Statist Theologians

When arguing against pro-life Christians, so-called "Liberals" warn against the outrage of Theocracy. They confess that only Christians care about human lives other than their own.

When arguing against displaying the Ten Commandments in public places and when arguing against the objections of conscientious parents to the sexualization of their children through so-called "Sex Education" classes, so-called "Liberals" become self-righteous advocates for their "separation of Church and State". They confess the moral values they oppose are only found in Christianity.

However, so-called "Liberals" attempt to use the Bible in order to persuade Christians to support the Statist lure of so-called "welfare programs", thereby confessing their acceptance of Theocracy.

Love vs. Legalism

In Crazy Love, Francis Chan writes:

Most Christians have been taught in church or by their parents to set aside a daily time for prayer and Scripture reading. It’s what we are supposed to do, and so for a long time it’s what I valiantly attempted. When I didn’t, I felt guilty.

Over time I gradually realized that when we love God, we naturally run to Him—frequently and zealously. Jesus didn’t command that we have a regular quiet time with Him each day. Rather, He tells us to “love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.” He called this the “first and greatest commandment” (Matt. 22:37-38). The results are intimate prayer and study of His Word. Our motivation changes from guilt to love.

This is how God longs for us to respond to His extravagant, unending love: not with a cursory “quiet time” plagued by guilt, but with true love expressed through our lives.

What Francis Chan says about a "quiet time" can also be said just as accurately about tithing, church attendance, evangelism, or any number of other activities against which we have learned to judge one another and ourselves.

Lean Forward

Obama's new campaign slogan is "Lean Forward". There can be no doubt about what it really means.



Edit: I now understand Lean Forward is actually the new slogan for MSNBC, and not Obama's campaign.
But really... What's the difference?

CA Schools Promote Gender Confusion

Calif. School Tells Elementary Students There Are More Than 2 Gender ‘Options’

The trainer also told the children that this diversity applies to human beings as well. It is this rationale — that gender is pliable and that there are “more than two options” — that has some people frustrated.

There are moral implications for all this, but more central to what is being taught are common sense and biological facts. When you bring evolution into the discussion, you are talking about biology. Humans are not clown fish. In the context of human biology, there are only two genders. It‘s also worth pointing out that neither of them is an ’option’. We don’t get to choose our gender. Technology may someday allow the choice, but for now, we are stuck with what we’re born with. Cosmetic surgery doesn’t change the reality. That is the plain and simple biological fact. Teachers and whoever else is behind teaching this nonsense to children should be held publicly accountable for such drivel.

Hispanic Christian Democrats Demonstrate Against "Gay Marriage"

Go West!

Part One:



Part Two:



Hat Tip: The Right Scoop

The Palestinian Wall of Lies

David Horowitz and Walid Shoebat stand against Islamic Anti-Semetic genocidal propoganda.

Democrats Truly, Madly, Deeply Love Abortion

On This Aborted Fetus, Democrats Plant Their Flag

And then, totally by accident, Republicans stumbled onto the Democrats' Achilles heel. Among their specific defunding proposals, Republicans had suggested taking mere peanuts away from Planned Parenthood. The Democrats responded: NO! WE'LL CUT 40 BILLION! JUST DON'T TOUCH PLANNED PARENTHOOD!
[...]
If Republicans keep threatening to defund Planned Parenthood, they can probably get Democrats to repeal Obamacare, pass a flat tax and get a capital sentence for Khalid Sheik Mohammed.

Project White Rose

Hat Tip: ARRA News Service

Smokey the Bear is a Fascist

It seems any government agency can and will be used to deprive you of your rights. The National Forestry Service violated Bobby Unser's rights. That's far more serious than trespassing into a 'national forest'. The Forestry Service ought to be subject to punative fines and the individuals responsible ought to be in prison.



Hat Tip: The Heritage Foundation

All For One and One For All!

