reduced tariffs until 1842. The South Carolina convention repealed the Ordinance of Nullification, and both sides claimed victory. However, the point remains that whenever questions of states' rights came up, they had been solved through compromise, at least until the Civil War, and since.
The "threat" of nullification may be effective. The actual attempt would be suicide for not only those who promote, their state, and the union. It is much like the use today of "going to the media" in a dispute with a company. Until you actually do, it can be very effective in intimidating those in the company to soften their stance in a dispute, however, after it is done, there is no longer any motivation to do so, and everyone loses.
When I hear rumblings of a new Civil War, I wonder if those speaking have any idea of the terror, death, and pain that the last one caused. There were at least 618,000 who were killed in battles during our Civil War, records are not sure what the total numbers might have been. In the Civil War there were more or less defined boundaries and the combatants wore different uniforms under the guidance of military leadership. If things deteriorate into Civil War today, it wouldn't look anything like that, it would be much more like the French Revolution with no clear lines, no uniforms, just a national melee, where 40,000 people died during the "Terror" in just a few months. The alliances were to different political alignments who were intermixed throughout society, this is where we would be today.
We are greatly divided politically today, it is a time of great strife, but we need to focus on coming together and taking our nation back at the ballot box in 2010. We need to come together under one unified party to turn back the Democrat attack on our Constitution. Of course if Obama and the Democrats would suspend that election, all bets should be off.
To close, let's hear from one of our great leaders Senator Daniel Webster's speech in January of 1830 as the nullification process was heating up.
"I have not allowed myself, Sir, to look beyond the Union, to see what might lie hidden in the dark recess behind. I have not coolly weighed the chances of preserving liberty when the bonds that unite us together shall be broken asunder. I have not accustomed myself to hand over the precipice of disunion, to see whether, with my short sight, I can fathom the depth of the abyss below... While the Union lasts, we have high, exciting, gratifying prospects spread out before us for us and our children. Beyond that I seek not to penetrate the veil. God grant that in my day, at least, that curtain may not rise! God grant that on my vision never may be opened what lies behind! When my eyes shall be turned to behold for the last time the sun in heaven, may I not see him shining on the broken and dishonored fragments of a once glorious Union; on States dissevered, discordant, belligerent; on a land rent with civil feuds, or drenched, it may be, in fraternal blood! Let their last feeble and lingering glance rather behold the gorgeous ensign of the republic, now advanced, its arms and trophies streaming in single star obscured, bearing for its motto no such miserable interrogatory as "What is all this worth?" nor those words of delusion and folly, "Liberty first and Union afterwards"; but everywhere, spread all over in characters of living light, blazing on all its ample folds, as they float over the sea and over the land, and in every wind under the whole heavens that other sentiment, dear to every true American heart - Liberty and Union, now and forever, one and inseparable."
I wouldn't want to put it to the test today, I am not sure we have men like Henry Clay and Daniel Webster who are so respected by both sides of any issue to stand in the gap and bring us back together.
Wal-Mart and other sporting goods stores are finding it difficult to keep ammunition on their shelves as people nearly meet the trucks and purchase it to stock up their home supplies. There is an undercurrent advocating, or at least preparing for a new civil war in America. If articles written in Europe are to be believed the Obama Administration is taking it seriously and preparing for it as well, if not instigating it. Again, I caution be very careful what you wish for.
As difficult as it is to watch an out of control political class run roughshod over the will of the people, and our Constitutional liberties, we need to work within the system to change it. Our opponents are not allowing themselves to be restrained by our Constitution, they have open contempt for it, and see it at most a hindrance to be ignored. We have to go no no further than the words of our current president that our Constitution is "nothing but a list of negative rules." He has surrounded himself with like believes who have even written books on how our Bill of Rights needs to be dismantled and rewritten. Cas Sunstein wrote "The Second Bill of Rights: FDR's Unfinished Revolution and Why We Need it More Than Ever." This parrots Obama's own words quoted a few years ago. Obviously We The People are under an assault of our Liberty and Rights unlike anything we have seen before.
Let's look at the history of the idea of Nullification. What is nullification? It is the theoretical right of a state to suspend the operation of a federal law within it's boundaries. It goes back to the very beginning of our Republic, after the loose Articles of Confederation had proved ineffective. Although the states definitely feared a tyrannical central government, they had agreed to yield certain powers to the federal government under the Constitution. The principles of nullification was supported by many of the founders, including James Madison and Thomas Jefferson. It has also been used by slavery opponents as a justification for failing to enforce the fugitive slave laws, which compelled the return of runaway slaves.
In 1828 a reluctant John Quincy Adams signed the largest tariff in American history at the insistence of Northern merchants, who wanted to protect their products by making European imports more expensive. This enraged the South, led by John Caldwell Calhoun, who holds the unusual distinction of being Vice President under two consecutive terms of John Quincy Adams, and then Andrew Jackson. Jackson and Calhoun were extreme political rivals, and became dueling politically over the issue of federal power.
Calhoun labeled it the "Tariff of Abominations." An angry Calhoun anonymously wrote an essay in 1828, "The South Carolina Exposition and Protest." Calling the tariff "unconstitutional, oppressive and unjust," he began to lay legal groundwork for the right of the states to "nullify" federal laws. In 1831 Calhoun made a clean break with Jackson, publicly issuing an address that made it clear he stood with the "nullifiers." In 1832 he became the first man to resign from the Vice Presidency, leaving when he won a seat from South Carolina in the Senate.
On November 24th, 1832, a South Carolina state convention issued an Ordinance of Nullification, which declared "null, void, and no law" the high protective tariff. President Jackson was not amused. He wrote to one of his generals, "Can any one of common sense believe the absurdity that a faction of any state, or a state, has a right to secede and destroy this union and the liberty of our country with it; or nullify laws of the union; then indeed is our Constitution a rope of sand; under such I would not live...The union must be preserved, and it will now be tested, by the support I get from the people. I will die for this union."
Jackson threatened to send fifty thousand troops to enforce the tariff in the port of Charleston when he said, "Disunion by armed force is treason. Are you really ready to incur this guilt?" The Governor and legislator of South Carolina stood defiant and called for ten thousand militiaman to repel any "invasion" by federal troops. America was on the verge of civil war. Faced with the prospects of warfare over the tariff, Calhoun joined forces with Henry Clay to reconcile the claims of South Carolina with those of the federal government. The results were the Compromise Tariff of 1833 which gradually reduced tariffs until 1842. The South Carolina convention repealed the Ordinance of Nullification, and both sides claimed victory. However, the point remains that whenever questions of states' rights came up, they had been solved through compromise, at least until the Civil War, and since.
The "threat" of nullification may be effective. The actual attempt would be suicide for not only those who promote, their state, and the union. It is much like the use today of "going to the media" in a dispute with a company. Until you actually do, it can be very effective in intimidating those in the company to soften their stance in a dispute, however, after it is done, there is no longer any motivation to do so, and everyone loses.
When I hear rumblings of a new Civil War, I wonder if those speaking have any idea of the terror, death, and pain that the last one caused. There were at least 618,000 who were killed in battles during our Civil War, records are not sure what the total numbers might have been. In the Civil War there were more or less defined boundaries and the combatants wore different uniforms under the guidance of military leadership. If things deteriorate into Civil War today, it wouldn't look anything like that, it would be much more like the French Revolution with no clear lines, no uniforms, just a national melee, where 40,000 people died during the "Terror" in just a few months. The alliances were to different political alignments who were intermixed throughout society, this is where we would be today.
We are greatly divided politically today, it is a time of great strife, but we need to focus on coming together and taking our nation back at the ballot box in 2010. We need to come together under one unified party to turn back the Democrat attack on our Constitution. Of course if Obama and the Democrats would suspend that election, all bets should be off.
To close, let's hear from one of our great leaders Senator Daniel Webster's speech in January of 1830 as the nullification process was heating up.
"I have not allowed myself, Sir, to look beyond the Union, to see what might lie hidden in the dark recess behind. I have not coolly weighed the chances of preserving liberty when the bonds that unite us together shall be broken asunder. I have not accustomed myself to hand over the precipice of disunion, to see whether, with my short sight, I can fathom the depth of the abyss below... While the Union lasts, we have high, exciting, gratifying prospects spread out before us for us and our children. Beyond that I seek not to penetrate the veil. God grant that in my day, at least, that curtain may not rise! God grant that on my vision never may be opened what lies behind! When my eyes shall be turned to behold for the last time the sun in heaven, may I not see him shining on the broken and dishonored fragments of a once glorious Union; on States dissevered, discordant, belligerent; on a land rent with civil feuds, or drenched, it may be, in fraternal blood! Let their last feeble and lingering glance rather behold the gorgeous ensign of the republic, now advanced, its arms and trophies streaming in single star obscured, bearing for its motto no such miserable interrogatory as "What is all this worth?" nor those words of delusion and folly, "Liberty first and Union afterwards"; but everywhere, spread all over in characters of living light, blazing on all its ample folds, as they float over the sea and over the land, and in every wind under the whole heavens that other sentiment, dear to every true American heart - Liberty and Union, now and forever, one and inseparable."
I wouldn't want to put it to the test today, I am not sure we have men like Henry Clay and Daniel Webster who are so respected by both sides of any issue to stand in the gap and bring us back together.
Sunday, December 13, 2009
Beginning of the Feud Between Israel and Muslims
We all know that the Muslims and the Jews as well as the Christians have been fighting for at least as long as anyone can remember. However, do you know when the split began that has caused the bad blood for all that time? Let's take a look.
In Genesis Chapter 15 God came to Abram and told him that he was going to be the father to a nation. Abram, though a man of faith, had a hard time believing this news since he and his wife SA'rai were both very old and long past childbearing years, and had always been childless.
"And behold, the word of the Lord came to him, saying, This one shall not be your heir, but one who will come from your own body shall be your heir.” Then He brought him outside and said, “Look now toward heaven, and count the stars if you are able to number them.” And He said to him, “So shall your descendants be.” Genesis 15:4&5.
When told, SA'rai didn't believe that she at her advanced age could possibly become pregnant, and thought maybe she could out think God. So SA'rai suggested that Abram have sex with her Egyptian maid HA'gar instead.
"Now Sarai, Abram’s wife, had borne him no children. And she had an Egyptian maidservant whose name was Hagar. So Sarai said to Abram, “See now, the Lord has restrained me from bearing children. Please, go in to my maid; perhaps I shall obtain children by her.” And Abram heeded the voice of Sarai." 16:1&2
After HA'gar conceived SA'rai and HA'gar became jealous of each other, Abram not wanting to deal with it told SA'rai, she is your servant do with her as you please. She treated her so harshly that HA'gar ran away, but an angle of God came to her and convinced her to go back.
"And when Sarai dealt harshly with her, she fled from her presence. Now the Angel of the Lord found her by a spring of water in the wilderness, by the spring on the way to Shur. And He said, “Hagar, Sarai’s maid, where have you come from, and where are you going?” She said, “I am fleeing from the presence of my mistress Sarai.” The Angel of the Lord said to her, “Return to your mistress, and submit yourself under her hand.”
"Then the Angel of the Lord said to her, “I will multiply your descendants exceedingly, so that they shall not be counted for multitude.” And the Angel of the Lord said to her: “Behold, you are with child, and you shall bear a son. You shall call his name Ishmael, because the Lord has heard your affliction. He shall be a wild man; his hand shall be against every man, and every man’s hand against him. And he shall dwell in the presence of all his brethren.”
Did you see this: (He shall be a wild man; his hand shall be against every man, and every man’s hand against him. And he shall dwell in the presence of all his brethren.”)
God told Abram that he would be the father of nations and would no longer be known as Abram, but Abraham, and SA'rai would give birth and be the mother of a nation and her name will forever more be Sarah. Abraham still couldn't understand how SA'rai would have a child, and asked God to bless Ishmael, God answered him.
"Then God said: “No, Sarah your wife shall bear you a son, and you shall call his name Isaac; I will establish My covenant with him for an everlasting covenant, and with his descendants after him. And as for Ishmael, I have heard you. Behold, I have blessed him, and will make him fruitful, and will multiply him exceedingly. He shall beget twelve princes, and I will make him a great nation. But My covenant I will establish with Isaac, whom Sarah shall bear to you at this set time next year.” Then He finished talking with him, and God went up from Abraham."
After Sarah gave birth to Isaac she became jealous of HA'gar and Ishmael and didn't want them around, she didn't want Ishmael taking any of what she wanted to be Isaac's. So she ordered Abraham to cast them out.
8 The child grew and was weaned, and on the day Isaac was weaned Abraham held a great feast. 9 But Sarah saw that the son whom Hagar the Egyptian had borne to Abraham was mocking, 10 and she said to Abraham, "Get rid of that slave woman and her son, for that slave woman's son will never share in the inheritance with my son Isaac."
