“Independence Day”—What a laugh!

By Al Benson Jr.

During the first week of July we celebrate July 4th, which has come to be called “Independence Day.” There was a time when that had meaning, but no more. Now it is a pathetic joke. Most Americans take a day off from work, light a few fireworks, roast a few hot dogs and boast about their :”freedom.” Another sick joke! We are “free” to do what the federal government tells us we must do and we are “free” to avoid those things they tell us we must not do and that is the sum total of the “freedom” we have left. The pathetic thing is that most people can not discern that fact.

The Supreme Court just handed down a ringing endorsement of Obamacare, which says, basically, that the federal government can compel you to buy health insurance whether you want it or not and then can tax you (penalize you) if you don’t buy it. Obama wanted this; Congress voted to give it to him so we “could find out what’s in the bill” and the Supreme Court upheld all this legal chicanery and we are still dumb enough to call ourselves free?

In April of 1776 American patriots stood at Lexington Green and Concord and faced British muskets to resist tyranny. Did they do what they did so we could end up being compelled to take part in Obamacare or so that the freedoms they fought for could be swallowed up by the Patriot Act? If they did, then the “history” we’ve been taught is a ludicrous joke. Of course much of the “history” we’ve been taught is a joke anyway.

The truth is that those men, for all their imperfections, had a vision for true liberty that we can’t even begin to conceive of. During our first War for Independence (the second war of independence was the War for Southern Independence) we had ministers in our churches that boldly proclaimed to their congregations what the issues were and what should be done. Thanks to 501 C3 that situation doesn’t even exist today. Many, if not most, of our church pastors have no real grasp of history and so they usually come down on the wrong side of most political issues. They are just not historically equipped to deal with them and so they don’t bother. They mouth something like “Romans 13 says to obey the higher authorities no matter what” and with that they move on to other issues and they hope you will to. If you persist in dealing the these issues you shortly get a reputation in your church and no one will talk with you seriously about anything except who might win the world series or whether it might rain day after tomorrow.

The sad state of affairs in most churches is that most preachers and most members of the congregations they serve don’t have a clue about what is happening in the country and how their liberties, God-given liberties, have been eroded—and they don’t want a clue. They don’t want to deal with any of these issues because having knowledge means increased responsibilities. I have a friend in Illinois who said, on several occasions “The last thing Christians want is responsibility. They will run from that like it was the plague.” Sadly, in many instances he is correct.

You might ask the question—is the United States a righteous nation anymore? The answer should be obvious. Another friend in West Virginia sent me another quote: “Does a righteous nation get a Barack Obama for a president?” Good question. The answer to that one should also be obvious. Does a righteous nation get a Bill Clinton, a Lyndon Johnson or a George Bush for president—each one getting a little worse than the one before him? And now the American electorate has placed a Marxist in the White House and the boot is starting to really pinch.

Will things turn around and get better if Obama goes and we get Romney, or as some already call him “Robamny?” I doubt it. Both of them belong to the same internationalist cabal, or their handlers do, so trading one for the other may postpone the inevitable for awhile, but not for that long.

Our churches need to recognize the national haze we are traveling in and humble themselves before the Lord and repent. We need to repent of lots of things and among those things is not being willing to learn the lessons our history has to teach us because we just don’t want to be bothered. So, along with our willing ignorance, we are lazy.

We have been taught that you never mix theology and politics, when actually politics is a by-product of theology. So if your political situation in this country is a mess, what does that say about the theology?

Christians have been taught to retreat from the ungodly culture around them rather than confronting and exposing its evil. It’s a lot easier just to “be nice” and not fight with anyone. Our pastor has correctly stated that “If you are loved by everyone and no one is mad at you, then you aren’t doing anything.” And that is where most of the Christian church is today. When it comes to freedom and liberty the church is just as ignorant as the rest of the world. Most of us were “educated” in public schools and have never taken the trouble to look beyond what those schools taught us. We just blindly accept their version of “history” because it is so much easier than doing all that digging to find out what really happened and how it affects your life today. Just ignore all that stuff and do a little evangelism and don’t worry about it.

Will this country go down the tubes? I think it will. It might not happen in the next five years but I think it will happen and part of the reason will be that Christians just didn’t want to make the effort to find out what really goes on and then to do something about it. It’s so much easier just to ignore it all, turn on the baseball game and vegetate. Not too many Bereans around in our day.

Would we be able to do what the folks in 1776 did to fight for their liberty? I doubt that. The moral fiber is gone in our day and it will take a long, long time to get it back.

So we will continue on in our spiritual malaise and celebrate July 4th under the illusion that we are “free” in the face of Obamacare and the Patriot Act, and heaven help anyone that dares to shatter our illusions!

Lincoln the Christian—Here we go again!

By Al Benson Jr.

On June 24, 2012 an article appeared on http://www.westernjournalism.com written by Kevin Probst, the name of which was “Emancipation Proclamation: Was Lincoln Motivated By Political Expediency Or Religious Conviction?” Mr. Probst seeks in this article to portray Abraham Lincoln as a Bible-believing Christian who was motivated by religious conviction regarding the Emancipation Proclamation. Mr. Probst is a teacher of history and apologetics at a Christian high school in Columbus, Georgia, so I do not for a minute doubt his honesty and integrity. However, the research I have done over the years forces me to disagree with his view of Mr. Lincoln as a dedicated Christian.

