When God gave the Ten Commandments he did so to all of Israel.  God appears at Mt. Sinai before the people and Moses and gives them the Ten Commandments.  Nowhere in the Bible does God appear to so many people at once and the Ten Commandments have become the basis of all Western Law.  According to Jewish tradition the Israelites only heard the first two commandments.  After that point the glory of God was so terrifying that they asked Moses to be an intermediary.  I think that in the absolute presence of God they were forced to see their own imperfection caused by their own decisions and couldn’t stand it.  So, instead of standing before God to receive the other commandments they chose their leader, Moses, to receive them.  This is why the first 2 commandments are in the first person “I am the Lord your God….” And the other 8 are in third person.  This would be one reason the commandments were written on tablets by God.  These divine commandments were so important that there needed to be no chance of misinterpretation or any suspicion of additions or subtractions.
It is interesting to consider that all of Israel heard the first two commandments.  The first 2 commandments are:
1.      I am the Lord Your God.
2.      You shall have no other gods before me.
This is of interest because it starts a long tradition of God directly meeting with an intermediary.  At first it is the high priest and then the prophets.  So that God can dwell with His people he commands the creation of the tabernacle and the Ark of the Covenant.  This area is so sacred and holy that only the high priest may enter and even then only on the day of Yom Kippur.  Yom Kippur is the holiest day in the Jewish faith and is known as the day of atonement.  The days leading to Yom Kippur are spent trying to amend one’s behavior and seek forgiveness for sins committed against God and man.  The day of Yom Kippur public and private petitions and confessions of guilt are made.  After Yom Kippur one is considered absolved by God.  It is only in the midst of this atonement and knowledge of a path to forgiveness that even the high priest could enter the presence of our perfect God.

Maintaining the purity of the Word of God is extremely important.  To this effect God always gives tests or indications of authenticity when His word is conveyed by others.  When the 10 commandments were given to Moses they were written on tablets by the hand of God.  When the high priest was the only one able to enter the presence of God another test was used.  To make sure that the high priest conveys the will of the divine the Israelites are given the Urim and Tummim.  While very little is written of these they are probably stones that through some method conveyed answers to questions, possibly yes or no.  The reason for this assumption is that when Joshua used the Urim and Tummim to find out who violated God’s ban on looting Jericho he did so in a manner similar to the game of 20 questions.  He first finds out what tribe the person belongs to.  He then progressively narrows it through levels of association until he is able to determine who the person is.  It is also important to note that the Urim and Tummim did not work for one not in God’s favor.  For instance after falling out of favor with God Saul tried to use them and had no luck.  Without the will of God the Urim and Tummim were just items.  If a high priest or other individual tried to use the Ummin and Thummim to convey information conflicting with the will of God they would not function.  So, the people of Israel had an intermediary with God and proof of God’s will and favor in the Urim and Tummim.  It is important to note that using these items was not divination which was forbidden.  Divination might be believing in tarot cards.  Believing that the cards somehow have a power to divine the future which is a power that can only belong to God.  God was the driving force behind the Urim and Tummim and the power and belief was not placed in the objects but in God.

Moses was on Mt. Sinai for 40 days.  While he is gone the people go to Aaron and demand that he create a god for them.  We know that the fallen were cast down to Earth and tempt mankind.  One can imagine that while Moses was gone they would be in full force tempting the people of Israel.  They have within 40 days witnessed the glory of the Almighty and still only days later fall to their own doubts and fears.  They have witnessed the plagues, the parting of the Red Sea, the gift of mana and the guiding pillar of fire.  They have stood at the foot of Mount Sinai in the presence of God.  But, as soon as they are out of the presence of God and their leader they come to the decision to give up that free will.  More precisely they make the decision to give up that responsibility.  They demand the creation of an idol to worship.  They demand it from their de facto leader Aaron, the brother of Moses.  They know that Aaron is a leader they can manipulate to their will.  The idol is a god that they can follow without responsibility or duty.  Its easy to follow a leader that will bend to your will and worship a god that you know is fake and who’s will can be whatever you want it to be.  After hearing the first two commandments which specifically forbid this, seeing the physical manifestation of God and seeing the Egyptian gods rendered impotent by the plagues they still go this route.  They had to know that this was a bad path.  In all the proof they had before their very eyes they had to give in to the temptations of the fallen and their own fears to convince themselves to believe in something that they knew beyond a shadow of a doubt was false.

One thing that may have happened is that the fallen played on their fears.  They had heard the first two commandments and knew that there were more.  The combination of false whispers and their own imaginations could create a panic of what the others might be.  With a false god there would be no other commandments they would be demanded to live by.  The fallen were more than happy to tempt and guide towards this false worship.  They had done similar in the beginning by rebelling against God in the full presence and knowledge of God.  The punishment for the fallen for doing so in a perfect world of God was damnation.  The punishment for the Israelites for failing in an imperfect world of man was death.  It is interesting to note that many years later Christ was in the wilderness for the same period of time, 40 days.  Just like the Israelites Christ has just been shown the presence of God during his baptism and his mission has been made known to him. During this time He is tempted by Satan quite dramatically and passes the test of faith.