11 The matter distressed Abraham greatly because it concerned his son. 12 But God said to him, "Do not be so distressed about the boy and your maidservant. Listen to whatever Sarah tells you, because it is through Isaac that your offspring [b] will be reckoned. 13 I will make the son of the maidservant into a nation also, because he is your offspring."
14 Early the next morning Abraham took some food and a skin of water and gave them to Hagar. He set them on her shoulders and then sent her off with the boy. She went on her way and wandered in the desert of Beersheba.
15 When the water in the skin was gone, she put the boy under one of the bushes. 16 Then she went off and sat down nearby, about a bowshot away, for she thought, "I cannot watch the boy die." And as she sat there nearby, she [c] began to sob.
17 God heard the boy crying, and the angel of God called to Hagar from heaven and said to her, "What is the matter, Hagar? Do not be afraid; God has heard the boy crying as he lies there. 18 Lift the boy up and take him by the hand, for I will make him into a great nation."
There has been conflict between the children of those two brothers ever since.
Beginning of the Feud Between Israel and Muslims
In Genesis Chapter 15 God came to Abram and told him that he was going to be the father to a nation. Abram, though a man of faith, had a hard time believing this news since he and his wife SA'rai were both very old and long past childbearing years, and had always been childless.
"And behold, the word of the Lord came to him, saying, This one shall not be your heir, but one who will come from your own body shall be your heir.” Then He brought him outside and said, “Look now toward heaven, and count the stars if you are able to number them.” And He said to him, “So shall your descendants be.” Genesis 15:4&5.
When told, SA'rai didn't believe that she at her advanced age could possibly become pregnant, and thought maybe she could out think God. So SA'rai suggested that Abram have sex with her Egyptian maid HA'gar instead.
"Now Sarai, Abram’s wife, had borne him no children. And she had an Egyptian maidservant whose name was Hagar. So Sarai said to Abram, “See now, the Lord has restrained me from bearing children. Please, go in to my maid; perhaps I shall obtain children by her.” And Abram heeded the voice of Sarai." 16:1&2
After HA'gar conceived SA'rai and HA'gar became jealous of each other, Abram not wanting to deal with it told SA'rai, she is your servant do with her as you please. She treated her so harshly that HA'gar ran away, but an angle of God came to her and convinced her to go back.
"And when Sarai dealt harshly with her, she fled from her presence. Now the Angel of the Lord found her by a spring of water in the wilderness, by the spring on the way to Shur. And He said, “Hagar, Sarai’s maid, where have you come from, and where are you going?” She said, “I am fleeing from the presence of my mistress Sarai.” The Angel of the Lord said to her, “Return to your mistress, and submit yourself under her hand.”
"Then the Angel of the Lord said to her, “I will multiply your descendants exceedingly, so that they shall not be counted for multitude.” And the Angel of the Lord said to her: “Behold, you are with child, and you shall bear a son. You shall call his name Ishmael, because the Lord has heard your affliction. He shall be a wild man; his hand shall be against every man, and every man’s hand against him. And he shall dwell in the presence of all his brethren.”
Did you see this: (He shall be a wild man; his hand shall be against every man, and every man’s hand against him. And he shall dwell in the presence of all his brethren.”)
God told Abram that he would be the father of nations and would no longer be known as Abram, but Abraham, and SA'rai would give birth and be the mother of a nation and her name will forever more be Sarah. Abraham still couldn't understand how SA'rai would have a child, and asked God to bless Ishmael, God answered him.
"Then God said: “No, Sarah your wife shall bear you a son, and you shall call his name Isaac; I will establish My covenant with him for an everlasting covenant, and with his descendants after him. And as for Ishmael, I have heard you. Behold, I have blessed him, and will make him fruitful, and will multiply him exceedingly. He shall beget twelve princes, and I will make him a great nation. But My covenant I will establish with Isaac, whom Sarah shall bear to you at this set time next year.” Then He finished talking with him, and God went up from Abraham."
After Sarah gave birth to Isaac she became jealous of HA'gar and Ishmael and didn't want them around, she didn't want Ishmael taking any of what she wanted to be Isaac's. So she ordered Abraham to cast them out.
8 The child grew and was weaned, and on the day Isaac was weaned Abraham held a great feast. 9 But Sarah saw that the son whom Hagar the Egyptian had borne to Abraham was mocking, 10 and she said to Abraham, "Get rid of that slave woman and her son, for that slave woman's son will never share in the inheritance with my son Isaac."
11 The matter distressed Abraham greatly because it concerned his son. 12 But God said to him, "Do not be so distressed about the boy and your maidservant. Listen to whatever Sarah tells you, because it is through Isaac that your offspring [b] will be reckoned. 13 I will make the son of the maidservant into a nation also, because he is your offspring."
14 Early the next morning Abraham took some food and a skin of water and gave them to Hagar. He set them on her shoulders and then sent her off with the boy. She went on her way and wandered in the desert of Beersheba.
15 When the water in the skin was gone, she put the boy under one of the bushes. 16 Then she went off and sat down nearby, about a bowshot away, for she thought, "I cannot watch the boy die." And as she sat there nearby, she [c] began to sob.
17 God heard the boy crying, and the angel of God called to Hagar from heaven and said to her, "What is the matter, Hagar? Do not be afraid; God has heard the boy crying as he lies there. 18 Lift the boy up and take him by the hand, for I will make him into a great nation."
There has been conflict between the children of those two brothers ever since.
Beginning of the Feud Between Israel and Muslims
Saturday, December 12, 2009
How Do You Filter Your Life?
During the middle of the night last night I awoke thinking of a quote from a sales pitch that I heard several years ago "You can either buy a water filter, or be a water filter." This is a powerful persuasive image, I am sure it has sold many water filters. However, that isn't what kept me awake. It was how the truth is that we are the filter with everything that happens in our lives, everything we read, hear, see, and do, or even have done to us.
The old saying rings very true, "It isn't what happens to you in your life, but how you handle it that makes all the difference." Isn't that part of that filter? We have been told that when dealing with things life can hand you, "We can be better or we can be bitter."
I guess it depends on what we choose to filter out, and what we choose to embrace as part of our ongoing lives. We are today the culmination of all we have experienced, and the choices we have made through them. Our tomorrows depend on our choices we make today.
Those things that come into your life, you can choose if you consider them challenges or problems, crisis or character building opportunities, those choices will greatly depend on how you filter them. The results of your life will depend on those choices. We all know people who are old before their times, while others seem ageless, most of those times their attitudes created the filters that determined their outcomes. When I was just a young man, I was taught the difference between being broke and being poor. The finances might be the same, but the attitude is the key. Being broke is a temporary pocketbook thing, being poor is a state of mind, and permanent until your thinking changes.
One of the worlds greatest teachers of this principle Viktor Frankl who survived a Nazi concentration camp, and who saw those who filtered the experience with a positive attitude would live, while those who filtered defeatist attitudes died, taught us.
“The one thing you can’t take away from me is the way I choose to respond to what you do to me. The last of one’s freedoms is to choose ones attitude in any given circumstance.” Viktor Frankl
Thank God, we have the choice, we get to set the filter, and that makes all the difference.
The old saying rings very true, "It isn't what happens to you in your life, but how you handle it that makes all the difference." Isn't that part of that filter? We have been told that when dealing with things life can hand you, "We can be better or we can be bitter."
I guess it depends on what we choose to filter out, and what we choose to embrace as part of our ongoing lives. We are today the culmination of all we have experienced, and the choices we have made through them. Our tomorrows depend on our choices we make today.
Those things that come into your life, you can choose if you consider them challenges or problems, crisis or character building opportunities, those choices will greatly depend on how you filter them. The results of your life will depend on those choices. We all know people who are old before their times, while others seem ageless, most of those times their attitudes created the filters that determined their outcomes. When I was just a young man, I was taught the difference between being broke and being poor. The finances might be the same, but the attitude is the key. Being broke is a temporary pocketbook thing, being poor is a state of mind, and permanent until your thinking changes.
One of the worlds greatest teachers of this principle Viktor Frankl who survived a Nazi concentration camp, and who saw those who filtered the experience with a positive attitude would live, while those who filtered defeatist attitudes died, taught us.
“The one thing you can’t take away from me is the way I choose to respond to what you do to me. The last of one’s freedoms is to choose ones attitude in any given circumstance.” Viktor Frankl
Thank God, we have the choice, we get to set the filter, and that makes all the difference.
Friday, December 11, 2009
Obama Says We Are Not a Christian Nation, Does History Agree?
"We are not a Christian nation." Obama told a Muslim audience. If you look to our schools, and many in our government they will agree with that statement. Our children are being, and have been for decades been taught that our Founders were deists and atheists, these are lies just like global warming is.
What are the facts, the facts that Americans are no longer taught? Let's ask our Founders, thank God, they were prodigious writers and have left their thoughts for us.
“God who gave us life, gave us liberty, can the liberty of a nation be secure if we remove the conviction that these liberties are the gift from God?” Thomas Jefferson
In our American system of government the foundation are these words;
“We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.”
The very key to our society is that these “unalienable rights” come not from a government, but from our Creator. If we ever come to a point in our society where we take the Creator out of our national creed, we are then accepting that our freedoms and rights come from a benevolent government, opening the door for them to retract those rights. I don’t care if you believe in God or not, you better believe that our nation was and is founded on those beliefs or your freedom is in jeopardy.
There is no attack on American culture more destructive and more historically dishonest than the relentless effort to drive God out of the public square. For our system of government to work it is understood that civic virtue is tied to personal virtue, and most people believe that they get their code of ethics from some sort of religion.
“It is impossible for the man of pious reflection not to perceive in it [the Constitution] a finger of that Almighty hand which has been so frequently and signally extended to our relief in the critical stages of the revolution. “
James Madison, Federalist No. 37, January 11, 1788
“ Of all the dispositions and habits which lead to political prosperity, religion and morality are indispensable supports. “ George Washington
“Our Constitution was made for a moral and religious people, it is wholly inadequate for the government of any other.” John Adams
The genius of the founders was how they wove religion into the framework of society politic while making it optional to believe. Though most of them were believers, and many devoutly and passionately, they understood that there couldn’t be a state run religion, or a government ruled by a religious sect. They knew that government should not interfere with religion, but also knew it couldn’t be hostile toward religion or the practice in the public square. It is best said that our nation was truly formed “Under God.”
For two generations we have passively accepted an assault on the core principle of our nation that our rights came from God. This assault comes from academic, legal, and media elite who find religious beliefs and expression frightening, old fashioned, and unsophisticated. We are in the midst of a culture war never before seen in America.
It is as if some are trying to take up George Washington’s dare from his farewell address. Where he said he would not take lightly if the republic could survive if the people abandon religion and morality.
For most people in America this systematic assault on all references to God and the removal of symbols from the public square is appalling. To artificially try to remove the references to God from our history and from our public square to please a small but vocal minority is wrong in the eyes of most Americans.
Two hundred years ago “Separation of Church and State” meant something very different from today’s interpretation. It was meant to keep government from founding a church and to keep a singular sect from running government. It was never intended to be hostile to the influences, and free expression of religion in our public square.
If you walk into our National Archives building in D.C. you will see a bronze inlay of the 10 Commandments in the floor, symbolizing that the Judeo Christian values and beliefs were at our nation’s foundation.
In our Declaration of Independence we find were Jefferson, Adams, and Franklin strove to keep a balance built in. In the first draft we see Jefferson wrote “We hold these truths to be Sacred” then we see where Franklin scratched out Sacred and added Self Evident. Then we see where John Adams wrote “by the Creator in between Endowed by and inalienable rights. From the beginning they knew the delicate balance that must be struck to create and sustain this great nation. The results is the only Constitutional government in the world to sustain for over two hundred years.
“ We hold these truths to be self evident that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights, that among these are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.” Thomas Jefferson
America at that time was called a second Israel, that is why on the Seal of the United States you will see images of Israel and Moses leading the Israelites out of bondage.
In our Constitution, you will see it is by the consent of the governed, “We the People” to make it clear the source of the power of the federal government.
In our First Amendment we see;
“Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the government for a redress of grievances.”
It makes it clear that we are not to establish a national religion, but is fine to practice religion freely even in the public square. It was designed to protect the Freedom of Religion, not the freedom from religion.
“I have lived, Sir, a long time, and the longer I live, the more convincing I see of this truth: that God governs in the affairs of man. And if a sparrow cannot fall to the ground without His notice, is it probable that an empire can rise without his Aid?”