One of the sources for his view of Lincoln is a book written by Rev. O. H. Pennell dealing with Lincoln’s faith. This was a short book, first published in 1899, when it sold for .25. It was only 58 pages long. Rev. Pennell cited different people and events in Lincoln’s life that led him to his conclusions. Some of these I had read about previously from other sources and they failed to convince me of Lincoln’s biblical faith. It is interesting to note that this book was written at the tail-end of that period when authors were attempting to literarily seat Lincoln at God’s right hand. The period from 1865 through around 1900 was when Lincoln was almost being deified by authors—the apotheosis of Lincoln if you will.

Many portrayed him as a sincere, humble Christian man, literally praying to God almost hourly. One such was Josiah Gilbert Holland, who wrote a biography Life of Abraham Lincoln. Before he wrote this, Holland went to visit William Herndon, Lincoln’s old law partner. According to the book Lincoln’s Herndon by David Donald, published in 1948 by Alfred A. Knopf, Holland asked Herndon all about Mr. Lincoln’s religious faith. Herndon’s reply to that was “The less said the better” to which Holland replied “O never mind, I’ll fix that.” Donald wrote: “When the Life of Abraham Lincoln appeared, Herndon learned that Holland had done just that. A sincerely devout man himself, the Massachusetts author had at the very outset decided that the defied Lincoln must have been a ‘true-hearted Christian.’ He incorporated into his biography all sorts of improbable anecdotes to emphasize Lincoln’s religiosity..”

When Herndon read some of what Holland had written he nearly had apoplexy. Donald wrote: “Decidedly unorthodox in his own religious views he (Herndon) was not willing to have his partner canonized as a Protestant saint… Herndon had little personal knowledge of his partner’s religious beliefs, but in collecting his Lincoln records he had formed an opinion decidedly different from Holland’s. Joshua F. Speed, one of Lincoln’s most intimate friends during the early Springfield years, had written Herndon that Lincoln ‘was skeptical as to the great truths of the Christian religion’; Lincoln’s first law partner, John Todd Stuart, considered him an infidel; Isaac Cogdal, a Menard lawyer who rode the circuits in central Illinois, affirmed that Lincoln gave no credence to ‘the orthodox Theologies of the day’; Mrs. Lincoln herself stated that her husband ‘was not a technical christian’;–this from Speed to Herndon in January, 1866.”

Donald also wrote that: “Hardin Bale and other New Salem survivors asserted that Lincoln had read Volney and Paine during his Menard County period and had written ‘a work on infidelity, denying the divinity of the Scriptures.’ James A. Matheny, best man at Lincoln’s wedding also knew of this pamphlet attacking the divinity of Christ—special inspiration, Revelation etc”. Matheny or one of the others took the book and burned it, explaining to Lincoln how such a work would damage his political career.

Then there was the Newton Bateman story which was mentioned in Pennell’s little book. Newton Bateman was the Illinois superintendent of education. His offices adjoined those that were used by Lincoln in the Illinois state capital. According to David Donald: “Holland received an eight-page memorandum detailing a remarkable conversation with the Republican presidential nominee in October 1860.” The quote is a bit long, but the gist of it is that Lincoln affirmed the truth about Christ and the Scriptures that he had so long denied. This surprised Bateman, who had heard the stories in Springfield about Lincoln being an agnostic. Donald continued: “When the superintendent remarked how strange it was that intimate friends should be ignorant of Lincoln’s change of heart, the Republican candidate had confided; …I am obliged to appear different to them, but I think more on these subjects than all others,& have done so for years,& I am willing that you should know it.’ All these words of Dear noble heroic Lincoln Bateman vouched for as exactly as he uttered them.” This all caused Herndon some distress. Donald continued: “With such testimony in mind, Herndon stamped into the office of the superintendent of education and charged; Bateman, in order to make Lincoln a technical Christian–you have made him a hypocrite. . Looking puzzled—or ashamed—the school superintendent backed down from his statement as quoted in Holland’s biography. His recollection of Lincoln’s words, he confessed with embarrassment, was not precise—didn’t write out in particular and full until after Mr. L. was assassinated. In later conversations with Herndon (records of which are now lost) Bateman apparently retracted even further—but prohibited Herndon from publishing his statement…If Lincoln really was a Christian, Herndon shrewdly pointed out, there was no conceivable reason why he should have felt obliged to conceal his change of heart, for to reveal his hidden conversion would have won influential political and social support. The ultimate effect of Bateman’s rather flimsy testimony was to show up Lincoln as insincere and even a little foolish.” So it would seem that a good part of one of the main stories of Lincoln’s conversion was “not precise.” Who knows what was really said, but Lincoln’s supposed “conversion” makes a good story.

Interestingly also, was Mrs. Lincoln’s statement in 1866 that “Mr. Lincoln was not a technical Christian.” Yet supposedly after the death of their son, Willie, Lincoln, supposedly, “turned his heart to Christ” according to what Mary Lincoln is supposed to have told Rev. James Smith on June 8, 1870. So which is it? In 1866 his wife says he was not a technical Christian, but in 1870 she says he turned his heart to Christ while still in office. We have a contradiction.

My own research has led me to the conclusion that Lincoln was not only not a Christian, he was a socialist.

