Are Free Speech and the First Amendment Under Attack? (Is the grass green?)

by Al Benson Jr.

Member, Board of Directors, Confederate Society of America

Free speech has always been under attack throughout history, and mostly the attackers have been those in power who wanted to make sure they stayed in power. Regardless of what those who promote censorship and speech restrictions say, this is not about the “public good.” It is usually about hiding the truth, and the censors are usually those who claim that the public, for their “own good” just doesn’t need to know about this scandal or that. What this really means is that the censors already have done, or are in the process of doing something shady (of financial benefit to themselves) and they don’t want you to be aware of that. Does the Uranium One scandal come to mind here? So the doers of these evil deeds either try to sugarcoat them or just outright lie about them, or, if confronted, their friends in the “Fake News” media try to hide it “on page 46 under the obituaries” where almost no one will ever see it.

An article on http://www.foxnews.com for January 25, 2018 observed: “Free speech is under attack on college campuses across the country. The problem is not limited to a few colleges banning radical speakers to avoid a riot. Universities large and small, public and private,  are restricting students’ and professors’ speech or enabling others to silence speech with which they disagree. These restrictions take a variety of forms. For example,  free speech codes at many colleges ban speech that is ‘offensive,’ a subjective standard that allows college administrators to arbitrarily ban speech they find disagreeable.” In other words, under the guise of “free speech” they really get to say who says what and who doesn’t get to say anything! Although this is current, it is hardly a new problem. I have seen colleges in the East, years ago, that had no problem whatever with having an identified Communist speak to their students but wouldn’t, for all the gold in Fort Knox, dream of having someone from the John Birch Society come and speak to those same students. A Communist speaker was just fine and as one college official stated, his school “wanted to expose students to all kinds of thought.” However, that standard would never have included a speaker from the JBS. They didn’t want to expose the kids to “all kinds of thought” that much!

Back on August 28, 2017 an article appeared on http://www.campaignforliberty.org which said: “The Senate Intelligence Committee recently passed its Intelligence Authorization Act for 2018 that contains a chilling attack on the First Amendment. Section 623 of the act expresses the ‘sense of Congress’ that WikiLeaks resembles a ‘non-state hostile intelligence service often abetted by state actors and should be treated as such. The language is designed to delegitimize  WikiLeaks, encourage the federal government to spy on individuals working with WikiLeaks, and block access to WikiLeaks’ website…WikiLeaks critics claim that the organization’s leaks harm US national security. However, these critics are unable to provide a single specific example of WikiLeaks’ actions harming the American people. WikiLeaks does harm the reputations of government agencies and politicians, however…” That’s really where the rub is! Too many Leftist politicians are getting exposed for the frauds they really are and people are starting to find out that what some of these Leftist and Deep State turkeys have done has harmed out national security and sovereignty, so they’d rather just sweep all that under the rug so we don’t find out about it–all for “our own good” of course. Or is it really for their own good?

Wesley Pruden wrote on https://www.washingtontimes.com on 4/27/17 that: “The only thing anyone is allowed to hear on campus is a slogan. Thinking is so 20th century (and early 20th century at that). The adults paid to be in charge have retreated to a safe place, where never is heard an encouraging word and the skies are cloudy all day…” Howard Dean, the former governor of Vermont and onetime chairman of the Democratic Party has noted that, where free speech is  concerned, that does not always include “extending it to everyone who disagrees with them.” In other words–if you agree with me and my agenda you get to talk (maybe). Otherwise, forget it because we don’t want anyone to hear what you might have to say.

There has been a lot on the Internet of late about how the big media sites, Facebook, Twitter, and others have been changing their algorithms so that conservative sites that use them get less traffic.

I am not a “technical” person, so I am not sure I understand how all this works, but, however it works, what it seems to do is end up taking conservative and patriotic sites and putting their material on pages 10 or 12 rather than on pages 1 or 2 where it had been previously. That does cut down on their viewership because most folks just don’t have the patience to scroll all the way down to page 10 to get what they used to get on page 2. So, leading conservative and nationalist sites like http://www.infowars.com, the Drudge Report, WorldNet Daily and a host of others will start to see their sites consigned to an internet netherworld, buried somewhere in a hundred pages of listings which most folks will not take the trouble to go into. This is designed to cut way down on the influence they have and the audience they are able to reach. It’s not that these big liberal/Left sites actually remove the material–they just bury it!

