Could Not Possibly Have Said It Better, So Why Try?

As both of the long-time readers of this blog know, I love the challenge of writing, (and hate the challenge of spelling, thank you spell check). As with anyone developing a talent with which providence has not been generous, the attempt to do so gives that person an appreciation for those with whom providence, coupled with hard work, has enabled them to do excellently. I just read just such an article on Timothy's blog, a blog I recently found through one of my favorite blogs, 4Simpsons. (Personal note Whisper: sorry Neil, you provide lots of good ideas with which to link which I had hoped to use, but unfortunately I've run out of time.) It is an article written by Timothy's brother, and I have copied and pasted here in its entirety without their consents.
The standard in blogging, as I understand it, is no long articles. One of the ways I determine good writing is when I do encounter a long article, it leaves me longing for more. This is one such case. Enjoy:

It's pretty funny.

Rush Limbaugh refers to liberals as "long-haired, dope-smoking, FM Radio good time Rock n' Rollers."

From about 1976 til the late '80's I had shoulder length hair, worked as a morning DJ on FM Album rock stations from Texas to Florida and throughout the South. I had a pretty good time, doing morning comedy on-air and playing competitive tennis every afternoon. I make no comments regarding inhalation of substances controlled or otherwise.

But somewhere along the way, my labels changed. I was once considered liberal. Now, turns out I'm reportedly arch conservative - at least that's what they call me. But I don't remember ever changing. I don't remember going somewhere and changing my affiliation. I don't remember any of that.

I remember Vietnam.

I remember being a sophomore in high school, and finding out guys I'd been in art class the previous year had been drafted and killed in Vietnam. I remember my scout troop leaders who'd gone on to West Point and Annapolis came back from tours saying 'Johnson wouldn't let us win the war.' I learned what FUBAR meant. I remember seeing these officers, guys I'd admired for dedication to God and Country since I was 12 years old telling me, "Whatever you do, don't go - go to Canada if you have to."

We trusted our friends, especially since the picture of the war was vastly different than what the 'establishment media' was telling us. We didn't trust anyone. We refered to the government as 'the man' or 'the establishment'.

We got angry. We went to every protest we could find. Our friends were dying. And not for some cause that meant anything.

By the time I came of age, most of the heavy lifting had been done. Kennedy and Johnson's war gave us Nixon, promising withdrawal with honor - or some such crap. I do remember years later, Jimmy Carter would talk about reinstating the draft. That afternoon, I sold my share in the construction company I owned and enrolled in the first college that would admit me - without waiting to find out if Carter could actually bring the draft back - or if there would still be a college deferrment. Another year, my draft number was #128 - but they quit drafting at #121.

I know they didn't have a litmus test of beliefs to get into the anti-war protests. But I do know we were mostly in agreement in the following:

Never trust The Man - the government - the media - the power structure
Liberty, as in Give us Liberty or Give us Death - sounded good, why die in Vietnam for nothing when you could die locally for a 'cause'.
Freedom - Like Ritchie Havens sang at Woodstock - Freedom...from war, Free love, free thought, free lifestyles.
Free People - quit repressing women, blacks, Mexicans, gooks - sorry to be crude, but labelling people with derogatory labels like "gook" made them easier to kill - and we knew cool black dudes, a mexican guy we liked - it was all about individuals.

Earlier this week, I was reading one of the few liberals I admire, Camille Paglia - she had a great column on what happened to the idealism of the '60's being replaced by the complacent servility of statist goals over the rights and freedoms of the individual.

She says it much better than I ever could.

http://www.salon.com/opinion/paglia/2009/09/09/healthcare/index.html

So what changed?

Don't Trust the Man became Totally Rely on the Man - for healthcare, taxation to control our baser instincts, retirement, security, almost everything....

Liberty became conformity - in thought, deed, speech and action - in agreement with all 'right thinking' people. Lord knows none of those people would actually think for themselves.

