The Danger of America's Anti-Gun Culture

Posted at RenewAmerica

The bestial act played out Friday last in the bucolic community of Newtown, Connecticut returns the nation to the question why? Why would such an act occur? What drives a young man to so horrific a crime?

If one is open to the truth the answer is quite simple —As a culture, we have assigned souls to guns while deemphasizing the souls of children.

It is the guns in our society not the lack of human feeling we are fostering in an unbelieving, post-Christian youth culture, that bear the responsibility of tragedies like the one in Newtown.

A secular culture cannot take in the fact that it is not enough to have a morality unattached to something greater than oneself. This detachment is illustrated by President Obama shedding a tear for the victims of a madman, children slaughtered in what is supposed to be the safest of environments, the classroom. Yet, he fervently advocates for a medical procedure that leads to the wholesale slaughter of some 3,200 children a day in what is supposed to be the safest place for a child, a mother’s womb.

Take for example a couple visits the doctor and has it confirmed they are expecting a child, their second. They bristle with excitement while telling their oldest they are about to have a sibling. The first child hears this news with much rejoicing, because “Inside Mommy is my new baby brother or sister”!

Now that same child overhears Mommy talking to a friend who is also pregnant who relates that she is going to terminate her pregnancy. The child later asks Mommy what that means—If the mother were to share the realities of abortion with her child, the child would be revolted. 

“Doesn’t Mrs. So and So love her baby like you love our new baby Mommy?” Again, if the mother shares the truth of what motivates people to choose abortion, in that child’s mind, doesn’t human life become less precious? When weighed against a warped pragmatism, a baby’s life has just become less important than whatever motivated the other mother to come to the decision abortion is a better “choice” than human life.

If as a culture we do not uphold the sanctity of life at every stage, why bother at any stage? This is the sometimes, unconscious thought process that is impossible for many of our youth to ignore, particularly if they are emotionally or mentally unstable. Frankly, this is the natural thought process of anyone who thinks logically really. It’s the reason sane, rational people oppose unfettered abortion on demand.

Despite the convoluted thinking of sportscasters and sports writers like Bob Costas and Jason Whitlock commenting on the Jovan Belcher murder/suicide, America’s gun culture is not the problem; it is our anti-people culture that drives the Adam Lanza’s of the world. The desire for elements in our society with far too much influence, to advance the idea that human life is no more important than an individual’s personal choice and oftentimes less important than the earth itself.

Whenever we have a mass shooting, the left immediately begins a coordinated tirade against an armed American citizenry. Today, America vilifies the tool as if the tool is the motivator. That childish thought process is fueled by a need to deny the inherent flaws in human nature, flaws that are exacerbated if not counteracted by an obligation to a law giving Creator - a Creator the liberals fight without ceasing to marginalize.

Putting aside the logical truth that the real problem leading to the all too prevalent incidents like Newtown is a lack of Christian morality amongst our youth—We have the pragmatic reality that the problem is a restriction on guns, rather than the guns themselves.

The left hates the argument that if the teachers, or another adult were armed at Sandy Hook Elementary School, Mr. Lanza’s attack may have been halted and lives saved. Tyrants with guns will always oppress the unarmed. Those who cry for fewer guns in the hands of a responsible citizenry rush headlong towards tyranny’s dreaded embrace.

We have bred the sense of duty, the responsibility of gun ownership in the pursuit of securing American society from the tyranny of criminals and politicians out of the American psyche. A government that seeks to limit a citizen’s ability to protect his or her own community by being armed is one of a suspicious nature.

Either such a government seeks a disarmed citizenry to exert it’s will on the people, or it is a government populated with fools detached from reality.

The Founders of this great nation were neither. Thomas Jefferson in his letter to Justice John Cartwright on June 5, 1824 said: “The constitutions of most of our States assert that all power is inherent in the people; that … it is their right and duty to be at all times arme[d]."