I noticed, and also had it commented on to me, how that, in 2017 a number of patriotic blogs had experienced a significant loss of viewership in 2017, compared with viewership in the previous 3 or 4 years when it had been expanding. So you have to wonder if such an occurrence might have been an “experiment” to see how this kind of thing would work for the Leftists and Deep State folks.

You folks who follow some of these sites that now seem to be getting posted three day’s journey from anything might have to start taking some of the important material from these sites and reposting it, with credit, on your own sites and for your own email lists so people can continue to read what the Deep State/Left does not want them to see.

Update: The internet censors have been at work on my article since I first posted it last evening (3/15/18).

When you read it you will notice I mentioned several websites you could click onto as sources for what I wrote. I also mentioned InfoWars and gave their link. When I clicked on their link in my article I ended up with someplace selling homes. I did the same this morning and ended up with an Amazon add, as well as a notice telling me I was trying to reach a “suspicious site.”

So I will type the link in here, again, and see what happens. If you try to click onto this and get some oddball substitute please let me know as then I will know that InfoWars is being censored off my blogs (for my own good, of course). Thanks.

https://www.infowars.com

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The Culture War and Secession

by Al Benson Jr.

That this country is divided and engaged in a cultural war is a fact that cannot be disputed. On the one side you have the Leftists, Satanists, most Democrats, RINO’s and the Transgender crowd who all realize this and they know what this war is all about–the destruction of Christian culture and influence. On the other side you have patriotic and conservative folks, many of them Christians, and, unfortunately, many of them  don’t have a clue as to what this war is really all about, or that there even is a war. They seem to think that most of this is, somehow, a political issue and most of them have been taught that politics is “of the world” and so they shouldn’t get involved. That’s rotten theology, but it has been effective theology for the past 150 years, so why should the Leftists and their ilk change horses in midstream when this horse has been doing so well?

That this culture war transcends politics and is really all about whose culture will be dominant is something many good folks, Christians included, have not begun to fathom yet. And so they sit it out while the Left wins almost by default.

The news, when accurately reported, shows the marked divergence between these two cultures and it is a difference that will never be reconciled, nor should it be. That’s like trying to mix oil and water. If you synthesize the two then truth is gone forever.

This point can be proven, again, by accurate reporting of the news rather than by media spin. An article for February 25th on http://www.dailycaller.com by Peter Hasson  showed the Satanic Left on display for all to see. There was a town hall meeting somewhere in Louisiana, and Mr. Hasson observes: “Liberal protesters became enraged when a Louisiana town hall with Republican Sen. Bill Cassidy opened with prayer earlier this week, screaming at the chaplain as he tried to lead the crowd in prayer. The protesters, who were there with a local chapter of anti-Trump group Indivisible, can be heard groaning and shouting as the chaplain says ‘In God we trust.’  One man can be heard saying  ‘Pray on your own time!’  Video of the event, first reported by the Washington Free Beacon,  reveals one woman shouting the name ‘Lucifer’ while the chaplain invokes God’s name…They became especially furious  when the chaplain closed the prayer ‘in Jesus’ name’.” This is something he should have done. No matter who liked it or not!

This incident, among countless others, displays where the culture of the Left has always been–and always will be. You cannot compromise with such folks, you must expose and resist them. They are a big part of the cultural Marxist crowd that seeks to tear down and destroy the Christian culture of the South. You might say they are  a major part of the “ongoing reconstruction” of the South, and eventually of the rest of the country.

As I said, this is far from the only example of this. This morning I read an article by Jon Bowne  on http://www.infowars.com which noted: “Self-described exorcists, witches and occultists announced their plans to carry out a ritual designed to ‘bind Donald Trump and all who abet him’.”  That means you, folks, and me, and all of us who support what Trump is trying to do to “drain the (political and cultural) swamp.”  At a recent meeting in Florida, Mrs. Trump started off the event by reciting the Lord’s Prayer. I’ll bet that gave the Lefties the heebie-jeebies! Those people hate us, but what is more pertinent, they hate Jesus Christ and any and all things even remotely Christian. The fact that they will one day have to bend the knee to Him is not something they want to hear about.

Then there is the secession issue, which is related to all of this, though most folks never seem to manage to connect the dots.Back in 1860 one of the main reasons many Southern folks wanted to secede from the North was due to that region’s galloping apostasy. Nowadays we all hear about California wanting to secede from the Union because Trump won the election.  I find it amusing that many of the same people that howl about the South’s secession, labeling it treasonous, seem to have no problem with the idea of secession for California.  I don’t see any great outcry from the Satanic Left about Californian secession being treasonous. They are strangely mute on this issue. Now if South Carolina or Texas were to try it no doubt that would be a different story, but as long as it’s Leftist California –just keep quiet and don’t say anything.

