Nations are living organisms: biological – with an emphasis on logical – made up, obviously, of living, breathing people who share basic concepts of right, wrong, love, family, economics and social status. The health of the nation connects to the health of its members, physically, but also to the health of its beliefs, religious and otherwise. Some nations started because of religious beliefs, but most are or were tribal. Weaving through hundreds or thousands of years of history – perhaps “progress” – nations either progress evenly enough that its members accept, over time, their relationships to political power-holders, elected or otherwise. It is a function of “social status” noted earlier.
Wars change nations, usually by a form of cruel, expensive, bloody separation or segregation: almost purification. If there were some semblance of justice in the origins and results of war, stronger nations, healthier nations, will result. Former amalgamations of nations are distilled apart leaving nations comprised of people who more evenly – fairly – share the basic concepts of life and cooperation listed at the beginning of this observation.
Historians, of course, amidst their natural biases, justify or castigate wars along a spectrum of perceived fairness or righteousness in their origins. However, time reveals the health of nations following the wrenching of war, and the correctness of the new or modified nation’s composition. Is the society healthy? Do its members accept, if not reinforce one another? Is there a path for the divisions of social status to soften or encourage improvement of the economic and social status of its members? If so, that nation will retain its shared identity and ethical agreements.
The advent of writing and written “history” of nations and wars, began a process that has left “modern” peoples with an image, at least, often biased and one-sided justifications of conflicts over the past 5,000 years or so. The use of writing, long, long ago, was a tool of kings or emperors: ruling classes, certainly. The recorded story would automatically be told from the outlook of “rulers,” and then, only of the victorious rulers. As writing and reading spread through greater fractions of societies, somewhat truer, more accurate pictures of the how’s and why’s of wars have been “painted.” Throughout, the tendency for dominant elements of societies – governors – to control what those dominated know or believe about the nature of the world around them and, more specifically, about the workings and intentions/philosophies of their “governors,” themselves.
Occasionally – very infrequently, actually – only once, in fact, a nation is (was) formed based on the best of the philosophies and histories that human history had delivered to that point and place in time. To define that nation, the philosophies of individual sovereignty, responsibility, liberty and from-the-people authority to govern, and the reasons for employing those ideas, were written into the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution and Bill of Rights of 1789. Underlying all of them is the tradition of Judeo-Christianity: 5,000 years of learning what are rights and wrongs and how honesty and honor can and should dissolve lies and hatred and disrespect.
Through it all the Bible has made clear that the most powerful relationship with God is an individual one. Fellowship and congregation are wonderful reinforcements for the individual’s ability to internalize the concepts of God and His rules for life and ascension. Without religious freedom the evolution of souls and the growth of individuals would be impossible. Without the lessons religion provides, the model for 2-parent families and effective fathering of sons and daughters, including economic security, would slip away. There are those, today, who think the government will take better care of children than will their parents. God forbid.
The Constitution is both a covenant and a unique, exceptional, partnership with the people – citizens – of the United States. Unique among nations and history, the CITIZENS of the United States formed the government of the United States. The founding had flaws, primarily slavery and slaves, themselves. The problem that the founders hoped would fade away became the gut-wrenching lever that separated the states. The Civil War became the awful medicine that commenced the cure of slavery fairly quickly, and the cure of racism that has progressed for decades afterwards. But, in both the forming and preservation of the Union, God blessed our nation with the wisdom and fortitude to earn the right of national identity.
Our identity depends upon our general grasp of the IDEAS, the philosophies that underlie our founding and why the Constitutional model is designed the way it is. As we select our representatives, governors and President, we should be looking for each of their understanding of our Constitutional Republic being a PARTNERSHIP that makes possible the success of every U. S. citizen. U. S. citizenship is the “Gold Standard” of all citizenships around the world. One of the prime tests of the right to lead Americans is whether the person seeking that power/status is prepared to defend the unique value of U. S. citizenship. Anyone who would dilute, or threaten that value, by definition is unqualified to lead us. Only U. S. citizens live under the protections and guarantees of the U. S. Constitution and those comprise the most valuable possession – personal property – of every citizen.
An example of PARTNERSHIP would be careful defense of our borders on behalf of every state and every citizen, with proper and strict control over non-citizens allowed to enter our nation. An example of TYRANNY would be loose or virtual non-control over illegal entrants. An example of PARTNERSHIP would be careful, balanced budgeting and management of the people’s money, taxes and banking/investment regulations. An example of TYRANNY would be $35Trillion in national debt and $1Trillion owed in interest every year. An example of PARTNERSHIP would be honest law enforcement and equal application/protection of the laws. An example of TYRANNY would be use of law enforcement agencies and even courts, to persecute people because of their beliefs or politics.
An example of PARTNERSHIP would be telling U. S. citizens the truth about government actions and legislation. An example of TYRANNY would be for the government or its agencies to lie to Americans… or to bring up for a vote legislation with more than the number of words than are in our amended Constitution.
Since the brutal terror-attack on Israel last October 7th, there have been “protest” actions ranging from building occupations at universities to outright vandalism to widespread hate-crimes and breaching of civil rights of Americans. The so-called protests were… are, aimed at Israel and Jews in general as though Israel caused its own victimization. Funding for all of the signs, flags, tents and food support comes from a variety of front organizations for Hamas and, ultimately, Iran. The marchers, occupiers and rioters are, essentially, shouting in FAVOR of murder: death to Israelis and to the nation of Israel, itself. The thinnest of membranes separates that desire from the very same for America, itself. This death business has become one of the largest businesses in America. Sadly.
Another death-rattle in our modern, “progressive” society is the aggressive abortion industry. One need not be an active “Christian” to grow up with a sense of the sanctity of life. Our Declaration of Independence lists our “unalienable Rights” among which are “Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of Happiness.” Little of the message of our Declaration is known or contemplated by most Americans, but many can quote “life liberty and pursuit of happiness” and most actually think those promises are in the Constitution. Shame on elementary education that the Declaration is so poorly known or understood, but if only one scrap were able to be widely known, “Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of Happiness” is the one most needed. The sanctity of LIFE is part of America.
For 150 years the sanctity of life has been under assault from forces flying a variety of banners. One of the worst is eugenics. Unfortunately, the concept of perfecting or purifying the racial makeup of our population captured the backing of many politicians. The concept of choosing death of non-whites over education and opportunity is a sick one. Big names, like Harriman, signed on to Margaret Sanger’s effort to abort the babies of the less fit – mostly brown-skinned. How it is that blacks and others can vote for Democrats and their slavish promotion of abortion as a social problem solution, is an example of excellent “psy-ops” by Democrats to convince blacks that the people trying to abort them are their friends.
The concept to marginalizing, if not killing blacks, can be seen at work in “Great Society” welfare programs that have practically destroyed the black family. The whole miasma of “the war on drugs” that has produced 50 years of increase, has also yielded overdose deaths on a scale that once would have caused immense distress to “normal” people, but has become just a background problem for those “less fit.” Shame on us for not being nationally serious about drugs. They KILL upwards of 100,000 AMERICANS every single, damned year.
However, we have been programmed to believe that life is not part of the American way; it is only true if you don’t upset the oligarchy – and the Communists – too much. Life is no longer revered. Murderers are rather routinely let out of prison or not even prosecuted. The greatest murder machine on earth: Planned Parenthood, is a political force, able to tap into federal taxation/borrowing in various ways. Politicians seek their support. Churches are denigrated and polluted with popular fads, their normal defense of life as not just revered but, sacred, yet under constant assault. Children are indoctrinated with odd theories of sexual unreality, part of the great movement to disassociate Americans from truth. Halloween is celebrated more than Christmas.
Clearly there is a macabre fascination with, if not celebration of death. Great effort has been made to convince the blindly secular that murder isn’t murder if there is some overriding social purpose. Among such purposes are convenience, economics, social injustice, food profits, pharmaceutical profits, climate change and hatreds, including political hatred… so many ways to justify death as a preferred solution. Underlying many of them is a political belief that the Earth would be a great place to live if it weren’t for all the humans. Dropping the total population by FIVE OR SIX BILLION people, as many elite globalists would like, would make for some very uncomfortable decades. Large sums of money are being spent to achieve depopulation.
One political party has staked its success on abortion rights, on backing Hamas and Iran and on greasing the subversive skids of the Chinese Communist Party, the most murderous nation on Earth. The same party helped kill tens of thousands of Americans with stupid Covid rules and stupid mRNA injection mandates, and looks forward to reducing our population by reducing food supplies while still promoting these infernal gene-therapy shots to even 5-year olds and to everyone else in the form of “boosters” that limit and undercut our natural immune systems. The latest weapon in this attack is an mRNA technology called “Replicon,” being tested on the Japanese right now. Once at work in humans’ cells, this crap replicates itself so as to spread to other cells where it generates “spike” proteins, ostensibly to stimulate an immune response.
