Saying No to Justice

Why I declined to meet with the President’s Detention Policy Task Force.

By Andrew C. McCarthy

I did something today that I’ve never done before. The Department of Justice, which I proudly served for a quarter century as an assistant U.S. attorney and a deputy U.S. marshal, asked me for help, and I declined. Actually, what I declined to do was attend a meeting. My hope is that the dissent I am registering — to the administration’s disastrous policies of releasing trained terrorists and threatening prosecution against government lawyers — will help the department and the Obama administration, even if they don’t want to hear it. At the start of his term, President Obama directed Attorney General Eric Holder to head up the President’s Detention Policy Task Force to study detention, trial, and other issues relating to alien enemy combatants — though that venerable law-of-war term has been purged in favor of “individuals captured or apprehended in connection with armed conflicts and counterterrorism operations.” The attorney general has assigned lawyers in the department’s Counterterrorism Division to organize the effort. Those lawyers invited me, among other former and current prosecutors experienced in terrorism and national-security matters, to attend a roundtable session next week, to sort through the vexing legal challenges of modern international terrorism. I’ve declined the invitation. It pained me to do it. I’ve always believed enforcing our laws and defending our nation are duties of citizenship, not ideology. My conservative political views aside, I regularly make myself available to liberal and conservative groups, to Democrats and Republicans, if they think tapping my national-security or law-enforcement experience would be beneficial.

This time, though, I had to say no. As I explain to Attorney General Holder in a letter, which was posted this morning on the website of the National Review Institute, I declined for two reasons.

First, President Obama and Attorney General Holder have created an untenable situation for lawyers asked to advise the government on policy matters.

Former Justice Department attorneys John Yoo (now a law professor at Berkeley) and Jay Bybee (now a federal appeals-court judge in California), as well as other government attorneys, were asked during the emergency conditions that followed the 9/11 attacks to advise Bush administration policymakers on U.S. interrogation law. They did that in good faith and, despite the fact that it’s now de rigueur to castigate them, quite reasonably (as I’ve argued in an online Federalist Society debate, see here). For their service to our country, they are now being tormented by the Obama administration with both a criminal investigation and an ethics inquiry by Justice’s Office of Professional Responsibility. (There have even been calls on the left for Judge Bybee’s impeachment, which — even if he had done something wrong years earlier as a Justice Department lawyer — would be absurd: The Constitution reserves judicial impeachment for misconduct committed during the judge’s tenure on the bench, and Bybee is an excellent judge.)

A little over a week ago, the Obama administration recklessly revealed publicly (i.e., to al-Qaeda) the details of enhanced interrogation tactics used by the CIA against top-tier terrorists. The decision to employ these tactics was not made by Yoo, Bybee, or other government lawyers. They did not look to press these practices on government agents. Rather, the CIA initiated the controversy by asking for clarification of its authority. President Bush and his top national-security officials, including CIA Director George Tenet, were responsible for making the policy. The attorneys merely gave their best legal advice — the policymakers didn’t have to follow it, and it was the CIA, not the lawyers, that conducted questioning and made judgments about how it was affecting the terrorists.

Yet President Obama’s antiwar base is in a froth — so much so that he has unleashed his Justice Department to criminalize political disputes after claiming for weeks that he did not want to do this. And the president is being a bully about it. He obviously doesn’t want to incur the wrath of leaking spooks, so he has said CIA agents won’t be investigated (the right result reached for self-interested reasons). He hasn’t worked up the nerve to go after his predecessor, who ordered the policy, and Tenet — a Democrat and one of Bush’s Clinton-holdovers — is another politically inconvenient target. That leaves the lawyers — relatively unknown and thus easily demonized — as the feast for the piranhas.

Any experienced prosecutor would know there is no criminal case here. And let’s assume you think the lawyers gave bad advice — as many say they do, particularly if they haven’t read the memos. Bad legal advice given in good faith is not an ethical violation. There’s not a lawyer in America who hasn’t given bad legal advice at some point — certainly not in the government. It is disgraceful to target these lawyers for this kind of persecution, to force them to retain counsel to defend their wartime service to the country, and to put them in fear of criminal, professional, and financial repercussions. It should be offensive to all people of good will, regardless of their politics or of where they come out on the explosive issue of coercive interrogation. We can arrive at a sound policy, or not, without demonizing our adversaries as crooks and cads.

But that’s not how the attorney general sees it. For all his confirmation-hearing talk about learning his lesson from the Marc Rich debacle and being strong enough to stand up to a president who tries to politicize the Justice Department, Holder took the buck that Obama decided stops at the Justice Department. The attorney general dutifully promised to “follow the evidence wherever it takes us.”

That puts every lawyer who is asked to advise the government on notice: If the Holder Justice Department decides your good-faith advice promoted what it considers illegal activity, you could face criminal prosecution or ruinous ethical charges. That turns out to be a problem for me.

The government has asked for my legal advice on detainees. And worse, I already know that Holder thinks the advice I would give counsels illegal activity. That is, I believe alien enemy combatants should be detained, until the conclusion of hostilities, at Guantanamo Bay (or someplace just like it). Yet, in a provocative speech in Germany on Wednesday, the attorney general framed that notion as a violation of “the rule of law.”
Continuing the new administration’s unbecoming propensity to vilify its predecessor, Holder told his audience, “Nothing symbolizes our [adminstration’s] new course more than our decision to close the prison at Guantanamo Bay. . . .  President Obama believes, and I strongly agree, that Guantanamo has come to represent a time and an approach that we want to put behind us: a disregard for our centuries-long respect for the rule of law.”

Was Holder just pandering, as he was when he called Americans “cowards” on the issue of race? Perhaps. From my perspective, though, I’m a lawyer who’s been asked to give advice to the government by an administration that says such advice could lead to criminal investigation and professional discipline. And although the advice I would give is firmly rooted in the laws of war, and was reaffirmed by the Supreme Court in the 2004 Hamdi decision, this administration regards such detention as running afoul of the rule of law. Thus, as I wrote to the attorney general:

Given your policy of conducting ruinous criminal and ethics investigations of lawyers over the advice they offer the government, and your specific position that the wartime detention I would endorse is tantamount to a violation of law, it makes little sense for me to attend the Task Force meeting. After all, my choice would be to remain silent or risk jeopardizing myself.

The second reason for declining the Justice Department’s request is that the exercise known as the “President’s Detention Policy Task Force” is a farce. The administration has already settled on a detainee policy: It is simply going to release trained jihadists. Holder said as much in his Germany speech. In the irrational world he inhabits, the existence of Guantanamo Bay, where dangerous terrorists cannot harm anyone, is more of a security threat than jihadists roaming free, plotting to menace and murder us. That’s why the administration just released Binyam Mohammed, who conspired with Khalid Sheikh Mohammed and “Dirty Bomber” Jose Padilla to execute post-9/11 bombings in American cities. That’s why Holder will soon announce (perhaps as early as today) that the Chinese Uighur detainees — who’ve been affiliated with a designated terrorist organization and who’ve received paramilitary training at al-Qaeda camps — will not only be set free in the United States but will, according to National Intelligence Director Dennis Blair, subsist on the support of the American taxpayer.

For all their talk about “the rule of law,” President Obama and Attorney General Holder have to know this policy is illegal. In 2005, Congress provided in the REAL ID Act that aliens who’ve been affiliated with a terrorist organization or who’ve received paramilitary training (which has been a staple of virtually every jihadist plot against the United States) are excludable from the United States. Moreover, even if the administration were not riding roughshod over federal immigration law, it is endangering the American people. The sophistry required to believe that having people who want to kill us locked up is more perilous than loosing them on civilian populations is so absurd it nearly defies description.

To satisfy his antiwar base and to put paid to commitments offered by his top campaign advisers (like Eric Holder), President Obama promised to close Guantanamo Bay within a year, despite having no plan for what to do about the terrorists there, many of whom cannot be tried under the standards of the civilian justice system. Military proceedings are anathema to the administration — many of whose lawyers either represented the Gitmo detainees or come from firms that did. (Holder’s former firm, for example, brags on its website that it represents detainees in their wartime lawsuits against the American people.) And the administration is evidently not very interested in exploring novel systems of preventive detention, such as my proposal for a “national security court,” which would require extensive legislative work. Instead, the Obama policy is simply to release our enemies — knowing many are certain to return to the jihad — if that’s what it takes to comply with the president’s promise to close Gitmo by January.