At the risk of sounding uncharitable, I would say–if California wants to “depart in peace” then let her go. That would place Hollyweird in a whole different country–a novel experience, but maybe not an altogether bad one. And it would give all those movie primadonnas who don’t want to live in this country while Trump is president another country to live in, and they  wouldn’t even have to move!

I have never forgotten how some folks in Illinois laughed (behind my back) when I talked about secession 15-18 years ago. They thought the idea was simply ludicrous. A few of them probably are not laughing anymore. And I’ll tell you something–with the culture war proceeding the way it is, keeping this present “Union” cobbled together is not a foregone conclusion.

America’s Humanist Seminaries–Public Schools

by Al Benson Jr.

Recently I read an article on http://www.lewrockwell.com  which had originally been published on http://www.garynorth.com on  November 23, 2016. It had to do with public schools–always an area of concern for me. Ever since the days of the textbook protest in Kanawha County, West Virginia in the mid-1970s, I have had a major concern about public schools and what they do to the children of America.

Mr. North’s article started off this way: “Challenge: Which institution would I defund 100%?  I would eliminate all funding for education, including all of the military academies.”

I usually read Gary North’s articles when I can find them because he always gives  you insights you probably would not come up with on your own–things most of us ought to be thinking about that hardly ever seem to occur to us. And Mr. North’s take on public education is pretty much the same as mine. When we educated our two children, lo these manly years ago now, public education was never an option, much to the chagrin of most of the folks in the church we attended at the time. I guess those folks can be forgiven for their mindset–they had never spent any time in West Virginia during a textbook protest, never heard school board members lie to them, never seen “law enforcement” officers beat up textbook protesters or any of the rest of what went on there in the Establishment’s attempt to get those kids back into public schools–no matter what. Don’t get me wrong, they were good folks, but having spent no time on the “battle front” so to speak, they were extremely public school oriented–and therein lies the Christians dilemma in our day. Most Christians send their kids to be “educated” (if such it can be called) for five days a week every week except during the summer, in public schools and they can’t seem to figure out why an hour of Sunday School on the Lord’s Day doesn’t counteract whatever evil influences the kids pick up during the week, at school and other places. Maybe part of the problem is that most of the parents were also “educated” in public schools and were “educated” so as not to notice what really goes on in these “institutions of learning.”

Gary North has labeled public schools “a substitute church.” He has observed: “I am convinced that the American public school system is a humanistic attempt to  substitute the state for the church. This has certainly been the case in American history.” He noted the Puritans’ attempt in the 1600s to create the “city on a hill” that could serve as a pattern for the rest of the world and then he said of the Yankees in New England that: “The Yankees wanted to achieve a decent society by not only controlling the impulses of sin, but also by promoting righteous causes by means of state funding. The public school system was the first great Yankee experiment in this regard.” Unfortunately it was not the last. And Mr. North has taken note of what the Yankees did in the South after the War of Northern Aggression. He said: “By hook or by crook–and in the case of the Civil War, by means of military conquest–the Yankees exported the public school system, and then, in alliance with New York City publishers, took over the production of textbooks that would be used to reshape the rest of the country along Yankee lines.” (Emphasis mine).

So, to begin with, the public schools were never really about education in the true sense of that term. They were ever and always about social engineering and promoting the Yankee worldview (especially in the South, so their former adversaries would be “educated out” of the desire to ever again think for themselves or question illegitimate authority). Like true cultural Marxists, they killed two birds with one stone. They dumbed  down their potential opposition (not only for that generation but for generations to come)  and the Yankee book publishers made a pile of dinero out of the deal as well.

And “those people,” always mindful of their agenda to create “their humanist city on all hills” wanted to make sure children spent as little time with their parents as possible and as much time with the public school “educators” as possible to reduce parental influence and direction.

Back on November 24, 2011, one of the first articles I did for this blog spot was called Kindergarten’s Socialist Origins. For awhile it got quite a bit of readership. I would encourage readers to go back and check it out.