Freedom - became servility, letting our betters tell us which light bulbs to use, which toilets to flush, which cars to drive, - And freedom of thought? Only if you freely agree with the politically correct side - because if you don't freedom of debate is gone, the only people who disagree are bigoted, racist, homophobes who deal in 'hate speech' and don't deserve a fair hearing, only charachter assasination. Also facts suck.

Free people became aggreived groups who's ills can only be addressed by approved racism, proper bigotry and the pitting one group against another is SOP. Two wrongs don't make a right, but a few million wrongs may eventually create a level playing field. But don't count on it during your kid's lifetime. You notice how they all say 'diversity is our greatest strength' but no one ever cites a single case of that diversity doing anything strong? Celebrating our differences is more important than E Pluribus Unum.

So I wondered, where did it all come from? How did the idealism of the 60's become so turned around?

And it came to me, if you (as I do) believe in God, and the corollary that the Bible is the word of God, then the bummer part of that is, you also have to believe in Satan - because, like it or not, that's in there too.

And if there is a Satan, and he is in charge of this earthly realm, and he is really crafty, sneaky, turning our weaknesses to decieve us - if there is such a demon - he could probably take something like the freedom, love, independence and individuality of the '60's and turn it into the socialism, authoritarianism, approved racism, hate and groupthink of the 2000s.

Cue Dana Carvey (as The Church Lady) So exactly who is it messing with your little political world? Could it be, Oh, I don't know, SAAAATTAAAANNN!?!?!?

Don't know for sure, but I do know changing the liberty of liberals in the 60's to the conformity of leftists today, might well be a trick worthy of something otherworldly, demonic, even satanic.....

Or could just be an odd coincidence.

So there.

Alinsky's Rules for Radicals

The fifth video exposing even more corruption in the political activist organization ACORN surfaced yesterday. They can be seen at Biggovernment.com.

The fifth video is the same story of ACORN helping a man who passes himself off as an aspiring politician who needs advice on channeling money from his underage prostitution ring into his future political campaign, and a prostitute.

At Big Government however James Okeefe, the undercover journalist in these stories, quotes from the book, "Rules for Radicals" by Saul D. Alinsky (1909-1972), a mid twentieth century leftist activist. This is becoming an increasingly well known political play book that the left, through organizations such as ACORN, have been using against other organizations for years. Okeefe is now using the left's own tactics to infiltrate their organizations.

According to Richard Lawrence Poe "In a 1971 book called Rules for Radicals, Alinsky scolded the Sixties Left for scaring off potential converts in Middle America. True revolutionaries do not flaunt their radicalism, Alinsky taught. They cut their hair, put on suits and infiltrate the system from within. Alinsky viewed revolution as a slow, patient process. The trick was to penetrate existing institutions such as churches, unions and political parties. "

We see this today as churches, unions, the Democratic, and to some degree, the Republican party; not to mention institutions of higher learning and the government education system, have to a varying degrees, become tools in the hands of those with a socialist agenda.
As always these agendas wrap themselves in terminology that is familiar to the institution being co-opted. Whether it is Christianese, helping the poor, doing what is moral and right-what ever that means, civil liberties, or social justice, the end game is always the same, the imposition of a socialist worldview with the one true God replaced by the Man/State as the final arbiter on all things.

If you haven't seen Ainsky's rules, they are listed as follows:

RULE1: "Power is not only what you have, but what the enemy thinks you have." Power is derived from 2 main sources - money and people. "Have-Nots" must build power from flesh and blood. (These are two things of which there is a plentiful supply. Government and corporations always have a difficult time appealing to people, and usually do so almost exclusively with economic arguments.)

RULE 2: "Never go outside the expertise of your people." It results in confusion, fear and retreat. Feeling secure adds to the backbone of anyone. (Organizations under attack wonder why radicals don't address the "real" issues. This is why. They avoid things with which they have no knowledge.)
RULE 3: "Whenever possible, go outside the expertise of the enemy." Look for ways to increase insecurity, anxiety and uncertainty. (This happens all the time. Watch how many organizations under attack are blind-sided by seemingly irrelevant arguments that they are then forced to address.)

