A nation that does not defend itself from threats ``foreign and domestic`` will not remain a nation for long.  This holds especially true for the ``illegal immigration`` problem; we are being invaded with the full complicity of the Mexican government by people who have no desire to be assimilated into our culture and traditions. 

What is the answer?  A ``Guest Worker Program`` offering a ``path to citizenship`` is nothing but an enticement, plus it means that the lawbreakers are rewarded by moving up the ladder, thus leaving another opening at the bottom socio-economic rung.  It will do nothing but bring more people in to fill the jobs vacated by the newly minted legals.  The reason we have the problem is that we have allowed employers to hire these people under-the-table at sub-par wages.  What it means is that the great edifice of OSHA, Workmen`s Comp, Minimum Wage Laws, HHS regulations, FICA, etc. are systematically being ignored by those who break the law and hire illegals, while the poor citizens of this country find it difficult to obtain work, since the employer has to dot every i and cross every t when employing them. These employers will not be satisfied with ``bringing these people out of the shadows`` since the reason they are in the shadows is to circumvent the draconian system in place.  They will need new illegals to fill these positions once the old illegals have been regularized, unionized, registered as Democrats, and otherwise been mainstreamed as yet another balkanized, indigestible block.

It is little more than a hat dance, with millions of people seeking to win the prize of ``a path to citizenship``.

Actually, the whole argument is silly; enforcement of existing laws can handle the problem, leading to self-deportation by the immigrants who came here to make money.  In the long run, this will benefit everyone because Mexico will have to clean up its act, ending the ``worker`s paradise`` that has destroyed the Mexican economy (despite the glittering jewels of Gulf Oil awaiting them), making life livable for the poor.  Is it compassion to force the Mexican poor to wander the Earth to survive?  They have to wander because Mexico makes them.  WE have to make Mexico reform, care for their own citizens.  It is counter-productive to maintain the current system.

But, the advocates claim, we need those people to do jobs ``Americans just won`t do``!  Perhaps Americans should be given an opportunity to do those jobs before we pass such judgement.  Americans may not do them for $2 an hour, so pay more!  Many employers are caught in a trap; if they pay more they can`t compete because of the Mexican labor.  It is an Antebellum system; cheap labor destroyed the Southern Economy before the Civil War, depressing wages of workmen because slaveholders could do the work cheaper. Innovation was stifled because innovation competed with the slaves.  While the Mexican laborers may not be slaves and may want to work (and work well) the effect is the same; we will never mechanize some industries because it is cheaper to pay a migrant to do the work. 

Furthermore, it discourages enterprise in our young, who traditionally took those back-breaking jobs.  They learned about responsibility with those labors, but now they live at home, unable to get jobs and suckling at their parents teats as a result.  These jobs were the farm teams for corporate America; kids learned the value of hard work, and carried that to their careers.  No longer, thanks to illegal immigration.

So, enforcement is the obvious answer, and enforcement means not just at the border. 

Of course, liberals and journalists (do I need to differentiate?) are completely at a loss to understand this.  For example:

"... let me address something a lot of people think is really going across the line .... a new law just in effect in Oklahoma made it a felony not only to provide employment, a job, to an illegal immigrant, but how about this? Provide transportation or shelter? ... People are vigilantes about transportation and shelter? Isn't that going too far?"

>Diane Sawyer interviewing CNN's Lou Dobbs on ABC's Good Morning America, Nov. 20; reported by MRC's NewsBusters Nov. 20 and CyberAlert Nov. 21

So, we are somehow evil for not transporting illegals from the border to middle America, and not giving them room and board?  The Libs spin it, of course, to sound unkind, but we aren`t talking about leaving destitute people in the dead of winter to die.  (I thought Global Warming means no winters to worry about, anyway.)  If illegals do not belong here we are not supposed to be driving them from the border to Oklahoma.  We aren`t supposed to be giving them apartments to reside in if they are illegal.  We ARE supposed to be handing them over to INS for deportation.  That is the law, and it is a just law; Mexico does the same. 

This attitude suggests we may lose our country; we cannot see that we have the right to defend our border, to insist that people who come here do so with our approval.  A nation is not a nation if it cannot control who comes and goes.

So for now the Hat Dance continues.

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Jack Kemp addresses the gay army plant at the Republican (sic) debate:

Tim,
 
here's the "money quote" from the article below.
 
Jack
 
But there’s more. According to Col. Bill Campenni (USAF, ret), one of President Bush’s squadron mates in the Texas Air National Guard, there is no such thing as the California National Reserve of which Kerr claimed to be a former member.

Campenni told HUMAN EVENTS that Kerr is not even a retired Army General.

``He retired as a California Army National Guard colonel,`` said Campenni. ``It is common at Guard retirement ceremonies to give an honorary promotion to colonels to the STATE rank of Brigadier General``[but] ``it has no meaning other than a fancy certificate for the wall and use of the title at local Guard functions.`` 

Campenni said the rank of general is not federally recognized and the title can not be used or the rank worn outside the state.  

Like everything from the Clintons, it stinks to high heaven.
 
Jack
 
http://www.humanevents.com/article.php?id=23698
 
There's More to the Keith Kerr Story
by Ericka Andersen

Posted: 11/29/2007
Controversy erupted last night after Republican presidential candidates participating in the CNN/YouTube debate received a question from an undisclosed gay activist and supporter of Hillary Clinton’s campaign.  
Retired Brig. Gen. Keith H. Kerr told candidates he was an ``openly gay man,`` member of the ``California National Reserve``, and asked ``why you think that American men and women in uniform are not professional enough to serve with gays and lesbians?``

He did not mention that he is a member of the LGBT Americans For Hillary Steering Committee and a co-chair on Hillary Clinton's National Military Veterans group.

Kerr was in the audience and host Anderson Cooper even asked him if he was satisfied with the answers. All of the candidates support the ``don’t ask-don’t tell`` policy and Kerr said he was not happy with their responses.

Former Education Secretary Bill Bennett learned of Kerr’s involvement with the Clinton campaign approximately 30 minutes after the debate, while serving on a CNN panel. He received emails from friends who made the connection.

Cooper, the debate and panel moderator, quickly responded, saying that had CNN known Kerr was involved with the Clinton campaign, they would have disclosed the information or not used the question at all.

But there’s more. According to Col. Bill Campenni (USAF, ret), one of President Bush’s squadron mates in the Texas Air National Guard, there is no such thing as the California National Reserve of which Kerr claimed to be a former member.

Campenni told HUMAN EVENTS that Kerr is not even a retired Army General.

``He retired as a California Army National Guard colonel,`` said Campenni. ``It is common at Guard retirement ceremonies to give an honorary promotion to colonels to the STATE rank of Brigadier General[but] ``it has no meaning other than a fancy certificate for the wall and use of the title at local Guard functions.`` 

Campenni said the rank of general is not federally recognized and the title can not be used or the rank worn outside the state.         

Although CNN claimed they verified Kerr’s military background and that he had not contributed any money to any presidential candidate, it’s unlikely that no one at the network was aware of his identity within the Clinton campaign. 