In a society like ours, the primary function of a firearm, where one does not need to wrest a living from the land, is protection. Not just personal protection, but the duty to protect society from tyrants like Mr. Lanza and others who prey upon elementary schools, movie theaters, college campuses to do their evil, or anywhere gun restrictions are greatest.

As an American an armed citizen has the duty to “secure the blessings of liberty.” This is a vow meant for “We the people,” not the government. When government seeks to restrict the Constitution it ceases to be “the people” and is an entity separate from the people.

Tyranny isn’t ended with platitudes and good intent alone. It takes the ability to mete out justice through the equal strength of arms. Otherwise you and I are just dead meat. American men used to understand that concept.  However, of late, liberal “progressivism” has fostered the idea that we are victims who should not resist evil ourselves, rather leave the resistance to others. That is an exceedingly dangerous mindset.

Most citizens, unfortunately, do not know that the “others” that include law enforcement and government are not obligated to protect Americans from crime. Moreover, officers of the law are seldom around when crimes occur.

America’s anti-gun culture, as propagated by the Democrat party and American liberalism in general is not inspired by a desire for peace, peace must be secured--It is ignorance and cowardice that is the inspiration when spouted by the left's puppets. It is tyranny when ordered by the puppet masters in government and the media.

In a letter to his fifteen-year-old nephew, Peter Carr, Thomas Jefferson gave him this advice regarding his exercise:

[I] advise the gun. While this gives a moderate exercise to the body, it gives boldness, enterprise, and independence to the mind. Games played with the ball and others of that nature, are too violent for the body and stamp no character on the mind. Let your gun therefore be the constant companion of your walks.

What changed in our society when most today would prohibit a fifteen-year-old of possessing, or carrying a gun? Let alone suggesting that responsible gun ownership “stamps character on the mind.”  That is a question that wants looking into, not whether semi-automatic rifles should be readily available.

I'll end with a few words from the ultimate Law Giver who knew the nature of the world He was sending His beloved disciples forth into, the world He was about to make the ultimate sacrifice for.  Jesus told them to make provision for the more dangerous mission they faced when they left the close confines of their own lands with these words:

And he said unto them, when I sent you without purse, and scrip, and shoes, lacked ye any thing? And they said, nothing. Then said he unto them, But now, he that hath a purse, let him take it, and likewise his scrip: and he that hath no sword, let him sell his garment, and buy one ( Luke 22:35, 36).

Digital Publius

Whirlwind a Comin'

There is a fellow who calls himself  “Ramius” that pops up on my Digital Publius blog from time to time—this person can’t seem to figure out the proper way to post on my blog so the header on his posts always comes up “Anonymous” and then he signs it “Ramius” at the end of his usually flippant but otherwise vacuous comments. He left a question this morning that I have decided to answer and post in short blog form.

Anonymous August 16, 2012 2:37 AM

If the election is under God's sovereign hand as you say then why did the two candidates who claimed to have heard the voice of God telling them to run, dropped out? [sic]

What will you say when Obama wins his second term? That God heard your prayers and said NO! ?? Too funny!

-Ramius

My response:

Digital Publius August 16, 2012 6:40 AM

God telling them to run is not the same as God telling them they would win! There is a purpose in giving America a choice too. Whom we reject shows the spiritual position of a nation just as much as whom we accept and elect. The God of the Holy Bible is always more interested in our spiritual condition than our temporal.

Obama has been God's punishment for this nation and I believe that if he wins, Romney will also be a punishment. It will be a punishment that we have earned. Regardless of who garners the most votes in November, the only winner this cycle is Satan.

President Obama was necessary to bring this nation to a point where we are no longer strong enough or relevant enough to effect world outcomes, especially as it pertains to Israel. (look up sequestration)  It is only through a President like Obama that the Islamic nations could gain the strength and religious audacity growing ever stronger in the Mid-East to embolden the Islamic nations to attack Israel as foretold in the Holy Bible.