The trouble is, these replicating RNA strands can be transmitted to others in close contact, causing them to be “innoculated” unknowingly. Unfortunately, the well-documented threats to overall health and natural immunity are just as bad as from the original mRNA shots that people lined-up-for… until they got wise and no longer do. This would be a wonderful planet if it weren’t for all the people. In Prudence’ view the most tragic death will be of the United States, itself.
Killing a nation happens on multiple “fronts.” Obviously, killing all the people would kill the IDEA of a nation and its culture. Genocide is the worst war crime there is. But, if the ideas that are shared by the citizens of a nation can be eroded, even reversed, so to speak, that nation will die a different kind of death. As the process descends that nation increasingly exists for the benefit of others, not for itself or for its people. Soon its education system is teaching history (if taught at all) of all the reasons to be ashamed of the nation’s founding, ideals and actions. Then, enclaves of foreign cultures are invited in where populations of people with unassimilated and unassimilable ideas are allowed to grow to an extent that they affect elections, crowding out American beliefs and voters. Closer to the end, law and order, police systems, layers of the judiciary and national law enforcement are twisted into political tools for resisting or undercutting the members of society that still are passionate about the nation and its founding philosophies.
Finally, one political party commits itself to all the forces and fallacies that spread the many kinds of death that are threatening to kill the nation. That party should never hold power, again.
America appears to be at its weakest condition both nationally and internationally (if the two can be considered separately), if not ever, certainly since the Civil War. We’re entering the last few months of the most questionable Presidency in our history, during which the actual levers of power and communication seem to be in the hands of unknown people other than the erstwhile president, Joe Biden. Major changes in our international relationships have taken place in the same period, including significant failures both military and diplomatic. Our greatest enemies have formed new or stronger alliances against the U. S. or its allies, and our economic position is under daily assault, also both domestically and internationally.
Our financial structure is groaning under the weight of excessive borrowing and debt. Even as the cost of INTEREST in the federal budget has exceeded One Trillion Dollars per year, the Biden-Harris regime is planning deficit spending that will take our total debt to over $50 Trillion in another 10 to 15 years! Even without the Marxist welfare plans they have, deficit spending is now such a habit in federal budgeting that the concept of balance income and expenses at the federal level is so politically distant that the risks to solvency AND OUR ABILITY TO DEFEND OURSELVES, are far away behind a fog-bank of self-service and electoral enrichment.
Our Navy, for example, is at its smallest, least-modernized status of the past 50 years. Our latest aircraft are so expensive that fleet size has been curtailed, as are, sadly, some of the advanced technologies, themselves. Piece by piece, we have reduced the number of defense contractors, and thus the competitive pressures that yield the best innovations and quality. Many armaments depend on materials and chips, in particular, that must be imported. It is questionable whether the U. S. could sustain more than a week or two of all-out war with either Russia or China. Indeed, we are strained to provide arms to Ukraine and Israel at the same time.
And our allies, solid and ephemeral? The Biden regime has disturbed them at every turn. The inexplicable retreat from Afghanistan, after pouring treasure and people into that odd, horribly expensive balancing act of inexplicable purpose, has other nations wondering about trusting the U. S. when the chips are down for their countries. Why didn’t we hold Baghram Air Force Base? Because the Chinese Communists told Biden they wanted us out of there? They didn’t want the U. S. able to strike from a few hundred miles instead of several thousand? What should India think… or Pakistan? Or, anyone else?
We’re no longer the “arsenal of Democracy…” more like the arse-holes of Democracy. We’ve been sending our treasure and our best young people to other lands to instill a form of government and ostensible freedom, that we don’t want, ourselves! Indeed, one of our major political parties delights in encouraging demonstrations and riots that tear at the roots of our society as if they prove how wonderful and “free” our system is. It is, apparently, a message that 70 MILLION aborted Americans can’t transmit.
A majority of Americans no longer trust our basic institutions of government and society, including even medicine and higher education. One political party constantly tells us how crass and dismal our history is, how the high-falutin ideals of our founding are really lies told by enslavers, how religion is part of the lies we have been told, and how children can be helped to change their genders. It is difficult for citizens to keep their mental footing.
Marriage is crumbling. There is no more significant pillar upholding Western / American civilization than strong, committed, life-long marriages. Those on the left, opposed to religion, particularly Christianity – and the farther Left the more virulently opposed – look to government laws and regulations as the only source of ethics or, even, morals. Satisfying government bureaucrats, so-called “experts,” is the goal of anti-religionists. Satisfying personal, conscientious beliefs and oaths of honor, is the abiding guideline of those raised in a religious environment, in families strengthened by the same sort of personal honor. There is nothing stronger or more life-affirming. No civilization or culture can survive or grow without a commitment to LIFE. The growing commitment to anti-life, anti-marriage and anti-growth in America, is a recipe for doom. We are reinforcing this trend with our mendacious economics, as well.
The left, placing its entire hopefulness in the hands of government, cannot trust in individuals or their ethics. The private economy is a mystery to leftists / socialists / Communists and Democrat liberals. They call themselves “progressives” so as to avoid anyone mouthing those other names. They believe that welfare and massive government spending will somehow make individuals smarter, stronger, more productive and more moral. Having rejected spiritual life, entirely, Progressives place no trust in any individual’s motivation to do what is right or beneficial. Consequently, Progressive, far-left Presidential administrations will, and always have, diverted resources away from Defense and into domestic “free stuff.”
On Mayday, 2010, a major water main bringing water from the Quabbin Reservoir in Massachusetts to the Greater Boston city and regional system, burst at a gigantic valve in the town of Weston. It created a major water emergency. Governor Deval Patrick issued directives for people to boil their water until further notice. Made eminent sense. At the same time, the MWRA brought truckloads of bottled water to key distribution points. One might think that boiling water would be a function that most humans in the United States could handle… even in 2010. Fights broke out over the bottled water distribution, fights that made the news. Amazing. Even for such a simple emergency situation: the recommendation to boil tapwater before cooking with it or drinking it, large numbers of people expected government salvation without delay. They wanted enough bottled water to take baths with, not just for consumption. It seemed weird.
What is likely to happen when Americans are forced to sacrifice? What if we must fight all-out war? What if the economy, $35 Trillion in debt, collapses and foreign countries won’t accept payment in devalued dollars? Would people find a way to persevere as they did during the Depression? Or, during World War II? Would we be capable of boiling our water if an enemy has contaminated water supplies? One wonders. What if we lose the internet, GPS, cell-phone service or electric power for long periods? Are we tough enough to survive? Smart enough?
History is moving a little more quickly in 2024. Despite our constant bathing in 24/7 news coverage and exceptional secrecy, or obfuscation, by our own government: the generator of most “news,” Americans are less and less informed about the matters that do and will define our political systems and actual governance. Those who follow current events and who can recall the years after World War II, can make some sense of the need for secrecy during the war, and the rapid expansion of the “secrecy industry” within our federal government, readily justified by the “Cold War” with nuclear-armed U.S.S.R. and, soon, Red China. Our spies were keeping us safe.
Multiple books, movies and TV shows glorified our heroic spies: how much they had to sacrifice to stay undercover, how they tripped up Soviet spies, in particular, how they convinced “Russians” to switch allegiance and act as “double-agents” as they fed soviet secrets to us. On the other hand, those Americans who fed information to the Russians were portrayed as the most heinous of traitors. The Rosenbergs were executed. It is instructive – and Prudent – to recall President Eisenhower’s warning about the “Military-Industrial complex” and President Kennedy’s deep distrust of the “CIA” following the failed “Bay of Pigs” invasion and the assassination of President Diem of South Vietnam. Both recognized the loss of control over the Executive branch of government. Kennedy paid the ultimate price in November of 1963, for attempting to reverse the “intelligence” coup of the federal government. His brother, Robert, his most trusted advisor, paid the same in 1968. The truth of the two assassinations is still not clear to Americans.