For further research on Lincoln I would suggest the following:
The Real Lincoln by Thomas DiLorenzo, Prima Publishing, Roseville, California
The Real Lincoln by Charles L. C. Minor, Sprinkle Publications, Harrisonburg, Virginia
The South Was Right by the Kennedy Brothers, Pelican Publishing, Gretna, Louisiana
Thle South Under Siege 1830-2000 by Frank Conner, Collards Publishing Company, Newnan, Georgia
Lincoln’s Marxists by Al Benson Jr. and Walter Kennedy, Pelican Publishing, Gretna, Louisiana.
The Coming of the Glory by John S. Tilley, Bill Coates, Ltd, Nashville, Tennessee

There are several other books out there but these are some I have access to at this point.

The whole question of Lincoln’s political and theological worldview needs to be reassessed. He had a decided fondness for those on the political left and they had a decided affection for him and his policies that went all the way from support to implementation where possible. The early Republican Party had notable socialist support and participation, and Mr. Lincoln was not ignorant of this. Had he really been a Christian this should have bothered him and apparently it did not. That fact alone should tell us where he was really coming from.

A Mix Of Truth and Error About the War Between the States

By Al Benson Jr.

Back on June 21 there was an article posted on The News Virginianwebsite, written by Nelson Graves in which he seemed to question why re-enactors are still “fighting” the War of Northern Aggression, although he didn’t call it that.

My intent is not to question Mr. Graves’ sincerity but rather to question where he got his “facts” from. He made several statements in his article that I have to disagree with. His article was like so much of the material we read about the War in our day, a mix of a little truth and a lot of misconceptions.

Naturally, he has to drag the slavery issue into it all. After all, it’s what he was probably taught, like most of us, that slavery was what it was all about. No other reasons need be given—just the one that creates the hot button emotional response.

He wrote: “On June 18, 1865, Union General Gordon Granger told slaves in Galveston, Texas, that they were free. Per the Internet, according to legend, Granger told the slaves on June 19. The slaves in Confederate States were emancipated effective January 1, 1863…” Sorry, but they really weren’t emancipated then. Lincoln, in his infamous Emancipation Proclamation, only “freed” slaves in Confederate territory, which he had no right or authority to free. Slaves in Union-held territory in the South, as well as slaves in Kentucky, Missouri, and Maryland, which had remained in the Union, all remained in bondage until the 13th Amendment was passed after Lincoln had gone on to his reward, whatever they may have been. So Lincoln’s “proclamation” really freed no one.

Graves also noted that: “Every year, all during the year it seems, Civil War historians, buffs, enthusiasts and those in general who just can’t let go of the war, gather to re-fight it. As the report said, ‘It has been 147 years since the conclusion of the American Civil War, and re-enactors are still arguing about the causes, tactics and atrocities …” Believe it or not, that’s good, even though Mr. Graves doesn’t seem to think so. The fact that Americans are still arguing over this most pivotal event in our history shows that the professional “historians” have not sewed up all the loose ends they were supposed to and the panacea of political correctness has not completely taken over yet. That’s good.

Mr. Graves also observed: “The Union won on the field, slaves won their freedom and citizens of the Confederacy didn’t lose their rights and privileges as they usually do when defeated…” Oh really? Has Mr. Graves ever read about what happened during “reconstruction” in the South after the shooting phase of the War was over? He should sometime. If he got hold of the right book it would be a real eye-opener for him. He needs to read Frank Connor’s book The South Under Siege 1830-2000, specifically the section pertaining to “reconstruction” and then come back and tell me the South kept their “rights and privileges.”

He also mistakenly stated: “Former Confederates kept their weapons and had their citizenship restored. They suffered only two losses—a free workforce and embarrassment.” Here Mr. Graves is really off base. If Southerners kept their weapons then why did Genera Lee’s men at Appomattox have to stack their rifles and heave them there? Since about 75-80% of the South’s fighting men did not own slaves, the vast majority of them were not really concerned with losing a free workforce. It was something they never had to begin with. As far as embarrassment, the Southern folks suffered much more than that—they suffered and are still suffering the effects of Yankee/Marxist cultural genocide. The Yankee Marxists ( I call them that because their mindsets are nearly identical) began inflicting their brand of “justice” on the South even before the War was over and they have continued ever since, using the public school system as one of their main vehicles. It is perfectly permissible in the South today to mock Southern beliefs, make school children feel guilty about their history and heritage (in fact make sure they feel guilty about these things) and it is basically open season on Southern whites when it comes to crass political jokes.

Southern culture is and has been under assault since “reconstruction” started, but, according to the politically correct, that’s okay. If you insult anyone else’s culture and beliefs the nightly news will seek to crucify you but if you do it to white Southern folks it’s perfectly acceptable, in fact it is expected. This is part of what many of the re-enactors are consciously or unconsciously fighting about in their re-enactions—the fact that their culture and beliefs are constantly under attack from politicians, the “news” media, and scurrilous organizations like the Southern Poverty Law Center, which is really just a left-wing hate group.

Contrary to Mr. Graves’ wishes the debate will continue to go on because, in spite of their public school “educations” there are still some Southern folks out there who realize their beliefs and way of life are under attack and they have made the decision to resist, even with a re-enactor’s uniform on a Saturday afternoon in the local state park.

If Mr. Graves really wants a shock he should get hold of the book Lincoln’s Marxists (Pelican Publishing, Gretna, Louisiana) and begin to learn about the real Northern mindset before, during and after the War. He won’t like what he reads but he may learn something.

Comrade Obama, the United Nations, and Gun Control

by Al Benson Jr.

