"...Let me tell you where real hope lies. It's not the hopey-changey stuff we heard about in 2008. Real hope comes from realizing how God has blessed our exceptional nation, and then doing something about it. We have been blessed with natural resources, hardworking entrepreneurs, and a Constitution that preserves the greatest form of government ever devised by man. If we develop those natural resources, allow our entrepreneurs to keep and invest more of what they earn, and adhere to the time-tested truths of our Constitution, we will prosper and endure." -- Sarah Palin July 9, 2011
They know. We know. They know we know. We know they know, and they know we know they know. So why isn't something being done about it?
I'm talking about Obama's Constitutional ineligibility to be POTUS, and the refusal of anyone in a position to do something about it, to do something about it. To stop pretending that nothing is amiss, that nothing is wrong and everything is as peachy as can be. Well, things are not peachy. Things are very far from being in any sense peachy. In fact, things are going to hell in a hand-basket rather quickly.
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In a recent article "Tyrannus Obama Rex" Jay Clarke noted that "A thriving middle class is dangerous for any tyrant. With time and income to allow for certain luxuries, middle-class citizens can also become politically active. A strong and vibrant middle class is essential for a healthy economy, but it is also a driving force for the expansion of liberty. Liberty is a tyrant's Kryptonite. It would stand to reason that the destruction of the middle class by the reduction of middle-class wealth would be an endgame for the tyrant in training."
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Indeed. "We the people" are witnessing day by day the destruction of America's middle-class by intent and design. This vital segment of our (or any) free republic is being whittled away, disregarded, and destroyed -- all rhetoric to the contrary notwithstanding. So what do we do? The political elite in Congress are loath to move in any constructive direction, so it is up to us to light a fire under them, and give them direction.
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The fact that there are distant rumblings about impeachment coming from Congress is heartening. But it should be noted that such talk of impeachment does not concern Obama's lack of Constitutional authority to be POTUS, but rather stems from various other transgressions against the US Constitution -- perhaps most notably the unconstitutional
de facto war on Libya.
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Despite all the verbal "bobbing and weaving" around the issue, it is indeed a war, ("It's not a war, it's a, uh, a kinetic military action -- yeah, there's the ticket, a kinetic military action -- besides, it's all NATO's fault!"). The Libyan cluster-# is a war that Obama flagrantly bypassed Congress in starting. That's a big "no-no" -- or should be.
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Quo Warranto and jail time for misprision of felony is the best strategy against those implicated in the cover-up of Obama's illegitimacy to be POTUS, but impeachment may yet be the best route to follow in the targeting of other criminal behavior.
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For instance, Rep. Allen West (R-FL) recently said, "Eric Holder needs to be removed from the Department of Justice" (DOJ). Mr. West, of course, meant in the event that Holder is found guilty of committing any crimes. Given the continuing blow-back from the BATF's "Fast and Furious" fiasco, such a possibility is looking likelier all the time. Something to think about.
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I would now like to return to the subject of my previous article "United in Hate vs. United We Stand," which addressed Christian beliefs. You might wonder, why bring religion up at all? Are not America's chief problems political and economic?
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I would say that the most visible signs of America's soul sickness are the economy, and the ongoing political dust-up, but these are mainly symptoms, and the disease itself runs deeper and is largely hidden. America has lost its moral direction. We have been waylaid by liberal philosophies such as polymorphous perversity, and the credo "If It Feels Good Do It." By taking God out of our government and culture (i.e. becoming secular), we have embarked down a one-way road to moral relativism and nihilism.
In his book "What We Can't Not Know" J. Budziszewski puts it this way "Our problem is not that there isn't common moral ground, but that we would rather be standing somewhere else." Why resist temptation, if you are told that to do so is reactionary, dull, and cowardly? Whereas to do what you feel like doing is freeing, liberating, and brave. Vapid, dangerous, and alluring liberal cant.
Budziszewski continues, "We are not in Dante's inferno, where even the sinners acknowledge the law which they have violated. We are in some other hell. The denizens of our hell say that they don't know the law -- or that there is no law -- or that each makes the law for himself. And they all know better."
Bottom line, America needs to infuse a fresh sense of morality into our government and culture -- and vague notions of "universal goodwill" are not going to cut it. There is no need to reinvent the wheel here. America has strong Judeo/Christian roots, and a long tradition of following Christian principles (natural law). All that's needed is to pick them up, dust them off, and reinvigorate them. They have been neglected, or merely paid lip-service to, for far too long, by far too many of us.