For those who can’t contemplate their own government’s ability to murder a president, it might be well to recall the complete deception / fraud embodied in the statement signed by “51 intelligence experts and 5 former heads of the CIA.” These mendacious frauds were instructed to make the claim that Hunter Biden’s abandoned laptop was an example of “Russian disinformation.” This single deception was employed by Joe Biden to divert attention from the evidence of bribery and treason recorded on his son’s laptop – bribery and treason that would have upset Biden’s campaign for president in 2020. Given the hatreds generated about Donald Trump (a new Hitler, a dictator, a philanderer who pays off prostitutes, a threat to democracy, etc., etc., and now, very questionably, convicted felon) is it very much of a leap to simply eliminate such an evil person? Add to the possibility the threat he represents to the intelligence “community” that has conspired against him for years, and the people who removed a president and his brother would seem to have all the excuses they need to remove Trump, too, from the political scene… one way or the other.
History seemed to accelerate just a little when Trump beat Hillary Clinton. The course defined by the powers that were running things in 2016, was upset – diverted – by Trump’s upheaval of nature. The machinery of “Trump derangement syndrome” switched on throughout the “intelligence” community, the leftist media complex, the Clinton campaign and the rest of the Democrat party, a powerful array. Within days the “Russian collusion” claims began and the “Steele Dossier” was generated through a complex scheme involving a major Democrat law firm and a Clinton campaign opposition research contractor. At almost the same time elements of the “intelligence” community began subverting people connected to the Trump campaign or otherwise associated with Donald Trump. Yet Trump beat the odds against him and beat Clinton in the Electoral College. Before he was inaugurated the calls for his impeachment began. It all represented a change in the nature of American events and, in light of the number of unique events associated with the 2016 political activity, it could be described as moving faster, even, than during 9-11 and the Bush administration.
Obama tried to get history to accelerate, too. He dreamed of leaving the ideas of America behind because he, Obama, would “fundamentally transform” the nation… and transform history’s rate of change with it. History slowed down, Prudence could argue, when the worldwide COVID-19 hoax swept over most of our common senses. Medical knowledge – AND PRACTICE – was turned on its head, governments retreated from basic freedoms and small-r republicanism, global governance was promoted in coordination of vaccine and “proper” care for the infected. Economies around the world were stymied by regulatory directives, overriding even the U. S. Constitution, causing hundreds of collateral deaths as people’s lives were torn asunder, including personal economies and professions ruined by extra-legal vaccine mandates.
The advancement of freedom, justice and individuality, that Americans pretend to believe is inexorable, was not only reversed, but shattered by COVID. What has been worse is the hundreds of thousands of deaths that can be laid at the doorstep of the so-called vaccines, themselves. Americans agreed to accept some form of promised “safety” in exchange for their freedoms. Shame on us. We can blame education, generally, for the ignorance of history and of the Constitutionally protected rights citizens are born with. Now, we’re watching the Democrat party subvert the democratic process by removing the PRESIDENT from his own campaign, and replacing him, in effect, with the Vice-President for whom no one has voted in the Democrat primaries. When it comes to upsetting American traditions, the Left has accelerated the flow of history all by itself.
Now we have seen another assassination plot that, Providentially, failed to kill former President Trump. As is the common model, the “shooter” was, supposedly, a troubled young man acting alone, who was killed quickly following his intended kill-shot. No one is going to ask HIM any questions. So many basic protective steps were ignored in preparation for one of Trump’s campaign rallies, one can justifiably wonder whether the Secret Service was directed to be unprofessionally sloppy for this event? Was there a scheme under way to enable the murder of former President Trump?
Mike Adams, who pod-casts as “The Health Ranger” on BRIGHTEON BROADCAST NEWS, analyzed the acoustic signatures of shots fired during the assassination attempt. The sound came from recording at the speaker’s (target’s) microphone. There were at least 3 shooters at different distances away from Trump, with young Mr. Crooks being the closest at 130+ yards. The second was at about twice that distance away, which could include the water tower where Rally-goers observed TWO individuals, ONE OF WHOM WAS OBSERVED BEING SHOT BY A SNIPER, while the second one disappeared. The third acoustic signature indicates a shot taken from several hundred yards away. The “lone gunman” looks more and more like a patsy in a plot.
Maybe the reason Secret Service Director Cheatle couldn’t or wouldn’t give straight answers to Congress on July 22nd is that she actually wants to hide behind a phony report prepared by those who organized the plot to kill Trump in the first place, she actually doesn’t KNOW what the Hell went on and prefers to stay ignorant. Amazingly, Joe Biden gave up on re-election just a few days later and shifted the news engine to other topics, completely. We’ll all watch as the pace of history will slow down markedly in the next couple of weeks.
Finally, Director Cheatle has resigned, which is a good thing, by itself, but it brings into even starker relief why she bothered to show up to “testify” before the House Oversight Committee. Clearly her intention was NOT to convey information to the Congress. She barely changed her demeanor or facial expression throughout the brutal questioning by the Committee from both sides of the aisle. She knew it would be brutal and she knew she wasn’t going to satisfy any questioner. That wasn’t her job on Monday. She was there to draw fire and resign the next day. At the same time, the Kamala geyser was set to erupt and distort the news. The deep state is not done with Donald Trump, yet.
Prudence is, sadly, fairly certain that another attempt on Trump’s life will be made. Be wary, my Friend.
So much speculation. Those of us who have been praying for this nation are waiting to see God’s hand at work reforming our moral platforms, perhaps penetrating our wayward churches, perhaps loosening the chains on our public education. Can He cleanse higher education, as well? Of course. Those with eyes to see and ears to hear are in for a period of joy. To the less-inspired, if you have been hoping for a sign… well, there you are.
Joe Biden threw down a challenge to the Almighty the other day: he would get out of the campaign for re-election only if God Almighty told him to get out. Hmmnnhh… sometimes the observer is too close to the signs to see them – forest for the trees, and all that. JOE! JOE! Heaven to JOE! If you can’t take a bright, shining slap to your psyche, you will not like the two-by-four on the side of your head. Take the hint, Joe… please!
All of the pablum comments about “lowering the temperature” of political discourse, are no more than political comments uttered by the unaware. We need to recognize that God is totally unimpressed by politicized speeches, statements, position papers and other modified forms of bull-hockey. He cares only about your soul and the love in our hearts. The hatreds are our business, alone.
Political campaigns are staffed, in part, by professional liars. Prudence doubts that this fact is actually a good thing, or good aspect of human endeavor in any case. It will be interesting to see what changes might manifest in the output of campaign drivel. Will it become more principled? Will it add to Americans’ understanding of the Covenant aspect of our exceptional Constitution and Republic? Will anything be conveyed in place of standard calumny and excrement? There’s is a lot to watch and listen for. Which campaign will actually improve the level of “unity” in these great United States?
The “LEFT,” so called, is a wide, stinking river of anti-American opinion, calumny and hatreds of multiple kinds, cobbled together to defeat conservatism. American conservatism doesn’t really fit anywhere on the spectrum from LEFT to RIGHT as typically distinguished – most of the distinguishing being done by those on the Left.
As much as possible, the original founding ideas of “America,” were developed in concert with the principles of Judeo-Christianity. Key to the non-religious basis of the American Republic is that equal application of the Law applies to everyone. This concept is a continuous lesson in Biblical writings, and we see it in the balance between FREEDOM and RESPONSIBILITY. God’s instruction to mankind is based on FREE WILL, but it is bound by the responsibility to answer for the consequences of our free-will decisions. (As ye sow, so shall – so MUST – you reap) This fundamental concept is the basis of our Constitution. For humans to establish a government that can so closely reflect the fundamentals of both the Old and New Testaments, is a small miracle. The alternative to the Constitution is the mix of philosophies we call “the Left.”
As illustrated in virtually every Bible story and book, those who stand up for God are almost immediately attacked, if not killed. From the very start: Garden of Eden, the “serpent” employed the process of dialectic materialism, as in Marxism. God commanded Adam and Eve to not partake of the Tree of Knowledge in the center of the Garden, else they would die. The serpent argued that the benefits were even greater than god inferred, and that despite what He said, surely they wouldn’t actually DIE for gaining the knowledge of the Gods. God stated the Thesis (God’s Word) the serpent argued the Anti-thesis, and the net result became the Synthesis. Adam and Eve were not struck dead, but they were Banished from God’s bountiful Garden, thereafter forced to struggle in lives of constant testing and difficulty. The process of dialectic lying has never changed: Abortion is not murder; unborn babies are not humans with souls. The synthesis is not an alternate truth… it is an alternate lie that is easier or more beneficial for people to believe. The process leads to Communism: the exact opposite of our Constitutional Republic.
When the United States of America was formed, it stood against thousands of years of evil and tyranny, much of it represented by Royal families. The forces of the Left almost immediately started to undercut the new government, an effort that truly shifted into gear following the Civil War. For 150 years we have been bending to the blandishments of dialectic materialism. Today we’re $35 Trillion in debt, borrowing at an unsustainable rate to maintain astonishing welfare outflows, while reducing our ability to physically defend ourselves!