No one that has not even taken a second look at the Obama administration can have any doubts that this administration has as one of its main priorities the disarming of American citizens. They wish to make sure none of us can defend our homes and families if necessary and in the name of “openness and change” they just want us all to surrender our guns and “trust them.” Doing that is akin to handing either the fox or coyote the keys to the hen house. This Marxist administration has proven that it is more than willing to sacrifice our God-given rights on the alter of UN one world government. Those that can’t figure out this much aren’t really trying too hard.

The United Nations Arms Trade Treaty (ATT) is nothing more that a backdoor attempt to impose strong restrictions on gun rights in this country. Negotiations on this treaty are being conducted “behind closed doors” naturally, lest the public find out what’s going on and protest it. So much for openness and transparency. Has it ever occurred to anyone that what the politicians promise us is exactly the opposite of what they give us?

This treaty, in all probability will contain language that will require registration and licensing of American firearms, require mandatory destruction of surplus ammunition and ban large categories of firearms, among other things. Maybe, if we are lucky, they will let us keep our slingshots.

According to the Gun Owners of America: “The treaty could also be self-executing, which would mean that it would achieve its anti-gun objectives whether or not implementing legislation was passed by Congress. Some think the US would never sign off on such a treaty. Well, think again. In 2009 Secretary of State Hillary Clinton announced the US agreed to negotiate on the treaty.” What “negotiation” means is that Hitlery will ask the UN to word this thing in such a way as to fool the average American gun owner. And if you think the US Senate would never agree to this, think again. Some of these senators in both parties can’t wait to sign this if it ever gets to them, though most likely Comrade Obama will just pass it by executive order like he does everything else anymore. It seems more and more that Congress is only there to collect the fat paycheck while Obama dictates all that will take place in the country. More and more Congress is becoming little more than an expensive appendage.  But having them sit there and pretend to legislate may keep the serfs in line for a little while longer.

You can just imagine what another four years of Obama’s Marxist administration will do to this country. There’s not much left now and he will make sure what is left is gone before he is done. It’s what he’s there for.

Kansas senator Jerry Moran his introduced a bill in the Senate that would prohibit the Obama administration from negotiating away our gun rights to the United Nations and folks in this country need to contact their senators and tell them they want them to support Moran’s bill. This is an election year and some of those people will respond to pressure from the folks at home only because they want us to send them back to Washington so they can continue to feed at the federal trough.

If this UN anti-gun treaty is half as bad as we have been told it is, I can only imagine what the United Nations has in store for all the countries that are dumb enough to sign on to this thing. Obviously the UN would love a United States with almost no weapons. All the better for the Mongolian troops or whoever may land to patrol our streets in the name of one world government at some point in the future. This administration, as well as previous ones, is more than willing to work with the United Nations in putting us under some form of world government. I can just imagine that private ownership of firearms in this country, along with all other private property ownership, would not fit in with the “economic sustainability” of the UN’s Agenda 21 program.

So contact your senators and tell them to support Jerry Moran’s bill. The gun you save just might be your own.

Agenda 21 is Cleverly Packaged Marxism

By Al Benson Jr.

The title of this article may shock some folks who naively believe that anything the United Nations comes up with just has to be a boon to mankind. Sorry to burst your bubble, folks, but the United Nations is not, nor ever has been, what you were taught to believe it is. If you want to find out what the real game of the United Nations is I can recommend two books I have read that tell the truth about it—The Fearful Master by G. Edward Griffin and Freedom On the Alter–the United Nations Crusade Against God and Family by William Norman Grigg. I believe these can be obtained from American Opinion Publishing in Appleton, Wisconsin. You may not like what you read but it will be the truth and the truth is to be preferred over being comfortably ignorant.

If you want to begin to perceive where the Marxists are really at you need to get a copy of The Communist Manifesto written by Karl Marx, the supposed father of communism. Actually this document, although written by Marx, was the work of a group called the League of the Just (Illuminati) and they just hired Marx, who was a second-rate revolutionary hack to write it out for them. His name did not even appear on the first edition. They allowed him to add it later.

Marx laid out their (and his) plan in this publication and they were quite specific. On page 19 of the edition I have Marx stated: “In this sense, the theory of the Communists may be summed up in the single sentence: abolition of private property.” On page 20 he says: “In one word, you reproach us with intending to do away with your property. Precisely so; that is just what we intend.” Nothing bashful about Marx. He lays it all out and if he were not such a boring writer, more might read his diatribes and begin to understand. He also states: “The Communists are further reproached for desiring to abolish countries and nationalities.” And then, one of his classic statements: “But Communism abolishes eternal truths, it abolishes all religion, and all morality, instead of constituting them on a new basis; it therefore acts in contradiction to all past historical experience.” This sentiment is straight out of the French Revolution. The French revolutionaries sought to abolish eternal truths too and start with a new creation of their own making. And although they managed to mess up France (which is still messed up because of them) they did not abolish eternal truth. God is Truth, just as He is Love, and these revolutionary fools will never be able to get rid of Him no matter how hard they try—and they are still trying. The United Nations is one of their attempts.

