While I was at the Marine Corps Basic School in Quantico, Virginia, in 1982, a black colleague of mine accused me one day in front of our entire platoon of being a racist because I had graduated from Bob Jones University. He knew nothing else about me, but he hated me because he was sure I was a racist.
I hope the evidence of my life tells a different story. I am interracially married to a woman I met in the Philippines, and together in the mid-90's, we worked with black kids in an inner-city ministry through our church in Denver, Colorado. Then we came here to Kenya twelve years ago this month to work as missionaries among black African people. Last September our guard at our house, Ezekiel, who had worked for us the entire time we've been here suddenly died, leaving three orphaned girls in our care. (His wife had died three years earlier.) We paid for the funeral, and then put the girls in schools and are caring for their needs at this moment.
Racism is a two way street and there are many influences that may cause someone to be racist. I was in the ninth grade when desegregation came to my school in Denver. We had a welcome day for the fifty or so kids that came over, and I made it a point to try and make friends with them. One boy in particular, named Larry, was friendly to me and we often did things together at lunch, until one day as we were walking across the playground another black kid came up and Larry said to him, "Let's go hit some white boys on the chest." I stopped and looked at him with my mouth agape. They looked at me and then took off, got a little gang of eight or ten together and started terrorizing white kids across the playground. They didn't come after me and the only thing I can think is that I had tried to be friends with Larry so they left me alone.
Later that summer I was playing baseball. Our team had just beaten a team from a black neighborhood. After the game we sat down to watch the next game being played. While we watched the black kids from the team we had beaten came over and started harassing us and then started hitting some of our players. Our coach told us at first to ignore them, but when we couldn't we went to our cars and left. Interestingly enough, we had two black kids on our team. The confrontation started with the losing players calling those two boys the n-word.
Two years later in 1971, at South High School over two hundred black kids were bussed in to our school. Tensions were high and only two weeks into the school year they rioted, going down the hallways, breaking out windows and causing general mayhem. Police cars were out in the parking lot for about four days before everything got back to normal. Of course, normal was never the same after that, but I had plenty of negative influence in my life about black people, and it all came from black people.
And now I'm in Kenya taking care of three orphaned girls along with the rest of our work because no one in their large extended family is either willing or able to take the girls in. Let the "wazungu" (white people) do it is the attitude.
I lay this foundation because I am fed up with a society that will lay a charge of racism against any white person for anything they do or say with or about a black person that is not deemed to be "politically correct." I am tired of hearing the MSM accusing the Tea Party movement of racism simply because they favor conservative causes. I'm tired of a president, pandering to small minds, accusing anybody who opposes his agenda of racism while he violates the law and his oath of office and systematically destroys the Constitution.
This president, who was going to bring the people together and heal the racial divide among us, has done more to promote racism and drive a wedge between the races than any president in our history.
This past week Attorney General Eric Holder defended his decision not to prosecute the New Black Panthers, who had illegally intimidated people at polling places in Philadelphia during the 2008 elections trying to prevent them from voting for Republican candidates. You know the people they were intimidating, of course, were white. Holder's excuse was that to prosecute these thugs after black people had to fight for their own right to vote in the 60's would be a disservice to "my people."
My people? Is he talking about a different people than the American people? Whatever happened to the melting pot? What about e pluribus unum, "out of the many, one?" Out of the many that have come to our shores we are supposed to be one people. Apparently, Al Gore's ignorantly redefined version, "out of the one, many," is what we are now. And it has nothing to do with white people being racist.
It has to do with different racial groups holding onto their ethnic backgrounds and cultures and refusing either to become or to be American. John Wayne said it well in a recording called, The Hyphen:
The Hyphen, Webster's Dictionary defines, Is a symbol used to divide a compound word or a single word. So it seems to me that when a man calls himself an "Afro-American," a "Mexican American," Italian-American," an "Irish-American," "Jewish-American," what he is saying is, "I'm a divided American."
That is the whole problem. Instead of people working together to build a stronger America, we have black racists in our government intentionally dividing the country in order to find some kind of advantage for "their people." If Eric Holder is the Attorney General for only "his people" and not for all Americans, he needs to go.
I'll tell you who my people are. My people are Americans. My maternal grandparents immigrated from the Netherlands. They were Americans of Dutch descent, but they became Americans. My wife immigrated from the Philippines. She is an American of Filipino descent, but she is an American. If the problems in our country are going to be fixed, they are going to be fixed because We the People are Americans, and We the American People work together to fix them. If we remain divided without a singular national identity America as a nation will not survive.
Duke Wayne ended his discourse on The Hyphen with this:
So you be wise in your decision, and that little line won't cause division. Let's join hands with one another, for in this land, each man's your brother. United we stand, divided we fall. We're Americans, and that says it all.
God bless America, and God bless all who are truly Americans, no matter what color or ethnicity they are. These are My People.
Saturday, March 5, 2011
Sunday, February 27, 2011
The Rule of Law
We often hear people refer to America as a democracy. In a pure democracy the people vote on every issue and the majority, no matter how slim, wins the day. The danger of democracy historically has been that it devolves in time into mob rule. When people don't get what they want they go to the streets and try to bully the opposition into surrendering. The result is chaos and civil war.
Our Founders, understanding the weakness of such a system, wisely created a republic, a representative government, to protect the rights of the minority. The people take part in a democratic process by electing from their peers someone to represent them in the government. The checks and balances built into the system with the Executive, the Legislative, and the Judicial branches of government ensure the rights of all the people, the minority included. This system has worked fairly well for over two centuries keeping the country operating peacefully and generally promoting the welfare of the people.
Obviously there are flaws because people are flawed, but this system of government by the people, a first in world history, has succeeded because the people have accepted the rule of law. We are not led by a monarchy with a divine right to act above the law. We are not enslaved by a tyrant with an iron fist who rules by the whims of his own deviant desires. Neither do we take to the streets with "people-power" revolutions whenever we are not satisfied with the leaders we have. The United States essentially has a revolution every four years where the people change the leadership, or determine to continue with the current leadership, by the ballot box.
While there have been many attempts to copy or reproduce something similar to our government, most nations fail to repeat the success of the United States because of corrupt, power hungry leadership that defies the system. These "banana republics" always degenerate into self-destruction because the people have no foundation or moral conviction to live by the rule of law. Chaos ensues.
The principle of self-government was a key factor in the deliberations over our Constitution. Free people can get by with limited government if they have the integrity to govern themselves. Basically, when people live by the Golden Rule there is less crime and less need for excessive laws or government intrusion. But as John Adams wrote, this kind of government can only work for a religious and moral people. It can work for none else.
The religion and morality he was referring to was the Christian religion and the principles found in the Bible. James Madison declared that the Founders had created a government based on the Ten Commandments and the New Testament. Self-government works when people love God and have the conviction to live by God's standards, and when they love their neighbors as themselves. The only place you find this kind of religious or moral teaching is in the Bible.
America today is facing a crisis more profound, I think, than even many conservatives realize. We have left our Bible foundation far behind. The love of God is forgotten and the love of neighbor, or the brotherhood of man which the liberals so piously intone, is rejected for the selfish greed of personal aggrandizement. A government usurping powers never intended for it by the Founders has created a welfare system that has made a generation of Americans not only dependent on the government, but demanding rights, privileges, and wealth the government cannot give.
Liberals infamously call the 1980's the decade of greed, but we are seeing greed in an unprecedented scale right now. For the last four years we have seen representative government callously mock the people it represents, passing legislation such as Obamacare that at least two-thirds or more of the country opposes. It is spending more money than even the world can afford to loan us, and surprise, when anyone suggests we have to cut back, the greedy, welfare dependent society that this government run amuck has created starts having a temper tantrum.
Further complicating the matter, we have a president who has declared he will no longer govern by the rule of law. The president has usurped the authority of the judicial branch to declare the Defense of Marriage Act, passed by Congress and signed by former president, Bill Clinton, unconstitutional. His government will no longer defend this law. In other words, he is presuming to do the Judiciary's job for it, while he reneges on doing his own job. The question that needs to be asked is, if he can get away with this, how many other laws will he also ignore? (For starters, how about his failure to defend the Arizona border and prosecute illegal aliens?)
The president is thumbing his nose at the Constitution. He is telling us that the law doesn't matter. His "Organizing for America" has made Wisconsin a battle ground and is instigating labor unions, which represent less than 13% of the total work force, and which poured hundreds of millions of their mandatory union dues into Democrat campaign coffers in the last election, to take to the streets and protest, to demand their rights, and to perpetuate their greed. The president is leading the country in a mad descent from constitutional government to mob rule. (Have we heard any more comparisons to Ronald Reagan lately?)
In Wisconsin, a budgetary crisis led newly elected Governor Scott Walker to take measures designed to save the state from bankruptcy. The state is 3.6 billion dollars in debt, even though it's previous Democrat governor received 4 billion dollars in stimulus money from Obama in the previous two years. Walker's attempt to save the state from going bankrupt resulted in a strike by the union cry-babies, which is spreading to other states.
Walker has an opportunity now to show himself truly Reaganesque. In 1981 when the air traffic controllers went on strike, President Reagan gave them 48 hours to return to work, then fired those who didn't and dissolved PATCO, their union organization. Walker ought to give Wisconsin state employees, including public school teachers, 48 hours to return to work, then sack those who don't. The strike will break up when the rent comes due and no paychecks are forth coming.
The nation is watching: Liberals to see if they can get away with defying the law and entrenching themselves in entitlements forever, or until the government declares bankruptcy; Conservatives to see if the rule of law will be upheld and some common sense returned to government. Conservatives are looking for another Ronald Reagan. If Scott Walker handles this crisis right he could be perceived to be the man to fill Reagan's shoes, and it could be the catalyst to propel him to the White House.
That will happen, by the way, not when the mobs rule the streets, but when the Constitution is followed and a new election is held according to the rule of law.
Our Founders, understanding the weakness of such a system, wisely created a republic, a representative government, to protect the rights of the minority. The people take part in a democratic process by electing from their peers someone to represent them in the government. The checks and balances built into the system with the Executive, the Legislative, and the Judicial branches of government ensure the rights of all the people, the minority included. This system has worked fairly well for over two centuries keeping the country operating peacefully and generally promoting the welfare of the people.
Obviously there are flaws because people are flawed, but this system of government by the people, a first in world history, has succeeded because the people have accepted the rule of law. We are not led by a monarchy with a divine right to act above the law. We are not enslaved by a tyrant with an iron fist who rules by the whims of his own deviant desires. Neither do we take to the streets with "people-power" revolutions whenever we are not satisfied with the leaders we have. The United States essentially has a revolution every four years where the people change the leadership, or determine to continue with the current leadership, by the ballot box.
While there have been many attempts to copy or reproduce something similar to our government, most nations fail to repeat the success of the United States because of corrupt, power hungry leadership that defies the system. These "banana republics" always degenerate into self-destruction because the people have no foundation or moral conviction to live by the rule of law. Chaos ensues.
The principle of self-government was a key factor in the deliberations over our Constitution. Free people can get by with limited government if they have the integrity to govern themselves. Basically, when people live by the Golden Rule there is less crime and less need for excessive laws or government intrusion. But as John Adams wrote, this kind of government can only work for a religious and moral people. It can work for none else.
