Happy Thanksgiving

Happy Thanksgiving 

Thanksgiving is a uniquely American holiday.  The original Presidential declaration was based on the special day of thanks that the Pilgrims held to thank God for preserving them and for blessing them with a bountiful harvest.  Aided by Squanto, they learned how to harvest oysters and how to survive in the New Land.  It was an all day affair with food of all kinds prepared by both the Pilgrims and by the Indians.  But the centerpiece of the day was a focus on the God from whom all our blessings flow.  They knew that they would not have survived the previous winter or the winter to come without the guiding hand of Divine Providence.

There was actually another Thanksgiving celebration held years earlier in Virginia which had a similar complexion.  Again, the Virginia Colony gave thanks to God for preserving them, watching over them, and blessing them with a great harvest.  The Virginia Colony had gone through rough times.  Initially they established a socialist system in which all would share equally in the crops, the hunting results, and the fishing harvest.  But, not surprisingly, it failed.  The aristocrats felt themselves too good to work in the fields and spent their time idling away or searching for gold.  As a result of this disastrous system, many of the colonists died the first winter from starvation. 

Finally, Captain John Smith instituted a free market system and after that the Virginia Colony flourished.  And so it was that they gave thanks to God for their barns being filled to the brim before the winter came upon them.  They re-learned a powerful truth from the Bible that, "If a man will not work, he shall not eat." (2 Thessalonians 3:10b)  It was the slogan adopted by Captain John Smith and thereafter the Colony prospered.

Today our nation is going through what we consider to be hard economic times and indeed a large number of our countrymen and women are out of work.  It’s my prayer that everyone who has the capacity to do a job of any kind will find a job to do.  I don’t think that I can appreciate the desperation of being out of work and unable to find a job.  We need to keep all these Americans in our prayers.

I was delighted that the Eberle Communications Group team showed their generosity this year by underwriting 1,310 Thanksgiving dinners for the poor and hungry in the Washington, DC area.  This was true compassion.  It was charity in the best sense of the word, for after all, the meaning of charity is love.  And God commands us to care for and love our fellow man.  Well done, folks.

Now, let me encourage you to have a wonderful 2010 Thanksgiving celebration, thanking God for our abundance, the blessings of freedom, and hope that only He can give.  Like you, I plan to enjoy the turkey and the football, but I also plan to take some time to thank the Lord for my many blessings.  A nation on its knees in Thanksgiving knows its priorities, its heritage, and its hope for years to come.  Kathi and I wish you and your family all the best at Thanksgiving and in the years to come.  May God continue to bless America as the land of the free, the faithful, and the home of the brave.

7 Events That Made America America

7 Events That Made America America

  

I just finished reading the book, 7 Events That Made America America: And Proved That the Founding Fathers Were Right All Along, by Professor Larry Schweikart.  What a fun, interesting, and informative book to read.  I highly recommend it.  Professor Schweikart is the co-author of the #1 New York Times bestseller, A Patriot’s History of the United States, a 700+ page tome that I am about 75% finished with.  I’ll certainly review that one when I’m finished, but I interrupted the reading of it with this shorter book of just 216 pages.

What are the 7 events that Professor Schweikart argues that have made America America?  Let’s look briefly at a couple of interesting chapters.

The first chapter is a brief study of little noticed United States President Martin Van Buren, father of the modern Democratic Party.  Schweikart identifies Van Buren as America’s first liberal (or progressive) President.  As an aside, I wish those on the left would settle on one title because, as Shakespeare said, “A rose by any other name would smell as sweet.”  Van Buren was, in today’s vernacular, a consummate politician.  He was the nightmare that Alexis de Tocqueville forecast in his 1830’s book, Democracy in America.  De Tocqueville said, “When those in power realize that they can perpetuate themselves in power through taxing, spending, and electing, your democracy will be dead.”

That formula pretty much sums up Martin Van Buren.  Van Buren astutely recognized that if the Democrat Party could utilize the government treasury to provide jobs and benefits to the masses, he could seduce them into supporting anything.  Van Buren didn’t stop there.  Systematically he began to set up newspapers across the United States that were controlled and in most cases owned outright by the Democratic Party.  Believe it or not, these papers were even more biased and slanted than many of today’s papers.  And a number of them still exist.  Almost all carry the name Democrat in their title, such as the Arkansas Democrat Gazette.

