Founders

1st Amendment - Congress - Constitution - Declaration of Independence - Founders - History - Holiday - Independence Day - Thomas Jefferson - Warner Todd Huston

236 Independence Days and Counting, But What Does it all Mean?

July 4, 2012 by

-By Warner Todd Huston

Today America enjoys the celebration of 236 years of existence as a nation by noting the day we declared our independence from our Mother nation, England. Sadly, that celebration has, for too many, become the “July Fourth” holiday, a day of picnics, rote parades, “white sales,” and for some a day off work. Of course, we should not and don’t celebrate any “July Fourth.” We celebrate Independence Day, the day we formally separated from our parent nation and took those first unsure steps into the world as a nation of our own.

So, what is this Independence Day all about? Well, for one thing we celebrate the gifts that our Creator have given us. That’s right, our Founding Fathers started this nation celebrating the gifts of life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness and those natural rights given to us by God, rights that no man can tax away from us, rights no man can legitimately take by force.

Contrary to the God averse America we have stumbled into, the Declaration mentions God, the Creator, or the divine multiple times and the Founders rested their entire claim of liberty and freedom on the claim that no government can legitimately take away the natural rights that mankind should and must enjoy.

The fact is the Founders did not want a nation free from religion (there is no such founding principle as a “wall of separation” as many think of it today, but that is another story for another day). This is not a Godless nation, but a nation based on Christian ideals.

Secondly, the Declaration of Independence is also a list of the wrongs and slights that England perpetrated against us. In the list of crimes against us that the English Crown and Parliament perpetrated against us is detailed many of the rights that free men must enjoy to truly be free men. This list of slights is not just stuffy old history but are timeless principles which should guide all men even today.

And lastly, to that “all men” point just noted. Our Founders did not write a Declaration that only pertained to their situation in their focused pint in history. Instead they wrote a document to inspire every people to take up freedom and liberty as their own. The Declaration of Independence is not just a document for America. It is one that should inspire all men everywhere to throw off the shackles of government imposed slavery. It is a document that is not just for the nascent American people, but one that insists, “all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights, that among these are life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.”

The Declaration of Independence is for humanity. Not just America.

And so that is also our charge. Freedom is a cause for all men, not just Americans. The United States should not shrink from the charge to aid and encourage freedom and liberty for all men.

Please take a minute to read the entire Declaration below and re-famliarize yourself with our founding ideals.
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236 Independence Days and Counting, But What Does it all Mean?”

1st Amendment - Anti-Americanism - Christianity - Congress - Constitution - Declaration of Independence - Democrats/Leftists - Ethics - Founders - GOP - Government - History - House of Representatives - Liberals - Policy - President - Religion - Republicans - Thomas Jefferson - Warner Todd Huston

Does ‘Separation of Church and State’ Really Exist?

July 4, 2012 by 7 Comments

-By Warner Todd Huston

Note: I wrote this in 2008, but it is so far back in the archives that it isn’t properly showing in searches, so I am updating it.

Secularists today have a catch phrase that they use like a club against religion in America. That club is named “the separation of church and state.”

So many Americans have heard the phrase that they think it is one actually written right into the Constitution of the United States itself. Those who are more learned on the subject realize it is not. Those who are learned on the subject also know that it wasn’t mentioned in any law, or even in the halls of Congress, until long after the Constitution was written. In fact, there was not much attention paid to the phrase at all until after Thomas Jefferson, the originator of the phrase, was long dead.

Not even the Supreme Court paid it much attention until the 1940s. So this “wall of separation” issue is not one that hails from the early Republic with the same meaning as it does today. Our Founders had very different ideas about religion and government, ideas that were not nearly as simple as the stark black or white assumptions of the activists of today.

The Danbury Letter

The man who initially conjured the “wall of separation” phrase, President Thomas Jefferson (1800-1808), wrote it in an 1802 letter to a congregation of Baptist churchmen from Danbury, Connecticut. Only elected president of the United States but two years previously, Jefferson was responding to a letter sent him by the Danbury church members who were attempting to get his support for their struggle against the state’s somewhat oppressive religious requirements for certain rights — not an unusual practice in the states at that time. While Jefferson’s letter only obliquely addressed the Baptist’s concerns, more importantly it addressed the Federal position on establishing a national religion. Jefferson’s reply, in reality, was focused on the Federal issue, not that of the states.

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Does ‘Separation of Church and State’ Really Exist?”

Atlanta - Constitution - Declaration of Independence - Founders - Georgia - Government - History - Warner Todd Huston

Georgia Gov. Signs Bill Allowing 10 Commandments Posted at all Public Bldgs

May 9, 2012 by 1 Comment

-By Warner Todd Huston

Georgia Governor, Republican Nathan Deal has signed an amended “historical display” law that will allow America’s founding documents as well as the Ten Commandments and the Magna Carta to be posted at schools and other government buildings in addition to the courthouses as the original bill allowed.