The religion and morality he was referring to was the Christian religion and the principles found in the Bible. James Madison declared that the Founders had created a government based on the Ten Commandments and the New Testament. Self-government works when people love God and have the conviction to live by God's standards, and when they love their neighbors as themselves. The only place you find this kind of religious or moral teaching is in the Bible.
America today is facing a crisis more profound, I think, than even many conservatives realize. We have left our Bible foundation far behind. The love of God is forgotten and the love of neighbor, or the brotherhood of man which the liberals so piously intone, is rejected for the selfish greed of personal aggrandizement. A government usurping powers never intended for it by the Founders has created a welfare system that has made a generation of Americans not only dependent on the government, but demanding rights, privileges, and wealth the government cannot give.
Liberals infamously call the 1980's the decade of greed, but we are seeing greed in an unprecedented scale right now. For the last four years we have seen representative government callously mock the people it represents, passing legislation such as Obamacare that at least two-thirds or more of the country opposes. It is spending more money than even the world can afford to loan us, and surprise, when anyone suggests we have to cut back, the greedy, welfare dependent society that this government run amuck has created starts having a temper tantrum.
Further complicating the matter, we have a president who has declared he will no longer govern by the rule of law. The president has usurped the authority of the judicial branch to declare the Defense of Marriage Act, passed by Congress and signed by former president, Bill Clinton, unconstitutional. His government will no longer defend this law. In other words, he is presuming to do the Judiciary's job for it, while he reneges on doing his own job. The question that needs to be asked is, if he can get away with this, how many other laws will he also ignore? (For starters, how about his failure to defend the Arizona border and prosecute illegal aliens?)
The president is thumbing his nose at the Constitution. He is telling us that the law doesn't matter. His "Organizing for America" has made Wisconsin a battle ground and is instigating labor unions, which represent less than 13% of the total work force, and which poured hundreds of millions of their mandatory union dues into Democrat campaign coffers in the last election, to take to the streets and protest, to demand their rights, and to perpetuate their greed. The president is leading the country in a mad descent from constitutional government to mob rule. (Have we heard any more comparisons to Ronald Reagan lately?)
In Wisconsin, a budgetary crisis led newly elected Governor Scott Walker to take measures designed to save the state from bankruptcy. The state is 3.6 billion dollars in debt, even though it's previous Democrat governor received 4 billion dollars in stimulus money from Obama in the previous two years. Walker's attempt to save the state from going bankrupt resulted in a strike by the union cry-babies, which is spreading to other states.
Walker has an opportunity now to show himself truly Reaganesque. In 1981 when the air traffic controllers went on strike, President Reagan gave them 48 hours to return to work, then fired those who didn't and dissolved PATCO, their union organization. Walker ought to give Wisconsin state employees, including public school teachers, 48 hours to return to work, then sack those who don't. The strike will break up when the rent comes due and no paychecks are forth coming.
The nation is watching: Liberals to see if they can get away with defying the law and entrenching themselves in entitlements forever, or until the government declares bankruptcy; Conservatives to see if the rule of law will be upheld and some common sense returned to government. Conservatives are looking for another Ronald Reagan. If Scott Walker handles this crisis right he could be perceived to be the man to fill Reagan's shoes, and it could be the catalyst to propel him to the White House.
That will happen, by the way, not when the mobs rule the streets, but when the Constitution is followed and a new election is held according to the rule of law.
Wednesday, February 23, 2011
The Disaster of Our Time
I always find it interesting to watch news media and pundits trying to outdo each other in predicting what political trends will happen next and how the world will be affected. A few years ago one author wrote a book to prove that the 2008 presidential election would be Hilary vs. Condoleeza Rice. Boy, did he get it wrong. It never seems to bother these people, they keep making their predictions and they usually keep missing the target. I'm not a prophet and I won't pretend to be as smart as these prophetic pundits, but it is pretty obvious that if some changes aren't made fast our country will be in big trouble.
We are beginning to see what could be a crisis of world-wide proportions across the Middle East. Tunisia, Algeria, and Bahrain are being crippled by strikes and rioters. In Egypt, Hosni Mubarrack has already been forced to resign, and in Libya, the longest ruling despot in the region, Moammar Khadaffi, is facing the test of his life to see whether he'll survive as ruler of that country. Libya's oil output has already declined by 20% since this uprising started, and as more foreign companies shut down operations in Libya it will only grow worse, driving up oil prices around the world.
A bigger problem is that the Muslim Brotherhood, a terrorist organization, appears to be behind some of these uprisings, and positioning themselves to take over. If this anti-American group gets control of the oil rich Arab nations and shuts off oil exports to the United States, our economy could be crippled over night. That's probably not likely to happen because these oil rich Arab nations depend almost solely on oil for their wealth. But they could tighten production like OPEC did three years ago and drive prices higher, possibly as high as the seven dollars a gallon candidate Obama told us we should get ready for.
This would plunge America into an unprecedented economic crisis. The country needs gasoline and diesel fuels to keep trucks on the road and freight trains on the rails. Not to mention the every day driver like you and me. When the price of fuel sky-rockets, the price of consumer goods follows, and when the prices get too high, people won't be buying, the economy will be falling, and unemployment will be rising again.
It has never been more clear why we need an energy policy that will make us independent of foreign oil. Forget the Department of Energy. That ugly monstrosity in 34 years has consumed hundreds of billions of dollars and to date hasn't produced one gallon of a feasible alternative fuel, neither has it made us independent of foreign oil, which is its whole purpose for existence. We use more foreign oil now than when the department was created.
Forget the environment. We've already taken better care of ours than all the rest of the world combined. We're not going to destroy anything by drilling for our own oil in our own territory, be it off shore or in Alaska.
The problem is we have a government filled with a bunch of cowards unwilling to stand up to the lunacy of special interest groups and tell them to go home. In 2003, President Bush tried to have the Alaskan wilderness opened for drilling. Republicans controlled the Congress and for the first time in decades had a chance to do something right for the country. Instead, a group of RINO's voted with the Democrats to block Bush's legislation.
Environmentalists argue that it would take at least ten years for newly found oil to be drilled, refined and finally put into production anyway, so why bother. Why bother? If drilling had begun in 2003, it would be available at local gas stations within another two years, and the current crisis would be curtailed. Oh wait, if gas prices were about to drop below a dollar a gallon by the 2012 election, Obama would take the credit for it and probably get re-elected. Maybe the environmentalists have done us a favor after all.
Now as we face an economic disaster, the president can't make up his mind what to do in the Middle East. He failed to support the recent popular uprising in Iran which could have removed an insane, tyrannical regime, but now supports the uprising in Egypt that overthrew our best ally in the Arab world. Worse than that, he is apparently supporting the union uprisings in Wisconsin and Indiana, ultimately promoting the same kind of chaos going on in the Middle East here in America. At a time when he should be using his bully pulpit to try and bring calm and unity to an increasingly divided nation, he is helping drive the wedge of division deeper into the heart of the country.
What we are seeing more and more is a president with no clue on foreign affairs, no clue on domestic policy, no clue on economics, and apparently only a plan to ignore the Constitution, to rule like a dictator, and to drive America into the poor house.
What a pathetic contrast to our first and greatest president, George Washington. How far the character of the most important office in the world has fallen. Washington was a man of such integrity that there was nothing anyone could point to that would have made him ashamed. Obama is a man whose best quality is duplicity for which he is unashamed.
We are sitting on the brink of an economic disaster of monumental proportions, yet the disaster of our time is more than just economic. It is a disaster of week-kneed leadership that will destroy this country if we do not vote out the current administration in the next election. More than that, the disaster of our time is a moral and spiritual disaster of a people that have forgotten the Christian principles and the God of their Founding Fathers, and that is illustrated no better than by the man sitting in the White House.
We are beginning to see what could be a crisis of world-wide proportions across the Middle East. Tunisia, Algeria, and Bahrain are being crippled by strikes and rioters. In Egypt, Hosni Mubarrack has already been forced to resign, and in Libya, the longest ruling despot in the region, Moammar Khadaffi, is facing the test of his life to see whether he'll survive as ruler of that country. Libya's oil output has already declined by 20% since this uprising started, and as more foreign companies shut down operations in Libya it will only grow worse, driving up oil prices around the world.
A bigger problem is that the Muslim Brotherhood, a terrorist organization, appears to be behind some of these uprisings, and positioning themselves to take over. If this anti-American group gets control of the oil rich Arab nations and shuts off oil exports to the United States, our economy could be crippled over night. That's probably not likely to happen because these oil rich Arab nations depend almost solely on oil for their wealth. But they could tighten production like OPEC did three years ago and drive prices higher, possibly as high as the seven dollars a gallon candidate Obama told us we should get ready for.
This would plunge America into an unprecedented economic crisis. The country needs gasoline and diesel fuels to keep trucks on the road and freight trains on the rails. Not to mention the every day driver like you and me. When the price of fuel sky-rockets, the price of consumer goods follows, and when the prices get too high, people won't be buying, the economy will be falling, and unemployment will be rising again.
It has never been more clear why we need an energy policy that will make us independent of foreign oil. Forget the Department of Energy. That ugly monstrosity in 34 years has consumed hundreds of billions of dollars and to date hasn't produced one gallon of a feasible alternative fuel, neither has it made us independent of foreign oil, which is its whole purpose for existence. We use more foreign oil now than when the department was created.
Forget the environment. We've already taken better care of ours than all the rest of the world combined. We're not going to destroy anything by drilling for our own oil in our own territory, be it off shore or in Alaska.
The problem is we have a government filled with a bunch of cowards unwilling to stand up to the lunacy of special interest groups and tell them to go home. In 2003, President Bush tried to have the Alaskan wilderness opened for drilling. Republicans controlled the Congress and for the first time in decades had a chance to do something right for the country. Instead, a group of RINO's voted with the Democrats to block Bush's legislation.
Environmentalists argue that it would take at least ten years for newly found oil to be drilled, refined and finally put into production anyway, so why bother. Why bother? If drilling had begun in 2003, it would be available at local gas stations within another two years, and the current crisis would be curtailed. Oh wait, if gas prices were about to drop below a dollar a gallon by the 2012 election, Obama would take the credit for it and probably get re-elected. Maybe the environmentalists have done us a favor after all.
Now as we face an economic disaster, the president can't make up his mind what to do in the Middle East. He failed to support the recent popular uprising in Iran which could have removed an insane, tyrannical regime, but now supports the uprising in Egypt that overthrew our best ally in the Arab world. Worse than that, he is apparently supporting the union uprisings in Wisconsin and Indiana, ultimately promoting the same kind of chaos going on in the Middle East here in America. At a time when he should be using his bully pulpit to try and bring calm and unity to an increasingly divided nation, he is helping drive the wedge of division deeper into the heart of the country.
What we are seeing more and more is a president with no clue on foreign affairs, no clue on domestic policy, no clue on economics, and apparently only a plan to ignore the Constitution, to rule like a dictator, and to drive America into the poor house.
What a pathetic contrast to our first and greatest president, George Washington. How far the character of the most important office in the world has fallen. Washington was a man of such integrity that there was nothing anyone could point to that would have made him ashamed. Obama is a man whose best quality is duplicity for which he is unashamed.