Chapter three is about the Jamestown Flood of 1889 which caused a dam to break above Jamestown, Pennsylvania and release 20 million gallons of water on the unfortunate inhabitants of this steelmaking community.  To quote directly from the book, “The destruction was near total:  over 2,200 people were killed, and the waters caused $17 million in damage.  It constituted the worst single loss of civilian life in America prior to 9/11.  The flood destroyed the railroad, along with 1,600 homes and four square miles of Johnstown proper.  After the damage had been done, at least 27,000 people needed care, shelter and food.”

This is just the beginning of the chapter.  Professor Schweikart proceeds to tell the amazing story of the recovery effort that took place without the assistance of FEMA or any other entity from the Federal government and he contrasts the effectiveness of the effort with that of Hurricane Katrina.  It is a surprising and captivating story.

Other chapters are just as interesting.  They carry titles such as “Ike Has a Heart Attack, Triggering Dietary Nannyism” and “A Steel Guitar Rocks the Iron Curtain.”

7 Events That Made America America is an interesting, sometimes humorous book that is well worth reading.  And when you get to the Professor’s last chapter titled, “Conclusions,” he provides some insight into the intentions of the Founders and why they were bent upon limiting the power of government over the citizens of America.  There’s no doubt in his mind that “…if the government had ever tried to meddle in the private affairs of individuals the Founders would have fought against it.”  He goes on from there to explain the flawed rationalization for the vast expansion of government over our lives.

For example, reference is often made by liberals to the phrase “promote the general Welfare” in the United States Constitution.  In fact, this phrase does not appear in the Constitution, but only in the preamble, and no preamble is ever considered to be a part of the document itself.  It has no power or force in law.  What an incredible stretch.

The second door that liberal judges and their supporters use to expand the enumerated powers of the Constitution is the “necessary and proper” clause found in Article I, Section 8.  It reads:

“The Congress shall have Power—To make all Laws which shall be necessary and proper for carrying into Execution the foregoing Powers, and all other Powers vested by this Constitution in the Government of the United States, or in any Department or Officer thereof.”

Professor Schweikart observes, “Note that the clause refers to the ‘foregoing Powers, and all other Powers vested by this Constitution.’  Therefore, the so-called elastic clause cannot apply to any powers exercised outside the narrow definitions of the Constitution.  Unless the actions themselves are delineated in the Constitution, they are illegal.”

What the good professor is pointing out is that the Founders would have been aghast that the Federal government of the United States would think it had any legal power to tell us what to eat, how to get our medical services, what kind of car to drive, whether we can drain a swamp on property we own, what kind of light bulbs we choose to use in our home, etc., etc.

As I said, this is a fun book to read.  It’s highly entertaining and provides a strong reminder of how far we have traveled from the enduring principles established for government by our Founders.  Please read and pass along to a friend.  It’s time for the re-education of Americans in the values that made the United States of America the greatest nation in the history of the world.

I’d even recommend it for our President, Barack Obama.  He’d learn much.

The Root of Racism in America

The Root of Racism in America 

What is racism?  Put simply, it is denigrating any individual solely on the basis of their race.  Such demeaning can take many forms—the written word, the spoken word, a law, a policy, a rolling of the eyes, or an inappropriate shrug of the shoulders.  It’s a sin.  At its core is hatred of another individual—again, solely on the basis of their race.

Here’s a simple test to identify if someone has made a racist statement.  If the terms black, white, Asian or Hispanic are used, simply reverse the words.  For example, in the Jim Crow days, Southern whites said, “Blacks should sit at the back of the bus.”  That was clearly a racist statement and a racist law.  If a law or someone said, “Whites should sit at the back of the bus or Hispanics should sit at the back of the bus” that statement or law would be equally racist and equally repugnant.

Our President spent more than 20 years sitting in church, listening to the racist rantings of his Pastor, Jeremiah Wright.  Not only did he not leave that church, he dedicated his autobiographical book, The Audacity of Hope, to Pastor Jeremiah Wright.  He was married by Wright, his children were baptized by Wright, and Wright christened their home.  This is old news, but it’s pertinent.

Shortly after Barack Obama became President, he interjected himself in a local police matter in Cambridge, Massachusetts.  The story line is rather simple.  A college professor (who incidentally happened to be black) returned from a trip and did not have his key, so he decided to break into his home.  You and I would have probably done the same thing.  A neighbor called the police, thinking that a neighbor’s house was being broken into by a burglar.  The police arrived and asked the professor for identification.  It was a perfectly reasonable and understandable request, but one that was responded to with loud shouting and personal attacks on the police officers as racists.  After continued refusal to provide identification, the professor was hauled to jail whereupon he finally provided identification, was released and returned to his home.  End of story?  Not quite.