It should be noted that not all people of Israel worshipped the calf.  There were some that stayed faithful through this period, specifically those belonging to the tribe of Levi.  When Moses descended from the mountain after being told by God what the people were doing  he called for any that were loyal to God to follow him.  The Levites rallied around him and slaughtered thousands that had participated in the idolatry.  The Levites would later become the priests.  The priests were the spiritual leaders of Israel and the high priest was the intermediary between God and man.  When mankind turned away from God He chose the Israelites to be his people and keep His word in the world.  When the Israelites turned against Him he chose the Levites who remained faithful to be the spiritual leaders and carry the Word.  When the law was corrupted by the greed and corruption of man He sent his Son to restore it.  The sacrifice of Christ on the cross washed clean all the sins that have ever been or ever will be.  Because sin can not enter the presence of God this washing clean meant that God could not dwell within us in the form of the Holy spirit and guide us.  Where the Israelites were terrified we have the promise of forgiveness and the path of salvation.  We still have free will to make right or wrong decisions but we now have a guide within us.  That this transition has occurred happens quite dramatically and visually within the temple.  The curtain that separated the Holy of the Holies from the rest of the temple is torn completely in half at the moment of Christ’s death.  God now dwells within His people and an intermediary is no longer needed.  It is important to note that the sin and weakness is always from the person.  God can dwell within the most sinful of us because God is perfect.  However, as sinful beings it is only through the salvation of Christ that was can accept the perfection of God within our lives.

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Seriously, what Twilight Zone bizzaro world are we living in?  I highly encourage everyone to read the Five Thousand Year Leap to read how the founding fathers felt a representative of the people should act and regard their position.  They are our representatives not our kings.  They are supposed to be the best and brightest among us making the sacrifice to engage in public service.  They are supposed to be humble and never forget that they are there at the favor of their constituents.  This is something that we have to rectify and the first step to doing so takes place in November.

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WHO WE ARE: A nationwide network of Democrats, Republicans, and Independents who are all sick and tired of that loose affiliation of racists, homophobes, and morons; who constitute the fake grass-roots movement which calls itself “The Tea Party.”

WHAT WE WANT: To dismantle and demolish the Tea Party by any non-violent means necessary.

HOW WE WILL SUCCEED: By infiltrating the Tea party itself! In an effort to propagate their pre-existing propensity for paranoia and suspicion… We have already sat quietly in their meetings, and observed their rallies.

Whenever possible, we will act on behalf of the Tea Party in ways which exagerate their least appealing qualities (misspelled protest signs, wild claims in TV interviews, etc.) to further distance them from mainstream America and damage the public’s opinion of them. We will also use the inside information we have gained in order to disrupt and derail their plans.

I see two things that this website accomplishes. First of all, if any part of it is real they truly would like to get pictures, video, audio, etc of people at tea party rallies acting like racist bigots. They can’t win arguments based on ideas or merits so they attack. This is from Saul Alinsky’s Rules for Radicals, one of the first “community organizers” and admitted hero of President Obama and Secretary of State Clinton. According to The Washington Post in 1968 Ms. Clinton was offered a job by Alinksy and President Obama 16 years later by associates of the then late Alinsky. Here are the “rules for radicals” as written by Alinksy in his book by the same name:

Rule 1: Power is not only what you have, but what an opponent thinks you have. If your organization is small, hide your numbers in the dark and raise a din that will make everyone think you have many more people than you do.

Rule 2: Never go outside the experience of your people. 
The result is confusion, fear, and retreat. 

Rule 3: Whenever possible, go outside the experience of an opponent. Here you want to cause confusion, fear, and retreat. 

Rule 4: Make opponents live up to their own book of rules. “You can kill them with this, for they can no more obey their own rules than the Christian church can live up to Christianity.”

Rule 5: Ridicule is man’s most potent weapon. It’s hard to counterattack ridicule, and it infuriates the opposition, which then reacts to your advantage.

Rule 6: A good tactic is one your people enjoy. “If your people aren’t having a ball doing it, there is something very wrong with the tactic.”

Rule 7: A tactic that drags on for too long becomes a drag. Commitment may become ritualistic as people turn to other issues.

Rule 8: Keep the pressure on. Use different tactics and actions and use all events of the period for your purpose. “The major premise for tactics is the development of operations that will maintain a constant pressure upon the opposition. It is this that will cause the opposition to react to your advantage.”

Rule 9: The threat is more terrifying than the thing itself. When Alinsky leaked word that large numbers of poor people were going to tie up the washrooms of O’Hare Airport, Chicago city authorities quickly agreed to act on a longstanding commitment to a ghetto organization. They imagined the mayhem as thousands of passengers poured off airplanes to discover every washroom occupied. Then they imagined the international embarrassment and the damage to the city’s reputation.

Rule 10: The price of a successful attack is a constructive alternative. Avoid being trapped by an opponent or an interviewer who says, “Okay, what would you do?”

Rule 11: Pick the target, freeze it, personalize it, polarize it. Don’t try to attack abstract corporations or bureaucracies. Identify a responsible individual. Ignore attempts to shift or spread the blame.

Another quote attributed to Alinsky is as follows:

“The enemy properly goaded and guided in his reaction will be your major strength.”

This quote illustrates their strategy towards the Tea Party in general and with this website. They have no good argument or ideas to counter what we are saying, so they are going to use human nature to destroy us. They have since our inception characterized us as a bunch of racists, bigots, and the stereotypical angry white men. In March as the Health Care Bill was on the verge of passing and emotions were running high they tried to guide us into racism or violence that they could capture on camera and use against us. I was there in those protests and there were cameras everywhere. Certain representatives took the extrodinary action of walking through a crowd of 40-50,000 protestors to the capital when they could have taken their normal underground route. When they couldn’t goad any of us into the actions they wanted they made up claims of racism and bigotry that to this day have not seen one shred of evidence. Now, because they have been called on this they are going to create the evidence. You can read their playbook above. They will not back down and will not stop fighting to destroy our group.

