Can America Survive in a World Without G0d?

There has been a slowly rising crescendo for half a century from a growing group of conservatives who are religious and hold their faith in the L0rd as dearly as they hold to the rights as delineated in the founding documents, the Constitution, the Bill of Rights, and increasingly the Declaration of Independence. It is in the Declaration of Independence that these religious conservatives find their strongest arguments that they are uniquely positioned to more fully understand the ideas and ideals behind the founders and what they viewed as the origins of the nation they wished to found. They also take to heart many of the arguments made between the different founders which many were fortunately preserved in the letters of correspondence. The likely most famous coming from John Adams who wrote, “Our Constitution was made only for a moral and religious people. It is wholly inadequate to the government of any other.” But even this quote falls short of the delineation of the manners for power distribution which was the backbone of the Declaration of Independence. Despite the watering down of the reference in order to pacify a select group of founders who feared placing too strong a reference to things religious as they feared relating too close an interdependence between the Almighty and the governance of the country they were to found. Still, the distribution of power is given a direct flow from the Creator to the individual people and from them to government. The government was relinquished to accepting only those powers permitted by the people and the people retained all other powers and rights not relegated to government. And taking things one step further, the power which was relinquished to the purview of government was to be most powerful at the most local level and from their powers would be relented upwards until the Federal Government would receive the least power and only those powers which were furthest from the citizens as those powers were to be retained at the governance closest to the people and most readily monitored and corralled by the citizens. The Constitution went even further in limiting the powers of the Federal Government in that it spent more words forbidding powers to the Federal Government than granting it powers.

 

It would be an impossible argument to try and claim that as time has passed that the Americans as a peoples have strayed from their strict religious beliefs and are now at best evenly divided between religiously observant and largely secular. If one were to query a plurality of Americans as to where their rights originate, they would likely say they were granted by the government and likely the Federal Government. This is exactly the opposite of the ideas that were the underpinning of the intentions and inspirations of the Founding Fathers. This belief has become so widespread that the Federal Government does not even pretend to follow the restriction on their powers as delineated in the Constitution. This has been a growing problem which found its origins in the humanist movement which really gained steam at the turn of the twentieth century. The prominence of the humanist, secular humanist in particular, was given a huge impetus with the writings of two men of science, the first being Charles Darwin and the second Sigmund Freud. Between these two gentlemen much of what had been wonder and the purview of the Creator were now reassigned to the purviews of science and given Earthly explanations. This drove the movement that culminated in <a href=http://www.usconstitution.net/xconst_Am17.html?ModPagespeed=noscript>Amendment 17</a> to the Constitution which stripped the States of their representation at the Federal Level thus removing the power to limit the powers stolen from the States by the Federal Government which over time allowed the Federal Government to gather far superior power over that of the States and other local governances. This inverted the power curve from G0d – People – Local Governments – State Governments – Federal Government to the new divisions of power which now appears to closely resemble Federal Government – State Governments – Local Governments – People. When the followers of secular humanism rearranged the structures of power in the governance of the United States they not only inverted the entire power curve, they removed the Creator from the picture completely and placed the Federal Government as the originator of all powers, rights, and grantor of all privilege. The same year that Amendment 17 was ratified there was another, namely Amendment 16. This permitted the Federal Government to collect an income tax from the people which further placed the peoples under the thumb of the Federal Government as the governance now had a direct access to one’s wealth.

