The Party Poopers

It is rather for us to be here dedicated to the great task remaining before us -- that from these honored dead we take increased devotion to that cause for which they gave the last full measure of devotion -- that we here highly resolve that these dead shall not have died in vain -- that this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom -- and that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth. – Abraham Lincoln

“Let that be your last battlefield!” The concept of ‘government of, by and for the people’ is an idea that has joined the heavenly choir invisible. It has ceased to be!

I say that because with the arrival of the 24 hour news cycle – comes the accompanying manipulation, nay rather the shaping of opinion the news cycle affords those with vested interest in seeing the status quo in America be maintained at all costs. Somehow, the establishment – on both the left and the right has managed to neuter the Tea Party movement, nullifying its considerable power and ability to influence the Republican primary process.

The Republican establishment, together with the media Just before the arrival of the primary voting season, has guided the race to the point where the candidates least favored by the Tea Party have now become the Republican Party cause célèbres. All the while marginalizing the Tea Party faithful.

After much hand wringing, weeping and gnashing of teeth -- the republican establishment has finally succeeded. They have at last gotten their conservative uncle, who believes in the quaint ideas so fundamental to our once great republic, out of sight – ensconced safely in the rear of the house – where their progressive friends can’t see him.

With great gladness, the Sunday morning talking heads were able to declare in no uncertain terms that it is finally coming to a point where it is winnowed out to a two-man race between Mitt Romney and Newt Gingrich. Gleefully, able at long last to be free of having to speak of conservative ‘uncles’ Herman Cain, Rick Perry or, gasp ‘auntie’ Michelle Bachmann.

Now the republican establishment and the media can get down to the brass tacks of picking candidates for us -- unencumbered by actually discussing candidates with substantive ideas. The media can discuss freely how the upcoming election will be a struggle between the 99% and the 1%. Just the way they like it.

On his website, Mitt Romney’s “plan” has exactly 12 pages devoted to tax policy. There is much there bemoaning President Obama and the left’s ideas and some lovely charts that illustrate what the problems are, but no charts explaining the impact of his “plan”. In short, Romney’s near term goal as president will be to:

• Maintain marginal rates at current levels

His long term goals:

• Lower the corporate income tax rate to 25 percent

• Transition to a “territorial” tax system (whatever that means)

Romney pays lip service to things like eliminating death taxes and reducing, not eliminating taxes on savings and investment. 



Newt’s corporate tax plan reduces Romney’s 25% to 12.5% and suggests moving towards a simpler 15% flat tax option for individuals. But like Romney, Newt neglects to explain the real impact, in numbers, of his plan in relatable terms. 



Contrast the current frontrunner’s plans with the comprehensive clarification provided by Herman Cain when explaining the economic impact of his 999 Plan. Then ask yourself, which candidates are offering mere window dressings to hide the fact their plans will maintain the status quo as well as continuing the excessive reach and power of lobbyists? 



The constant refrain heard without end during Herman Cain’s rise in the polls was that he could not win because he lacked campaign infrastructure and funding. Never mind Newt Gingrich’s senior team quit on him back in June.

I have heard that Mr. Gingrich’s people are beginning to return now that Newt is politically a going concern. But this begs the question, or at least it ought to: If, at the beginning, Mr. Gingrich couldn’t get his staff to buy in and commit for the long haul, what does that say about his leadership?

When the money began to flow into the Cain campaign – the liberal media and the republican establishment had to switch tactics.

Suddenly there was a bevy of women accusing Mr. Cain of sexual impropriety. The media reacted with ruthless efficiency -- the accusers vowed to come together in a joint press conference so they could bolster each other and expose this loutish brute of a man.

Soon Mr. Cain acquired the services of his own well-heeled attorney and a video depicting the results of a voice stress analysis began to make the rounds in the blogosphere and appeared to reveal the dubious nature of Sharon Bialek’s testimony. Couple that with the fact that her own former fiancé came forward only to distance himself from Ms. Bialek -- it is no wonder the first Cain accusers’ joint presser with latter day accuser Karen Kraushaar was abruptly cancelled.

The other ladies never did step forward. 

Meanwhile a deathly silence has befallen the Herman Cain as sexual predator meme. It didn’t help the ladies cause, or the media’s for that matter when it was discovered they both had ties to the Democrat machine. Nevertheless, Herman Cain’s character has been besmirched and, after the fact, it appears as if the shallow have little regard for the truth.

After the failure of the sexual harassment controversy, the effort to marginalize Mr. Cain began in earnest. The media worked feverishly to paint him as a fellow with inadequate experience in foreign policy. This narrative peaked with an interview Mr. Cain granted the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel.

During an interview for a print article, Mr. Cain paused to collect his thoughts while answering a question on Libya, not expecting that the interview being taped would be shown to the public. The Milwaukee Sentinel made the pause the story by showing a truncated clip of the interview highlighting Mr. Cain's pause. The media framed it, as a sign of confusion and a lack of foreign policy know how. 



It doesn’t matter that when you watch the full interview Mr. Cain answers the question correctly and that he was also right about his understanding of a union’s collective bargaining issue the interviewer tried to gainsay Mr. Cain on. The pause became the story, not Cain’s accurate answer to the question.

The wrongheadedness of the notion repeated ad nauseam by the so-called conservative intelligentsia that we ought to back the candidate with the “best chance of winning” as opposed to the candidate with the demonstrably better ideas for addressing our national problems is indicative of where we are as a people.

Most people prefer style over substance, the puffed up and vainglorious, ever ready with quips and professorial diatribes rather than plain talk and directness. Herman Cain’s one webpage dedicated to his 999 Plan says more than the dozens of pages on tax reform and fiscal policy found in Romney’s downloadable PDF.