But whether they had knowledge or not, it was CNN’s journalistic responsibility to find out.

CNN Senior Vice-President David Bohrman said, "We regret this, and apologize to the Republican candidates. We never would have used the general's question had we known that he was connected to any presidential candidate."    

According to a press release, the Clinton campaign did not know of Kerr’s question, though the campaign was recently criticized for planting a question at a recent speaking engagement.

This morning on CNN, Kerr said he had not been active in the identified groups. He said, ``Several friends asked me if I would allow my name to be listed as and I agreed because she is such a strong advocate of gays and lesbian rights.``

Kerr said he was a member of the Log Cabin Republican and that question ``was a private initiative on my own,`` not something encouraged by the Clinton campaign.

Additionally, Kerr was active supporter of the 2004 John Kerry Campaign and is a member of the Servicemembers’ Legal Defense Network's advisory council, which says it works to end discrimination against military members affected by policies like ``don’t ask, don’t tell.``  SLDN does more than that: they have sued the Defense Department seeking court orders to reinstate openly gay members to active duty.

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Another from Jack Kemp:

In an open letter to the children of the city http://www.seattle.gov/news/detail.asp?ID=7946&dept=40 , Seattle Mayor Greg Nichols warned children that if they didn't use energy efficient light bulbs.
http://www.seattle.gov/news/detail.asp?ID=7946&dept=40
 
Among other things, Nichols warned that reindeers at the North Pole would be forced to swim if global warming continues. Presumably this means that Santa could be forced to swim or drown. No, this is not from The Onion.
 
So mayor Nichols feels (notice I said feels, not thinks) he has to scare little children to advance his agenda. Yes, the mayor is green - just like the Grinch.
 
Jack

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This from Jack Kemp:

CNN Headquarters, Atlanta
 
CNN debate host Anderson Cooper was severely reprimanded today for an error made involving average citizens asking questions of Republican candidates during Wednesday night's debate.
 
CNN officials berated Cooper for not airing a videotape sent in by an undecided voter named Osama Bin Laden (address unknown) concerning the War in Iraq's effect on global warming and polar bears. A leaked memo stated, "Anderson, you really dropped the ball by not including this profound and impartial subject in the on-air questions. We also received a translation to go with the tape. Just because the translation text began with "filthy infidel dogs," that's no excuse not to have asked the question of the Republican candidates."
 

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By Jack Kemp

Tim, I heard the story about the Jew who complained about a Christmas tree at Missouri State http://www.ky3.com/news/local/11913886.html . I was told as a teenager that I actually have a distant cousin in Springfield, MO from my mother's side of the family who I have never looked up. I hope this prof. isn't from that family.
 
I want to reply with the American Thinker Christmas-related story I wrote and posted last Dec. 20th when Rush Limbaugh picked it up and read it on the air. This story is about my comments on the Long Island story of a school bus driver who was asked to remove his red Santa hat last year because it upset some kid. I looked at it from the viewpoint of a New Yorker who is used to meeting European immigrants (I can tell Russian from Polish from Hungarian, even though I speak none of them), people with Irish, Italian, Indian (the subcontinent), Hispanic and Chinese backgrounds. Seeing someone from another culture in New York doesn't shock me.

Jack

http://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2006/12/political_correctness_flips_it_1.html

December 19, 2006
Political Correctness flips its lid
Jack Kemp

Newsday, a Long Island news daily, informs us that a Commack, L.I., school bus driver named Kenneth Mott, who has a white beard and bears more than a passing resemblance to St. Nicholas was ordered to remove his Santa Claus hat. It seem that:

"Mott said he was told that a parent of a child complained to the district about Mott's headgear, saying that the child doesn't believe in Santa Claus and was bothered by the hat."

Gee, a man with a beard wearing a hat who looks religious, minding his own business, upset them. I guess these parents won't be taking their kid to see Fiddler on the Roof, either. Or when they show the Greek Orthodox Christmas services on New York area television stations, they will have to change the channel. How about bearded motorcyclists with a red helmet? The possibilities for "upset" in this child's life are endless.

Bus company officials told Mr. Mott to remove his Santa hat and, much to his credit, he refused. Kenneth Mott stated,

"Nobody is going to tell me what I can do and can't do," said Mott, who added that he doesn't pretend to be Santa Claus while driving, nor does he play Christmas carols or decorate his bus. "This is America. I'm not hurting anybody."

The bus company has relented, apparently deciding privately that they couldn't win any lawsuit brought by Mr. Mott - and so the hat stays.

This farce, the type of thing one sees in the plot of a $7 Christmas movie you can buy off the rack at a drugstore chain, has mercifully ended for now. It seems there are two major schools of thought about unusual people with odd hats. One is that we should all learn about other cultures and be tolerant of them. The other is that we now in America have the Guaranteed Right not to be made uncomfortable by anything that doesn't suit our fancy, be it a person with an unusual hat or a with only one leg or who is obese or doesn't wear designer jeans - or is obese AND wears designer jeans. These two opposing viewpoints are increasingly headed for confrontations. And the winners will be those who come to the conclusion that we are all entitled to our reasonable public displays of our culture that don't interfere with public safety.

Let us hope that this youngster - and his parents - realize soon that just because you are smart enough to file a complaint, that doesn't mean your complaint is worthwhile. If this youngster grows up to work and live in today's Long Island, realizing this will serve him well. And if he seeks work in the nearby Big City with 83 neighborhoods and even more languages, that attitude will serve him even better.

Then maybe he can file a complaint against his parents.

(Jack Kemp is not the former politician of the same name.)

(Editor`s note: It should be pointed out, too, that neither Santa Claus nor the Christmas tree are especially Christian symbols.  Santa Claus may have been based loosely on St. Nicholas, but he is a far more worldly figure, concerned with giving material things.  The Christmas tree was adopted, as was the date of Christmas itself, from the pagan feast celebrating the winter solstice, and the evergreen was a symbol of life, the promise that the trees would green again.  The Romans celebrated the Saturnalia-in honor of their god Saturn, obviously-and they gave gifts and made merry at this time.  New converts hated to give this jolly festival up, so the Church decided to have Christmas-the birth of Jesus-coincide with the solstice.  The Gospels do not record the date of Jesus` birth, but it was likely in the spring, perhaps early April.  The weather is described as cold but the Shepherds were in the fields, something that wouldn`t have happened in February or January.  Also, it seems unlikely that the Romans, ever efficient, would have attempted to conduct such a complicated proceedure as the census during winter months. A spring cold snap seems the most likely explanation.)

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Nasa`s Chandra X-ray observatory has discovered a neutron star moving 3 million miles an hour! 

From the article:

The name of the star is RX J0822-4300. It's a neutron star created by the Puppis A supernova explosion about 3700 years ago. Three Chandra observations clearly show the neutron star moving away from the center of the blast. Speed: 3 million mph! At this rate, RX J0822-4300 is destined to escape the Milky Way just millions of years from now...

