The Patriot's Declaration of Solidarity

The resurgence of the Patriot Movement, otherwise known as the Tea Party Movement, has risen from amongst the citizenry of the United States in protest toward the abuse of federal power through the use of oppressive policy actions.
We, who love the United States of America, believe in the universality of the unalienable rights of life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness as granted to every American by Almighty God and stated as such by the Founders of this country in the Declaration of Independence. We uphold our Constitution, complete with all of its amendments as the sine qua non of our 234-year existence. We, who love our country, are concerned with the regression of the original intent and purpose of our Federal Government that is to establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defence, promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity,
We, as protestors by right of the First Amendment, hereby impeach our national leaders, many of whom claim to represent the Republican Party and who do not, and most national leaders who are Democrats and who fail to represent American economic and social tradition. Recognizing that there are some elected leaders, representative of both political parties, true public servants who are their constituents’ voice in Washington, we acknowledge their service and we exclude them from the grievances contained herein. We do, however, accuse the majority of our elected officials, calling them unfit to serve. To prove this, let Facts be submitted to a candid world.
The President, with the consent of Congress, has violated our traditional economic system of Capitalism by taking control, via the federally-funded Troubled Asset Relief Programs (TARP), of the private sector. Examples of this include the entire banking and investment industry and two-thirds of American automobile manufacturers.
The President, with the consent of Congress, has promoted policy that is based upon faulty, deceptive, and incomplete scientific information known not to be in the best interest of the Nation such as Cap and Trade legislation.
The President, with the consent of Congress, has neglected to provide for or hindered the common defense by acting indecisively with regard to our military missions in the Middle East in the ongoing War on Terror, he has rescinded the Don’t Ask Don’t Tell (DADT) policy, and he has weakened intelligence-gathering through the outlawing of important interrogation techniques.
The President, with the consent of Congress, is guilty of several counts of broken oral contracts with the citizenry; generally, by not acting in a transparent manner with regard to legislation, and specifically, by not allowing access by the citizenry to proposed legislation in a timely manner. Further, he blatantly promotes earmarked Congressional spending after promising to eliminate them.
The President, with no subsequent Congressional censure, has misrepresented the United States to other countries as “arrogant”, as not a Judao-Christian nation, and as apologetic for political and military actions performed in the past.
The President and the Congress employ fear tactics to create panic amongst the citizenry, as evidenced by the policy introduced by Secretary of Homeland Security, Janet Napolitano, seeking out “groups and individuals that are dedicated to a single issue, such as opposition to abortion or immigration,” and includes those “rejecting federal authority in favor of state or local authority.”
The President, with the consent of Congress, fails to respect the value of human life as demonstrated by his promotion of abortion and euthanasia.
The President, in collusion with certain Representatives and Senators, has used coercion to achieve political success. Bribery in the form of promised federal funds has been made to some members of Congress who once opposed health care reform legislation.
The President, with the consent of Congress, has engaged in abuse of power by his misinterpretation of Executive Orders, and by expanding centralized powers through appointing Executive Branch employees otherwise known as “czars”. He has, in effect, “erected a multitude of New Offices, and sent them hither swarms of Officers to harass our people, and eat out their substance”.
The President, with Congressional approval, has attempted to subvert individual liberty and encroach on personal privacy through Internal Revenue Service fines sanctioned by the recently-introduced health care reform and climate change bills.
Our President, with the consent of Congress and the U.S. Attorney General, has weakened our political and economic stature with regard to the rest of the world by trying terrorist war criminals in civil court rather than by proper military tribunal. Additionally, in the same manner, he has de-valued the meaning behind United States citizenship.
Our current Government has imposed Taxes, tariffs, and fees on us and legitimate global trade partners without our consent. It has nullified, in many cases, States’ rights as authorized by the Tenth Amendment wherein it states that “The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people”.
Most members of Congress have turned humble public servanthood into a mockery. They have selfishly put the needs of themselves above the citizens whom they represent through careerism. Therefore, we no longer can rely on the ballot box to ensure term limits and must turn instead to a Constitutional amendment.
We have lost all manner of good faith and trust in our elected leaders because of their rampant insincerity, dishonesty, and disgraceful moral character.
We, the citizens of the United States, are falsely misrepresented by those whom we have elected to represent us. We make our will known to them with regard to legislation and governance, yet they refuse to yield to our preferences.
Be it resolved that
Whereas our President has not yet attained the position of true Tyrant, many policies of the present Administration as well as the manifestations of several Congressional actions and tactics are leading these United States toward that form of dictatorial oppression, and
Whereas the purist form of economic freedom lies within the precepts of free-market capitalism, yet our elected officials seek to restrict free trade with its requisite successes and failures, by promoting Socialism and thereby not following the enumerated powers of the Constitution, and
Whereas the American people are weary of an oversized, overbearing, inefficient, and costly Federal Government,
We, the Patriots of the United States of America, therefore, make this Declaration of Solidarity in an effort to define our position and to avow to work tirelessly in order to realize a return to Constitutional Government under God, of the people, by the people, and for the people.