I began this offering with the closing paragraph of President Lincoln’s Gettysburg Address. The beginning of the address consists of just five sentences. This most treasured of Presidential utterances harkens back to a time when “brevity [was] the soul of wit”.

If Newt followed honest Abe in a debate, Mr. Gingrich would essentially say the exact same thing Abe did -- only with an allusion to Jerome or Pliny the Elder and a stern rebuke aimed at the moderator thrown in for good measure. I’m certain Mr. Gingrich would most assuredly get a louder round of applause than Abe.

Meanwhile Mitt Romney would beat them both because he ‘looks more presidential’ despite saying even less than both of his opponents.

Where is our discernment? Where is the Tea Party? Are we really about to prove the Cain Praxis true, that: 



“Any truly conservative candidate popular with the grass roots, regardless of competency, is deemed unelectable by conservative leadership in favor of the most generic alternative.” 



All Herman Cain has done during his forty-year career is take over situations where someone else failed and turned those failures around and made them massive successes. Mr. Cain is a problem solver and isn’t that what we need to head the Executive branch?

When I think of our current ‘frontrunners’ it reminds me of Christ’s description of the heady priests of His day: 



Then spake Jesus to the multitude, and to his disciples, Saying, The scribes and the Pharisees sit in Moses' seat: All therefore whatsoever they bid you observe, that observe and do; but do not ye after their works: for they say, and do not. For they bind heavy burdens and grievous to be borne, and lay them on men's shoulders; but they themselves will not move them with one of their fingers. But all their works they do for to be seen of men: they make broad their phylacteries, and enlarge the borders of their garments, And love the uppermost rooms at feasts, and the chief seats in the synagogues, Matthew 23: 1-6

Is it really only important that we field a candidate that Karl Rove and Charles Krauthammer and the rest of the establishment thinks has a chance to win? Why aren’t we backing the best man available, with the best ideas, throwing our full weight behind him and fighting like our nation’s future depends on it?

Snap out of it and put the kettle on -- this Tea Party isn’t over! Or is it?

Digital Publius

Zuccotti Zombie Apocalypse

They are among us! They look like you and me but be not deceived. They shamble en masse in search of places to aimlessly occupy. 

As their numbers grow, they infect an area and begin to fester. Left unabated, they send up a putrid stench accompanied by a stentorian cacophony. Driven by primal urges, the zuccotti feed, copulate and defecate all in a common area giving rise to pestilence and violence.

The fevered minds of the zuccotti formulate incoherent messages giving rise to discordant paradigms which perpetuate their circumstances. All those who seek to communicate and understand these creatures, have their attempts at reason rejected. These brave souls eventually recoil–stunned–minds reeling as they are subjected to one vicious regress after another.

Unchecked, the zuccotti will infect your families, your neighbors and friends. We see their withering effect on society as members of the media and left wing political leaders who seem particularly susceptible; regularly succumb to this plague.

Unlike their un-dead zombie kin, the zuccotti cannot be stopped by delivering force to their heads--the brain is not what motivates them, the Zuccotti brain is too primitive and limited. Their faculties far too underdeveloped compared to the higher operating zombie brain, especially if the subject is infected at an early age.

Though it has been observed that when it strikes a more mature victim, brain decay is greatly accelerated until the subject reaches a mental and emotional equilibrium, matching the childlike state exhibited by younger subjects.

This brain atrophying malady strikes and spreads virulently, attacking liberal enclaves. Groups found to be more logical and objective who rely on facts with a firm grip on reality, while completely immune to the fever, are nonetheless burdened with the aftermath of a zuccotti attack.

Knowing the source of this affliction is not nature but rather nurture combined with sin-nature as conceived in the most diabolical leftist labs and think tanks in the world. These sources specialize in confusing feelings with thinking.

The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked: who can know it? Jeremiah 17:9

We must guard our children’s minds jealously and raise them up in the admonition of the Lord lest they too slip into the mind numbing clutches of the zuccotti!

Now the Spirit speaketh expressly, that in the latter times some shall depart from the faith, giving heed to seducing spirits, and doctrines of devils; Speaking lies in hypocrisy; having their conscience seared with a hot iron; I Timothy 4:1.2

Ere the rise of the zuccotti.

Digital Publius

© Hassan Nurullah

A Tale of Two Movements

It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness, it was the epoch of belief, it was the epoch of incredulity, it was the season of Light, it was the season of Darkness, it was the spring of hope, it was the winter of despair, we had everything before us, we had nothing before us, we were all going direct to Heaven, we were all going direct the other way — in short, the period was so far like the present period, that some of its noisiest authorities insisted on its being received, for good or for evil, in the superlative degree of comparison only. — Charles Dickens


Amazing how relevant the opening to Dickens' "A Tale of Two Cities" is relative to present day America. It is indeed the best of times and the worst of times. Never has a time in our nation been so blessed with marvels and opportunities, yet so dysfunctional and discontent.

President Obama promised a "spring of hope," and led us into a darkening"winter of despair." We are right at the edge, the very precipice of national self-destruction, with subtle forces eager to offer a gentle nudge just strong enough to send us reeling into the abyss.

We are a "house divided against itself." One side with a chimerical view of America that never existed, bent on "change" that would mean returning America to an imaginary past. The other still holding to the principles that made America great — interested in reform rather than change.

One side working within the democratic system, the other undermining democracy while espousing a bizarro world version of democracy more akin to Bolshevism than American republicanism. Or perhaps the type of government French libertines' wanted when they cried out for Liberté, égalité, fraternité.