The breakneck speed of the Puppis A neutron star is not easily explained, however, by even the most sophisticated supernova explosion models. "The puzzle about this cosmic cannonball is how nature can make such a powerful cannon," says Winkler. "The velocity might be explained by an unusually energetic explosion," but researchers remain unsure.

END QUOTE

Neutron stars are composed of neutronium, the densest matter in the Universe.  A neutron star is usually created when a star with a density of 1.44 times our sun (Chandrasekhar`s Limit) collapses.  Stars below 5 solar masses can supernova and the pressure in their core turns them into neutron stars. Any star below Chandrasekhar`s limit will become a white dwarf, while those above the Tolman-Oppenheimer-Volkoff (TOV) limit will become a black hole. With neutron stars, the diameter shrinks to under 10 miles and the subsequent increase in surface gravity forces the electrons of the individual atoms into the protons in their nucleus, turning them into neutrons.  Neutron stars are nothing but neutrons packed tightly together;  with no electrical repulsion between particles they can become thicker than the Democratic caucus.

(A quick note; SURFACE gravity rises as the distance to the center of mass decreases-basic Newtonian physics Fg=GXM1M2/dsquared.  Think of a tornado; the ferocity of the tornado stems not from the energy in the body in and of itself but in the entire rotating wind pattern which coalesces in a tornado.  Energy is forced into a small area-same with a neutron star or black hole. The total gravitational field remains constant.)

What`s amazing about this story is the speed that sucker is traveling. Superman, eat your heart out! A speeding bullet might as well be standing still!  This thing moves faster than Bill Clinton when he sees a microphone!  It will be out of our galaxy in a few million years, a wanderer in the eternal emptiness between galaxies.  Good luck to you, old boy!

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by Jack Kemp

In the Ron Fornier piece on Tuesday entitled" "Good Bill" vs "Bad Bill," it states:
 
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20071128/ap_po/on_deadline_bill_clinton_1
 
 'Late in his 50-minute address, Clinton told the crowd that wealthy people like he and his wife should pay more taxes in times of war. "Even though I approved of Afghanistan and opposed Iraq from the beginning, I still resent that I was not asked or given the opportunity to support those soldiers," he said.'
 
END OF QUOTE
 
Mr. Clinton, as luck would have it, the following US Treasury website will give you the opportunity to support the troops via assisting the federal budget http://www.treasurydirect.gov/govt/resources/faq/faq_publicdebt.htm#DebtFinance
 
On that page, is the necessary information. This will enable you to end your "resentment.":
How do you make a contribution to reduce the debt?
Make your check payable to the Bureau of the Public Debt, and in the memo section, notate that it is a Gift to reduce the Debt Held by the Public. Mail your check to:

Attn Dept G
Bureau Of the Public Debt
P. O. Box 2188
Parkersburg, WV 26106-2188

Jack Kemp

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Crime and punishment; something as old as humanity itself.  Throughout human history Man has sought ways to force people to obey laws, but the human condition is such that even good men sometimes do bad things.  That is what the Bible was trying to say with the concept of Original Sin and the fallen nature of Man and the world.  Encouraging righteousness, decency, and respect for the laws has been a primary activity of governments, with mixed results.  Crime is like an infestation with no chemical treatments available; you can control the bugs but not get rid of them. 

Of course, there are steps that can be taken to achieve that control, to minimize crime as much as possible; fostering a culture of intolerance toward criminal activity using shame, encouraging religious traditions which entice the individual towards righteousness, taking steps to minimize the glamour of criminality, and establishing firm punishments when crimes are committed. 

Most ancient cultures utilized the iron fist to enforce obedience, generally because most ancient cultures were imposed by military force, and there was little in the way of compassion or popular sovereignty.  In small communities, shame was a powerful factor, and most individuals would rather cut off their right arms than face the wrath of public humiliation before their friends and neighbors.  This was powerful, and criminals were simply not tolerated by the community.  The problem is, this method does not translate well to a larger community where the criminal is but another anonymous face in a large, heterogenous crowd. It is at that level that the punishment came into play, and in early civilizations that punishment was usually severe.  The ancients understood that the death sentence at least ended one reign of terror, and acted as a warning to others.  It may not have worked perfectly, but it did work.

Early civilizations had primitive polytheistic religious systems, and their gods were not concerned with human welfare.  The rise of Judaism changed all that; and first Jewish, then Christian, civilizations had a powerful tool to wield against criminality.  The salvation of souls was of primary importance, and the death penalty was not meted out so easily, nor was torture in a dungeon.  Persuasion rather than punishment was attempted with mixed results; bad people were still bad people, and that, according to the Bible, was still the reason government had the power of the sword ``to punish evildoers``. 

But it was the spread of Christianity (and Judaism, to a lesser degree) that brought the changes in the way criminals were dealt with; dungeons would eventually be changed into clean prisons, torture would be abolished, greater care would be taken to not punish innocent people, and executions would drop.  The purpose of this was to offer the penitent a chance to save his soul, rather than taking that chance away.  The focus became more on reforming the criminal than on punishing him.

But the threat was always there for the recalcitrant; it had to be.

It was the coming of Liberalism that saw the sharp rise in crime.  Liberals dismantled the traditional mechanisms which held crime in check.  The liberal insistence on the rights of people to be ``free`` from social norms meant the dismantling of the traditional use of shame at the community level.  Honor became a dirty word to the left, and the concept that the community could impose standards became a matter of disgust for them.  How dare a community ostracize a pregnant teenager!  They must accept ``her choice``!  How dare a community say that people could not smoke pot, or snort cocaine!  Who are THEY to impose their morality on others! 

So the honor system was smashed, and communities could no longer shame people into proper behavior.  In fact, that breaking was accompanied by an insistence by the left in relativism, the concept that there really is no right and wrong, so nobody could judge another.  Nonjudgementalism is a bad man`s dream; it frees him (or her) to behave according to their own will.  Crime has been rampant ever since.

The left`s efforts to establish a global perspective has done much to exaserbate the crime problem; the world is no longer local, and now not even national, but global.  The community is shattered in favor of larger allegiances, and this is ideal for crime; the criminal doesn`t feel he is actually hurting his family and friends, but some nebulous strangers.

Furthermore, Deconstructionism has depleted the American ideal of respect for laws most of us have agreed to obey.  What law?  If a law can be twisted and molded by a lawyer or scholar, if words can be kneeded like breaddough into that which they were not intended, then they have no meaning at all.  If laws lose their meaning, it becomes easy to disobey them.  Ditto ridiculous or unfair laws; the IRS code, for example, encourages lawbreaking because it is almost impossible to follow, and it is grossly unfair.

Of course, the left`s obsession with destroying the traditional Judeo-Christian religions and their moral standards has removed yet one more restraint on crime.  Fear of the wrath of God did prevent many from committing crimes, and many criminals repented of their sins out of fear of Hell.  No more.  The worst there is to fear now is a short jail sentence where the criminal can exercise and hone his illegal skills among a group of criminal master tradesmen.

Which leaves our society with nothing but punishment as the primary mechanism to stop lawlessness.  The left is working dilligently to dismantle this last bulwark against chaos, and their crackpot psychological theories have made a permanent barbarian class in our midst.  They have fought for shorter sentences, easier time, etc. to our peril.