This trend has, if anything, accelerated. Just today, 12/12/16 on the LewRockwell.com Blog, I read an article by Michael S. Rozeff entitled On Eliminating the Family and the Person. Mr. Rozeff stated that a Nobel Prize winner has now said that public preschool programs should start at birth. In other words–from the womb to the public school classroom! Seems these public school “change agents” really have wonderful plans for our children that do not include any parental involvement whatever, except in the breeding process–parents producing “children for the state.” Mr. Rozeff said: “It’s not precisely ‘Brave New World,’ but it shares the social control, conditioning and removal of parents.” Rozeff observed that such a move would engender the formation of a whole new federal education agency, quite possibly something like the “Office of Preschool Education.” Yet another federal bureaucracy–the Yankee types would love it!

Mr. Rozeff quite correctly observed that: “This is another step in the elimination of the family. The family disappears and goes the way of the dodo bird. Utilitarians and progressives rejoice. No child if left behind. Every child is ‘saved’. It takes a village becomes a reality: It takes a society. Hillary Clinton triumphs after all. The shadow of socialism is proffered as the Light.”

In his article, later on, Rozeff asked who owns the child and who has rights over the child. Silly question that. The bureaucrats have already answered that one with their educational Leviathan of public schools, rules, regulations–and propaganda–always the propaganda–it’s the real reason for the school’s existence after all. And all the time you thought it was about “quality education” because that’s what the experts told you, and you believed them. After all, they were the “experts” weren’t they? But experts at exactly what? Stealing your children, that’s what! And how many Christians are willing to go along with this because they are just not willing to take the time and make the effort to find out where public education started and where it is really coming from or where it plans to take us and our kids and grandkids.

The majority of parents pay the biggest part of their property taxes to help finance the public school Leviathan. Why people are willing to have their property taxed to finance the moral destruction of their kids is something that escapes me. I guess I missed that class on Brainwashing 101 when it was held.

BUT–what if there were a law that said that only those who use public schools should have to pay taxes for their upkeep? What if there were laws that prohibited compulsory attendance in schools?  Oh, we’d all go back into the Dark Ages, you say. I really don’t think so. Those who really wanted to educate their kids would find creative ways to do that, Christian and home schooling being among them, and for those that don’t care one way or the other, all the public school does is provide a federally-funded babysitting service–propaganda included!

Gary North has raised a good and valid point. Defund the public school system and you can begin to do away with spending billions on a federal Department of Education we never should have had to begin with and that really does nothing more than to ensure that your kids get dumber and more ignorant one generation at a time.

People have been conned into thinking the public school has been a failure because there was never enough money for a really “quality education” and therefore, we need to spend billions more on public education yearly. The teachers unions love it! Actually, the exact opposite is true. Karl Marx’s public school system (see point 10 in The Communist Manifesto) has actually been a screaming success, because indoctrination has always been the name of the game–not education. If we can just begin to get that through our heads then maybe, with the Lord’s help and guidance, we can begin to turn things around. Real Christian education is a necessity, not just one option among many.

Are Some Churches Literally Going To Hell?

by Al Benson Jr.

A good subtitle for this article might be Who Really Runs the Ethics and Religious Liberty Commission of the Southern Baptist Convention? 

Earlier this week someone sent me an article from http://faithandheritage.com written by someone named Adi on June 20th. I don’t know who Adi is, but he dealt with some things that need to be dealt with. The headline for his article was Russell Moore Endorses Idolatry. Some may recall, from a previous article, that Russell Moore is presently the president of the Ethics and Religious Liberty Commission of the Southern Baptist Convention. Adi writes of him that: “Moore reached a new low this week, however, besides ousting the Confederate Battle Flag from a historically Southern denomination, in defending his active support for the increased institutionalization of idolatry in the United States, when he was asked about his commission’s support for the erection of an Islamic mosque in Bernards Township in New Jersey.”

The planning board of this township, back in December of 2015 “voted down an application from the Islamic Society of Basking Ridge to build a 4,252 square feet mosque on Church Street.” Naturally the Islamic Society filed a lawsuit that accused the planning board of violating their religious liberties.  Adi tells us that “An amicus brief was filed on behalf of the Islamic Society, fighting for the establishment of the mosque on the basis of religious liberty. In addition to Moore’s ERLC, the brief was also signed by the International Society of Krishna Consciousness, the National Association of Evangelicals, and the Unitarian Universalist Legislative Ministry of New Jersey.” What a woeful mix of supposed Christian orthodoxy and outright false religion! You have to wonder why some church groups are making common cause with the Krishnas and the Unitarian Universalists? Isn’t there a verse somewhere in the Scriptures about Christians not being yoked together with unbelievers? Last time I checked it was still there.