You might think this is all very interesting but be wondering how this applies to the United Nations Agenda 21 project, which has been around much longer than most of us realized it was. In an article posted on http://www.wrightcountyteaparty.org the program for Agenda 21 is listed. It was published courtesy of Tiffany Gabbay of The Blaze on 2/10/12 It states in part: “Agenda 21 is a two-decade old grand plan for global ‘Sustainable Development,’ brought to you from the United Nations. George H. W. Bush (and 177 other world leaders) agreed to it back in 1992, and in 1995 Bill Clinton signed Executive Order #12858, creating a Presidential Council on ‘Sustainable Development.’ This effectively pushed the UN plan into America’s large, churning government machine without the need for any review or discussion by Congress or the American people…’Sustainable Development’ sounds like a nice idea, right, until you scratch the surface and find that Agenda 21 and Sustainable Development are really cloaked plans to impose the tenets of Social Justice/Socialism on the world. At risk from Agenda 21; Private Property ownership; Single-Family homes; Private car ownership and individual travel choices; Privately owned farms…The Agenda 21 plan openly targets private property. For over thirty-five years the UN has made their stance very clear on the issue of individuals owning land.” So how come people who support the UN don’t seem to know about this? Or if they do they are strangely silent. If the United Nations favors the abolition of private property rights they how are they any different from Karl Marx and what he wrote in The Communist Manifesto?

Of course Marx didn’t have good old George Soros in the background financing his leftist projects, but he did have Friedrich Engels to do that. It turns out that George Soros, through his foundation, has donated $2,147,415 to the International Council of Local Environmental Initiatives (ICLEI) to support that group’s Local Agenda 21 Project.

The article from Gabbay also noted: “The seeds for Agenda 21 were planted back in 1987 when the writings of Gro Harlem Brundtland ( a woman who was first Vice-President of the Socialist International) caught the eye of the UN. So the beginnings of the Agenda 21 program were socialist. No wonder Marx would have loved them. You can bet this little tidbit is not one the UN will reveal.

How many of you have ever heard anything about Megaregions? No one has informed you about these? I wonder why. There is an interesting site on the Internet http://www.stopagenda21inms.com which notes that: “Mississippi’s Gulf Coast has been included in one of the country’s 10 megaregions. Under the Saul Alinsky mantra, ‘never let a good disaster go to waste’ our state is losing the ability to be self-governing. This megaregion was developed by America 2050…A major focus of America 2050 is the emergence of megaregions—large networks of metropolitan areas, where most of the population growth by mid-century will take place. Examples of megaregions are the Northeast Megaregion, from Boston to Washington, or Southern California from Los Angeles to Tijuana, Mexico…” Notice that these megaregions can cross international borders—thus Tijuana, Mexico is part of the Los Angeles megaregion. I wonder if Seattle, Washington and Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada will be included all in one big megaregion. This would all fit in with what Marx outlined in the Communist Manifesto about abolishing countries and nationalities and it is being done under the auspices of the United Nations—and most people don’t have a clue.

Commentary on http://agenda21canada.wordpress.com has noted: “Agenda 21’s main thrust is to stealthily return ALL land and privately-owned property back to public domain (one-world government control) by relieving people of their rights personal property and/or titled real estate, the cornerstone of any free society…Agenda 21 also destroys industry and the middle-class society. People are reduced to paupers when land is rendered off-limits to mineral exploration, prospecting, mining,…farming, ranching, trapping… The writer of this article finishes up with this thought “…my advice to any community, territory, province, state, country or country that has joined the freedom-sucking Agenda 21, bail out; if your community has not yet enlisted, then stay out. The whole program is nothing more than cleverly packaged Marxism, which is what the United Nations is really all about. That old John Birch Society slogan “Get US out of the United Nations”  is really right on the money.

Change the Name but Keep the Game

By Al Benson Jr.

Lately all the publicity the United Nations Agenda 21 private property confiscation game has gotten has not been positive. Some cities and towns around the country have begun to realize that in signing up to be part of Agenda 21 they are, in effect, signing their lives away. Their local communities are no longer their own and the United Nations is a harsh taskmaster. Moreover, the United Nations really has no business sticking its socialistic nose into what goes on in American communities—not that this stops them from trying.

I recently noted an article on the Internet from Townhall.com for 5/31/12. The headline read: “Alabama Fights a UN Land Grab.” In fact, the Governor of Alabama actually signed an anti-Agenda 21 bill, Senate Bill 477.There was also a brief article about this on http://www.varight.com 

The Townhall.com  article noted: “Defined these days as ‘sustainable development,’ Agenda 21 seeks to transform humanity with ‘new global ethics.’ At the most basic level, beyond the soft words like ‘sustainability’ and ‘eco-friendly environments’, Agenda 21 takes away private property ownership, single-family homes, private car ownership, individual travel choices, and privately owned farms. These socialist ethics, as described by Mikhail Gorbachev at the UN Rio Conference in 1995, mean that ‘we should restrict and limit our consumption and also reassess our way of life, we should be more modest.” I always wonder, when these globalist programs come out if the elite that propose them are willing to subject themselves to what they propose for the rest of us. But then you already know the answer to that one. It’s the same as the answer Congress gave when asked if they’d be willing to subject themselves to the provisions of Obamacare—gee thanks, but no thanks!

I expect Attorney General Holder to momentarily sue the state of Alabama for daring to outlaw Agenda 21.

At any rate, the name Agenda 21 is starting to get a bad rap—and justifiably so, and so the one-worlders have come up with another name to throw the unwary off track. Their rationale seems to be “if it doesn’t say Agenda 21 at the top of the document those fools out in flyover country won’t know the difference.” Sorry folks, in spite of your horrendous “public education” system, some of us can still reason and think.