This piece at Fox News by John Lott illustrates this last point; the fact that the question is being asked ``does the risk of prison actually prevent crime?`` illustrates that jail has become a long vacation and not something to be feared.  OF COURSE IT DOES provided it is applied properly.  Mr. Lott offers a number of decent albeit imperfect analogies, but his reasoning is sound. 

This from the article:

Given these results, is it really difficult to believe, as the JFA Institute report claims, that the number of prisoners increased while crime rates fell? Is there really anything that makes criminals immune to these same forces?

The Department of Justice responded to the JFA Institute report by claiming that 25 percent of the drop in violent crime during the 1990s was due to increased imprisonment. But, unfortunately, the research that they cited only looks at the percent of people in prison, not other factors that are correlated with imprisonment such as arrest and conviction rates, thus falsely attributing too much of the drop to prison.

So, despite leftist beliefs, crime actually does drop when punishment is used.  How amazing!  I wonder if the same principle works with children?  Imagine if one were to reward a child`s good behavior while punishing their bad; what would be the outcome of that?  If schools would institute punishment for misbehavior, could they actually quiet the classrooms and maybe teach a little?  What an incredible concept!

We need to rebuild the old institutions if we are to restore sanity and order to our society.  I`m not saying we should return to the ancient method of killing everybody who gets out of line, or torturing them, but I am suggesting a return to concepts such as honor, decency, God-fearing, humility.  VIRTUES!  We need a more virtuous society, one which believes in kindness and charity but also justice.  We no longer care for justice-except in matters of social policy where it is somehow ``unjust`` that one man has more than another-despite the disparity in work ethic or effort.  We need a return to the Judeo-Christian view of justice. 

We`ll never get that as long as liberalism haunts our minds like an evil phantom.  It`s time these leftist social experiments be consigned to the ashbin of history.

(HAT TIP; WIL WIRTANEN)

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Jack Kemp sends part two in the series on the radical Hillary:

Tim,
 
Although not as interesting as yesterday's column, this front page story on Hillary's friendship with Jessica Milford, author and wife of leftist attorney Robert Treuhaft - and their falling out concerning an escaped Arkansas prisoner's extradition - has its insights.
 
Ms. Milford, the daughter of a British baron, remained in touch with the Hillary long after she left California and became the wife of the Arkansas governor. A convict, James Dean Walker,  fled Arkansas on a prison furlow for the Lake Tahoe region of California. Jessica Milford helped make a cause celebre out of him, claiming he was reformed and innocent. The convict was found because he got caught committing another crime in California. Bill and Hillary insisted he be returned to Arkansas, stating that prison conditions had been improved as a result of Bill Clinton's work as state attorney general. This caused a falling out between Hillary and Jessica Milford.
 
Two points in the story caught my attention. The first is that although Jessica Milford passionately believed in James Dean Walker's innocence, she would not condescend to live in Arkansas for several months in order do research and write a book pleading his case/cause. These people used to be called "Salon Communists" in Europe, prefering to advocate communism from the comfort of their literary salons.
 
The second more telling point is an window into how Mrs. Clinton views the world and politics. In a 1980 letter from Hillary Clinton to Jessica Milford, Hillary stated that:
 
"I don't believe you, or Bill or me will be satisfied with prison conditions here or elsewhere in the country for the forseeable future, especially with Reagan in the White House and the resurgence of reaction."
 
The article then gives this timeline persepective:
 
"Reagan, who was about to receive the Republican nomination for president, would not be elected until four months later."
 
So, in Hillary's mind, it was all Reagan's fault - and responsibility - even though he had not yet been elected as President. Although states are responsible for state prison systems, Hillary's central government viewpoint wanted to blame a Republcian president even though he was not yet in office. It couldn't be Jimmy Carter's fault - or her husband Bill's, even though he was the highest government executive administering Arkansas prisons at that time. All this is reminescant of Bush Derangement Syndrome and also John Kerry's blaming Nixon for incursions into Cambodia a month before Nixon was sworn in as president. If you don't like something you or a fellow Democrat is responsible for, simply blame a previous or following Republican president and no further self-examination is required. I remember when the liberal Village Voice in 1980 published an "Impeach Reagan" bumbersticker on their front page the day after he was elected, I thought they were mental. But at least the Village Voice waited until he was definitely known to be the next president.
 
http://www.nysun.com/article/67002[/i]

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Amendment IV

The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized.

I suppose I have a bit of a libertarian streak; I believe that government is a dragon in need of restraining lest it devour us, and I don`t like to be controlled either by the state or by individuals other than myself.  Actually conservatives and libertarians share those particular traits, although libertarian thought is based on a more materialistic worldview, and the libertarian is unwilling to accept any restraints (such as national borders) while I acknowledge that some are necessary and proper.  There are, after all, evil men in this world, and evil things are often done in the name of liberty.  Certainly, if one believes that an unborn fetus is a human being then the act of abortion is murder; many libertarians would disagree or would say it is a matter of conscience.  Would those same libertarians think it a matter of conscience were someone to decide that THEY were an unnecessary annoyance and liquidate them?

I don`t see the U.S. Constitution as a Universalist document; it applies to citizens of these United States, and, yes, I agree with much of the Patriot Act as a result.

Still, I see the libertarian point on a number of issues.  I am opposed to a national I.D., for instance, because the government has no business watching you. I don`t like these big government programs like Social Security, which was a fancy way to take the social welfare out of the hands of individuals and compel those who have neither interest in nor desire to perform such acts of charity to fund another person`s poor planning.  (Of course, now we have payed into it, so are entitled to our share.  That precludes ``means testing`` as the rich paid their share, too, and are entitled to the benefits.) I don`t like the use of the social security number as a means of identification (you used to be able to opt out-both of using the number and of the whole rotten program.  I had a friend who did not have a social security number until he was in his twenties, when the Missouri Department of Motor Vehicles forced him to get one to renew his driver`s licence.)

What I`m getting at is that it is that a government which can track and follow her citizens, can require that those citizens provide all sorts of information (via the income tax return) is a tyrant.  We can no longer claim that this nation is free insofar as every liberal, do-gooder program has robbed us of our money and our independence of movement. 

Secure in persons, houses, papers, and effects?  Hah!  I can be stopped  on any pretext in my car and searched bodily on the most nebulous of suspicions.  My car could be impounded, and I would have to pay to get it out-even if I have done nothing wrong (except maybe mouth off to the flatfoot who stopped me on ``suspicion``).  The IRS can raid my home, search through my papers and effects with impunity.  I can forfeit my possessions to taxation.

My Great-Grandmother owned a backwoods farm, and during the Depression she would argue with my Great-Grandfather about Roosevelt.  A very genteel lady and devout Methodist, she always spoke mildly and properly -except where the economically fascistic FDR was concerned.  According to my father (who used to live there off and on) his grandfather would say ``Good for Roosevelt.  He`s going after all of those rich bastards`` to which my great-grandmother (who would never use a swear word) replied ``Yes, and when he`s done with those rich bastards that son-of-a-bitch will be coming after you!``

Eventually he did; great-grandma lost the farm piecemeal to the taxman. Can it be said that someone actually owns property if the government can take it away for failing to pay them?  Doesn`t that mean that THEY own the property?