If you go to their website, make sure you are polite and don’t give them anything to spread over the Internet. In fact, I wouldn’t post at all as our opponents have proven they are not above fabricating evidence. When you are put in a situation where you need to argue our cause be passionate but calm. Do not under any circumstances allow yourself to be “goaded and guided” into a reaction that they can use. When you are at protests or other public events bring an audio recorder, flip video recorder, or at least a cell phone that can record. This will be beneficial in two ways. First, you protect yourself from being smeared because you will have evidence of your words and actions. Second, when you do come across those trying to infiltrate, and it will be pretty obvious, you can get evidence of them and make it public. Above all, stay firm in your thoughts, beliefs, and morals. Theirs are the tactics of the desperate and depraved, bereft of ideas, morality, and truth. They hide behind lies, change words to fit their agenda, and infiltrate and use groups of peoples and organizations to advance their cause. They have no respect for morality, honor, or any of the universal truths that our nation was founded upon. However, history has shown us that there are two ways that they can win this fight. The first is for the rest of us to do nothing. The progressive movement is patient and in their most insidious designs inch ever forward in removing our liberties like an eroding tide. The second is to discredit and destroy those of us that stand against their forward motion like a wall against the rising tide. If they can turn us into the “radicals”, unwashed bigots led by base emotions of fear and hatred instead of ideas then they will win and turn the rest of the population against us. Then, with the opposition silenced they can surge through in the cloak of false morality and half truths and bring us all to “social justice,” yet another bastardized term to sweeten the bitter pill of tyranny. Stay true to your creator, your morals, and yourself and just like in our past they will at last overstep their bounds and be forced back into the shadows and footnotes of history. Allow them to win, and we won’t even be afforded footnotes.

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From The Life of Colonel David Crockett, by Edward S. Ellis (Philadelphia: Porter & Coates, 1884)