To throw a red herring across the trail and confuse the issue for us “great unwashed” the global elite in this country has come up with something they call The Rewilding Project. The Internet site http://www.sweetliberty.org carries a report of this that is quite revelatory. It states in part: “The Rewilding Project is brought to us from the United Nations. A relevant tentacle of Agenda 21, the Rewilding Project is designed to restore a major portion of the planet to its ‘original’ state before man came along and messed it all up; however, it could not be happening if it were not being implemented by state and local legislation. State legislation creates the agencies that mirror federal agencies which were created to implement the schemes emanating from the UN; those Federal agencies would include Forestry and Fish and Wildlife.” It seems, according to this report that they have already implemented this in the state of Pennsylvania. It has been reported that, due to this program, cougars have been sighed in Pennsylvania, but, of course, those people claim that such is impossible.

The report observed: “while researching the Rewilding Project, the Pennsylvania Wildlands Recovery Project (PWRP) came up in an article…At the PWRP website it was explained that the ultimate goal is to establish multi-state/multi-national Wildland Corridors beginning with the State Parks except they’ll no longer be called ‘State Parks’; they’ll be called State Wildlands. Each State Park will connect by wooded corridors to other state and national parks. The wildlands will prohibit any human habitat and their corridors will severely restrict human habitation. Any private property in the way will be ‘taken’ by eminent domain, although the term used is ‘willing sellers.’ That’s another subject. Suffice it to say that when they want your property you WILL sell and at a price they set. Otherwise they’ll remove you forcefully…In the case of Wildlands and their Corridors, it will be dedicated exclusively to plants, insects, bees, birds, fish, reptiles, amphibians and animals. Carnivores figure heavily in their plan.” This is nothing more than Agenda 21 with a little different twist.

And where do all the folks that have lost their property go to live? Why the UN has a wonderful habitat for them planned in a big city near them, a residence on the 15th floor of a new high-rise apartment building with two other families in the same apartment—just like they do it in the Soviet Union. And you won’t need your car because you won’t be able to go anyplace. You’ll be literally surrounded by “Wildlife Corridors.”

Anybody who even shows up at your local town council meeting proposing this type of “economic sustainability” needs to be confronted publicly and given the bum’s rush—whether he or she is from your state government, the federal government or the UN. This hogwash needs to be exposed and folks at the local level need to realize it is nothing more than a plan to deprive them of what is theirs. It is legalized theft with a nice-sounding name and that’s all it is—that and a power grab by the United Nations.

Is Big Brother Watching?

by Al Benson Jr.

I’ve noticed for a little over a week now that viewership for the blog spot has seemed to fall off, as has the volume of email I have been getting. People I used to hear from quite often suddenly seem to be silent. No more emails from them. It’s like about 30 of them at once have all decided to go on extended summer vacations without bothering to let me know they would be gone.

People who used to comment on the articles herein have suddenly gone silent and you don’t hear from them anymore. I had thought it was a bit odd, but didn’t think anything more than that about it until this morning when I got an email from a lady who has followed my writing for some time now.. Like me, she has an AOL email address.

She wrote: “I am beginning to get paranoid about AOL censoring what I read and send on this computer. I am not exaggerating when I tell you that almost every Christian and Conservative link that I attempt to make, AOL either freezes my computer where the cursor will not move or AOL closes out. The following (ed. my latest article on the Council on Foreign Relations) comes to you only after the fifth time this has happened this morning! The 5th time AOL completely shut down my computer and I had to reboot it! To me, this indicates that what we are learning about censorship in the United States is true. I believe certain “words” click a monitoring process for entities such as AOL carriers for them to do what they can to prevent truthful information about world politics as that relates to our country, being easily sent on the Internet. I may be wrong. I hope I am.”

I don’t profess to know if this good Christian lady is wrong or not, but, in light of reduced viewership in the past week, it did give me something to think about. I am by far not the world’s greatest writer, but the information contained in my three recent articles on the Council on Foreign Relations can’t be so bad that they have turned off two thirds of my viewers within a week, can they? So, with what I have noticed and what she has noticed I am wondering if she might not be onto something here–and maybe not just with AOL but with other carriers  that I am not aware of at this point.

I talked briefly with another gentleman just this afternoon and he commented that his computer seems to have a case of the “slows” with most material from Verizon, yet others will carry the same material much faster.

I don’t know for sure if there is anything to this or not. Two situations might be a coincidence, but are three? I would imagine if the Establishment were going to censor the Internet they would just not shut everything down all at once. That would create much too big a shock–at least at this point. And also, there is a lot of stuff out there they couldn’t care less about because it doesn’t expose what they do. But the Christian and Conservative web sites and blog spots are another matter. Some of them might be potentially troublesome, so might not some sort of a system be set up that will track some of these to determine how much of a problem they might be, and if it turns out some of them are a rather large concern to the Establishment, might not some method be put into practice that begins to “restrict” their outreach?

I realize it all sounds a bit far out, but, with my suspicious mind, I do begin to wonder, especially when two different people in the same day inform me of such situations they have both had.

If Big Brother is really watching, I wonder how many folks this short article will make it out to, or will there be something in it, some word or catch phrase that will siphon it off into the Internet “memory hole” so that 2/3 of those I send it to will never receive it.