Ben Franklin
“Reason and expression both forbid us from expecting that national morality can prevail in exclusion of religious principles.” George Washington
“No People can be bound to acknowledge and adore the invisible hand, which conducts the Affairs of men more than the People of the United States. Every step, by which they have advanced to the character of an independent nation, seems to have been distinguished by some token of providential agency.” George Washington
The words “Under God” first came to us from George Washington as he spoke to his troops telling them “You now, Under God, are the only defense of this nation as we head to war.”
When George Washington took the oath of office the first time, he asked that the Bible be open to the book of Deuteronomy Chapter 28. At the moment he was sworn in he said, “So help me God,” then bent over and kissed the Bible.
“ God touched us every step of the way to this victory.” George Washington
At the top of the Washington Monument are the Latin words Laus Deo, which means “Praise Be to God.”
We hear that Thomas Jefferson wasn’t a believer, however if you look at all he said, and how he governed you would have to believe that he was.
“ I have sworn upon the alter of God Eternal hostility against any for of tyranny over the mind of man.” Thomas Jefferson
In an 1803 treaty with a tribe of Indians, Jefferson used Federal funds to pay to have missionaries go to teach the Indians about God. He also used Federal funds to pay to build churches for them to worship. This was from the man who today is used as THE example of separation of church and state.
Jefferson, himself, denied those who considered him to be hostile toward religion in a letter to a colleague. “My views are the result of a life of inquiry and reflection and very different from that anti-Christian system imputed to my by those who know nothing of my opinion.” Thomas Jefferson
As America was fighting to not be torn asunder during the Civil War, we were still led by men who looked to God for their strength.
“We here highly resolve that these dead shall not have died in vain, that this nation, Under God, shall have a new birth of freedom.” Abraham Lincoln
“With malice toward none, with charity for all, with firmness in the right as God gives us to see the right, let us strive to finish the work we are in.” Abraham Lincoln.
“If I had my way this war would never have been commenced, if I had been allowed my way this war would have ended before this, but we find it still continues and we must believe that He permits it for some wise reason of His own mysterious and unknown to us.” Abraham Lincoln
During W.W.II and The Great Depression:
When you look at Franklin D. Roosevelt, the father of modern liberalism, he was unapologetically a man of deep faith. He linked the preservation of our nation during the depression and during W.W. II with the preservation of religion. He was a deeply religious man who through prayer was able to stay strong. On the eve of the great D-Day invasion he wrote and led the nation in this prayer.
“ Almighty God, our sons, pride of our nation, this day have set upon a mighty endeavor, a struggle to preserve our public, our religion, and our civilization, and to set free a suffering humanity. Some will never return, embrace these Father and receive them Thy heroic servants into Thy Kingdom. Oh Lord, give us faith, faith in Thee, faith in our sons, faith in each other, faith in our own united crusade. Thy will be done, Almighty God, Amen.” FDR
If you read his speeches you will often see him evoke prayer to God and for the Country.
“We humbly ask the blessing of God, may He protect each and everyone of us, may He guide me in the days to come.” FDR
“Human government is more or less perfect as it approaches nearer or diverges farther from the imitation of this perfect plan of Devine and moral government.” John Adams
When you walk through our Capital building, you will see the Rotunda filled with Religious images and symbols. When Thomas Jefferson became president in 1800, there were only two churches in Washington D.C. so the Congressional Chaplin asked if they could use the House chambers for church services on Sundays. Jefferson found no problem with this and he himself attended those services in those chambers regularly, as did James Madison after him.
“ While we assert a freedom to embrace to profess, and to observe the religion that we believe to be of Divine origin we cannot deny an equal freedom to choose mind who have not yet yielded to the evidence which convinced us.” James Madison
When you walk into the Supreme Court, you will once again see images of religion and the lawgivers all about you. Every session of the Supreme Court begins with an invocation, a prayer where the marshal stands up and says “God save the United States and this honorable Court.”
Each session of Congress also begins with a prayer.The source of all of our laws, the source of our freedom, liberty, and rights as defined in the Declaration of Independence was our Creator, God.
When you walk into the Library of Congress, you will see upon the walls these inscriptions;
“What doth the Lord require of thee, but to do justly, to love mercy, and to walk humbly with thy God.”
“ The Heavens declare the glory of God, and the firmament showeth His handiwork.”
“Ignorance is the curse of God, knowledge the wing, where with we fly to Heaven.”
You will see a statue of Moses holding the 10 Commandments, and a painting called Judea with a young Jewish woman praying. In 1998 the Library of Congress held and exhibition called “Religion and the Founding of the American Republic,” it explored the role of religion from Jamestown until just past the Revolutionary War era.
“I do not know whether all Americans have a sincere faith in their religion—for who can search the human heart?—but I am certain that they hold it to be indispensable to the maintenance of republican institutions. This opinion is not peculiar to a class of citizens or to a party, but it belongs to the whole nation and to every rank of society.” Alexis de Tocquieville upon his observations on America.
“True religion affords to government its surest support.” George Washington
“Let us raise a standard to which the wise and the honest repair, the rest is in the hands of God.” George Washington
“Religion and virtue are the only foundations. Not only of republicanism and of all free government, but social felicity under all governments and in all combinations of human society.” John Adams
“Surely God would not have created such a being as man with the ability to grasp the infinite to exist only for a day, No, No, man was made for immortality.” Abraham Lincoln
“We look forward to a world founded on four essential human freedoms, the first the freedom of speech and expression, everywhere in the world. The second, is freedom of every person to worship God in his own way everywhere in the world. And the third is the freedom from want, the fourth the freedom from fear.” FDR
“We believe all men were created equal because they are created in the image of God.”
Harry S. Truman
“If we ever forget that we are one nation Under God, then we will be a nation gone under.” Ronald Reagan
In the White House in the State Dining room there is a plaque on the fireplace placed by John Adams. It reads;
“I pray to Heaven to bestow the best of blessings on this house and all that shall hereafter inhabit it. May none but honest and wise men overrule under this roof.” John Adams
“The real fire within the builders of America was faith, faith in a Providential God whose hand supported and guided them, faith in themselves as the children of God endowed with purposes beyond the mere struggle for survival, faith in their country and its principles that proclaimed rights for freedom and justice derived from His Divine origins.” Dwight D. Eisenhower.
“ With a good conscience our only reward with history the final judge of our deeds, let us go forth to lead the land we love, asking His blessing and His help, but knowing that here on earth God’s work must truly be our own.” John F. Kennedy
“I know that there is a God and that He hates injustice. I see the storm coming and His had is in it, but if he has a place and a part for me in it, I believe that I am ready.” JFK
“The belief is that the rights of man come not from the generosity of the state, but from the had of God” JFK
Our belief in this country has and must always be that the very foundation of our nation is that the Creator God is the source of all of our rights, liberties, and freedoms.
“I now make it my earnest prayer, that God would have you, and the State over which you preside, in His holy protection, that he would incline the hearts of the citizens to cultivate a spirit of subordination and obedience to government, to entertain a brotherly affection and love for one another, for their fellow citizens of the United States at large, and particularly for their brethren who have served in the field, and finally, that He would most graciously be pleased to dispose us all, to do justice, to love mercy, and demean ourselves with that charity, humility and pacific temper of mind, which were the characteristics of the Divine Author of our blessed religion, and without an humble imitation of whose example in these things, we can never hope to be a happy nation.”
George Washington letter of farewell to the Army June 8th 1783
There is nothing more clear that the founders intended for an embrace of faith throughout all of America both in private and in public. This understanding was always clear until 1963 when an out of control Supreme Court started trying to wrest who we are and what we have and always will stand for from our nation.
We have never seen a more open attack on Christianity and faith than we do under this administration. Woe to us all if we allow God to be cast aside, those blessings that have made America the shining city on the hill will end. Look to the Old Testament, whenever God's people moved from God, they moved into slavery. Whenever they moved toward God they moved toward freedom and prosperity. America we need to dance with He who brought us, and bought us with his blood.
.
What are the facts, the facts that Americans are no longer taught? Let's ask our Founders, thank God, they were prodigious writers and have left their thoughts for us.
“God who gave us life, gave us liberty, can the liberty of a nation be secure if we remove the conviction that these liberties are the gift from God?” Thomas Jefferson
In our American system of government the foundation are these words;
“We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.”
The very key to our society is that these “unalienable rights” come not from a government, but from our Creator. If we ever come to a point in our society where we take the Creator out of our national creed, we are then accepting that our freedoms and rights come from a benevolent government, opening the door for them to retract those rights. I don’t care if you believe in God or not, you better believe that our nation was and is founded on those beliefs or your freedom is in jeopardy.
There is no attack on American culture more destructive and more historically dishonest than the relentless effort to drive God out of the public square. For our system of government to work it is understood that civic virtue is tied to personal virtue, and most people believe that they get their code of ethics from some sort of religion.
“It is impossible for the man of pious reflection not to perceive in it [the Constitution] a finger of that Almighty hand which has been so frequently and signally extended to our relief in the critical stages of the revolution. “
James Madison, Federalist No. 37, January 11, 1788
“ Of all the dispositions and habits which lead to political prosperity, religion and morality are indispensable supports. “ George Washington
“Our Constitution was made for a moral and religious people, it is wholly inadequate for the government of any other.” John Adams
The genius of the founders was how they wove religion into the framework of society politic while making it optional to believe. Though most of them were believers, and many devoutly and passionately, they understood that there couldn’t be a state run religion, or a government ruled by a religious sect. They knew that government should not interfere with religion, but also knew it couldn’t be hostile toward religion or the practice in the public square. It is best said that our nation was truly formed “Under God.”
For two generations we have passively accepted an assault on the core principle of our nation that our rights came from God. This assault comes from academic, legal, and media elite who find religious beliefs and expression frightening, old fashioned, and unsophisticated. We are in the midst of a culture war never before seen in America.
It is as if some are trying to take up George Washington’s dare from his farewell address. Where he said he would not take lightly if the republic could survive if the people abandon religion and morality.
For most people in America this systematic assault on all references to God and the removal of symbols from the public square is appalling. To artificially try to remove the references to God from our history and from our public square to please a small but vocal minority is wrong in the eyes of most Americans.
Two hundred years ago “Separation of Church and State” meant something very different from today’s interpretation. It was meant to keep government from founding a church and to keep a singular sect from running government. It was never intended to be hostile to the influences, and free expression of religion in our public square.
If you walk into our National Archives building in D.C. you will see a bronze inlay of the 10 Commandments in the floor, symbolizing that the Judeo Christian values and beliefs were at our nation’s foundation.
In our Declaration of Independence we find were Jefferson, Adams, and Franklin strove to keep a balance built in. In the first draft we see Jefferson wrote “We hold these truths to be Sacred” then we see where Franklin scratched out Sacred and added Self Evident. Then we see where John Adams wrote “by the Creator in between Endowed by and inalienable rights. From the beginning they knew the delicate balance that must be struck to create and sustain this great nation. The results is the only Constitutional government in the world to sustain for over two hundred years.
“ We hold these truths to be self evident that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights, that among these are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.” Thomas Jefferson
America at that time was called a second Israel, that is why on the Seal of the United States you will see images of Israel and Moses leading the Israelites out of bondage.
In our Constitution, you will see it is by the consent of the governed, “We the People” to make it clear the source of the power of the federal government.
In our First Amendment we see;
“Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the government for a redress of grievances.”
It makes it clear that we are not to establish a national religion, but is fine to practice religion freely even in the public square. It was designed to protect the Freedom of Religion, not the freedom from religion.
“I have lived, Sir, a long time, and the longer I live, the more convincing I see of this truth: that God governs in the affairs of man. And if a sparrow cannot fall to the ground without His notice, is it probable that an empire can rise without his Aid?”
Ben Franklin
“Reason and expression both forbid us from expecting that national morality can prevail in exclusion of religious principles.” George Washington
“No People can be bound to acknowledge and adore the invisible hand, which conducts the Affairs of men more than the People of the United States. Every step, by which they have advanced to the character of an independent nation, seems to have been distinguished by some token of providential agency.” George Washington
The words “Under God” first came to us from George Washington as he spoke to his troops telling them “You now, Under God, are the only defense of this nation as we head to war.”
When George Washington took the oath of office the first time, he asked that the Bible be open to the book of Deuteronomy Chapter 28. At the moment he was sworn in he said, “So help me God,” then bent over and kissed the Bible.
“ God touched us every step of the way to this victory.” George Washington
At the top of the Washington Monument are the Latin words Laus Deo, which means “Praise Be to God.”
We hear that Thomas Jefferson wasn’t a believer, however if you look at all he said, and how he governed you would have to believe that he was.