We are sitting on the brink of an economic disaster of monumental proportions, yet the disaster of our time is more than just economic. It is a disaster of week-kneed leadership that will destroy this country if we do not vote out the current administration in the next election. More than that, the disaster of our time is a moral and spiritual disaster of a people that have forgotten the Christian principles and the God of their Founding Fathers, and that is illustrated no better than by the man sitting in the White House.
Saturday, February 19, 2011
Christian Atheists?
In a recent article political columnist Mike Adams writes about Two Kinds of Atheists. He describes one as being an "unbelieving" atheist. The unbeliever is generally a reasonable person who may have never had any religious influence on his life and has accepted the secular humanist view of life without God, that religion and logic don't mix. He is content in his belief and doesn't worry about what anyone thinks. He is reasonably and logically wrong, of course, but he is one who can discuss his belief, or lack of belief, rationally.
The other kind is the "evangelistic" atheist. This type belongs to the ACLU or any number of other atheist organizations, and is on a warpath to destroy everyone's belief in God. These people write books like The Da Vinci Code to deliberately slander and debunk the Bible. They are irrational in their hatred of God and unable to carry on a logical discussion of the issues. They would rather shout down their opponents than let their opponents have an opportunity to speak.
Interestingly enough, these atheists are not concerned about the gods of Islam, Hinduism, or any other religion. Their vitriol is focused on only one God. Their attempts to disprove what nature itself proves without doubt are only against Jesus Christ, which exposes their intent as being more than just a quest for the truth, but a concerted effort to destroy Christianity.
The unbelieving atheist is sometimes a political conservative. The evangelistic atheist is always a liberal. Adam's concludes that conservative atheists need to wake up, because "a godless conservatism is only one election away from extinction."
What I found even more interesting than the article was a comment in the debate section below by a man claiming to be a Christian atheist. He described himself as a conservative who believed the Bible, but quoted several passages from the prophet Isaiah which he claimed proved there is no God. His belief is in Christ the man, not Christ the Son of God. His denial of the deity of Christ puts him in the category of a Christian cult, much like the Jehovah's Witnesses or the Mormons. By misquoting and misinterpreting Scripture The Jehovah's Witnesses deny that Jesus Christ is God. Likewise, the Mormons, with an exceptionally twisted theology, believe that Christ became God just like you and I can become God. They do not believe in the eternal deity of Christ or the biblical doctrine of the Trinity.
This Christian atheist, however, is a first for me. It's not only a contradiction in terms, but is so illogical that it is hard to believe a reasonable person could hold the view. The man says he believes in the conservative values of family and brotherhood of man. He's for fiscal responsibility, reducing the debt and a free market economy over socialism. He wants to defund the pornographic National Endowment for the Arts because it is evil and bad morality.
But herein lies the problem. Without God there is no morality. There is no foundation for the family. There is no reason to assume there is a better way to live than the NEA's porno view of the world. True atheism seeks to destroy the family and all that is moral, because nothing is evil if there is not a Good Creator.
An atheist cannot be a Christian no matter how much of the Bible he may accept as true. At the heart of Christianity is belief and faith in the God-Man, Jesus Christ. The very name, Christian, means "one who is a follower of Christ." No one who denies His deity can be a true follower, and therefore cannot claim the title of Christian.
Furthermore, a true atheist, no matter how patriotic he may be, will never fully understand the nature of our Constitution or the intent of our Founding Fathers. He will never be able to come to grips with the fact that our American heritage is a Christian heritage, based on the providence of the Christian God. All that is good about America extends from that fact.
President John Adams wrote, "The doctrine of human equality is founded entirely in the Christian doctrine that we are all children of the same Father, all accountable to Him for our conduct to one another, all equally bound to respect each other's self love."
That America is the world's beneficiary nation comes from its faith in the Christian God and the doctrines of the Bible. Everywhere in our founding documents and in the writings of the Founders we find the same thing. On November 22, 1800, Congress convened in joint session in the new, not yet completed, capitol building in the new, not yet completed Washington, D.C. Adams stood to speak for the last time as president of the nation, and his first comment was this:
"It would be unbecoming the representatives of this nation to assemble for the first time in this solemn temple without looking up to the Supreme Ruler of the universe, and imploring His blessing."
An unbelieving politically conservative atheist, who thinks reasonably, needs to think his beliefs through logically and come to the understanding that the entire conservative movement is a reflection of the Christian beliefs of our Founders. Without a Christian base and a belief in God, conservatism has no foundation and cannot survive. Neither can there be such a person as a Christian atheist.
The other kind is the "evangelistic" atheist. This type belongs to the ACLU or any number of other atheist organizations, and is on a warpath to destroy everyone's belief in God. These people write books like The Da Vinci Code to deliberately slander and debunk the Bible. They are irrational in their hatred of God and unable to carry on a logical discussion of the issues. They would rather shout down their opponents than let their opponents have an opportunity to speak.
Interestingly enough, these atheists are not concerned about the gods of Islam, Hinduism, or any other religion. Their vitriol is focused on only one God. Their attempts to disprove what nature itself proves without doubt are only against Jesus Christ, which exposes their intent as being more than just a quest for the truth, but a concerted effort to destroy Christianity.
The unbelieving atheist is sometimes a political conservative. The evangelistic atheist is always a liberal. Adam's concludes that conservative atheists need to wake up, because "a godless conservatism is only one election away from extinction."
What I found even more interesting than the article was a comment in the debate section below by a man claiming to be a Christian atheist. He described himself as a conservative who believed the Bible, but quoted several passages from the prophet Isaiah which he claimed proved there is no God. His belief is in Christ the man, not Christ the Son of God. His denial of the deity of Christ puts him in the category of a Christian cult, much like the Jehovah's Witnesses or the Mormons. By misquoting and misinterpreting Scripture The Jehovah's Witnesses deny that Jesus Christ is God. Likewise, the Mormons, with an exceptionally twisted theology, believe that Christ became God just like you and I can become God. They do not believe in the eternal deity of Christ or the biblical doctrine of the Trinity.
This Christian atheist, however, is a first for me. It's not only a contradiction in terms, but is so illogical that it is hard to believe a reasonable person could hold the view. The man says he believes in the conservative values of family and brotherhood of man. He's for fiscal responsibility, reducing the debt and a free market economy over socialism. He wants to defund the pornographic National Endowment for the Arts because it is evil and bad morality.
But herein lies the problem. Without God there is no morality. There is no foundation for the family. There is no reason to assume there is a better way to live than the NEA's porno view of the world. True atheism seeks to destroy the family and all that is moral, because nothing is evil if there is not a Good Creator.
An atheist cannot be a Christian no matter how much of the Bible he may accept as true. At the heart of Christianity is belief and faith in the God-Man, Jesus Christ. The very name, Christian, means "one who is a follower of Christ." No one who denies His deity can be a true follower, and therefore cannot claim the title of Christian.
Furthermore, a true atheist, no matter how patriotic he may be, will never fully understand the nature of our Constitution or the intent of our Founding Fathers. He will never be able to come to grips with the fact that our American heritage is a Christian heritage, based on the providence of the Christian God. All that is good about America extends from that fact.
President John Adams wrote, "The doctrine of human equality is founded entirely in the Christian doctrine that we are all children of the same Father, all accountable to Him for our conduct to one another, all equally bound to respect each other's self love."
That America is the world's beneficiary nation comes from its faith in the Christian God and the doctrines of the Bible. Everywhere in our founding documents and in the writings of the Founders we find the same thing. On November 22, 1800, Congress convened in joint session in the new, not yet completed, capitol building in the new, not yet completed Washington, D.C. Adams stood to speak for the last time as president of the nation, and his first comment was this:
"It would be unbecoming the representatives of this nation to assemble for the first time in this solemn temple without looking up to the Supreme Ruler of the universe, and imploring His blessing."
An unbelieving politically conservative atheist, who thinks reasonably, needs to think his beliefs through logically and come to the understanding that the entire conservative movement is a reflection of the Christian beliefs of our Founders. Without a Christian base and a belief in God, conservatism has no foundation and cannot survive. Neither can there be such a person as a Christian atheist.
Sunday, February 6, 2011
Remembering Ronald Reagan
In the fall of 1996 I was working temporarily as a mail sorter for the US Post Office in Denver. The election was on the horizon and a representative of the Postal Union came around every night trying to encourage the workers to vote Democrat, because, he said, if Robert Dole wins the election the Republicans will change the Post Office and we will all lose our jobs. A Republican victory would take us back to the worst economy in fifty years like we had under Reagan.
First of all, I told him, I don't think that as a government union you are allowed to be partisan. Secondly, where did you hear the Republicans are going to change the Post Office? Last year the US Postal Service made a 6 billion dollar profit! Nobody in their right mind is going to change that, and there was nothing in the Republican platform about it. It is a flat out union lie. And third, what country were you living in during the 1980's. Reaganomics gave America its longest peacetime economic expansion in history. It was not the worst economy in fifty years, but the greatest economy we've ever had.
He looked at me dumbfounded and said, "I never heard that before."
"Of course you haven't," I replied, "because all you are is a Democrat union lackey and all you know is what your union boss tells you. If you'd take the time to study real history instead of swallowing liberal propaganda you might figure it out." He walked away in a fog, unable to give me a coherent answer, and never bothered me again.
That union representative's attitude was typical of Democrats and their left-wing media cohorts. For the last thirty years they have excoriated Reagan, calling him an "amiable dunce," claiming Nancy Reagan made all the decisions, accusing him of being senile or suffering from Alzheimer's long before he actually came down with the disease, and ridiculing him as the worst president we've ever had.
Then came Obama's State of the Union address two weeks ago. He was very "Reaganesque" the liberal media said. Really? What brought about the change? A month ago Reagan was the worst president in history. Now, all of a sudden, he was a man great enough for the media to compare their false "messiah" to. Except that, their false messiah doesn't begin to compare with the true man that Ronald Reagan was.
I saw Ronald Reagan in person one time. In 1980, on the campaign trail, he came to speak at Bob Jones University. I was sitting about ten seats over from the door where he entered the huge amphitorium on the campus. The seven thousand seat auditorium was filled to capacity with media representatives and dozens of cameras set up to one side of the stage. Reagan paused as he entered, taking in the enormity of the auditorium (I think his advance party failed to prepare him properly for the venue), and I had a chance to take a good look at him close up. He then moved to the platform and gave his stump speech.
I was already hooked, I'd been supporting him since the 1976 primaries, but if there had been any doubt, seeing him in person removed all questions. Reagan was my man, the man America needed. In fact, I believe he was the man God had prepared for the job.
Ronald Reagan grew up in Illinois, not poor, but probably lower middle class. His father was a drunk, his mother a Presbyterian, his best friend a black boy who had suffered from racial prejudices. With that humble beginning he lived the American dream, studying hard and excelling in high school, working his way through college, becoming a radio announcer, and finally eking out a living in Hollywood until he became a major star.
World War II interrupted his career. He joined the Army and was promoted to captain, but extremely poor eyesight prevented him from going into combat. Instead, because of his movie background, he was placed in the intelligence community where he examined photos and film, and where he became aware of the horrible, inhumane atrocities going on in Europe long before they were revealed to the public. It prepared him for the next stage of his life, a forty-five year personal war against communism.
It was not a war without casualties. His life was threatened. He slept with a gun under his pillow every night. It cost him his first marriage.