Without any knowledge of the facts or the circumstances, President Obama said before the cameras, “The police acted stupidly.”  Now apply the racist test to the same situation if the professor had been white.  Would our President have interjected himself in a local police incident?  Would he have said that, “The police acted stupidly” or would it never have come to his attention?  Our President assumed the worst of the police because they were white and the professor was black, not because he had any information, whatsoever, in regard to the facts of the matter.  His statement was a knee jerk, racist reaction.

In the President’s Marxist view, the story of the world is a struggle of class warfare.  It is black vs. white, rich vs. poor, Hispanic vs. white, workers vs. owners, men vs. women, and the intellectual elite vs. the average American.  He loves to lecture others on their failings.  “Americans cling to their guns and their religion” he famously said to a group of San Francisco liberals during the 2010 campaign.  He complains that Americans “just don’t understand” or that they can’t “comprehend” the true genius of his socialized medicine program.  “If they only understood…” he likes to say, but they just aren’t smart enough or well educated enough.  The poor average American is just dumb.

In Obama’s view, Republicans and Tea Party members are rich, white racists.  Just before the election, he said in a clear reference to Jim Crow laws, “Republicans can sit in the back of the bus.”  You can’t get much more racist than that.

Of course his view of the Republican Party, and especially the Tea Party, is wishful thinking.  Tens of thousands of African Americans are seeing through the ideologically rigid approach that President Obama is taking to remaking America as a nation with entitlements instead of opportunity, a land of apology, instead of pride, a land of injustice instead of equal justice.  Our President is a divider, not a unifier.  He seeks retribution, not forgiveness and harmony.  He is an angry racist.

He has done much damage to our children’s future, regardless of race, economic status, or background.  He has mortgaged their future through reckless spending, overreaching government, and out-of-control political correctness.  He has no understanding of why the Founders sought to limit the power of government because he has a flawed understanding of human nature. 

There is no one race or segment or group in our society or any society that is morally superior to any other group.  We are all sinful human beings, all cursed by the fall of man.  We are all not only susceptible to sin, we all succumb to sin.  We break all of God’s laws and, sadly, we do it every day.  That’s the reality of the human condition. 

Any ideology built on the concept that there is a certain class of men and women who are smarter, better and morally superior to their fellow man and woman is fatally flawed.  No matter how good the intentions, the result will be the same, less freedom, more corruption, less prosperity, less justice, and more inequality in the distribution of wealth. 

That’s why the Founders sought to limit the power of men in government.  They understood the frailty of human nature and thus they knew that the concentration of power in the hands of one or a few always leads to despotism.

The inability of American liberalism to understand human nature is the blindness that dooms all their policies and programs to failure.  Are African Americans any better off today than they were prior to the Great Society?  Has their view, that the United States is just another nation, led to greater peace around the world?  Has their repeated efforts to appease the enemies of America worked?  Has their substitution of a new morality for God’s fixed moral laws made for a kinder, gentler society?  Have their higher taxes, increased regulations, and vast spending outlays created prosperity for all Americans? 

American liberalism, progressivism or any other name they invent means the same thing.  It is a failed philosophy based on the flawed premise that there is a group of elites in society who are morally and intellectually superior to their fellow man and woman.  They mistake intelligence and education for wisdom. 

Where does wisdom come from?  “The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom.”—Psalm 111:10.  Indeed.  “For the Lord gives wisdom, and from his mouth come knowledge and understanding.”—Proverbs 2:6.  God is the source of all wisdom.  “For the foolishness of God is wiser than man's wisdom, and the weakness of God is stronger than man's strength.”—1 Corinthians 1:25.  While man struts and pontificates and prides himself in his own wisdom, God laughs. 

Any effort or venture or government based on the superiority, intelligence and wisdom of man is now and will always be a failed enterprise.  Man proposes, but God disposes.

Election Update: Broader & Deeper Yet

Election Update:  Broader & Deeper Yet

  

In my first update on the 2010 election, I observed that the election results were very broad and deep.  As information on the lower races continues to come in, that analysis is not only confirmed, but in fact the depth of the conservative success continues to be astounding.  The day after the election I learned that the GOP would pick up five to seven state legislatures, in addition to the other victories at the top of the ticket.