Brilliant Response Against Exceptions for Rape/Incest

The trouble with unprincipled incrementalism and allowing for exceptions
Rebecca Kiessling

This is my response to Scott Klusendorf’s blog on the subject:

Hello Scott, thank you for bringing up these very important issues. Many in the pro-life movement will insist that we remain silent on things that matter to us in order to have “unity.” But the reality is that there is not unity within the pro-life movement on every issue and on strategy. We may say we want unity, but really, we’d like everyone else to either agree with us, or keep it to themselves. I think it’s beneficial for all to have logical discussions on issues involving strategy, and hopefully through these discussions we’ll at least gain more understanding.

I’m very thankful to have this opportunity to address the efficacy and import of what you refer to as “the incremental approach” to legislating abortion. I’ve written a piece which is the #1 ranked philosophical abortion essay on Google, and I’m well-able to articulate logical arguments on the subject, but for me, this is far more than merely a philosophical exercise. You see, I was conceived in rape and nearly aborted at two back-alley abortionists. But the dangerous conditions and the fact that it was illegal caused my birthmother to back out. She did not choose life for me. She chose abortion. Pro-life advocates and pro-life legislators chose life for me by making sure abortion was illegal in Michigan back then, even in cases of rape – 100% pro-life, no exceptions, no compromise, no incrementalism. They are my heroes and I owe my life to them! This is why I, in turn, do the same for others. I wasn’t lucky – I was protected. And so, it is with this sense of gratitude, purpose and urgency that I address these issues here.

I often hear the “burning building” and “sinking ship” analogies when speaking of allowing for exceptions – that you should try to save as many as you can. I believe that these analogies fail for several reasons. First of all, with the sinking ship, you are making a judgment call as to whom you should save – who is worthy of being saved first. This judgment call speaks volumes as to what values a society or organization holds dear. The saying, “women and children first” became a protocol used in marine disasters after it was established with the sinking of HMS Birkenhead in 1845, later employed in the sinking of the Titanic when 74% of the women on board were saved and 52% of the children, but only 20% of the men. By contrast, when the French ship SS La Bourgogne sank in 1898 killing 546 people, of the 165 survivors, 104 were crew members, 61 passengers, and only one woman. This was a product of the French Revolution and considered to be shameful to the entire French merchant marine. When we choose who we will save, it speaks volumes about what we really believe and who we are. Allowing for the rape exception says that children conceived in rape are disposable. It’s like putting us out there as infantry soldiers on the front lines, and then taking a huge step back, because you think that this current battle needs to be won and you perceive it’s the only way to achieve victory. But we are not column fodder!

Secondly, with the “burning building” analogy, the assumption would be that you would make efforts to go back and save the rest, right? In your blog, you state: “We are choosing to save as many as we can while we work to save all.” Well Scott, I would love to see the statistics as to how many times anyone has gone back to save the 1% after the 99% were already safe. How much are these incrementalists truly “working to save all?” I just don’t see this happening. Instead, all I’ve witnessed is that once the 99% are “safe”, the firehoses are being shut off, the fire engines are sent home, and unprincipled incrementalists are allowing the building to be burnt to the ground because, after all, those stuck inside are “only 1%.” Why bother wasting all of that water, manpower and other resources for only 1%?

The Hyde Amendment is a glaring example of this. A generation ago, the Hyde Amendment allowed for taxpayer funding of abortions in cases of rape. And instead of the pro-life calvary returning to save the 1% who’d been left behind, we had the celebration of the proposed Stupak Amendment a generation later as being a pro-life victory. In fact, NRLC originally sent out a press release saying that the Stupak Amendment wouldn’t provide for the funding of any abortions, which of course was not true because the rape exception was in there. When this fact was exposed, then NRLC and others dismissed it by saying that it “merely” incorporates the terms of the Hyde Amendment, and again, “it’s only 1%.” And so, mediocrity begets mediocrity. For me, this is so much worse than pro-choicers who would say to me “I think your mother should have been able to abort you / if I have my way, you’d be dead right now.” No, it’s much worse because it’s saying, “And our tax dollars should have paid for it!” Ouch! And that’s pro-life??? When you’re the 1%, you feel it, you get it, and it’s not a strategic game plan – it’s the lives and deaths of those similarly-situated. They are not a nameless-faceless irrelevant 1%.