The current leftist "Occupy" movement seems more interested in disruptive invasions of private and public property. They prefer socialistic demonstrations of revolt, rather than patient change within the framework that has always insured that revolution is never necessary in a true democracy. They are like petulant children hunkered down arms akimbo, lips quivering, stubbornly refusing to come in from the rain.

The sort of child that sees coming in as an end to fun and immediate gratification instead of the shelter from misery prolonged exposure to the elements leads to. America has been such a shelter for millions of people seeking refuge from the stormy world outside her borders. Often a child cannot appreciate what has been provided for him until he has to leave it and fend for himself.

If you have a serviceable home, you don't raise it to the ground because you don't like the color of the walls in the kitchen. Socialism brings in the bulldozers — representational democracies buy paint and brushes.

This is the primary difference between the Occupy Wall Street protesters and The Tea Party. What is the Occupy crowd's endgame — how exactly is the justice they seek defined? How do they mean to reach that end?

It seems to be force, whether passive, by merely causing disruptions in peoples lives. Or violence as some amongst their ranks have suggested and implemented. But make no mistake their method of choice seems to be force.

Contrast that with the Tea Party. Tea Party rallies, no matter where they have been or who the organizers were, have always been orderly affairs. The movement forwarded a set of principles; adopted a platform based on those principles; and then found and supported candidates willing to represent those ideas.

Sometimes the candidates won and sometimes they lost, but those candidates who have been successful have had a profound effect on policy. That is how an American style democracy functions. You don't need bullets, Molotov cocktails, or drum circles — you need a plan and order.

So far what has marked the occupation protests? We have seen a lot of enthusiasm and sincerity. We have seen opportunism. There has beendeath, violence and rape. Filth and pestilence are on the rise — as areselfishness and hypocrisy, not to mention licentiousness.

What we have not seen is anyone offering solutions. We've seen no coordinated co-operations working towards anything other than keeping these neo-primitive colonies functioning.

There is nothing so far to indicate that we will see occupy supported candidates running for public office as we saw with the candidates that were a natural manifestation of the Tea Party. Not when the occupy movement's politics bear more in common with the politics of The Democratic People's Republic of Korea than it does the form of representational republicanism established by our Founders.

The Communist Manifesto ends with these words in the last paragraph:

"The Communists disdain to conceal their views and aims. They openly declare that their ends can be attained only by the forcible overthrow of all existing social conditions. Let the ruling classes tremble at a Communistic revolution. The proletarians have nothing to lose but their chains. They have a world to win."

This varies wildly from:

"We the People are the rightful masters of both Congress and the Courts — not to overthrow the Constitution, but to overthrow the men who pervert the Constitution." — Abraham Lincoln

The Tea Party follows the Lincoln model — the Constitution is good. If officials refuse to abide by the provisions the Constitution established — vote the bums out.

The Occupiers identify with the Marxist model. The reason Marxists rely on force is because they know they can never wrest power through political means because their ideas are rejected by rational thinking people not ruled by their passions.

The quandary for those of us who consider ourselves among the rational, is why do the socialists, and those who align themselves with the socialists, believe that what has failed everywhere else it has been tried, will succeed here? Socialism has never taken hold of a society without delivering with it, misery.

I take solace in the fact that old Abe's position, is affirmed by a much greater Authority:

When the righteous are in authority, the people rejoice: but when the wicked beareth rule, the people mourn. Proverbs 29:2

What seems to elude the Occupiers and what the Tea Party understands and embraces — is that the wicked are just one election cycle away from their most assured overthrow. It doesn't take a month of Sunday's worth of disrupting people's lives for the people's voices to be heard.

On the first day of the protest, everyone got the message that 'occupiers' think things are out of whack. The question is: how does stinking up the place, setting fires and spreading disease fix it?

Digital Publius

© Hassan Nurullah

Justiagate: The Adept Unseen Hand

Originally posted at Renew America

For we wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this world, against spiritual wickedness in high places. Ephesians 6:12

Every great movement in history resulting in “change”, either positive or catastrophic, began with either conspiracy, or collaboration. Indeed, at the very beginning of time the serpent conspired with Eve, resulting in a catastrophe of...Biblical proportion.

The Founding Fathers collaborated with each other in securing our independence from a tyrannical king and formed the greatest nation the world has ever seen. The Founders understood that if they were going to form “a more perfect union,” they needed to work together.

It is the end result of collaboration or conspiracy that determines whether the source of either one was benevolent or sinister. Moreover, the methods employed are telling as well. Conspirators connive; they do in secret the things they know will not stand up to moral scrutiny. Anything is acceptable as long as it helps the conspirator meet the goal. 

Collaborators or co-laborers, have no need to hide their work because their cause is just. In doing the right thing there is nothing to be ashamed of and a collaborator can be totally above board. A co-laborer may have to hold the cards close to the vest until the proper time to spring into action, but there is no worry that any action will be perceived as immoral.

Just as we “know the tree by the fruit” it bears, we should also be mindful that there is righteous seed and bad seed. Bad seed may produce a tree baring fruit that is pleasant to the eye, but when harvested, the yield is revealed to be bitter and unwholesome.

I began this article by quoting Ephesians 6:12, where God warns His people that the woes of the world, even from the very beginning, find their source in Satan. We’re not fighting against mere men, but rather those influenced by Satan. God even arranged this verses’ address in the Holy Bible with significance. Verse 6:12, or 6:6+6. God really wants the reader to get the point.

It is also significant that on November 5th, 2008, the day America awoke to celebrate the election of Barack Obama - in his home state of Illinois - that evening the lottery number was 666. An interesting coincidence?

I do not believe that Barack Obama is the anti-Christ. I do believe that he, and the overwhelming majority in his party, knowingly or unwittingly represent a dark force. 