Consequently, the President’s Detention Policy Task Force is not an effort to arrive at the best counterterrorism policy. It is an effort to justify a bad policy that has already been made — to be able to tell the American people that this suicidal approach was arrived at in consultation with experienced terrorism prosecutors and national-security officials.

As I told the attorney general in my letter, “I am powerless to stop the president, as he takes these reckless steps, from touting his Detention Policy Task Force as a demonstration of his national security seriousness. But I can decline to participate in the charade.”

Cube-Steak Americans vs. The Wagyu-Beef White House

By Michelle Malkin
March 6, 2009

Maybe thrift isn't dead after all. The Year of the Bottomless Bailout has yielded a much needed correction in the lives of ordinary Americans. While fiscal restraint is AWOL in Washington, individual frugality has made a cultural comeback. Better late than never.

In large and small ways, we are cutting back. An online Zogby International survey this week reported that 70 percent of households are foregoing movies and restaurants. Forty percent of those polled said they were delaying the purchase of major items such as automobiles, home entertainment electronics or a computer; the same percent said they were giving up vacations. Notably, Reuters pointed out, "nearly 80 percent of younger adults, aged 18-29, said they have scaled back on going out, compared to 55 percent of people 65 years and older."

Pollster John Zogby called the results "depressing." I beg to differ. Out of necessity, a consumption-based society is learning to live within its means. For decades, government policies fueled that insatiable appetite -- and new government programs are desperately trying to preserve it. But the Obama administration's frantic efforts to encourage more brainless home buying, car buying and consumer borrowing aren't producing their desired results. Generational theft, it seems, has a silver lining.

The phenomenon is spreading beyond America's borders. London-based economic journalist Hamish McRae recently observed: "We may be on the cusp of a big socioeconomic shift. We have had half a century when the developed world has gradually moved away from regarding thrift as a virtue. It has moved at different speeds in different countries, faster in the U.S. and UK than in Germany or China. ... We have created the institutional structure that has supported this shift: from credit cards to collateralized debt obligations (CDOs).

The world has clearly reached a point where it can go no further down that road. ... The pendulum will swing back. How far and how fast we cannot tell, but we can be sure that debt will be regarded differently a generation from now."

President Obama, celebrated by his liberal media admirers for a miraculous ability to groove with the common man, hasn't yet caught on to the new age of individual austerity. As always, he talks a good game of "personal responsibility" and "sacrifice." But while penny-pinching Americans head to Sonic Drive-Ins for $1 everyday value meals or stay at home for cheap cube-steak dinners (sales of the inexpensive meat are up 10 percent), the White House serves up high-grade Wagyu beef to congressional revelers. The luxury item was on the menu for the bipartisan stimulus dinner in January, and was also served at the governors' dinner hosted at the White House two weeks ago.

Team Obama's image experts, perhaps hung over from all the Camelot-re-creating Wednesday cocktail parties that are now a signature of the new administration, have fallen down on the job. The man who scolded Americans for wasting energy and turning their thermostats too high still hasn't lowered his own. "He's from Hawaii, OK?" senior adviser David Axelrod snickered to The New York Times in January. "He likes it warm. You could grow orchids in there."

In flyover country, the mood could not be more different. Party time is over. I heard from a reader in northwest Arkansas, now upside down on her house with two college-age kids, who is preparing to tighten the family belt. President Obama, meet personal responsibility:

"We are ultimately responsible for the mess we are in. If my husband and I have to live in his pickup and get ready for work at the community gym, so be it. If we lose our jobs, we will move in with (my husband's) mother, and he will hunt and I will garden. We have never been on unemployment, welfare or other assistance. We are Americans. Our ancestors fought in the American Revolution, the Civil War, World War I, World War II, the Korean War, and his brother fought in Vietnam. Our family has faced tougher foes than this economy and Barack Obama. We will do as true Americans do; we will not whine, we will persevere."

Waste not, want not: Outside of Washington, it's the renewed American way.

Note: some may wonder what Wagyu beef is. If you have to ask then you are one of those....you know...er...cube steak Americans, aka, Chicken Fried Americans. At any rate, here is some info if you care; What Wagyu Beef Is

To heap more insult on us, guess who pays for this $150.00 per pound beef? That's right. You do. The American taxpayer.
While most of us working for a living and subsisting on fish heads and rice using your momma's recipe "1001 ways to make red beans and rice" daily, "Sponge" O'bama and the rest of his entourage are living high on the hog...er...well...high on expensive beef. Remember. Wednesday is party time at the White House.

A question for Spongebama. Since we, the taxpayers, are buying that expensive beef for you and your cronies to eat, don't you think the American taxpayer should at least be invited to the party??

UPDATE: White House nightlife under investigation

You angry yet? If not, why not?

Op-Ed: Moderates Make Me Want to Vomit!

H/T Fort Hard Knox.
By Jenn Sierra

Hey, that’s not my idea. That came from God:

“I know your works, that you are neither cold nor hot. I could wish you were cold or hot. So then, because you are lukewarm, and neither cold nor hot, I will vomit you out of My mouth…” - Revelation 3:15, 16 NKJV

I’ve been hearing lately from so many people who seem to believe that being a political “moderate,” during a time when our country is being destroyed is somehow a virtue. Some even have the gall to say, “Moderation in all things!” when challenged on this issue, as if their “moderation” is somehow condoned by God.

When asked, most of these “moderates,” couldn’t tell you where that phrase is in the Bible, or what the original context of it is. All they know is that it gives them a convenient excuse to occasionally postulate and opine on political events from their comfortable armchairs, but never actually take a stand or do anything - all supposedly with the blessing of their Creator.

Well, here’s that verse in the Bible - keep in mind that the chapter these verses are contained in was written to a bunch of very passionate, very radical (my our current definition of the word) church workers, evangelists, and ministers:

“Rejoice in the Lord always: and again I say, Rejoice.
“Let your moderation be known unto all men. The Lord is at hand.
“Be careful for nothing; but in every thing by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known unto God.” - Philippians 4:4-6 NKJV

The “moderation” Paul was talking about in these scriptures had nothing to do with refraining from getting too excited, or radical about anything. Paul, after all, was one of the most passionate Christians in history - he wrote a large portion of the New Testament, and was eventually beheaded for his fervor for God. The “moderation” spoken of in this passage relates to selflessness - eschewing an over-reliance on the things of this world for the work of God.

Political “moderates,” want to dabble a little on the right, then a little on the left. They want to try to stay popular with their friends on both sides of the fence. They want to avoid taking a stance on any issues for which they will be held responsible. Many simply enjoy amusing themselves by heckling and ridiculing those who are sincerely passionate about their beliefs, while never espousing any real beliefs or convictions of their own.

Political “moderates” often still haven’t decided on their way to the polls how they are going to vote. They end up making their decision based on some irrelevant “feeling,” or “whim,” or “funny” cartoon they read on the way. After they’ve voted they are not able to defend their decision in a way that makes sense to anyone - if, indeed, they can even remember who they voted for.

Much like the Christians in Name Only that John the Revelator wrote about in Revelations chapter 3, these political moderates are neither liberal nor conservative, and they make those of us (often on both sides) who have taken a stand want to puke. We wish they would just poop or get off the pot, already. We encourage them to quit straddling the fence - They look so silly there.

Politicians who dream of somehow reconciling the two very different visions for the future (one based on values, traditions, lessons learned by history, respect for our Creator, and the other based on the self-centerdness of man usurping the role of God and finding fulfillment in humanistic pursuits) are misguided.

There are some things you can’t reconcile: Oil and water, good and evil, left and right. Some things are opposites, and efforts to please everyone on both sides are doomed from the onset.

