Thursday, March 24, 2011

Give Me Liberty AND My Soul

I am forwarding this timeless call to duty by Shane Ison.
I hope you enjoy

Regards,
Joseph


Give Me Liberty AND My Soul

An appeal to my fellow-Americans to not sell their souls or principles of freedom for the sake of economic expedience – falsely purported.

Shane E. Ison

The land of the free and the home of the brave is crumbling right before our very eyes. Our republic and constitution are being threatened with shameless vigor as they are being drug with all haste out from under God. I fear that we need to beware lest having eyes we see not and having ears we hear not. I write this on the anniversary (March 23, 2011) of the famous speech by Patrick Henry in 1775, and I am stirred by the similarity of threatened liberty between his day and ours – hence the title and shared quote above.

I am also writing this article from the heartland state of Indiana, where our Democratic Legislators have been AWOL for 32 days now. Early on in this walkout process I heard a local defender of the Democratic party as a guest on a local news program. He defended the acceptableness of the walkout on the basis that “standing up for collective bargaining and standing up to corporate greed is a core belief of the democratic party.” The question I immediately asked the radio in my car was, “What makes corporate greed bad and union creed and individual greed and government greed ok?” Yes Corporate greed/idolatry is the problem, Corporate, as in all of us.

So what about the “core beliefs” of the Democratic Party? A core belief of the Democratic Party is that the killing of helpless babies is and should be legal. A core belief of the Democratic Party is that Homosexual marriage is normative and ought to be legal. A core belief of the Democratic Party is that God and His Son Jesus have no place in the congress, courts, or schools. In fact, it seems to me that a core belief of the Democratic Party is that there is no God and we are all a product of chance and evolution; hence the forcing of all Americans everywhere to support and fund the indoctrination of children in this religion via public schools. Should parents not be free to choose whether or not their money will be used for a form of education they agree with? Instead they are, against their will, made to pay for other peoples children to receive a godless education. Check it out my friends. Are these not core issues that the majority of Democrats constantly support?

My fellow-Americans, do not claim to be God-fearing and then sell your soul. We hear the rhetoric of politicians of every stripe as they almost always end their speeches with the words, “God bless America”. We say it. We sing it. We print it on our money, but do you not see that it has become a mockery and offense to God by now? Do you not think that God does not say of America, “They honor me with their mouth, but their heart is far from me?” Can we ask God to bless on one hand and push Him to obscurity on the other? He is ripped from the history books and from the science books and consequently declared to be a myth, and we ask Him to bless us? We call ourselves Christian? Can we shed the innocent blood of those He has fearfully and wonderfully formed for His purposes, trample on the definition of marriage that originated with Him, call good evil and evil good, and expect him to bless us? Many appear to accuse God when disaster happens, but very few want to give God the credit for all the blessings we do have.

My connection with Unions, collective bargaining, and the dereliction of duty by our legislators is this. The party of the Unions is the Democratic Party. In recent years we have seen rapid expansion of socialist and communistic ideas largely at the hands of the Democratic Party (I am speaking in broader national terms here). The voters rose up this last election and elected a conservative majority. Instead of allowing this representative form of government to work as it is suppose to, instead of presenting their cause in the State House, and doing their duty through the legislative process; the Democratic Representatives abandoned their post and refused to come to work. When the republicans tried to do business without them, they then accused the republicans of usurping the democratic process. Now it should not take much common sense to determine who is usurping the process here.

I am not an expert in the Union business and all they do and don't do. I am sure there may be some good things about it, but the tendency toward mob rule is concerning to me. I know some good people and good friends who work in Unions, so I am sympathetic to some degree for their sake. In my friendships with Union workers my general perception is that union jobs are not all they are cracked up to be. Most of the guys I know seem to be laid-off more than they are working, and if they do have work they have to travel out of town often for it. I also have some experience in strong Union areas where Unions force out non-union contractors. It also appears that the strongest Union sectors of our economy are not necessarily at the top of the list. In fact, hasn't bankruptcy been a pattern? Detroit and Gary are Union strongholds aren't they? Where is the thriving middle class there? If huge pension plans and out-of-sync pay scales are draining the coffers without putting anything back in, where will the middle-class be after those coffers are emptied?

So my first point would be; the argument that Unions are somehow going to be the Savior of our economy is not so forceful when you step back and look at the big picture. Besides all of this, the collective bargaining bill has been dead for weeks now, and the legislators have still not returned. So it adds to the impression that this is a political temper-tantrum of sorts that is threatening our representative form of government. Should the liberties of the people be jeopardized for such things? To that point I agree with others in questioning whether government workers should ever be allowed to unionize. It was not the private sector of Unions being considered in the bills in the first place. But if government is to be run by those elected by the people, then how can that happen when Unions (those not elected by the people) are able to refuse to operate on the terms set forth by the elected authorities. In my opinion, it is yet another affront to our liberties and the protection of them.

My second and more important point is this; whether you believe Unions are a good thing or not, what is not good is the encouragement of public servants to abandon their post and to refuse to vote on bills that matter to The People. What is not good is to support those who call good evil and evil good and support the destruction of liberty. Lobby them, write them, but please do not support the hijacking of liberty and law. Do not sell your soul for a piece of real estate in Detroit or a welfare check or even a big, fat Union check.

My God-fearing, freedom-loving, fellow-American, will you be ashamed to say that this nation has been blessed by God and that without Him we have nothing? What then motivates you to support these walkouts? What motivates you to support liberal candidates in elections? Is it principles or paychecks? If it is only paychecks, then I fear you will never be free. The handwriting is on the wall for our nation, and I fear it is no different than what we find in that ancient Biblical text. We cannot serve gods of gold and silver without being divided and destroyed every time. If you serve the gods of mans making then you will turn a blind eye when the God of Heaven is pushed out of the public square. You will turn a blind eye when people's property and liberty is forcibly taken from them, when innocent blood is shed, and righteousness lies trampled in the streets.

Yes, I am for freedom! Freedom to work where I want, for whom I want. Freedom to own a business and hire and fire as I choose. Freedom to own property and give property to whom I choose. Freedom to teach my children that there is a God and He has a Son, and this whole world belongs to Him. Freedom to pray like this: Father, God of Heaven, may you help us to extol you and give you all honor. We kiss your riven Son and pray that we, through Him, may find grace to sell our soul to none but you.

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