(Grandma Bessie was quite a lady.  My father was telling stories about ``the old days`` and mentioned one I had forgotten about her; she had befriended and employed a black woman to work on her farm in a lilly-white county, and her husband-being a railroad man-used to be gone 4 days out of 7.  They lived waaayy back in the woods, with no telephone, electricity, running water, etc.  One night three Ku Klux Klansmen rode up on horseback in full regalia, carrying pistols on their belts and crosses ready for the burning.  They demanded that Bessie discharge the woman immediately, and they would subsequently make it clear she had worn out her welcome.  She went into the house and came out with a loaded double-barrel shotgun, pointed it at the men, and ordered them to leave the woman and her family alone and get off her property or she ``would blow your heads off``!  Now, this woman was at most 4 feet 10 and weighed under 100 lbs., but she chased these three full grown farm men away-and they never came back!  In the dead of night, mind you!)

Was my great-grandmother secure in her property?

No!

Consider these other amendments in the Bill of Rights:

Amendment IX

The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people.

Can any of this be said to be true any longer? 

Now, I`m not saying that we aren`t more free here in America than elsewhere, it`s just that people around the world live in chains and are used to it.  We aren`t supposed to, yet we have, for a long time, willingly allowed the yoke to be hung around our necks.  The New Deal was surprisingly similar to the economic programs presented by both the fascists and Lenin`s New Economic Program.  Roosevelt wasn`t the first, either; the Civil War was fought as much about the growth of big government as anything, and the subsequent reconstruction era saw the encroachment of government on aspects of people`s lives that had never been acceptable. Teddy Roosevelt and the ``progressive`` era also so much encroachment with the Federal government creating national parks-something outside of their purview-as well as anti-trust laws and other economic ``oversight`` by the Federal government.  After Roosevelt we had Kennedy, Johnson and his ``Great Society``, Nixon, Carter, etc., with an exponential growth of government regulation of so many aspects of our lives.  ``Public accomodation`` laws-well meaning though they may have been-made businessmen mere stewards of their companies and not rightful owners.  Anti-lynching laws and the civil rights acts were in clear violation of the Tenth Amendment, yet America accepted them gladly because of their good intentions.  Government has grown into a tyrant and beast, and the ``conservative revolution`` has merely slowed that growth.

Which brings me to a case in point; The United Nations is trying to impose worldwide tracking systems on livestock, and the U.S. government will probably make this the law of the land.  There was an interesting piece in GOPUSA about this; the Department of Agriculture will require that all livestock be tagged with bar-coded emblems for easy identification.

The article explains the costs and difficulties of compliance with these requirements overseas, but that is beside the point; do we, or do we not, have a free country?  If yes, then a rancher has the right to opt out (something the pilot program allows, but for how long?)  They are his property, not the governments, and not the U.N.`s either.

But there is more to this than that; the world is becoming increasingly blase` about freedoms in general, and people are willingly accepting the watchful eye of Big Brother.  This piece by Linda Chavez chronicles the trend of installing GPS systems on cell phones and whatnot.  This allows the government-and an employer-to know exactly where you are at any given time. 

Freedom of movement has been the hallmark of American liberty; we do not require that travelers ``show their papers``.  An American has always enjoyed the knowledge that he can simply pick up and leave and that was entirely his own business.  Technology is making it more and more difficult to pull this off, and a person leaves a wide trail for anyone to follow.

Wyatt Earp left Arkansas after killing a man-just jumped bail.  He went to neighboring Kansas, started life anew, and became one of the most famous lawmen in the West.  It could never happen today; Earp would have been hunted down, returned to Arkansas, and, even if acquitted for the killing, would have served time in prison for jumping bail.  He would have carried his record with him, and never, never been given a law badge. 

This sort of thing stultifies our society, forces everyone into bland compliance.  There are no fresh starts, no new opportunites.  In many ways, the electronic shackles which we are imposing on ourselves are more tyrannical than the worst Medieval despot; they cannot be evaded. Even the old Soviet Union could only watch so closely.  Imagine if the Soviets had the technology of today!

We must be very cautious, lest we build a virtual prison for ourselves. I fear the desire for security and novelty will overcome our zeal for freedom, and we will allow ourselves to be tagged like those cattle in the E.U.
 

Posted by: Timothy Birdnow at 08:17 AM | Comments (2) | Add Comment
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Here is an interesting paper I came across at Junkscience by William Kininmonth of The Australasian Climate Research Institute (in PDF-sorry!). Dr. Kininmonth does a fine job of explaining the importance of ocean currents and shows that the tropics are emitting long wave radiation back into space in violation of the IPCC`s model.  His conclusion is that Global Warming is a natural phonomenon, and that the alarmists are wrong. 

It cannot be overemphasized that the fundamental assumption of AGW is that CO2 emissions are pooling in the atmosphere and blocking the long-wave radiation from escaping into space. Radiation falls on the Earth and then must escape back into space or be randomized as heat (basic thermodynamics).  If this long-wave radiation does not escape we should see a sharp rise in temperatures in the Troposphere where the waves are being reflected.  The land and oceans should show a much slower rise as their greater mass means they can absorb more energy-just as a swimming pool will have cold water on the first blistering hot day of summer, whatever the air temperature. We do not see this at all, but the reverse; there has been very little increase in atmospheric temperatures, and, as Dr. Kininmonth illustrates in this piece, the tropics at least are radiating as much as ever.  We see the temperature increases on land and sea, which one expects if the primary mechanism causing climate change were solar and not CO2 driven.

This paper also discusses the IPCC`s refusal to admit that the Medieval Warming Period and Little Ice Age were anything other than a regional phonomenon (they`re still clinging to Michael Mann`s infamous and bogus ``hockey stick`` graph).  Recent ice core studies, as well as tree rings, have confirmed that the MWP and LIA were worldwide climate events.  (It should be pointed out that the movement of people and animals illustrates this point quite well, but the political atmosphere of the times makes the use of evidence and common sense insufficient.) Kininmonth shows that the warming and cooling were global.

This is a bit lengthy, but well worth the read-even in PDF!

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Conservatives all sense that Hillary Clinton was much more radical in her youth (and today, for that matter) than she has been publicly portrayed.  The feminist personae, the attempts to defeminize her appearance, suggest a woman who did more than  chase boys in her college days and married an upwardly mobile lawyer afterward; she smells of radicalism, but there has been nothing to put one`s finger on exactly. 