Moderates - quit deluding yourselves. You don’t look cute or clever. You look ignorant, and wish-washy. Political moderation is not a virtue - it’s simply a form of cowardice. It’s not an intellectually “elite” position; it’s a foolish one…which reminds me of another Bible quote about vomit:

“As a dog returns to his own vomit, so a fool repeats his folly. Do you see a man wise in his own eyes? There is more hope for a fool than for him.” -Proverbs 26:11, 12 NKJV

An Open Letter To Our New President

GOPUSA

By Doug Patton
February 2, 2009

Recently, you stated that: "There will be a time for profits...Now is not that time." Not since you made Joe the most famous plumber in America by telling him (and all of us) that you wanted to "spread the wealth around" have you been so transparent about your attitude toward the private sector.

You complain about "excessive" CEO salaries and bonuses. And I must admit that it strains credulity to imagine the chutzpah it takes for some of these companies to engage in such indulgences with both hands outstretched to the federal government for bailout dollars in numbers most of us can't even comprehend. It is unseemly at best to watch these jackals presiding over companies that are hemorrhaging buckets of red ink while they fly off into the sunset in their corporate jets with their golden parachutes -- paid for by American taxpayers.

Unfortunately, the same rules don't seem to apply to you and your cohorts in government. You have an equally arrogant, cavalier attitude toward the hard-working Americans who pay for your salary and your extravagant lifestyle. And you don't seem to play by the rules you create for the rest of us. Your new treasury secretary cheated on his taxes and yet was confirmed to oversee the Internal Revenue Service. Your nominee to run the health and human services department is the poster boy for limousine liberals who don't even pay for their limousines -- or at least not the taxes they owe on them. And your attorney general believes in pardons for terrorists and tax cheats.

Meanwhile, you and your Democrat Congress act as though the revenue you are using for your pork-laden bailouts and so-called stimulus packages just grew on the money tree in the back yard at the White House and is yours to do with as you see fit. Well, let me remind you of something, Mr. President: that money you are doling out is money my great-grandchildren haven't even earned yet. It is tax revenue your successor five presidents down the line will have to steal from them in order to pay for this madness.

The saddest thing about this whole scenario, Mr. President, is that you are killing the one entity in our society that is actually creating jobs. Any high school Economics 101 teacher can tell you that in good economic times, 75 percent of new jobs in this country are created by small, independently-owned businesses. In times like these, when corporate America is slashing workforces like mad, that number is 100 percent!

And yet who gets the bailouts? Joe the Plumber or Sam's Handyman Service, who eek out a living trying to find enough work to keep themselves and one or two employees afloat? No, it's Citibank and the bloated auto industry. We're told that they are "too big to fail."

Well, let me tell you something, Mr. President. Granted, it would be a pretty big ripple through the economy if General Motors went under. But if you put every small entrepreneur in this country out of business, our economy, as we know it, will be gone.

Mr. President, small business owners are being crushed by a largely hysteria-created recession. Their credit has been cut off because of the irresponsible behavior of Members of Congress and the greed of some on Wall Street. These entrepreneurs aren't asking for a bailout. They just want you and your bloated, obstructionist government to get out of their way!

Not the time for profits, indeed! With all due respect, this is precisely the time when businesses need profits.
But then, the ignorant souls who voted for you -- many of whom don't even pay taxes -- have so wrapped yourselves in victim status and class envy that they are cheering you on as their new Fairness Czar; so I guess I don't expect you to listen to me. I won't have a real say in the matter again until the first Tuesday after the first Monday of November 2012. See you then.

Respectfully,
Doug Patton

An American taxpayer

---

Doug Patton is a freelance columnist who has served as a political speechwriter and policy advisor to conservative candidates, elected officials and public policy organizations. His weekly columns are published in newspapers across the country and on selected Internet web sites, including Human Events Online and GOPUSA.com, where he is a senior writer and state editor. Readers may e-mail him at dougpatton@cox.net.

Mark Steyn: Stimulated right into being another Europe

By Mark Steyn

Plan also could trigger protectionist backlash, just like during the Depression.

Nancy Pelosi, Speaker of the House, is on TV explaining the (at this point the congregation shall fall to its knees and prostrate itself) "stimulus." "How," asks the lady from CBS, "does $335 million in STD prevention stimulate the economy?"

"I'll tell you how," says Speaker Pelosi. "I'm a big believer in prevention. And we have, er… there is a part of the bill on the House side that is about prevention. It's about it being less expensive to the states to do these measures."

Makes a lot of sense. If we have more STD prevention, it will be safer for loose women to go into bars and pick up feckless men, thus stimulating the critical beer and nuts and jukebox industries. To do this, we need trillion-dollar deficits, which our children and grandchildren will have to pay off, but, with sufficient investment in prevention measures, there won't be any children or grandchildren, so there's that problem solved.

The more interviews Speaker Pelosi gives explaining how vital the STD industry is to restarting the U.S. economy, the more I find myself hearing "syphilis" every time she says "stimulus." In late September, America was showing the first signs of "primary stimulus" – a few billion lesions popping up on the rarely glimpsed naughty bits of the economy: the subprime mortgage racket, the leverage kings. Now, the condition has metastasized in a mere four months into the advanced stages of "tertiary stimulus," with trillions of hideous, ever more inflamed pustules sprouting in every nook and cranny as the central nervous system of the body politic crumbles into total insanity – until it seems entirely normal for the second in line of presidential succession to be on TV gibbering away about how vital the federalization of condom distribution is to economic recovery.

The rules in this new "post-partisan" era are pretty simple: If the Democratic Party wants it, it's "stimulus." If the Republican Party opposes it, it's "politics" – as in headlines like this: "Obama Urges GOP To Keep Politics To A Minimum On Stimulus." These are serious times: As the president says, it's the worst economic crisis since the Thirties. So politicians need to put politics behind them and immediately lavish $4.19 billion on his community-organizing pals at the highly inventive "voter registration" group ACORN for "neighborhood stabilization activities."

"Neighborhood stabilization activities." That sounds like a line item from the Baath Party budget when Saddam sends the lads in to gas the Kurds. What does it mean in a nontotalitarian sense? Do you need a federally subsidized condom to do it? If so, will a pathetic $4.19 billion be enough?

"Stimulus" comes from the verb "stimulare," which is Latin for "transfer massive sums of money from what remains of the dynamic sector of the economy to the special interests of the Democratic Party." No, hang on, my mistake. "Stimulare" means "to goad." And, on that front, the Democrats are doing an excellent job. They've managed to goad 58 percent of the American people into opposing the "stimulus" package. They've managed to goad all 117 Republicans in the House into unpacking their mothballed cojones and voting against the bill. And they've managed to goad the rest of the world into ending the Obama honeymoon in nothing flat. Headline from the London Daily Telegraph:

"U.S.-EU Trade War Looms As Barack Obama Bill Urges 'Buy American.'"

That would be the provision in the Senate bill prohibiting any foreign-made goods from being used in "stimulus" projects. So, if you own a rubber plantation in Malaysia, and you're hoping for a piece of Nancy Pelosi's condom action, forget it. The EU Trade Commissioner is outraged at the swaggering cowboy Obama shooting from the hip and unilaterally banning European goods from American soil. But so are American companies such as General Electric. Bill Lane, an executive honcho with Caterpillar (the 10th-biggest U.S. investor in the United Kingdom), says, "We are students of history. A major reason a very deep recession turned into the Great Depression was the fact that countries turned inward." Ah, yes. The Buy American Act of 1933. How'd that work out?

Even without Speaker Pelosi talking STDs on the evening news, there is danger here for the new administration. Setting aside the more messianic effusions ("We needed him. And out of that great need," gushed Maya Angelou, "Barack Obama came") as unbecoming to the freeborn citizens of a constitutional republic, it seems clear that large numbers of people voted for this president because they wanted something different, something other than "politics as usual." Not just something pseudo-different like the dreary maverickiness of John McCain "reaching across the aisle" (one of those dead phrases no one outside the Beltway gives a hoot about), but something really different. But the "stimulus" package is just politics as usual with a few extra zeros on the end. Will you notice anything? No. Don't get your hopes up. If you're broke now, you'll be broke in October. The Congressional Budget Office estimates only 25 percent of it will be spent by early next year. The other 75 percent is as stimulating as the gal in the Nancy Pelosi Pussycat Lounge telling you she had such a good time she's penciled in a second date for spring 2010. A third of all the spending won't come until after 2011.