“ I have sworn upon the alter of God Eternal hostility against any for of tyranny over the mind of man.” Thomas Jefferson
In an 1803 treaty with a tribe of Indians, Jefferson used Federal funds to pay to have missionaries go to teach the Indians about God. He also used Federal funds to pay to build churches for them to worship. This was from the man who today is used as THE example of separation of church and state.
Jefferson, himself, denied those who considered him to be hostile toward religion in a letter to a colleague. “My views are the result of a life of inquiry and reflection and very different from that anti-Christian system imputed to my by those who know nothing of my opinion.” Thomas Jefferson
As America was fighting to not be torn asunder during the Civil War, we were still led by men who looked to God for their strength.
“We here highly resolve that these dead shall not have died in vain, that this nation, Under God, shall have a new birth of freedom.” Abraham Lincoln
“With malice toward none, with charity for all, with firmness in the right as God gives us to see the right, let us strive to finish the work we are in.” Abraham Lincoln.
“If I had my way this war would never have been commenced, if I had been allowed my way this war would have ended before this, but we find it still continues and we must believe that He permits it for some wise reason of His own mysterious and unknown to us.” Abraham Lincoln
During W.W.II and The Great Depression:
When you look at Franklin D. Roosevelt, the father of modern liberalism, he was unapologetically a man of deep faith. He linked the preservation of our nation during the depression and during W.W. II with the preservation of religion. He was a deeply religious man who through prayer was able to stay strong. On the eve of the great D-Day invasion he wrote and led the nation in this prayer.
“ Almighty God, our sons, pride of our nation, this day have set upon a mighty endeavor, a struggle to preserve our public, our religion, and our civilization, and to set free a suffering humanity. Some will never return, embrace these Father and receive them Thy heroic servants into Thy Kingdom. Oh Lord, give us faith, faith in Thee, faith in our sons, faith in each other, faith in our own united crusade. Thy will be done, Almighty God, Amen.” FDR
If you read his speeches you will often see him evoke prayer to God and for the Country.
“We humbly ask the blessing of God, may He protect each and everyone of us, may He guide me in the days to come.” FDR
“Human government is more or less perfect as it approaches nearer or diverges farther from the imitation of this perfect plan of Devine and moral government.” John Adams
When you walk through our Capital building, you will see the Rotunda filled with Religious images and symbols. When Thomas Jefferson became president in 1800, there were only two churches in Washington D.C. so the Congressional Chaplin asked if they could use the House chambers for church services on Sundays. Jefferson found no problem with this and he himself attended those services in those chambers regularly, as did James Madison after him.
“ While we assert a freedom to embrace to profess, and to observe the religion that we believe to be of Divine origin we cannot deny an equal freedom to choose mind who have not yet yielded to the evidence which convinced us.” James Madison
When you walk into the Supreme Court, you will once again see images of religion and the lawgivers all about you. Every session of the Supreme Court begins with an invocation, a prayer where the marshal stands up and says “God save the United States and this honorable Court.”
Each session of Congress also begins with a prayer.The source of all of our laws, the source of our freedom, liberty, and rights as defined in the Declaration of Independence was our Creator, God.
When you walk into the Library of Congress, you will see upon the walls these inscriptions;
“What doth the Lord require of thee, but to do justly, to love mercy, and to walk humbly with thy God.”
“ The Heavens declare the glory of God, and the firmament showeth His handiwork.”
“Ignorance is the curse of God, knowledge the wing, where with we fly to Heaven.”
You will see a statue of Moses holding the 10 Commandments, and a painting called Judea with a young Jewish woman praying. In 1998 the Library of Congress held and exhibition called “Religion and the Founding of the American Republic,” it explored the role of religion from Jamestown until just past the Revolutionary War era.
“I do not know whether all Americans have a sincere faith in their religion—for who can search the human heart?—but I am certain that they hold it to be indispensable to the maintenance of republican institutions. This opinion is not peculiar to a class of citizens or to a party, but it belongs to the whole nation and to every rank of society.” Alexis de Tocquieville upon his observations on America.
“True religion affords to government its surest support.” George Washington
“Let us raise a standard to which the wise and the honest repair, the rest is in the hands of God.” George Washington
“Religion and virtue are the only foundations. Not only of republicanism and of all free government, but social felicity under all governments and in all combinations of human society.” John Adams
“Surely God would not have created such a being as man with the ability to grasp the infinite to exist only for a day, No, No, man was made for immortality.” Abraham Lincoln
“We look forward to a world founded on four essential human freedoms, the first the freedom of speech and expression, everywhere in the world. The second, is freedom of every person to worship God in his own way everywhere in the world. And the third is the freedom from want, the fourth the freedom from fear.” FDR
“We believe all men were created equal because they are created in the image of God.”
Harry S. Truman
“If we ever forget that we are one nation Under God, then we will be a nation gone under.” Ronald Reagan
In the White House in the State Dining room there is a plaque on the fireplace placed by John Adams. It reads;
“I pray to Heaven to bestow the best of blessings on this house and all that shall hereafter inhabit it. May none but honest and wise men overrule under this roof.” John Adams
“The real fire within the builders of America was faith, faith in a Providential God whose hand supported and guided them, faith in themselves as the children of God endowed with purposes beyond the mere struggle for survival, faith in their country and its principles that proclaimed rights for freedom and justice derived from His Divine origins.” Dwight D. Eisenhower.
“ With a good conscience our only reward with history the final judge of our deeds, let us go forth to lead the land we love, asking His blessing and His help, but knowing that here on earth God’s work must truly be our own.” John F. Kennedy
“I know that there is a God and that He hates injustice. I see the storm coming and His had is in it, but if he has a place and a part for me in it, I believe that I am ready.” JFK
“The belief is that the rights of man come not from the generosity of the state, but from the had of God” JFK
Our belief in this country has and must always be that the very foundation of our nation is that the Creator God is the source of all of our rights, liberties, and freedoms.
“I now make it my earnest prayer, that God would have you, and the State over which you preside, in His holy protection, that he would incline the hearts of the citizens to cultivate a spirit of subordination and obedience to government, to entertain a brotherly affection and love for one another, for their fellow citizens of the United States at large, and particularly for their brethren who have served in the field, and finally, that He would most graciously be pleased to dispose us all, to do justice, to love mercy, and demean ourselves with that charity, humility and pacific temper of mind, which were the characteristics of the Divine Author of our blessed religion, and without an humble imitation of whose example in these things, we can never hope to be a happy nation.”
George Washington letter of farewell to the Army June 8th 1783
There is nothing more clear that the founders intended for an embrace of faith throughout all of America both in private and in public. This understanding was always clear until 1963 when an out of control Supreme Court started trying to wrest who we are and what we have and always will stand for from our nation.
We have never seen a more open attack on Christianity and faith than we do under this administration. Woe to us all if we allow God to be cast aside, those blessings that have made America the shining city on the hill will end. Look to the Old Testament, whenever God's people moved from God, they moved into slavery. Whenever they moved toward God they moved toward freedom and prosperity. America we need to dance with He who brought us, and bought us with his blood.
.
Thursday, December 10, 2009
What Does History Teach Us About Faith and Our Nation's Founding?
Few issues have been more mischaracterized than religion, and the founder's early
government's attitude toward religion. Modern Americans readily cite the "separation of church and state," phrase that does not appear in the Constitution, yet is a concept that has become a guiding force in the disestablishment of religion in America.
Most settlers had come to America with the quest for religious freedom constituting an important, if not THE most important, goal of their journey.
Maryland was a formed as a Catholic state; Pennsylvania, a Quaker state; Massachusetts, a Puritan state; and so on. But when Thomas Jefferson penned Virginia's Statute for Religious Freedom (enacted 1786), the states relationship to religion seemed to change. Or did it?
Jefferson wrote the Virginia sabbath law, as well as ordinances sanctioning
public days of prayer and fasting and even incorporated some of the Levitica
code into the state's marriage laws. In 1784, however, controversy arose
over the incorporation of the Protestant Episcopal Church, with Baptists and
Presbyterians complaining that the act unfairly bound church and state. The
matter, along with some related issues, came before several courts, which by
1804 had led the legislature to refuse petitions for incorporation by
churches or other religious bodies.
By that time, the American religious experience had developed several
characteristics that separated it from any of the European churches.
Americans de-emphasized the clergy. Not only did states such as Virginia
refuse to fund the salaries of ministers, but the Calvinist/Puritan
tradition that each man read, and interpret, the Bible for himself meant
that the clergy's authority had already diminished.
Second, Americans were at once both evangelically active and liturgically lax. What mattered was salvation and "right" living, not the form or structure of the religion.
Ceremonies and practices differed wildly, even within denominations.
Finally, as with America's new government itself, the nation's religion made
central the personal salvation experience. All of this had the effect of
separating American churches from their European ancestors, but also
fostering sects and divisions within American Christianity itself.
Above all, of course, America was a Christian nation. Jews, nonbelievers,
and the few Muslims or adherents to other religions who might make it to the
shores of North America in the late 1700's were treated not so much with
tolerance as with indifference. People knew Jews, Muslims, Buddhists, or
others were a minority and, they thought, were going to remain a minority.
So in the legal context, the debates never included non-Christian groups in
the deliberations. At the same time, this generic Christian faith, wherein
everyone agreed to disagree, served as a unifying element by breaking down
parish boundaries and, in the process, destroying other political and
geographic boundaries. The Great Awakening had galvanized American
Christianity. pushing it even further into evangelism, and it served as a
springboard to the Revolution itself, fueling the political fire with
religious fervor and imbuing in the Founders a sense of rightness of cause.
To some extent, then, the essential difference between the American
Revolution and the French Revolution is that the American Revolution was a
religious event, whereas the French Revolution was an anti-religious event.
John Adams said as much when he observed that the "Revolution was in the
mind and hearts of the people; and change in their religious sentiments of
their duties and obligations."
Consequently, America, while attaching itself to no specific variant of
Christianity, operated on an understanding that the nation would adopt an
unofficial, generic, Christianity that fit hand in glove with republicanism.
Alexis de Tocqueville, whose perceptive "Democracy in America" (1835)
provided a virtual road map for the future direction of the young nation,
observed that in the United States the spirit of religion and he spirit of
freedom "were intimately united, and that they reigned in common over the
same country." Americans, he added, viewed religion as "indispensable to the
maintenance of the republican institutions," because it facilitated free
institutions. Certain fundamentals seemed appropriate; prayers in virtually
all official and public functions were expected; America was particularly
blessed because of her trust in God; and even when individuals in civic life
did not ascribe to a specific faith, they were expected to "act" like "good
Christians" and conduct themselves as would a believer.
Politicians like Washington walked a fine line between maintaining the secularist form and yet supplying the necessary spiritual substance. In part, this explains why
so many of the writings and speeches of the Founders were both timeless and uplifting. Their message of spiritual virtue, cloaked in republican processes if civic duty, reflected a sense of providential mission for the young country.
Isn't it interesting how the facts from history are so different from what we are now being told about history? Wonder if it is done on purpose? Could it be the same reason that Alexis de Tocqueville's book when it was re-edited and abridged in 1956 went from 770 pages to 270 pages losing every reference about God and faith?
government's attitude toward religion. Modern Americans readily cite the "separation of church and state," phrase that does not appear in the Constitution, yet is a concept that has become a guiding force in the disestablishment of religion in America.
Most settlers had come to America with the quest for religious freedom constituting an important, if not THE most important, goal of their journey.
Maryland was a formed as a Catholic state; Pennsylvania, a Quaker state; Massachusetts, a Puritan state; and so on. But when Thomas Jefferson penned Virginia's Statute for Religious Freedom (enacted 1786), the states relationship to religion seemed to change. Or did it?
Jefferson wrote the Virginia sabbath law, as well as ordinances sanctioning
public days of prayer and fasting and even incorporated some of the Levitica
code into the state's marriage laws. In 1784, however, controversy arose
over the incorporation of the Protestant Episcopal Church, with Baptists and
Presbyterians complaining that the act unfairly bound church and state. The
matter, along with some related issues, came before several courts, which by
1804 had led the legislature to refuse petitions for incorporation by
churches or other religious bodies.
By that time, the American religious experience had developed several
characteristics that separated it from any of the European churches.
Americans de-emphasized the clergy. Not only did states such as Virginia
refuse to fund the salaries of ministers, but the Calvinist/Puritan
tradition that each man read, and interpret, the Bible for himself meant
that the clergy's authority had already diminished.
Second, Americans were at once both evangelically active and liturgically lax. What mattered was salvation and "right" living, not the form or structure of the religion.
Ceremonies and practices differed wildly, even within denominations.
Finally, as with America's new government itself, the nation's religion made
central the personal salvation experience. All of this had the effect of
separating American churches from their European ancestors, but also
fostering sects and divisions within American Christianity itself.