Crockett was then the lion of Washington. I was a great admirer of his character, and, having several friends who were intimate with him, I found no difficulty in making his acquaintance. I was fascinated with him, and he seemed to take a fancy to me. I was one day in the lobby of the House of Representatives when a bill was taken up appropriating money for the benefit of a widow of a distinguished naval officer. Several beautiful speeches had been made in its support – rather, as I thought, because it afforded the speakers a fine opportunity for display than from the necessity of convincing anybody, for it seemed to me that everybody favored it. The Speaker was just about to put the question when Crockett arose. Everybody expected, of course, that he was going to make one of his characteristic speeches in support of the bill. He commenced: “Mr. Speaker – I have as much respect for the memory of the deceased, and as much sympathy for the sufferings of the living, if suffering there be, as any man in this House, but we must not permit our respect for the dead or our sympathy for a part of the living to lead us into an act of injustice to the balance of the living. I will not go into an argument to prove that Congress has no power to appropriate this money as an act of charity. Every member upon this floor knows it. We have the right, as individuals, to give away as much of our own money as we please in charity; but as members of Congress we have no right so to appropriate a dollar of the public money. Some eloquent appeals have been made to us upon the ground that it is a debt due the deceased. Mr. Speaker, the deceased lived long after the close of the war; he was in office to the day of his death, and I have never heard that the government was in arrears to him. This government can owe no debts but for services rendered, and at a stipulated price. If it is a debt, how much is it? Has it been audited, and the amount due ascertained? If it is a debt, this is not the place to present it for payment, or to have its merits examined. If it is a debt, we owe more than we can ever hope to pay, for we owe the widow of every soldier who fought in the War of 1812 precisely the same amount. There is a woman in my neighborhood, the widow of as gallant a man as ever shouldered a musket. He fell in battle. She is as good in every respect as this lady, and is as poor. She is earning her daily bread by her daily labor; but if I were to introduce a bill to appropriate five or ten thousand dollars for her benefit, I should be laughed at, and my bill would not get five votes in this House. There are thousands of widows in the country just such as the one I have spoken of, but we never hear of any of these large debts to them. Sir, this is no debt. The government did not owe it to the deceased when he was alive; it could not contract it after he died. I do not wish to be rude, but I must be plain. Every man in this House knows it is not a debt. We cannot, without the grossest corruption, appropriate this money as the payment of a debt. We have not the semblance of authority to appropriate it as a charity. Mr. Speaker, I have said we have the right to give as much of our own money as we please. I am the poorest man on this floor. I cannot vote for this bill, but I will give one week’s pay to the object, and if every member of Congress will do the same, it will amount to more than the bill asks.” He took his seat. Nobody replied. The bill was put upon its passage, and, instead of passing unanimously, as was generally supposed, and as, no doubt, it would, but for that speech, it received but few votes, and, of course, was lost. Like many other young men, and old ones, too, for that matter, who had not thought upon the subject, I desired the passage of the bill, and felt outraged at its defeat. I determined that I would persuade my friend Crockett to move a reconsideration the next day. Previous engagements preventing me from seeing Crockett that night, I went early to his room the next morning and found him engaged in addressing and franking letters, a large pile of which lay upon his table. I broke in upon him rather abruptly, by asking him what devil had possessed him to make that speech and defeat that bill yesterday. Without turning his head or looking up from his work, he replied: “You see that I am very busy now; take a seat and cool yourself. I will be through in a few minutes, and then I will tell you all about it.” He continued his employment for about ten minutes, and when he had finished he turned to me and said: “Now, sir, I will answer your question. But thereby hangs a tale, and one of considerable length, to which you will have to listen.” I listened, and this is the tale which I heard: Several years ago I was one evening standing on the steps of the Capitol with some other members of Congress, when our attention was attracted by a great light over in Georgetown. It was evidently a large fire. We jumped into a hack and drove over as fast as we could. When we got there, I went to work, and I never worked as hard in my life as I did there for several hours. But, in spite of all that could be done, many houses were burned and many families made homeless, and, besides, some of them had lost all but the clothes they had on. The weather was very cold, and when I saw so many women and children suffering, I felt that something ought to be done for them, and everybody else seemed to feel the same way. The next morning a bill was introduced appropriating $20,000 for their relief. We put aside all other business and rushed it through as soon as it could be done. I said everybody felt as I did. That was not quite so; for, though they perhaps sympathized as deeply with the sufferers as I did, there were a few of the members who did not think we had the right to indulge our sympathy or excite our charity at the expense of anybody but ourselves. They opposed the bill, and upon its passage demanded the yeas and nays. There were not enough of them to sustain the call, but many of us wanted our names to appear in favor of what we considered a praiseworthy measure, and we voted with them to sustain it. So the yeas and nays were recorded, and my name appeared on the journals in favor of the bill. The next summer, when it began to be time to think about the election, I concluded I would take a scout around among the boys of my district. I had no opposition there, but, as the election was some time off, I did not know what might turn up, and I thought it was best to let the boys know that I had not forgot them, and that going to Congress had not made me too proud to go to see them. So I put a couple of shirts and a few twists of tobacco into my saddlebags, and put out. I had been out about a week and had found things going very smoothly, when, riding one day in a part of my district in which I was more of a stranger than any other, I saw a man in a field plowing and coming toward the road. I gauged my gait so that we should meet as he came to the fence. As he came up I spoke to the man. He replied politely, but, as I thought, rather coldly, and was about turning his horse for another furrow when I said to him: “Don’t be in such a hurry, my friend; I want to have a little talk with you, and get better acquainted.” He replied: “I am very busy, and have but little time to talk, but if it does not take too long, I will listen to what you have to say.” I began: “Well, friend, I am one of those unfortunate beings called candidates, and – ” “‘Yes, I know you; you are Colonel Crockett. I have seen you once before, and voted for you the last time you were elected. I suppose you are out electioneering now, but you had better not waste your time or mine. I shall not vote for you again.’ This was a sockdolager… I begged him to tell me what was the matter. “Well, Colonel, it is hardly worthwhile to waste time or words upon it. I do not see how it can be mended, but you gave a vote last winter which shows that either you have not capacity to understand the Constitution, or that you are wanting in honesty and firmness to be guided by it. In either case you are not the man to represent me. But I beg your pardon for expressing it in that way. I did not intend to avail myself of the privilege of the Constitution to speak plainly to a candidate for the purpose of insulting or wounding you. I intend by it only to say that your understanding of the Constitution is very different from mine; and I will say to you what, but for my rudeness, I should not have said, that I believe you to be honest. But an understanding of the Constitution different from mine I cannot overlook, because the Constitution, to be worth anything, must be held sacred, and rigidly observed in all its provisions. The man who wields power and misinterprets it is the more dangerous the more honest he is.” “I admit the truth of all you say, but there must be some mistake about it, for I do not remember that I gave any vote last winter upon any constitutional question.” “No, Colonel, there’s no mistake. Though I live here in the backwoods and seldom go from home, I take the papers from Washington and read very carefully all the proceedings of Congress. My papers say that last winter you voted for a bill to appropriate $20,000 to some sufferers by a fire in Georgetown. Is that true?” “Certainly it is, and I thought that was the last vote which anybody in the world would have found fault with.” “Well, Colonel, where do you find in the Constitution any authority to give away the public money in charity?” Here was another sockdolager; for, when I began to think about it, I could not remember a thing in the Constitution that authorized it. I found I must take another tack, so I said: “Well, my friend; I may as well own up. You have got me there. But certainly nobody will complain that a great and rich country like ours should give the insignificant sum of $20,000 to relieve its suffering women and children, particularly with a full and overflowing Treasury, and I am sure, if you had been there, you would have done just as I did.” “It is not the amount, Colonel, that I complain of; it is the principle. In the first place, the government ought to have in the Treasury no more than enough for its legitimate purposes. But that has nothing to do with the question. The power of collecting and disbursing money at pleasure is the most dangerous power that can be entrusted to man, particularly under our system of collecting revenue by a tariff, which reaches every man in the country, no matter