In a media age, politics is a battle of language, and "stimulus" is too good a word to cede to porked-up statist hacks. "Stimulus" has to stimulate – i.e., it's short-term, like, say, an immediate cut in payroll taxes that will put real actual money in your pocket in next month's paycheck. That way, you don't need to wait for ACORN: You can start "stabilizing" your own "neighborhood" right now.

But, if this fraudulent "stimulus" does pass, it will, in fact, destimulate, and much more than the disastrous protectionist measures of the Thirties did: Back then, America was dealing with a far less globalized economy, and with far fewer competitors. "In the long run, we are all dead," Lord Keynes, the newly fashionable economist, famously said. But, if this bill passes, in the medium term we're all dead. It's a massive expansion of the state in the same direction that has brought sclerosis to Europe. A report issued last week in London found that government spending now accounts for 49 percent of the UK economy – and in the Celtic corners of the kingdom the state's share of the economy is way higher, from 71.6 percent in Wales to 77.6 percent in Northern Ireland. In the Western world, countries that were once the crucible of freedom are slipping remorselessly into a thinly disguised serfdom in which an ever higher proportion of your assets are annexed by the state as super-landlord. Big government is where nations go to die – not in Keynes' "long run," but sooner than you think.
©MARK STEYN

It Isn't Easy Being a Saint

Pajamas Media

By Victor Davis Hanson
January 25, 2009

All of you readers have had this odd experience. Just remember a bit. Someone you know, even know well, whom you thought was reasonably conservative, if perhaps at least a centrist, who would have welcomed a McCain “moderate” campaign, rather than a hard-core conservative candidacy, suddenly, without warning in a conversation, perhaps over the phone, confesses that he was voting for Obama!

And he was not just voting for Obama, but doing so in almost teen-aged hysterical fashion. I’m not talking of a Colin Powell phenomenon, but someone who had no political interests or career concerns, or need for psychological remissions of sins, someone whose entire political philosophy was seemingly antithetical to Obamism.

It made no sense, you thought, given that the apostate’s previous protestations about being conservative, but not a Bush conservative, would have led naturally to an affinity for McCain. After that you had the weird feeling, perhaps as you remember in the Invasion of the Body Snatchers, that anyone at anytime could wake up and almost zombie like not seem like he was before, but apparently docile, happy, and eager to join an entirely new centrally-guided paradigm that would prove for us new automatons to be in our best interests.

This occurred to me on at least ten occasions, with long-time friends, some familiar pundits, and a few in government no less. So I came to appreciate the power of the Obama rhetoric. And there was power too in the desire for change after eight years, and an understandable yearning for our first African-American President.

I was writing a TMS column today on Obama’s soaring rhetoric and the impossible expectations that he imprisoned himself in, and began thinking back on the last two years. What explains his near miraculous rise, when pros had almost coronated Hillary and assured us she would trounce Giuliani?

I suppose Barack Obama made the nation giddy when he proclaimed there were no red and blue states, just Americans. He promised to unite us across political, racial, and religious lines. And for the age of cynicism there was something admirable to returning to the age of belief. For some in one fell swoop they were given exemption for all racial sins and now could continue to live as before-but relieved of white guilt. So we overlooked the racialist sermonizing from Michelle Obama, Barack’s occasional promises for reparations in deed not mere word, and the odd things that a Joseph Lowery said on Inauguration Day that were acceptable for a Civil Rights veteran but would have sent a white professor, journalist, or politician into the Don Imus stocks for a week or two.

Of course, during the campaign, some of us—dismissed as old and in the way, hoped and changed away white guys—suspected Obamania in part was a result of mere political rhetoric of the Huey Long or JFK sort. We remembered instead that his pastor Rev. Wright’s venom was not evidence of indiscretion but proof of clear serial hatred. We read carefully his platform and saw at best Carterism and at worse some half-baked European socialism that we now see imploding in Greece, Italy, or Spain.

Obama’s career in Chicago politics was all too familiar in such a landscape—friends acquired like convicted felon Tony Rezko and rival election candidates dropping out through law suits, or mysteriously being forced off the ballot due to leaks about their divorces. Only the genius of David Mamet could write its Chicago script.

And for all the talk of bipartisanship, candidate Obama had the most partisan record in the US Senate, and serially trashed right-wingers like Sean Hannety (and by extension his audience of 10 million) during the campaign. In fairness, I think he proved the nastier gutter fight than ambivalent Hamlet-like John McCain, who seemed at times he wished to lose nobly than sandbag the nation’s historic chance for a gifted African-American healer.

But then Obama was elected and as President promised, as most Presidents do, to bring us together. He met with conservative pundits, reappointed Bush’s Defense Secretary Robert Gates, and brought in scores of Clinton centrists to manage his administration. Bravo to all that.

Yet the old Obama is starting to appear as most of you astute readers knew he would. Not a word from him about what can, without hyperbole, be called a dishonest Charlie Rangel, a reprehensible Chris Dodd, and the inexplicable Barney Frank who goes barking from one mortgage/banking ethical lapse to another, confident that no Democrat will dare take him on (he enjoys the exemption accorded to the proverbial raving but glib street-corner prophet who accosts you, flips you off on the street, and shouts in your ear and in public all the way to the car before trying to mount the hood and grab the windshield wipers).

Obama loftily talked about a new ethics law outlawing lobbyists, even as he tried to get an exemption for Raytheon lobbyist William Lynn. The problems that surrounded Treasury-Secretary designate Timothy Geithner, or the “troubles” with Attorney General Eric Holder, and Gov. Bill Richardson border on old-style greed, careerism and conflict of interest—in other words, the normal sort of controversies that a politician routinely overcomes if he’s not a saint.

For all the talk of bipartisanship, Obama like Lord Xerxes on his throne nevertheless has got down and dirty and trashed Rush Limbaugh (and by extension his 20 million listeners) and boasted to the Republican opposition. “I won. I am the President”—in braggadocio that exceeded the “decider” George Bush’s. I suspect if the Blago tapes are ever released in their entirety Rahm Emanuel will sound more like Nixon to Halderman than earnestly discussing the rising oceans with St. Obama.

The problem with all this is not that Obama’s trying to wheel and deal and talk out of both sides of his mouth like Bill Clinton and others, but, far worse, is staring to appear ridiculous like Jimmy Carter, divinely talking down to us as mere mortals as he acts like a mere mortal.

So what for others might be written off as the usual hypocrisy and small-mildness—No More Lobbyists in Government—Just One More in Mine! / I’m Zeus on Olympos above mortal cares—but Sean and Rush really piss me off and I want to get even with both! /I’m a radical egalitarian, but please appoint Caroline Kennedy who endorsed me but otherwise seems dyslexic—proves toxic even if it comes out as hexameter verse from St. Obama. The wages of prophethood are heavy, and those who walk on water, and proclaim Vero Possumus! can endure no mortal sin. Will the media that was made to look foolish with tingling legs and tearing cheeks get fooled twice, as Obama the Saint and Obama the Chicago Politician begin to bifurcate?

You readers remember that sometime around mid 2007, Obama made a Faustian bargain. Without much national name, without a legislative record in Illinois or the US Senate, but with quite a lot of Chicago baggage, Obama gambled on the hope and change new persona (soon to be followed with the soaring FDR/MLK/JFK prose, Latinate seal, Greek architraves, Victory Column /Sermon on the Mount speeches, Father Abraham’s arrival to DC by slow-moving rail car (after flying back to Illinois by jet)). For much of the campaign, he either hoped that Tony Rezko, Bill Ayers, Rev. Wright, Father Pfleger and the other assorted Dailey/Blago baggage would not surface, or, if it did, he could hope and change them all away. And he did—brilliantly . And now they are history and those who dredge them up little more cranky sore-losing has-beens.