President Obama's inaction and in some cases, encouragement of the Islamic brotherhood and the like in places like Iran, Libya, Egypt, Syria... Has laid the groundwork. His obvious hostility towards Israel and the work he and the Democrats are doing to destroy this nations economy and erode our military, have put us in an unprecedented position.

America has always had the resources to absorb the tragedies besetting our nation whether they be man-made or natural in origin. President Obama, in his efforts to weaken and therefore equalize the American economy with the rest of the world, has placed us in a position where that may not be true in the near future.

We as a nation are very weak by every measure right now--but especially spiritually. We have rejected God with the choices of who will represent us in this Presidential election left and right and we will reap the whirlwind because of it.

To believe that electing a man like Mitt Romney, a man who has rejected the God of the Holy Bible will be the answer to Obama is foolish and again speaks directly to our lack of spiritual maturity today. Satan cannot and will not cast out Satan.

If you are a Christian who believes in the concept of false religion, (as is clearly taught in the Holy Bible) you have to know that the source of that falsehood is Satan. Regardless of how nice the face of the LDS church is, it is anti-Christ and therefore anyone who chooses that faith is an enemy of God and man.

If you object to Barack Obama on moral grounds, examples; abortion breaks the sixth commandment and his tacit support of special gay rights and marriage breaks number seven, how do you not reject Romney on the same grounds when he breaks the very first commandment of God? Do you really think he is the answer?

" Providence has given to our people the choice of their rulers, and it is the duty, as well as the privilege and interest of our Christian nation to select and prefer Christians for their rulers." John Jay, Source: October 12, 1816. The Correspondence and Public Papers of John Jay, Henry P. Johnston, ed., (New York: Burt Franklin, 1970), Vol. IV, p. 393.

"Whether our religion permits Christians to vote for infidel rulers is a question which merits more consideration than it seems yet to have generally received either from the clergy or the laity. It appears to me that what the prophet said to Jehoshaphat about his attachment to Ahab ["Shouldest thou help the ungodly and love them that hate the Lord?" 2 Chronicles 19:2] affords a salutary lesson." [ John Jay, The Correspondence and Public Papers of John Jay, 1794-1826, Henry P. Johnston, editor (New York: G.P. Putnam's Sons, 1893), Vol. IV, p.365]

II Chronicles 19:

1 And Jehoshaphat the king of Judah returned to his house in peace to Jerusalem.

2 And Jehu the son of Hanani the seer went out to meet him, and said to king Jehoshaphat, Shouldest thou help the ungodly, and love them that hate the LORD? therefore is wrath upon thee from before the LORD.

Zechariah 11:

1 Open thy doors, O Lebanon, that the fire may devour thy cedars.

2 Howl, fir tree; for the cedar is fallen; because the mighty are spoiled: howl, O ye oaks of Bashan; for the forest of the vintage is come down.

3 ¶There is a voice of the howling of the shepherds; for their glory is spoiled: a voice of the roaring of young lions; for the pride of Jordan is spoiled.

4 Thus saith the LORD my God; Feed the flock of the slaughter;

5 Whose possessors slay them, and hold themselves not guilty: and they that sell them say, Blessed be the LORD; for I am rich: and their own shepherds pity them not.

6 For I will no more pity the inhabitants of the land, saith the LORD: but, lo, I will deliver the men every one into his neighbour's hand, and into the hand of his king: and they shall smite the land, and out of their hand I will not deliver them.

7 And I will feed the flock of slaughter, even you, O poor of the flock. And I took unto me two staves; the one I called Beauty, and the other I called Bands; and I fed the flock.

8 Three shepherds also I cut off in one month; and my soul lothed them, and their soul also abhorred me.

9 Then said I, I will not feed you: that that dieth, let it die; and that that is to be cut off, let it be cut off; and let the rest eat every one the flesh of another.

10 ¶And I took my staff, even Beauty, and cut it asunder, that I might break my covenant which I had made with all the people.

11 And it was broken in that day: and so the poor of the flock that waited upon me knew that it was the word of the LORD.