Reagan had been an FDR Democrat, but in the 1950's he began to see, as he traveled the country representing General Electric, the damage and hardship increasing taxes were putting on average Americans. He grew weary of the Cold War doctrine of appeasement that had us doing "duck and cover" drills in school and left the world in fear of nuclear holocaust.
He changed parties and his 1964 speech, A Time for Choosing, at the 1964 Republican convention started him on a political journey that would change the world. After two successful terms as governor of California, he set his eyes on the presidency and in 1981, at the age of 69, he took the oath of office.
America was in a deep recession, a "malaise," according to Jimmy Carter. Under Carter taxes went up, inflation went up, interest rates went up, and his only answer was we had to learn to live with it. Reagan had a greater vision for America and his tax cuts reversed the recession and led to six years of economic growth. And let us remember, the economic success of the Clinton years was not due to raising taxes and putting more burden on the American people. Bush I raised taxes and brought on a recession. It ended after the Republican Revolution of 1994 which forced Clinton to stop trying to socialize the economy and return to "Reaganomics."
Reagan restored a sense of honor to America. He formally welcomed home the forgotten Vietnam veterans, then built up the military in a pre-determined effort to defeat the Soviet Union by spending them to death. He had the courage to call the communist regime an "evil empire," and tell Gorbachev at the Brandenburg Gate in Berlin to "tear down this wall." His strategy worked. The Soviet economy collapsed, Eastern Europe was freed and threw out their communist leaders, and in 1991 the Soviet Union died. The Cold War was over. Reagan had changed the world.
More than his accomplishments, however, Reagan's greatness lies in his personality. He never forgot his humble origins. He never looked down upon anybody. He treated everyone with the same kindness and respect that he treated those he loved. Even his political enemies, such as Tip O'Neil, and media enemies like Sam Donaldson, found in him a gracious, likable man. He had the ability to make Americans feel good about themselves.
He connected with Americans because he was not an elitist who thought he was better than anyone else. He spoke what average, hard working Americans were thinking. He was not afraid to go against political correctness to tell the truth. Was he perfect? No. Did his administration have problems? Yes. But he understood better than any president since Washington the value of Washington's admonition that "honesty is the best policy."
Edmund Morris was Reagan's official biographer. His publication, Dutch, was not well received because of the style in which it was written, but Morris had the opportunity to sit in the oval office and interview Reagan on a regular basis for many months or years. After his book was published he said in an interview that Reagan was simply the most honest person he had ever known.
Ronald Reagan not only loved America, he believed in America. He never felt it necessary to apologize for our greatness. Rather, he understood what liberal politicians never will, that this country is God's gift to the world; that Americans have done more to bring about peace and a better world than any other people in history. In a televised speech on March 31, 1976, during his primary campaign against Gerald Ford, Reagan said the following:
We're Americans and we have a rendezvous with destiny.... No people who have ever lived on this earth have fought harder, paid a higher price for freedom, or done more to advance the dignity of man than the living Americans - the Americans living in this land today. There isn't any problem we can't solve if government will give us the facts. Tell us what needs to be done. Then, get out of the way and let us have at it.
Today is the 100th anniversary of Ronald Reagan's birth. We would do well to remember the truth about the man, his message, and his vision for America. Reagan was America's greatest president of the 20th century, and ranks with Washington and Lincoln as one of our greatest presidents of all.
Happy Birthday President Reagan. You are not forgotten. Your legacy will be remembered throughout all time.
First of all, I told him, I don't think that as a government union you are allowed to be partisan. Secondly, where did you hear the Republicans are going to change the Post Office? Last year the US Postal Service made a 6 billion dollar profit! Nobody in their right mind is going to change that, and there was nothing in the Republican platform about it. It is a flat out union lie. And third, what country were you living in during the 1980's. Reaganomics gave America its longest peacetime economic expansion in history. It was not the worst economy in fifty years, but the greatest economy we've ever had.
He looked at me dumbfounded and said, "I never heard that before."
"Of course you haven't," I replied, "because all you are is a Democrat union lackey and all you know is what your union boss tells you. If you'd take the time to study real history instead of swallowing liberal propaganda you might figure it out." He walked away in a fog, unable to give me a coherent answer, and never bothered me again.
That union representative's attitude was typical of Democrats and their left-wing media cohorts. For the last thirty years they have excoriated Reagan, calling him an "amiable dunce," claiming Nancy Reagan made all the decisions, accusing him of being senile or suffering from Alzheimer's long before he actually came down with the disease, and ridiculing him as the worst president we've ever had.
Then came Obama's State of the Union address two weeks ago. He was very "Reaganesque" the liberal media said. Really? What brought about the change? A month ago Reagan was the worst president in history. Now, all of a sudden, he was a man great enough for the media to compare their false "messiah" to. Except that, their false messiah doesn't begin to compare with the true man that Ronald Reagan was.
I saw Ronald Reagan in person one time. In 1980, on the campaign trail, he came to speak at Bob Jones University. I was sitting about ten seats over from the door where he entered the huge amphitorium on the campus. The seven thousand seat auditorium was filled to capacity with media representatives and dozens of cameras set up to one side of the stage. Reagan paused as he entered, taking in the enormity of the auditorium (I think his advance party failed to prepare him properly for the venue), and I had a chance to take a good look at him close up. He then moved to the platform and gave his stump speech.
I was already hooked, I'd been supporting him since the 1976 primaries, but if there had been any doubt, seeing him in person removed all questions. Reagan was my man, the man America needed. In fact, I believe he was the man God had prepared for the job.
Ronald Reagan grew up in Illinois, not poor, but probably lower middle class. His father was a drunk, his mother a Presbyterian, his best friend a black boy who had suffered from racial prejudices. With that humble beginning he lived the American dream, studying hard and excelling in high school, working his way through college, becoming a radio announcer, and finally eking out a living in Hollywood until he became a major star.
World War II interrupted his career. He joined the Army and was promoted to captain, but extremely poor eyesight prevented him from going into combat. Instead, because of his movie background, he was placed in the intelligence community where he examined photos and film, and where he became aware of the horrible, inhumane atrocities going on in Europe long before they were revealed to the public. It prepared him for the next stage of his life, a forty-five year personal war against communism.
It was not a war without casualties. His life was threatened. He slept with a gun under his pillow every night. It cost him his first marriage.
Reagan had been an FDR Democrat, but in the 1950's he began to see, as he traveled the country representing General Electric, the damage and hardship increasing taxes were putting on average Americans. He grew weary of the Cold War doctrine of appeasement that had us doing "duck and cover" drills in school and left the world in fear of nuclear holocaust.
He changed parties and his 1964 speech, A Time for Choosing, at the 1964 Republican convention started him on a political journey that would change the world. After two successful terms as governor of California, he set his eyes on the presidency and in 1981, at the age of 69, he took the oath of office.
America was in a deep recession, a "malaise," according to Jimmy Carter. Under Carter taxes went up, inflation went up, interest rates went up, and his only answer was we had to learn to live with it. Reagan had a greater vision for America and his tax cuts reversed the recession and led to six years of economic growth. And let us remember, the economic success of the Clinton years was not due to raising taxes and putting more burden on the American people. Bush I raised taxes and brought on a recession. It ended after the Republican Revolution of 1994 which forced Clinton to stop trying to socialize the economy and return to "Reaganomics."
Reagan restored a sense of honor to America. He formally welcomed home the forgotten Vietnam veterans, then built up the military in a pre-determined effort to defeat the Soviet Union by spending them to death. He had the courage to call the communist regime an "evil empire," and tell Gorbachev at the Brandenburg Gate in Berlin to "tear down this wall." His strategy worked. The Soviet economy collapsed, Eastern Europe was freed and threw out their communist leaders, and in 1991 the Soviet Union died. The Cold War was over. Reagan had changed the world.
More than his accomplishments, however, Reagan's greatness lies in his personality. He never forgot his humble origins. He never looked down upon anybody. He treated everyone with the same kindness and respect that he treated those he loved. Even his political enemies, such as Tip O'Neil, and media enemies like Sam Donaldson, found in him a gracious, likable man. He had the ability to make Americans feel good about themselves.
He connected with Americans because he was not an elitist who thought he was better than anyone else. He spoke what average, hard working Americans were thinking. He was not afraid to go against political correctness to tell the truth. Was he perfect? No. Did his administration have problems? Yes. But he understood better than any president since Washington the value of Washington's admonition that "honesty is the best policy."
Edmund Morris was Reagan's official biographer. His publication, Dutch, was not well received because of the style in which it was written, but Morris had the opportunity to sit in the oval office and interview Reagan on a regular basis for many months or years. After his book was published he said in an interview that Reagan was simply the most honest person he had ever known.
Ronald Reagan not only loved America, he believed in America. He never felt it necessary to apologize for our greatness. Rather, he understood what liberal politicians never will, that this country is God's gift to the world; that Americans have done more to bring about peace and a better world than any other people in history. In a televised speech on March 31, 1976, during his primary campaign against Gerald Ford, Reagan said the following:
We're Americans and we have a rendezvous with destiny.... No people who have ever lived on this earth have fought harder, paid a higher price for freedom, or done more to advance the dignity of man than the living Americans - the Americans living in this land today. There isn't any problem we can't solve if government will give us the facts. Tell us what needs to be done. Then, get out of the way and let us have at it.
Today is the 100th anniversary of Ronald Reagan's birth. We would do well to remember the truth about the man, his message, and his vision for America. Reagan was America's greatest president of the 20th century, and ranks with Washington and Lincoln as one of our greatest presidents of all.
Happy Birthday President Reagan. You are not forgotten. Your legacy will be remembered throughout all time.
Monday, January 31, 2011
A Sputnik Moment
This last week in his State of the Union Address, Obama, trying to claim the mantle of JFK, and sound Reaganesque all at the same time, referred to the crisis of our time as "a Sputnik moment." In the process he spoke a lot about "investment" (code word for more out of control deficit spending), and not only did he not sound like Ronald Reagan, he failed to make the connection between himself and John F. Kennedy.
In the dark days of the Cold War the Soviet Union launched the first man made satellite, Sputnik 1, into orbit in 1957, and on April 12, 1961, they again beat the United States to the punch putting the first man in space. In response Kennedy challenged America to be the first to put a man on the moon. It was a rousing speech that ignited not only patriotic fervor, but American ingenuity to develop such a program and successfully carry it out.
Obama, trying to invoke the memory of Kennedy to restart his failing presidency, could hardly have chosen a more inappropriate comparison. In his two very long years as president he has gutted NASA's budget and made its top priority to improve relations with Muslims by making them feel good about their non-contributions to science.
Politics aside, NASA and the entire space program is one of the greatest examples of why America is the greatest nation on earth. Forty-two years after Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin touched down on the moon's surface, while several other nations including China have slowly found their way into space flight, no one else has ever even considered going to the moon.
This passed week is an important week in the memory of America's space program. It was on January 27, 1967, that we had our first tragedy with the Apollo 1 fire. Apollo was the program designed to go to the moon and was using the first three-manned space capsule. Astronauts Gus Grissom, America's most experienced space flyer, Ed White, the first American to "walk" in space, and Roger Chaffee, on his first space mission, climbed into the capsule for a rehearsal countdown. Somewhere in the 100% oxygen atmosphere of the capsule a spark ignited and a shout came over the radio from Ed White, "Fire." In less than 30 seconds the conflagration turned the capsule into a charred wreck and three American heroes were lost.