But as President, no matter how historic a candidacy (more astounding than any in American history), no matter how calm in the face of continuous pressure, no matter how brilliant in prepared and set oratory, one can’t get away with that disconnect forever. There is a reason why a plodding Ike and blunt Harry Truman were greater Presidents than even JFK—and why in 2-3 years even George Bush will begin to seem in retropect honest, sober, and straight-talking rather than word-mangling.

As a novice politician without an Arkansas, or Plains, or Crawford mafia, even, or rather especially, Obama, had to import the hardest of the hard core Clintonistas—Emanuel, Podesta, Panetta, Hillary herself—and he had to pay off some overdue IOU’s to the left with symbolic gestures and appointments (more rhetoric and symbolism and task forces to come on Don’t Ask/Don’t Tell, Gay Marriage, Cap and Trade, Kyoto redux, etc.).

Again, the backtracking on the issues, the tough centrist appointments, and the seeming continuance of a Bush (III?) foreign policy, once demonized now quietly embraced, are fine for Bill Clinton, Al Gore or Harry Reid, but in aggregate ever so insidiously they become finally problematic for the redeemer. As stated, even the Left-wing media won’t like looking foolish twice. And even the smug Europeans will turn on those who prod them to be reasonable and honest after serenading them with prose set to Mozart. Yes, he can halt the messiah act and we will forgive him for not being a messiah—or continue it in lieu of honest governance and I assure you in time even Newsweek and NPR will turn on him, in fear that they are not merely gullible, but looking ridiculous.

So even now, Obama need not play any longer the hypocrite and can recover if he mans up to the past hypnosis of the campaign, cools the Lincoln talk, reads about Nemesis, and admits that he is a mere mortal, an inexperienced one at that, matches his deeds with honest words, and seeks to govern in human rather than divine fashion from on high. That way a William Lynn or Timothy Geithner are just political landmines that one steps over rather than proof that the Wizard turns out to be a little man with levers and dials behind the curtain.

Americans can and will forgive almost anything other than hypocrisy.

OP-ED: Moral Clarity in Gaza

By Charles Krauthammer
Friday, January 2, 2009; Page A15

Late Saturday, thousands of Gazans received Arabic-language cell-phone messages from the Israeli military, urging them to leave homes where militants might have stashed weapons.

-- Associated Press, Dec. 27
 
Some geopolitical conflicts are morally complicated. The Israel-Gaza war is not. It possesses a moral clarity not only rare but excruciating.

Israel is so scrupulous about civilian life that, risking the element of surprise, it contacts enemy noncombatants in advance to warn them of approaching danger. Hamas, which started this conflict with unrelenting rocket and mortar attacks on unarmed Israelis -- 6,464 launched from Gaza in the past three years -- deliberately places its weapons in and near the homes of its own people.

This has two purposes. First, counting on the moral scrupulousness of Israel, Hamas figures civilian proximity might help protect at least part of its arsenal. Second, knowing that Israelis have new precision weapons that may allow them to attack nonetheless, Hamas hopes that inevitable collateral damage -- or, if it is really fortunate, an errant Israeli bomb -- will kill large numbers of its own people for which, of course, the world will blame Israel.

For Hamas, the only thing more prized than dead Jews are dead Palestinians. The religion of Jew-murder and self-martyrdom is ubiquitous. And deeply perverse, such as the Hamas TV children's program in which an adorable live-action Palestinian Mickey Mouse is beaten to death by an Israeli (then replaced by his more militant cousin, Nahoul the Bee, who vows to continue on Mickey's path to martyrdom).

At war today in Gaza, one combatant is committed to causing the most civilian pain and suffering on both sides. The other combatant is committed to saving as many lives as possible -- also on both sides. It's a recurring theme. Israel gave similar warnings to Southern Lebanese villagers before attacking Hezbollah in the Lebanon war of 2006. The Israelis did this knowing it would lose for them the element of surprise and cost the lives of their own soldiers.

That is the asymmetry of means between Hamas and Israel. But there is equal clarity regarding the asymmetry of ends. Israel has but a single objective in Gaza -- peace: the calm, open, normal relations it offered Gaza when it withdrew in 2005. Doing something never done by the Turkish, British, Egyptian and Jordanian rulers of Palestine, the Israelis gave the Palestinians their first sovereign territory ever in Gaza.

What ensued? This is not ancient history. Did the Palestinians begin building the state that is supposedly their great national aim? No. No roads, no industry, no courts, no civil society at all. The flourishing greenhouses that Israel left behind for the Palestinians were destroyed and abandoned. Instead, Gaza's Iranian-sponsored rulers have devoted all their resources to turning it into a terror base -- importing weapons, training terrorists, building tunnels with which to kidnap Israelis on the other side. And of course firing rockets unceasingly.

The grievance? It cannot be occupation, military control or settlers. They were all removed in September 2005. There's only one grievance and Hamas is open about it. Israel's very existence.

Nor does Hamas conceal its strategy. Provoke conflict. Wait for the inevitable civilian casualties. Bring down the world's opprobrium on Israel. Force it into an untenable cease-fire -- exactly as happened in Lebanon. Then, as in Lebanon, rearm, rebuild and mobilize for the next round. Perpetual war. Since its raison d'etre is the eradication of Israel, there are only two possible outcomes: the defeat of Hamas or the extinction of Israel.

Israel's only response is to try to do what it failed to do after the Gaza withdrawal. The unpardonable strategic error of its architect, Ariel Sharon, was not the withdrawal itself but the failure to immediately establish a deterrence regime under which no violence would be tolerated after the removal of any and all Israeli presence -- the ostensible justification for previous Palestinian attacks. Instead, Israel allowed unceasing rocket fire, implicitly acquiescing to a state of active war and indiscriminate terror.

Hamas's rejection of an extension of its often-violated six-month cease-fire (during which the rockets never stopped, just were less frequent) gave Israel a rare opportunity to establish the norm it should have insisted upon three years ago: no rockets, no mortar fire, no kidnapping, no acts of war. As the U.S. government has officially stated: a sustainable and enduring cease-fire. If this fighting ends with anything less than that, Israel will have lost yet another war. The question is whether Israel still retains the nerve -- and the moral self-assurance -- to win.
 
letters@charleskrauthammer.com

Everyone is out to destroy Palin - but it's Obama's past we should examine

By Melanie Philips.

With all eyes glued to the collapse of global capitalism as we know it, attention has been somewhat distracted from the race to lead what still remains the most powerful nation on earth - the United States. We ignore it at our peril.

From the shockingly partisan presentation by the pro-Obama media on both sides of the Atlantic, you'd think this was a contest between twin pillars of rectitude and inspirational high seriousness on the Democratic side, and a joke Republican ticket consisting of an erratic old man and a brainless, wacko, gun-toting beauty queen, who in a fit of madness John McCain picked as his vice-presidential candidate.

Unfortunately for the Democrats, the beauty queen in question, Governor Sarah Palin of Alaska, has struck an enormous chord with Middle America. As a result, Barack Obama's media supporters are making a huge effort to destroy her.

Inquiry

Now the Left thinks it has shot its moose. It has been crowing that an inquiry by Alaska's legislature has found Palin abused her office by firing Alaska's Commissioner of Public Safety for refusing to fire in turn Palin's former brother-in-law, Trooper Michael Wooten.

This really is a case of half-baked Alaska. First, the inquiry's conclusions were ambiguous. It found that Palin had violated public trust through using official action for personal interest; but it also said the firing was a proper and lawful exercise of her authority, and that personal interest had only been a contributory factor in the Commissioner's firing.

And just what was that personal interest? Palin wanted a state Trooper fired because he had assaulted his 11-year-old stepson with a stun gun, been caught drinking alcohol in his patrol car, and the Palins say was threatening to kill a member of their family.

Certainly, there was a conflict of interest because Wooten was the Governor's sister's ex-husband. But shouldn't the real question be why such a man was not fired?