12 And I said unto them, If ye think good, give me my price; and if not, forbear. So they weighed for my price thirty pieces of silver.

13 And the LORD said unto me, Cast it unto the potter: a goodly price that I was prised at of them. And I took the thirty pieces of silver, and cast them to the potter in the house of the LORD.

14 Then I cut asunder mine other staff, even Bands, that I might break the brotherhood between Judah and Israel.

15 ¶And the LORD said unto me, Take unto thee yet the instruments of a foolish shepherd.

16 For, lo, I will raise up a shepherd in the land, which shall not visit those that be cut off, neither shall seek the young one, nor heal that that is broken, nor feed that that standeth still: but he shall eat the flesh of the fat, and tear their claws in pieces.

17 Woe to the idol shepherd that leaveth the flock! the sword shall be upon his arm, and upon his right eye: his arm shall be clean dried up, and his right eye shall be utterly darkened.

Digital Publius

Root Of Bitterness

Originally posted at Renew America June 19, 2012


As any good capitalist knows, the greatest and most important type of capital is human capital. The United States of America needs more people. We should be building more cities and towns, encouraging policies that improve proper, legal immigration and we need to have more babies.


We railed against the left for having "Bush Derangement Syndrome" but many of us on the right aren't much better. So great is the enmity felt for President Obama by conservatives, we fail to recognize when he may be doing something right for a change — Like the "deferred action" immigration policy he announced last week.

The Conservative web was awash with posts lambasting the President's move. I had an instant messaging conversation with one of the columnists I hold in highest regard yesterday on this issue. I asked her "isn't this, as President Obama pointed out in his speech, essentially a President Bush plan he is enacting?

Keep in mind here, this is not the ridiculous Dream Act the Democrats came up with a while back — this plan is more akin to what has been said is contained in the Marco Rubio plan and as I said, much like President Bush's plan.

Immigration reform is really a conservative Republican issue that has been high jacked by the left to curry political favor with the increasingly powerful Hispanic vote. The tragedy is in the fact that intrinsically, the Latin vote should be a conservative vote. The problem is the ham-fisted way Republicans have handled this issue.

No one is more ideologically conservative than Hispanics. Almost everything Latin Americans hold dear socially and politically, the left is diametrically opposed to — But we are handing them over to the left by allowing the Democrats to appear more sympathetic and take-charge on immigration reform.

"Follow peace with all men, and holiness, without which no man shall see the Lord: Looking diligently lest any man fail of the grace of God; lest any root of bitterness springing up trouble you, and thereby many be defiled;" Hebrews 12:14,15

A Root of Bitterness implied impure worship, bad doctrine and false ideas that can corrupt and direct people down the wrong path spiritually and temporally. We are so busy chanting "Anybody but Obama" we chose the man with the least inspired solutions to our nations ills to be our candidate for President.

Many grassroots conservatives feel the right chose Mitt Romney not because we thought he was the best man, but because so many bought into the "best candidate with the chance to win" meme. Repeated ad nauseam by establishment talking heads on television and radio it became fact. Republican voters unfortunately missed an opportunity to field a candidate with a more meaningful and fleshed out agenda to address the nations problems. Romney has been very weak on solutions regarding immigration reform in particular.

Most of the ideas President Obama and the left propose are woefully wrongheaded — but not everything. Not this plan. The President's finger wagging and expressed High Dudgeon at being interrupted aside, we need to get out in front of the illegal immigrant issue and claim the votes that should rightfully be ours.

We mustn't let our bitterness towards President Obama dissuade us from doing the right thing. Inaction and a perceived unsympathetic view towards immigrants will be used against us.

It was interesting to see Bill Kristol and Karl Rove essentially saying the same thing on Fox News Sunday. Even the establishment Right recognizes that this is an issue we are getting the crap kicked out of us on. Congressional Republicans need to take the lead and put forth and pass the Rubio Plan before the left gets all the credit.

