Wednesday, July 21, 2010
God is in Charge
"All that we possess is the gift of God. We should acknowledge him in all things. We sometimes talk about men having this right and the other right. We have no rights, only such as God gives us. . . . Our safety and happiness and our wealth depend upon our obedience to God and his laws..." (The Gospel Kingdom, p. 248). - John Taylor -
Tuesday, July 20, 2010
Thursday, July 15, 2010
We See the Hand of the Lord
"We look upon George Washington, the father of our country, as an inspired instrument of the Almighty; we can see the all-inspiring Spirit operating upon him. And upon his co-workers in resisting oppression, and in establishing the thirteen colones as a confederacy; and then again the workings of the same Spirit upon those men who established the Constitution of the United States. . . . We see the hand of the Lord in these things" (The Teachings of Lorenzo Snow, p. 191-192).
"As far as constitutional liberty is concerned, I will say, the God of heaven has raised up our nation, as foretold by his prophets generations ago. . . . It is also well known how our forefathers found a home and an asylum in this land from the hand of persecution, and how they planted here the tree of liberty and jealously guarded it from the attempt of the mother country to uproot and destroy it. The hand of God was in this; and it is through the intervention of his providence that we enjoy today the freest and most independent government the world ever saw. "And what was the object of this? It was to prepare the way for the building up of the kingdom of God in this last dispensation of the fulness of times; and as long as the principles of constitutional liberty shall be maintained upon this land, blessings will attend the nation." (The Discourses of Wilford Woodruff, p. 188-189).
"As far as constitutional liberty is concerned, I will say, the God of heaven has raised up our nation, as foretold by his prophets generations ago. . . . It is also well known how our forefathers found a home and an asylum in this land from the hand of persecution, and how they planted here the tree of liberty and jealously guarded it from the attempt of the mother country to uproot and destroy it. The hand of God was in this; and it is through the intervention of his providence that we enjoy today the freest and most independent government the world ever saw. "And what was the object of this? It was to prepare the way for the building up of the kingdom of God in this last dispensation of the fulness of times; and as long as the principles of constitutional liberty shall be maintained upon this land, blessings will attend the nation." (The Discourses of Wilford Woodruff, p. 188-189).
Monday, July 12, 2010
The Devil is in the Details
Joseph Fielding Smith said:
“Satan has control now. No matter where you look, he is in control, even in our own land. He is guiding the governments as far as the Lord will permit him. That is why there is so much strife, turmoil, confusion all over the earth. One master mind is governing the nations. It is not the President of the United States …it is not the king or government of England or any other land; it is Satan himself." (Joseph Fielding Smith, Doctrines of Salvation, Vol. 3, pp.314-315)
“Satan has control now. No matter where you look, he is in control, even in our own land. He is guiding the governments as far as the Lord will permit him. That is why there is so much strife, turmoil, confusion all over the earth. One master mind is governing the nations. It is not the President of the United States …it is not the king or government of England or any other land; it is Satan himself." (Joseph Fielding Smith, Doctrines of Salvation, Vol. 3, pp.314-315)
Thursday, July 1, 2010
Remembering From Whence We Came
The Loyal Opposition
By Steve Farrell
On the 6th of June 1776, Boston’s Samuel Adams wrote to fellow Son of Liberty, James Warren, President of the Provincial Congress of Massachusetts: “Tomorrow, a motion will be made, and a question I hope decided, the most important that was ever agitated in America.”
Indeed it was. The motion introduced in the Second Continental Congress by Richard Henry Lee of Virginia read:
Resolved, That these United Colonies are, and of a right, ought to be, free and independent States, that they are absolved, from all allegiance to the British Crown, and that all political connection between them and the State of Great Britain is, and ought to be, totally dissolved; that it is expedient forthwith to take the most effectual measures for forming foreign alliances; and that a plan of confederation be prepared, and transmitted to the respective colonies for their consideration and approbation.
The very introduction of this resolution, so far as the King, the British Parliament, and to tens of thousands of loyalists this side of the Atlantic was concerned was an open act of sedition, the sure fire equivalent of a death sentence to its authors, supporters, and enforcers.
Remembering that three years prior, those who had merely joined hands with the Boston Committee of Correspondence were branded as “atheists,” and “black-hearted fellows whom one would not choose to meet in the dark,” as well as “deluded … atrocious criminals,” and “malignant spirits.” “Traitor” and “death to these devilish traitors” logically came next and did.
But again, what of this charge, “traitor”? A decade earlier, in February of 1766, Richard Henry Lee authored another document, the Westmoreland Resolution, probably the first public and open resistance to the Mother Country. It bound citizens to support “our lawful sovereign, George the Third … so far as is consistent with the preservation of our rights and liberty.” (my emphasis)
Or to put it another way, sedition in a constitutional republic is defined as disloyalty to the Charter or Constitution and the Higher Laws upon which it rests, not disloyalty to any man, group of men, or current administration. If then the King, President, or other government official is fundamentally and/or dangerously at odds with those Higher Laws, criticism and the use of every legal channel of resistance is not treasonous but virtuous. “Rebellion to tyrants,” penned Jefferson, Franklin, and before them John Bradshaw, “is obedience to God.”