The Left has insinuated its socialist-communist forces into the Deep State, into public and private education, into higher education, into globalist corporations and communications. Just look at the list of “Americans” who attend the World Economic Forum and who are comfortable with the influence of the U. N. and the World Health Organization as it attempts to gain treaties with developed countries that would place the W.H.O. in charge of NATIONAL health-care policies and much more. It’s time to put Satan behind us.
The United States, due mainly to failures in education and religion, has accepted anti-Americanism to a great degree. Every principle embodied in our Constitution is challenged constantly by some form of anti-thesis, usually couched in this or that sympathetic concern for poor, hungry, fat, disabled, dysphoric, addicted or homeless misfortunates that the ‘fortunate’ are obligated to pay government employees and contractors to make comfortable. Those same employees or contractors are rarely paid to solve life’s many misfortunes. Providing real solutions to how people became so unhappy and uncomfortable is perceived as cruel, racist, or insensitive, and frequently, illegal. Both the government and the social problems become larger. Thesis – anti-thesis – synthesis.
The other day a “lone, crazed gunman” came within an inch of killing Donald Trump. As things ramped up for the Republican National Convention, the love for Mr. Trump seemed to expand and motivate the assembled crowd to new heights of love for him and his “larger than life” status in the party and in the country. For Trump, however, the events of Saturday, July 13, 2024 re-oriented him to his true status: mortal. They made clear to him that he is not larger, but smaller than he thought; that he is a tool in the hands of God, to Whom he owes his continued life on Earth. The mission has changed.
The divine intervention that saved him also makes clear that there has always been a plan and purpose for the creation of the United States of America. One hopes that the many uncertain Americans who may have suspected some kind of “purpose” for America: Free-Masons and all of that, might experience a renewal in their faith, having witnessed a pretty clear message from the Almighty. The Lord works in mysterious ways. For Trump, there is a new reason to do his best for America – new reasons to stop our self-destruction, stop our acceptance of Marxism / Communism, stop our un-Godly drift away from faith and truth. For those of us with eyes to see and ears to hear, we should be ready to help him… or, help ourselves.
As a cruise ship plows forward, forcing water aside, waves are created, however short-lived, and they are real… impermanent, but real. Perhaps that is because they last for more than a moment. From windows forty feet above, with the sun shining against the ship and water, there appear light and dark patterns – like lace – flashing into and out of view, only “real” because I have perceived their ephemeral patterns. Engaging someone’s consciousness: is that essential for reality?
Someone sitting at another window could not perceive the same tracery despite its reality to me for a flash of time. It’s much the same as Love or Anger or Sadness or a dozen… no, ten-dozen other emotions, the reality part, at least. Usually they flit across one’s being like a shadow, gaining reality only if your consciousness grabs hold and commits mental energy to one.
Suddenly, from a flash of fear or loathing of someone’s odd difference from your own self you have made a decision – a choice – to hate the different one, even for a few moments… a feeling that is no longer fleeting, but real. If left private, shared with no one else, it is neither bad nor good. While it may affect your own physiology, quicken your breath and pulse, you may choose from evil. You may release the ill-feeling before it becomes a belief. Only belief can render such a flash real.
Funny thing, belief. We all suffer from it, it is how we live. Faith requires it and Hope is made of it. Faith, compounded of hundreds of stories – ideas, really, that can’t be replicated or proven, on the surface, can’t be tested to establish some sort of “proof” for the benefit of others who doubt is premises. It need not be put to any test for those who have it. Faith is trust and that means trust in A source of the idea, or in THE source of the idea.
We, humans, live in faith. It surrounds our beings, functions and beliefs. Much is made of religious faith in this day of militant, feral atheism. Religious faithful especially are denigrated for beliefs in “mumbo jumbo,” although these besmirchments apply almost exclusively to Christians and Jews. One never sees “protesters” opposed to Hindus or Muslims or Buddhists. There are some opponents to Mormons: mostly a quirk of Christian intolerance – the same that underlay many wars, even AMONG Christians, but no worse than sectarian conflicts elsewhere. It has never been settled whether tolerance, per se, is good or bad. Tolerance of what?
But, in terms of faith, itself, those who trust in the solidness of soil, rocks, wood or ice are no less faithful, however shallow that faith may be. After all, if doubt creeps in, one need simply pick up another rock and have his or her faith restored. However, “science” shows us that rocks and other “solid” things are comprised of atoms which are mostly empty space, each part of which is a mere vibration of energy. So, how is it enough of these supposed “atoms” can hold up the weight of others of its kind, plus the weight of us, our rocks, cars and houses?
Well, let’s not worry about such things. Thank God they do… ummm, I mean, thank goodness. Same thing.
We trust in a lot of life we can’t control – or understand – so why is trust in God so singularly questioned? Does His / Her possibility threaten us? Is it because God proclaimed rules that humans are “commanded” to follow? Rules for Good and Bad and Love and Life and Death? One of those rules, that EVERY human once had faith in, Is “Thou shalt not steal.” It’s a pretty good rule, too: easy to understand and without compromise.
We expect, for example, to be impacted by government – an expectation that is so often realized that it becomes a “matter of faith.” We know government is going to limit or coerce us in matters of stealing and, frankly, in almost every action we take. We have FAITH in government’s intrusiveness for it is proven to us a hundred times each day… or, a thousand times, if we open our eyes and ears. It’s part of our belief system – giving us faith in the likelihood that “our” government will impact us similarly tomorrow. There is every reason to believe so.
Admonishing us to not steal implies the existence of private, individual ownership of “things,” “items,” “money” and so forth. In our illuminated existences we like to consider “rights” as something we possess, as well. Maybe we do… possess rights. How so? By virtue of birth? Do our parents give us these amazing, non-substantial things… these rights? Perhaps on a certain birthday?
If they are “parents,” in fact, they provide necessities like food, clothing, shelter, a bed, one hopes. Do children then possess a “right” to these things? Or must such rights be “earned? If earned, at whose expense? “Our” government says, “At all of our expense. We, collectively, will guarantee availability of these necessities for the children in our country whether or not their parents are able to – or choose to – provide them.” The government, in effect, creates those “rights” as extensions of the “Right to Life.” Really?
How can the government do this when it has no means (money) to do so?
This same government does its damnedest to pay for and otherwise facilitate abortion, although the government, per se, has no money. It would seem that “our” government has chosen to steal a thing from the “abortee:” its Right to Life, at the same time stealing the money needed to inflict the abortion, from all of the rest of us. Thou shalt not steal must have severe compromise built into it… hmmph.
One could leap to the presumption that the TWO parents of the human working to be born, had not only some right to copulate but, instantaneously, the OBLIGATION to provide for the child of their union. Further, it would be more honest and fair if there were some punishment or sanction for creating a child while denying any of the coincident obligations. Do they have a “right” to create an obligation for all of us not involved in the procreation? By whose authority?
Birth may be induced within a week or two of due date; other forms of early delivery may be employed up to two MONTHS earlier. In some jurisdictions the proto-mother can elect to terminate that life for convenience’ sake… even to the time of natural birth. Indeed there are instances of babies surviving abortion who have then been “eased” from life after delivery or while their heads are still in the birth canal… on the whim of the mother. That doesn’t seem different from murder.
Wasn’t that live baby a U. S. citizen by virtue of being born on U. S. soil? Who has the right to steal its Right to Life? Who can grant such a right to steal? Thou shalt not steal.
Does not the brand-new U. S. citizen have unalienable rights under the Constitution? Rights like Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of Happiness? Was there some point… a single breath, perhaps, at which “we, the People…” invested “our” government with the power to take those rights away from a citizen? That’s a major theft, it seems Prudent to say. That baby owned those rights; they were stolen from him or her. Thou shalt not steal.
Our we-the-People-created government has not only assumed for itself the power to grant the right to murder one’s offspring, a U. S. citizen, for no reason, but also to steal the Right to Life from the recipient of the abortion process.
To sell the idea of child assassination as a net “good” requires a remarkable re-making of beliefs. The person / mother who is responsible for the life gestating within her, almost always sees her own life, and Right to it, as precious, if not sacred. In the course of her re-education she is brought to a belief about the new person for whom she is responsible, that is completely different: her baby has no rights and she has no obligation to defend either the baby or the rights. She must come to believe that the baby is anything but a baby: it’s a mass of cells, like a tumor; or, he or she is a parasite, invading mother’s physical sanctity and convenience. Well, if the re-education is thorough, the removal of the invading mass is “health care,” albeit for only one of the parties involved. At least the parasite has no name and can’t feel anything… the proto-assassin hopes.