January 28, 1986 was another tragic day in NASA history when the Challenger space shuttle blew up 73 seconds after takeoff. President Reagan was scheduled to give his State of the Union address that evening, but postponed it in order to speak to the American people and comfort the nation in the deaths of seven astronauts "who had slipped the surly bonds of earth to touch the face of God."
The space program would suffer another setback when the Columbia shuttle disintegrated over Texas upon re-entry on February 1, 2003. NASA, and America, would overcome all three disasters to prove to the world that there is nothing that can stop the adventurous, pioneering spirit of a free people.
This was never more clearly illustrated than when an oxygen tank blew the side off of Apollo 13 on its way to the moon. On April 13, 1970, the radio crackled at the Johnson Space Center and Commander James Lovell reported, "Houston, we've had a problem." The problem became how to slingshot the space capsule around the moon and send it back to earth using only the Lunar Module engine. The Command Module was essentially one giant computer, but what is so amazing about it is that the technology, only 41 years ago, was so archaic, that today you have more memory in a laptop computer than they had in their space capsule. They had to figure out their trajectory by hand using slide rules. And they did it.
It is my opinion that to date in the history of the world, landing on the moon is the crowning achievement of mankind. When Neil Armstrong took "one small step for man; one giant leap for mankind," he simply surpassed every other achievement ever made by man in any other condition or situation in all recorded time. It is not insignificant that it was America that did this. A free people in a nation built on Christian principles, honoring God with their lives and their history, accomplished what no one else has done, nor is likely to do for a long time to come.
When the Soviets put their first cosmonaut into space, Yuri Gagarin returned to earth and very sarcastically said, "I didn't see God up there." What a contrast to Apollo 8, the first spacecraft to ever leave earth's orbit and completely lose contact with the earth as it went behind the moon. Before signing off on Christmas Eve 1968, astronauts Frank Borman, James Lovell, and William Anders sent a message to the world that God is up there. "In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth," they read and continued through the first nine verses of Genesis 1.
The godless Soviet Union is no more, while God-fearing America continues to thrive. Tragically, our future as a free nation is today in danger. The Marxists of the Obama regime, aided by the leftist socialists of the Democrat Party, are endeavoring to enslave our free society with massive bureaucracy and unsustainable national debts, which are destroying our economy, and will change forever our country as we know it.
The answer to this Sputnik Moment is not more "investment" in America's future bankruptcy; it is overturning the Obama agenda that seeks to "change" America by ignoring the Constitution and spending us into oblivion. The answer is a return to Constitutional government, fiscal responsibility, and the God of our Founding Fathers.
In the dark days of the Cold War the Soviet Union launched the first man made satellite, Sputnik 1, into orbit in 1957, and on April 12, 1961, they again beat the United States to the punch putting the first man in space. In response Kennedy challenged America to be the first to put a man on the moon. It was a rousing speech that ignited not only patriotic fervor, but American ingenuity to develop such a program and successfully carry it out.
Obama, trying to invoke the memory of Kennedy to restart his failing presidency, could hardly have chosen a more inappropriate comparison. In his two very long years as president he has gutted NASA's budget and made its top priority to improve relations with Muslims by making them feel good about their non-contributions to science.
Politics aside, NASA and the entire space program is one of the greatest examples of why America is the greatest nation on earth. Forty-two years after Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin touched down on the moon's surface, while several other nations including China have slowly found their way into space flight, no one else has ever even considered going to the moon.
This passed week is an important week in the memory of America's space program. It was on January 27, 1967, that we had our first tragedy with the Apollo 1 fire. Apollo was the program designed to go to the moon and was using the first three-manned space capsule. Astronauts Gus Grissom, America's most experienced space flyer, Ed White, the first American to "walk" in space, and Roger Chaffee, on his first space mission, climbed into the capsule for a rehearsal countdown. Somewhere in the 100% oxygen atmosphere of the capsule a spark ignited and a shout came over the radio from Ed White, "Fire." In less than 30 seconds the conflagration turned the capsule into a charred wreck and three American heroes were lost.
January 28, 1986 was another tragic day in NASA history when the Challenger space shuttle blew up 73 seconds after takeoff. President Reagan was scheduled to give his State of the Union address that evening, but postponed it in order to speak to the American people and comfort the nation in the deaths of seven astronauts "who had slipped the surly bonds of earth to touch the face of God."
The space program would suffer another setback when the Columbia shuttle disintegrated over Texas upon re-entry on February 1, 2003. NASA, and America, would overcome all three disasters to prove to the world that there is nothing that can stop the adventurous, pioneering spirit of a free people.
This was never more clearly illustrated than when an oxygen tank blew the side off of Apollo 13 on its way to the moon. On April 13, 1970, the radio crackled at the Johnson Space Center and Commander James Lovell reported, "Houston, we've had a problem." The problem became how to slingshot the space capsule around the moon and send it back to earth using only the Lunar Module engine. The Command Module was essentially one giant computer, but what is so amazing about it is that the technology, only 41 years ago, was so archaic, that today you have more memory in a laptop computer than they had in their space capsule. They had to figure out their trajectory by hand using slide rules. And they did it.
It is my opinion that to date in the history of the world, landing on the moon is the crowning achievement of mankind. When Neil Armstrong took "one small step for man; one giant leap for mankind," he simply surpassed every other achievement ever made by man in any other condition or situation in all recorded time. It is not insignificant that it was America that did this. A free people in a nation built on Christian principles, honoring God with their lives and their history, accomplished what no one else has done, nor is likely to do for a long time to come.
When the Soviets put their first cosmonaut into space, Yuri Gagarin returned to earth and very sarcastically said, "I didn't see God up there." What a contrast to Apollo 8, the first spacecraft to ever leave earth's orbit and completely lose contact with the earth as it went behind the moon. Before signing off on Christmas Eve 1968, astronauts Frank Borman, James Lovell, and William Anders sent a message to the world that God is up there. "In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth," they read and continued through the first nine verses of Genesis 1.
The godless Soviet Union is no more, while God-fearing America continues to thrive. Tragically, our future as a free nation is today in danger. The Marxists of the Obama regime, aided by the leftist socialists of the Democrat Party, are endeavoring to enslave our free society with massive bureaucracy and unsustainable national debts, which are destroying our economy, and will change forever our country as we know it.
The answer to this Sputnik Moment is not more "investment" in America's future bankruptcy; it is overturning the Obama agenda that seeks to "change" America by ignoring the Constitution and spending us into oblivion. The answer is a return to Constitutional government, fiscal responsibility, and the God of our Founding Fathers.
Saturday, January 15, 2011
The Constitution
We were on the coast in Malindi at Turtle Bay last week; no TV's, no internet, completely disconnected from the rest of the world for a relaxing six days. Consequently we missed the opening of Congress and the reading of the Constitution, and we didn't hear about the Tucson, Arizona shooting until Monday.
Sadly, the mainstream media's reaction to the shooting of Congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords and the murder of six others was not only typical, but predictable. While they immediately warned the country not to rush to judgment when Nidal Hassan murdered 13 soldiers while shouting, "allah akbar," this time they rushed to judgment blaming the Tea Party movement, talk radio hosts, Sarah Palin, and guns. One deranged Congressman from South Carolina even suggested that the reading of the Constitution at the Capitol caused the atmosphere for the shooting to take place.
For four days the media shamelessly spewed their vitriol until the President made his speech about not using this for political expediency. Nice, except it was about four days too late. And it hasn't apparently helped. We just watched Jonathan Mann's weekend review on CNN Overseas. His expert analyst reported it was a bad week for news journalists because of all the false accusations that went flying over the airwaves. While making the analysis pictures of Rush Limbaugh, Glenn Beck and Ann Coulter were splashed on the screen. Let me see, those weren't the journalists spreading the lies and hate, they were the ones being slandered by people who were spreading the lies and hate. Shameless isn't even a strong enough word for the MSM.
Now it turns out the shooter is an extremely liberal registered Independent, looney-tune pothead, who was in favor of illegal alien amnesty. A far more rational rush to judgment would have been to say that he shot Giffords, who is a conservative Democrat in favor of closing the border and against amnesty, because he was influenced by liberal alien amnesty supporters. But the MSM hasn't given us that side of the story.
"The pen is mightier than the sword," but the pen can be used to tear down or to build up. In this case it is the pen of hate filled left-wing socialist slugs who don't give a rip about America. They don't care about the Constitution either, which is why the left wing agenda so often rejects the very basic tenets of our founding document.
The Constitution was written "in Order to form a more perfect Union." In other words, the Constitution was designed to unite, not divide. Anybody who will take an objective look at America today (which leaves out the MSM) will see that the vitriol, the hate speech, the perpetuation of racial divisions, and the perversion of the Constitution comes not from conservatives, but from the far left. Liberals are usually guilty of the very things they accuse conservatives of, and they are the ones doing the dividing, not the other way around.
One purpose of our more perfect Union is to "establish Justice." Justice is not served, however, when the Constitution becomes a living document that constantly changes to fit self-serving liberal interpretations of it. Neither is justice served when our national boundaries are left unprotected and foreign drug cartels run freely across American soil murdering Americans eighty miles inland from the border, and US Border Patrol agents are sent to jail for trying to stop them.
Another purpose is to "insure domestic Tranquility." That means to keep the peace, which is to be kept by the rule of law, which is the Constitution. Unfortunately, the current administration has thumbed its nose at the Constitution, showing its absolute disregard for America's traditions and the rule of law.
The Union is to provide for the "common defense" which includes closing and protecting our borders from all enemies, which illegal alien drug running cartels from Mexico are.
Finally, the Union is to "promote the general welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity." A socialist state will not promote the blessings of liberty. It will restrict them until it enslaves the people, and a 14 trillion dollar untamed debt will deny those blessings to our children for generations to come.
The answer for America is to go back to our beginnings, re-establish our Constitution, and govern by the principles and character of our Christian Founding Fathers. We could no more govern America effectively without the Constitution than a Christian Church could carry out its business without a Bible. Enough of the progressive movement trying to rewrite our history and our beliefs. We have the greatest governing document ever written in the history of man. Reading it in Congress was a good idea. Now, We the People need to demand the government not only defend the Constitution of the United States, but govern strictly by the Constitution of the United States.
Sadly, the mainstream media's reaction to the shooting of Congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords and the murder of six others was not only typical, but predictable. While they immediately warned the country not to rush to judgment when Nidal Hassan murdered 13 soldiers while shouting, "allah akbar," this time they rushed to judgment blaming the Tea Party movement, talk radio hosts, Sarah Palin, and guns. One deranged Congressman from South Carolina even suggested that the reading of the Constitution at the Capitol caused the atmosphere for the shooting to take place.
For four days the media shamelessly spewed their vitriol until the President made his speech about not using this for political expediency. Nice, except it was about four days too late. And it hasn't apparently helped. We just watched Jonathan Mann's weekend review on CNN Overseas. His expert analyst reported it was a bad week for news journalists because of all the false accusations that went flying over the airwaves. While making the analysis pictures of Rush Limbaugh, Glenn Beck and Ann Coulter were splashed on the screen. Let me see, those weren't the journalists spreading the lies and hate, they were the ones being slandered by people who were spreading the lies and hate. Shameless isn't even a strong enough word for the MSM.