This was just as much the case in the last resort of violence, or when every legal channel had been exhausted and a long train of abuses became intolerable.
It is upon this proper understanding of things as they once were in America, and still ought to be, that Thomas Paine wrote in 1776:
But where says some is the King of America? I’ll tell you Friend, he reigns above, and doth not make havoc of mankind like the Royal Brute of Britain. Yet that we may not appear to be defective even in earthly honors, let a day be solemnly set apart for proclaiming the charter; let it be brought forth placed on the divine law, the word of God; let a crown be placed thereon, by which the world may know, that so far as we approve as monarchy, that in America THE LAW IS KING.
For as in absolute governments the King is law, so in free countries the law ought to be King; and there ought to be no other.
There is a definite order of things here, the Foundation is God’s law, the structure built upon it, the Constitution (in 1776 the Charter), everything else, executive, legislative, and judicial officers, and the laws they make, enforce, and judge, are to be subservient thereto, and if not, the loyalty of the people flies to the law, not to the usurper or king man or socialist.
As if to put an explanation mark on this point, Paine added:
But lest any ill use should afterwards arise, let the crown at the conclusion of the ceremony be demolished, and scattered among the people whose right it is. A government of our own is our natural right.
Centralized power, and especially a distant centralized power, was too big a temptation for men in power to make themselves kings and tyrants, even Gods, and thus too big a threat to the whole inspired idea of republican government — and so there ought not ever be a monarch or anything like unto it. But Paine is also noting that whereas the Divine and constitutional Law is King, one of those divine laws is that man can only be ruled by consent.
Why? God made man in his image, endowed him with agency, including various inalienable rights, and in that he forces no man to Heaven, certainly no government has the right to force him into a so-called heaven on earth, even a socialist Utopia.
Which brings us to the current crisis in America.
It is the loyal opposition that resists this betrayal of all that our forefathers bequeathed to us — especially when one recognizes that today brand of tyranny (a socialism that has advanced for a century, usually by stealth and patient gradualism, but of late, more openly and aggressively) is far worse than anything our forefathers faced.
Yet we have more tools to fight back than they had against England: representative government, frequent elections, vertical and horizontal separation of powers to include the principle of federalism, checks and balances, impeachment, the rule of law, a bill of rights to include freedom of speech, press, religion, assembly, petition, and so forth.
The truly patriotic and wise will use these, use them first, use them effectively, use them consistently and persistently, and protect their continued availability with all the vigor of heart and soul and mind they merit.
This then is the loyal opposition … to the usurpers in DC. To use every constitutional tool in the arsenal to throw the bums out — to restore the limited government and free enterprise system of our forefathers, and to be virtuous and vigilant thereafter. That is enough. But let us do no less.
Steve Farrell is one of the original pundits at Silver Eddy Award Winner, NewsMax.com (1999–2008), associate professor of political economy at George Wythe University, the author of the highly praised inspirational novel “Dark Rose,” and editor in chief of The Moral Liberal
By Steve Farrell
On the 6th of June 1776, Boston’s Samuel Adams wrote to fellow Son of Liberty, James Warren, President of the Provincial Congress of Massachusetts: “Tomorrow, a motion will be made, and a question I hope decided, the most important that was ever agitated in America.”
Indeed it was. The motion introduced in the Second Continental Congress by Richard Henry Lee of Virginia read:
Resolved, That these United Colonies are, and of a right, ought to be, free and independent States, that they are absolved, from all allegiance to the British Crown, and that all political connection between them and the State of Great Britain is, and ought to be, totally dissolved; that it is expedient forthwith to take the most effectual measures for forming foreign alliances; and that a plan of confederation be prepared, and transmitted to the respective colonies for their consideration and approbation.
The very introduction of this resolution, so far as the King, the British Parliament, and to tens of thousands of loyalists this side of the Atlantic was concerned was an open act of sedition, the sure fire equivalent of a death sentence to its authors, supporters, and enforcers.
Remembering that three years prior, those who had merely joined hands with the Boston Committee of Correspondence were branded as “atheists,” and “black-hearted fellows whom one would not choose to meet in the dark,” as well as “deluded … atrocious criminals,” and “malignant spirits.” “Traitor” and “death to these devilish traitors” logically came next and did.
But again, what of this charge, “traitor”? A decade earlier, in February of 1766, Richard Henry Lee authored another document, the Westmoreland Resolution, probably the first public and open resistance to the Mother Country. It bound citizens to support “our lawful sovereign, George the Third … so far as is consistent with the preservation of our rights and liberty.” (my emphasis)
Or to put it another way, sedition in a constitutional republic is defined as disloyalty to the Charter or Constitution and the Higher Laws upon which it rests, not disloyalty to any man, group of men, or current administration. If then the King, President, or other government official is fundamentally and/or dangerously at odds with those Higher Laws, criticism and the use of every legal channel of resistance is not treasonous but virtuous. “Rebellion to tyrants,” penned Jefferson, Franklin, and before them John Bradshaw, “is obedience to God.”