Sadly, tragically, this is not the case after just a few weeks of gestation.
Imagine a company the business of which were the aborting of kittens or puppies – say, puppies. The mother dog’s guardian (one cannot “own” another life form we’re told) knows the bitch has allowed to be done to her what dogs do, doggy-style, and is exhibiting signs of pregnancy. The guardian, not wanting the expense of another dog/puppy, or puppies, decides to have some convenient “health-care” performed on the pregnant bitch and the unborn puppies excised… like parasites. “Planned Puppyhood” might then sell the fresh, wet-iced organs of the puppies to “science” for research.
A neighbor of the guardian tells her that she hasn’t noticed “Buttons” running around for a few days and asks if everything is okay… with the dog? “Oh, yes,” says guardian, “she was pregnant and I took her to “Planned Puppyhood” for an abortion; 3 pups were removed. She’ll be home by tonight. Thanks for asking.”
The neighbor recoils in shock. “How could you do such a thing?” she cries. You could have let Buttons give birth and brought the puppies to a shelter! There are places that will take them and find them good homes. Oh, gracious, I feel terrible! I would have taken them!” Neighbor is crying.
“Oh for Heaven’s sake,” exclaims the guardian. Having those puppies would have been more trouble than I could put up with. I just don’t have the time, with work and all. What’s done is done and things will be back to normal going forward. Calm down. I still love Buttons.”
Neighbor shares the tragedy with others and local news gets the story. Do you think PETA and hundreds of pet-lovers and veterinary assistants will be picketing the guardian? Signs will call her a murderer and puppy-hater. She did, after all, STEAL the right of the bitch to give birth to her puppies and nurse them. Thou shalt not steal.
Probably, Planned Puppyhood would never get a permit to open a new facility in guardian’s county: dogs don’t contribute millions of dollars to political campaigns… at least the smart ones don’t.
The facilitators of abortions, that is, proto-mothers (women don’t actually receive abortions, they participate, but the recipient of the abortion is the baby: the abortee, as it were) have developed a great faith in the new meanings of words they’ve been re-taught. The multiple aspects of Life and Humanity NOT being those things MUST BE TRUE. If they aren’t… OMG! Not that they intend the meaning of “OMG” literally, it’s a social media thing, the meaning of which has been stolen by vulgarity.
Apparently, “our” government has perfected stealing and, usually, when theft is the subject, money is the object, in most people’s minds. Some person steals your wallet and everything in it and they have not only your cash but your credit cards and identity. He or she could steal even your house as well as drain your bank account – stealing from your future. God forbid. Clearly there are multiple crimes possible and, let’s hope, “our” government will harshly sanction the thief in every case. After all, everyone recognizes the truth and justice of Thou shalt not steal. Just consider how firmly “our” governments deal with shoplifters after they steal from store-owners.
“That’s not a fair sarcasm,” some automatically say, “those people have insurance against theft.”
Sounds like a definition is being stolen right from under us: “stealing” isn’t stealing if the victim is wealthy, or insured, and not known face-to-face. No kidding? Thou shalt not steal.
Moreover, if “religious” people think that rule is sacred, having come from God – especially Jews or Christians – then to Hell with that. We’re not going to have religious doctrine shoved down our throats, it’s un-Constitutional. Now they’re stealing the meaning of “Constitution,” too. But, back to the money thing.
A truly clever group would want its theft of EVERYONE’S money… I mean, if they had a very damned good reason to pull that off, they would find a way to hide the theft and their hands in it from… well, everyone. To do that they’d have to steal some word definitions such as “Inflation.” Every public commenter, including the smart ones, say “inflation” when they mean “price increases.” Generally the “rate” they talk about is the rate of increase or decrease measured by the “CPI,” the Consumer Price Index. The true “CPI” is comprised of a market “basket” of things that consumers can’t avoid buying in the normal course of providing for themselves and their families. Our government has stolen the meaning of this measure.
The “basket” includes food, cleaning products, clothing, housing, energy, TV, phone and internet services, insurance, transportation, taxes and accounting, health care and medications, maintenance and household services, banking and credit services, education and child-care. There are more, but sustenance and advancement are possible from that list.
Everyone but the wealthy elite agonizes over rapid price increases for items in the market “basket.” It’s heard everywhere: “Eggs used to be 99 cents a dozen, now they’re $4.79!”
“Inflation is high,” someone replies. News commenters refer to the “rate” of inflation as the average rate of, say, 3 and ½% as proof that “our” president’s policies have “brought down” the rate of “inflation.” What a wonderful piece of work. All are misusing the term, “inflation.” By repeated, round-the-clock misuse, the meaning of inflation has been stolen. Here’s a little lesson:
Inflation means inflation of the money supply… simple. Inflation, by itself, doesn’t mean the increase in a price… of any thing. It does, however, REDUCE THE VALUE of all the dollars there are sloshing around the economy: one of the greatest thefts ever devised. Only governments can do that. Thou shalt not steal.
Inflation is a government policy. It’s not caused by changes in the weather or lunar cycles. Politicians decide to use inflation to their advantage, either to buy votes or to cover up errors they have made with other policies. “We, the people” are the last and least consideration when inflation is being contemplated. Any legislation that increases federal spending, cannot, by definition, “reduce” inflation. To say otherwise, perhaps by naming said legislation an “Inflation-Reduction Act,” is a complete lie, told by politicians to their constituents from whom they have just stolen monetary value of savings and pension plans and liquid cash assets. It is not only mendacious, but cruel. Thou shalt not steal.
But, why do prices go up after the government inflates the money supply? Supply and demand: the very essence of economics, trade, valuation of goods and services and, wait for it, TAXES! The insidious economics of “our” (federal) government results from constant “deficit spending:” spending more to operate the government than tax receipts and other revenues can cover, which sounds pretty stupid. But in order to do that, the government borrows the difference, virtually on a daily basis, for which it incurs an interest obligation – all done on “our” behalf.
That interest obligation is now greater than ONE TRILLION DOLLARS per year, and growing. Most of the money borrowed to fill annual “budget” gaps is basically air… (see: https://www.prudenceleadbetter.com/2020/09/27/knife-edge-election/) … for which we pay real-money interest. It’s the theft that keeps on stealing. When your favorite politician sends you some re-election mail, be sure to send him or her a check, won’t you?
Inflation automatically, in a sense, causes reactionary DE-flationary effects, bringing balance back to the supply of dollars and the supply of goods and services to be purchased. The fastest adjustment is the higher price of things. Eventually, the price of labor also rises. All of these increases generate – wait for it – higher tax revenue! It’s a miracle! Or, it’s a policy… who’d have thought?
So, who can commit such a crime? Who benefits from this theft? Who can even DO the crime? “Our” government, that’s who. The rate of inflation IS high, BUT, and this isn’t good news, as a percentile increase, even the last FOUR presidents have been unable to increase the rate more than a total of 100%!
“Really? Where did it go?” one asks. Why, to the greatest deflationary mechanism ever invented: DEBT! It’s now over $35 Trillion!
“Whose debt is it?” you could rightly ask. Well, it’s YOURS, mine, all of ours. “How will we repay it?” could be the next logical question.
“We can’t unless we run surpluses in the federal budget for the next 50 years or so.”
“When will we do that?” Also a good question. Likely answer:
“Never. Our Reps and Senators will have to change their habits and, right now, their habit is to get re-elected and they have to buy a lot of votes.”
“So, it’s a debt that will never be repaid?”
“Yes. It’s indistinguishable from theft. In this case, the money has been stolen from generations into the future, to whom the thieves will never answer.” Thou shalt not steal.
Along the path of perpetual debt many meanings of words and principles have been stolen… and rights, as well. To maintain the lie of theft-as-debt, we are paying interest, which is a “current” obligation, competing with federal departments, like Defense, for limited resources, along with other key obligations comprised of horse-shit, chicken-shit and bull-shit, not to overlook the mountain of citizen and illegal welfare we feel compelled to pay.
Our “representatives” (a questionable term) have aided in this multi-generational embezzlement for decades, as it buys their votes, too. Aside from a handful in either House: a dozen in the Senate, perhaps thirty in the House of representatives – both parties have facilitated and voted for repeated deficit-spending packages, including “continuing resolutions” that merely continue rates of spending that exceed revenues… over and over and over. They lie, in other words; indeed, they fail to represent our interests TO or AGAINST the government, as directed by our Constitutional covenant. Instead they represent the government to us! They have stolen the term, “representative,” one of the worst of thefts. $35 Trillion. Thou shalt not steal.