The Ethics and Religious Liberty Commission of the SBC, currently chaired by Mr. Moore is an “interesting” group, which I am sure many Southern Baptists probably don’t know a lot about.

According to an article on http://www.thewatchmanwakes.com  the ERLC is classified as a NGO (non-governmental organization) of the United Nations and it has a “special consultative status.” This article noted a Dr. Albert Mohler and says of him that “Dr. Mohler is a Founding Fellow of the Research Institute (think tank) of the Ethics and Religious Liberty Commission (ERLC). The ERLC is the public policy arm of the Southern Baptist Convention…Why is this information noteworthy? Because the ERLC is a non-governmental organization..of the UN…What does it mean that the ERLC partners with the UN as an NGO? What are the criteria for NGO’s to be granted this status? The following are just a few…The NGO must support the principles of the Charter of the UN…The NGO must have a clear mission statement that is consistent with those principles…the NGO must promote knowledge of the principles and activities  of the UN.” Now stop and think about these for a minute. What this means is that your organization, as an NGO must be one that will support the principles of the United Nations.

Should any church organization of any denomination, be that closely involved with the United Nations that it has to have a mission statement that is consistent  with the principles of the United Nations?  Does anyone out there especially in churches, have the remotest concept of what the United Nations stands for? You should, especially if you are a Christian, because if you are, then the United Nations stands against everything you stand for as a believer in Jesus Christ as Lord.

There are a couple books out there that you might still be able to come up with on this subject.  One is called The Fearful Master and is a masterful study of the United Nations written by G. Edward Griffin several years ago now. You might be able to find it on Amazon and if you can and it doesn’t cost an arm and a leg, get it. The other one is Freedom at the Altar–The UN’s Crusade Against God & Family by William Norman Grigg. Check Amazon for that one too. It was first printed in March, 1995 by the John Birch Society. Both of these books will give you an understanding of the United Nations and its real goals and aims that every Christian should have.  And you will then have to ask yourself–why is any organization that is part of my church involved with anything the United Nations does? More Southern Baptists, and others too, need to start asking that question and demanding answers from their leadership. Oh, I realize that in the SBC each church is independent, but, folks, as long as your denomination is represented  by the ERLC you have a major problem and you need to start to deal with it.

Is There A Warning For The Church Here?

by Al Benson Jr.

The realization that lots of folks will not be overly thrilled with what I say here has not escaped me, but I feel it needs to be said anyway.

In looking at the history of Israel in the Old Covenant we can see many problems that most people today would rather not address and some even want to sweep under the rug. There are various reasons for that, one of which is that a true rendering of Israel’s real history just might affect the sales of “End Times” prophecy books because many would now start to begin to realize that there is really no crying need for such material.

A good friend of mine who is a pastor recently preached a sermon, the title of which was, Israel’s Only Hope.  And Israel’s only hope isn’t the “rapture” or the rebuilding of the Temple or the reinstitution of the Old Covenant sacrifices or any of the stuff most of us were taught as kids or young Christians. We have to learn to put this stuff aside. My friend aptly noted that Israel’s only hope before 70 AD was the acceptance of Jesus the Christ as their Messiah–something Israel’s religious leaders steadfastly refused to do for the most part. He observed that, by the time of Jesus’ virgin birth, Israel had a long history of unbelief, hardheartedness, and outright rebellion (which has carried over into the present age). Now, with Jesus’ appearing, Israel was being given one last chance to repent, turn around, and do what God had beforehand ordained for them to do–be a light to the world, to be faithful servants of God, and most of all, to accept Jesus for who He was and is. Israel’s response, through her religious leaders, was to plot His death. In reply to Pilate’s attempt to turn Him loose the Jews cried “Crucify him, His blood be on us, and on our children.”(Matthew 27:25).  I doubt that most of them knew what they we’re asking for.

As recorded in Luke 4, Jesus in Capernaum was confronted by a demonic in the synagogue. We’ve all probably read this story over the years and never thought to question why was this man in the synagogue to begin with? Demon-possessed people were not supposed to be in the synagogue to begin with and yet they were. What does that say for the spiritual condition of the synagogue? And, though Jesus healed many people there, it is interesting to note that only the demon acknowledged who He really was (Luke 4:41).