The amended law introduced by State Rep. Tommy Benton (R, Jefferson, Dist. 31) allows the “Foundations of American Law & Government Display” to be publicly displayed in “all public buildings.”

The display includes the following documents:
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Georgia Gov. Signs Bill Allowing 10 Commandments Posted at all Public Bldgs”

Anti-Americanism - Barack Obama - Budget - Congress - Constitution - Democrats/Leftists - Ethics - Founders - Government - Health - History - House of Representatives - John Adams - Journalism - Liberals - Media Bias - Nanny State - Obamacare - President - Regulation - Senate - Taxes - Warner Todd Huston

No, Left-Wingers, the ‘Founders’ Did NOT Approve of Mandates or Obamacare

April 16, 2012 by

-By Warner Todd Huston

Every few weeks leftist supporters of Obamacare will float the “fact” that our founders passed the first “national healthcare law” claiming that this supports Obamacare. The truth is, though, the history they claim supports them doesn’t in any way prove that the founders would approve of mandates in general or Obamacare in particular.

This failed historical analogy is once again seen this month in the prattling of one Einer Elhauge, a fellow who claims himself the title of a professor at Harvard Law School. If his recent article in The New Republic is any indication of the level of history he teaches students, we have yet another example of our failed state of higher education.

Elhauge makes two failed analogies to history in his support of Obamacare. One is the 1792 law that required men to own a firearm. This law passed by many members of our founding generation — with only four opposing the mandate — proves, Elhauge claims, that mandates were not something the founders would oppose.

Elhauge’s claim is facile, of course. After all, we had no standing army at the time (in fact the founders were vehemently against a standing army) and the whole of the people in the form of the militia were the army.

So, requiring people to own firearms was, at the time, observing the Constitutional mandate to protect the nation. Helthacre is not something in the Constitution and cannot be construed as such, so Elhauge’s extrapolating military matters to Obamacare is absurd o its face.

Then there is the sailor relief act that lefties have been harping on for several years now claiming that it supports Obamacare. This, too, is a facile comparison cynically and illicitly used to explain away Obamacare.
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No, Left-Wingers, the ‘Founders’ Did NOT Approve of Mandates or Obamacare”

Abraham Lincoln - Anti-Americanism - Campaign Finance - Democrats/Leftists - Economy/Finances - Elections - Ethics - Founders - Franklin Deleno Roosevelt - GOP - Government - History - Liberals - President - Warner Todd Huston

Come On, People! Poor Men Do Not Become President

January 18, 2012 by 2 Comments

-By Warner Todd Huston

I have to say, I am getting a bit sick and tired of this nonsensical lament about how rotten it is that those running for president are “rich” people. Stop it right now, America. The fact is that we’ve never really had a poor man as president so talking about it as if it is news that rich people often seek the presidency is stupid. Not only that, but today it is impossible for a poor or even middle class man to run for president anyway, so get this populist silliness out of your minds right this instant.

The latest in this onslaught of populist foolishness is the New York Times (unsurprisingly) with an article full of serious tones on how hard it is going to be for two Harvard educated, Richie-Riches like Obama and Romney to win over those “blue collar Americans.”

“Both are Harvard-educated millionaires,” The Times begins sonorously. “Both have been criticized as elitist and technocratic. Both have struggled to handle the populist anger coursing through politics.”

Of course, much of that anger is fostered by the Old Media constantly harping on that “anger” by writing daily stories indulging themes of class warfare as if it is some sort of legitimate political discussion in this, a capitalist-based society.
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Come On, People! Poor Men Do Not Become President”

Christianity - Founders - Michael Bresciani‏ - Religion

Prophecy 2012: America in the Valley of Decision

December 11, 2011 by

-By Rev Michael Bresciani

This message is less about the denouement of America than it is about the deliberations of a nation at an urgent and critical moment in its history. I urge Americans to carefully consider the course they are choosing in the very near future.

My choice would have been to put this message out later in 2012, but on December first, I realized that nothing could wait, the timing of a message is equally important to the content. Here are seven points and a conclusion that I can only pray that many will give careful consideration to, as we enter what promises to be, the most critical year of our entire history as a nation.

It may not even need to be said that terms like liberal and conservative, the right wing and the left have ceased to be terms that can be used in the broadest sense, as they have been for generations. Now the battle is emerging between good and evil, right and wrong and Godliness and ungodliness. It is all preparation for the coming world ruler known as the antichrist and his aide the false prophet.
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Prophecy 2012: America in the Valley of Decision”

Anti-Americanism - Barack Obama - Budget - Business - Capitalism - Communism - Constitution - Democrats/Leftists - Economy/Finances - Elections - Ethics - Federalism - Founders - Free Trade - Government - Jobs - Liberals - Nanny State - President - Regulation - Socialism - Taxes - Warner Todd Huston

Obama: Capitalism and Liberty Don’t Work

December 8, 2011 by

-By Warner Todd Huston

Barack Obama, President of the United Deniers of America, is slamming the country again. This time he ways that capitalism, liberty, and American principles have never worked.