Kidnapping is the most heinous of THEFTs and, if there are degrees of heinousness, kidnapping a child is a still greater level of evil. Yet, every weekday we willingly pass off our children to “public” education systems where ideological and unionized teachers and equally warped administrators divert children’s beliefs away from those of their parents. If a person’s beliefs are taken from him or her, it is a theft of the most personal property. Uniquely foul is the daily effort to make children question their own being: boys aren’t actually boys; girls not actually girls. For shame.
Such “teachers”… no, “educators,” are the worst thieves possible: willing to steal children’s selves. Ultimately, they are willing to perfect the theft by having kids be subjected to chemical sterilization and, if they can reach the nadir, surgical mutilation. In the process they may even get to rejoice the theft of the children from their parents, altogether. Oh, the glory! Once a thief… Thou shalt not steal.
The United States is, essentially, a “Christian” nation. We were founded by Christians and our fundamental laws and jurisprudence are inspired by the laws and advisories of how to live and love that are contained in the Old and New Testaments. For hundreds of years the lessons of Christ have slowly converted relative pagans into empathetic Christians. It never worked universally; there have always been agnostics and atheists, but until quite lately, they were the outliers. Virtually automatically, the divine lessons and instructions have been modified, structured and even diluted by men (mostly), since they were first revealed. As quickly as Jesus, the Christ, declared His “church,” Peter and his spiritual descendants have seized Christ’s teachings as the means to political power and economic, let alone intellectual, control of “the masses.”
It was unavoidable. We have “free will” and the daily, hourly, momentary opportunity to choose from evil, which seems to lurk around every corner… when not lurking right beside us. Still, prelates of churches based on multiple emphases of certain teachings and of the traditions of Catholicism or Orthodox Christianity, have continued to prod us toward incrementally closer adherence to Christ’s teachings. It worked for centuries, resulting in the evolution of what we call modern ethics and economics… and freedom. Ultimately, the pinnacle of American success was reached, approximately in 1962.
The forces attempting to unseat Christianity have never wavered. The energy they have employed was noted as “early” as the story of the Garden of Eden. As quickly as God had prepared Man and Woman to take dominion over His “garden,” the serpent offered a great temptation. At the moment of choice, God’s creation chose to accept the risk to enjoy the “benefits.” Today we call those temptations “socialism.” Its “benefits” are the promise of avoiding both responsibility and hard work, while having access to everything in creation. Ancillary benefits include debauchery and license to enjoy sexual perversions and the thrills of hatred. No longer would the “serfs” have to earn their own way or face the responsibility for their decisions. Paradise on Earth.
The simplest, clearest distinction between the “forces of God” and the forces of anti-religious socialism can be stated as Life versus Death. God promises not only life on Earth, but eternal life. Socialism promises irresponsible cavort on Earth and then, lights out. Rather than growing both spiritually and physically by accepting the tests and responsibilities, even hardships and opportunities of life, many are tempted to seek comforts, enjoyments and conveniences of life without hardship, unfairness, or injustice, as promised by the sirens of socialism and, even more promissory, Communists. Throughout the growth of the socialist opposition to Christian-based government and economics, Democrat or Social-Democrat political parties have drifted (if not skipped) closer to outright Socialism while pretending to adhere to the traditions of “Western” civilization and civilian governance. But, like all opposition to Christian influence, their efforts are constant – sometimes incremental, sometimes leaping and bounding as they undercut those same traditions in pursuit of power.
Since that same 1962, leftist forces have assumed control of the “Democratic” party. First, they killed Kennedy… not the ordinary Democrats like Johnson and others, but the rabid defenders of the C.I.A. and other elements of the growing, deep, administrative state – the true leftists. One by one, people who overtly dislike everything about religious freedom – Judaism and Christianity, specifically – managed to obtain election to the House and Senate. First through opposition to fighting Communism in Viet-Nam and marshaling students to widespread demonstrations against the government, and then, cherry on top, unseating President Richard Nixon. A new landscape emerged in American politics and power; trust in government was gone. Rebellions of the ‘60’s shifted morality to the dark side as federalized welfare began to erode family strengths and the raising of children to be new, moral, responsible adults. As the old order, the fundament of governance, liberty and improved standards of living, imperfect but wildly successful, was dumped, the new order of Roe v. Wade was imposed on the flimsy premise that the “penumbra of the Constitution” protects a brand of “privacy” that permits personal convenience to be worth more than human life.
Since the explosion of drug addiction as new streams of tar heroin entered the U. S. market from Southeast Asia (thank-you, C.I.A. and the Golden Triangle), the “War on Drugs” has managed to capture tons of drugs and dollars, but the total flow of both has increased for decades. Drugs provide a foul but profitable – and corrupting – business in cities large and small, and a slow-motion suicide process for thousands of addicts. We’ve never had the upper hand on drugs. As we have helped to feed the growth of Mexican Cartels (and their Chinese providers) there has grown a deep division in American politics: Democrats have favored illegal entrants and “sanctuary” status for cities and states, where police cannot cooperate with federal deportation enforcement. Republicans have been opposed to both, and yet thwarted in every attempt to sanction so-called, law-nullifying, “sanctuary” declarations.
Today, drugs, mainly fentanyl, kill 100,000 mostly younger Americans EVERY DAMN YEAR! If we were facing groups of people who were SHOOTING and killing 100,000 Americans every year, this American hopes that we would marshal our forces and destroy them, saving the lives of our sons and daughters. Yet, for some reason, we have neither the wit nor will to stop drugs. Apparently there is a “right” to suicide by addiction. Did I mention profitable corruption? Who opposes rampant addiction? Well, it seems to be a right-wing thing which is condemned by the left (Democrats) since so many people wind up incarcerated for drug dealing. Boo-hoo. There must be a racist component since there is a preponderance of black and brown people breaking laws involving drugs. So, less than nothing is done. Indeed, in Democrat cities there are varieties of programs that FACILITATE drug use on the basis of… hold on to your brains… SAFETY!
A hundred-thousand lives are not enough. The same forces apologizing for drug users are rabidly in favor of abortion up to the moment of birth AND EVEN BEYOND THAT MOMENT. Indeed, they base their election efforts on appealing to women who agree with having the RIGHT to destroy gestating beings. First they must remain convinced that the growth in their bellies is not a human being.
Finally, the same leftists in the U. S. tend strongly toward both globalism (communism) and wars of maintenance (leftists in both parties) where, in effect, our greatest export are young men and women who risk death or disability for circumstances that have no plan for victory. And, still, there are too many Americans.
Democrats have an affinity for globalist fantasy, like “Climate Change,” as the reason to change U. S. policy to the detriment of our economy and, now, our food supply. They’ve gone so far as to advise numbskulls to consider the climate before having children… not before having sex. After all, if something goes “wrong,” we can always kill the product. Instead of promoting a clean, non-polluting economy, they prefer the more fascist approach of restriction, mandation and coercion through economic leverage, like encouraging banks and others to not do business with anyone who threatens the climate, as they see it, or, God forbid, exercises Constitutional rights. This includes changing the technologies of washing machines, stoves, toilets and schoolbuses, and not for the better. After all, a lot of those manufacturers are white people, and of Euro-centric backgrounds who don’t deserve any consideration for climate and a hundred other reasons, especially if Christian to boot.
Covid-19 showed that the W.H.O., China and the U. N. can fool all the people some of the time, but they were able to kill off only a few million humans with the original bug and then the mRNA shots. They’ll have to do something more, ummm… effective, yes, effective, to get the world population down to their “ideal” of a billion or fewer. That many people could eat beef all they want without damaging the Earth. Still, it will take a lot of dying to achieve the “safety” of our planet in a single lifetime.
Prudence recently located these comments by a well-known small-business owner. They were written shortly after the U. S. began the war in Afghanistan, following 9-11-2001. Statistics are pertinent to those days, but the heartfelt admonitions are timeless. Americans, in particular, should reflect upon them.
I believe, and could argue, that the Constitution is the best possible distillation into secular law of Judeo-Christian ethics. Indeed its very simplicity shows that without a shared moral foundation, mere mortals could not long sustain a government with so few vested powers. It is self government, raising the individual to virtually sovereign heights and it requires both free will and self-restraint: self-governance most profound.
If one believes in God’s role in the evolution of mankind from beast to gentleman or innocent creation to energetic dissembler, one recognizes the great good humor of God in providing us free will. Thou mayest choose from evil. We believe, in the world’s richest larder, that our view of civilization is part of a prophecy or destiny; somehow we have taken over from God on this leg of the relay. Now that the baton of life is ours, we decide if the unborn shall win their freedom to simply be on earth, and we, alone, should decide whether God has particular relevance or is only a super-agency to whom we appeal when, in our judgment, our stumbling arrogance delays some gilded wants.