how poor he may be, and the poorer he is the more he pays in proportion to his means. What is worse, it presses upon him without his knowledge where the weight centers, for there is not a man in the United States who can ever guess how much he pays to the government. So you see, that while you are contributing to relieve one, you are drawing it from thousands who are even worse off than he. If you had the right to give anything, the amount was simply a matter of discretion with you, and you had as much right to give $20,000,000 as $20,000. If you have the right to give to one, you have the right to give to all; and, as the Constitution neither defines charity nor stipulates the amount, you are at liberty to give to any and everything which you may believe, or profess to believe, is a charity, and to any amount you may think proper. You will very easily perceive what a wide door this would open for fraud and corruption and favoritism, on the one hand, and for robbing the people on the other. No, Colonel, Congress has no right to give charity. Individual members may give as much of their own money as they please, but they have no right to touch a dollar of the public money for that purpose. If twice as many houses had been burned in this county as in Georgetown, neither you nor any other member of Congress would have thought of appropriating a dollar for our relief. There are about two hundred and forty members of Congress. If they had shown their sympathy for the sufferers by contributing each one week’s pay, it would have made over $13,000. There are plenty of wealthy men in and around Washington who could have given $20,000 without depriving themselves of even a luxury of life. The Congressmen chose to keep their own money, which, if reports be true, some of them spend not very creditably; and the people about Washington, no doubt, applauded you for relieving them from the necessity of giving by giving what was not yours to give. The people have delegated to Congress, by the Constitution, the power to do certain things. To do these, it is authorized to collect and pay moneys, and for nothing else. Everything beyond this is usurpation, and a violation of the Constitution.” I have given you an imperfect account of what he said. Long before he was through, I was convinced that I had done wrong. He wound up by saying: “So you see, Colonel, you have violated the Constitution in what I consider a vital point. It is a precedent fraught with danger to the country, for when Congress once begins to stretch its power beyond the limits of the Constitution, there is no limit to it, and no security for the people. I have no doubt you acted honestly, but that does not make it any better, except as far as you are personally concerned, and you see that I cannot vote for you.” I tell you I felt streaked. I saw if I should have opposition, and this man should go talking, he would set others to talking, and in that district I was a gone fawn-skin. I could not answer him, and the fact is, I did not want to. But I must satisfy him, and I said to him: “Well, my friend, you hit the nail upon the head when you said I had not sense enough to understand the Constitution. I intended to be guided by it, and thought I had studied it full. I have heard many speeches in Congress about the powers of Congress, but what you have said there at your plow has got more hard, sound sense in it than all the fine speeches I ever heard. If I had ever taken the view of it that you have, I would have put my head into the fire before I would have given that vote; and if you will forgive me and vote for me again, if I ever vote for another unconstitutional law I wish I may be shot.” He laughingly replied: “Yes, Colonel, you have sworn to that once before, but I will trust you again upon one condition. You say that you are convinced that your vote was wrong. Your acknowledgment of it will do more good than beating you for it. If, as you go around the district, you will tell people about this vote, and that you are satisfied it was wrong, I will not only vote for you, but will do what I can to keep down opposition, and, perhaps, I may exert some little influence in that way.” “If I don’t,” said I, “I wish I may be shot; and to convince you that I am in earnest in what I say, I will come back this way in a week or ten days, and if you will get up a gathering of the people, I will make a speech to them. Get up a barbecue, and I will pay for it.” “No, Colonel, we are not rich people in this section, but we have plenty of provisions to contribute for a barbecue, and some to spare for those who have none. The push of crops will be over in a few days, and we can then afford a day for a barbecue. This is Thursday; I will see to getting it up on Saturday week. Come to my house on Friday, and we will go together, and I promise you a very respectable crowd to see and hear you.” “Well, I will be here. But one thing more before I say good-bye. I must know your name.” “My name is Bunce.” “Not Horatio Bunce?” “Yes.” “Well, Mr. Bunce, I never saw you before, though you say you have seen me; but I know you very well. I am glad I have met you, and very proud that I may hope to have you for my friend. You must let me shake your hand before I go.” We shook hands and parted. It was one of the luckiest hits of my life that I met him. He mingled but little with the public, but was widely known for his remarkable intelligence and incorruptible integrity, and for a heart brimful and running over with kindness and benevolence, which showed themselves not only in words but in acts. He was the oracle of the whole country around him, and his fame had extended far beyond the circle of his immediate acquaintance. Though I had never met him before, I had heard much of him, and but for this meeting it is very likely I should have had opposition, and had been beaten. One thing is very certain, no man could now stand up in that district under such a vote. At the appointed time I was at his house, having told our conversation to every crowd I had met, and to every man I stayed all night with, and I found that it gave the people an interest and a confidence in me stronger than I had ever seen manifested before. Though I was considerably fatigued when I reached his house, and, under ordinary circumstances, should have gone early to bed, I kept him up until midnight, talking about the principles and affairs of government, and got more real, true knowledge of them than I had got all my life before. I have told you Mr. Bunce converted me politically. He came nearer converting me religiously than I had ever been before. He did not make a very good Christian of me, as you know; but he has wrought upon my mind a conviction of the truth of Christianity, and upon my feelings a reverence for its purifying and elevating power such as I had never felt before. I have known and seen much of him since, for I respect him – no, that is not the word – I reverence and love him more than any living man, and I go to see him two or three times every year; and I will tell you, sir, if everyone who professes to be a Christian lived and acted and enjoyed it as he does, the religion of Christ would take the world by storm. But to return to my story. The next morning we went to the barbecue, and, to my surprise, found about a thousand men there. I met a good many whom I had not known before, and they and my friend introduced me around until I had got pretty well acquainted – at least, they all knew me. In due time notice was given that I would speak to them. They gathered around a stand that had been erected. I opened my speech by saying: “Fellow citizens – I present myself before you today feeling like a new man. My eyes have lately been opened to truths which ignorance or prejudice, or both, had heretofore hidden from my view. I feel that I can today offer you the ability to render you more valuable service than I have ever been able to render before. I am here today more for the purpose of acknowledging my error than to seek your votes. That I should make this acknowledgment is due to myself as well as to you. Whether you will vote for me is a matter for your consideration only.” I went on to tell them about the fire and my vote for the appropriation as I have told it to you, and then told them why I was satisfied it was wrong. I closed by saying: “And now, fellow citizens, it remains only for me to tell you that the most of the speech you have listened to with so much interest was simply a repetition of the arguments by which your neighbor, Mr. Bunce, convinced me of my error. “It is the best speech I ever made in my life, but he is entitled to the credit of it. And now I hope he is satisfied with his convert and that he will get up here and tell you so.” He came upon the stand and said: “Fellow citizens – It affords me great pleasure to comply with the request of Colonel Crockett. I have always considered him a thoroughly honest man, and I am satisfied that he will faithfully perform all that he has promised you today.” He went down, and there went up from the crowd such a shout for Davy Crockett as his name never called forth before. I am not much given to tears, but I was taken with a choking then and felt some big drops rolling down my cheeks. And I tell you now that the remembrance of those few words spoken by such a man, and the honest, hearty shout they produced, is worth more to me than all the honors I have received and all the reputation I have ever made, or ever shall make, as a member of Congress. “Now, Sir,” concluded Crockett, “you know why I made that speech yesterday. I have had several thousand copies of it printed and was directing them to my constituents when you came in. “There is one thing now to which I will call your attention. You remember that I proposed to give a week’s pay. There are in that House many very wealthy men – men who think nothing of spending a week’s pay, or a dozen of them for a dinner or a wine party when they have something to accomplish by it. Some of those same men made beautiful speeches upon the great debt of gratitude which the country owed the deceased – a debt which could not be paid by money, particularly so insignificant a sum as $10,000, when weighed against the honor of the nation. Yet not one of them responded to my proposition. Money with them is nothing but trash when it is to come out of the people. But it is the one great thing for which most of them are striving, and many of them sacrifice honor, integrity, and justice to obtain it.”