For a thorough recap of the down ticket success of the Republican Party, just listen to the following excerpts from an editorial in the November 4, 2010 issue of the Washington Examiner:

“Republicans took control of at least 19 additional state legislative bodies Tuesday for a total of 26 in which the party controls both chambers, compared with 21 for the Democrats and with three still up for grabs.  Among these are legislatures in Alabama and North Carolina that had not seen elected Republican majorities since the Reconstruction elections of 1876 and 1870, respectively.  Those that argued just two years ago the GOP was in danger of becoming a Southern regional party were proved resoundingly wrong as state legislative chambers in New Hampshire, Maine, Wisconsin and Minnesota flipped to GOP control.  Republicans even made major inroads and could end up on top of legislative bodies in Oregon and Washington [state].  Republicans won 16 of 30 races for state attorney general, taking five such offices away from Democrats…

“The GOP also won 17 of 26 secretary of state races, a gain of six, giving the party a 25-22 edge…

“Republicans now will play a role in redrawing the boundaries of a whopping 314 congressional districts.”

All told, the Republicans now have control of both houses of the state legislature in 25 states.  This encouraging news, coupled with the fact that the Republican Party also won 25 governorships on Tuesday, including 12 states where a Republican is replacing an incumbent Democrat, again shows the depth of the electoral sweep by the party of Lincoln and Reagan. 

This means that the GOP bench for future presidential campaigns is deep and substantial.  Not since 1928 has the Republican Party been so strong up and down the ticket.  But 1928 signaled the end of the long reign of the GOP, while the 2010 election signals the potential beginning of long Republican dominance in American politics.

The question, however, is the one posed by United States Senator-elect, Marco Rubio, who said, “Tuesday’s election was not a mandate, it was a second chance.”  Rubio has it exactly right.  If the Republicans stick to their conservative principles of limited government, which translates into smaller government, less taxes, less government intrusion into the lives of its citizens, and a strong national defense, their success at the ballot box will continue.  If, on the other hand, they become a faint shadow of the Democratic Party, they are doomed to failure.  This is the second chance for the GOP.  Will they muff it?  Or will they be faithful to the ideals of those who founded this great nation?  Only time will tell.

A Good Start!

A Good Start!

  

On Tuesday, November 2, 2010, the Republican Party won a great victory that was broader and deeper than any election victory since 1928.  Going back to January of 2008, the pundits predicted that with far more Republican seats at risk in the US Senate than Democrat seats, it was likely that the GOP would make no gains in 2010 and that the governorships would hold constant.  Understanding that situation provides great perspective to the political earthquake that took place on Election Day.

Although the final count is not yet in, some 60 seats have changed hands in the United States House of Representatives and the GOP picked up at least 5 seats in the United States Senate.  Equally important, those elected to the Senate, like Rubio, Paul, Johnson, Lee, Toomey, and possibly Buck and Rossi, will put a new face on the Republican Party, one of principle and integrity rather than Republican opportunism as personified by Lisa Murkowski.  The man who deserves the most credit for the election of these principled conservatives is United States Senator Jim DeMint of South Carolina, head of the Senate Conservatives Fund  (www.senateconservatives.com).  Thankfully DeMint will also have much say as to who the Republican nominee for President will be in 2012.

But it is the emerging picture of the depth of the election that makes it even more amazing.  The Republican Party picked up control of at least five additional state legislatures and possibly as many as seven, giving the Party control of more state legislatures than it has held since 1928.  And when the final tale of the tape is read, I’m sure we will find that the GOP won more mayoralty races, more city and more county council races than it has for more than 70 years.

Of course, the amazing election success of the Republican Party in winning state house races in Ohio, Florida, Michigan, Wisconsin and Pennsylvania is a 2012 storm warning sign for the White House.  Unless, like Bill Clinton, President Obama makes strong course corrections, he will not survive the political hurricane which is brewing.

While the name on the back of the jerseys of those elected to Congress may say Democrat or Republican, this was not a Republican victory.  In fact, as Speaker-elect John Boehner made clear, the Republicans blew it the last time they gained power in 1994.  Their spending policies were virtually indistinguishable from the Democrats who preceded them.  The Republicans lost not because the Democrats had new ideas (when was the last time you have ever heard of any new idea coming from the Democrats?), but because Republicans abandoned their traditional commitment to limited Constitutional government. 

What the GOP has now is an opportunity.  It is an opportunity to prove that they have limited government principles and convictions that determine their course of action, not political expediency that is solely self-serving.  We can and should be encouraged by the victory statement of Speaker-elect John Boehner.