After all, if you can’t trust your government, why, then, who can you trust? Right? Right? Please don’t all answer at once now, but if a few of you want to answer at least I will know this got out to somebody..

Our Invisible Government—Part Three

By Al Benson Jr.

Dan Smoot’s excellent book The Invisible Government has given much information about the Council on Foreign Relations and I would encourage everyone to check it out on either Amazon.com or http://www.gutenberg.org and start to become educated as to what this almost unheard of organization does to influence the direction this country has gone in.

Another book that contains much information about the Council on Foreign Relations is The Biographical Dictionary of the Left–Volume One which was printed back in 1969. The author was Francis X. Gannon This book contains much information about many leftist individuals and groups, but the CFR is covered on pages 53-62. I don’t know if this book has ever been updated or reprinted or not, but if not it should be.

Mr. Gannon has made several comments that will give the discerning some food for thought. He noted, on page 58, that: “Franklin Roosevelt’s precipitate plunge into globalism was completely agreeable to CFR leaders. They were solidly behind U.S. involvement in World War 2 long before Pearl Harbor. They favored Roosevelt’s fawning overtures to the Soviet Union and its barbaric leader Stalin. They were overwhelmingly in evidence at the creation of the United Nations.”

In regard to elected officials Mr. Gannon observed that: “The CFR’s membership has produced Presidents Hoover, Eisenhower, Kennedy, and Nixon and presidential candidates Thomas Dewey, Henry A. Wallace, Wendell Wilkie, and Hubert Humphrey. In the Senate the voice of the CFR has been heard through Jacob Javits, Stuart Symington, Clifford Case and Gale McGee, among others. In the press media, the CFR viewpoint has been promoted by A. H. Sulzberger, Henry Luce, Gardner Cowles, Norman Cousins,…David Lawrence,…Whitelaw Reid, Eugene Meyer,…Philip Graham,…George Gallup, William L. Shirer,…Joseph Kraft, Walter Lippman, and Marquis Childs.” Bear in mind that this was written in 1969, so there are lots more of these media moles out there now quietly undermining state and national sovereignty and seeking to condition Americans to become part of the New World Order via the United Nations. Even at that, many of these names should be familiar to older folks who grew up in my generation.

Gannon has accurately described the CFR’s position on Communism as “jelly-soft.” Maybe he was being charitable here. And, at well publicized meetings over the years the CFR has had, as honored guests such leftist luminaries at Fidel Castro, Ghanas, Communist Prime Minister Kwame Nkrumah, and a whole klatch of other Communist and socialist officials from all over the world.

And Gannon concluded with “No matter the CFR project (the sellout of Southeast Asia; the socialization of Latin America; the support of civil rights revolutionists; rapprochement with Communist regimes) it is financed and extolled through the vast network of interlocking influences exerted by CFR members in tax-exempt foundations…in television and radio networks, in metropolitan newspapers, in mass magazines and scholarly journals, in major universities and publishing houses, in church organizations…This massive aggregate of control virtually precludes any effective opposition to CFR policies since no counter-inner circle exists even as a loyal opposition to the Ruling Establishment.”

Have you ever wondered why you get no media coverage of Ron Paul unless it is something negative? Have you ever wondered why, when Ron Paul finishes second in a primary the media dances all around, talking about how the people in first, third, and fourth places did so well? Wonder no more. Were it not for the Internet the CFR crowd and its paid prostitutes in the media would totally control the news and you would not even know Ron Paul existed, let alone be running for President.

Folks, you all had better start waking up to what is going on and who is controlling it, or one of these days you will wake up and find out that the One Worlders have completely taken over and it’s all over—at which point many of you will howl “why didn’t somebody tell us?” Some of us tried, but you didn’t want to hear it, so if the day ever comes that the Lord allows the socialists and Communists to take over the country (and that’s not a far-fetched possibility) as a judgment because we were not willing to stand up for what was right, don’t complain.

There are several books out there that you can find that deal with some of this. There is The Rockefeller File by Gary Allen, which although I believe it is out of print, I think it has been posted on the Internet. I believe None Dare Call it Conspiracy also by Gary Allen has been posted on the Internet. These will give you much background information about the people involved with the CFR.

Our Invisible Government—Part Two

By Al Benson Jr.

In the last article I noted how little most people have ever heard about the Council on Foreign Relations. It is truly one of our “news” media’s best kept secrets. In fact, I don’t know why we still insist in calling them the “news” media at this late date. Real news is the absolute last thing those people are about.

For an organization that has been around for as long as it has, the CFR is almost totally unknown. If you stopped 1000 people on the street and asked them about the CFR probably 997 of them would never have heard of it and the three that had would not have all that much information about it. But, then, that’s according to plan.

After World War 1 Woodrow Wilson and his alter-ego in the White House, Colonel Edward Mandell House (he was to Wilson what Kissinger was to Nixon) had come up with a plan to supposedly head off future wars. Dan Smoot has noted that: “In September, 1916, Wilson (at the urging of House) appointed a committee of intellectuals (the first President’s Brain Trust) to formulate peace terms and draw up a charter for world government. This committee, with House in charge, consisted of about 150 college professors, graduate students, lawyers, economists, writers, and others. Among them were men still familiar to Americans in the 1960s: Walter Lippmann (columnist); Norman Thomas (head of the American socialist party); Allen Dulles (former head of CIA); John Foster Dulles (late Secretary of State); Christian A. Herter (former Secretary of State)…These eager young intellectuals around Wilson, under the clear eyes of crafty Colonel House, drew up their charter for world government (League of Nations Covenant) and prepared for the brave new socialist one-world to follow after World War 1.” However, things did not quite work out the way they wanted at that time. When strictly constructed constitutionalists in the US Senate found out what was afoot they made it quite plain that the Senate would not authorize United States membership in this one-world scheme.