Speaking in Osawatomie, Kansas, where in 1910 an off-the-rails Teddy Roosevelt laid out a new socialist-inspired dream for America he entitled the “New Nationalism,” Obama had a few choice words for our American principles.

In his speech, Obama went for the gusto in class warfare rhetoric characterizing anyone that makes a few dollars as the eeevil rich that refuse to be “fair” to the poor. Obama told his audience that capitalism doesn’t work and never did. And guess what he thinks the solution is? Yep, more power to himself and government.

If no other video clip has done it for you, this one should show that Barack Obama’s ideals are not American ideals.
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Obama: Capitalism and Liberty Don’t Work”

Anti-Americanism - Budget - Congress - Conservatives - Constitution - Declaration of Independence - Democrats/Leftists - Elections - Founders - GOP - Government - History - House of Representatives - Liberals - Nancy Salvato - Republicans - Senate - Socialism - Taxes

Contrasting World Views

December 5, 2011 by

-By Nancy Salvato

Thomas Jefferson outlined the philosophy of our nation’s government in the Declaration of Independence with the words,

“All men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.–That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed.”

Make no mistake; this is the philosophy on which our fundamental law is based. The goals for our government, which are listed in the preamble to our constitution, are intended to secure these unalienable rights.

“In Order to form a more perfect Union, establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defense, promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity,…”

If the electors and elected officials of our country do not honor our covenant

“We the People…[who] do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America…”

And if they choose not to uphold the blessings of liberty, then

“Whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute a new Government.”

What happens if the electorate and elected officials of our country do not understand the covenant, or what if they choose not to subscribe to the mission? What if the goals of our electorate are not aligned with the fundamental law set down by the Founders and Framers? What if the policy on which our representatives vote and implement is at odds with the philosophy on which our government was founded?

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Contrasting World Views”

Anti-Americanism - Congress - Conservatives - Constitution - Democracy - Democrats/Leftists - Ethics - Federalism - Founders - GOP - Government - History - Liberals - President - Republicans - Senate - Warner Todd Huston

What Is Constitutional Conservatism?

November 27, 2011 by

-By Yuval Levin, National Review

(ED: I don’t usually repost an entire article from another site but this article is too important to just excerpt. I apologize to Mr. Levin in advance, but his essay is one of the best definitions of what American conservatism truly is that I’ve seen for a long time. It is also a good explanation on why modern liberalism is as wrong as can be and anti-American to boot. It is a must read for anyone that wants a hint of the character of American conservatism and a good guide on how to think about what conservatives advocate. I just had to post it in it’s entirety, just had to have this chronicled on my site.)

This fall, liberals from the president on down have begun to grasp the scope of the political and intellectual disaster that the past three years have been for the Left. Their various responses to the calamity have tended to have one thing in common: immense frustration. But the different expressions of that frustration have been deeply revealing. They should help Americans better understand this complicated moment in our politics, and, in particular, help conservatives frame their responses.

Liberal frustration has fallen into two general categories that seem at first to flatly contradict each other: denunciations of democracy and appeals to populism. In September, Peter Orszag, President Obama’s former budget director, wrote an essay in The New Republic arguing that “we need less democracy.” To address our country’s daunting problems, Orszag suggested, we need to take some power away from Congress and give it to “automatic policies and depoliticized commissions” that will be shielded from public pressure. “Radical as it sounds, we need to counter the gridlock of our political institutions by making them a bit less democratic.” Two weeks later, North Carolina’s Democratic governor, Beverly Perdue, made a less sophisticated stab at the same general point, proposing to suspend congressional elections for a few years so members of Congress could make the difficult decisions necessary to get our country out of its deep problems.

Orszag and Perdue both seemed to channel a long and deeply held view of the Left — that the complexity of modern life and the intensity of modern politics should lead us to put more power in the hands of technical experts who have the knowledge to make objective, rational choices on our behalf. Leaving things to the political process will result only in delay and disorder. President Obama has frequently expressed this view himself — wistfully complaining to his aides earlier this year, for instance, that things would sure be easier if he were president of China.
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What Is Constitutional Conservatism?”