A good magician is adept at misdirection. An able illusionist can force the observer’s attention towards an innocuously occupied hand, while he works his trick with the unseen hand. This is how conspiracy works. The conspirator directs toward one thing, causing the deception to go unnoticed.

A good example of how this works would be the question of Barack Obama’s eligibility to hold the office of President of the United States. The connivers have kept the discussion relegated to whether or not Mr. Obama was born in Hawaii and therefore a citizen. This gave rise to the birth certificate issue.

The President and his people proved marvelously adroit at keeping America focused on whether he had a legitimate American birth certificate. First, by only releasing the short form, the President gained two years of people speculating and demanding to see the long form.

All during this time the media on both sides of the political spectrum denounced anyone who thought this was an important issue. Marginalizing the curious, calling them “Birthers.”  Framing them as racists unhappy with a Black president – or just plain kooks.

It is worth noting that the calls for Mr. Obama’s birth certificate have their origin in the Democrat Party. It was Clinton operative Phillip Berg, a Philadelphia attorney, former chair of the Democratic Party in Montgomery County, Pennsylvania, who first filed suit alleging Mr. Obama’s lack of eligibility.

Berg’s suit, filed against Senator Barack Obama, the Democratic National Committee, and the Federal Election Commission, sought to put a halt to Mr. Obama’s candidacy and to stop the DNC from nominating him based on eligibility. Or at least that is what they wanted America to think. 

Berg's suit stated the short form birth certificate provided by the Obama camp is a forgery, and even if Obama is a natural-born citizen, he gave up his citizenship when he was adopted in Indonesia.

Thus, the ‘birther’ distraction was born. The issue had all but died in the public consciousness, until Donald Trump revised the story just as the Obama administration began applying pressure to Hosni Mubarak in Egypt and Muammar Gaddafi in Libya to step down, which coincided with other dubious movements in the Arab world, prompting the so-called Arab Spring.

People were once again talking about goofy birthers while ignoring the Obama administration’s maneuvers elsewhere. At the same time, in the early stages of their campaigns, legitimate Republican candidates were having the air sucked out of them by a ridiculous feint at a candidacy by ‘The Donald.’

When it looked as if the birth certificate issue placed the President on the ropes. Suddenly the long form birth certificate appeared and Mr. Obama appeared like a Jove hurling lightning bolts from on high vanquishing his loud-mouthed, follically challenged foe.

Back in 2008, as Phillip Berg flashed the hand with the show us the real birth certificate sign, the unseen hand of the Democrat Party, prior to the nomination, made it nearly impossible for journalists interested in finding precedents for what makes a person eligible to hold the office of President.

It seems, someone with access to Justia.com, the online resource for U.S. legal information used by journalists, attorneys or anyone interested in finding case law, was being scrubbed. 

Specifically references to a Supreme Court case, Minor Vs, Happersett, 88 US 162 (1875). The Minor case is the only one in US history to directly define the Constitutional guidelines for Presidential eligibility outlined in Article 2 Section 1. It is unanimous and clear. It defines a "native or natural-born citizen" as a person born in the US to parents who are citizens.

So far on Justia.com there have been some 25 Supreme Court cases that referenced Minor v. Happersett found to be mysteriously altered. 25 files intentionally corrupted leading up to the ’08 election and before the Birther phenomenon. This aided in the fog surrounding the eligibility issue. 

It doesn’t matter if Mr. Obama was born in Hawaii or not, it never did--because we know for a fact that his father was not. Therefore, Barack Obama is ineligible to be President of the United States according to precedent established by unanimous Supreme Court opinion. It is the law of the land.

The action of tampering with the files on justia.com, presenting the world with information represented as unmolested and complete, was done with extreme malice and forethought! All Americans should be enraged at the manipulation. Without regard to political sensibilities this is outrageous.

Most people still haven’t heard of what is being called “Justiagate,” which speaks to the size and power of the conspiracy. Either way, when exposed to the light eventually everything comes out. What matters is how we react to the revelation. 

If President Obama is in fact righteous, he would not have needed unrighteous means to obtain an office that he is not entitled to. Barack Obama says he is a Christian, but he denies the essentials of Christian faith. He has a “form of Godliness” but when he declares there are other ways to God besides Christ and he calls what God calls bad natural, he denies the power thereof. And God commands: “from such turn away.”

I do know this, generally when a conspiracy begins to come to light, whatever plan was put in motion is beyond being stopped. Mr. Obama and his party have done great damage to both our country and to the world. I fear the situation in the Middle East and Africa has been manipulated to a point where the Biblical prophecy concerning a concerted Arab and African Islamic attack on Israel is a fait accompli.

Though they join hand to hand, the wicked shall not be unpunished: but the descendants of the righteous shall be delivered. Proverbs 11:21

Leaders like Mubarak and Gaddafi, more interested in their personal ends than those of islam, had to go. Even with a new President that cannot be undone. We need to see to our relationship to Christ Jesus personally, He is right at the door.

“Sow to yourselves in righteousness, reap in mercy; break up your fallow ground: for it is time to seek the LORD, till he come and rain righteousness upon you.” Hosea 10:12

Digital Publius

The Cain Praxis

Thus far, I’ve made no attempts at maintaining any sort of unbiased approach in my comments vis-à-vis the Republican field of presidential hopefuls. I have declared myself for Herman Cain. With the possible exception of Newt Gingrich, Herman Cain in my opinion, is the smartest person vying for the nations highest office on either side of the political spectrum, by a mile!