Respectfully submitted,
Robert B. Thompson

A Great Example to the World

Former White House Correspondent for ABC News, Brit Hume, who now is a senior political analyst for Fox News, is catching all manner of flack because of his recent comments regarding golfer Tiger Woods. Woods, you may know, is being accused of numerous extra-marital affairs.

The flack began flying just after the Sports segment of an airing of Fox News, when Mr. Hume stated that he thought Tiger Woods would "recover as a golfer", but it was uncertain whether he would personally recover his familial relationships. Hume offered some personal spiritual advice to Woods during this same commentary that Woods should "turn to the Christian faith, and [he] can make a total recovery and be a great example to the world"

First, I applaud Brit Hume for not being ashamed to speak openly about Christianity. Obviously, Hume spoke from his heart, offering sound advice to Woods as if they were close friends. It was done in Christian love. One could argue that Fox News is not the forum for spiritual matters, but then isn't every opportunity a forum for such things? Isn't the idea of evangelism to bloom where you're planted, performing the Lord's work within your own sphere of influence? Sure it is.

Our Sunday School discussion this morning (Mathews Baptist Church) revolves around the Bible story of Ruth and Naomi, who, contrary to GLAAD, were not lesbians. Putting that aside, our discussion was about redemption, Jewish law, Levirate marriage, and how Boaz redeemed Ruth. It is one of many allegorical stories of salvation that point to the ultimate redemption of mankind through the sacrifice of Jesus Christ. The big question put to us today was "How do you explain redemption in the Christian sense to a non-believer?"

Several people in our class offered various explanations. They each had parts that were useful but no one succinctly stated an easy answer. I withheld my own S & H Greenstamps analogy for two reasons, first being that most people there wouldn't have known what I was talking about; and second, it was hardly succinct.

Okay, I'll try to be brief: With S & H, many different merchants would give out little stamps (like they do with coupons today) whenever you purchased goods. Usually you'd receive them when you bought gasoline or groceries. You'd then paste them in special S & H stamp books and when you'd amassed a certain number of filled books, you could come in to your local Sperry and Hutchinson (S & H) merchandise store and redeem your books for certain items, depending on how many books S & H required. E.g., if you needed Dining Room furniture, S & H might give you a table and chairs for 175 completed stamp books. A table radio might only require 25 books. I have no idea how many stamps it took to get anything--I just remember helping my mom glue them in and actually going to the merchandise store back when I was about four or five years old.

Anyway, I thought it out this way: our lives would be represented by the stamp books. All of our faults, failures and sinful nature would be glued into our own compilation of books. All of the features/rewards of Christianity like eternal life in Heaven, communion with God, peace of mind, forgiveness, the fruits of the Spirit, etc. would be the items found in the ultimate S & H store that I would call Christianity. God, the owner of the store, would send His manager, Jesus, to wait on you, giving you everything in the store by redeeming all of your stamp books.

It was the consensus that, unless there was divine intervention and/or a personal epiphany, it would be difficult to succeed in just one sitting. I'd like to go ahead and concede here that the S & H example would be, in fact, several painful sittings where the listener would convert to something simpler!

Brit Hume mentioned that he didn't "think that [Tiger Woods' Buddhist] faith offers the kind of forgiveness and redemption that is offered by the Christian faith." His statement here could be a lead-in for Woods (who apprently doesn't have his moral life together, based upon "news" reports) to reflect on redemption. This could be the seed that needed to be planted.

Perhaps Mr. Hume's remarks will lead to Mr. Woods' salvation and he will be as successful on and off of the green. Even in the sad case that it doesn't save Tiger Woods, millions of viewers around the globe heard this story. St. Paul wrote in I Corinthians 9:22, "I have become all things to all men so that by all possible means I might save some." It is impossible to quantify the results of Brit Hume's efforts, but, using his own words in this case, he is a great example to the world.