Next, these analogies fail because the assumption is that 99% of the others’ lives have been saved by this unprincipled incremental approach, when that couldn’t be farther from the truth. What I’ve observed is a mediocre attempt to save the lives of the 99%, but in reality, very few have been saved by these measures, and they have not brought us any closer to ending legalized abortion – especially now with chemical abortions so readily available. Instead, many pro-lifers have become satiated with these so-called victories. When you’re satisfied with baby steps, why bother exhausting yourself with a giant leap? But after 40 years, you haven’t even made it across the room!

Fourth, these analogies and unprincipled incrementalism are based on the faulty assumption that you can’t save them all, and that simply isn’t the case. Scott, on your blog, you mentioned “abortion-control legislation aimed at limiting evil insofar as possible given current legal restraints” and “given current political realities.” Oh really? And what are those current political realities? Is it some supernatural phenomenon which is truly out of our sphere of influence or control? Of course not! The current political realities are lawmakers who have been re-elected because they’ve repeatedly received the exclusive endorsement of major pro-life organizations’ PACs in recurring election cycles, despite the fact that those lawmakers have not voted 100% pro-life. These lawmakers do not make the rape exception in a political vacuum. They make the rape exception because they are able to make the rape exception and get away with it. Too many pro-life organizations are not holding them accountable because they are allowing for it as well. Accepting rape exceptions = allowing for rape exceptions = supporting rape exceptions = making rape exceptions. The outcome is all the same, and what you support and applaud as a victory speaks volumes as to what your true values are. We will always have lawmakers who will insist on the rape exception as long as we have major pro-life organizations which tolerate, and thus, condone it. Instead of trying to push legislation through as quickly as possible, those who are 100% pro-life should hold out, as the Democrats did when they got what they wanted with the national health care legislation. They kept working their fellow lawmakers until they had them convinced and had the votes to win.

I just recently testified before a state house committee on a pro-life piece of legislation which had no exceptions. The sponsor of the bill was hoping for a 12 – 8 vote before the hearing began, but in the end, it passed with a 15 – 5 vote. Many legislators who make the exception have never really been challenged on this issue and have never put a face to it. I find that it’s rather easy to change the minds of those who make the rape exception – challenge them, hold them accountable, and put a face, a voice, a story to the issue. Even if it’s anecdotal, it’s still okay Scott. My observation is that many people like to keep this discussion in the philosophical realm so that the can play “let’s make pretend we’re not talking about real people,” so that you don’t have the opportunity to penetrate the stone wall they’ve built around their hearts with a personal story. But I’ve found that there’s nothing which pierces the heart like a personal story.

As a strategic means of ending abortion, unprincipled incrementalism has been a complete failure and got us the ruling in Roe v Wade. The majority opinion of the United States Supreme Court in Roe v Wade, Sec. IX, states, “If this suggestion of personhood is established, the appellant’s case, of course, collapses, for the fetus’ right to life would then be guaranteed specifically by the Amendment.” However, the Court noted the following in footnote 54: “When Texas urges that a fetus is entitled to Fourteenth Amendment protection as a person, it faces a dilemma. Neither in Texas nor in any other State are all abortions prohibited. Despite broad proscription, an exception always exists. The exception contained [410 U.S. 113, 158] in Art. 1196, for an abortion procured or attempted by medical advice for the purpose of saving the life of the mother, is typical. But if the fetus is a person who is not to be deprived of life without due process of law, and if the mother’s condition is the sole determinant, does not the Texas exception appear to be out of line with the Amendment’s command?