Jack Kemp (not the politician) has kindly given us the proof of Hillary`s radical activity:

Tim,

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Just a few days ago I wrote about a breakthrough in bioengineering in which scientists found a way to reprogram adult cells so that they essentially became embryonic stem cells, and I warned that the Left would not be satisfied with their use.  I didn`t have to wait long to prove my point; PZ Myers [radical atheist and Darwin propogandist] states">http://www.scienceblogs.com/pharyngula/2007/11/stem_cell_breakthrough.php]states that quite plainly

This discovery is probably going to become a political football in short order, with the far right politicians who have restricted American research into embryonic stem cells claiming vindication. However, let's point out some realities here. Americans did not make this discovery; Japanese researchers did. It required understanding of gene expression in embryonic stem cells, an understanding that was hampered in our country. It's going to require much more confirmation and comparison between the induced pluripotent stem cells and embryonic stem cells as part of the process of making this technique useful  science doesn't take just one result from a few labs and accept it as gospel truth. And we definitely need to figure out better ways of switching the four genes on. Figuring that out will require more research into how organisms switch cells into the ES state in situ &mdash we can't figure that out from these cells with inserted, artificial gene constructs.

Or we can just sit back and let the Japanese and Europeans and Koreans do it for us, which is OK, I suppose. Just keep in mind that ceding the research to others means giving them a head start on the development of all the subsequent breakthroughs, too, and that what we're doing is willingly consigning US research in one of the most promising biomedical research fields ever to an also-ran, secondary status.

Of course, PZ ignored the work of James Thomson at the University of Wisconsin, Madison when he makes the claim that the Japanese succeeded because they have embryonic stem-cell research.  Thompson accomplished the reprogramming, and reported it online in Science at about the same time as the Japanese group.  When an alert reader called him on it he said he hadn`t read the piece, excusing his ideologically-motivated assertion while not admitting he had been unfamiliar with the work of the Wisconsin group. (Would he have let me get away with that?  Somehow I doubt it.)

One reader made this point:

Actually you are wrong too. It wasn't just the Japanese. Dr. James A. Thomson, from the University of Wisconsin simultaneously published similar results as the Japanese researchers. He also has a slightly different take on the impact:

Posted by: cbone | November 21, 2007 12:47 PM

Also, it`s interesting to note that PZ takes great pains to point out that these cells aren`t useful for therapies, leaving the reader with the notion that embryonic cells somehow are.  The reality is, embryonic stem-cell research has not developed any useful therapies, while work with adult stem-cells has produced many.

Embryonic stem-cell research is not illegal, contrary to the impression that the left wished to leave.  In fact, President George W. Bush made public funds for such research available for the first time, only he limited the lines of cells which researchers could use and still feed at the public trough.  That isn`t enough for the radicals, who demand more public funding. 

This is, as I have pointed out, more a matter of usurping the powers of the Divine than about the science.  Has anyone out there read Mary Shelley? She hung around with the intellectual crowd, and saw this phonomenon first hand.  Of course, Shelley borrowed from the ancient Greeks, and even entitled her book Frankenstein: The Modern Prometheus. You may recall that Prometheus was a Titan who stole fire from the gods and gave it to mankind.  What she was trying to illustrate was the perils of hubris; we seem to be full of that today.

Don`t believe me?  Read these comments from Pharyngula readers:

What the religious right doesn't realize, is that IPS cells in fact explode a myth that they hold on to dearly: conception is required to make a "soul". Because of this research we know that activating 4 genes can basically transform any old cell into an IPS cell that can go on to regenerate an entire organism. All this argumentation about "destroying life (i.e. a soul) is purely bunk!

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I will be making a short visit to the Ozark Hilton today, so I won`t be posting until tomorrow afternoon at the earliest.  I wanted to make a couple of announcements before I leave.

First, our old friend William from Theory=Dogma has moved his most excellent site from Blogger to Mee.nu, and you can find him at The New Theory=Dogma or simply click on the blogroll.  I strongly recommend you bookmark his site!

Secondly, I`m going to add Darwiniana to my blogroll.  Although this is ostensibly a site dedicated to discussing all things Darwin (the proprieter is a very liberal guy who, much like myself, happens to disagree with Darwinian theory) it delves into many other interesting fields involving science and, to a lesser degree, politics.  I do not agree with Nemo on many issues, but I find his site top-notch. It`s especially interesting to those with an interest in cutting-edge science.

Finally, I had a very pleasant surprise the other day; I discovered that Commentary Magazine had linked my site on their (short) blogroll. I am highly honored by this, because Commentary was and is one of the big bruisers in conservative circles, on the par with National Review.  I was absolutely delighted to find my site listed under political websites at Commentary!  Anyone who has never checked it out is truly missing out.

I`ll see you all tomorrow!

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One of the reasons we still use fossil fuels despite the many problems with them (they are environmentally dirty, controlled by unfriendly countries, etc.) is because nobody has been able to come up with an adequate alternative; alcohols release too little energy while consuming too much in their production to make them viable, ditto solar and wind, geothermal is quite difficult, etc.  Nuclear is fine, but many people fear the waste generated.  Environmentalists do not want us building new dams.  Solar Power Satellites would be heinously expensive and they lose too much in transmission through the atmosphere (not to mention what microwaves beaming through the air will do is unclear), so we seem to be stuck with good, old oil and coal. 

I`ve advocated a mixed economy of hydrogen produced from energy generated by nuclear plants. Anything that runs on oil can theoretically run on hydrogen, which puts out more energy than fossil fuels and produces water as the ``pollutant``.  The problems with hydrogen are 1.because it is more energetic it is more dangerous to handle and 2.it takes as much energy (or more) to produce than is returned.  Hydrogen has to be split from oxygen via electrolisis, an energy-intensive proposition.  The technical difficulties involved in handling hydrogen can (and have) been solved, but it is still to costly to make hydrogen.  Gasoline can be refined from oil far more cheaply, because the energy was put there ultimately by the Sun; it`s just a matter of putting oil in a convenient form.  Hydrogen has to be made from scratch.

Which is what makes this piece from Livescience so interesting; it chronicles a new technique employing microbes acting on sewage and fermentation waste products to produce the hydrogen.  If this method is capable of producing hydrogen on an industrial scale it could bring the costs down and make a hydrogen economy practical.

It will still be a long, hard slog in that hydrogen will have to be fazed in gradually; nothing we use today will run on hydrogen, so we`ll have to bring hydrogen cars into the economy along with adding hydrogen pumps at the gas stations.  The difficulties of change-over should be eased somewhat by the clean nature of hydrogen fuel, since it will have strong appeal to environmental-minded folks (just as hybrid cars do now) who will be willing to pay extra to use something that does not harm the environment.  No carbon emissions!  Of course, the true environmentalists will resist this, too, since their aim is to fundamentally change society.  They want our industrial civilization to be dismantled in favor of a feudal system of small, independent homesteads powered by sunlight and wind.  Anything that enshrines high-energy usage and maintains our current military/industrial complex is anathema.  They believe they can create a pastoral paradise, and hydrogen will simply get in the way.

Moonbats aside, a hydrogen economy would make for a cleaner and more energy-intensive world-both good things.  If the practical use of hydrogen can be developed we will all be better off.

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Here is a good piece from the Wall Street Journal on the Second Amendment and it`s day in court, courtesy of Wil Wirtanen:

November 23, 2007
 
Second-Amendment Showdown
By MIKE COX
November 23, 2007; Page A13

Mr. Cox is the attorney general of Michigan.