 

Once the Federal Government inverted the entire power structure which had been implemented under the system designed by the Founding Fathers it began to take over those areas which had been relegated to religion and seen as the place where religion and thus G0d was responsible. Such areas included assisting those who were in need, those unable to care for themselves, feeding the hungry, assisting those who were unemployed, the homeless, providing for the education of the people, providing health care, childcare of orphans, and all distribution of charity. One by one the government took control of these areas with the concept that the government would provide such care without subjecting those who were in need with sermons and other pressures which religious institutions were presumably guilty of forcing upon those they helped. The fact that a church run soup kitchen might impinge upon those receiving their food that they say a prayer and listen to hymns while they ate was cast as being an unnecessary victimization on those who were needy. Why should anybody have to put up with such an imposition of their sensibilities just to receive a meal. Government was going to save these needy people from such an imposition. Government took over the care for children in orphanages with the reasoning that the government would be more suitable and particular when choosing adoptive parents and this would free those seeking to adopt from the possibility for meeting unnecessary religious requirements. The result was that the main determination for adopting a child became more aligned with wealth or who one knows than more humanistic qualities. Unemployment, charity, you name it and the government crept in and usurped responsibility replacing religion in every sector of our society. By the end of this year the government will be well on their way to replacing religion in its last bastion, hospital and health care. The death knell for religious provided health care is known as Obama Care which will slowly morph health care in ways that will wrest it from the hands of religious institutions eventually making government the sole provider for health care just as they have taken over every other area in society which once was provided by religious institutions. This was not done by accident as government was seeking to replace religion and replace G0d as the originator and guarantor of rights and freedoms. Let us pray that when we find that we the people can no longer suffer the overreach and domination of government over the individual that we can find the strength of character and the power of faith and trusting in our Creator take back from government those rights and privileges it has stolen from us the people and return the balance of power such that the people are under the protection of G0d and not the vassals under government.

 

Beyond the Cusp

 

The Untouchable Side to Illegal Immigration

Whether you call it amnesty, path to citizenship, legal registration process or other more involved description masking the true legal approach to illegal immigration, eventually deportation must be a part of the solution. Would I desire that every single person who can be technically described as an illegal immigrant be deported? Even in a perfect world that would be heartless solution to a very small percentage of what we now euphemistically call undocumented workers, paperless immigrants, extra-legal refugee or any other reference carefully crafted to avoid any mention of lawlessness. The case of an immigrant who was brought into the United States illegally at an age under ten and has spent as much as twenty years going to school who has a pliable skill and solid employment record or has sufficient grades proving their intent to live a productive life, for these exceptional cases we should find an inventive way of allowing them to remain as they have been raised pretty much as an American. But as far as the vast majority of illegal immigrants who are found in the United States should be deported and maybe, if they have no criminal record other than their illegal entry into the country, allowed to automatically begin the regular process to immigrate and be placed at the back of the line and allowed to go through the system in order to legally enter the United States. Should anything else be done regarding immigration? I believe most who have studied the immigration problems have agreed that the current system is extremely broken. We should definitely revamp and modernize our immigration processes and make the whole system more user-friendly and efficient. The stories of people going through decades of paperwork, interviews and other bureaucratic intricacies and requirements are completely unacceptable. There has to be a better way, a more efficient process, especially in the modern age of computers. The other side of any upgrading to the immigration system is to initiate a responsive system which can adapt to and shift in the nation’s needs or requirements for which immigrants can be chosen as a solution. It would only be logical to tailor the people we bring into the country with areas where the country has a need for additional workers immediately. We might also want to return to the previous idea of immigrants being required to have a sponsor or group of sponsors who will be responsible for aiding the new immigrant in their adjustments and making their way on the path to citizenship. The intent of immigration is to facilitate an orderly manner for integrating people into the fabric of the society as seamlessly and orderly as we are able.