I would like to see Herman Cain as president and Newt Gingrich as his Chief of Staff, in an advisory role, where Mr. Gingrich’s impressive breadth of political savvy could be best employed.  With Congressman Marco Rubio (R-FL) installed as vice president and waiting in the wings, the right would have a secure hold on the Executive branch for some time to come.

Your opinion may vary and that’s swell. But what I find distressing is the right’s inability to learn. I am being charitable in offering that last statement because I fear the reality may be far worse than a simple conservative learning disorder–perhaps even sinister.

How else to explain the right’s propensity for self-immolation? No…wait…let’s make that the establishment right.

The grass roots right just gets their hopes crushed as the establishment  elephant, gorging on the peanuts they hand him, grows and grows until the grass roots are pressed and suffocated against the walls of the conservative leadership’s narrow, little minds.

This is the second presidential election cycle where this behavior can be observed. The establishment right wing leadership works hand-in-glove with the ultra-liberal left wing media machine. Their mission? Destroy the most galvanizing conservative candidates.

In the last cycle, the establishment left had their money on Hillary Clinton and the leftist grass roots panted for Barack Obama. By establishment right wing standards neither of these candidates would have made the cut. If the left had followed the right’s modus operandi, the Democrat candidate would have likely been either Joe Biden or a pre-scandal John Edwards--the leftist doppelgängers of the doddering John McCain and the affable Mitt Romney.

Why Hillary Clinton, whose experience consisted of being President Clinton’s First Lady and some eight years in the Senate qualified her to be president is God’s own mystery to those of us with a brain. Moreover, how the far less impressive three years served in the Senate by Mr. Obama made him a practical choice to hold the highest office in the land is an even greater conundrum. Yet here we are.

The left didn’t stop to quibble over who is smarter than who, or which person would actually make a good president - Democrats just wanted a win. The liberal establishment knew that the emotionally charged, reactionary leftist grass roots wanted Mrs. Clinton or Mr. Obama.  Thus, they threw their weight behind those two choices.

Meanwhile the right spent their time convincing the right wing grass roots the candidates they were most excited about could not defeat McCain and that McCain was the only person who, in the general election, could ever hope to beat Clinton or Obama. And again, here we are.

The tragedy is that the popular candidates the establishment right and conservative media aided the left in tearing down - like Mike Huckabee - would not have been settling. Mr. Huckabee was a proven commodity and would have been infinitely more preferable to Mr. Obama.

So while the left stood behind questionable but galvanizing candidates, chanting “yes we can” with blind enthusiasm, the right discarded capable popular candidates in favor of the feckless John McCain with a refrain akin to “we could have, but we chose not to."

The establishment right told the grass roots, “Huck may be sexy, but McCain is old and we are smarter than you are.”

We are seeing the same old tableau erected again in this election cycle. Herman Cain and to a lesser extent Rick Perry offer actual solutions. Noted economic wonk, Paul Ryan on Cain’s 999 Plan: “We need more bold ideas like this because it is specific and credible,” Though Ryan declared himself, “...more of a flat-tax kind of a guy.” Which is much like the plan offered by governor Perry. Nevertheless the establishment continues to tout Mitt Romney who hasn’t added anything to the debate in the form of tangible self-originating ideas.

Herman Cain also enjoys popular support, reflected in a barrage of first place finishes in the polls. Mitt Romney in the last cycle was neither popular with the establishment nor the grass roots. This time the establishment has chosen him, but he still remains unpopular with the grass roots. The establishment continues to apply a steady oppressive resolution in it’s anointing of Romney.

In an article earlier this year, I put forward that we on the right ought not offer hit pieces on our candidates. I don’t intend for this article to be construed as a hit piece on Mitt Romney, but I find this whole process vexing.

We hear the pundits affirming the notion that the 2012 elections will be about the economy. They also rightly insist Mr. Obama’s health care plan constitutes a dire threat to the economic health and well being of our republic. They say this while promoting a candidate who the moment he begins an attack on the president’s health care debacle, the same Mr. Romney will be hoisted with his own petard. This tendency speaks to some self-destructive tendency within the right.

The establishment right never misses an opportunity to tell us how great Mr. Cain or Rick Perry are just before assuring us they cannot possibly win the nomination and they certainly can’t beat President Obama. Quick to point out the polls showing Cain beating Romney are irrelevant while maintaining the polls showing Obama beating Cain or Perry are holy writ.

Every chance Bill O’Reilly gets he assures his viewers that Cain, while capable, can’t hope to win the nomination and that Romney is inevitable. The same is heard over and over, repeated by establishment right wing voices all over the media. You didn’t see this sort of behavior marking the rise of Barack Obama on the left. Even when an article is favorable to Mr. Cain it is not without the “can’t win” addendum.

Case in point, I received via email this very morning “The awful sin of Herman Cain”, the latest article by Wesley Pruden, editor emeritus of The Washington Times. Wherein Mr. Pruden laments the unjust treatment Mr. Cain suffers from the left for having the temerity to be a Black conservative, he writes:

The toxic reaction to Herman Cain’s hearty welcome to Republican and conservative ranks, his spectacular rise in the polling of Republican voters, is a grim preview of what lies ahead. The liberals (“progressives,” as they call themselves this year) are not actually frightened by the prospect of President Cain; they recognize, given the givens, the high improbability of that happening. What irks, galls, frustrates and infuriates the east coast lib snobs is that the Republican embrace of the pizza man destroys the story line they want to reprise from 2008, that only bigots oppose President Obama.

Mr. Pruden’s description of liberal pathology is spot on, but why the need to foster the notion of the impossibility of Mr. Cain succeeding in obtaining the nomination or winning the presidency? In doing so, Mr. Pruden perpetuates those ephemeral “givens” invoked in his article.