Above all, of course, America was a Christian nation. Jews, nonbelievers,
and the few Muslims or adherents to other religions who might make it to the
shores of North America in the late 1700's were treated not so much with
tolerance as with indifference. People knew Jews, Muslims, Buddhists, or
others were a minority and, they thought, were going to remain a minority.
So in the legal context, the debates never included non-Christian groups in
the deliberations. At the same time, this generic Christian faith, wherein
everyone agreed to disagree, served as a unifying element by breaking down
parish boundaries and, in the process, destroying other political and
geographic boundaries. The Great Awakening had galvanized American
Christianity. pushing it even further into evangelism, and it served as a
springboard to the Revolution itself, fueling the political fire with
religious fervor and imbuing in the Founders a sense of rightness of cause.
To some extent, then, the essential difference between the American
Revolution and the French Revolution is that the American Revolution was a
religious event, whereas the French Revolution was an anti-religious event.
John Adams said as much when he observed that the "Revolution was in the
mind and hearts of the people; and change in their religious sentiments of
their duties and obligations."
Consequently, America, while attaching itself to no specific variant of
Christianity, operated on an understanding that the nation would adopt an
unofficial, generic, Christianity that fit hand in glove with republicanism.
Alexis de Tocqueville, whose perceptive "Democracy in America" (1835)
provided a virtual road map for the future direction of the young nation,
observed that in the United States the spirit of religion and he spirit of
freedom "were intimately united, and that they reigned in common over the
same country." Americans, he added, viewed religion as "indispensable to the
maintenance of the republican institutions," because it facilitated free
institutions. Certain fundamentals seemed appropriate; prayers in virtually
all official and public functions were expected; America was particularly
blessed because of her trust in God; and even when individuals in civic life
did not ascribe to a specific faith, they were expected to "act" like "good
Christians" and conduct themselves as would a believer.
Politicians like Washington walked a fine line between maintaining the secularist form and yet supplying the necessary spiritual substance. In part, this explains why
so many of the writings and speeches of the Founders were both timeless and uplifting. Their message of spiritual virtue, cloaked in republican processes if civic duty, reflected a sense of providential mission for the young country.
Isn't it interesting how the facts from history are so different from what we are now being told about history? Wonder if it is done on purpose? Could it be the same reason that Alexis de Tocqueville's book when it was re-edited and abridged in 1956 went from 770 pages to 270 pages losing every reference about God and faith?
Wednesday, December 9, 2009
Tiger Woods A Convenient Diversion
With the media frenzy around the tragedy that is revealing itself in Tiger Woods and his family's lives, it makes one wonder if he is getting media payback for his audacity at praising the military, and completely ignoring Obama at his speech during Obama's inauguration. Or is it that he has given the illusion of leading a model life, portraying a squeaky clean image as the poster boy for every advertiser who could throw enough money to get his name and image attached? Whatever it is, it is completely out of control.
It doesn't matter what news channel you watch, Tiger, and his dirty laundry is leading the way. Could it be that way the focus is off Obama's poll numbers, Climate Gate, Copenhagen, Socialized Health Care, Cap and Trade, and TARP/Stimulus, etc? Last evening I turned on Hannity, but when he started covering Tiger, I was off to watch a movie. I am sad for Tiger's family, I am so sorry for his kids who will have video evidence of watching their dad drug through the mud forever, but frankly am not interested in watching this train wreck.
It does seem convenient that whenever Obama needs people to pay attention to anything but what he is doing, something comes along to draw the public attention like moths to a flame.
It is time that Americans start paying attention to things that truly will make a difference in their lives now, and in the future, and overcome their voyeurism over celebrities dirty laundry.
The old quote holds true, and as a good warning to each of us as we find our own conversations turning to different topics.
"Brilliant people talk about ideas. Normal people talk about news. Small minded people talk about other people".
It doesn't matter what news channel you watch, Tiger, and his dirty laundry is leading the way. Could it be that way the focus is off Obama's poll numbers, Climate Gate, Copenhagen, Socialized Health Care, Cap and Trade, and TARP/Stimulus, etc? Last evening I turned on Hannity, but when he started covering Tiger, I was off to watch a movie. I am sad for Tiger's family, I am so sorry for his kids who will have video evidence of watching their dad drug through the mud forever, but frankly am not interested in watching this train wreck.
It does seem convenient that whenever Obama needs people to pay attention to anything but what he is doing, something comes along to draw the public attention like moths to a flame.
It is time that Americans start paying attention to things that truly will make a difference in their lives now, and in the future, and overcome their voyeurism over celebrities dirty laundry.
The old quote holds true, and as a good warning to each of us as we find our own conversations turning to different topics.
"Brilliant people talk about ideas. Normal people talk about news. Small minded people talk about other people".
Sunday, December 6, 2009
Cassius Marcellus Clay "The Lion of Whitehall"
One of the most colorful and interesting figures from history is also one of the least well known. Cassius Marcellus Clay, one of the founders of the Republican Party, is a movie character waiting to be discovered, he was a real life action hero. Clay had a reputation as a rebel and a fighter. There were so many threats to his life that he carried two pistols and a Bowie knife everywhere he went. In addition he used a cannon to protect his home and office. His family home was nicknamed White Hall, and he was known as The Lion of White Hall.
Cassius Marcellus Clay, Jr. is a much more well known name, later known as Muhammad Ali, he was named for his father Cassius Marcellus Clay, Sr., whose grandfather grew up on the property of Cassius Clay for whom he was named. Ali, was quoted that he changed his name and "denounced his slave name." What he may never have known was the story of the man he was named for and why. It was Clay who freed Ali's grandfather who named his son born in freedom in his honor. I wonder if he might have a different thought if he knew the story of who he was named for.
A soldier in The War of 1812, later fought in the Mexican American War where he was captured as a prisoner of war. Elected to Kentucky State Legislature, news paper editor, and one of the leading forces in the anti-slavery movement.
Clay was appointed Minister to Russian in 1861 came home in 1862 to the Civil War, but went back to St. Petersburg in 1863 and stayed until 1869, where he was instrumental in clearing the way for America's purchase of Alaska. He came home to become a general in the U.S. Army in the Civil War but resigned his post when the Lincoln administration failure to immediately proclaim emancipation of all slaves in the South. He then formed the "Strangers Guard in Washington at the beginning of the Civil War. It had the special responsibility of protecting the White House, the Navy Yard, and cleared the city of masses of Southern sympathizers.
Clay was the son of Revolutionary War General Green Clay, who was a contemporary of Daniel Boone. Green Clay amassed great wealth from property in Madison County, Kentucky, and as a slave holding plantation owner. Cassius "Cash" was also cousins with the famed politician Henry Clay,known as one of the greatest Senators of all time, and personal hero of Abraham Lincoln. Cash was also a friend and one of the co-founders of the Republican Party with Lincoln with the goal of ending slavery.
Cash attended Yale where in 1832 he was impressed by an anti-slavery speech by the abolitionist William Lloyd Garrison. From then on, Cassius Clay spent his life opposing slavery and working for its end. Clay was an emancipationist, not an abolitionist, where he sought to eliminate slavery by gradual, legal means, while abolitionists wanted slavery to end by any means possible. Their methods sometimes included violence and a disregard for the law of the United States. Clay and the emancipationists, including his cousin Senator Henry Clay, "The Great Compromiser," and Lincoln hoped to maintain the law and the Constitution while ridding the country of slavery by peaceful means. Of course those high hopes would eventually prove futile as America and these men were drawn into the Civil War.
Cash entered politics was elected to state representative from Madison County in 1835, lost the next year, and then elected again in 1837. His speeches won him praise for his speaking skills, but made many enemies for their content speaking against slavery in Central Kentucky. He was threatened often and fought many duels.
Once during the Wickliffe-Garret Davis debate at Russell's Cave Spring in 1843, Clay was attacked by a hired assassin named Samuel Brown. Brown shot Clay in the chest, but Clay defended himself with a Bowie knife, cutting off Brown's nose, ear, and gouging out Brown's right eye. Clay then picked up Brown and threw him over a wall down an embankment. The helpers who carried Clay away were astonished to find that Clay's knife scabbard, which he kept strapped to his chest, had stopped Brown's bullet. Clay was charged with Mayhem, but the charges were later dropped.
A few years later, on June 15, 1849, Clay traveled to Foxtown, Ky to speak out against slavery at a local political meeting. He was then a member of the Liberal Party, which hoped to elect anti-slavery delegates to the upcoming state constitutional convention. As Clay stepped down from the podium, Cyrus Turner, the son of a pro-slavery candidate, called him a liar and struck him. Clay drew his knife but was surrounded by a crowd, who disarmed him and began clubbing him. Clay was stabbed in the lung, and his breastbone was severed.
Badly wounded, Clay grabbed his knife and wrestled it away from an attacker, cutting his own fingers to the bone. He then found Turner in the crowd and stabbed him. Clay's 14 year old son, Warfield Clay, handed him a pistol, but Cash was beginning to lose consciousness from his loss of blood. One of Turner's relatives tried to shoot Clay in the head, but the gun misfired. As he passed out, Cash was reported to have said, "I died in defense of the liberties of the people." The statement was a bit premature, Clay didn't die. Turner however, did a few days later.
Clay's reputation from his many duels was so intense, that one man who was scheduled to duel Clay the next day, committed suicide the night before!
Clay started an anti-slavery newspaper in Lexington, KY, called "The True American," but in it's first year his office and printing presses were wrecked by a mob of 60 men. After this he moved his paper to Cincinnati, OH and later yet moved it back to Louisville and renamed it the Examiner.
Historian William Ritchie wrote; "After the election of Lincoln, Clay hoped that the portfolio of war was assured him. When strong opposition developed against him, Clay sought the assistance of other men of influence, such as (Salmon) Chase, and (Carl) Schurz. Clay failed to secure the appointment to the cabinet. He blamed William Seward, who said that Clay's appointment would constitute a declaration of war on the South." Clay took his case directly to Lincoln, but Lincoln was quick to reject his claim with "Who ever heard of a reformer reaping the rewards of his work in his lifetime? I was advised that your appointment as Secretary of War would have been considered a declaration of war upon the South. I have no objection to your return to St. Petersburg. I thought that you had desired to return home; at least (Secretary of State) William H. Seward so stated to me."
While Clay was commander of the Clay Battalion, of The Stranger's Guard in D.C. he was colorfully described by Clay biographer, David Smiley. "As commander, Clay enlivened the atmosphere at his headquarters in Willard's Hotel with his braggadocio. With three pistols strapped to his waist, and an elegant sword hanging from his side, he talked to anyone who would listen about his Mexican War exploits and his political battles."
A few months before Cash Clay died at 93 years old, while still a young man of 92, three men broke into his home late one evening trying to either rob, or attack the old warrior. However, he still had plenty of fight left in him. Clay shot one, eviscerated a second, and seriously injured the third before the intruder escaped.
This guy's life is begging to be made into an action hero movie.
Cassius Marcellus Clay, Jr. is a much more well known name, later known as Muhammad Ali, he was named for his father Cassius Marcellus Clay, Sr., whose grandfather grew up on the property of Cassius Clay for whom he was named. Ali, was quoted that he changed his name and "denounced his slave name." What he may never have known was the story of the man he was named for and why. It was Clay who freed Ali's grandfather who named his son born in freedom in his honor. I wonder if he might have a different thought if he knew the story of who he was named for.
A soldier in The War of 1812, later fought in the Mexican American War where he was captured as a prisoner of war. Elected to Kentucky State Legislature, news paper editor, and one of the leading forces in the anti-slavery movement.
Clay was appointed Minister to Russian in 1861 came home in 1862 to the Civil War, but went back to St. Petersburg in 1863 and stayed until 1869, where he was instrumental in clearing the way for America's purchase of Alaska. He came home to become a general in the U.S. Army in the Civil War but resigned his post when the Lincoln administration failure to immediately proclaim emancipation of all slaves in the South. He then formed the "Strangers Guard in Washington at the beginning of the Civil War. It had the special responsibility of protecting the White House, the Navy Yard, and cleared the city of masses of Southern sympathizers.
Clay was the son of Revolutionary War General Green Clay, who was a contemporary of Daniel Boone. Green Clay amassed great wealth from property in Madison County, Kentucky, and as a slave holding plantation owner. Cassius "Cash" was also cousins with the famed politician Henry Clay,known as one of the greatest Senators of all time, and personal hero of Abraham Lincoln. Cash was also a friend and one of the co-founders of the Republican Party with Lincoln with the goal of ending slavery.