This was just as much the case in the last resort of violence, or when every legal channel had been exhausted and a long train of abuses became intolerable.
It is upon this proper understanding of things as they once were in America, and still ought to be, that Thomas Paine wrote in 1776:
But where says some is the King of America? I’ll tell you Friend, he reigns above, and doth not make havoc of mankind like the Royal Brute of Britain. Yet that we may not appear to be defective even in earthly honors, let a day be solemnly set apart for proclaiming the charter; let it be brought forth placed on the divine law, the word of God; let a crown be placed thereon, by which the world may know, that so far as we approve as monarchy, that in America THE LAW IS KING.
For as in absolute governments the King is law, so in free countries the law ought to be King; and there ought to be no other.
There is a definite order of things here, the Foundation is God’s law, the structure built upon it, the Constitution (in 1776 the Charter), everything else, executive, legislative, and judicial officers, and the laws they make, enforce, and judge, are to be subservient thereto, and if not, the loyalty of the people flies to the law, not to the usurper or king man or socialist.
As if to put an explanation mark on this point, Paine added:
But lest any ill use should afterwards arise, let the crown at the conclusion of the ceremony be demolished, and scattered among the people whose right it is. A government of our own is our natural right.
Centralized power, and especially a distant centralized power, was too big a temptation for men in power to make themselves kings and tyrants, even Gods, and thus too big a threat to the whole inspired idea of republican government — and so there ought not ever be a monarch or anything like unto it. But Paine is also noting that whereas the Divine and constitutional Law is King, one of those divine laws is that man can only be ruled by consent.
Why? God made man in his image, endowed him with agency, including various inalienable rights, and in that he forces no man to Heaven, certainly no government has the right to force him into a so-called heaven on earth, even a socialist Utopia.
Which brings us to the current crisis in America.
It is the loyal opposition that resists this betrayal of all that our forefathers bequeathed to us — especially when one recognizes that today brand of tyranny (a socialism that has advanced for a century, usually by stealth and patient gradualism, but of late, more openly and aggressively) is far worse than anything our forefathers faced.
Yet we have more tools to fight back than they had against England: representative government, frequent elections, vertical and horizontal separation of powers to include the principle of federalism, checks and balances, impeachment, the rule of law, a bill of rights to include freedom of speech, press, religion, assembly, petition, and so forth.
The truly patriotic and wise will use these, use them first, use them effectively, use them consistently and persistently, and protect their continued availability with all the vigor of heart and soul and mind they merit.
This then is the loyal opposition … to the usurpers in DC. To use every constitutional tool in the arsenal to throw the bums out — to restore the limited government and free enterprise system of our forefathers, and to be virtuous and vigilant thereafter. That is enough. But let us do no less.
Steve Farrell is one of the original pundits at Silver Eddy Award Winner, NewsMax.com (1999–2008), associate professor of political economy at George Wythe University, the author of the highly praised inspirational novel “Dark Rose,” and editor in chief of The Moral Liberal
Wednesday, June 30, 2010
Tuesday, June 29, 2010
Really?
The following was taken from
Chuck Muth's
Nevada
News & Views
June 29, 2010
3:52 p.m.
From the Department of You’ve Gotta Be Freaking Kidding Me:
The Las Vegas Review-Journal reports this afternoon that in the middle of this Great Recession – with bankruptcies and foreclosures through the roof; with unemployment higher in Nevada than anywhere else in the free world; with an Energizer Bunny state budget deficit that seems to just keep growing and growing and growing; with public schools sucking and health care costs skyrocketing – some of our lame-brained legislators, led by our Nanny-Stater-in-Chief, Sen. Mike Schneider (Democrat - Uranus), “agreed Tuesday to draw up a bill to require auto repair shops, smog stations and oil change businesses to check the air pressure in their customers' tires.”
That’s right. As Rome burns, the Subcommittee on the Production and Use of Energy is contemplating a stupid bill mandating that Nevada businesses check your stinking tire pressure!
And some people still think we ought to let these idiots meet EVERY YEAR?
3:52 p.m.
From the Department of You’ve Gotta Be Freaking Kidding Me:
The Las Vegas Review-Journal reports this afternoon that in the middle of this Great Recession – with bankruptcies and foreclosures through the roof; with unemployment higher in Nevada than anywhere else in the free world; with an Energizer Bunny state budget deficit that seems to just keep growing and growing and growing; with public schools sucking and health care costs skyrocketing – some of our lame-brained legislators, led by our Nanny-Stater-in-Chief, Sen. Mike Schneider (Democrat - Uranus), “agreed Tuesday to draw up a bill to require auto repair shops, smog stations and oil change businesses to check the air pressure in their customers' tires.”
That’s right. As Rome burns, the Subcommittee on the Production and Use of Energy is contemplating a stupid bill mandating that Nevada businesses check your stinking tire pressure!
And some people still think we ought to let these idiots meet EVERY YEAR?
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)