A Summary of Rubio's plan in his own words:

"The plan basically would award the kids who meet a certain criteria — they got here by a certain age, have lived here, graduated from high school, don't have a criminal record, want to go to college — they get what, in essence, is a student visa, and thereafter, a work visa.

And after some period of time, probably 10 years, we would then allow them to access the immigration system just like any non-immigrant visa holder in the United States would. ... So they'd be no worse off than anybody else, but no better off, either. No special path. Just the same path as everyone else."

It was the right and compassionate thing to do when President Bush proposed similar policy; it has not changed since and now President Obama has commandeered it. Pass Marco Rubio's Plan in Congress and the President's actions last week are cancelled out.

Stop crying and act, make it legal and take credit for it! No one is suggesting lawlessness should prevail, or amnesty proffered for those who have played hob with our nation's statutes. However the innocent should not be punished for the actions of guilty parents. The words inscribed on Lady Liberty:

"Give me your tired, your poor, your huddled masses yearning to breathe free,

The wretched refuse of your teeming shore. Send these, the homeless, tempest-tost to me, I lift my lamp beside the golden door!" Echo the Words of the Lord found in Isaiah chapter 58:6-12 

Is not this the fast that I have chosen? To loose the bands of wickedness, to undo the heavy burdens, and to let the oppressed go free, and that ye break every yoke?

Is it not to deal thy bread to the hungry, and that thou bring the poor that are cast out to thy house? When thou seest the naked, that thou cover him; and that thou hide not thyself from thine own flesh?

Then shall thy light break forth as the morning, and thine health shall spring forth speedily: and thy righteousness shall go before thee; the glory of the Lord shall be thy reward.

Then shalt thou call, and the Lord shall answer; thou shalt cry, and he shall say, Here I am. If thou take away from the midst of thee the yoke, the putting forth of the finger, and speaking vanity;

And if thou draw out thy soul to the hungry, and satisfy the afflicted soul; then shall thy light rise in obscurity, and thy darkness be as the noon day: And the Lord shall guide thee continually, and satisfy thy soul in drought, and make fat thy bones: and thou shalt be like a watered garden, and like a spring of water, whose waters fail not.

And they that shall be of thee shall build the old waste places: thou shalt raise up the foundations of many generations; and thou shalt be called, The repairer of the breach, The restorer of paths to dwell in.

We cannot allow a root of bitterness to spring up in our hearts in the face of the left's wrong doings — as Conservatives we must be better than leftists and not defile ourselves by stooping to their level. Gainsaying everything the left does to the detriment of what is good is not a recipe for avoiding the precipice the nation is poised to fall over.

Digital Publius

Anybody But Obomney

Originally posted at Renew America

Anybody but Obama! That is the right's battle cry moving into the November elections. Do those reading this who consider themselves conservative really believe that simply installing a person in the White House who happens to have an "R" next to his name, and who has contemporaneously taken up spouting conservative bromides, will be enough to right a wayward ship of state?

Is the temporal well being of the nation all we are concerned with? Is it even possible to have a temporally healthy America if a nation's leadership and people are spiritually unhealthy? Do values matter anymore?

If values do matter — is it important to know the source those values flow from? If a leader's "values" are similar enough to your own, does it matter where he gets his values? Do you think it matters to God?

Think carefully about this next question: Should the source of values be immutable or can the source be situational? What is the conservative answer to that last question?

Now what is the Christian answer to that question? Are the conservative and Christian answers in concord?

Are conservative and Christian synonymous? Are Christian conservative and Republican synonymous? The establishment right certainly hopes so. No, that last statement is inaccurate — the establishment left and right believes it is. So much so, that we have had in the last election cycle, and this one too, the candidate whom the Christian right has the least enthusiasm for.

I should qualify that last sentence — the spiritually minded Christians have no enthusiasm for our present candidate — the "anybody but Obama crowd" doesn't think it matters whom as long as they have the aforementioned "R" and what the Holy Bible calls "a form of godliness."