Cash attended Yale where in 1832 he was impressed by an anti-slavery speech by the abolitionist William Lloyd Garrison. From then on, Cassius Clay spent his life opposing slavery and working for its end. Clay was an emancipationist, not an abolitionist, where he sought to eliminate slavery by gradual, legal means, while abolitionists wanted slavery to end by any means possible. Their methods sometimes included violence and a disregard for the law of the United States. Clay and the emancipationists, including his cousin Senator Henry Clay, "The Great Compromiser," and Lincoln hoped to maintain the law and the Constitution while ridding the country of slavery by peaceful means. Of course those high hopes would eventually prove futile as America and these men were drawn into the Civil War.
Cash entered politics was elected to state representative from Madison County in 1835, lost the next year, and then elected again in 1837. His speeches won him praise for his speaking skills, but made many enemies for their content speaking against slavery in Central Kentucky. He was threatened often and fought many duels.
Once during the Wickliffe-Garret Davis debate at Russell's Cave Spring in 1843, Clay was attacked by a hired assassin named Samuel Brown. Brown shot Clay in the chest, but Clay defended himself with a Bowie knife, cutting off Brown's nose, ear, and gouging out Brown's right eye. Clay then picked up Brown and threw him over a wall down an embankment. The helpers who carried Clay away were astonished to find that Clay's knife scabbard, which he kept strapped to his chest, had stopped Brown's bullet. Clay was charged with Mayhem, but the charges were later dropped.
A few years later, on June 15, 1849, Clay traveled to Foxtown, Ky to speak out against slavery at a local political meeting. He was then a member of the Liberal Party, which hoped to elect anti-slavery delegates to the upcoming state constitutional convention. As Clay stepped down from the podium, Cyrus Turner, the son of a pro-slavery candidate, called him a liar and struck him. Clay drew his knife but was surrounded by a crowd, who disarmed him and began clubbing him. Clay was stabbed in the lung, and his breastbone was severed.
Badly wounded, Clay grabbed his knife and wrestled it away from an attacker, cutting his own fingers to the bone. He then found Turner in the crowd and stabbed him. Clay's 14 year old son, Warfield Clay, handed him a pistol, but Cash was beginning to lose consciousness from his loss of blood. One of Turner's relatives tried to shoot Clay in the head, but the gun misfired. As he passed out, Cash was reported to have said, "I died in defense of the liberties of the people." The statement was a bit premature, Clay didn't die. Turner however, did a few days later.
Clay's reputation from his many duels was so intense, that one man who was scheduled to duel Clay the next day, committed suicide the night before!
Clay started an anti-slavery newspaper in Lexington, KY, called "The True American," but in it's first year his office and printing presses were wrecked by a mob of 60 men. After this he moved his paper to Cincinnati, OH and later yet moved it back to Louisville and renamed it the Examiner.
Historian William Ritchie wrote; "After the election of Lincoln, Clay hoped that the portfolio of war was assured him. When strong opposition developed against him, Clay sought the assistance of other men of influence, such as (Salmon) Chase, and (Carl) Schurz. Clay failed to secure the appointment to the cabinet. He blamed William Seward, who said that Clay's appointment would constitute a declaration of war on the South." Clay took his case directly to Lincoln, but Lincoln was quick to reject his claim with "Who ever heard of a reformer reaping the rewards of his work in his lifetime? I was advised that your appointment as Secretary of War would have been considered a declaration of war upon the South. I have no objection to your return to St. Petersburg. I thought that you had desired to return home; at least (Secretary of State) William H. Seward so stated to me."
While Clay was commander of the Clay Battalion, of The Stranger's Guard in D.C. he was colorfully described by Clay biographer, David Smiley. "As commander, Clay enlivened the atmosphere at his headquarters in Willard's Hotel with his braggadocio. With three pistols strapped to his waist, and an elegant sword hanging from his side, he talked to anyone who would listen about his Mexican War exploits and his political battles."
A few months before Cash Clay died at 93 years old, while still a young man of 92, three men broke into his home late one evening trying to either rob, or attack the old warrior. However, he still had plenty of fight left in him. Clay shot one, eviscerated a second, and seriously injured the third before the intruder escaped.
This guy's life is begging to be made into an action hero movie.
Thursday, December 3, 2009
Tiger Woods Fall From Grace
The most popular and successful athlete in history took a surprising fall this week. It wasn't a sports injury that got him, but that devil that so often causes men, most often to stumble, damaging their own as well as their families lives....the other woman, or women.
Tiger Woods seemed immune to anything that could tarnish his image, he has been in the limelight since he was just a child and has publicly handled it with grace and panache. The ultimate endorsement celebrity, the guy everyone wanted their products associated. He was Mr. Cool. Golf tournaments where he doesn't play, or make the cut are ratings bombs, non golf enthusiasts will turn them on Sunday afternoons to watch Tiger make history. If you have seen his wife, who would cheat on her? He is rich, famous, gifted, married to a beautiful wife, has wonderful kids and family, what more could anyone want? How many women watching this unfold are asking, if a man would cheat on her, can you ever trust them?
Tiger, his wife, and family have a lot of work to do. Hopefully, they can find a way to overcome this. I pray for them, and I would beg the media, and his fans to leave them alone to try to work this out away from the glare of outside attention. Tiger also has an opportunity to make something good out of this. If he can take ownership, truly repent, and turn his personal life around he could be an inspiration to his kids, his wife, and to all of those watching. That will be up to him to find the strength to repent and change.
How can something like this happen to someone like Tiger? Why would he take such a risk? Why would so many men do such stupid and hurtful things? There are a lot of reasons, but I want to focus on one of those big traps for "celebrities" of all levels.
I thank God so often for the men that he put in my life when I was young and developing who I would be. At twenty one, I was what was known as a Direct Distributor in the Amway business and had a decent sized business. This allowed me to be on the speaking circuit traveling around doing motivational and training. I loved it, for someone who grew up dreaming of being a rock star, but without any musical ability, it was a very nice substitute. You got to speak in front of large cheering crowds and sign autographs, have people want jockey to sit near you at restaurants to be able to hear, or tape, some sort of "wisdom" you might say. It was very heady stuff.
I knew that one of the reasons that I got to speak a lot was at 21, I was known as the "Diaper Direct," most of those around me were my parents age. I would often share the stage with Dr. Jack, a Dutch immigrant who was a 79 year old nuclear physicist, and I was this 21 year old college drop out. I understood that by putting us on the same stage, the point that ANYONE can do this was ringing out loud and clear.
The leadership of the business knew what pitfalls could await and were wonderful about training you of what to watch out for. A brilliant man, Dexter Yager, conducted a men's only meeting for those at my level where he warned us that we could easily be put into a compromising position. That women would see us at conventions standing on stage in our tuxedos, with diamond rings glittering, speaking to, and firing up the crowds, then would see their own husbands sitting on the couch in their underwear drinking a beer watching sports. What they wouldn't see, is that the next day we would be home sitting on the couch in our underwear watching sports as well. He taught us how Billy Graham to make sure that he would never be tempted and that no one could ever accuse him of infidelity or acting inappropriately, never in his career was in a room, office, or even a car with a woman by themselves with the door closed. He was always visible, and transparent so to speak.
I have always tried to follow Dr. Graham's advice, the overly safe, so never sorry approach. However shortly after that lesson from Dexter, I found that what he was saying was absolutely the truth. We were at a convention and my wife and I had booked a two bedroom suite at the Hyatt. We were letting a few other couples use the other room, and crash on the couches to help them out. In those days, I was always working helping put on the convention as well, so we would be in meetings from early morning until 2-3 the next morning. Then I, and some others, would work on the audio/video productions for the next day's meetings all night between sessions. You learned to function on no sleep for days.
One afternoon, there was a break in sessions so the attendees could go out and explore the city. My wife, and a bunch of girls, were heading out shopping. I realized I didn't have anything that I had to do, so thought I would catch a couple hours sleep so went to our room in the suite. I had barely just fallen asleep when I heard the door open and close and felt her climb in with me, her warm flesh pressed up behind me. I have to admit, I thought about it a second... do I want sleep, or my young bride. Ladies and Gentlemen, I was 21 and figured you can sleep when you are dead. When I rolled over I was very surprised that it wasn't my wife, but the wife of one of our distributors, it seems she let all the rest including her husband go sightseeing and then came back to the suite. This was not an easy choice to make, I didn't want to do the right thing. However it helped that I heard Dex in my head telling me that it wasn't me but a distorted image of me she wanted. I told her that I was complimented, but that since we were both married, and not to each other, that this could not happen. To say that she had no use for me in any way from then on would be most accurate.
Through out the years other "opportunities" have come along, some more challenging than others. In my line of work, I keep very strange hours, I might be gone for days at a time, not often, but occasionally. I have women call me, and I have their numbers on me in my planner all the time, men's numbers and calls as well, but those wouldn't concern my wife. There is a demand of trust, or it would create havoc in our lives.
There are several ways that I found it not terribly hard to practice fidelity. The first is that I love my wife, and children, and would never want to tear those relationship apart. The second is I am a Christian, and believe that you can gain strength from faith. However, as has been proven over and over, neither of those are iron clad protectors for falling short. Men have done so since the dawn of man, not saying that women don't, but since I am a guy, I am going to focus on us.
For me those above are part of the foundation, but there is more. One is that I see myself as a man of honor and integrity, and that self-belief is critical to who I see myself to be. It gives me a cornerstone to build upon, it is something that I cherish and wouldn't give away to anyone, for anything. I never want to have to avert my eyes from the man in the mirror. I believe that by breaking this code, if you are ever caught or not, will do serious damage to you and your self-image. It would make setting a goal much harder. Just think, if you told yourself you are going to do such and such, but you know in your heart and your subconscious that you are a cheater, and a liar to your wife, your own subconscious is going to remind you that your word is no good. If you lie to her, wouldn't you lie to you, or anyone?
There have been moments through the years that there have been temptations, a few have even suggested that no one, especially your wife would never need to know. My answer to them, and to myself, was always yes there would be, I would know. I never wanted to have to deal with me if I didn't respect me. What I feared most of all is if I would once compromise that doing so again would be much easier. If honor was breached, it was gone, and no longer there as a stalwart.
To me there are always some tricks that I have used through the years to help protect me from myself. I am still human, and as such never above falling. As a Christian I am a no better man than others, just forgiven, with a goal and dream of being better daily. There a far too many Godly men and women who have made these mistakes. I needed some techniques or crutches to help assure me of making the right choices.
When a woman is making me feel that things might be getting too friendly, by either of us, I start talking and telling about my wife, fun, uplifting, edifying stories about her, not "that she doesn't understand me" stories that I hear are common. Plus I would be lying if I would say that Jodi doesn't understand me, I find it frightening how well she knows me.
If things get further into a danger zone, maybe with someone who I would have worked with, or would be seeing often through normal business day, I would tell Jodi that I think so and so might have a crush on me, or that I could easily have one on her if that would be the case. By alerting her, I am making it nearly impossible to "get away" with something it helps me put an insurance policy on it.
There were a couple times where talking of my happy marriage didn't diffuse things, both were secretaries who I worked with daily, both Jodi knew about. However, eventually it came down to a talk about that though flattered, I would never put myself, my wife, my family, or her into such a compromising situation. That no matter what happened someone would get hurt, or likely all of us would.
Through the years, I have watched friends, and business associates fall into these traps, some get caught, some don't. I know that when I see someone cheat, and lie to their wives, that no matter how much I like them, respect them in business, it always diminishes them in my eyes. It also makes me trust them less, if they would do that to their wife and take such risk with their kids, why should I believe that they wouldn't be capable of screwing me in business.
Once again, I thank God for putting me in the councel of men like Dexter in my youth. Men who led by example, and with wisdom, and who could show me what to look out for, and why.
Tiger Woods is one of the wealthiest, most popular celebrities on the planet. If I in my little world had any situations, I can't imagine the "opportunities" of beautiful, exciting women throwing themselves at him daily. Once you make that wrong choice once, it would get ever more easy to make again, and again.
I pray that he uses that inner strength, and self-discipline that he used to make himself the best golfer in the world, to become the man he, his wife, and children deserve. We should all pray for him and them, if he can make this difficult journey and save his family, he will be a light for other men to realize that they too can be men, and not boys in adult bodies.
Tiger Woods seemed immune to anything that could tarnish his image, he has been in the limelight since he was just a child and has publicly handled it with grace and panache. The ultimate endorsement celebrity, the guy everyone wanted their products associated. He was Mr. Cool. Golf tournaments where he doesn't play, or make the cut are ratings bombs, non golf enthusiasts will turn them on Sunday afternoons to watch Tiger make history. If you have seen his wife, who would cheat on her? He is rich, famous, gifted, married to a beautiful wife, has wonderful kids and family, what more could anyone want? How many women watching this unfold are asking, if a man would cheat on her, can you ever trust them?