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So, if this bill was so important for the future of our country, why does most of it not kick in until years in the future?  Well as for all things involving Congress look to the politics.  First, the famed Congressional Budget Office estimates on the savings this bill will bring are based on 10 years of taxes and 6 years of benefits (thats if the 30 million get health care before the deadline of 2019.)  If they were to put the benefits in immediately the costs would be so far in the red that they could not have used the economy as a reason for passing it.  This doesn’t even take into account the fact that CBO estimates on social programs is usually off by an order of being several times more expensive.

Secondly, look at the dates of these milestones in coverage and compare them to major elections.  Later this year we have a mid-term election.  Most likely the Democrats will take huge hits and may even lose their majorities.  The next big election will be in 2012.  By this point in time none of the big benefits have kicked in nor have the biggest taxes.  So, President Obama and the Democrats in 2012 will be able to campaign and basically say the following:  Its two years later and the world hasn’t ended nor has your life really changed.  All those Republicans and Conservatives telling you this was a travesty were blowing hot air so don’t listen to them anymore.  Second and probably more importantly, we will have been paying taxes on the bill for a couple of years and Obama will be able to campaign that if he isn’t voted back into office it will all be for nothing because the Republican candidate will repeal the legislation.  We will have been paying taxes for two years and never get to see any of the benefits.  The same type of argument can be used in 2014 as right around that mid-term election the benefits will start kicking in and can be used as a campaign talking point.  Finally, when the biggest parts of the legislation kick in in 2019 Obama will have been out of office for several years and a new president, if they are a democrat or a progressive, will also be able to say just keep us in office and wait a little longer, utopia is just around the corner.

Around this time something else will have happened as well.  In 2014 there is no discrimination based on pre-existing conditions and there is no cap on coverage.  Americans will be mandated to have insurance (heavily subsidized below a certain income) but the penalty for not having it will be cheaper then the insurance itself.  The combination of these factors leads to people who just pay the fine until they become ill and need insurance.  Then, the company that they apply with will have to take them, offer them government mandated coverage, and not charge an excessive amount for the convenience.  This, combined with other restrictions such as not being able to charge more then three times more for a policy of an elderly person then a young healthy person will will either start to drive insurance companies out of business by making their costs too high or causing them to raise premiums on everyone to an unsustainable point.

In the 2018 Presidential election we will probably be having another health care debate (if it doesn’t happen sooner.)  In this one, we will be told that the private health care system has completely failed and that the country should now go to a government only system.  They will be able to point at the benefits from 2014 to that time and show that the taxes haven’t been that bad.  Remember, the major benefits that cost a lot of money to the government haven’t kicked in yet, only the ones on private industry that they want to fail.  The big “Cadillac” tax won’t have kicked in yet either so the government looks rosy and private industry looks weak and impotent.  By the time 2019 rolls around and the full coverage and costs will have begun they will have eased us into a single payer system and kept themselves in power in the process.

In conclusion, I am not saying this is what will happen, I’m proposing this is their thinking on what will happen.  Unfortunately for everyone, long before we reach 2019 our credit status in the world will have fallen well below its current AAA rating and we will not be able to borrow the money to fund these deficit causing programs.  By 2020, the Congressional Budget Office predicts that our deficit will reach 90 percent of the GDP.  In all circumstances, Utopia at that cost will lead to our destruction not with a bang, but with a European Socialism style whimper.