Our presumptive nominee certainly looks the part, but then so did Saul! And for many, so did Barack Obama! Is it enough to have " a form of godliness?" For a lot of Christian conservatives it seems so. I know many Christians who will vote for any candidate simply because he is the only alternative to Obama.

The right may have been for someone else earlier on, but they will conform — after all, anybody but Obama right?

Is that the right way of thinking?

The term " a form of godliness" comes from the Second Book of Timothy, lets look at it in context, chapter 3:

1 This know also, that in the last days perilous times shall come. 2 For men shall be lovers of their own selves, covetous, boasters, proud, blasphemers, disobedient to parents, unthankful, unholy, 3 Without natural affection, trucebreakers, false accusers, incontinent, fierce, despisers of those that are good, 4 Traitors, heady, highminded, lovers of pleasures more than lovers of God; 5 Having a form of godliness, but denying the power thereof: from such turn away.

Well, many of you will say: "That may sound like Barack Obama, but it doesn't sound like any of our candidates." Doesn't it? Frankly it sounds like all of us.

The difference is some will come to recognize they are in the reprobate state described above and choose to leave it by accepting the God of the Holy Bible's precepts and redemptive work through Christ Jesus — while the people being addressed above have chosen to deny the God of the Holy Bible in favor of other gods or what suits them temporally and spiritually.

The likely Republican candidate has been a Mormon all of his life and for some, despite the grievous differences between Mormonism and Biblical Christianity and because Mormonism looks similar to Christianity using some of the same language and because Mormons seem outwardly to be good people, that is enough.

The apparent Republican favorite was a pro-choice Mormon when it was politically expedient for him to be pro-choice. Now that he is seeking the conservative vote he is what most conservatives want him to be, a pro-life Mormon. The "Christian" God is always pro-life. Yes, even in cases of rape and incest.

God is immutable — it is that immutability that prompted the founders of this nation to base our country's moral laws on the unchanging tenets of the Holy Bible. This is also the reason they acknowledged our rights flow not from the situational ethics of an ever shifting human morality, but from the Creator God, the Author and Sustainer of all.

"Men love to gratify their own lusts, more than to please God and do their duty. When every man is eager for what he can get, and anxious to keep what he has, this makes men dangerous to one another. When men do not fear God, they will not regard man." — Matthew Henry

Those are wise words from Matthew Henry's commentary on II Timothy 3:5. I have said to many over the years that after accepting the saving grace of Christ and becoming a born again believer, I could not figure out how I could vote for any of the Democrats on the national stage and still stay true to the God of the Holy Bible.

You cannot be a pro-choice Christian if you believe what the God of the Holy Bible says in His Word. You can't advocate for gay rights either. So how do you vote for a party or a person who makes advancing issues like those a top priority?

When a politician says he can disregard his Christian faith when considering political decisions he does not fear God — he fears public opinion.

"God is to be loved above all; but a carnal mind, full of enmity against him, prefers any thing before him, especially carnal pleasure. A form of godliness is very different from the power; from such as are found to be hypocrites, real Christians must withdraw." — Matthew Henry

A Christian is not just someone who appears so outwardly, showing a form of godliness, looking to be a good family man or choosing to abstain from smoking, or drinking — but one who is one inwardly. A Christian man does not change his convictions to suit his desire for power, wealth, and comfort. He does not seek to conform his faith to the world, but rather allows his faith to inform his decisions and politics.

When we on the Christian right disregard our faith and what it teaches about false religion and the lessons the Holy Bible teaches about people who pick leaders by appearance and expediency, how are we any different from those who fell for "Hope and Change"?

Just as the establishment left counts on minorities to mindlessly vote for the Democrat candidate without thinking about how ineffective and in some cases down right destructive liberal policies have been to them and the nation on the whole — The establishment right takes it for granted that the Christian right is synonymous with Republican.