The sermon referenced here noted: “In chapter 5 Jesus heals a leper–demonstrating not only His power but His willingness to restore those who have become unclean and cut off from God’s presence. Then He heals a paralytic–which shows not only His power to heal and to cleanse but also His authority to forgive sins. Jesus is the fulfillment of all that the Temple signified.” Therefore, in Christ, there is no more need for the Temple–and many in our day need to let this sink in.

The sermon concludes with this thought: “Israel’s unbelief has brought sickness and uncleanness. The only hope for Israel is Jesus who is both willing and able to cleanse and heal and restore them. If they reject Him they will perish.” And that holds as true today as it did before His crucifixion and resurrection. But mostly Israel ain’t having any of that and their spirit of rebellion exists today as it did then. How many radical, leftist groups in our day are peopled with those that have embraced the religion of Judaism, whether they can even trace their ancestors back to Abraham or not! In fact, since His death and resurrection their spirit of rebellion has intensified. Having rejected their Messiah it seems they have no place else to go to but radical revolution and this has become the god for many–a god that will ultimately fail.

Just this past weekend I read an article on http://www.israelnationalnews.com by a David Rosenberg, the title of which was American Jews strongest backers of gay marriage, abortion.  The article stated: “Jews are the most libertine religious group in America according to a new Gallup poll, and are more likely even than people with no religion to find same-sex relations and abortion to be morally acceptable…According to the survey,  American Jews were more likely than any other religious group–including those with no religion–to find abortion and gay relations morally acceptable. With few exceptions, Jews reflected strongly libertine views that deviated from those of Catholics, Protestants, and Mormons. A whopping 76% of American Jews said they felt abortion was ‘morally acceptable,’ compared to just 38% of Catholics, 33% of Protestants, and 18% of Mormons.” Again, with sodomite and lesbian relations, 85% of Jews had no problems,  and that even beat those who claimed no religious affiliations of any kind. They registered 83%. There was more to the survey but I can’t cover it all here. Anyway, you get the idea.

So I have to ask–is there a lesson here for the Church also? All that has been recorded in the Scriptures pertaining to Israel’s  unbelief has been written so we could learn from it and not repeat the same grievous errors that Israel committed. So how is the Church doing today with some of this? When it comes to sodomy, lesbianism, and abortion in our day the Church seems to be sending out a mixed message. Some get it right and others are way off in Left field, and then there are those in the broad middle that don’t seem to want to “offend” anyone and so they seem to take no position, not realizing that in so doing they are silently siding with the perverts and abortionists.

The warnings to Israel in Jesus’ day are something the Church needs to be aware of in our day, lest in trying to be even more merciful than God, we bring judgment upon ourselves.

Why I Can’t Vote For Ted Cruz–part one

by Al Benson Jr.

I expect this column will make lots of sincere folks mad at me and I debated whether or not I should write it and finally felt that I had to. I hope some of the good folks whose first reaction may be anger will step back and think about what I’ve said with some sober reflection.

Over the past months I’ve watched the presidential candidates from both parties scream, shout, posture, and generally do whatever they seem to think it will take to get elected. I’ve watched some of the “conservative” websites on the Internet and have concluded that many of them are little more than political shills for certain candidates. The political process in this country is a charade, geared to fool the gullible public into thinking they really have a say in what their government does and the direction it goes in. It’s what the Bible refers to as a “cunningly devised fable.”

Maybe a year and a half or so ago I did an article for this blog that still gets more views than anything I have done since–one on why “Hillary the unindicted”  will end up being the next president.  Unless someone in the top echelons of the Establishment gets ticked at Hillary for some reason and she ends up getting indicted, I’m not ready to change my mind of that. I’d dearly love to be wrong. The prospect of a Hillary Clinton presidency does not thrill me. But let’s wait and see.

Recently a sincere Christian gentleman stopped to talk with me and was curious about where I stood on the Republican candidates involved in this year’s presidential dog and pony show.  I told him that I had been watching Trump and leaned somewhat toward him for the simple reason that almost everyone of consequence, both left and right, seemed to hate his guts. Trump makes them all mad. He has this disconcerting habit of saying things that need to be said and that strikes a chord with the American people who have begun to realize that the politicians and the government have been shafting them for generations now.  Though some outfits are now in the process of trying to tell us how much the public disapproves of Trump, and you can skew your polls however you want, but that’s not what I’ve seen so far.

At any rate, this man wondered if I had considered Ted Cruz as a votable possibility and he told me someone, I can’t recall now, in his family, had heard Cruz was a committed Christian, that his father was an evangelist. I don’t for a minute doubt his sincerity.