*******************************end article*************************

You know, when I was in Jamaica on my honeymoon years ago I picked up a  newspaper and the lead story was about a major raid on an illicit firearms factory.  Jamaica has a total ban on privately-owned firearms, and has a terrible crime problem as a result; the criminals make their own handguns while the law-abiding citizenry is defenseless.  Illegal firearms factories are a thriving cottage industry, and the criminal element is well armed, despite the ban.  If more Jamaican citizens had access to legal weapons for their own protection the crime rate would probably plummet, but the law keeps those weapons safely in the hands of the police, so criminals have carte blanche.

There are, of course, innumerable quotes from the Founding Fathers extolling the virtues of an armed citizenry to defend against crime as well as tyranny from the government.  It should be obvious that the Second Amendment was intended to guarantee the rights to private gun ownership, but Liberals and lawyers are genius at obfuscation, and they have managed to muddy what is fairly clear language.  There really should be no need for this to end up at the Supreme Court, but the Left is ever-eager to trample on our basic civil rights if those rights are inconvenient.  (It amazes me that the Left will claim that George Bush`s recording of telephone numbers between two calls both originating outside of the United States but passing through our country via satellite is some sort of ``shredding`` of the Constitution while they eagerly deny the right to ``keep and bear arms`` in direct violation of the Second Amendment.)

It should not be forgotten that Karl Marx made disarming the public of firearms one of the principle steps in establishing the ``dictatorship of the proletariate``(he also wanted a heavy, progressive income tax and inheritence taxes); tyrants need the public to be helpless before them.  The Founding Fathers had understood that principle (having just fought a war with the Mother Country for their independence) and that is why they inserted this clause; they wanted Americans to be able to rebel should the government become despotic.

Should the Courts interpret this any other way, should they say the People do NOT have the right to private gun ownership, I would say that the despotism that the Founders feared has come. 

Political power flows from the barrel of a gun, according to Mao Tse Tung.  In America the People are supposed to hold the political power, and thus those guns rightly belong to them.
 

Posted by: Timothy Birdnow at 11:18 AM | Comments (4) | Add Comment
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Jack Kemp forwards this for our consideration:

Tim, I saw this on Frontpage Mag. and went out and bought the book whose author, a space scientist, is reviewed below. I really don't have time to read all of it now but a quick glance shows it to be a compelling argument for growing 50% of our fuel needs either in the US or in friendly countries. Being a scientist, Robert Zurbrin works out the economics of a much better system that trucking grown plants to a central ethanol factory. And he said this could eliminate a lot of poverty in the US and South America. New cars SOLD could be converted to dual gas-biofuel usage for $100 per car. I urge everyone to read the article below and possibly the book.
 
Jack
 
http://www.frontpagemag.com/Articles/Read.aspx?GUID=0CDC8C5D-29E6-4421-8B17-5BD34783B0F0
 
Energy Victory  
By Jamie Glazov
FrontPageMagazine.com | Wednesday, November 21, 2007

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Wishing a happy Thanksgiving to all my readers on this day (even you Darwinists and Atheists who have been flooding my site).  Remember the purpose of this day is to give thanks to God for the many blessings we have, and to instill some gratitude in us for the good things in our lives.  (For you Atheists, at least reflect upon the bountiful life you have, and about the reasons for that bounty.)  Enjoy your feast, enjoy the football and parade, but keep the ultimate reason for the day in mind. 

The Pilgrims started America on the path it has taken, and here is one of our founding documents which they bequethed us:

Mayflower Compact 1620

Agreement Between the Settlers at New Plymouth : 1620
IN THE NAME OF GOD, AMEN. We, whose names are underwritten, the Loyal Subjects of our dread Sovereign Lord King James, by the Grace of God, of Great Britain, France, and Ireland, King, Defender of the Faith, &c. Having undertaken for the Glory of God, and Advancement of the Christian Faith, and the Honour of our King and Country, a Voyage to plant the first Colony in the northern Parts of Virginia; Do by these Presents, solemnly and mutually, in the Presence of God and one another, covenant and combine ourselves together into a civil Body Politick, for our better Ordering and Preservation, and Furtherance of the Ends aforesaid: And by Virtue hereof do enact, constitute, and frame, such just and equal Laws, Ordinances, Acts, Constitutions, and Officers, from time to time, as shall be thought most meet and convenient for the general Good of the Colony; unto which we promise all due Submission and Obedience. IN WITNESS whereof we have hereunto subscribed our names at Cape-Cod the eleventh of November, in the Reign of our Sovereign Lord King James, of England, France, and Ireland, the eighteenth, and of Scotland the fifty-fourth, Anno Domini; 1620.

Mr. John Carver,
Mr. William Bradford,
Mr Edward Winslow,
Mr. William Brewster.
Isaac Allerton,
Myles Standish,
John Alden,
John Turner,
Francis Eaton,
James Chilton,
John Craxton,
John Billington,
Joses Fletcher,
John Goodman,
Mr. Samuel Fuller,
Mr. Christopher Martin,
Mr. William Mullins,
Mr. William White,
Mr. Richard Warren,
John Howland,
Mr. Steven Hopkins,
Digery Priest,
Thomas Williams,
Gilbert Winslow,
Edmund Margesson,
Peter Brown,
Richard Britteridge
George Soule,
Edward Tilly,
John Tilly,
Francis Cooke,
Thomas Rogers,
Thomas Tinker,
John Ridgdale
Edward Fuller,
Richard Clark,
Richard Gardiner,
Mr. John Allerton,
Thomas English,
Edward Doten,
Edward Liester.

Posted by: Timothy Birdnow at 10:28 AM | No Comments | Add Comment
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Jack Kemp is looking for the original news stories about (one of) Clinton`s (many) dirty trick(s) in which he made the low sulphur coal fields of Utah part of a National Park (thus making the coal untouchable) in return for campaign money from Indonesia`s Lippo Group (who happened to own most of the low-sulphur deposits elsewhere).  I searched for these stories myself and could not find anything but blogs on Google and Yahoo.  Hmmm.  I find that to be not just a little suspicious.

At any rate, if any of you, my wise and noble readers, should chance upon this story from a reputable source (well, the MSM is o.k., too) Jack and I would greatly appreciate it if you would forward us the link.

This from Jack:

Tim,
 
I'm having trouble accessing the original news stories about Bill Clinton turning a huge Utah clean coal deposit into a national park which helped his buddies the Lippo Group in Indonesia to eliminate a coal competitor. Free Republic and this website  http://www.apfn.org/apfn/riady.htm  have some comments, but I can't link to the original 1996-7 documentation. Someone should ask Mrs. Clinton if she is so much in favor of energy independence, then why did her husband (possibly with her advice) decide to make us even more dependent on foreign energy. And Bill Clinton joined the Riadi Group Board of Directors in 2001.
 