Capitalism - Communism - Europe - Founders - History - Holiday - Liberals - Nanny State - Socialism - Thanksgiving - Warner Todd Huston

Thanksgiving Story: Why There Are No Communist Pilgrims

November 24, 2011 by

-By Warner Todd Huston

With as Euroized as Democrats and their supporters in our miseducation establishment have become these days, one shouldn’t be surprised to learn that one of the important lessons of Plymouth Colony — popularly known as the Pilgrims — is practically unknown in our schools today. We are all familiar with the bountiful Thanksgiving meal shared between the Pilgrims and the Indians, but less well known is how the Pilgrims turned away from their experiment in the communist-styled social policy upon which they built their fledgling, New World colony.

That’s right, the Pilgrims repudiated communism in 1623. No wonder the principles of communism never got a foothold here until recently when the Democrat Party began to shift away from American principles and toward the more socialistic ideas of Europe’s social democrats.

You see, when the emigres from England via Holland got to the New World and they established their new colony, Governor William Bradford and his fellow leaders decided to follow what they thought was the ideal Christian society. It was a version of the later communist ideal of “from each according to his ability to each according to his need.
It certainly seemed like a good idea, right? The whole of the colony would work for the benefit of the whole of the denizens therein. What could be more selfless? What could be more equitable and, well, Christian?
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Thanksgiving Story: Why There Are No Communist Pilgrims”

Constitution - Democracy - Elections - Ethics - Founders - Nancy Salvato

A 2012 World View: What is the End Game?

November 11, 2011 by

-By Nancy Salvato

Having a world view and understanding how that perception influences our choices is important to knowing ourselves, being able to take or defend a position, and set goals and work to meet them. Sharing perspective helps us to understand and communicate with those who do not share the same belief systems but allows us to get along if we can find some commonalities or on what we can agree to disagree. When people holding a world view do not have the awareness to understand why they hold their position or are unable to comprehend that different experiences allow for a different outlook, this is when conflict can occur. This holds relevance for the 2012 election cycle.

Conflict is not confined between strangers. It can arise within family units; it can happen in the workplace, on the playing field, or even at a party. On such a smaller scale, it might be considered a personality conflict. A person can even be conflicted inside one’s own head. It is how potential conflict is addressed that makes all the difference in the world.

Within our own country, the Founders and Framers understood that there has to be a balance between individual rights and the rights of the community. They were under no illusions that in a country this large that everyone could hold the same beliefs and goals. They wanted to create a place where to the largest extent possible, people could be free without imposing on others. You could say their end goal was freedom. In creating the U.S. Constitution, they created a document that would maximize freedom and minimize conflict. For example, rather than elevate one religion over others by sponsoring it by the state, they included the First Amendment, which reads:
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A 2012 World View: What is the End Game?”

Abraham Lincoln - Alexander Hamilton - Atheism - Bible - Christianity - Democrats/Leftists - Education - Ethics - Founders - George Washington - History - James Madison - John Adams - Journalism - Liberals - Media - Media Bias - Religion - Revolutionary War - Thomas Jefferson - Warner Todd Huston

Atheists Lie And Do So On a Billboard!

October 31, 2011 by

-By Warner Todd Huston

Talk about making a mistake everyone can see! Atheists in California have done a disservice to their own crusade to spread atheism by launching a new billboard campaign that ascribes a false quote to Thomas Jefferson. That’s right, they’ve essentially become liars for atheism.

In Costa Mesa, California a group of atheists calling themselves Backyard Skeptics have unveiled a billboard to sell atheism to the general public that features a quote they claim came from Thomas Jefferson, the Third President of the United States.

“I do not find in Christianity one redeeming feature,” the billboard “quotes” the president as having said. “It is founded on fables and mythology,” this quote concludes.

That would be a stinging rebuke of Christianity, indeed… were it true. Unfortunately for this little atheist group it seems that their quote is a fake quote the group found on the Internet and assumed was real.
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Atheists Lie And Do So On a Billboard!”

Barack Obama - Budget - Congress - Constitution - Democrats/Leftists - Federalism - Founders - Government - Health - History - John Adams - Liberals - President - Regulation - Taxes - Warner Todd Huston

No, John Adams Did Not Pass the First Obamacare Law

July 6, 2011 by

-By Warner Todd Huston

Every few weeks for months now leftist bloggers have been happily touting the “fact” that our second president, John Adams, passed the first “national healthcare law” one that supposedly forced Americans to buy a form of healthcare. Unfortunately for them, this is simply untrue and comparing John Adams’ sailor’s relief act to Obamacare is misleading at worst and an apples to oranges comparison at best.

But even as today’s leftists want to use this old sailor’s act as poof that nationalized healthcare has precedent, and even as they are wrong, the history does serve us well as an example of the follies of nationalized healthcare. Curiously enough, it’s a lesson that the leftists don’t seem to mention in their laudatory pieces on John Adams’ law.

The law in question is the “act for the relief of sick and disabled seamen,” passed in 1798.