The election results were a great victory for the common sense conservative movement which has most recently manifested itself in the form of the Tea Party.  The Tea Party itself is fueled by ideas.  Rather than being “know nothings,” as the mainstream news media would have us believe, the Tea Party movement is at its core an intellectual movement.  The leaders and participants in the Tea Party understand the principles of limited government.  They don’t just blindly believe that freedom in a society cannot exist without an economic free market, they understand why that is the case.  As witness to this fact, consider that the classic economic primer on free market economics, The Road to Serfdom, by Friedrich von Hayek, which was written and published prior to World War II, reached the New York Times best seller list in the last 12 months.  The Democrats bragged that they did not read the more than 2,000 page bill that was Obamacare, but the Tea Party members did.  And while Democrat candidates and legislators have limited knowledge of the United States Constitution, Tea Party members distribute and read it carefully.  The Tea Party, for the most part, consists of good Americans who care about others, respect the law, teach their children good manners, have a strong moral code, are well educated, and worship the God of their forefathers.

On the other hand, today’s Democratic Party is, in general, the real “know nothing” Party without intellectual depth, historical perspective, common sense, or faith or belief in anything but gaining more power over the people and personal aggrandizement.  The Democratic Party is not based on principles, but rather on cobbling together support from a bunch of special interest groups that they keep in line by handing out largess supplied by American taxpayers.  It is a Party that has sold its soul by appealing to the most base instincts of the American people.  They set poor against rich, black against white, men against women, workers against employers, young against old.  For the most part, its leaders are bereft of personal compassion, love of country, and respect for the Founders’ principles that provide for a free and just nation.  They see America as the source of evil, not the good, generous and great nation that it really is.

When Barack Obama was elected to the White House by a slim majority of 53%, he became the President of a divided nation.  He promised to be a healer, a unifier, a President to all Americans.  Instead, he became a divider, an antagonist, who looked upon the broad swath of hardworking middle class Americans as his “enemies.”  Instead of building up the nation and bringing Americans together, he chose to govern against the clear wishes of the people.  He set about not to improve and rebuild America, but to “remake it” into something entirely foreign and distinct from the Constitutional limited government created by Washington, Jefferson, Madison, Adams and the other Founders.  He appointed powerful Czars like Van Jones, a self proclaimed Communist, who worked outside the framework of government to implement a far left agenda.  He bowed to dictators.  He kowtowed to tyrants.  Without Constitutional authority, he took over banks and major segments of the economy.  His Attorney General made a sham of equal justice under the law.  Obama apologized for the United States.  He became a willing puppet of the union bosses.  With a complicit Congress he spent money we didn’t have on a stimulus that created no jobs, but served only as a payoff to loyal politicians and union bosses.  With his leftist cohorts in Congress, Reid and Pelosi, He rammed through a socialist health care law that, if left in place, will destroy the greatest health care system in history and that will place a financially unsustainable burden on generations yet unborn.

The response of the electorate was predictable.  The election on November 2nd was a full, deep, and broad repudiation of the progressive/liberal agenda put forward by an overreaching Democratic Party that has been captured by leftist ideologues.  And this victory is just the beginning.

It’s not only the White House that is up for grabs in 2012, but the Democrats also face a dismal picture when it comes to the races for US Senate that year.  Of the 33 seats that will be contested in 2012, 20 are currently held by Democrats.  Of those 20 seats, 11 states were carried by the McCain-Palin ticket.  In other words, the Democrats had better brace for yet a second tidal wave of the size of the 1932 elections which swept Franklin D. Roosevelt to President.  Only this time, the winners will have a different title on the back of their jerseys.

Yes, it was a great election victory.  More important, it is just the beginning. 

The bloodletting will soon commence in the Democratic Party.  The far left radicals think Obama didn’t go far enough left.  The career Democrats who saw their Party decimated are angry and out for blood.  They know that Obama, Pelosi, and Reid unnecessarily led their Party down this path to a massive defeat.  It’s not a question of if Obama will have a primary opponent, but rather who that opponent will be.  It’s not a question of if there will be bloodletting internal fights within the Democratic Party, but rather who will come out the victors.

Now is not the time to sit back and relax or celebrate our victory.  It is the time to press on with resolve and determination to return our nation to the principles and ideals that made this the greatest nation in the history of the world.  It is the time to donate, to work, and to spread the message that limited Constitutional government is the only framework that secures freedom and prosperity for this and future generations of Americans.

May God continue to bless America!