What is really astounding, however, is the hue and cry over this non-event in Alaska while a raft of disturbing evidence about Senator Obama's connections is being either glossed over or not reported at all.

This may come as a shock to most people, but Obama is at the centre of a network of radical associations which he has tried to conceal.

Take for example his relationship with William Ayers, founder of the terrorist Weather Underground which bombed federal buildings in the 1960s and who has consistently maintained his radical views ever since.

Obama's own political career was actually launched in Ayers's Chicago house at a fundraising-event in 1995 which fired the starting gun for his run at the Illinois Senate.

Not only that, Obama and Ayers both sat on the boards of two organisations, the Chicago Annenberg Challenge and the Woods Fund. These organisations put into practice Ayers's revolutionary ideology by channelling money supposed to fund regular educational projects into extreme radical groups instead.

Obama now says he didn't know of Ayers's terrorist past and never endorsed his views, simply working with him on an educational project. But it defies belief he didn't know about Ayers, who was notorious in Chicago.
In 2001, indeed, Ayers told a magazine: 'I don't regret setting bombs. I feel we didn't do enough.'

The crucial point was that this educational project was itself a vehicle for subversion; in the view of Ayers, its driving force, education was 'the motor-force of revolution'. Moreover, Obama wrote a rave review about Ayers' book on criminal justice, which compared America to South Africa under apartheid.

Scandal

Through the Woods Fund, Obama also funnelled millions of dollars to the Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now (ACORN). Described by an academic sympathiser as 'a uniquely militant organisation', ACORN played a significant role in the sub-prime scandal - which detonated America's financial crisis - by physically intimidating banks into lowering credit standards for poor and minority customers.

The Obama campaign has paid an ACORN subsidiary $800,000 to register new voters. But now, numerous states are launching investigations into massive voter fraud being carried out by ACORN activists who are being caught falsifying voter registration cards, registering fictitious individuals and hounding voters to register multiple times.

But Obama's connections with ACORN go even deeper. Even though his campaign has denied this, for several years running he trained its activists and in 1992 even ran one of its voter registration projects.

Such radical links fit with other highly dubious associations Obama has made. We all
know that, under pressure, he distanced himself from his longstanding mentor Pastor Wright, who infamously coined the phrase 'God damn America!'

But Obama never distanced himself from the anti-white teachings of his church, which was heavily influenced by the philosophy of the black racist James Cone who claimed that 'whiteness is the symbol of the antichrist'.
And after the controversy over Wright, Obama has become close to another preacher, Jim Wallis, who spews out the same anti-American message - once calling the U.S. 'the great power, the great seducer, the great captor and destroyer of human life'.

That's not all. ACORN is heavily involved with a Marxist group called the Chicago New Party, whose strategy is to force the Democratic Party to the far Left by infiltrating it and ' burrowing from within'. In 1996, the New Party exulted that one of its members who had just been successful in the political primary season was - Barack Obama.

Guilt

Whenever any of this surfaces, the Left tries to suppress it by screaming 'guilt by association'. Not so. This is guilt by participation.

The left cries 'smear' and 'racism'. On the contrary - if Obama wasn't a black Democrat, with this history his candidacy would have been toast before it got started.

Just consider if the boot had been on the other foot and McCain's political career had been launched by an abortion clinic bomber; his mentor for 20 years had been a Ku Klux Klansman, and he had paid nearly a million dollars to far-Right militias who strong-armed voters into fraudulent registrations.

Of course, there is no suggestion that Obama supports terrorism or intimidation. But the question is whether through expediency or ideological sympathy or a combination of the two, he has allowed himself to be associated with thinking that threatens the basic values of America and Western society.

This may sound too incredible for words. But what's really incredible is that, with dozens of reporters feverishly combing Alaska for any evidence to tarnish Sarah Palin, the mainstream media has largely refused to investigate any of this.

What's really incredible is that a man with such a background in anti-Western thinking can now stand on the verge of becoming the leader of the free world.

Please don't get me wrong. I am not a particular fan of John McCain. I think he is indeed erratic, and has run a lousy campaign. And the exhausted Republicans deserve to lose. But the prospect of Obama in the White House as America's first far-Left radical president is deeply worrying.

It would be a crowning triumph for the anti-Western ideology which has wrought such havoc on both sides of the Atlantic.

The reason Sarah Palin has struck such a chord is that Middle America sees her as the first candidate in its lifetime who stands against that destructive nihilism. That's why she is the key target for Western radicals who are now poised to gain the biggest prize of all. 

Guest OP:ED - Energy Cause and Effect

Cause and Effect

            Energy is on the minds of all the people right now. High Gas Prices seems to be the one topic that is hard to understand.  Some people blame the Oil companies for obsession profits.  The issue is actually very broad. Many factors affect the cost of Gas Prices.  The increase in Fuel prices affects many different parts of the economy.  So what are the real facts?

                Total Energy consumption in the US has increased over the past few years.  Currently Crude oil production in the US has dropped since 2004 by 320,000 Barrels per Day.  This means that increase needs of energy usage will have to be made up by foreign sources.  The good news between 2004 and 2007 we have lowered our use of Petroleum by 30,000 Barrels per day.   During this time frame the cost per barrel of Petroleum has doubled. Renewable energy has increased but has not kept pace with the increase in Energy Usage.  To see the numbers look at the link for Energy Consumption.

                Nuclear power to provide Electricity has some interesting problems. Nuclear Power in the USA  Talks about 21% of electricity was from Nuclear Power Back in 1996. Currently our energy needs have increased so the share of power from Nuclear power has dropped to 19.4%.  Extended reactor lifetimes from 40 years to 60 years Means we can still get power from our aging Nuclear Power Plants.  Increased Power Plant Utilization our capacity has been increasing not due to more plants but due to Capacity increased as systems are more efficient.  But we cannot continue to run these plants.  Replacements will eventually be needed.  104 Reactorsprovide ~20% of our electrical energy needs.

                As Demands for Energy Consumption increase we see two areas where supply from inside the USA have decreased or will decrease in the coming years.  Our Government regulations are affecting both of these declines. Congress has prevented any oil exploration in large areas known to have oil. Democrats keep blocking drilling off shore or ANWAR. So we will see decline in Oil production inside the Continental USA. The only bright side is North Dakota, South Dakota and Montana have commenced drilling there oil.   These lands are not controlled by the Federal Government.  Sen. John Barrasso, R-Wyo., has introduced a bill in Congress that would prevent oil and gas drilling on 1.2 million acres in the Wyoming Range.   This is taking place when identifying a large area that has oil production range that goes from Canada into South Dakota.  Lots of drilling is taking place in Wyoming but preventing any explorations in over a Million acres does not help meet our energy needs. 

                Economy is hurt by the rising costs for energy.  As we spend more money to fuel our cars means fewer purchases in other areas of the Economy. It affects jobs. Why has the number of jobs in the US dropped?  We are seeing the affect as a slowing economy. Slowing due to less money available as Energy needs increase a bigger bite out of the pocket books.  This has cause higher costs for bringing food to the local Food Chains. These costs cause the cost of Food and Other daily needs to also increase.  This also takes a bigger bite out of our personal budgets.  This will cause a loss of tax revenue to local and Federal levels.  As demands for even more money for growing all levels of Government means there is a demand for higher taxes, which in turn will cause the economy to further slow because the consumers have less money to pay for other than basic necessities.   Congress wants to increase taxes on the oil companies.  This will cause increase in costs for Gas which will further slow the economy.  The Cause and Effect more taxes less money for the oil companies have available for drilling and exploration.  Making it more expensive and take longer to find new oil supplies. This may also stop drilling for Oil in the US because of the higher taxes. Companies have to make a profit. And if it is cheaper to drill in other countries what is the incentive to drill in the US.