RULE 4: "Make the enemy live up to its own book of rules." If the rule is that every letter gets a reply, send 30,000 letters. You can kill them with this because no one can possibly obey all of their own rules. (This is a serious rule. The besieged entity's very credibility and reputation is at stake, because if activists catch it lying or not living up to its commitments, they can continue to chip away at the damage.)

RULE 5: "Ridicule is man's most potent weapon." There is no defense. It's irrational. It's infuriating. It also works as a key pressure point to force the enemy into concessions. (Pretty crude, rude and mean, huh? They want to create anger and fear.)

RULE 6: "A good tactic is one your people enjoy." They'll keep doing it without urging and come back to do more. They're doing their thing, and will even suggest better ones. (Radical activists, in this sense, are no different that any other human being. We all avoid "un-fun" activities, and but we revel at and enjoy the ones that work and bring results.)

RULE 7: "A tactic that drags on too long becomes a drag." Don't become old news. (Even radical activists get bored. So to keep them excited and involved, organizers are constantly coming up with new tactics.)

RULE 8: "Keep the pressure on. Never let up." Keep trying new things to keep the opposition off balance. As the opposition masters one approach, hit them from the flank with something new. (Attack, attack, attack from all sides, never giving the reeling organization a chance to rest, regroup, recover and re-strategize.)

RULE 9: "The threat is usually more terrifying than the thing itself." Imagination and ego can dream up many more consequences than any activist. (Perception is reality. Large organizations always prepare a worst-case scenario, something that may be furthest from the activists' minds. The upshot is that the organization will expend enormous time and energy, creating in its own collective mind the direst of conclusions. The possibilities can easily poison the mind and result in demoralization.)

RULE 10: "If you push a negative hard enough, it will push through and become a positive." Violence from the other side can win the public to your side because the public sympathizes with the underdog. (Unions used this tactic. Peaceful [albeit loud] demonstrations during the heyday of unions in the early to mid-20th Century incurred management's wrath, often in the form of violence that eventually brought public sympathy to their side.)

RULE 11: "The price of a successful attack is a constructive alternative." Never let the enemy score points because you're caught without a solution to the problem. (Old saw: If you're not part of the solution, you're part of the problem. Activist organizations have an agenda, and their strategy is to hold a place at the table, to be given a forum to wield their power. So, they have to have a compromise solution.)

RULE 12: Pick the target, freeze it, personalize it, and polarize it." Cut off the support network and isolate the target from sympathy. Go after people and not institutions; people hurt faster than institutions. (This is cruel, but very effective. Direct, personalized criticism and ridicule works.)

As Christians we are to be wise as serpents. Not everyone coming in the name of the Lord is in fact from our Savior. We should warn young ones (young in spirit) of the enticing and good sounding arguments of those who, on the outside appear as sheep, but who are on the inside ravenous wolves. This is one of the reasons that the issue of abortion is far wider in scope than the systematic killing of the unborn, it is also one indicator of whether a person serves his Father in heaven, or his father the "murderer from the beginning".

Pastor Bill Willson

By far one of the most influential people I have ever heard speak is Pastor Bill Willson of Metro Ministries. He spoke at Belmont Church in Nashville Tennessee where I was then attending. There were three services and after hearing him speak, when I learned that all his messages would be different, I sat through all three. He didn't mince words and I was shocked at what I can only call his hardcore Christianity. It was a wonderful departure from anything I'd seen before, or since, and he was severely challenging to say the least.

After thinking about this man lately I found an interesting YT documentary on his ministry.

Part 1



Part 2

Acorn Corrupt? Who Cares?

Featured at the end of this post is a video of a man and woman portraying a pimp and his prostitute going into a tax supported ACORN office and getting advice on:

• How to run a prostitution business
• Tax advice on that business
• How to keep minor prostitutes shipped in from San Salvidor a secret
• How to work the tax code around the child prostitutes
• Advice on how to train those child prostitutes

There is also a link to another similar video.

For the political savvy on both the left and the right, the videos featured here are not at all surprising. For those on the left, they are of no consequence, just part and parcel to winning elections. For those on the right the videos are proof of two things. One, man is corrupt and should be monitored. Two, the media who's job it is to monitor are beholden more to their ideology than ferreting out the corruption of those with who's ideology they agree.