This stance is perhaps the most important difference between true patriotic conservatives, and fiscally conservative Libertarians and Ayn Rand aficionados. It is not enough to be merely fiscally conservative. Without social conservatism, any purely economic conservative moves are simply the equivalent of changing deck-chairs on the Titanic.
They are welcome moves, no doubt, but they still leave the main issue unaddressed. How does America regain its moral bearings? How do we get a better lodestone then avarice and arrogance to direct our Ship of State by? That is where the list I proposed in my last article comes in.
The list was an attempt to gather together some generic Christian beliefs, or themes, that would help the various major Christian denominations bypass some of the more divisive issues among them, and focus on what they hold in common, so as to provide a more united front against the many enemies that Christianity currently faces. As you may recall, the list stated that as Christians we believe that:
- Jesus is The Lord.
- Jesus is The Way.
- Jesus performed real miracles -- not stunts, not tricks, not magic, but real miracles.
- Each of us, as individuals (with God's grace), earns our salvation.
- We rejoice in our hearts ("We are the Easter people and hallelujah is our song").
- The Bible is a holy book -- the holy book.
- The Judeo/Christian tradition -- Western civilization -- is worth defending; worth fighting for, and if need be, worth dying for. We are not rug-mats.
In addition, we believe in:
- The Crucifixion and the Resurrection.
- Divine reward and punishment (heaven and hell).
- The Ten Commandments.
- Jesus' 11th Commandment ("Love others as I have loved you" -- a key word being "as").
Let me reiterate that my list is simply a "suggested guideline, that others, better qualified than I, might use as a starting template." Nor am I proposing that it should act as some sort of replacement for the orthodoxy and dogma of any of the various denominations -- our Christian teachings have been diluted quite enough, thank you.
I am merely suggesting that such a list might reinforce, re-invigorate, and refresh American Christianity, and remind us that, when all is said and done, the major Christian denominations have much more in common with each other, than with atheism, paganism. or relativism, for example.
Valid Christianity is by its nature conservative -- by which I mean that although it is always evolving and growing, at the same time it holds onto that which is good, honest, and true from the past. True conservatism is always forward looking. It is always changing, always evolving, but in an intelligent manner -- retaining that which has proven itself through trial and error, while discarding that which has proven irself to be useless and/or harmful. Change for change's sake is avoided as being juvenile and foolish.
Yet change for change's sake is exactly what the liberals have been pushing on us for decades. Their "progress" is in truth nothing but a retrogressive return to a pre-Judeo/Christian paganism, a feudal-style system of aristocracy and peasants, and an ever-growing jungle of laws that are bereft of any firmly rooted underpinnings or moral authority. We are well on our way to becoming high-tech barbarians -- monkeys with handgrenades instead of rocks. "Progressives" my butt.
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Be that as it may, the one element in my suggested list that drew any real disagreement, was the statement "Each of us, as individuals (with God's grace), earns our salvation." It turns out that such a statement is precisely the sort of divisive declaration that I was suggesting we Christians avoid in such a list.
Although I have not changed my mind regarding the validity of the statement, I have certainly changed my mind as to whether it should be included in the list. I believe that it should not be included. Perhaps it could be replaced with something along the lines of "We try to live our lives in a way that is in alignment with God's will." (There was also some reader concern regarding the statement that "Jesus is the Way" -- feeling that it was too elitist and exclusionary. I'll simply say that Jesus is indeed The Way for mainstream Christians, and leave it at that).
In any event, I want to thank the readers who responded to my last article. Without your thoughtful and valuable input I would have remained blissfully unaware that I had inadvertently stepped on anyone's theological toes. May God bless "we the people," the United States of America, and may we find ourselves in alignment with His will.
Laus Deo.
P.S. In addition to Dr. Budziszewski's laudable defense of natural law and the Judeo/Christian tradition, I would also recommend "What's So Great About Christianity" by Dinesh D'Souza; "The Book That Made Your World" by Vishal Mangalwadi; C.S. Lewis' classic "Mere Christianity," and Thomas Cahill's "How The Irish Saved Civilization," and "The Gifts Of The Jews." There are, of course, many other excellent books elucidating the time-tested positive effects of the Judeo/Christian system of spiritual/social regulation and salvation.