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When God created man, He gave man two of these gifts.  From the Garden of Eden story we can infer that Adam and Eve could reason and had free will.  However, they did not know the difference between good and evil and they could not fully experience emotions without this gift.  Also, from the Garden of Eden story we know that at least one of the fallen angels, satan, was present in the Garden.  We know that man had reason and free will from the instructions of God regarding the tree of knowledge.  Adam was told that he was not to eat the fruit of the tree or he would die.  From this we can infer two things.  First of all, for Adam to be able to do something that God did not want him to he had to have free will to make his own decisions.  Second, for Adam to commit such an action and be responsible, i.e. the fruit didn’t fall into his mouth while he was sleeping, he had to be able to come up with a reason to defy God.  Finally, man did not know the difference between good and evil.  God told him that if he ate of the fruit he would die, something Adam could quantify.  God didn’t tell him not to do it because it was wrong.  This is similar to how one gives rules to a young child.  The child does not have the combination of reason and morality that come with experience to just tell them that something is wrong.  So, you tell them not to commit an action or they will be spanked, get a time out, be grounded, etc.  You give immediate consequences for their use of reason and free will to do something wrong.

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One of the stranger moments of the health care legislation battle over the last weekend was when President Obama signed an executive order barring the use of federal funds for abortions.  Pretty much every interested group on both sides came out and said that such an action won’t stand up in courts.  So, besides a rather weak attempt to give Stupak cover for his vote, why was it done?  It is my opinion that this is the first strike in an effort to add teeth to the executive order.  President Obama, by signing this legislation, is throwing down the guantlet and saying that he has the ability to make law.  Now, he can sit back and let the conservatives argue that he had the right to do it.  Look at the alternative, either we try to give teeth to the President’s bill or we allow abortion to become federally funded.  By taking this action the President is having us fight his battle for him.  This bill will eventually be overturned in court, most likely through a lawsuit by a pro-choice group.  So, in the end if this goes as I think its planned those that are pro-life will have to argue for this executive order to stand.  We already see that we don’t have the backing in Congress any longer to get an actual bill passed.  Stupak and the others knew very well that this executive order was a sham, so Stupak and others have pretty much said that they can no longer be trusted to support pro-life legislation.  So, in the end the legislation will be overturned and the most pro-abortion president in history will have federally funded abortion to go with his socialization of the American health care system.  At the same time, the next time he wants to sign an executive order to do something big that he can’t get through Congress, he will have all those arguments on his side as to why he can.

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I know that on Saturday when we left the rally and went over to the congressional offices that just happened to be the exact time many Democratic members of Congress decided to walk out of their offices through the crowds and into the Capital.  This was after they had locked the doors to one of the offices so that a huge crowd converged on that spot.

At the time I had hoped that it was just a coincidence, perhaps even a fated one that they would have to walk through all of us and be reminded of where their power came from.  I figured that it was just incompetence that led to them feeling the need to lock the doors and overprotectiveness that led to this:

Then I saw Nancy Pelosi with her cartoon mallet and a huge grin on her face practically dancing through the crowd on Sunday to actually go pass the bill and I thought it was just arrogance.  Now we are hearing all these claims that members of congress feel threatened and that certain members were assaulted with racial slurs or disparaging comments about their sexuality.  I know what they are doing now, they are trying to incite violence.  Nancy Pelosi had no good reason to walk through the crowds to get to the Capitol.  There is no evidence that racial slurs or homosexual slurs were used by the protesters.  In fact, there is some evidence that Barney Frank looked at one protester and said f*** you.  Don’t be fooled into thinking all these things are blind arrogance or the tactics of those that can only pull racism or petty arguments out of their playbooks.  They want us to be violent.  They want to make us so angry that someone does something stupid.  Then, they can use that one act or few acts of stupidity and violence to completely discredit our movement and seperate us from the American people.  As Glenn Beck has been saying on his shows, those that are in power are the radicals of the 1960’s.  The elites right now are people like Van Jones and the head of the Apollo Alliance that actually was a terrorist bomber in the 60’s.  They found out the hard way that the American people detest violence.  We are a nation of ideals and reason and our government is structured in such as a way that we solve our differences through debate and not with the barrel of a gun.  We have to make sure that we stay on that side of America.  The radicals of the 60’s went violent and were utterly discredited.  Now they want us to take that role so that they can rise to the position of moral authority.  We have to hold strong to our ideals, morals, and conscience.  As long as we stay peaceful and beat them with our ideas they can not polarize the rest of America against us.  They will continue to look like fools and corrupt thieves and we will strip them of political power in November.  If we fall and resort to petty tactics of violence and terror, we do not deserve the mantle of freedom and we will have failed in our responsibilities to our children and future Americans.

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Protestors gather at the front of a locked Rayburn Congressional Office Building almost immediately following the rally.

I was one of the 40,000 plus protesters that rallied in front of the Capitol building at noon on Saturday, March 20.  We were told that the lawn we were on holds 40,000 people and it was packed with others on either side of the lawn and spreading down the national mall towards the Washington Monument.  The rally was awesome.  We listened to speakers such as Michelle Malkin and many other of our representatives that opposed the bill.  Afterwards, the crowd converged on the three office buildings to speak to their representatives and things got interesting.

Seeing that the lines would be huge I left the rally a few minutes early because I wanted to make sure that I got to make my presence known at my representatives office.  The first thing I noticed was that Rayburn was locked from the start.  As I walked by it there was a huge line of people yelling “let us in.”  Things didn’t get any better there as they were not let in.  I was told that the few people that did get into the building found welcome plaques next to bolted doors to congressional offices.