Tiger, his wife, and family have a lot of work to do. Hopefully, they can find a way to overcome this. I pray for them, and I would beg the media, and his fans to leave them alone to try to work this out away from the glare of outside attention. Tiger also has an opportunity to make something good out of this. If he can take ownership, truly repent, and turn his personal life around he could be an inspiration to his kids, his wife, and to all of those watching. That will be up to him to find the strength to repent and change.
How can something like this happen to someone like Tiger? Why would he take such a risk? Why would so many men do such stupid and hurtful things? There are a lot of reasons, but I want to focus on one of those big traps for "celebrities" of all levels.
I thank God so often for the men that he put in my life when I was young and developing who I would be. At twenty one, I was what was known as a Direct Distributor in the Amway business and had a decent sized business. This allowed me to be on the speaking circuit traveling around doing motivational and training. I loved it, for someone who grew up dreaming of being a rock star, but without any musical ability, it was a very nice substitute. You got to speak in front of large cheering crowds and sign autographs, have people want jockey to sit near you at restaurants to be able to hear, or tape, some sort of "wisdom" you might say. It was very heady stuff.
I knew that one of the reasons that I got to speak a lot was at 21, I was known as the "Diaper Direct," most of those around me were my parents age. I would often share the stage with Dr. Jack, a Dutch immigrant who was a 79 year old nuclear physicist, and I was this 21 year old college drop out. I understood that by putting us on the same stage, the point that ANYONE can do this was ringing out loud and clear.
The leadership of the business knew what pitfalls could await and were wonderful about training you of what to watch out for. A brilliant man, Dexter Yager, conducted a men's only meeting for those at my level where he warned us that we could easily be put into a compromising position. That women would see us at conventions standing on stage in our tuxedos, with diamond rings glittering, speaking to, and firing up the crowds, then would see their own husbands sitting on the couch in their underwear drinking a beer watching sports. What they wouldn't see, is that the next day we would be home sitting on the couch in our underwear watching sports as well. He taught us how Billy Graham to make sure that he would never be tempted and that no one could ever accuse him of infidelity or acting inappropriately, never in his career was in a room, office, or even a car with a woman by themselves with the door closed. He was always visible, and transparent so to speak.
I have always tried to follow Dr. Graham's advice, the overly safe, so never sorry approach. However shortly after that lesson from Dexter, I found that what he was saying was absolutely the truth. We were at a convention and my wife and I had booked a two bedroom suite at the Hyatt. We were letting a few other couples use the other room, and crash on the couches to help them out. In those days, I was always working helping put on the convention as well, so we would be in meetings from early morning until 2-3 the next morning. Then I, and some others, would work on the audio/video productions for the next day's meetings all night between sessions. You learned to function on no sleep for days.
One afternoon, there was a break in sessions so the attendees could go out and explore the city. My wife, and a bunch of girls, were heading out shopping. I realized I didn't have anything that I had to do, so thought I would catch a couple hours sleep so went to our room in the suite. I had barely just fallen asleep when I heard the door open and close and felt her climb in with me, her warm flesh pressed up behind me. I have to admit, I thought about it a second... do I want sleep, or my young bride. Ladies and Gentlemen, I was 21 and figured you can sleep when you are dead. When I rolled over I was very surprised that it wasn't my wife, but the wife of one of our distributors, it seems she let all the rest including her husband go sightseeing and then came back to the suite. This was not an easy choice to make, I didn't want to do the right thing. However it helped that I heard Dex in my head telling me that it wasn't me but a distorted image of me she wanted. I told her that I was complimented, but that since we were both married, and not to each other, that this could not happen. To say that she had no use for me in any way from then on would be most accurate.
Through out the years other "opportunities" have come along, some more challenging than others. In my line of work, I keep very strange hours, I might be gone for days at a time, not often, but occasionally. I have women call me, and I have their numbers on me in my planner all the time, men's numbers and calls as well, but those wouldn't concern my wife. There is a demand of trust, or it would create havoc in our lives.
There are several ways that I found it not terribly hard to practice fidelity. The first is that I love my wife, and children, and would never want to tear those relationship apart. The second is I am a Christian, and believe that you can gain strength from faith. However, as has been proven over and over, neither of those are iron clad protectors for falling short. Men have done so since the dawn of man, not saying that women don't, but since I am a guy, I am going to focus on us.
For me those above are part of the foundation, but there is more. One is that I see myself as a man of honor and integrity, and that self-belief is critical to who I see myself to be. It gives me a cornerstone to build upon, it is something that I cherish and wouldn't give away to anyone, for anything. I never want to have to avert my eyes from the man in the mirror. I believe that by breaking this code, if you are ever caught or not, will do serious damage to you and your self-image. It would make setting a goal much harder. Just think, if you told yourself you are going to do such and such, but you know in your heart and your subconscious that you are a cheater, and a liar to your wife, your own subconscious is going to remind you that your word is no good. If you lie to her, wouldn't you lie to you, or anyone?
There have been moments through the years that there have been temptations, a few have even suggested that no one, especially your wife would never need to know. My answer to them, and to myself, was always yes there would be, I would know. I never wanted to have to deal with me if I didn't respect me. What I feared most of all is if I would once compromise that doing so again would be much easier. If honor was breached, it was gone, and no longer there as a stalwart.
To me there are always some tricks that I have used through the years to help protect me from myself. I am still human, and as such never above falling. As a Christian I am a no better man than others, just forgiven, with a goal and dream of being better daily. There a far too many Godly men and women who have made these mistakes. I needed some techniques or crutches to help assure me of making the right choices.
When a woman is making me feel that things might be getting too friendly, by either of us, I start talking and telling about my wife, fun, uplifting, edifying stories about her, not "that she doesn't understand me" stories that I hear are common. Plus I would be lying if I would say that Jodi doesn't understand me, I find it frightening how well she knows me.
If things get further into a danger zone, maybe with someone who I would have worked with, or would be seeing often through normal business day, I would tell Jodi that I think so and so might have a crush on me, or that I could easily have one on her if that would be the case. By alerting her, I am making it nearly impossible to "get away" with something it helps me put an insurance policy on it.
There were a couple times where talking of my happy marriage didn't diffuse things, both were secretaries who I worked with daily, both Jodi knew about. However, eventually it came down to a talk about that though flattered, I would never put myself, my wife, my family, or her into such a compromising situation. That no matter what happened someone would get hurt, or likely all of us would.
Through the years, I have watched friends, and business associates fall into these traps, some get caught, some don't. I know that when I see someone cheat, and lie to their wives, that no matter how much I like them, respect them in business, it always diminishes them in my eyes. It also makes me trust them less, if they would do that to their wife and take such risk with their kids, why should I believe that they wouldn't be capable of screwing me in business.
Once again, I thank God for putting me in the councel of men like Dexter in my youth. Men who led by example, and with wisdom, and who could show me what to look out for, and why.
Tiger Woods is one of the wealthiest, most popular celebrities on the planet. If I in my little world had any situations, I can't imagine the "opportunities" of beautiful, exciting women throwing themselves at him daily. Once you make that wrong choice once, it would get ever more easy to make again, and again.
I pray that he uses that inner strength, and self-discipline that he used to make himself the best golfer in the world, to become the man he, his wife, and children deserve. We should all pray for him and them, if he can make this difficult journey and save his family, he will be a light for other men to realize that they too can be men, and not boys in adult bodies.
Monday, November 30, 2009
History Sadly Repeating at West Point Today
President Obama, always the politician, never the leader has made an odd but rather fitting choice to deliver his speech on his plans for our military in Afghanistan by using West Point as his back drop. The normal location we are accustomed to seeing our Commander in Chief give such important military talks is the Oval Office. For some reason, Obama doesn't think it gives him enough "gravitas," and needs one of our most important military symbols behind his teleprompter.
The irony of this location I am sure escapes Obama, and all of his staff. It would be hard to imagine any American History majors working anywhere in his administration, so to them West Point is just another "great photo op." However the fact that just 230 years ago it was the sight of the single most treasonous act was attempted by an American military leader, General Benedict Arnold.
After Obama assumed command as president, he replaced General McKiernan with General Stanly McCrystal in May of 09 as his leader for the Afghanistan War. After three months on the ground, McCrystal sent in his report and request for 40,000 more troops on August 30th of 2009. With this dire warning;
“Failure to gain the initiative and reverse insurgent momentum in the near term (next 12 months) — while Afghan security capacity matures — risks an outcome where defeating the insurgency is no longer possible,” General McChrystal writes.
Now after 102 days of dithering while Afghanistan was burning, Obama finally decides to take yet another road trip to grace us all with his decision. For someone who fancies himself Lincolnesque is anything but, one of Lincoln's rules for leadership was to make decisions quickly but be stubborn to change them once made.
What we hear leaked that will be in that speech is there are no references to winning, victory, or any achievement, just an exit strategy. It is as if Obama is flying to West Point the cradle of great military leadership to spit in the face of our military past and present.
Two hundred thirty years ago, General Benedict Arnold sought the command of West Point to get back at his country for what he believed were slights, and for his badly bruised ego. Arnold was one of George Washington's most able subordinates and skilled officers. An officer who had been responsible for victories at Ticonderoga, Quebec, and, in part, Saratoga. His ego was bruised under the apparent lack of recognition for his efforts as General Gates, and Ethan Allen both took the glory from the field even though the victory was actually Arnold's.
While commanding a garrison in Philadelphia, where he married Peggy Shippen, a wealthy Tory who encouraged his spending and speculation. In 1779 a committee charged him with misuse of official funds and ordered Washington to discipline Arnold. Instead, Washington, knowing that the Governor who was attacking Arnold was doing so out of jealousy of power. Washington praised his general's military record without mentioning the charge. Arnold took this as less than full support, not considering Washington's need to keep the governor placated as well.
Through his wife Arnold was convinced to get his revenge, and to clean up his finances, by turning over West Point to the British. His courier was caught and hanged, Washington and Hamilton were on their way to confront Arnold when he got word and ran. Arnold then fielded a command for the British against the Americans in Virginia. He later retired to England in 1781, where he died bankrupt and unhappy, his name forever equated to treason in America.
As colonial historian O.H. Chitwood observed, if Arnold "could have remained true to his first love for a year longer his name would probably now have a place next to that of Washington in the list of Revolutionary heroes."
Today, 230 years later, we have once again a military leader, this time Commander in Chief, choosing West Point as his location of choice to be a traitor to his command, and to his country. His name will one day also be spit out with vile as Arnold's is today.
The irony of this location I am sure escapes Obama, and all of his staff. It would be hard to imagine any American History majors working anywhere in his administration, so to them West Point is just another "great photo op." However the fact that just 230 years ago it was the sight of the single most treasonous act was attempted by an American military leader, General Benedict Arnold.
After Obama assumed command as president, he replaced General McKiernan with General Stanly McCrystal in May of 09 as his leader for the Afghanistan War. After three months on the ground, McCrystal sent in his report and request for 40,000 more troops on August 30th of 2009. With this dire warning;
“Failure to gain the initiative and reverse insurgent momentum in the near term (next 12 months) — while Afghan security capacity matures — risks an outcome where defeating the insurgency is no longer possible,” General McChrystal writes.
Now after 102 days of dithering while Afghanistan was burning, Obama finally decides to take yet another road trip to grace us all with his decision. For someone who fancies himself Lincolnesque is anything but, one of Lincoln's rules for leadership was to make decisions quickly but be stubborn to change them once made.
What we hear leaked that will be in that speech is there are no references to winning, victory, or any achievement, just an exit strategy. It is as if Obama is flying to West Point the cradle of great military leadership to spit in the face of our military past and present.
Two hundred thirty years ago, General Benedict Arnold sought the command of West Point to get back at his country for what he believed were slights, and for his badly bruised ego. Arnold was one of George Washington's most able subordinates and skilled officers. An officer who had been responsible for victories at Ticonderoga, Quebec, and, in part, Saratoga. His ego was bruised under the apparent lack of recognition for his efforts as General Gates, and Ethan Allen both took the glory from the field even though the victory was actually Arnold's.
While commanding a garrison in Philadelphia, where he married Peggy Shippen, a wealthy Tory who encouraged his spending and speculation. In 1779 a committee charged him with misuse of official funds and ordered Washington to discipline Arnold. Instead, Washington, knowing that the Governor who was attacking Arnold was doing so out of jealousy of power. Washington praised his general's military record without mentioning the charge. Arnold took this as less than full support, not considering Washington's need to keep the governor placated as well.
Through his wife Arnold was convinced to get his revenge, and to clean up his finances, by turning over West Point to the British. His courier was caught and hanged, Washington and Hamilton were on their way to confront Arnold when he got word and ran. Arnold then fielded a command for the British against the Americans in Virginia. He later retired to England in 1781, where he died bankrupt and unhappy, his name forever equated to treason in America.