Two years ago I coined an eponymous law describing the most popular leftist narrative fomented by the “progressives”.

The Obama Principle: Opposition to the policies of an African American president exists by virtue of him being an African American president.

I now offer a new law, which I self-indulgently proffer as an explanation of the thinking process of the modern so-called conservative intelligentsia.

The Cain Praxis: Any truly conservative candidate popular with the grass roots, regardless of competency, is deemed unelectable by conservative leadership in favor of the most generic alternative.

This is not a racial principle, it could just as easily be called the “Huckabee Barb”, Cain Praxis just sounds better--I wish it weren’t so true.

“Jesus said unto him, If thou canst believe, all things are possible to him that believeth.” Mark 9:23

The American left, populated by people less likely to even believe in the God of the Holy Bible, have a firmer grasp of this Scriptural precept given us by Christ the Savior. I hope you join me in praying: "Dear Lord we do believe; help us overcome our unbelief!" In Jesus’ mighty name, Amen!

Digital Publius

Nazis, Commies and Occupiers Oh My!

In the last century, the United States of America sacrificed more than 400,000 of our young men fighting against Japan and the evil of Germany’s National Socialism. America lost another 100,000 or so stopping the encroachment of Sino-Soviet style socialism in both hot and cold wars.

There is not a single political philosophy responsible for more human carnage than socialism. Leftist ideologies, whether you call it fascism, socialism or communism, are directly responsible for the slaughter of millions in just a single century. Let’s look at the tally of deaths resulting from socialist revolutions.

Nazi Germany: 6 million Jews alone another 6 million Soviet POWs, Poles, Romani (Gypsies), Disabled, Slovenes, Homosexuals...
Soviet Union: Lenin-Stalin, 29 million.
China: Under Mao Zedong, 40 million
Cambodia: Pol Pot, 1.6 million

Those are just the big boys, that count doesn’t include Tito, Fidel Castro and Ernesto "Che" Guevara or any of the other tin pot socialist dictator’s atrocities. Good thing that a great deal of the “revolution” was indeed not televised.

The left, particularly in academia, has worked wonders in distancing themselves from the barbarism their ideology inevitably led and continues to lead to, especially fascism. Despite the overwhelming support German and Italian fascism received from Western leftist progressives like H.G. Wells, NAACP founder W.E.B. DuBois, George Bernard Shaw, Will Rogers and Rexford Guy Tugwell, to name a few, the left has managed to somehow repaint fascism as a right wing philosophy.

The leftist progressives fell all over themselves in praise for Lenin, Stalin, Hitler and Ol’ Il Duce...until the slaughter began. W.E.B. DuBois declared that the National Socialist Party (Nazis) takeover of Germany was: “absolutely necessary to get the state in order.”  Further Dubois wrote from Russia to the readers of his magazine ‘The Crisis”:

“I stand in astonishment and wonder at the revelation of Russia that has come to me. I may be partially deceived and half-informed. But if what I have seen with my eyes and heard with my ears in Russia is Bolshevism, I am a Bolshevik.”

As DuBois later condemned Nazism’s extremes and lamented the deaths caused by the revolutions he had praised earlier, it was clear that he was indeed both deceived and ill-informed.

After a visit to Italy, Will Rogers said of Mussolini: “I’m pretty high on that bird.”

How are erstwhile political dilettantes like Rogers and DuBois any different from their contemporary progeny? Doesn’t Sean Penn’s praise of Venezuelan Dictator Hugo Chavez sound eerily similar to Will Roger’s praise of Il Duce? Is the solidarity shown by “progressives” like President Obama and Nancy Pelosi with the neo-pinko Occupy Wall Street throng any different than DuBois declaring himself a Bolshevik? 

I would have to say that the biggest difference has to be that the modern day progressive has the luxury of hindsight. History is a very useful thing to have--unless, out of either ignorance or hubris, you ignore it. And that is what we are seeing today. Some are willingly ignorant, others are simply evil.

Well the modern day Nazis and Communists have thrown their collective lots in with the Occupy Wall Street protestors. The Nazis because just like the National Socialist movement of Nazi Germany included an anti-semitic element, the same element is also present in the Occupy protests. And you don’t see the anti-semites being universally denounced or made to feel unwelcome by their fellow protestors.

The neo-nazi groups are saying since there is already anti-Jewish literature and rhetoric being preached at these rallies, they should remove the more offensive symbolism of the Nazi movement and join the Wall Street protests with watered down versions of their more inflammatory fare. Apparently this was issued by a nazi group in Westland Michigan just in time for the Detroit Occupy protest.

If socialism is such a good idea, why does it inspire so much death and destruction? You can see the modern progressives twisting history to the applause of the again, unthinking, ill-informed herd  in this video.

Liberals feverishly try to draw a moral equivalency between the Tea Party and the Occupy Wall Street crowd. But you don’t see the Nazis and the Commies issuing pleas for their followers to join the Tea Party. You can’t shout racist, anti-Semitic or anti-American rhetoric at a Tea Party gathering.

Those who do are on the other side of barricades conducting anti-Tea Party rallies. Despite liberal attempts to call the Tea Party racist, those are the facts.

"Be not deceived: evil communications corrupt good manners" I Corinthians 15:33

The Greek word translated into the phrase “evil communications” is “homilia”, “companionship”, i.e. (by implication) intercourse:--communication. This is from the Greek word “homilos” (meaning a crowd); association together, i.e. a multitude:--company.

In other words, associating with the wrong crowd corrupts (often making a person act counter to their character by being engulfed in reactionary herd thinking) the way others perceive you and whatever message you may be trying to convey. This simple Biblical tenet is often taught to children by good parents. Be careful of the people you hang around with, because bad behavior tends to rub off.