The one statement that is used ad-nauseum which is really an insult and completely violates all sense of fairness is that we cannot deport these illegal immigrants as that would be unfair and impossible to accomplish. It is always pointed out that should we even claim to intend to deport these people that they will simply go further underground and become impossible to root out and we would not be capable of deporting all of them even under the best of conditions. The fact that it might be difficult to attempt to find and deport the vast majority of illegal immigrants who are deemed undesirable to offer a path to legalization or even citizenship, is not a valid argument under any consideration. An analogous claim would be that the police are unable to catch every person who exceeds the speed limit, then the police should simply ignore anybody they witness speeding. The same comparison holds for every single crime on the books such as murder, theft, armed robbery, or even acts of terrorism. The public would never accept the authorities to ignore terrorist acts so why should they accept such an approach to illegal immigration? Often the first step to perpetrating an act of terrorism is preceded by an act of illegal immigration. Even if the government simply required that whenever the police interact with people in the performance of executing their charge that they check their citizenship and for any noncitizen they run a full check on their immigration status and hold until deported any person found to be here illegally, whether they entered illegally or simply have remained beyond their visa limitations or otherwise are violating their visa requirements. The government cannot claim that they did not find a fair number of illegal immigrants simply through traffic stops for speeding or other motor vehicle violations, not to mention those who were arrested for more serious criminal offenses.

Another action which must be taken immediately is to disallow any State, County, City, Township, or other defined district from the practice of harboring illegal immigrants declaring themselves as sanctuary zones. Such designated places where Federal laws concerning individuals crossing the nation’s borders are disregarded and left unenforced are a breakdown of Constitutional law, particularly the Fourteenth Amendment. The concept of equal enforcement under the law enumerated within the Fourteenth Amendment is a double bladed sword in that it not only means that all people are entitled to equal rights and protections under the law but also they are required to fulfill equal obedience and face equal enforcement under the law. Your and my citizenship becomes meaningless when illegal immigrants are treated as equal to a citizen, and this is a compromise which should enrage the average citizen, especially those who are legal immigrants and went through what is a painstakingly drawn-out form-filled undertaking in order to be considered equal as citizens. What greater insult could any nation commit to those who played by the rules than to allow those who flaunted the rules and took a completely illegal shortcut and are granted equal rights, treatment and status as those who suffered the entire legal processes.

There is another reason for not granting the vast majority of illegal immigrants a path to legal status and that is the future treatment of illegal immigrants and the likelihood that such opportunists will do what it takes to gain entrance by other than legal means. When the United States first granted amnesty to the vast majority of illegal immigrants during the 1980s with a guarantee that tighter enforcement of the borders would be enacted subsequent to the granting citizenship a funny thing happened, the enforcement was never enacted and the border remained a sieve. That amnesty granted instant path to citizenship for approximately 2.7 million illegal immigrants. By granting amnesty the United States set a precedent of taking the easiest way to enforcing immigration law, namely ignoring it. This precedent was not lost on the millions who desired to become American citizens or at least gain some form of legal status to remain in the United States but felt they would be unable to gain such legally or simply had no desire to obey the laws of the country in which they desired to live. Thanks to the lack of dedication to the law or to their promises, the Congress did nothing in the follow-up to the amnesty legislation with even the slightest action towards closing the border. The truth is that in many ways the borders of the United States are less secure today than they had been before the 1986 amnesty legislation. The proof of this is the fact that there are now an estimated 9 to 11 million illegal immigrants with some estimates reaching past 20 million illegal immigrants. The border security has mostly remained the same as the tunnels and methods of infiltration have dramatically increased in capabilities and sophistication. There have been some minor improvements and half-measures with some minor local improvements which are mostly credited to the individual states’ efforts.

The Congress is once again discussing what they euphemistically call Comprehensive Immigrations Reform. If history is to be trusted as insight, they may as well call what they are discussing Comprehensive Blind Eye Solution Avoidance Amnesty Program. There does exist one item about immigration reform which makes it unique from everything else in Washington; it is bipartisan in that both the Democrat and Republican Parties are equally to blame as neither actually desires to prevent the influx of illegal immigrants, though for very different reasons. The Democrats see the illegal immigrants as future Democrat voters while the Republicans see the illegal immigrants as inexpensive and even sub-minimum wage workers. Both parties are showing a lack of respect for the individual immigrants as they both see them as faceless masses they can take advantage of with little regard for their humanity. It is probably the fact that these people are allowed to live at the fringes of our society and are only viewed as statistical objects which can be utilized to fulfill certain objectives without any concern for their actual wellbeing. Such attitudes are dehumanizing and should disgust any righteous person who holds their fellow humans as precious in their own way. Even if it is only so that all people who enter and live in the United States are legal, thus holding complete and guaranteed Constitutional rights and are equal before the law, granting all a status worthy of respect and equality while not forcing people to live in the margins with meager means and no recourse against mistreatment due to illegal status; that is a sufficient and noble enough a reason for proper and comprehensive immigrations reform. This can only be accomplished by making the border closed so tight that we will detect ants crossing in real time and also have the ability and staffing to intercept any smuggling of people or contraband with near 100% efficiency and effectiveness. It honestly is a matter of human rights and respect for all humanity that demands the border be enforced and all immigrants are legal.