“There are other inconsistencies between Fourteenth Amendment status and the typical abortion statute. It has already been pointed out, n. 49, supra, that in Texas the woman is not a principal or an accomplice with respect to an abortion upon her. If the fetus is a person, why is the woman not a principal or an accomplice? Further, the penalty for criminal abortion specified by Art. 1195 is significantly less than the maximum penalty for murder prescribed by Art. 1257 of the Texas Penal Code. If the fetus is a person, may the penalties be different?”

And then the Court concluded, “In short, the unborn have never been recognized in the law as persons in the whole sense.”

You see, the hard lesson from Roe v Wade is that when ALL aren’t protected, NONE are protected. But it’s a lesson of which some are either ignorant, have forgotten, neglected, or have yet to learn. We will never have an end to legalized abortion in the U.S. as long as unprincipled incrementalists have their way.Many of the incremental laws which merely regulate abortion are heralded as necessary protections for women. So then why the rape exceptions? Don’t rape victims deserve the same protection? Again, it just makes no sense to throw it in there. If you can’t stand up for the 1% in some of these small measures, how are you going to do it when it comes to actually ending legalized abortion? You’ve already established that we’re expendable.

For those who would like to put names, faces and stories to this issue, please visit these pages on my site, which include written stories and videos:

www.rebeccakiessling.com/Othersconceivedinrape.html

and

www.rebeccakiessling.com/PregnantByRape.html

And there are a multitude of others for whom we speak. Never forget that 1% of 54,000,000 = 540,000 people!

Scott, I would have to be suicidal to acquiesce to a rape exception. I love life! I love the opportunity to live which was afforded to me by others who recognized the value and dignity of children conceived in rape, and that we were worth fighting for. My birthmother is thankful too. In fact, she and her husband legally adopted me 4 months ago – 22 years from the day we met. When you can say that you are committed to holding out for 100% pro-life legislation, it’s like saying, “I get it. You all matter. Yours were lives worth defending.” Now I hope you’ll all proceed from here and do the same for others!

Rebecca Kiessling, Esq., Pro-Life Speaker/Activist

Leftist Climate of Hate

Union members call their governor "Hitler" only because he's trying to break up their monopolistic, budget-busting, sweetheart deals that were arranged by corrupt politicians. And they attempt to bully and terrorize those who report the facts.

Learning to Hate My Life

“If anyone comes to me and does not hate his father and mother, his wife and children, his brothers and sisters—yes, even his own life—he cannot be my disciple. ~Luke 14:26

As I consider my life since coming to faith in Christ, I see that as I have grown older, I have gradually, ever so slowly, learned more and more about following Jesus and about being guided by the Holy Spirit. But I also see that as I have aged, I have become more desperate for the materialistic things I have always wanted. For example, a sexy wife, and a high-paying job. While these are merely temptations to indulge in selfishness, still I struggle against growing desperation as I see the years rolling on ever faster.

Jesus says we must hate our respective lives in order to be his disciples. This desperation makes that easier. That is, it seems to. However, I suspect it isn't my life that I'm inclined to hate, but rather my circumstances. But resigning to hating my life because it isn't what I'd like it to be simply feels like giving in to discouragement. This kind of despair is not what Jesus is talking about. It seems instead to be hating the absence of particular idols from my life rather than hating my life.

The goal in having the proper perspective Jesus prescribes is not in being bitter over what my life is like, but rather in having no inordinate love for all the good of which my life consists. I must thank God for all his many blessings, yet never love them. I must keep them distant from my heart because this life, as good as it may be, is never the point.

The enjoyment of God's blessings is a natural consequence of having received them and appropriately results in gratitude and admiration for God. Yet my pleasure in life must never crowd out my love for God. Not in any way. Not in the slightest.