This law mandated owners of sailing vessels to pay a per-sailor tax to the federal government so that members of the merchant marine could find temporary healthcare when they got sick. The act informed the nation that the president is “hereby authorized, out of the same, to provide for the temporary relief and maintenance of sick, or disabled seamen, in the hospitals or other proper institutions…”

Now, the modern American left points to this and, squealing with glee, claims that this was the first “healthcare mandate.” They imagine that this law was the first version of Obamacare and that this is somehow precedent for Obama’s modern, socialist power grab.

Unfortunately for our friends on the left, a closer look at this ancient law fails the test as support for Obamacare.
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No, John Adams Did Not Pass the First Obamacare Law”

Anti-Americanism - Constitution - Declaration of Independence - Democrats/Leftists - Education - Founders - History - Independence Day - Liberals - Patriotism - Warner Todd Huston

Harvard Study: Patriotism Doesn’t Appeal to Democrats

July 3, 2011 by 2 Comments

-By Warner Todd Huston

The L.A. Times recently reported something that has been conventional wisdom with conservatives for close to 30 years, now. Democrats hate patriotism. It’s been a matter of faith for quite a while but now comes Harvard to help substantiate that little factoid.

For the L.A. Times, Andrew Malcolm sarcastically makes his way through the Harvard study pointing out that it seems that only conservatives, Republicans, or people that lean toward those views find the celebration of Independence Day a joyous occasion. Democrats and leftists, on the other hand, are not too fired up about all that “July Fourth red-white-and-blue stuff.”

Apparently the study finds…

If you’re into the national holiday by age 18, you are 2% more likely to identify as a Republican, 4% more likely to vote that way and 3% more likely to make political donations.

The study found a lot of other things, of course, but the upshot is that if you are a Democrat or you lean left of center then you aren’t too likely to attend patriotic celebrations. It also finds that people that do attend patriotic events will be more likely to vote against left-wingism.
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Harvard Study: Patriotism Doesn’t Appeal to Democrats”

Declaration of Independence - Founders - History - John Adams - RightPundits.com - Warner Todd Huston

John Adams’ Reminiscences of the First Independence Day

July 3, 2011 by

-By Warner Todd Huston

John Adams was one of the truly indispensable men among our founding fathers. He was the man that wrote one of the first fully written out Constitutions in human history when he wrote the Constitution of Massachusetts. He wrote a seminal book on government that helped inform the founders of our nation, he was an ambassador to France and other European nations, he was our first vice president, our second president, and more.

In fact, Adams was at the center of one of the incidents that set the tone for our national character. When the Redcoats responsible for the Boston Massacre were put under arrest, John Adams stepped forward to represent the Redcoats in court. Many of his fellow patriots were amazed at this offer, some even incensed at Adams for doing so. But Adams said that the rule of law was far more important than merely making points with the home crowd and the Redcoats deserved to have competent representation…

Read the rest at RightPundits.com.

Anti-Americanism - Bible - Catholicism - Christianity - Congress - Constitution - Democrats/Leftists - Education - Elections - Ethics - Founders - Freedom - George Washington - Government - History - House of Representatives - James Madison - Journalism - Liberals - Los Angeles - Media - Media Bias - Morals/Sex - Newspapers - Religion - Republicans - Senate - Thomas Jefferson - Warner Todd Huston

L.A. Times Tim Rutten, Historical Idiot

June 3, 2011 by

-By Warner Todd Huston

Tim Rutten is a left-wing, hack writer from L.A. He is always good for contemporary left wing trope but the other day we discovered that he is also good for the sort of uninformed blathering that leftists of his ilk pretend is American history. Chiefly that of America’s religious history and the so-called “wall of separation between church and state.”

In a June 1 piece about Mitt Romney, Rutten regaled us with his “reading” of Mitt’s current political reality. Rutten proposed that any question about Mitt’s Mormonism was somehow a threat to the United States.

Before I get to Rutten’s warped take on U.S. history, let’s take this business about the attacks on Mitt’s Mormonism.
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L.A. Times Tim Rutten, Historical Idiot”

Budget - Business - Capitalism - Communism - Congress - Constitution - Democracy - Democrats/Leftists - Economy/Finances - Education - Elections - Ethics - Founders - Free Trade - GOP - Government - History - House of Representatives - Liberals - Nancy Salvato - Republicans - Security/Safety - Taxes

Notes on Democracy: And to the Republic, for Which It Stands

May 31, 2011 by

-By Nancy Salvato

I’m fairly certain that everyone from my generation knows the words to The Pledge of Allegiance by heart.

“I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America, and to the Republic, for which it stands, one Nation, under God, indivisible, with Liberty and Justice for all.”