I proceeded on to Longworth where I had better luck.  The line was just forming there and people were being let in.  I managed to get into the building and through security into the ground floor near the elevator where 100 or more people were standing.  While trying to figure out what floor the office I wanted to visit things got quite loud.  Evidently, by some fluke or act of providence our representatives chose that exact moment to make their way out of the building and to the Capitol Building.  They literally had to walk through a gauntlet of protesters to get out the door.  Everyone was respectful to the point that everyone cleared the way so they could get through and nothing approaching a threat to the representatives occurred.  It mainly consisted of us all chanting “kill the bill” as they filed through between our ranks followed by television cameras.  I will always remember that moment and the deer in headlights look some of them had.

After the first group had exited the building the security told us that we had to be quiet.  About that time another group of representatives came through and things got loud again.  At that point we were told that we were being thrown out of the building because we didn’t follow their instructions.  As soon as that order was given yells of they’re throwing people out began and television cameras converged on the officer making the demand.  Not a person moved and the matter was dropped as soon as it began.  From people I talked to afterwards as soon as the representatives left the office they had to walk through the remainder of the 40,000 people that were converging on the buildings at that time.  This is when the media is reporting that supposedly racial slurs were used.  I can say that I certainly my entire time there did not hear or see a single racial remark, sign, or action.  I have to think that from the people I saw there that had someone made such a statement it would have been shouted down by the crowd.  Also, there was no video of this supposed incident and no witnesses beyond the couple of democratic congressmen that so convieniently heard it.  There was even supposedly an arrest yet there isn’t even a mug shot of the person involved.  I call foul play and think its sad that this was the only retort that they had to the voice of the American people.

At that point, wanting to actually make it to a congressional office I made it to an elevator and the fifth floor of the building.  There were lots of people walking around and speaking with congressional aids.  I found the office I was looking for and of course representative Ethridge was in the capitol building.  There were probably 20 people in and surrounding the office filling out forms for the representative expressing their displeasure at his recent announcement to vote for the bill.  I must say that even though I got quite vocal (but civil) with the aids over the decision I have never had a bad experience with his staff.  They are very patient, listen, and even got us all water (it was a hot day.) 

Once I left the office I walked passed Rayburn again.  They had still not allowed anyone in and there was a massive crowd in front of the building as you can see in the picture at the top.  Evidently the police were getting nervous at that point because there were a few officers standing near the crowd with tear gas rifles ready to disperse the crowd.  However, I spoke with one of these officers and they told me that this was one of the most peaceful rallies that they had seen.  I heard that sentiment echoed by serveral others.

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 My name is John Daniels and I am one of your constituents. I am writing to voice my concern at your stated position supporting current health care legislation. While I completely agree that we need health care reform, I am totally against the current legislation that is being considered.

First of all, I am extremely skeptical of the CBO figures as released today. They are for one thing not the final projections as stated by the chairman of the CBO but also historically expenses on social programs have exceeded CBO estimates by as much as 700 percent. If this trend continues a bill that is slightly under a trillion dollars becomes a money pit that will cost the people of this country over 6 trillion dollars in a 10 year period.

Second, the current legislation does not commence with benefits until 2014, however taxes and fees associated with the legislation begin immediately. So, the figures are taking into account 10 years of funds entering the system while only taking out 6 years of benefits.

Third, the CBO makes predictions on tax revenue and economic performance that in light of projections by many respected economists appears extremely unlikely.

Fourth, according to the 10th amendment to the Constitution all powers not specifically delegated to the federal government nor prohibited to the states belong to the states. Nowhere in the Constitution do I find the ability given to the federal government to create social programs such as mandatory health care. Also, it is obvious to myself and apparently the rest of the country that this is just a first step towards a single payer system. The president is actually on video on more then one occasion saying as much. Congress and you through your affirmative vote will be working towards taking over 1/6 of the United States economy and replacing the best health care system on the planet (not perfect but better then all the other options out there) with a disastrous system that will lower the standard of living in this country as well as potentially factor into the lowering of our nation’s credit rating.

Fifth, while article 1 section 5 of the Constitution does allow each branch of Congress to make their own rules, article 1 section 7 says that all bills must be approved by both houses of Congress and then signed by the President before they are law. According to Clinton vs. New York (1998) the Supreme Court affirmed that for a bill to be a law it must pass both chambers of Congress with the exact same language both times before being signed by the President into law. The self-executing rule (or Slaughter Rule) will be saying that the House agrees that the Senate bill is law and then creates a bill to ammend it that will be sent to the Senate for reconciliation. You are voting to amend a law that does not exist yet. It has not been passed by both chambers of Congress and then signed by the President. I would go further and say that if it does end up before the President having been deemed to have passed in the House and reconciled in the Senate, that in the end two different bills (as far as language is concerned) will have been passed and therefore can not be signed into law by the President per the Supreme Court. I am already aware of lawsuits that will be filed should this happen to have it striken down as unconstitutional.

Finally, I would appeal to your sacred honor as a representative of the people of North Carolina and your oath to uphold the Constitution. What you are doing is wrong and violates everything that this country was founded on and grew great as a result of. There are already systems in place such as medicaid that could be used to cover people without this fundamental change in our economy. Even better, changes in government regulation, return of competition between states, and major malpractice reform would do much more to honor the spirit of this great nation, help those in need, and move our country in the right direction.

May God inspire and remind you of your responsibility as the holder of your constituent’s power. Should you abuse this responsibility, may you be shown for what you are and voted off the public stage. As my representative, I trust you to make the right decision and promise you what I am sure the maelstrom of phone calls this week has only confirms; whatever your decision we are awake, we are watching, and we will not forget.

Respectfully,

John W. Daniels

Resident of Raleigh, North Carolina

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