I tell you the truth, unless a kernel of wheat falls to the ground and dies, it remains only a single seed. But if it dies, it produces many seeds. The man who loves his life will lose it, while the man who hates his life in this world will keep it for eternal life. Whoever serves me must follow me; and where I am, my servant also will be. My Father will honor the one who serves me. ~John 12:24-26

Straight Shooter

Most politicians are either correct but lack the conviction to defend their own positions on the one hand or incorrect and have to dodge questions and give long-winded round about responses that don't tell you anything on the other hand. Chris Christie does neither. He is correct and he's courageous enough to tell it like it is.

Democrats' Anti-American Foreign Policy

Democrats: Emboldening America's Enemies and Terrifying Her Allies Since 1976

[T]he moment Egyptians started rioting, Obama said, "We hear your voices."

He can hear their voices? He couldn't hear the voices of the tea partiers, and they were protesting on the streets of Washington, D.C.

But as long as Obama can hear the voices of protesters in Cairo, why doesn't he ask them what they think about ObamaCare? Maybe the Egyptians can change his mind.

The fact that liberals support democracy in Egypt, but not in Iraq or Iran, can mean only one thing: Democracy in Egypt will be bad for the United States and its allies. (As long as we're on the subject, liberals also opposed democracy in Russia, East Germany, Czechoslovakia, Yugoslavia and all the Soviet satellite states, China, Vietnam, North Korea, Cuba, Grenada, Nicaragua and Minnesota.)
[...]
For 50 years, Democrats have harbored traitors, lost wars, lost continents to communism, hobnobbed with the nation's enemies, attacked America's allies, and counseled retreat and surrender. Or as they call it, "foreign policy."

As Joe McCarthy once said, if liberals were merely stupid, the laws of probability would dictate that at least some of their decisions would serve America's interests.

I Can See Clearly Now..."

2020!

Allen West for President 2020

Now that our nation is so thoroughly burdened with debt, we are very tempted to look for a president who is adept at managing money and financial matters. But a president must be primarily shrewd with regard to international affairs and national security. Congressman Allen West has only just begun his first term as a representative from Florida. He has already demonstrated familiarity with international issues and the character required to overcome the suicidal leftists in congress. Some day, perhaps in 2016 or 2020, he will make an excellent president of the United States.

NPR & CBS Report Lies and Approve Slavery & Pedophilia

Planned Parenthood (formerly The Birth Control League) staff in several different infanticide facilities are caught on video attempting to help a pimp obtain abortions for pregnant children who have been enslaved for the sex trade. This makes them accessories to child sex trafficking. NPR, CBS, and others aired blatant lies in order to defend Planned Parenthood. It is crystal clear, while NPR and CBS are ostensibly news organizations, they have a deep, abiding, desperate love for abortion.

Planned Parenthood, Child-Trafficking, and the Poor Choices of NPR and Company

The first dishonest spin I could find came from Media Matters. They asserted that the video was a “hoax” and that Planned Parenthood had immediately contacted the FBI to report a potential human-trafficking ring. This assertion was patently false. The truth is that these videos had been made in numerous locations. In each setting, a senior Planned Parenthood staff member did everything they could to help the supposed perpetrator continue to profit from the raping of children. They even went as far as instructing the supposed perpetrator on the importance of making sure the little girls “kept their mouths shut,” lest a concerned employee would get nosy and report them.
[...]
To my astonishment, NPR had taken the same spin and framing as Media Matters.
[...]
At that point, I wasn’t at all surprised to see CBS adopting the Media Matters/NPR framing and doing the same cover-up for the ignorance and lack of humanity displayed by numerous senior staff members from Planned Parenthood. It seemed so simple to me. Come out, thank Lila Rose for identifying the issue and bringing it to light, announce a new effort to better train staff, and most import of all, use the entire matter finally give help to the advocates of human-trafficking victims who have fought for years to educate the public on what atrocities are occurring right beneath our privileged little noses. But no, the Left Media’s little darling could do no wrong.
[...]
what about us as a nation? Do our past “choices” keep us from being able to honestly look at what has just occurred? Are we allowing our various political orientations to blind our ability to recognize such a clear case of wrong?
[...]
The videos of Planned Parenthood managers and staff doing these horrible deeds are accurate, truthful, and should be seen by all. The Mainstream Media Establishment’s portrayal of the videos has entered the realm of utter deception and has participated in perpetuating a system where adults and children are victimized by the human-sex-trafficking industry.