When reciting the pledge, we should focus on the meaning attached to these words, most of which were written by Francis Bellamy, commemorating our history in honor of the 400th anniversary of Columbus Day at Chicago’s World’s Fair. I say “most” because the original pledge, as written by Bellamy, was altered. Nevertheless, each word in this final version provides our citizenry an appropriate lens through which we may view our world.
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Notes on Democracy: And to the Republic, for Which It Stands”

Alexander Hamilton - Congress - Constitution - Democracy - Democrats/Leftists - Federalism - Founders - GOP - Government - History - House of Representatives - James Madison - Liberals - Nancy Salvato - President - Republicans - Senate

‘A Government of Laws, and Not of Men’: The Electoral College

May 11, 2011 by 1 Comment

-By Nancy Salvato

In Federalist 51, James Madison writes,

“In framing a government which is to be administered by men over men, the great difficulty lies in this: you must first enable the government to control the governed; and in the next place oblige it to control itself. A dependence on the people is, no doubt, the primary control on the government; but experience has taught mankind the necessity of auxiliary precautions.”

Madison’s concern is that, even though the people are sovereign, hold the ultimate authority over the government, there need be additional mechanisms to assist in preventing the possibility of power becoming consolidated within a particular faction of those charged with governing on our behalf. Should power become consolidated under one entity, and the faction abuse its authority, the people would be ruled through tyranny, denying them their ultimate sovereignty unless they take drastic measures to remove the authority from power.

Perhaps what Madison is saying here is better understood through an analogy of what can happen when those charged with looking after our best interests give greater concern to selfish motives. Until a child grows into an adult, he or she cannot make all the decisions associated with being grown up. In such a case, all power is vested in one or two parents who are expected to make decisions in the best interest of the child. Sometimes one or both parents make really bad decisions that can cause irreparable damage to a child. This might require a drastic measure, such as a child protective services agency stepping in to remove the child from the situation. James Madison feared that those in a position of power may not always put our rights first. This problem would become much worse, and more drastic measures would need to be taken, when all authority is vested in one entity that is in charge of all decision making, as in the situation of a child with abusive parents.

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‘A Government of Laws, and Not of Men’: The Electoral College”

Anti-Americanism - Budget - Capitalism - Constitution - Democrats/Leftists - Economy/Finances - Founders - Frank Salvato - Government - Liberals - Money - Taxes

To Be Clear, It’s Not the Government’s Money

December 18, 2010 by

-By Frank Salvato

“I cannot undertake to lay my finger on that article of the Constitution which granted a right to Congress of expending, on objects of benevolence, the money of their constituents.”
– James Madison, Fourth President of the United States and considered the Father of the United States Constitution.

There seems to be a great deal of confusion in Washington DC, especially on the Left side of the aisle, about the revenue surrendered to the federal government through taxation. For some reason, many Democrats – and all Progressives – seem to believe that they have a right to the citizens’ money, for whatever cause, whatever initiative and/or whatever programs they deem necessary. Not only isn’t this even close to the truth, but to believe so is to have a non-functional understanding of the Constitution and the proper limits of government.

If this needs to be said once it needs to be said a thousand times; it is not the right of the federal government to do with tax revenue what it pleases. Tax revenue, privately earned money that is surrendered to the federal government under law, is meant to fund the vital processes of the federal government as outlined in the enumerated powers of the US Constitution and the whole of the Charters of Freedom.
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To Be Clear, It’s Not the Government’s Money”

2nd Amendment - Alexander Hamilton - Anti-Americanism - Ben Franklin - Constitution - Democrats/Leftists - Founders - Government - Guns - James Madison - Liberals - Regulation - Sam Adams - Supreme Court - Warner Todd Huston

Supreme Court Justice Breyer: Founders Were For Restricting Guns… Why Breyer is Wrong

December 14, 2010 by 1 Comment

-By Warner Todd Huston

On Fox News Sunday, Supreme Court Justice Stephen Breyer spoke of his dissenting decisions in the several Second Amendment cases that he heard as a Justice. He told host Chris Wallace that he thought that James Madison only included the Second Amendment in the Bill of Rights as a sop to the states and Breyer insisted that historians agreed. In essence, Breyer was saying that Madison was not interested in an individual’s right to gun ownership and self-protection and for that reason his dissenting opinions against that individual right accorded well with what the founder’s thought on the issue.

But Breyer’s assumption that a citizen’s right to bear arms is not sacrosanct and his following contention that the founders would agree seems to ignore much of the history of the era not to mention the precedents in law and the historical record upon which the founders relied to define their political ideas — including Madison.

Of course, it is a bit ridiculous to take one lone founder’s words and assume that it represents the opinion of all of them. It is quite easy, after all, to find quotes from any particular founder that in no way reflected even a minority opinion of the day. For instance, Thomas Jefferson once advocated that all laws be dumped every few decades so that the next generation could start over with their own ideas unencumbered by past generations. Even Madison thought that idea was absurd. Hamilton found that many of his most dearly held financial ideas left his fellows cold. John Adams thought that we should call the president “your majesty,” an idea that earned him much derision. And Poor Richard himself, Benjamin Franklin, once proposed that each galaxy had it’s own “God” that ruled in his own sphere meaning that there were infinite gods for infinite galaxies. Not every idea the founders had were gems, to be sure.