But I’ve watched presidential races since the late 1960s and all the aspirants for the office of president have claimed Christian credentials–mainly because they want the votes of Christians who don’t have the first clue about how the political process in this country works, and who, quite frankly, are not interested in learning. All most of them want is a “feel good” candidate who claims he is a Christian and waves his Bible around so they can feel like they voted for a Christian. Even the current occupant of the White (Red) House claimed at one point that he was a “committed Christian” and I wonder, in view of his performance in office, how many still buy that bit of bovine fertilizer. Way too many, I’m afraid. There is a world of difference in spouting about your Christian faith on the campaign trail and then governing like one if you get elected and I haven’t seen a president in all the years I can remember back to Roosevelt, that remotely tried to act like a Christian once he got in office. Oh, they will use the gullible Christians to get themselves elected so they can then govern exactly like the One World Government pagans that most of them really are. Of course, in this context, most of us also realize that the president doesn’t really “govern” much of anything. What he really does is to work to forward the ungodly agendas of those who wanted him in office for just that reason–to move their agendas forward regardless of the will of the American people.

One Christian pastor that I do follow quite regularly is Chuck Baldwin from Montana. I’ve watched him over the years and he does seem to have a lot more on the ball than most Christian preachers when it comes to the political arena. Most Christian pastors have been brainwashed into ignoring politics like the plague. They know nothing and want to know nothing. And that’s part of the reason we have so many scumbags in government–willful Christian ignorance.

Anyway, Pastor Baldwin had some interesting and revelatory commentary about Ted Cruz in a March 10th column on NewsWithViews.com  Pastor Baldwin observed that: “In current politics, presidential candidate Ted Cruz has taken up where G. W. Bush left off. He is pushing the ‘war for Israel’ button HARD.  And don’t forget that both Ted and his wife, Heidi, are ardent disciples of G. W. Bush–and Heidi was also a long-standing member of the quintessential neocon organization the Council on Foreign Relations (CFR). Ted’s preacher father is an outspoken leader in ‘Greater Israel’ prophecy circles.  He (Ted’s dad) goes to churches all over America preaching the idea that God has called Ted to ‘save Israel’ and usher in the Second Coming of Christ.”

So here we have a presidential candidate whose wife has been a CFR member, among other things, and whose father thinks he should be president so he can “save Israel” and by so doing usher in the Second Coming. I submit that it’s not up to any human being to help speed up the Second Coming.  That event is in the Lord’s hands and He will decide when, not any of us.

To be continued.

Christian Opposition, Checks & Balances, Etc.

by Al Benson Jr.

Having read several insightful articles by Al Cronkrite, a freelance Reformed Christian writer who lives in Florida, I usually pay attention when I see his name on an article because I know I will get something that goes beyond the usual “patriotic” chatter that is so prevalent on the Internet. Mind you, I am not against patriotism, but lots of what floats around out there today is not real patriotism but merely a shallow brand of nationalism–sort of like “My country, right or wrong–rah, rah, rah.” In its own way it’s just as bad as liberalism because it leads sincere Americans down the garden path to Nowheresville when they should be on the cultural path removing the thorns.

Having said that, I recall reading an article by Mr. Cronkrite in The Covenant News back in July of 2009 where he observed that most folks today view our founders as mostly Christian men “…who produced documents that, if they were not expressly Christian, contained Christian principles. Others find it strange that Christian men would fail to encode the name of the Savior or refer to His dominion.” Regarding the Constitution that brings a different dimension to the topic, one that Gary North has referred to more than once in his writings.

Mr. Cronkrite, along with others, also observed that: “The Philadelphia Constitutional Convention in the Summer of 1787, was a secret gathering convened for the purpose of revising the Articles of Confederation. It was an elite group that Jefferson described as ‘demigods’. Alexander Hamilton, James Madison, and probably President George Washington had no intentions of abiding by the instructions from congress to revise the Articles. Their intention was to form a new federal government which they believed the states would accept in order to solve the problems they were having in conducting their inter-state affairs. They were conspiratorial and dishonest in their actions but right in their political assessment…Patrick Henry of Virginia claimed he ‘smelled a rat’ and refused to attend.” Time has shown how foul the rat Henry smelled really was, and is.