Now it turns out the shooter is an extremely liberal registered Independent, looney-tune pothead, who was in favor of illegal alien amnesty. A far more rational rush to judgment would have been to say that he shot Giffords, who is a conservative Democrat in favor of closing the border and against amnesty, because he was influenced by liberal alien amnesty supporters. But the MSM hasn't given us that side of the story.
"The pen is mightier than the sword," but the pen can be used to tear down or to build up. In this case it is the pen of hate filled left-wing socialist slugs who don't give a rip about America. They don't care about the Constitution either, which is why the left wing agenda so often rejects the very basic tenets of our founding document.
The Constitution was written "in Order to form a more perfect Union." In other words, the Constitution was designed to unite, not divide. Anybody who will take an objective look at America today (which leaves out the MSM) will see that the vitriol, the hate speech, the perpetuation of racial divisions, and the perversion of the Constitution comes not from conservatives, but from the far left. Liberals are usually guilty of the very things they accuse conservatives of, and they are the ones doing the dividing, not the other way around.
One purpose of our more perfect Union is to "establish Justice." Justice is not served, however, when the Constitution becomes a living document that constantly changes to fit self-serving liberal interpretations of it. Neither is justice served when our national boundaries are left unprotected and foreign drug cartels run freely across American soil murdering Americans eighty miles inland from the border, and US Border Patrol agents are sent to jail for trying to stop them.
Another purpose is to "insure domestic Tranquility." That means to keep the peace, which is to be kept by the rule of law, which is the Constitution. Unfortunately, the current administration has thumbed its nose at the Constitution, showing its absolute disregard for America's traditions and the rule of law.
The Union is to provide for the "common defense" which includes closing and protecting our borders from all enemies, which illegal alien drug running cartels from Mexico are.
Finally, the Union is to "promote the general welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity." A socialist state will not promote the blessings of liberty. It will restrict them until it enslaves the people, and a 14 trillion dollar untamed debt will deny those blessings to our children for generations to come.
The answer for America is to go back to our beginnings, re-establish our Constitution, and govern by the principles and character of our Christian Founding Fathers. We could no more govern America effectively without the Constitution than a Christian Church could carry out its business without a Bible. Enough of the progressive movement trying to rewrite our history and our beliefs. We have the greatest governing document ever written in the history of man. Reading it in Congress was a good idea. Now, We the People need to demand the government not only defend the Constitution of the United States, but govern strictly by the Constitution of the United States.
Monday, January 3, 2011
Time
Fast away the old year passes, and it’s only 357 days until next Christmas. Where does the time go? Or better yet, what are we going to do with the time before it gets away? We’re at the beginning of a new year with all the promises of a new beginning before us. What are we going to do with it?
John Quincy Adams once wrote, “There is no people on earth so ambitious as the people of America. The reason is because the lowest can aspire as freely as the highest.”
That’s why the son of a dirt poor farmer in the wilderness of Kentucky and Indiana, who learned to read by firelight and never finished school, much less went to college, could rise to become president of the United States. In his book, The Inspirational Wisdom of Abraham Lincoln, Philip Ostergard writes, “While others slept, Abe read all the books he could find; while others fiddled, he gained skill in mathematics; while others wasted time, he attended court in the County Court House, some fifteen miles distant from his home.”
Lincoln never let his poor, uneducated upbringing hold him back. He worked hard at everything and never wasted a moment. He grew strong and sinewy. No one could keep pace with him with an axe, but he was more than just a rail-splitter. Every experience for him was an opportunity to learn, and learn he did. Ostergard concluded that, “He embodied the best traits and spirit that characterize an American.”
Lincoln lived and fulfilled the American Dream. That dream of freedom to rise above your surroundings and the equal playing field to achieve a better life if you are willing to strive for it, as opposed to being stuck in a caste system, or an enslaving dictatorship, or an economy so poor there is no hope, is the desire of the world. For most of the world a desire is all it is, but Americans own the dream. That’s why everybody wants to come to America. It is a land of opportunity.
Unfortunately, there are sinister forces that want to take that opportunity away and replace it with a socialist “Nanny State,” that will make everybody equally poor and control every move everybody makes. They promise a big, benevolent government that will take care of you from the cradle to the grave. You don’t have to do anything. Sadly, and sickly, I might add, a large part of America’s non-thinking citizenry has bought into this nonsense. That’s why we have had the Obama/Reid/Pelosi reign of terror for the last two years.
Our hope now, however, is that when the new Congress is sworn in this week it will not forget the mandate it was given in the last election to overturn this socialist takeover of our country. Politicians being what politicians are, however, the new Republican majority in the House is just as likely to be stalled and buffaloed into business as usual, and go down the road of compromise to more mediocrity and a failure to follow through on the conservative principles that got them elected.
On January 27, 1838, in an address to the Young Men’s Lyceum of Springfield, Illinois, Lincoln compared the United States with the Church, which “the gates of hell shall not prevail against.” America is invincible, he said, as long as it remains true to the principles it was founded upon.
In his first Fourth of July address as president in 1861, Lincoln seemed to question whether or not America was being true to its founding principles. “Our popular government has often been called an experiment. Two points in it, our people have already settled – the successful establishing, and the successful administering of it. One still remains – its successful maintenance against a formidable attempt to overthrow it. . . . ”
In his Gettysburg Address he posed the same question: “testing whether that nation, or any nation so conceived and so dedicated, can long endure.”
We may well ask ourselves that question today. Is America going to long endure, or are we going to succumb to the godless, socialist threat from the liberal left, and from a president who may not even be eligible for the office?
“Eternal vigilance is the price of freedom,” and if the next year is going to be different than the last, we must not waste our time resting upon the laurels of the recent elections. We must use our time wisely to continue to be eternally vigilant.
John Quincy Adams once wrote, “There is no people on earth so ambitious as the people of America. The reason is because the lowest can aspire as freely as the highest.”
That’s why the son of a dirt poor farmer in the wilderness of Kentucky and Indiana, who learned to read by firelight and never finished school, much less went to college, could rise to become president of the United States. In his book, The Inspirational Wisdom of Abraham Lincoln, Philip Ostergard writes, “While others slept, Abe read all the books he could find; while others fiddled, he gained skill in mathematics; while others wasted time, he attended court in the County Court House, some fifteen miles distant from his home.”
Lincoln never let his poor, uneducated upbringing hold him back. He worked hard at everything and never wasted a moment. He grew strong and sinewy. No one could keep pace with him with an axe, but he was more than just a rail-splitter. Every experience for him was an opportunity to learn, and learn he did. Ostergard concluded that, “He embodied the best traits and spirit that characterize an American.”
Lincoln lived and fulfilled the American Dream. That dream of freedom to rise above your surroundings and the equal playing field to achieve a better life if you are willing to strive for it, as opposed to being stuck in a caste system, or an enslaving dictatorship, or an economy so poor there is no hope, is the desire of the world. For most of the world a desire is all it is, but Americans own the dream. That’s why everybody wants to come to America. It is a land of opportunity.
Unfortunately, there are sinister forces that want to take that opportunity away and replace it with a socialist “Nanny State,” that will make everybody equally poor and control every move everybody makes. They promise a big, benevolent government that will take care of you from the cradle to the grave. You don’t have to do anything. Sadly, and sickly, I might add, a large part of America’s non-thinking citizenry has bought into this nonsense. That’s why we have had the Obama/Reid/Pelosi reign of terror for the last two years.
Our hope now, however, is that when the new Congress is sworn in this week it will not forget the mandate it was given in the last election to overturn this socialist takeover of our country. Politicians being what politicians are, however, the new Republican majority in the House is just as likely to be stalled and buffaloed into business as usual, and go down the road of compromise to more mediocrity and a failure to follow through on the conservative principles that got them elected.
On January 27, 1838, in an address to the Young Men’s Lyceum of Springfield, Illinois, Lincoln compared the United States with the Church, which “the gates of hell shall not prevail against.” America is invincible, he said, as long as it remains true to the principles it was founded upon.
In his first Fourth of July address as president in 1861, Lincoln seemed to question whether or not America was being true to its founding principles. “Our popular government has often been called an experiment. Two points in it, our people have already settled – the successful establishing, and the successful administering of it. One still remains – its successful maintenance against a formidable attempt to overthrow it. . . . ”
In his Gettysburg Address he posed the same question: “testing whether that nation, or any nation so conceived and so dedicated, can long endure.”
We may well ask ourselves that question today. Is America going to long endure, or are we going to succumb to the godless, socialist threat from the liberal left, and from a president who may not even be eligible for the office?
“Eternal vigilance is the price of freedom,” and if the next year is going to be different than the last, we must not waste our time resting upon the laurels of the recent elections. We must use our time wisely to continue to be eternally vigilant.
Thursday, December 30, 2010
Remembering Where We Were When
The last week of the year for many people is usually a time for reflection. Many will take stock of their accomplishments, or lack of, and news media will remind us of the significant events of the past twelve months.
Some events are so critically important that people never forget where they were when they first heard. You know, the "Where were you when" events. I'm too young to remember Pearl Harbor, but I have living relatives and friends who remember it well.
The first significant event I remember was November 22, 1963. It was lunch time at Asbury Elementary School in Denver and all the kids were on the playground when one of my classmates, Scott Haskins, who had gone home for lunch, walked up with a great big grin on his face and said, "The president has been shot." Nobody believed him, but when the recess was over and we got back to class, we all noticed the somber look on the face of our English exchange teacher, Miss Mundy. She explained it to us with a compassion that, as I look back, I would never have expected from a foreigner. School was dismissed and we all filed out in silence.
I was at my grandparent's house watching with interest on July 11, 1969 when Neil Armstrong took "one small step for man, one giant leap for mankind."
On March 30, 1981, I was working at Wendy's when somebody pulled up to the drive through window and said, "Have you heard that the president was shot?" I remember my heart sinking; Reagan assassinated? All our hopes gone? We had no radio in the restaurant and we were asking every driver that came by all afternoon for updates. I could hardly wait to get home to see the news.
Another significant day was December 25, 1991. We were in the Philippines when we heard on the news that night that the Soviet Union had just voted itself out of existence. The Cold War was over. I had to let it sink in for a moment, but then I said to my wife, "We won!" It was rather surreal because the evil empire went out with such a whimper that almost nobody even noticed. When I went to work the next day there was no celebration, not even any discussion about it, but until 9/11 it had to be the single most significant event of my lifetime.
Of course I'll never forget 9/11. We were here in Kenya and I was a little ways north at a place called New Wood helping another missionary put up a new church building. Around 5:30 pm we got a call on the cell phone and heard about the World Trade Center attack.
As a historian (When I graduated with a BA in history my guidance counsellor told me that now I was a historian.) I often read about events that I wish I could have witnessed. I think the desire may have been planted when I was about ten or twelve years old by a collection of books called the "We Were There" series. The books were written for a young teenage audience and I think would have made good required reading in public schools.
One year at Christmas I received We Were There at the Battle of Lexington and Concord. It told the story of Rob, a teenager who wound up riding with Paul Revere to call out the militia, and then got his baptism of fire in the fight the next day. I loved the story and relived it over and over as I read the book probably a dozen times. I would like to have been there myself in those delicate days when the fate of our nation stood in the balance.