Still, Madison spoke with most of his contemporaries, not outside them, when he considered the meaning of the Second Amendment.
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Supreme Court Justice Breyer: Founders Were For Restricting Guns… Why Breyer is Wrong”

1st Amendment - Anti-Americanism - Constitution - Democrats/Leftists - Education - Elections - Founders - Government - History - Liberals - Thomas Jefferson - Warner Todd Huston

Two Examples Showing Liberals Don’t Know ANYTHING About U.S. History

October 19, 2010 by

-By Warner Todd Huston

This week we have two prominent examples proving that liberals are ignoramuses about the Constitution and U.S. history. One incident wholly misunderstood by the left was uttered by the redoubtable Sarah Palin and the other by Christine O’Donnell.

First up Sarah.

In Nevada Sarah Palin kicked off a new tour to spur conservatives and Republicans to the polls just ahead of the midterm elections. During one of her speeches Palin said that conservatives shouldn’t “party like it’s 1773” just yet. We need to keep our shoulder to the wheel and get to the polls first, she warned.

The idiots of the left went wild with Palin’s 1773 date. It proved that Palin was an idiot, they said. Why, the only famous date in our early history is 1776, they chortled. Palin is obviously too stupid to know we became a nation in 1776 they guffawed.

A string of Twitter posts and TV reports streamed from these unschooled leftists attacking Palin for her obvious stupidity.

Of course, these leftist idiots proved themselves illiterate enough not to know that Palin wasn’t referencing the 1776 birth of the nation. Palin was at a Tea Party rally and was referencing the Boston Tea Party… you know, the one that occurred in 1773? Yeah, remember that one?
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Two Examples Showing Liberals Don’t Know ANYTHING About U.S. History”

Budget - Congress - Constitution - Democrats/Leftists - Federalism - Founders - GOP - Government - History - House of Representatives - Liberals - Libertarian - Republicans - Selwyn Duke - Taxes - Thomas Jefferson

Libertarianism’s Folly: When the ‘Live and Let Live’ Mentality Becomes Vice

October 12, 2010 by

-By Selwyn Duke

While there was a time when I might have described myself as a libertarian, those days are long gone. In fact, I don’t even call myself a conservative anymore. Oh, don’t get me wrong, I agree with libertarians on many issues, and their governmental model is vastly preferable to what liberals have visited upon us. Yet there is a problem: However valid their vision of government may be, their vision of society renders it unattainable.

Thomas Jefferson once said, “The legitimate powers of government extend to such acts only as are injurious to others. But it does me no injury for my neighbor to say there are twenty gods, or no God. It neither picks my pocket nor breaks my leg.” Now, I certainly agree with the first sentence, as it’s merely a statement of the obvious. But then we have to ask, what constitutes “injurious”? And, when determining this, do we completely ignore indirect injury? Then, if we do consider the latter, to what extent should it be the domain of government? (When pondering these matters, note that the Founding Fathers didn’t reside on the modern libertarian page. They certainly would have, for instance, supported the idea of state and local governments outlawing pornography and would be appalled at what is now justified under the First Amendment.)
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Libertarianism’s Folly: When the ‘Live and Let Live’ Mentality Becomes Vice”

Founders - Government - History - Law - Liberals - Nancy Salvato - Rights - Thomas Jefferson

Eternal Principle

September 7, 2010 by

-By Nancy Salvato

Marcus Tullius Cicero, who was born in 105 B.C. and was beheaded by Antony’s soldiers in 43 B.C, writes in On the Laws ,

“Law was neither a thing to be contrived by the genius of man, nor established by any decree of the people, but a certain eternal principle, which governs the entire universe, wisely commanding what is right and prohibiting what is wrong.”

In the Declaration of Independence, Thomas Jefferson echoes this eternal truth when he explains that the function of government is to secure God-given rights.

How do we know about these rights?
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Eternal Principle”

Barack Obama - Civil Rights - Constitution - Declaration of Independence - Democrats/Leftists - Founders - Glenn Beck - Journalism - Liberals - Media - Media Bias - Nancy Morgan - Patriotism - Warner Todd Huston - Washington D.C.

For your consideration: How Many Attended The Glenn Beck Rally?‏

August 30, 2010 by

-By Nancy Morgan

The question on the minds of millions of Americans this morning: How many people attended Glenn Beck’s ‘Restoring Honor’ rally yesterday in our nations’ capitol?