If that is indeed the state of affairs with the Christian right, you are placing the temporal above the spiritual and you will be denying the God who says:

If my people, which are called by my name, shall humble themselves, and pray, and seek my face, and turn from their wicked ways; then will I hear from heaven, and will forgive their sin, and will heal their land. II Chronicles 7:14

It takes a great deal more than simply being able to identify the candidate who has an "R" next to his name, someone who woos you now that you seemingly haven't any choice. We need more than that to prompt God's healing. There is always a choice — you can choose the lesser of two evils because he is not Barack Obama — or you can simply reject evil all together.

This is why it is not possible for a person to be born a Christian. Christianity is a choice that one makes, a choice that brings about a change in the chooser. I was pro-choice before accepting Christ, but it did not take long after studying Christ's words to realize I couldn't stay pro-choice, so I changed my position on the issue to conform to Christ! I rejected the world's expediency.

Let me end with this example of what you get when you lose sight of the immutable. The Mormon god and his elders upheld the notion that no Black man could serve as a Temple Priest or take part in Temple ceremonies until 1978 when it became to hot politically for the LDS to maintain this prejudice. They then received from their god "revelation" that he had changed his mind and Blacks could serve.

Bruce McConkle, then a member of the Latter Day Saint's Quorum of the Twelve Apostles, was present when they received the 1978 revelation on priesthood. He wrote of the occasion:

"It was during this prayer that the revelation came. The Spirit of the Lord rested upon us all; we felt something akin to what happened on the day of Pentecost and at the Kirtland Temple. From the midst of eternity, the voice of God, conveyed by the power of the Spirit, spoke to his prophet. The message was that the time had now come to offer the fullness of the everlasting gospel, including celestial marriage, and the priesthood, and the blessings of the temple, to all men, without reference to race or color, solely on the basis of personal worthiness. And we all heard the same voice, received the same message, and became personal witnesses that the word received was the mind and will and voice of the Lord."

The Mormons got this revelation some two thousand years after the Holy Bible declared:

There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither bond nor free, there is neither male nor female: for ye are all one in Christ Jesus. Galatians 3:28

When the Apostle Paul gave instructions for choosing church leadership in I Timothy chapter 3 race is conspicuously absent from the list of criteria. Yet the Mormon's did not get from their god that as they put it, "The message was that the time had now come to offer the fullness of the everlasting gospel, including celestial marriage, and the priesthood, and the blessings of the temple, to all men," until 1978.

It is one thing when a person changes his mind — it is quite another when a person's god changes his mind. If a man's god is mercurial, can there be any wonder why the man following the mercurial god is also less than stable position ally on moral issues? If he is unstable on spiritual matters can he truly be trusted on temporal issues? The first Chief Justice of the Supreme Court didn't think so.

"Providence has given to our people the choice of their rulers, and it is the duty, as well as the privilege and interest of our Christian nation to select and prefer Christians for their rulers." — John Jay

Anybody but Obama right? Go with that! As long as you think spirituality doesn't matter and just any god will do so long as he looks good and says the right things.

I'm not putting my "Hope" for "Change" in anybody but the God revealed in the Holy Bible, even when that means voting "None of the above" for President and voting only for the House, Senate and the other choices come Election Day.

Digital Publius
© Hassan Nurullah

A Graduate Course in Propaganda

Originally posted at American Thinker blog

If you are at all a political creature and you have not read Jodi Kantor’s New York Times article “Michelle Obama and the Evolution of a First Lady” you really ought to.

Ms. Kantor’s article is easily one of the subtlest, most effective pieces of propaganda I have ever read.

The article perfectly illustrates to the savvy, why the left controls the narrative in contemporary American politics--they are so much better at it than the right. After reading this article I was compelled to click on Ms. Kantor’s highlighted by-line, as I was sure she was educated in the Ivy League and I was not wrong, Columbia quod Harvard.