History flows, more or less, away from savagery toward civilization, if not civility. Most societies see truth as relatively good and lies as relatively bad; charity and sacrifice as relatively good, too, with selfishness and greediness sort of bad. The birth of children is almost universally good, while murder is almost universally bad. A many-branched river, either in a torrent or a trickle, moves toward a more civilized social order where those less able are cared for by others more able. It meanders from backwater to swamp as it seeks a path toward a better human condition, but always, we like to think in our fatted West, toward a free and rewarding system very much like our own.
Those who bridle Islam with terrorism, ride its billion-plus souls into acts more heinous than war, attempting, they claim, to rid the earth of whole peoples whom they judge to be impure. Only by removing us and our open, licentious indecency can they preserve their self-perceived more pious way of life. To some of these, at least, our movies, music and overt sexuality are a terrifying rain of bombs upon their children, women and paternalist hegemony. What do we suggest is their proper defense?
The “West” is their unholiest of infidels, preaching depravity with a global, inescapable power of electronic, and cheap, media that is a new force upon the Earth. To Muslims who can renounce terrorism, but who are consciously pious and committed to the Koran – “deeply religious” we might say – there is no negotiation with the blandishments of Satan’s pit – no co-existence with perceived evil. Our only response, devoid of much imagination, is military.
History and our whole social and economic belief structure allows us no other. The President had to act, must act, did act. He has done the “right thing,” albeit with the wrong weapons, one might conclude. Bin-Laden has succeeded and succeeded again in directing our battle against the quarter of the planet that is Islamic. Our protestations of separating terrorism from Mohammedism serve to strengthen our timely coalitions, but fall upon non-believing ears in most of the Islamic world. The falling bombs are indistinguishable from America, itself. The fine points of selective targeting and diplomacy are lost on the millions who choose not to be like us, who are readily, almost eagerly, led by practiced haters. We sit in judgment of their failures to lead the world in technology, human rights and materialism. Our comforts and prosperity are not the fundament of their aspirations and our discussions of why certain fellow-Muslims must be killed are strictly one-way. We see ourselves as able to spank the errant billion, followed by immediate hugs and comfortings so they will realize we truly love them, but their bad-seed brothers had to go.
Why do they hate us so much? That is the question posed by our deepest thinkers.
“The West” has not only conquered communications, but has ringed the planet with satellites, effectively creating a sea of electronic trash through which Earth spins and rotates, year upon year. Television shows and movies that extol everything from abortion to homosexuality, murder to free sex, flood the airwaves. Books and magazines replete with same, are hawked from Zimbabwe to Mongolia. Not even China can stem the tide. We are angry at the Falwells and Robertsons who deign to point out that God can bless only the good, that His laws are completely Just, that He, Himself exists according to them with absolutely no ability to compartmentalize sinfulness. But, we say, throughout history America has been kind to its vanquished foes. Surely we can all see that this attack on Afghanistan will soon be good for them? God bless America; sing it loud. Drop the bombs of righteousness.
How will we know if the war on terrorism is won? So far we have proven that we can destroy Afghanistan’s tallest buildings as a sort of grandiose tit-for-tat. They are, of course, only a few stories tall. The political support for war, however, depends on both clarity of mission and conclusively good news about its fulfillment. There isn’t going to be much of either. We may not find Bin-Laden very quickly and already proclaim at every juncture that he is only one of many and that catching him is not the only goal. Will we, as in the war on drugs, proclaim the capture or death of some terrorist functionary to be of equal importance? Can we manufacture some interdicted tons of success sufficient to justify the whole war effort? Will Americans buy it? When the next terrorist action occurs will we accept that the need for more war-making is ever more justified? And the next?
And the next?
These questions are are not asked idly. A couple of ounces of powdered anthrax spores have place the nation on edge as almost no other mechanism might do. We readily conceive of fighting fire with fire, as it were, but with what do we fight disease? There is nothing. Cure the sick and worry. Cure the sick and fear.
Imagine a balloon-borne twenty pound tube of this anthrax stuff freely dispersing its load over, say, Chicago. A couple of square miles of city could be powdered and the ensuing panic, growing from media-spread spores of its own, would effectively shut that city down. People would flee, perhaps only to be prevented, possibly(?) from leaving until tested. Some sort of quarantine would be deemed necessary and, most certainly, travel to that entire region would cease. Talk about ripples in the economy. With the populace already so on edge as to run from spilled confetti, so many activities would cease that depression, not recession, would follow.
Not even the U. S. can absorb the costs of abject fear and still prosecute an endless war. The costs of terrorism we have only slightly begun to imagine. The politics of terrorism are also waiting to be unleashed.
The risk is greatest for President Bush. Everyone is backing him, now, in our newfound patriotism, but such high approval ratings are fleeting, in our history. George, the first, had a ninety percent rating eleven months before losing to Bill Clinton. With limited war news to prove his policies are both righteous and right, Bush will quickly be blamed by his enemies when the next big terrorist attack occurs. Every speech made includes an admonishment to prepare for more attacks and some comment about how we are preparing, nationally, for what, everything? But, when the ax falls, it is the President who will be blamed, however unfairly. Careful, methodical thinking and planning could fly out the window, then – and covert operations become overt.
Internationally, should America strike out in political anger rather than simple righteous vengeance, coalitions will fracture into alliances, neutral states and declared enemies. Then what? Terror groups will unleash everything they have; the U. S. will bomb population centers, world trade will slow to a trickle and a dozen opportunities to settle old differences, like Taiwan, Kashmir, Israel and South Korea, will be exercised by virulent enemies who are held in check now by our flexible willingness to oppose them. Like Gulliver, the Lilliputians will tie America down with a thousand tiny battles.
The most dangerous condition in the World is a lack of understanding of what the United States will finally fight for. So long as that point is not reached, we can push and pull and trade and buy a continued flow toward civilization. But when that line is crossed and should enemies in waiting decide that then is the time to fight their own battles, the possibilities of either a huge escalation or retreat into armed isolationism become real. Then the global power centers will shift. Wartime alliance or power vacuum. Either way, the future we have been hazily expecting will be replaced with another that we won’t control. A dark, sheer precipice terminates many of the paths we might take.
I see no one in the Congress who has the wisdom to advise the President better than what he is doing already. Neither do I see a happy ending for most of the right actions he might take. How I wish we, as a nation, had not been spending so much effort to turn our backs on God and His commandments. Perhaps we should have let in some of those aborted in the past thirty years. Now would be a very good time to turn to Him if He is still willing to hear us. With love, Bob Wescott.
A major factor in the success of the United States and its economic freedom (among other freedoms) is the honesty and relative strictness of its judiciary, both federal and State. The honesty of contracts at every level, including the contract between the American people and the federal government: the Constitution, relies increasingly upon the Supreme Court, the final arbiter.
Article III details the legal circumstances that require original jurisdiction of the Supreme Court, which means that the supreme court is the first, and only Court, that can hear those cases and rule upon the issues in conflict. In all other cases – and there are hundreds – the Court must agree to accept an appeal from litigants who not only aren’t satisfied with the decision made, but who also believe there is a Constitutional issue involved in their conflicting claims. At least four Justices must agree to accept a case, and one of them is likely to write an opinion, if not THE opinion that will form the Court’s ruling. It takes time. When the majority opinion is delivered there usually is a dissenting opinion. Lawyers everywhere study both. Crucial interpretations of Constitutional issues will form arguments in other cases. Sometimes the issues raised in the dissenting, or minority opinion, will be refined to bolster other cases. The written words of the Supreme Court are critical to our success as a nation.
The Congress is given the power to establish inferior federal courts and charge them with certain authorities over types of crime or types of conflicts. There are courts for immigration matters, for example, or for tax issues, and several others. The country is divided into 12 “Circuits” and Justices often visit those Circuits. See https://www.uscourts.gov/about-federal-courts/court-role-and-structure for a comprehensive view of federal court structure.
Leftism consistently challenges our Constitutional Republic. Socialism / Communism is inherently counter to the structure of morality and individual responsibility that is embodied in the Constitution. Freedom includes the freedom to fail, to try again and to make choices about how to advance in life. Forces of the left consistently attempt to tie individuals to government rules and regulations. This can be seen in attacks on religion and in unionized “public” education, itself. Little by little, leftist philosophies, even direct Marxism, like “minimum wage” laws, constantly distort our economy and increase dependence on government. These stresses generate social-issue conflicts that threaten domestic tranquility and even personal safety. This places immense public, if not mob pressure, on the Court and on individual Justices. Starting with Judge Robert Bork in 1987, the left – personified by Senator Ted Kennedy, an avowed socialist – has attacked and refused to compromise with “conservatism” in any form.