It has been duly noted by Mr. Cronkrite that almost nothing has been written about Christian opposition to the final results of the Constitutional Convention. And I have to admit that none of the history I have come across has mentioned any of this, even the home school material. He observed that: “The shift from a reformation to a substitution was successful and in the exuberant pride that characterized the birth of a new nation the still small voice of the Creator was drowned out and a grave error was made. Several prominent clergymen expressed their dissatisfaction. Rev. John Mason of New York wrote, ‘Should the citizens of America be as irreligious as her Constitution, we will have reason to tremble, lest the Governor of the universe, who will not be treated with indignity, by a people anymore than by individuals, overturn from its foundations the fabric we have been rearing, and crush us to atoms in the wreck’.”

Also, “Rev. Samuel Austin said, the Constitution ‘is entirely disconnected from Christianity. It is not founded on the Christian religion.’ Rev. Samuel Taggart lamented the lack of Christian reference to be a national evil of great magnitude.’ ‘It is a great sin to have forgotten God in such an important national instrument and not have acknowledged Him in that which forms the very nerves and sinews of the political body,’ lamented Rev. George Duffield. Rev. Jedediah Morse thought that the secular Constitution meant that America, like ancient Israel was doomed. Rev. James Wilson considered its creation ‘a degree of ingratitude, perhaps without parallel’.”

Now, folks, stop and reflect for a minute. How much about this Christian opposition to the Constitution have you ever read about in “history” books? I’ll wager that about all you ever read what just about what I read–that almost no one was opposed to it but Patrick Henry and a mere handful of his friends, who must all surely have had charter memberships in the Flat Earth Society. Those folks were supposedly anachronisms that just couldn’t see the pressing need for consolidation–Henry and his dwindling number of friends were a bit shortsighted, so it’s a good thing no one listened to them (or Leviathan wouldn’t be where it is today) and that’s about all you get, if that. The anti-Federalist arguments against ratification are seldom, if ever, mentioned–and as anachronistic as I guess I must be, the ones I’ve read about I’ve agreed with.

Mr. Cronkrite informed his readers that one of the big selling points for the new Constitution was that old, mythical “separation of church and state” story–the so-called government “neutrality” in regard to religion. All you have to do is look at where we are today in this regard and ask yourself–how’s that “government neutrality” in regard to religion working out for you nowadays? Anything even remotely Christian is now constantly under attack, while all the other pagan faiths seem to be getting a poss. Folks, this is not by accident. I put that in bold letters because we need to grasp that. Muslims will get to do in many educational institutions what Christians couldn’t even dream about. Any perversion today is accepted, no matter how gross, as long as it flies in the face of Christian culture. It’s all “protected” except Christianity and it’s open season on us and that’s not by accident.

I read an article on LewRockwell.com for October 30th written by Martin Armstrong of Armstrong Economics, in which he noted a raid in Texas by a SWAT team on a community in which there was no probable cause. The inhabitants had done nothing wrong, did not use drugs; no weapons or anything illegal was found, but the SWAT team handcuffed people, destroyed their crops, and pretty much did what they wanted because they could.

In his article Mr. Armstrong observed: “Raiding such a community without probable cause is totally unconstitutional. This is my point about the Constitution–it is just a worthless scrap of paper with the purpose of providing propaganda and false hope. The Constitution protects nobody. It was supposed to be a self-restraint upon government. It fails in every respect. Government agents can do as they like and it is the BURDEN of the citizen to prove that they violated the Constitution.” I might not have said it quite the way he did, but he does have a point.

There are no real restraints upon government, no real checks and balances so that if one branch oversteps its bounds the others will bring it to heel. They all collude with one another to quash whatever rights the citizens have, all the while telling us we live in a “free country”–the freest on earth they tell us–and it’s all just so much bovine fertilizer. This government has gone rogue–it went that way noticeably when the Lincoln administration started, but it had been showing signs of major slippage before that. John C. Calhoun noticed it before he died in 1850.

It really appears to me that we have a government that is one thing when we have been told it was something else. Most of us who have followed the political situation realize that we have been shamelessly lied to by “our” government about just about everything in our lifetime. But what about our ancestors? Were they lied to in the same way about what went on in their day? What about the War of Northern Aggression, the Spanish-American War, World Wars 1 and 2, Pearl Harbor, the USS Liberty, the Kennedy Assassinaton, and a plethora of other things I could spend paragraphs on just listing? Where, in all of this and more, has there been “constitutional” protection for our citizens–from their own government?

We had better start grappling with some of this folks, before the gates to the FEMA camps open wide and we all become “memory hole” material–naturally under the protection of the US Constitution, replete with its “checks and balances.”