I have seen Christians promoting these Occupy Wall Street rallies. I cannot for the life of me figure out why. Were we wrong to oppose the Nazis and the Communists for the better part of a century? Don’t you think it odd that Christians find themselves aligned with people holding anti-life political philosophies?

I am reminded of the words of my Lord in the Gospel of Matthew when His detractors tried to blame His actions on the devil:

“Jesus knew their thoughts and said to them, "Every kingdom divided against itself will be ruined, and every city or household divided against itself will not stand.” v25

How do we cure the ills of our nation by embracing and adopting the failed and murderous philosophies of our enemies? The answer is simple: You can’t. Socialism has wrought only misery whenever and wherever it has been tried. Without regard to nomenclature,  make no mistake that is what hides behind these protests. Christ continued in verse 26:

“And if Satan cast out Satan, he is divided against himself; how shall then his kingdom stand?”

If you are a Christian at an occupy protest and socialists are all around you, ask yourself why the teachings of Christ are done away with in socialist nations? If capitalism is evil, why does Christ teach the principals undergirding capitalism over and over again in Scripture, likening them to His kingdom? Read Luke 19:11-27 or the parable of the “talents” Matthew 25:14-30. Or the “laborers in the vineyard” were Jesus Christ begins:

For the kingdom of heaven is like unto a man that is an householder, which went out early in the morning to hire labourers into his vineyard. Matthew 20:1

You could just as easily change the word householder to capitalist or businessman: For the kingdom of heaven is like unto a man that is a capitalist... As with all things of importance taught by Christ--there is both a practical and a spiritual application. The practical in this verse is that God describes His kingdom as one which rewards industry. That’s how America used to be and should always be - a country that rewards the industrious.

I made this statement on my  Facebook fan page and on  Freedom Torch: “America doesn't need revolution, just a truly well informed electorate not blinded by misleading rhetoric. In the United States change comes with a vote not rioting.”  You do not get socialist revolutions, like the ones being called for by far too many of the Occupy Wall Street crowd without blood.

For the Christians yoking yourselves to these “Occupy” people I ask you to remember:

“Examine yourselves, whether ye be in the faith; prove your own selves. Know ye not your own selves, how that Jesus Christ is in you, except ye be reprobates?” II Corinthians 13:5

If you believe our system is wrong, do you really think standing with Nazis, Communists and people fornicating in the streets – defecating on police cars and all sorts of reprobate behavior is the right way to go?

If our system is evil, how does Satan cast out Satan? Again; “Bad company ruins good morals.”

Digital Publius

Is Steve Jobs In Hell?

I don't often post articles that I didn't write on Digital Publius, I think I have only done it some three times. This is a most worthy and important fourth and frankly I wish I had written it myself. You would be hard pressed to find a more committed Apple fan than your's truly – but the reality of  what Mr. Cousar presents here is jarring and hopefully thought provoking. May it be received in the spirit it was intended.

Digital Publius

I hesitated in writing this article because it has no political content whatsoever - so posting it here on FreedomTorch.com seems a little out of place.  But as I watched the news over the last two days of Steve Jobs' tragic and untimely death I couldn't help but wonder, "where is he right now?"  The news stories lauded praise and not a one raised the question of where he might possibly spend eternity - which actually seems to me to be the most important question of all.

We're all used to the fact that the secular media isn't going to go into questions like that.  And we know that non-Christians will always portray a good man as meeting St. Peter at the "pearly gates" and getting into heaven - thanks to their goodness.  And although that's not what the Bible teaches, even many Christians seem to want to go along with that story - because it just makes everybody feel better.  

What ultimately prompted me to write about this today was when I went to the Gospel Coalition website out of curiosity to see if even Christian websites were talking about his eternal destiny.  If anyone was going to speak on this issue you'd think it would be a Christian website.  But it wasn't to be - so I guess ironically - it will have to come from a political website!  I was startled to find an article on theGospelCoalition site lauding Steve Jobs and suggesting the church could learn a few lessons from him!  At the end of this article the author said that "when we see those glowing Apple logos let us take a moment to honor the greatness of our God."  I was stunned by that because what we know of Steve Jobs' Buddhist and new-age spirituality is that he was fairly militant in his hostility to Christianity.

At the end of his life none of us know where Steve Jobs stood in relation to Christ, but if we go by what we did know, then the Bible says he will be spending eternity in hell.  I don't report this to you with any glee or happiness whatsoever, for indeed it is the greatest tragedy of all. 

I should say that I'm writing this as a Christian to Christians, so if you're not a Christian, please forgive my expression of these Christian views here.  This is not meant to demean or in any way disrespect the beliefs of many of our FreedomTorch members. 

As I've listened to the news reports of his great, life-improving achievements, I realized that I myself have great admiration for this man and his accomplishments - they've certainly improved my life as well.  But, I couldn't help but wonder where is he now, and the words of Mark 8:36 came to mind:  "For what will it profit a man if he gains the whole world, and loses his own soul?"

From a Biblical perspective, since we can't know for sure whether Jobs had a last-minute conversion, let me not pick on him personally, but use him as a metaphor for wealthy, powerful people who do die without Christ and try to picture what that experience - going from life to death - might have been like. 

Try to imagine being as wealthy, powerful and influential as he was.  Imagine having so much wealth that you can speak things into existence by the very power of your words.  Imagine having everything you could possibly want at the snap of your fingers.  Imagine being able to literally call anyone in the world on your iPhone and have them take your call.  Celebrities, presidents, corporate chieftains, actors/actresses.  Is there anyone who would not have taken a call from Steve Jobs?  Imagine the sensation of having that kind of power and influence in the world. 