The answer to this question has ramifications far beyond mere crowd size. It is one of the few concrete indicators of the popularity and viability of the Tea Party and their message of traditional values, less government and a return to our Founders’ vision of America.

The New York Times described the crowd merely as “enormous and impassioned.” ABC was more specific, estimating the attendance at Beck’s Restoring Honor Rally in the “hundreds of thousands.” AP chimed in at “tens of thousands.”
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For your consideration: How Many Attended The Glenn Beck Rally?‏”

Congress - Constitution - Elections - Founders - Fox News - Government - History - Jeff Lukens - Journalism - Liberals - Media - Media Bias - Patriotism - President - Taxes

Restoring Honor: A New American Awakening?

August 23, 2010 by

– By Jeff Lukens

If anything good can be said about the progressive left controlling our government, it’s that their astonishingly brazen and heavy-handed tactics may have aroused the American people into a new spiritual awakening. With basic liberties under assault, we are seeing a revival of values that have been dormant for a long time.

Every great moment in this country, when real progress is made, there was a spiritual awakening. The Restoring Honor Rally in Washington D.C. on August 28 may be the one of those moments. The rally’s organizer is radio and television personality Glenn Beck. Beck says that our country’s troubles cannot be solved by the same methods that got us into this mess. Like an old time revivalist, he says “We must call upon God, and He will see us through.”
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Restoring Honor: A New American Awakening?”

Congress - Conservatives - Constitution - Founders - Government - Journalism - Liberals - Media - Media Bias - Politico - Revolutionary War - Tea Party - Warner Todd Huston

Is The Tea Party Like A Starfish, Like the Apache… Like al Qaeda?

August 3, 2010 by

-By Warner Todd Huston

Politico’s Kenneth Vogel has an interesting piece on a book that Tea Party activists are starting to glom onto as an administrative guidebook of sorts. The book, “The Starfish and the Spider: The Unstoppable Power of Leaderless Organizations,” is a book that explains how leaderless organizations work and can be effective. Of late tea partiers have accepted the tome as a way to explain the success of their movement as well as a way to legitimize their hold on a certain amount of power into the future.

The book, written by two lefty Stanford MBAs, has become what Vogel calls an “unlikely” guidebook for a conservative movement.

The principle of the book is in its title. The spider of the title is the typical top-down organization. Cut the spider’s head off and you have a dead spider and presumably, in the analogy, a dead organization. However, a starfish can regenerate itself if it loses an arm. Further that severed arm can also become a starfish that lives on because there is no “head” per se in a starfish. Cut up a starfish and you have many smaller starfish, not a dead one.

The thought is that the tea party movement is like a starfish. No head, no hierarchy, no way to “kill” it in the traditional sense.

Now, I must say one thing about Vogel’s piece. It will certainly destroy the left’s contention that the tea party movement is an “astroturf” effort. For the entire first year of its existence the left has tried to claim, falsely, that the tea party movement was invented by Fox News, or is a top-down creation by folks like Dick Army, former Congressman and top man for FreedomWorks.
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Is The Tea Party Like A Starfish, Like the Apache… Like al Qaeda?”

Budget - Conservatives - Constitution - Economy/Finances - Education - Founders - Government - History - Patriotism - Taxes - Warner Todd Huston

Jamal Greene: Why I Am a Conservative?

August 3, 2010 by

Jamal Greene took to his video camera to tell us why he is a conservative. His effort is a serious and worthy explication of conservatism and his words should be listened to.

Jamal Greene: “In this video I speak about the ideas and beliefs that hold true. As a young educated black male I wanted to show the other face of the Conservative Movement: Me. There are many of us out here. Thanks to Glenn Beck for having them on his show. As a young educated black I constantly face down the stereotype that all blacks are Liberal and vote democrat. I am a member of the Tea Party, so the liberal media lies about the tea party being racist are completely untrue. This video dedicated to freedom, life, and liberty of the American Spirit. The Best is still yet to come for America.” As seen on Mr. Greene’s FaceBook.

Barack Obama - Capitalism - Conservatives - Constitution - Democrats/Leftists - Dr. Don Boys - Federalism - Founders - GOP - Government - History - Liberals - President - Taxes

Am I an Extremist?

July 27, 2010 by

-By Don Boys, Ph.D.

According to the moguls of the media (the News Twisters), I would appear to be an extremist although I always thought I was mainline. (As mainline as an active Christian can be.) After reading the musings from the various politicians, I may be one of those dreaded extremists.

I believe strongly (all extremists believe strongly in their positions) that government, out of control, is a wild beast. Does that make me dangerous? Didn’t all our founding fathers believe government can be a wild beast? Did they not insist on the Bill of Rights because they knew that government (made up of depraved creatures) could not be trusted? Is it unreasonable to believe that all politicians and bureaucrats should be bound by the chains of the Constitution?

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Am I an Extremist?”