So, with these thoughts in mind, here is a list of events that if I were given the chance I would like to have personally witnessed:
- The look on the worried faces of the mariners on the Pinta, the Nina, and the Santa Maria, whose superstitious fears of falling off the edge of the world had nearly led them to mutiny, when someone cried out "Land ho!" What celebration must have taken place, and how stately the proud Christopher Columbus must have looked knowing that their discovery would change the world.
- George Washington on the march to Ft. Duquesne on July 9, 1755, when the British regulars were ambushed by a force of French and Indians. While the red coats panicked and fled, Washington, at all times exposed to enemy fire, rallied the militia to hold their ground and saved what was left of the army. Washington's coat was riddled by musket balls and several horses were shot out from under him, but he was miraculously unhurt.
- The stirring oration in St. John's Church in Richmond, Virginia on March 23, 1775 when Patrick Henry declared, "Give me liberty, or give me death."
- The Constitutional Convention in 1787, when argument had become so vehement that nothing was being accomplished. Benjamin Franklin took the floor and said, "I have lived, Sir, a long time, and the longer I live, the more convincing proofs I see of this truth - that God Governs in the affairs of men. And if a sparrow cannot fall to the ground without His notice, is it probable that an empire can rise without His aid?" I would like to have witnessed and then joined the delegates as they all got on their knees and began to pray for God's guidance.
- When the early morning fog and smoke from the cannons cleared on September 14, 1814, and revealed to Francis Scott Key the Star Spangled Banner flying over Ft. McHenry.
- The halls of Congress when on January 26, 1830 Daniel Webster trounced the nullification argument and finished one of the greatest patriotic speeches in history with the bold declaration, "Liberty and Union, now and forever, one and inseparable!"
- The Alamo in 1836 to see if Travis really did draw a line in the sand.
- The dedication of the National Cemetery in Gettysburg when on November 19, 1863, Abraham Lincoln gave his famous address.
- The immaculately dressed and dignified Robert E. Lee offering his sword to the shabbily dressed, yet humble and gracious Ulysses S. Grant at Appomatox Courthouse on April 9, 1865.
- Custer's attack on the Indian village on the Little Bighorn on June 25, 1876, to find out exactly how events of the battle transpired.
- The light in Thomas Edison's eyes when his incandescent lightbulb shone successfully for the first time in 1879.
It becomes a little harder to select events from the twentieth century because with news reels and modern media so much of it is available to be seen, but there are many events I would like to have seen first hand:
- The Wright Brothers at Kitty Hawk in 1903.
- Babe Ruth's called shot in the 1932 World Series or Mickey Mantle's monster homerun in 1956 that came within inches of being the only ball ever hit out of Yankee Stadium.
- Lou Gehrig in 1939 saying, "Today, I consider myself the luckiest man on the face of the earth."
- Kate Smith introducing and singing a new song by Irving Berlin in 1941, God Bless America.
- The flag raising on Mt. Suribachi on Iwo Jima, February 23, 1945.
- Aboard the Enola Gay to see the reaction of the aircrew when they saw the mushroom cloud rising over Hiroshima, August 6, 1945.
- Frank Borman, Jim Lovell, and William Anders in Apollo 8 orbiting the moon on Christmas Eve, 1968, and reading the first nine verses of Genesis Chapter One to the entire world before saying, "Good night."
- Ronald Reagan at the Brandenburg Gate in 1987 saying, "Mr. Gorbachev, tear down this wall."
- This past year I would like to have been able to attend the Restoring Honor rally held at the Lincoln Memorial by Glenn Beck on August 28.
I could go on ad infinitum but this is enough for now. You get the picture, and surely you can think of many events you would like to have seen yourself.
Suffice it to say that it is necessary that we remember particular events, not only in our lifetime, but in our entire history as a nation. In 1945 General Dwight Eisenhower ordered pictures and video to be taken of the Nazi death camps as they were liberated to create an indisputable record for the future because, he said, some day somebody will deny it ever happened. That is happening today frequently in spite of all the evidence.
The same can be said for America's Christian heritage. The ACLU, and many other leftist, socialist, and even muslim organizations, with the help of the current presidential administration, are trying to deny the Christian foundation of our country, and deny First Amendment rights to Christians. It is vitally necessary that we remember who we are and where we came from. We began as a Christian nation; the testimonies of the Founders, their writings and documents all attest to it. Those who say different either haven't read the Founders, or they are deliberately trying to deny the truth. When the French historian Alexis de Tocqueville visited the United States he reported that America was great because America was good, and that her goodness was found in her churches which were found in every corner of the land. It's the Christian religion, that is, faith in Jesus Christ, that made America great, nothing else.
As Ronald Reagan once said, "If we ever forget that we are One Nation Under God, then we will be a nation gone under."
Some events are so critically important that people never forget where they were when they first heard. You know, the "Where were you when" events. I'm too young to remember Pearl Harbor, but I have living relatives and friends who remember it well.
The first significant event I remember was November 22, 1963. It was lunch time at Asbury Elementary School in Denver and all the kids were on the playground when one of my classmates, Scott Haskins, who had gone home for lunch, walked up with a great big grin on his face and said, "The president has been shot." Nobody believed him, but when the recess was over and we got back to class, we all noticed the somber look on the face of our English exchange teacher, Miss Mundy. She explained it to us with a compassion that, as I look back, I would never have expected from a foreigner. School was dismissed and we all filed out in silence.
I was at my grandparent's house watching with interest on July 11, 1969 when Neil Armstrong took "one small step for man, one giant leap for mankind."
On March 30, 1981, I was working at Wendy's when somebody pulled up to the drive through window and said, "Have you heard that the president was shot?" I remember my heart sinking; Reagan assassinated? All our hopes gone? We had no radio in the restaurant and we were asking every driver that came by all afternoon for updates. I could hardly wait to get home to see the news.
Another significant day was December 25, 1991. We were in the Philippines when we heard on the news that night that the Soviet Union had just voted itself out of existence. The Cold War was over. I had to let it sink in for a moment, but then I said to my wife, "We won!" It was rather surreal because the evil empire went out with such a whimper that almost nobody even noticed. When I went to work the next day there was no celebration, not even any discussion about it, but until 9/11 it had to be the single most significant event of my lifetime.
Of course I'll never forget 9/11. We were here in Kenya and I was a little ways north at a place called New Wood helping another missionary put up a new church building. Around 5:30 pm we got a call on the cell phone and heard about the World Trade Center attack.
As a historian (When I graduated with a BA in history my guidance counsellor told me that now I was a historian.) I often read about events that I wish I could have witnessed. I think the desire may have been planted when I was about ten or twelve years old by a collection of books called the "We Were There" series. The books were written for a young teenage audience and I think would have made good required reading in public schools.
One year at Christmas I received We Were There at the Battle of Lexington and Concord. It told the story of Rob, a teenager who wound up riding with Paul Revere to call out the militia, and then got his baptism of fire in the fight the next day. I loved the story and relived it over and over as I read the book probably a dozen times. I would like to have been there myself in those delicate days when the fate of our nation stood in the balance.
So, with these thoughts in mind, here is a list of events that if I were given the chance I would like to have personally witnessed:
- The look on the worried faces of the mariners on the Pinta, the Nina, and the Santa Maria, whose superstitious fears of falling off the edge of the world had nearly led them to mutiny, when someone cried out "Land ho!" What celebration must have taken place, and how stately the proud Christopher Columbus must have looked knowing that their discovery would change the world.
- George Washington on the march to Ft. Duquesne on July 9, 1755, when the British regulars were ambushed by a force of French and Indians. While the red coats panicked and fled, Washington, at all times exposed to enemy fire, rallied the militia to hold their ground and saved what was left of the army. Washington's coat was riddled by musket balls and several horses were shot out from under him, but he was miraculously unhurt.
- The stirring oration in St. John's Church in Richmond, Virginia on March 23, 1775 when Patrick Henry declared, "Give me liberty, or give me death."
- The Constitutional Convention in 1787, when argument had become so vehement that nothing was being accomplished. Benjamin Franklin took the floor and said, "I have lived, Sir, a long time, and the longer I live, the more convincing proofs I see of this truth - that God Governs in the affairs of men. And if a sparrow cannot fall to the ground without His notice, is it probable that an empire can rise without His aid?" I would like to have witnessed and then joined the delegates as they all got on their knees and began to pray for God's guidance.
- When the early morning fog and smoke from the cannons cleared on September 14, 1814, and revealed to Francis Scott Key the Star Spangled Banner flying over Ft. McHenry.
- The halls of Congress when on January 26, 1830 Daniel Webster trounced the nullification argument and finished one of the greatest patriotic speeches in history with the bold declaration, "Liberty and Union, now and forever, one and inseparable!"
- The Alamo in 1836 to see if Travis really did draw a line in the sand.
- The dedication of the National Cemetery in Gettysburg when on November 19, 1863, Abraham Lincoln gave his famous address.
- The immaculately dressed and dignified Robert E. Lee offering his sword to the shabbily dressed, yet humble and gracious Ulysses S. Grant at Appomatox Courthouse on April 9, 1865.
- Custer's attack on the Indian village on the Little Bighorn on June 25, 1876, to find out exactly how events of the battle transpired.
- The light in Thomas Edison's eyes when his incandescent lightbulb shone successfully for the first time in 1879.
It becomes a little harder to select events from the twentieth century because with news reels and modern media so much of it is available to be seen, but there are many events I would like to have seen first hand:
- The Wright Brothers at Kitty Hawk in 1903.
- Babe Ruth's called shot in the 1932 World Series or Mickey Mantle's monster homerun in 1956 that came within inches of being the only ball ever hit out of Yankee Stadium.
- Lou Gehrig in 1939 saying, "Today, I consider myself the luckiest man on the face of the earth."
- Kate Smith introducing and singing a new song by Irving Berlin in 1941, God Bless America.
- The flag raising on Mt. Suribachi on Iwo Jima, February 23, 1945.
- Aboard the Enola Gay to see the reaction of the aircrew when they saw the mushroom cloud rising over Hiroshima, August 6, 1945.
- Frank Borman, Jim Lovell, and William Anders in Apollo 8 orbiting the moon on Christmas Eve, 1968, and reading the first nine verses of Genesis Chapter One to the entire world before saying, "Good night."
- Ronald Reagan at the Brandenburg Gate in 1987 saying, "Mr. Gorbachev, tear down this wall."
- This past year I would like to have been able to attend the Restoring Honor rally held at the Lincoln Memorial by Glenn Beck on August 28.
I could go on ad infinitum but this is enough for now. You get the picture, and surely you can think of many events you would like to have seen yourself.
Suffice it to say that it is necessary that we remember particular events, not only in our lifetime, but in our entire history as a nation. In 1945 General Dwight Eisenhower ordered pictures and video to be taken of the Nazi death camps as they were liberated to create an indisputable record for the future because, he said, some day somebody will deny it ever happened. That is happening today frequently in spite of all the evidence.
The same can be said for America's Christian heritage. The ACLU, and many other leftist, socialist, and even muslim organizations, with the help of the current presidential administration, are trying to deny the Christian foundation of our country, and deny First Amendment rights to Christians. It is vitally necessary that we remember who we are and where we came from. We began as a Christian nation; the testimonies of the Founders, their writings and documents all attest to it. Those who say different either haven't read the Founders, or they are deliberately trying to deny the truth. When the French historian Alexis de Tocqueville visited the United States he reported that America was great because America was good, and that her goodness was found in her churches which were found in every corner of the land. It's the Christian religion, that is, faith in Jesus Christ, that made America great, nothing else.