Jack
 
 From the website above:
 
CRONY RIADY INVITES CLINTON TO JOIN LIPPO BOARD This is one segment of intelligence of several, in the "Far East Economic Review." The following particular segment was near the end, should you care to view it at its site. Riady featured heavily during the revelations of cronyism and illegal campaign funds, a couple of years ago. He covertly donated tens of thousands of dollars to Clinton's campaign. Also, remember the Escalante millions of acres that was declared a National Monument in Utah--to in fact close off the coal mining in that area, in reality. The low sulphur non polluting coal that is mined only in that region of the U.S.? Well the Lippo Enterprise of Indonesia if you will recall, got the contract to import that same quality coal, making us totally dependent on foreign coal, a necessity for energy production in this country. with the stroke of a pen, this criminal president via EO, ensured that America will be dependent on foreign coal and other minerals.

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I had thought to write an historical account of the first Thanksgiving and the subsequent history of the holiday, but Mark Alexander at the Federalist Patriot did a fine job of it this morning, making any efforts by me unnecessary.  Here is his account in it`s entirety:

``Tomorrow being the day set apart by the Honorable Congress for public Thanksgiving and Praise; and duty calling us devoutly to express our grateful acknowledgements to God for the manifold blessings he has granted us, the General... earnestly exhorts, all officers and soldiers, whose absence is not indispensably necessary, to attend with reverence the solemnities of the day.``  George Washington (December 17, 1777)

The necessity of Thanksgiving
In this era of overblown political correctness, we often hear tales of Thanksgiving that stray far afield from the truth. Contemporary textbook narratives of the first American harvest celebration portray the Pilgrim colonists as having given thanks to their Indian neighbors for teaching them how to survive in a strange new world. This, of course, is in stark contrast to the historical record, in which the colonists gave thanks to God Almighty, the Provider of their blessings.

The ``First Thanksgiving`` is usually depicted as the Pilgrims’ three-day feast in early November 1621. The Pilgrims, Calvinist Protestants who rejected the institutional Church of England, believed that the worship of God must originate freely in the individual soul, under no coercion. The Pilgrims left Plymouth, England, on 6 September 1620, sailing to the New World on the promise of opportunity for religious and civil liberty.

For almost three months, 102 seafarers braved the brutal elements, arriving off what is now the Massachusetts coast. On 11 December, before disembarking at Plymouth Rock, the voyagers signed the Mayflower Compact, America’s original document of civil government predicated on principles of self-government. While still anchored at Provincetown harbor, Pastor John Robinson counseled, ``You are become a body politic... and are to have only them for your... governors which yourselves shall make choice of.`` Governor William Bradford described the Mayflower Compact as ``a combination... that when they came a shore they would use their owne libertie; for none had power to command them...``

Upon landing, the Pilgrims conducted a prayer service and quickly turned to building shelters. Malnutrition and illness during the ensuing New England winter killed nearly half their number. Through prayer and hard work, with the assistance of their Wampanoag Indian friends, the Pilgrims reaped a rich harvest in the summer of 1621, the bounty of which they shared with the Wampanoag. The celebration incorporated feasting and games, which remain holiday traditions.

Such ready abundance soon waned, however. Under demands from investors funding their endeavor, the Pilgrims had acquiesced to a disastrous arrangement holding all crops and property in common, in order to return an agreed-to half of their produce to their overseas backers. (These financiers insisted they could not trust faraway freeholders to split the colony’s profits honestly.) Within two years, Plymouth was in danger of foundering under famine, blight and drought. Colonist Edward Winslow wrote, ``The most courageous were now discouraged, because God, which hitherto had been our only shield and supporter, now seemed in his anger to arm himself against us.``

Governor Bradford’s record of the history of the colony describes 1623 as a period of arduous work coupled with ``a great drought... without any rain and with great heat for the most part,`` lasting from spring until midsummer. The Plymouth settlers followed the Wampanoag’s recommended cultivation practices carefully, but their crops withered.

The Pilgrims soon thereafter thought better of relying solely on the physical realm, setting ``a solemn day of humiliation, to seek the Lord by humble and fervent prayer, in this great distress.`` In affirmation of their faith and providing a great witness to the Indians, by evening of that day the skies became overcast and gentle rains fell, restoring the yield of the fields. Governor Bradford noted, ``And afterwards the Lord sent to them such seasonable showers, with interchange of fair warm weather as, through His blessing caused a fruitful and liberal harvest, to their no small comfort and rejoicing. For which mercy, in time convenient, they also set apart a day of thanksgiving.``

Winslow noted the Pilgrims’ reaction as believing ``it would be great ingratitude, if secretly we should smother up the same, or content ourselves with private thanksgiving for that, which by private prayer could not be obtained. And therefore another solemn day was set apart and appointed for that end; wherein we returned glory, honor, and praise, with all thankfulness, to our good God, which dealt so graciously with us...`` This was the original American Thanksgiving Day, centered not on harvest feasting (as in 1621) but on gathering together to publicly recognize the favor and provision of Almighty God.

Bradford’s diary recounts how the colonists repented of their financial folly under sway of their financiers: ``At length, after much debate of things, the Governor (with the advice of the chiefest amongst them) gave way that they should set corn every man for his own particular, and in that regard trust to themselves; in all other things to go in the general way as before. And so assigned to every family a parcel of land, according to the proportion of their number.``

By the mid-17th century, autumnal Thanksgivings were common throughout New England; observance of Thanksgiving Festivals spread to other colonies during the American Revolution. At other junctures of ``great distress`` or miraculous intervention, colonial leaders called their countrymen to offer prayerful thanks to God. The Continental Congresses, cognizant of the need for a warring country’s continuing grateful entreaties to God, proclaimed yearly Thanksgiving days during the Revolutionary War, from 1777 to 1783.

In 1789, after adopting the Bill of Rights to the Constitution, among the first official acts of Congress was approving a motion for proclamation of a national day of thanksgiving, recommending that citizens gather together and give thanks to God for their new nation’s blessings. Presidents George Washington, John Adams and James Madison followed the custom of declaring national days of thanks, though it was not officially declared again until another moment of national peril, when during the War Between the States Abraham Lincoln invited the whole American people to observe a day of thanksgiving and praise to our beneficent Father... with humble penitence for our national perverseness and disobedience. In 1941, Congress set permanently November’s fourth Thursday as our official national Thanksgiving.

The Pilgrims’ temporary folly of sundering and somersaulting the material as transcendent over the spiritual conveys an important lesson that modern histories are reluctant to tell. The Founders, recognizing this, placed first among constitutionally recognized rights the free exercise of religion faith through action.

If what we seek is a continuance of God s manifold blessings, then a day of heartfelt thanksgiving is a tiny tribute indeed.

This Thanksgiving, please pray for our Patriot Armed Forces standing in harm’s way around the world, and for their families especially the families of those fallen Soldiers, Sailors, Airmen, Marines and Coast Guardsmen who have died in defense of American liberty.

On behalf of your Patriot staff and National Advisory Committee, we wish God’s peace and blessings upon you and yours this Thanksgiving.

Semper Vigilo, Fortis, Paratus, et Fidelis!

Mark Alexander
Publisher

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