Beyond the Cusp

Can the Republican Party be Saved?

Recently the Republican hierarchy released their report detailing the problems the party is facing and attempting to detail the deficiencies and propose solutions. There were numerous voting blocs where they also found problems. One prime example was their losing the under thirty vote by at least a ratio of three to one. Other such blocs included single women, the less well off, almost the entirety of minority voters, and so forth. From what I saw it was possibly debatable if they even won a majority of the registered Republicans. Ok, I made that up but it was really almost that bad. They also found that they managed to receive fewer votes in every voting group over the results from four years earlier. Somehow the Republicans with candidate Romney were unable to even hold on to the McCain voters as they received fewer votes across the board in this last election. As horrible as this news was it was not as unsettling as the solutions the report provided. The main gist of the offered solution was to move the candidates and campaigns to align them closer to the Democrat message.

My bet is should they pursue this path it will lead to the death of the Republican Party. When the base voters who are the lifeblood of your political party are not getting to the polls your problem is not that you are too far removed from the other party, it is that you are not offering them anything distinctly different from the other party. The solution is not to attempt to be perceived as the Democrat Lite Party but to be the heart and soul Republican Party. Show a difference and celebrate that difference. The Republican Party has not given the feeling that they are proud, confident, or even that they believe in their party. They sound almost apologetic whenever they sound all that different from what the Democrats stand for. If you want a near perfect example of the real problem is that is cursing the Republicans all you need to do is listen to the “old guard” of the GOP during the debates on virtually any legislation where immigration reform is one of the most glaring examples. Another problem is the seeming lack of unity and cooperation between the different factions that make up the Republican Party. Sometimes it appears as if as a whole the Republicans do not stand unified for anything and are without honest and driving principles. We had a perfect example after Rand Paul’s efforts to make a serious protest over the evasiveness and apparent policy which would allow the use of drone strikes on American civilians inside the country’s borders in place of arrests and a trial if the President so deemed necessary with his thirteen hour filibuster and a number of the senior Republican Senators demeaned his efforts on the floor of the Senate. Such disagreements should never be fought out in the public square but should be discussed and resolved within the party. When was the last time you heard one Democrat Senator demean another Democrat on the floor of the Senate? Such would never happen as the Democrats have party discipline and would not stand for parading the party laundry in public.

Another problem the Republican Party needs to work on is simply getting their message out and being heard. Since the mainstream press is actually a willing partner in any Democrat candidate’s campaign, the Republicans have to find a delivery for their message which does not rely on the mainstream press. They definitely need to work on their Internet usage and make more and better use of U-tube, Twitter, Facebook, and all other forms of social media as well as blogs and the new media. There are a good number of conservative bloggers who would be anxious to support getting the republican message out if they only would be included in the campaign planning and get some assistance in coordinating with the candidate. They could offer releases to these bloggers once they had compiled an extensive list. But the most important challenge facing the Republican Party hierarchy and planners is a message around which the membership can rally and be excited over. The current state of the Republican can be summed up in two words, disjointed disarray. Until they can establish something that can be advertised as the Republican core beliefs around which every party candidate tailors their message, the Republican Party will continue to wander leaderless in the political wastelands.

Beyond the Cusp