But these folks, when they have what they consider a messianic agenda, do not quit. They retrench and come back—again and again if necessary. The Americans came back from the Paris Peace Talks and formed the Council on Foreign Relations in 1921. So you see this outfit has been around for over 90 years and I will bet that, in all that time, not more than a dozen authoritative articles have appeared anywhere in our “news” media. Our “investigative media” have had much more important things to deal with—everything from flappers to reality shows, and the public remains mostly ignorant. If you are surprised you shouldn’t be.

The CFR hardly amounted to a hill of beans until 1927. That’s when the Rockefeller family, through their various foundations, began pouring money into it. Not to be outdone, the Carnegie and Ford foundations followed suit. Dan Smoot noted: “In 1939 the Council began taking over the U.S. State Department.” This is the same State Department that gave us Communist spy Alger Hiss.

Smoot observed that: “The crowing moment of achievement for the Council came at San Francisco in 1945, where over 40 members of the United States delegation to the organizational meeting of the United Nations (where the United Nations Charter was written) were members of the Council…By 1945 the Council on Foreign Relations, and various foundations and other organizations interlocked with it, had virtually taken over the U.S. State Department. Some CFR members were later identified as Soviet espionage agents: for example Alger Hiss and Lauchlin Currie. Other Council on Foreign Relations members—Owen Lattimore, for example—with powerful influence in the Roosevelt and Truman administrations, were subsequently identified, not as actual communists or Soviet espionage agents, but as ‘conscious, articulate instruments of the Soviet international conspiracy.’” In other words, they were not “useful idiots.” They knew what they are doing.

Dan Smoot made an accurate observation when he noted “The fact, however, that communists, Soviet espionage agents, and pro-communists could work inconspicuously for many years as influential members of the Council indicates something very significant about the Council’s objectives. The ultimate aim of the Council on Foreign Relations (however well-intentioned its prominent and powerful members may be) is the same as the ultimate aim of international communism: to create a one-world socialist system and make the United States an official part of it.” That about sums it up, and the current objectives of the CFR are no different. How many former presidents have been CFR members? Eisenhower was one, and if Nixon wasn’t then his alter-ego Kissinger was.

Lots of this information is out there on the Internet. Go and check some of it out. This sort of thing will have a lasting effect on you and your children and grandchildren. You need to be aware of who these people are and what they are all about.

Our Invisible Government

By Al Benson Jr.

Back in 1962 an ex-FBI agent, Dan Smoot, wrote a book called The Invisible Government. It seems he could not find anyone willing to publish it and so he did it himself. It went through six printings. I have no idea how many he sold or what impact it made.

However it must have made some sort of impact, thankfully, because you can find used copies listed on Amazon.com and the book has been reprinted on
http://www.gutenberg.org and so is out there for anyone who is willing to take a serious look at what Mr. Smoot said. I would recommend that folks take a serious look.

What Mr. Smoot was dealing with was trying to expose those people that were and are, in effect, our invisible rulers. Many of these are people we have never heard of, though some are well-known. They are the “invisible government” behind those people we think we elected to public office.

This past weekend there was, in Virginia, a meeting of the Bilderberger Group, a group of intellectual elitists from all over the world who are dedicated to One World Government. It was rumored, and may well be true, that they met in secret session in Northern Virginia to decide who our next president will be. These are the sort of activities these people engage in. Should an international group such as this have any say over who becomes the next president of this country? They shouldn’t, but they do because they can and what passes for the “news” media in this country runs interference for them by just not reporting anything about them they are not forced to.

It’s the same thing with the group Mr. Smoot wrote his book about, the Council on Foreign Relations. How many of you have ever heard of this group? Ever read much about them in your evening paper or see much about them on your evening newscast? If you ever do it will be only a passing reference and you will never find out anything about them and the chokehold they have over government in this country.

Back in 1962 Mr. Smoot wrote of the Council on Foreign Relations (CFR) that: “…I am convinced that the Council on Foreign Relations , together with a great number of other associated tax-exempt organizations constitutes the invisible government which sets the major policies of the federal government; exercises controlling influence on governmental officials who implement the policies; and, through massive and skillful propaganda, influences Congress and the public to support the policies.” Mr. Smoot could be writing about what goes on in Washington today because nothing has changed. Cabinet members belong to the CFR. Congressmen belong to the CFR and so do many in the “news” media and the entertainment industry. Even some Christian denominations have CFR members in leadership positions. What does that tell you about where those churches will eventually be going?

Mr. Smoot continued: “I am convinced that the objective of this invisible government is to convert America into a socialist state and then make it a unit in a one-world socialist system.” I cannot disagree with his assessment.

Smoot also noted: “The ‘Bilderbergers’ are another powerful group involved in the internationalist web…This group consists of influential Western businessmen, diplomats and high governmental officials. Their meetings, conducted in secrecy and in a huggermugger atmosphere, are held about every six months at various places throughout the world.” These are the people who believe their money and power give them the right to decide how the rest of us have to live.

More later.