Like a certain wooden horse made famous in The Aeneid, the First Lady is merely a delivery system, for the articles true intent. This was a very artfully constructed assurance to the hard left that President Obama intends to go even further to the left than his staff "allowed" in his first term. Virgil would be proud and so would the author’s highbrow instructors—this is an elegant work of agitprop worthy of Pravda. 

This was written specifically for the Matt Damons, Sean Penns of the world. The hardline leftists who have been critical of President Obama for not being more forcefully liberal, not doing enough to drive a hardcore pink agenda.

I am not certain whether the Obama administration’s term in office should be identified as comedy or tragedy, but Ms. Kantor has deftly cast Michelle Obama as the play’s heroine. She is first portrayed as a type of Antigone, defiantly standing for what is right in the face of the President’s politically sensitive staff.

While the President’s inner circle, Rahm Emmanuel, Robert Gibbs and the like, would have preferred the First Lady play the more biddable roll of Ismene. The staffers wanted the First Lady to aid in encouraging the President to forgo his more leftist ambitions to advance the greater Democrat Party good.

By the end of the article Mrs. Obama is more a Cassandra who knows what is best prophetically for America. But unlike the Cassandra of old, Mrs. Obama will not be silenced; her predictions will be heard and heeded after a deftly manipulated “Change” within the administration’s power structure.

Ms. Kantor’s article really represents the acme of the sort of work the right finds mawkish, but is so very effective when spoon-fed to the easily manipulated liberals and the fence sitting, often morally ambiguous and spongy independents. You will see no such work emanating from the pens of conservative apologists or polemicists. The right doesn’t understand how really, because the right sees virtue only in success and the ideal, whereas the left can see how to spin failure into virtue.

“Woe unto them that call evil good, and good evil; that put darkness for light, and light for darkness; that put bitter for sweet, and sweet for bitter!” Isaiah 5:20

These words are utterly meaningless to liberals. What this Biblical passage warns against has become the left’s specialty.

The Obama administration has been a failure no less epic than any poem by Virgil or Homer—no less tragic than any play from Thebes. Yet the left celebrates dysfunction as chronicled in Jodi Kantor’s article and turns it into a thinly veiled promise that if granted another term, centrist compromise is out the window.

The First lady has not evolved, nor has her husband, but they will be set free in a second term. There will be no more subterfuge—the belly of the horse will spring open, there will be no lesser kings like Odysseus working behind the scenes to restrain King Agamemnon.

We will see a reemerging President Obama—no longer a tragic Greek emperor, now recast an American hero, an ersatz David Farragut staring down his backward right wing enemies, defiantly shouting; “Damn the torpedoes, full speed ahead”. This is precisely what the hardcore leftist wants and they shall have it, if the President wins a second term in November.

The right is very good at serving up red meat to stir up it’s own base. Yet the right is woefully bad at selling conservative ideas to anyone not already smart enough to know how bad the leftist agenda is for the country. And that is why the right is losing the culture war and why the country continues to decline spiritually and temporally.

If it were not so, men like Thomas Sowell or Peter Schiff would be seen and heard more. Men like Dr. Walter Williams would be a more frequent quest and we would see less of Dr. Marc Lamont Hill on Fox News.

Unfortunately the “conservatives” who have the loudest voices in America, The Bill O’Reillys, Ann Coulters, Michael Medveds… Are either more interested in advancing themselves, or too mindful of how they will be perceived, (mustn’t be considered too far to the right,) to mount a true offensive against the dark forces overtaking our culture.

This is the reason the Roves and Krauthammers fight so desperately hard to ensure a safe man like Mitt Romney secures the Republican Nomination for President. Better to appear the good presidential candidate than to actually have any real ideas to substantively change the nation for the better. Real ideas are an instant disqualifier sure to get you labeled unelectable.

The right screams anyone but Obama—but that anyone has to be just conservative enough to win and not a wit more. And we are satisfied with that? We must be, because that is all I ever hear. And that is all we ever get.

Where is the right’s Jodi Kantor?

Digital Publius

© Hassan Nurullah