As Ronald Reagan once said, "If we ever forget that we are One Nation Under God, then we will be a nation gone under."
Monday, December 20, 2010
December and the Real Meaning of Christmas
December is a month stock full of significant historical events for Americans. There is Pearl Harbor day on the 7th, the "day that will live in infamy," when, in 1941, the Japanese surprise attack on Hawaii killed over 2400 US servicemen and brought the United States into World War II.
The 8th is another infamous day for those who are fans of John Lennon, who was gunned down outside his apartment in New York City thirty years ago. Lennon was a cultural icon for the sexual revolution and the hippie movement of the 60's and 70's. Often called a brilliant musician, he is said to have influenced a generation. Indeed he did, but his legacy was one of moral impurity, drug abuse and atheism; hardly a role model any decent parent would want for his children.
On December 11 and 12, 1862, Union General Ambrose Burnside wrecked an entire corps of the Army of the Potomac at the Battle of Fredericksburg. He ordered his men to charge across a half mile wide open field to dislodge Confederate troops under Robert E. Lee, who were well entrenched behind a stone wall. Thousands were cut down and many of the wounded left on the field died in the freezing temperatures of the night. When the sun rose Burnside wanted to try the same folly again but finally gave it up. The battle left a bitter pall over the nation that Christmas, and a growing fear that the Civil War could not be won by the North.
The 14th of 1799 was a tragically sad day as well. The Father of our Country, George Washington, at age 67 was in excellent health and condition. A few days before he had been out riding his horse, even jumping fences, when a winter storm blew in and he got caught in the weather. He came down with a severe cold that lingered until a medical doctor decided to bleed the bad blood from his body. In so doing he bled the life right out of Washington. Modern critics of the Bible often say it is unscientific, but 3,500 years ago Moses, under the inspiration of God, penned the first five books of the Old Testament and declared in Genesis 9:4 and Leviticus 17:11 that the life is in the blood. George Washington could probably have lived a much longer life if the medical profession had examined and followed the "unscientific" Word of God.
Twenty-six years earlier on the 16th of 1773, the Sons of Liberty, led by Samuel Adams and Paul Revere, boarded three British merchant ships in Boston Harbor and dumped their entire cargoes of tea into the bay. The event became known as the Boston Tea Party. It was a reaction to the Stamp Acts which had levied a number of taxes against the colonists. Protests were so severe that most of the taxes were repealed, but the tea tax was left intact. The result of the Tea Party was the Intolerable Acts, passed by Parliament to close Boston Harbor to all shipping in 1774. This led to the skirmishes at Lexington and Concord a year later and brought on the American Revolution.
Ironically, four score and seven years later on December 20, 1860, South Carolina voted to secede from the Union setting in motion the events which led to the Civil War. The South stood on the 10th Amendment to the Constitution as the right to nullify Federal laws and secede from the Union, but the war ultimately decided there was no right of secession given to the States. Unfortunately the Republican led Union victory also opened the door to big government which in our day has become so enormous, that now Republicans are appealing to the 10th Amendment and talking about nullifying Federal laws. The State of Missouri even voted on and passed a law declaring parts of the Obama Healthcare law void in the state.
Christmas Day is an extremely important day in our history for more than the real meaning of Christmas. The year 1776 had been a bad one for George Washington and the Continental Army. They had been driven from Long Island, then Manhattan, then all the way across New Jersey in a series of delaying actions which kept the British at bay until the army escaped across the Delaware River into Pennsylvania and both armies went into winter quarters. A force of 1400 Hessians, German mercenaries hired by the British to fight the colonists, held the town of Trenton, New Jersey, and had settled down for Christmas dinner and ale. No one expected an attack, night patrols were not sent out, and most of the Hessian soldiers, including their commander were fast asleep on the morning of the 26th.
Washington, who was not only the commanding general of the Continental Armies, but the one man, the only man, who could possibly have kept the colonies united in the struggle for freedom, wisely decided a daring stroke was needed to finish the year and encourage Americans to keep on. At 11pm on the night of Christmas, his army of 2400 men crossed the freezing waters of the Delaware in a snow storm. The storm prevented another 1200 men from crossing, but by 3am all that were coming were across. At 8am the colonists attacked, taking the Hessians completely by surprise and in ninety minutes the battle was over. It was a severe blow to the British cause but a catalyst for the Americans, convincing colonial leaders to continue the fight for independence.
The birth of Christ, of course, is the true reason for the season. We are living in a day when hatred for Christianity is so severe that the un-American un-Civil non-Libertarian dis-Union (ACLU) spends all of its efforts at this time of the year trying to remove nativity scenes from public places. Many businesses no longer allow their employees to say, "Merry Christmas." Just this week the Federal Reserve told a bank in Oklahoma that they had to remove all Christmas decorations they had put up in their lobby. It's an atheist attack upon the founding principles of our country and nothing else. It has nothing to do with "separation of church and state" or the Constitution. It is simply a small minority (1.8% of Americans claim to be atheist) of the population trying to bully everybody else into bowing to their ungodly will.
We won't do it. America was founded as "One nation under God," and as Ronald Reagan once enjoined us, "if we forget that ... we will be a nation gone under." It is high time we remember the Christ of Christmas, not only when we shop and tell the clerk "Merry Christmas," but at all times. Jesus is the reason for Christmas. Born in a lowly manger some 2,000 years ago, Jesus left the glory of heaven to become man so that He might redeem fallen mankind to Himself. Without that promise there is no hope for eternity. Do you know Christ as your Savior? Are you sure you are on your way to heaven? If you cannot assuredly answer these questions in the affirmative, may I encourage you to read the third page on my blog, entitled, A Free Gift.
To all of you who have faithfully read these postings over the last several months and to the many who have commented, mostly by e-mail but some here on the blog, my sincere thanks and I hope that you all have
A VERY MERRY CHRISTMAS.
The 8th is another infamous day for those who are fans of John Lennon, who was gunned down outside his apartment in New York City thirty years ago. Lennon was a cultural icon for the sexual revolution and the hippie movement of the 60's and 70's. Often called a brilliant musician, he is said to have influenced a generation. Indeed he did, but his legacy was one of moral impurity, drug abuse and atheism; hardly a role model any decent parent would want for his children.
On December 11 and 12, 1862, Union General Ambrose Burnside wrecked an entire corps of the Army of the Potomac at the Battle of Fredericksburg. He ordered his men to charge across a half mile wide open field to dislodge Confederate troops under Robert E. Lee, who were well entrenched behind a stone wall. Thousands were cut down and many of the wounded left on the field died in the freezing temperatures of the night. When the sun rose Burnside wanted to try the same folly again but finally gave it up. The battle left a bitter pall over the nation that Christmas, and a growing fear that the Civil War could not be won by the North.
The 14th of 1799 was a tragically sad day as well. The Father of our Country, George Washington, at age 67 was in excellent health and condition. A few days before he had been out riding his horse, even jumping fences, when a winter storm blew in and he got caught in the weather. He came down with a severe cold that lingered until a medical doctor decided to bleed the bad blood from his body. In so doing he bled the life right out of Washington. Modern critics of the Bible often say it is unscientific, but 3,500 years ago Moses, under the inspiration of God, penned the first five books of the Old Testament and declared in Genesis 9:4 and Leviticus 17:11 that the life is in the blood. George Washington could probably have lived a much longer life if the medical profession had examined and followed the "unscientific" Word of God.
Twenty-six years earlier on the 16th of 1773, the Sons of Liberty, led by Samuel Adams and Paul Revere, boarded three British merchant ships in Boston Harbor and dumped their entire cargoes of tea into the bay. The event became known as the Boston Tea Party. It was a reaction to the Stamp Acts which had levied a number of taxes against the colonists. Protests were so severe that most of the taxes were repealed, but the tea tax was left intact. The result of the Tea Party was the Intolerable Acts, passed by Parliament to close Boston Harbor to all shipping in 1774. This led to the skirmishes at Lexington and Concord a year later and brought on the American Revolution.
Ironically, four score and seven years later on December 20, 1860, South Carolina voted to secede from the Union setting in motion the events which led to the Civil War. The South stood on the 10th Amendment to the Constitution as the right to nullify Federal laws and secede from the Union, but the war ultimately decided there was no right of secession given to the States. Unfortunately the Republican led Union victory also opened the door to big government which in our day has become so enormous, that now Republicans are appealing to the 10th Amendment and talking about nullifying Federal laws. The State of Missouri even voted on and passed a law declaring parts of the Obama Healthcare law void in the state.
Christmas Day is an extremely important day in our history for more than the real meaning of Christmas. The year 1776 had been a bad one for George Washington and the Continental Army. They had been driven from Long Island, then Manhattan, then all the way across New Jersey in a series of delaying actions which kept the British at bay until the army escaped across the Delaware River into Pennsylvania and both armies went into winter quarters. A force of 1400 Hessians, German mercenaries hired by the British to fight the colonists, held the town of Trenton, New Jersey, and had settled down for Christmas dinner and ale. No one expected an attack, night patrols were not sent out, and most of the Hessian soldiers, including their commander were fast asleep on the morning of the 26th.
Washington, who was not only the commanding general of the Continental Armies, but the one man, the only man, who could possibly have kept the colonies united in the struggle for freedom, wisely decided a daring stroke was needed to finish the year and encourage Americans to keep on. At 11pm on the night of Christmas, his army of 2400 men crossed the freezing waters of the Delaware in a snow storm. The storm prevented another 1200 men from crossing, but by 3am all that were coming were across. At 8am the colonists attacked, taking the Hessians completely by surprise and in ninety minutes the battle was over. It was a severe blow to the British cause but a catalyst for the Americans, convincing colonial leaders to continue the fight for independence.
The birth of Christ, of course, is the true reason for the season. We are living in a day when hatred for Christianity is so severe that the un-American un-Civil non-Libertarian dis-Union (ACLU) spends all of its efforts at this time of the year trying to remove nativity scenes from public places. Many businesses no longer allow their employees to say, "Merry Christmas." Just this week the Federal Reserve told a bank in Oklahoma that they had to remove all Christmas decorations they had put up in their lobby. It's an atheist attack upon the founding principles of our country and nothing else. It has nothing to do with "separation of church and state" or the Constitution. It is simply a small minority (1.8% of Americans claim to be atheist) of the population trying to bully everybody else into bowing to their ungodly will.
We won't do it. America was founded as "One nation under God," and as Ronald Reagan once enjoined us, "if we forget that ... we will be a nation gone under." It is high time we remember the Christ of Christmas, not only when we shop and tell the clerk "Merry Christmas," but at all times. Jesus is the reason for Christmas. Born in a lowly manger some 2,000 years ago, Jesus left the glory of heaven to become man so that He might redeem fallen mankind to Himself. Without that promise there is no hope for eternity. Do you know Christ as your Savior? Are you sure you are on your way to heaven? If you cannot assuredly answer these questions in the affirmative, may I encourage you to read the third page on my blog, entitled, A Free Gift.
To all of you who have faithfully read these postings over the last several months and to the many who have commented, mostly by e-mail but some here on the blog, my sincere thanks and I hope that you all have
A VERY MERRY CHRISTMAS.
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