Wolves in Sheep's Clothing

What about communists? Should they be welcomed into the conservative fold as well? GOProud claims to be a conservative group while promoting the cultural acceptance and normalization of gender confusion and homosexual acts.

CPAC’s Culture Club

“The issue is not that GOProud works on only four of the five traditional items on the conservative agenda — rather, it omits — because it actively opposes — one part of the core,” according to the official boycott letter that was sent to CPAC chairman David Keene in late November, signed by Cannon, Gary Bauer (president of American Values), Brian Brown (president of the National Organization of Marriage), and Mathew Staver (president of Liberty Counsel and dean of Liberty University’s law school). “It is no more acceptable as a participant at CPAC than a group that said it embraced the ‘traditional conservative agenda’ but actively worked for higher taxes and greater governmental control of the economy,” the letter continues.
[...]
Last fall, Barron all but “wrote Jim DeMint out of the conservative movement,” as Cannon tells it. In the heat of the midterm campaigns, GOProud joined liberals in attacking DeMint over comments he made about religious freedom and education — comments that bore no connection to any kind of legislative initiative. Barron has also said (on MSNBC, again) that DeMint — who’s now considered a Tea Party kingmaker — “has given up the ability to lead on any issues conservatives care about.”
[...]
This point was at the core of the November boycott letter: “We believe that, in general, the conservative movement is strengthened by the presence within it of organizations that give priority to particular, even single, issues. It is not necessary for each group within a political movement to embrace the fullness of a detailed and defined philosophy. But it is necessary for each group within any coherent movement not to stand in diametrical opposition to one or more of its core principles. It is our conviction that the institution of marriage and the family qualify — historically, philosophically and empirically — as such core principles. An organization committed to the ultimate abandonment of the legal and social meaning of marriage by definition disqualifies itself from recognition as a partner in the conservative cause.”
[...]
In the final analysis, GOProud may be doing conservatism a real service. The organization is helping a movement and party discern how to deal in a principled and prudent way with fundamental, personal issues in the political realm — in the contentious public square of a fallen world.

I have to respond to one point that is not central to the article, but is critical to GOProud's agenda:

GOProud presents itself as a victim. “The reason the boycotters applied a litmus test to us is because we were born gay,” its executive director, Jimmy LaSalvia, told the New York Times, where the controversy was featured this weekend.

Human beings are not gay. Human beings are, by definition, heterosexual. It's an obvious biological fact. That reality doesn't prevent us humans from participating in homosexual acts. But our identity as human beings is permanent and irrefutably heterosexual.

Bipartisan Revolt Against Obama's Statism

Equality in education is a civil rights issue...therefore, the Democrats are reliably against it.

Boehner Set to Revive Successful DC Voucher Program that Democrats Eliminated

[T]he Omnibus appropriations act of 2009 defunded (roll call vote here) the successful program–effectively eliminating any opportunity for poor DC schoolchildren to escape the horrid DC public schools. The Democrats, namely Dick Durbin, claimed that the program funding would take away from the money the DC public schools needed.
GOP House Speaker Boehner and Senator Lieberman put out this video statement:


[...]
this is going to be a tricky issue for Obama and the Democrats–one that will further define the Democrats as bought-off, public-sector union hacks and self-serving politicians who continually oppress and exploit others for their own political gain. Some of you may think, yeah, those Republicans, but I will remind you–it was the Republicans who originally started the DC scholarship program and the Democrats (and a few of the usual RINOs) who filibustered it. Kinda like the 1964 Civil Rights Act–Democrats filibustered that one, too. Look it up.

Does anyone see a pattern here?