                Immigration is another factor. Why do we have so many illegal aliens within this country? Some Estimates say 12 Million yet other estimates say it could be as high as 20 Million. Who knows for sure? If we make them all Citizens and they are allowed to bring in their extended Families does that mean to our energy needs if we add nearly 100 million more people to our population.  That is a very large influx of people into the US and would have a devastating effect on our infrastructure. Not only straining our Energy needs but government programs to help low income people.  This will also mean demands for more tax dollars. The economy could not handle such a large change in Population and people will be fighting for use the scarce energy availability. The same government officials that block energy independents also want unlimited immigration.  Does that make sense?  We need to use less energy yet we want to greatly increase the Population a total mixture that can be a disaster to our economy and our current standard of living.

                Government actions to prevent energy independence because of special interests will continue to cause the standard of living to drop.  I found one site very interesting on what thecost for energy has done in the past 28 years a number of good charts covering energy usage and availability.  It is an eye opener.  Consumption and Availability of energy needs past and future has a very bleak view.  And the more regulations move more jobs overseas.  Why do we not build and develop energy needs here in the US.  It means more jobs for Americans. The US Government needs to fight for more exploration, more development and Building Nuclear power plants. Each Nuclear power plant built could mean less coal burning to provide Electricity. Which is better burn coal or use Nuclear power that has no CO2 production?  What is the future you want for this country?  We have to start today to supply needs of the future.  

Alternative energy supplies are not efficient nor will they pick up the energy shortages that we face in the next few decades. Unless you want to start taking national forests property to cut down the trees in hundreds of square miles to build wind and solar power plants to just replace our current nuclear power plants.  So do you want 33 square miles for solar panels to replace one Nuclear power plant?  Cause and effect demands of various groups keep things in a grid lock.  Where will we be in 10 years if the current lack of real energy reform continues to happen? Cost of basic energy needs will continue to grow every year taking a large bit out each families budget.

 

David 

Bellevue, WA

Op-Ed: From the Charismatic Point of View

This is actually a relatively short reply to the issue of Charismaniac Christian belief. Only because I don’t believe there’s much to say as regards a belief versus a physiological manifestation of reality.

Preface: Belief for all Christians is based on that which we cannot reach out and physically touch, smell, hear or see. We all have that in common, from there we tend to diverge into various groups or denominations to the n^th degree.

 
That said, here goes. I will highlight my response in blue to NJ_GOP's comments. And NJ – never fear and let your heart not be troubled, offense is never taken at any faith viewpoint which embodies as THE central tenet of Christ crucified, His death on the cross, and His resurrection. Beyond the application of Christ as the Son of God and the Trinity, everything else is just a detail. The last time I looked none of the rest of us has a direct line (DSL or Cable modem etc.) to the Father.

Ok so here's where everybody gets crazy.  I have never found a verse that has convinced me that these gifts stopped when the Bible was canonized (proper term?).  However, having spent many years within the Charismatic movement, having studied the re-emergence of "gifts" in the early 20thcentury in the U.S. , and having sincerely tried to apply the Charismatic way of life, I have come to the conclusion that 90% of the teachings of the movement are erroneous, maybe even dangerous.

I will disagree with the teachings per se as being erroneous, I will agree that the application of the teaching is often outside the written Word, as revealed to man through the Holy Spirit.  

Charismatics, Pentacostals, Full Gospelers, Faith Movement Folks all seem to share the same common flaw in my humble opinion.  Their attitudes often reflect a desire to be God – anybody ever heard of Adam and Eve? 

Those who interpret Scripture to allow the Father OR His Son or to be placed in a position as co-equal to fallen man are going to wind up in eternity without a cool place to sit.

Over and over the teachers in these areas stress the importance of one's personal faith as the power behind getting your needs and desires fulfilled. This seems to be central in many books, sermons, chatrooms, blogs, whatever.  If something isn't going your way, then gosh darn it stamp your foot and demand that God obey your wishes!  These teachers often advise Christians to quote the Bible to God to coerce him into obedience.  Now they will say that this is based on David's prayers where he remembers God's word in his prayers….and yes, we should know God's word well enough to be able to pray like David.  But the distinction is in the attitude.

Attitude is personal, it happens to be only between God and the individual. Unless we develop the “ability” to directly read a persons intent or thoughts its all guess work.

I will agree there are people who seem to have made that error. E.W. Kenyon is likely the beginning of that vein of thought - “What I confess, I possess” was his terminology if memory serves.

The whole “name it and claim it” is from that line of thought. Ken Hagin was really the beginning though of the current Word of Faith movement though with the “blab it and grab it” concept, along with Ken Copeland, Joyce Meyer, Joel Osteen and some others.

I have read my Book through and through, I fid no reference which will lend credence to me having an easy life, or being wealthy just because I believe in Christ and am willing to die rather than give my self over to the enemy.

For any of the Cyber Crew (or our readers) who happen to swing that way, - It’s your choice, I just don’t see any evidence of a Heaven on Earth being promised to us.

 I have often said I would have made a great Jew or Catholic.  I would just love to be able to have someone hand me the rules and all I have to do is follow the checklist and I'm good to go.  No offense intended here, I know many in both faiths whose relationship with God is way beyond a checklist.

My point is that it is the attitude of our hearts that is the key to all matters of faith.  And keeping one's motives and thoughts in check is a lot harder than keeping an outward list of requirements for me.

We agree, except for being Catholic, I don’t need, want or desire an intermediary to stand between myself and Christ.

 Charismatics frequently (almost always it seems) have an attitude problem.

 Some do. So do Baptists, Presbyterians, Catholics, Lutherans and….

 For one thing,  Charismatics will not accept that anything bad can happen to a Christian.

Excuse me, but where does that come from? My wife is a cancer survivor (6+ yrs).

That wasn’t so terribly great to have happen. (she is a Christian also BTW)

 2nd preface(can their be two?)

I was raised as a Southern Baptist, fell away while I was in the service, and came back in a very small Non-denom church(which altered to a Word of Faith – Blab it and grab it)and went from there to a Assembly of God. At no time have I heard a Pastor ever say, or intimate that we as Christians are protected from the evils of the world. Only that having either gone through the ‘bad things’ or having succumbed (physically) to something bad, we have the Hope Of Christ for an eternity which so good, we are not capable of understanding at this point in our existence how good it can be.

 If someone tries that line of “Ghost Shirt” malarkey, I would point them in the direction of Wounded Knee to explain the concept in greater detail to the Sioux who tried that route. Works equally well today.

I often wonder if they have any idea the number of missionaries who have been martyred in this century alone?

I do, can’t say what the rest know about.

http://www.persecution.net/informed.htm  one place to start for anyone who pleads ignorance of how many die on an annual basis.

 

Do they blame these missionaries for not "praying the hedge of protection" around themselves?  As if God's hands are tied until WE pray this or that into existence!   I will never forget our A.G. pastor when I attended a very large church in the late 70s whose young daughter had cancer.  I don't know what kind of cancer it was, but she had deformities in the shape of her head and face and it was clearly obvious to anyone that she was very very ill. One Sunday morning, as the child lay on a pillow in the pew in front of me, I overheard the pastor's wife say to someone "It's a miracle she's completely healed."  This seemed like a completely stupid thing to say. 

In fact, it was not "faith talk" or "positive confession" it was an outright lie --- or else that poor mom was in a state of complete denial.   At a time when this family should have been preparing themselves and the siblings for this little girl's death, they instead thought it was somehow their responsibility to save their daughter's life by having enough faith. She died about a week later.

The senior pastor (now a consulting pastor) of my church has lost three of his

four children to cancer, the second eldest was the pastor of the church when he died.

No one has denied the results of, or the pain of the loss.

In think the central flaw in the Charismatic thinking is pride.  It is a mindset that God is sort of the O.S. working behind the scenes and nothing really happens until the user starts typing on the keyboard. The user is in full control, having installed the O.S.  – and the O.S. is there to serve the user, not the other way around.

 Pride is a human failing, not a charismatic failing. When I hear that applied to charismatic churches I tend to ask the person posing the question if they are breathing, if they are, I ask if everyone in their church breathes?. The answer is typically – yes. Some make the connection, some don’t.

 The major reason I joined a Charismatic church way back in the 70s is because I absolutely loved their zeal and their clapping and their raising their hands to God.  They really seemed to know what JOY was, and that's the way I felt in my heart but my church didn't act very happy.  That was also around the same time that musicians like Larry Norman were entering the scene,  and eventually many of the non-Charismatic churches caught up with the Charismatics where music and worship were concerned.