As colonial historian O.H. Chitwood observed, if Arnold "could have remained true to his first love for a year longer his name would probably now have a place next to that of Washington in the list of Revolutionary heroes."
Today, 230 years later, we have once again a military leader, this time Commander in Chief, choosing West Point as his location of choice to be a traitor to his command, and to his country. His name will one day also be spit out with vile as Arnold's is today.
Saturday, November 28, 2009
Margaret Sanger Saint or Devil
After learning that the "scientists" who were the authorities on man made global warming were cooking the books to "prove" their agenda rather than doing anything resembling honest scientific research, we should question many of those "sure" things we are being sold by the left.
Is there any intellectual honesty, or integrity to be found on the political left in any arena, or just "doctored books" trying to trick us on climate, health care, the war on poverty, unions, ACORN, you name it? Where can we trust them? Why should we?
Let's look at one of the political left's icon's of "virtue," Planned Parenthood. Aren't we led to believe that they are doing all these wonderful things to help the poor? At least they are looking out for those less fortunate aren't they? Let's look at their beginning, and their founder's intent for starting them.
Who was Margaret Sanger, was she a friend to the poor, minorities and the helpless? Who was she really? What do know about this "champion" for women's rights? If you do a Wiki search you will see glowing reports , but a search of the Library of Congress will uncover a wealth of information in her own writings and letters to her contemporaries. Margaret Sanger's papers show a woman obsessed with restricting the birth rights of those she described as unfit. She wanted birth licenses to qualified couples and was willing to use "Negro" Doctors and Ministers to influence and control the "Negro" race.
There are also accusations that Margaret Sanger traveled to Germany and was instrumental in developing Hitler's "Final Solution." "How to get rid of the Jews was a question answered by Adolf Hitler. His answer was to murder Jews throughout Europe along with other races that were believed to be sub-humans. This answer was called the “Final Solution,” a solution that started in the summer of 1941 and was believed to answer the “Jewish Question” and create an end to the Jews."
Sanger created what she called her "Negro Project." It was a well thought out plan to use the Black communities' doctors and ministers to win over the support of the community. It reminds me of Dr. Joycelyn Elders obsession with condoms and abortions and dogmatic support of Planned Parenthood.
Margaret Sanger was a prolific writer and authored books and articles explaining her views. She also published the views of her associates and experts. Her "The Birth Control Review" stated in the July/August 1932 edition, "There are other more remote but equally important gains. One is the enhanced respect to be had from the dominant White race. That the Negro must acquire if he is to enjoy the rights and prerogatives he covets. But acquired it he cannot and will not so long as he remains the thriftless, childlike, irresponsible dependent that he is, for such behavior does not command respect." This was way over the top racism even in 1932.
Like most racists, Sanger probably convinced herself that she was helping the poor Negro. It sounds like liberals today. Treating those they look down on almost like pets or worse, believing that "they" know best for all of the rest.
From Margaret Sanger's "A Plan for Peace."
a. To raise the level and increase the general intelligence of population.
b. To increase the population slowly by keeping the birth rate at it's present level of fifteen per thousand, decreasing the death rate below it's present mark of 11 per thousand.
c. To keep the doors of immigration closed to the entrance of certain aliens whose condition is known to be detrimental to the stamina of the race, such as feeble minded, idiots, morons, insane, syphilitic, epileptic, criminal, professional prostitutes, and others in this class barred by the immigration laws of 1924.
d. To apply a stern and rigid policy of sterilization and segregation to that grade of population whose progeny is already tainted, or whose inheritance is such that objectionable traits may be transmitted to offspring.
e. To insure the country against future burdens of maintenance for numerous offspring as may be born of feeble minded parents, by permitting all persons with transmissible disease who voluntarily consent to sterilization.
f. To give certain dysgenic groups in our population their choice of segregation or sterilization.
g. To apportion farmlands and homesteads for those segregated persons where they would be taught to work under competent instructors for the period of their entire lives.
She goes on to outline the taking control over "morons, mental defectives, and epileptics." Her plan called for an inventory of "illiterate, paupers, unemployables, criminals, prostitutes, dope-fiends, in order to better place them on the government run farms and homestead." These are her own words.
Her "American Weekly's" article seems to outline Planned Parenthood's plan to rid the world of inferior people.
Article 1. The purpose of the American Baby Code shall be to provide for a better distribution of babies, to assist couple who wish to prevent overpopulation of offspring and thus to reduce the burdens of charity and taxation for public relief, and to protect society against the propagation and increase of the unfit.
Article 2. Birth Control clinics shall be permitted to function as services of government health departments or under the support of charity, or as nonprofit, self-sustaining agencies, subject to inspection and control by public authorities.
Article 3. A marriage license shall in itself give the husband and wife only the right to a common household and not the right to parenthood.
Article 4. No woman shall have the legal right to bear a child, no man shall have the right to become a father without a permit for parenthood.
Article 5. Permits for parenthood shall be issued by government authorities to married couples upon application, providing the parents are financially able to support the expected child, have the qualifications needed for proper rearing of the child, have no transmissible diseases, and on the woman's part no indication that maternity is likely to result in death or permanent injury to health.
Article 6. No permit for parenthood shall be valid for more than one birth.
Article 7. Every county shall be assisted administratively by the state in the effort to maintain a direct ration between the county birth rate and its index of child welfare. When the county records show and unfavorable variation from this ration the county shall be taxed by the State... the revenues thus obtained shall be expended by the State within the given county in giving financial support to birth control clinics.
Article 8. Feeble minded person, habitual congenital criminals, those affected with inheritable diseases, and others found biologically unfit should be sterilized or in cases of doubt be isolated as to prevent the perpetuation of their afflictions by breeding.
This is just a small sample of some of Margaret Sanger's writings. It would take books to cover the topic of her and her friends published works on this subject. You can learn much more on Planned Parenthood and Sanger from L.E.A.R.N. the Life Education And Research Network. P.O. Box 1949, South Road Branch, Poughkeepsie, New York, 12601.
On Dec. 10th, 1939 Sanger wrote a letter to Doctor Gamble. In it she reveals her plan to use ministers, but warns, "We do not want word to go out that we want to exterminate the Negro population, and the minister is the man who can straighten out that idea if it ever occurs to any of their more rebellious members."
If you still have questions if Sanger was a devout racists who put Planned Parenthood clinics in poor neighborhoods to exterminate the African-American, and as she put it "other undesirables" just read her book "Woman and the New Race."
Once again one of those programs, or organizations that have long been embraced by the political left was founded for purely evil intent. What more can be said for ACORN, the ACLU, and the newly exposed fraud of Global Warming. Who can possibly believe that they are doing health care for "our own good" any more than the other evils of their long track record?
Is there any intellectual honesty, or integrity to be found on the political left in any arena, or just "doctored books" trying to trick us on climate, health care, the war on poverty, unions, ACORN, you name it? Where can we trust them? Why should we?
Let's look at one of the political left's icon's of "virtue," Planned Parenthood. Aren't we led to believe that they are doing all these wonderful things to help the poor? At least they are looking out for those less fortunate aren't they? Let's look at their beginning, and their founder's intent for starting them.
Who was Margaret Sanger, was she a friend to the poor, minorities and the helpless? Who was she really? What do know about this "champion" for women's rights? If you do a Wiki search you will see glowing reports , but a search of the Library of Congress will uncover a wealth of information in her own writings and letters to her contemporaries. Margaret Sanger's papers show a woman obsessed with restricting the birth rights of those she described as unfit. She wanted birth licenses to qualified couples and was willing to use "Negro" Doctors and Ministers to influence and control the "Negro" race.
There are also accusations that Margaret Sanger traveled to Germany and was instrumental in developing Hitler's "Final Solution." "How to get rid of the Jews was a question answered by Adolf Hitler. His answer was to murder Jews throughout Europe along with other races that were believed to be sub-humans. This answer was called the “Final Solution,” a solution that started in the summer of 1941 and was believed to answer the “Jewish Question” and create an end to the Jews."
Sanger created what she called her "Negro Project." It was a well thought out plan to use the Black communities' doctors and ministers to win over the support of the community. It reminds me of Dr. Joycelyn Elders obsession with condoms and abortions and dogmatic support of Planned Parenthood.
Margaret Sanger was a prolific writer and authored books and articles explaining her views. She also published the views of her associates and experts. Her "The Birth Control Review" stated in the July/August 1932 edition, "There are other more remote but equally important gains. One is the enhanced respect to be had from the dominant White race. That the Negro must acquire if he is to enjoy the rights and prerogatives he covets. But acquired it he cannot and will not so long as he remains the thriftless, childlike, irresponsible dependent that he is, for such behavior does not command respect." This was way over the top racism even in 1932.
Like most racists, Sanger probably convinced herself that she was helping the poor Negro. It sounds like liberals today. Treating those they look down on almost like pets or worse, believing that "they" know best for all of the rest.
From Margaret Sanger's "A Plan for Peace."
a. To raise the level and increase the general intelligence of population.
b. To increase the population slowly by keeping the birth rate at it's present level of fifteen per thousand, decreasing the death rate below it's present mark of 11 per thousand.
c. To keep the doors of immigration closed to the entrance of certain aliens whose condition is known to be detrimental to the stamina of the race, such as feeble minded, idiots, morons, insane, syphilitic, epileptic, criminal, professional prostitutes, and others in this class barred by the immigration laws of 1924.
d. To apply a stern and rigid policy of sterilization and segregation to that grade of population whose progeny is already tainted, or whose inheritance is such that objectionable traits may be transmitted to offspring.
e. To insure the country against future burdens of maintenance for numerous offspring as may be born of feeble minded parents, by permitting all persons with transmissible disease who voluntarily consent to sterilization.
f. To give certain dysgenic groups in our population their choice of segregation or sterilization.
g. To apportion farmlands and homesteads for those segregated persons where they would be taught to work under competent instructors for the period of their entire lives.
She goes on to outline the taking control over "morons, mental defectives, and epileptics." Her plan called for an inventory of "illiterate, paupers, unemployables, criminals, prostitutes, dope-fiends, in order to better place them on the government run farms and homestead." These are her own words.
Her "American Weekly's" article seems to outline Planned Parenthood's plan to rid the world of inferior people.
Article 1. The purpose of the American Baby Code shall be to provide for a better distribution of babies, to assist couple who wish to prevent overpopulation of offspring and thus to reduce the burdens of charity and taxation for public relief, and to protect society against the propagation and increase of the unfit.
Article 2. Birth Control clinics shall be permitted to function as services of government health departments or under the support of charity, or as nonprofit, self-sustaining agencies, subject to inspection and control by public authorities.
Article 3. A marriage license shall in itself give the husband and wife only the right to a common household and not the right to parenthood.
Article 4. No woman shall have the legal right to bear a child, no man shall have the right to become a father without a permit for parenthood.
Article 5. Permits for parenthood shall be issued by government authorities to married couples upon application, providing the parents are financially able to support the expected child, have the qualifications needed for proper rearing of the child, have no transmissible diseases, and on the woman's part no indication that maternity is likely to result in death or permanent injury to health.
Article 6. No permit for parenthood shall be valid for more than one birth.
Article 7. Every county shall be assisted administratively by the state in the effort to maintain a direct ration between the county birth rate and its index of child welfare. When the county records show and unfavorable variation from this ration the county shall be taxed by the State... the revenues thus obtained shall be expended by the State within the given county in giving financial support to birth control clinics.
Article 8. Feeble minded person, habitual congenital criminals, those affected with inheritable diseases, and others found biologically unfit should be sterilized or in cases of doubt be isolated as to prevent the perpetuation of their afflictions by breeding.
This is just a small sample of some of Margaret Sanger's writings. It would take books to cover the topic of her and her friends published works on this subject. You can learn much more on Planned Parenthood and Sanger from L.E.A.R.N. the Life Education And Research Network. P.O. Box 1949, South Road Branch, Poughkeepsie, New York, 12601.
On Dec. 10th, 1939 Sanger wrote a letter to Doctor Gamble. In it she reveals her plan to use ministers, but warns, "We do not want word to go out that we want to exterminate the Negro population, and the minister is the man who can straighten out that idea if it ever occurs to any of their more rebellious members."
If you still have questions if Sanger was a devout racists who put Planned Parenthood clinics in poor neighborhoods to exterminate the African-American, and as she put it "other undesirables" just read her book "Woman and the New Race."
Once again one of those programs, or organizations that have long been embraced by the political left was founded for purely evil intent. What more can be said for ACORN, the ACLU, and the newly exposed fraud of Global Warming. Who can possibly believe that they are doing health care for "our own good" any more than the other evils of their long track record?
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