Leftist, or “Progressive” policies, inherently are on the attack against the premises and ideas expressed in the Constitution. The Supreme Court was and is charged with primary defense of the ideas underpinning the Constitution. Judge Bork represented a shift away from leftist activism on the Supreme Court. The retiring Justice, Lewis Powell had often been the swing vote on issues like abortion, tilting the Court to the left. Bork was a strict constructionist, unswayed by social pressures. To leftists like Kennedy, that threat of a shift away from the attack on original intent, was a threat so serious that the destruction of the reputation of an esteemed legal scholar like Bork, was well worth the effort. The attacks continue, as evidenced by the violent reaction to the reversal of Roe versus Wade in the “Dobbs” decision in 2022.
Among our “Unalienable rights” listed in the Declaration of Independence are “Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of Happiness.” Within them has developed a severe conflict, mainly due to the equality of status that women have acquired since the beginning of the United States. “Liberty” and “Happiness” both depend upon freedom of action by individuals. Pregnancy, uniquely, with its 9-month period of physical commitment and subsequent lifetime obligations, can interfere, unquestionably, with happiness and liberty of the pregnant woman. So far, we have not found a balance between the rights of the mother/parent, and those of the baby growing inside her.
Does the right to LIFE take precedence? Many think so. Do the rights of the mother take precedence? Many believe this is so. Mainly non-religious, non-Christian or anti-Christian persons, are pleased to take dominion over natural life, and grant women the absolute right to abort their child. Religious people tend to support the rights of the new life to be born and to thrive after birth. They are “pro-life.” Abortion absolutists have done their best to pervert the meaning of conception and of what a fetus actually is: a human baby, growing. Inevitably, this conflict landed in the Supreme Court. Sadly, Roe versus Wade resulted in more than 60 Million Americans being aborted, most of whom were growing inside women of color. It is a number that should give Anti-life believers some pause.
The Supreme Court makes mistakes. The “Dred Scott” decision is recognized as the worst of them, as Chief Justice Roger Taney attempted to undo several state and federal laws governing the status of slaves and even of any free negro citizen. Taney went so far as to declare the Missouri Compromise un-Constitutional and to state that the concept of “free soil” and freedom of slaves who resided there, was constitutionally unenforceable and need not be recognized by other territories or states. The decision helped to push the South to secession and proved to be recognized in its disregard among free states and territories. The 13th amendment made Taney’s decisions moot.
Another simpler, but still egregious decision was the “Kelo” decision: a 7-year battle over the “taking” of private property for public use, that was decided – many feel, wrongly – in 2005. The city of New London, Connecticut, decided that development of land next to a new Pfizer plant, would increase tax receipts to the city, and therefore qualified as a public good. Unfortunately, Suzette Kelo and her neighbors lived on that land, many on long-time homesteads, in perfectly acceptable, non-condemned homes. The city turned the land over to a new, semi-private development Commission along with the power of “eminent domain,” with which the Commission forced homeowners to sell their real estate. Tragically, The Supreme Court interpreted the “taking” clause in the 5th Amendment to include not only the clearly stated “public use,” like a school or water treatment plant, but for an amorphous “expected benefit” for the public, such as increased tax revenues might provide. In other words, amazingly, “public use” was interpreted to include “private use” if it raised more taxes than current landowners provided. Several States have amended their own laws to prevent exactly the premise of the Kelo decision.
The American public is right to challenge the Supreme Court and, through the Senate, to carefully examine the beliefs of nominees to the Supreme Court. As political conflicts, largely fomented by the Left, become more heated and hateful, the ability of Justices to ignore such matters becomes ever more difficult. It is more crucial than ever that the strength and intention of the Court must be to preserve the originating ideas and ideals of the Constitution, resisting all attempts, regardless of political heat, to drift, stumble or run-away from them.
Prudence has noted in the past that 2020 seemed to be the year that the globalist, anti-American far left determined that it could overthrow the American system. The manufactured “pandemic” surrounding COVID-19 and resulting destruction of civil liberties, social structure and logic following the death of George Floyd in Minneapolis, seemed to be making the long-planned destruction of America possible. The primary tool to make such a profound change in the direction of history, is managed hatred.
The largest hatreds over the millennia are spiritual, if not identifiably religious. This is sad, in many ways, but also understandable given the nature of non-compromise at the heart of most organized religions. The power lies in belief. Shared belief is the strongest human force. Rare are they who can listen to alternative beliefs and subsequently change their own. Beliefs direct the actions of individuals, even to the point of destroying those with opposing beliefs. When added to “mob” coherence, shared beliefs account for more deaths than any other social circumstance.
To a great degree, religions are – or began as – tribal belief systems, and in the earliest periods they had few alternative ideas to resist. This fact makes the interesting similarities among early origin stories and beliefs about gods and an afterlife, even more remarkable. However, fairly small differences between belief systems can spark enormous conflict, like that between Protestants and Catholics or between Sunni and Shia sects of Islam. The religious differences translate readily into political and military differences, but at their core, they tend to be conflicts between which humans are in charge of the “religions,” not the deep principles underlying the beliefs.
Sadly, some belief systems are based in hatred, such that no form of compromise will permit even suspicious co-existence: the premise of one system being the elimination of the other system. If success appears to find the “destroyer” system, that system prepares to take on the next system it opposes. We can see this pattern with Marxism/Communism. Its basic opposition to private property is enabled by its fundamental opposition to religion of any form. However, one of the most hateful systems appears to be Islam, the premise of which is that the entire world must become Muslim; there is no workable form of co-respect or co-existence with other religions. We have become a world governed by competing hatreds.
In a Prudent view, that is not the way any God of humanity would have wanted mankind to develop.
Regardless of the scale of the groups toward whom hate is directed, the act of hating is still a very personal one. Pressures to convince large groups to direct their hatred at certain targets – politically in purpose and effect – can be successful only if lots of individuals are personally convinced of the “legitimacy” of that hatred. It’s not the same as “following orders” issued by authoritative leaders. And it’s not the same as “hating” those who are simply different from oneself – different sounding, looking, acting – which is closer to fear rather than actual hate. It is fairly easy to learn to stop fearing others, to gain understanding of those differences, to eventually become neutral toward the different and, perhaps, friendly. Soon, we’re marrying one another and blending our differences in beautiful children who will be less fearful than we used to be.
But to become hateful of particular others is a commitment with oneself. It’s hard to casually hate, but relatively easier if one can be convinced to do so, whereupon he or she becomes more comfortable in hatred if he or she convinces him- or her-self that hatred is part of a belief system to which he or she is committed. Soon, the haters are not being led to it, but are pushing for increased purity of hatred, often punishing or rejecting those leaders who seek compromise. Hatred is an awful way to guide or lead people. But, it’s cheap and effective.
America was once described as a melting pot. Ostensibly, people from all places could “become” Americans. Without offering multiple forms of welfare and help – including taxpayer-financed attorneys – in multiple languages and multi-lingual public education, people came only because freedom was offered. Everyone learned English and agreed to live within our legal system, one of the most honest… not perfect, but fairly evenly applied under the Constitution. “Melting pot” was not the most accurate description: “salad bowl” is probably better. America invited the best of the world to join us. Despite our mistakes, particularly with slavery, we learned to respect everyone who was willing to make and pay his or her own way. Things have changed. American “representation” has, in the past 30 years or so, become the politics of competing hatreds. From the Clintonian “politics of personal destruction,” we have devolved to the “politics of social and familial disintegration.”
There is a certain ease of slipping into hatred, for most humans, not all. Hating some one else or millions of someones else, requires justification. If a person can find justification for hatred, no matter how flimsy, additional scraps of justification will stick to that hate like double-sided carpet-tape, bonding it just as tightly to one’s beliefs – perhaps to one’s soul. Add in the power of group (mob) psychology and soon a novice hater is leading the charge. Somewhere or somewhen along the spectrum from distrust to embedded hatred, every individual must decide to continue in that direction or to take another. Every person, regardless of justifications, is responsible for his or her actions – including hatred.
Every person can choose from evil, which hatred certainly is, whether political or something else. Every one of us can make that choice. In spite of decades of public indoctrination, our ability to choose to be responsible still exists. We are Americans, still able to lead, including ourselves.