There is more to worship than music and songs, what we do in our lives to show the love of God to the unsaved is a form of worship, what we do when no one is watching can be a form of worship. The list goes on…

We have three primary “worship” teams plus a youth “worship” team (which played today BTW)all are worship all meet the need, some just worship faster than others.

 When I first started in the Charismatic church, I even had someone pray for me to receive the Holy Spirit and after that people in my Charismatic small group kept calling that prayer my "spiritual birthday".  

(?????) But that disturbed (it should!) me since I had been a born again Christian for many years and I knew I was saved – no doubt whatsoever.  I never adhered to the belief, in all the years I spent in the A.G. churches, that the baptism of the H.S. was a separate, one-time event.

With that I can disagree, it does seem to be a separate event,

but has nothing to do with being saved or not saved before that point.

My goal here is not to debate whether tongues are for today, or whether someone has this gift or that gift.  My point is that if you feel you have these gifts, then get your attitude in order before you even think  you are better than anyone else or you think you have "more of God" (I love that one) than another Christian.  Check your attitude before you start ordering God around and don't stop reading at the end of 1 Cor 12 because 1 Cor 13 is the rest of the message!

May I simply suggest we all need to do that?

In all you do, remember the suffering and death of our Lord Jesus Christ, who by the way really WAS AND IS better than everyone else but never ever acted in a condescending way even to the worst sinners.

We all need to humble ourselves before our maker and creator, in humility use our gifts, not letting the right hand know what the left hand is doing. Remember that there are people who are praying for their next meal, not for a new car or a bigger house.

One of the most profound things I ever learned, I learned from what I call a "full-blown-screaming" charismatic woman preacher whom I knew personally. She said that when sharing the gospel with the lost, people always ask questions like, "is it Ok to pray to Mary", or "is smoking a sin", or "what about all the evil in the world".  She said that she made it a point to always drive the conversation back to Jesus and avoid the tangents that lead away from introducing the person to Jesus Christ.

Sounds like a solid teacher. Stay focused on the goal, Christ. I’ll go along with that!

If our gifts or our attitudes or our actions have not originated with the goal of making a lasting impact for the kingdom of God then it's time to stop and think.  You may just be a clanging symbol. Forget what mere men may have told you about how great you are, or how much you deserve to be prosperous or the center of attention, or how you are entitled to certain things or how we should demand this or that from God.  (Try picturing yourself talking like that to God's face.)

John the Baptist said "He must increase, I must decrease".   You don't see people whose gift is picking up the trash or cleaning the church toilets with a blog show touting how God has given them the gift of toilet cleaning do you?  Yet the church toilet cleaner needs to check his or her attitude just as much as the "prophet" or "healer".

Study what God's word says, don't skip over the passages about suffering and poverty.  Study the lives of Christians who valued humility.  Examine yourself frequently and find an accountability partner. Consciously avoid speaking "Christianese".  And above all else, avoid the original sin, the one that got Satan kicked out of heaven and got Adam and Eve kicked out of paradise….the desire to be "God" or "Like God".  The best reading material I have found on this topic is at *www.equip.org <http://www.equip.org/>.  I have trusted this website for many years now and have found them to be accurate and factual on almost every topic. I'm still researching some things I have read there, but they are right on the money as far as the faith movement and Charismatic theology.

 Thanks for listening.

*Christianese Dictionary*

 *Word of Knowledge*:  a person will (under the influence of what he or she says is the Holy Spirit) tell you something about yourself that you already know.  These words of knowledge are based on 1 Cor 12; and to date I have never actually seen one come true unless of course the "word" was sufficiently vague so that it is about as valuable as reading your horoscope.

 *Prophesy* (*in the 21st century): quite honestly I'm not sure this is much different than the Word of Knowledge, except that Pat Robertson prophesied a famine in America that was supposed to occur sometime back in the late 80s I think, and Benny Hinn prophesied that Jesus would stand with him in the flesh on the stage at his Kenya revival.  Silly me thought that when Jesus returned to earth he'd be coming on the clouds and something about a trumpet…..

  *Hedge of Protection:  *another of my favorites.  About the best way to describe this is to tell a true story.  A depressed woman who had been robbed/burglarized 3 times in one year came to church to seek answers. 

When she asked "why" the church leader smiled with the most condescending grin and replied as if talking to a child…"now who's fault was all that?"  The woman was puzzled and said she didn't understand the question.  He went on to tell her that none of those things would have happened to her if she had prayed the hedge of protection around herself. 

*Plead the Blood:  You'll have to google this one  because I don't have a clue.*

 *The 3-second rule:  *that's when you drop the last cookie and you find an excuse to eat it.  – technically not Christianese but I thought we needed a break.

 *The spirit of:  smoking, drinking, anger, poopy diapers, etc*.:  this is the Charismatic's way of blaming the devil for everything that goes wrong. The irony is that for the most part, Charismatics are really into the power trip, except for when it comes to personal responsibility oftentimes.  In order to quit smoking or get a loved one to quit, they will pray against the spirit of tobacco…I just made up the poopy diapers part, I know for a fact that Charismatics potty train their kids.

*Spiritual Birthday – *usually this means the day a person is born again. However in my case they labeled the day I "got" the Holy Spirit my spiritual birthday.  In all seriousness, this is the most important day a person can ever experience.

*Point of faith*:  this generally amounts to some snake oil televangelist selling you some asinine object for 100 times what it's worth so that you will get that special prayer answered.  They will tell you that the object itself has no power, but it acts as a point of faith so that the Holy Spirit can answer your prayer (note the emphasis on the power f your faith here).

My absolute all time #1 favorite point of faith object was a photo of a life sized hand of Oral Roberts.  This thing was photo of the front and back of his hand, and it was attached to a little stick so you could put it anywhere that you needed healing.   To this day I wish I had that thing it would go for a bunch on Ebay I'll bet.

*The anointing*:  this one gets on my last nerve.  People go church shopping looking for a church that has the "anointing".  This usually means that they want to feel good when they leave.  Once this Charismatic was complaining that our pastor didn't have the "anointing.  (She came to our church because she felt God sent her to us to straighten us out – I'm not kidding). (steer clear of those, very very clear!!)  When I asked her what the heck that actually means she got really angry with me….probably because she suddenly realized that there was nothing in her thinking that was scriptural.  She never did answer my question.  She's now WHENEVER a person stands up, or cries out, or makes a noise like  “Thus sayeth the Lord of Heaven” I have been rude enough to saunter over and ask them what part of merry old England they happen to be from, and which dialect of Hebrew they were speaking in and/or which Arch Angel they might happen to be. It never won me any friends, but my A.G. pastor always backed me up, he couldn’t put up with it either. moved on to another church.   My bible says that all believers are anointed.  1 John 2:20, 1 John 2:27.

*Binding Satan*:  This practice implies that we physically "bind" Satan rendering him powerless over us after we say this.  It is usually said in a prayer but it is usually the person praying that causes the "binding" to happen.  So you may hear someone say "I bind you Satan in Jesus' name" during prayer.  Now I'm not of the opinion that our conversations with God should also be conversations with Satan, so on it's face I just think the practice is off base.  I'm sure there are many books on this topic.

I note that at no point in the Bible does any one imply that any being except God the Father exerts any power over Satan.

 

All in all, not that short a rebuttal I suppose.

The bottom line from my perspective is that you have had experiences with failed human beings,

One note regarding the mention of a large charismatic church. I’ve never seen a large charismatic church stay on track. They get to big and the fall of the track, they lose the focus of Christ and the whole deal begins to focus on “the mission” or “the ministries”, when the focus fails at any time to be Christ it’s time to consider how to fix that, or where to go to church except where that is going on.

 

One test I use is after being in a church for a year or two, can I recognize 90% of the people who go there, and do they recognize me? If I can (and I do) then it’s small enough to maintain accountability to and by my brothers and sisters in Christ.

garry