You're a true Master of the Universe, you're respected, honored and adored universally.  And then suddenly - you die.  And you die without Christ.  In an instant you've lost everything.   At the moment of your death you make the most horrifying discovery that everything written in the Bible you rejected, was true. You enter into the most horrible place you've ever imagined. While people are still lauding you with praises back here on earth you have just entered a place where the screams alone are unbearable. The heat is unimaginable. People are screaming and telling you there's no escape - it's too late. And suddenly you're faced with the reality that you are going to be there FOREVER! For ETERNITY and there's no way, nothing at all, not a single possibility you can ever get out.

Imagine going from your beloved earthly reality to that Biblical reality - in an instant. 

Christians don't talk about this often anymore and I'm not sure why. It's Biblical reality.

But we really need to think about it. Liberal pastors like New York City's Tim Keller says, "the primary purpose of salvation is cultural renewal - to make this world a better place." But is it really the PRIMARY purpose? What about ETERNITY and where we spend it? Is that not made more important by the sheer fact that it will go on and on forever?

While liberal pastors and theologians are busy at work thinking of ways to minimize the Biblical doctrine of hell, many more people are ending up there because they're not being taught the truth. 

In Philippians 3:18-21 the Bible tells us:

"For I have told you often before, and I say it again with tears in my eyes, that there are many whose conduct shows they are really enemies of the cross of Christ.  Their future is eternal destruction.  Their god is their appetite, they brag about shameful things, and all they think about is this life here on earth.  But we are citizens of heaven, where the Lord Jesus Christ lives.  And we are eagerly waiting for him to return as our Savior.  He will take these weak mortal bodies of ours and change them into glorious bodies like his own, using the same mighty power that he will use to conquer everything, everywhere."

Liberal pastors, theologians and writers like Tim Keller, Rob Bell and yes even C.S. Lewis, tell Christians they shouldn't talk about eternal damnation and hell and fire and brimstone, because they say, it turns people off from the Gospel!  But, it is an integral part of the Gospel!  It's like saying "don't tell people what the Gospel says because it might turn them off from the Gospel"! 

 But without a clear Biblical understanding of hell, we humans have no way of understanding just how bad even the least of our sins are to God.  And don't we use this same principle in our criminal justice system?  Don't serious crimes get harsher punishments?  A guy shoplifting an iPod might not get more than a slap on the wrist.  But a guy violently raping a woman might spend life behind bars.  The rapist, who has no doubt justified in his mind why what he's doing is okay, may have no other way of understanding just how bad his act is without looking at the punishment.  No matter how much he justifies it in his mind, when he looks at the possibility of life in prison he has to conclude that society believes rape is a horrible crime.  Same with hell.  Hell tells us that God believes our sins are horrible acts of disobedience - no matter how much we've justified them to ourselves.

It's only when we look at the serious nature of the eternal punishment that we can begin to faintly come to grips with the serious depravity of our human nature.  And it is only when we begin to understand the seriousness with which God considers our sins that we begin to dimly understand our need for a savior.  And it is only when we begin to understand our need for a savior that we begin to understand just how wonderful the word Gospel - which means Good News - really is.  For indeed, it is glorious news to learn that God has acted in human history to save us from the eternal punishment our sins have earned us. 

I think it's fitting to close with the story that Jesus told in the Gospel of Luke of Lazarus and the Rich Man.  The points of this story that haunt me are that hell is absolutely horrible and there is no way of ever getting out of it or getting any relief from the eternal pain and torture. 

(And fittingly, I'm typing this from my Bible that resides on my iPad) 

Jesus said, "There was a certain rich man who was splendidly clothed and who lived each day in luxury.  At his door lay a diseased beggar named Lazarus.  As Lazarus lay there longing for scraps from the rich man's table, the dogs would come and lick his open sores.  Finally, the beggar died and was carried by the angels to be with Abraham.  The rich man also died and was buried and his soul went to Hades.  There, in torment, he saw Lazarus in the far distance with Abraham.

The rich man shouted, "Father Abraham, have some pity!  Send Lazarus over here to dip the tip of his finger in water and cool my tongue, because I am in great anguish in these flames." 

But Abraham said to him, "Son, remember that during your lifetime you had everything you wanted, and Lazarus had nothing.  So now he is here being comforted, and you are in anguish.  And besides, there is a great chasm separating us.  Anyone who wanted to cross over to you from here is stopped at its edge, and no one there can cross over to us." 

Then the rich man said, "Please Father Abraham, send him to my father's house.  For I have five brothers, and I want him to warn them about this place of torment so they won't have to come here when they die."  But Abraham said, "Moses and the prophets have warned them.  Your brothers can read their writings anytime they want to." 
The rich man replied, "No, Father Abraham!  But if someone is sent to them from the dead, they will turn from their sins."  But Abraham said, "If they won't listen to Moses and the prophets, they won't listen even if someone rises from the dead." 

Now that by bringing the Biblical doctrine of hell to you, I have thoroughly succeeded in making everyone despise this God who would send us to such a horrible punishment, I have to remind you, that's not the whole story.  There's one more part.   The knowledge of an eternal hell makes the words of John 3:16-18 truly wonderful.  These words people have read so many times that they are sick of them.  But you can only be sick of these words if you don't understand that without them you too would spend eternity in hell.

"For God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, so that everyone who believes in him will not perish but have eternal life.  God did not send his Son into the world to condemn it, but to save it.  There is no judgment or condemnation awaiting those those who trust him.  But those who do not trust him have already been condemned for not believing in the only Son of God."


Jonathan Cousar, Founder of Freedom Torch