Leftist news agencies will eventually be forced to report on this due to the blogosphere and am radio, but it will be couched in questions of the legality of the filming, or perhaps the fact that conservative agencies have been guilty of similar activities, or some other mitigating circumstance with the intent of covering for their leader. Then as far as that media is concerned, it will become instant history, and it will be time to "move on".

Even though tax supported Acorn was the gestation organization for our current president, these videos will eventually find themselves in the trash Bin with all the other revelations about our illustrious leader as we simultaneously beg him, and bestow upon him the ability, to save us from reaping the harvest of our years of sowing to the wind.

The Other Video Is Here at Biggovernment.com. There are also transcripts.

A Little On Politics and Religion

Unlike some, I have never been able to separate politics and religion. It seems axiomatic to me that they are in fact inseparable. This reality is driven home to me daily in the market place as men and women struggle with the laws of the land, right and wrong, good and evil, and how to navigate and fit into the maze in which they are daily confronted.

The most important reason I find them impossible to separate however is the commandment to love my neighbor as myself. And in the same way that I hate my son when I love myself too much to put myself through the heartache of applying the rod, I also hate my neighbor when I love myself too much to go through the heartache of calling for a just government. Who knows, one day we may save our neighbor from an injustice like that experienced by Sara Capewell.

Duane's Mind posted on an article today from the UK regarding Miss. Capewell. Her baby was refused treatment because it was born two days before the "trigger" set by the UK government for providing health care for a premature baby. According to the Daily Mail the mother "begged them to save her tiny son, who was born just 21 weeks and five days into her pregnancy". knowing the heart of a mom after carrying and caring for her baby, I can only imagine her agony when she was informed by her doctors to "treat the labour as a miscarriage, not a birth”, and then was left after her labor to helplessly hold her dying son for the remaining two hours of his life.

This kind of thing is the reality in politics in the U.S. for indeed a baby still in its mother's birth canal can have a pair of scissors jammed into the base of its scull and its brains sucked out, while only a few inches later it will enjoy the full protection of the constitution. There are stark similarities between this reality and this UK woman, yet how many Christians are demanding that this same government take over health care in the name of love and compassion?

To be sure, there is a consequence when the salt ceases to be salt and abandons its call for righteous leaders in its government in favor of peace in its sanctuaries. Of this we can be assured, contrary to what we are being told, this is not love, and it's coming in spades to a hospital near you in the name of compassion in lieu of profits.

Time For A Laugh and Some Manly Advice

My Wife and I decided to each post a Tim Hawkins video. She chose one of my favorites so I decided to post one of hers. Here is some advice that I think may come in handy over this holiday weekend. Enjoy.

Time For a Little Worship Music

If this were about one of your political heroes, would it make you... perhaps... a little uncomfortable?

A Video Juxtiposition

I watched a movie called The Wave on The Clay Tablet. The movie is based on a true event that happened in Palo Alto, CA, in 1967. It begins with a teacher unable to answer a student's question as to why the German people did not stop the holocaust. The remainder tracks the teacher surreptitiously demonstrating to the students the answer to that question by basically turning his class into a cult which focused on discipline, community and action.

Below is part one of two parts. (The movie can be seen in its entirety at The Clay Tablet link above) Advance the movie to the time of 21:00 to get an idea of how the teacher's class was conducted.



The teacher's antics were starting to spread outside his classroom and were causing problems on campus. He brought the demonstration to a conclusion by announcing to the students that they had been participating in a nationwide movement and the national leader had a recorded message that was to be presented in the gym. Once all the students were assembled, he announced: "Ladies and gentlemen, this is your leader". Two televisions blazed to life with a recorded Adolf Hitler speech.

This movie was fresh in my mind as I came upon the following video: (advance to 3:50 to get to the similarity)




As I watched this video I had two thoughts. first, that almost everything that they claimed to be pledging, with the exception of Obama worship, was good. Second, their hope is that what they are voluntarily pledging, would become compulsory for all others.