Polls: Most Americans ‘Under God’

Polls: Most Americans ‘Under God’
Vol: 9 Issue: 30 Sunday, June 30, 2002

Following the outcry against the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals decision, Newsweek conducted a poll that clearly demonstrates how out of touch the media is with the rest of America.

As the pundits applauded the 9th Circuit decision to declare the ‘under God’ provision of the Pledge unconstitutional, Newsweek found less than one American in ten agreed with the media assessment.

Eighty-seven percent of Americans [Newdow estimated 90% in his “I’m a patriot” comments] believe the phrase does not violate the 1st Amendment ‘Establishment’ clause.

Only nine percent believe the phrase should be removed. Thirty-six percent read the Establishment Clause as prohibiting government from promoting religion in any way. But a fifty-four percent majority disagreed.

And fully six in ten Americans thing it is a good thing for America when government leaders publicly express their faith in God.

Only twelve percent of those polled by Newsweek felt that government should eliminate all references to God and religious beliefs in schools and government and public buildings.

A whopping eighty-four percent of all Americans believe such references are acceptable, provided they don’t mention a specific religion.

Before we start doing handsprings, it doesn’t necessarily follow that the majority of Americans are Christians, but we aren’t the tiny majority we’ve be led to believe by the liberal establishment.

Forty-five percent believe America is a secular nation in which religious belief or lack of it, isn’t a defining characteristic.

I would hazard an opinion that those figures come from across the spectrum, including the most conservative Christian view. I share that view, myself.

An American Buddhist, atheist, Muslim or Jew are no less American than an American Christian [or an American Indian who practices native animism, for that matter].

That particular question and response are so worded as to be essentially meaningless, except to suggest most people didn’t understand the question. But it does reveal that the majority disagree with the sentiment America is a secular nation, even if expressing that view suggested they supported religion as a qualification for citizenship.

One American in three believes America is a Christian nation, and another sixteen percent would define America [accurately, I believe] as a Biblical nation, defined by the Judeo-Christian tradition.

The Ten Commandments [and not the Golden Rule] form the bedrock of English [and American] common law, as defined by Blackstone’s definitive Commentaries on the Law.

Christians accept the whole Bible as the Word of God, not just the New Testament.

Assessment:

It’s that last figure that caught my attention. God has been banished from the public school system for some forty-plus years. An entire generation grew up in America under constant, systematic and organized spiritual desensitization.

Only a member of the liberal left would argue that such a desensitization process took place, or that the liberal left was not its champion.

After four decades of heavily slanted media propaganda exhorting abortion rights, NOW, the gay rights movement, evolution, the New Age, one American in three still sees America as a ‘Christian’ nation.

Less than half even come close to agreeing with the current liberal interpretation of America as wholly secular, even when the question is slanted to favor the ‘secular nation’ worldview.

[Why else would the question include religion as a qualification for citizenship? I know no Christian who would support involuntary conversion to Christianity].

The liberal pundits should take note as they wax eloquent about the upside-down version of democracy in which views espoused by less than one out of ten are celebrated as a victory for ‘majority rule’.

Despite the best efforts of an entire system to remove Jesus Christ from American public life from an entire generation of Americans, one in three still define America as a Christian nation.

When one considers the most generally accepted estimates of the Islamic population at about 3% of the US population, the homosexual population at about 2% of the population, the atheist population at 9% [or less – hard to nail it down from the vaguely worded poll question], and balance that against the third that view America as ‘Christian’, or the eighty-seven percent who want America to remain ‘one nation, under God’, it suggests somebody has been redefining the term ‘majority’ while we were sleeping.

Even after a generation of constant bombardment from the liberal elite, less than half [45%] buy the argument in even the most general terms that America is a secular nation.

For a generation, religious Americans have been told that they are outside the mainstream, and apparently, bought into the liberal propaganda that marginalized them as the Oddball Factor.

The poll numbers bring to mind Hans Christian Anderson’s political allegory/children’s fairy tale, “The Emperor’s New Clothes.”

The little boy in the story had no important job in the kingdom and, as the story goes, “therefore only saw what his eyes told him.

‘The Emperor is naked,’ he said.”

The Devil is in the Details

The Devil is in the Details
Vol: 9 Issue: 29 Saturday, June 29, 2002

Iraq and Saudi Arabia are preparing to reopen their joint border which has been closed for 12 years. The United Nations has approved the reopening of a first border crossing at Arar.

Western diplomats said the reopening of the border would lead to the revival of the Iraqi-Saudi oil pipeline, also closed since 1990, when Iraq invaded Kuwait. Saudi Arabia and Iraq have improved relations over the last year.

Riyad is considering signing an accord with Iraq for a free trade zone. It opposes a US military attack on Saddam. After all, as Saudi Defense Minister Prince Sultan Bin Abdul Aziz pointed out on Saturday, “Iraq does not represent any threat to the [Saudi] kingdom.”

Assessment:

The fact that Iraq represents a threat to America is immaterial at best, part of secret Saudi policy at worst.

In any case, it grows increasingly likely that Persian Gulf War Part Two, should it occur, is likely to be a lot longer and more costly than the first one.

On September 12, King Abdullah of Jordan told a television interview that the strikes on New York and Washington was the ‘beginning of World War Three’.

Given the instability in South Asia, Chinese belligerence, fresh clashes between the Koreas, the Persian Gulf region, the Arab-Israeli conflict, economic chaos in South America, — oh, let’s not forget the war on terror that adds another 40 possible belligerent countries — and Abdullah seems to be the only world leader to see the handwriting on the wall.

Yesterday, America bustled about, preparing for a Fourth of July celebration that will undoubtedly be especially poignant this year. While we were getting ready to celebrate our independence, it is threatened in a manner not yet fully comprehended by the average American.

Syria has launched plans to begin the production of the Scud D medium-range missile. While Damascus is providing some cooperation in the war on terror, it is on a selective basis. Senior Pentagon officials say Syria has increased strategic cooperation with Iraq and continues to develop medium-range missiles and weapons of mass destruction.

Iran continues to smuggle al-Qaeda terrorists into both Syria and Lebanon.

“It is correct that Iran has served as a haven for some terrorists leaving Afghanistan,” Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld said. “And it is also true that it has permitted transit of terrorists and supporters of terrorists through Iran to the south. It is also true that Iran has been involved in working with Syria and moving materials and people down into Damascus and then down through the Beirut road, through the Bekaa Valley and involved with terrorist activities in Lebanon and Israel.”

Tehran is also sending some of these al-Qaeda operatives into Turkey with orders to coordinated domestic insurgency activities as part of an effort to destablize the government there.

Turkey is only Islamic state to be a part of NATO and is the only Islamic state to enter into mutual defense agreements with Israel.

The terror network is also moving operatives across northern Iraq as a land route to move west into Syria. Hundreds more are harbored by Saddam in Kurdish areas of Iraq, where they are been sheltered, trained and exfiltrated for eventual new operations against Western targets.

In Asia, China developed countermeasures says a Chinese technical journal Taiyuan Huoli Yu Zhihui Kongzhi, that can render the US Patriot missile system ineffective.

China has been able to learn the exact characteristics of the Patriot during the 1990’s. Armed with that knowledge, it was only a matter of time.

The Bible speaks of the four spheres of global influence in the last days. The Bible divides them as ‘kingdoms’ by region. The kings of the East, according to John, will field an army of two hundred million men. [According to the KGB-CIA World Factbook, they can do that now].

Of the king of the south, Daniel says, “And in those times there shall many stand up against the king of the south: also the robbers of thy people shall exalt themselves to establish the vision; but they shall fall.” [Daniel 11:14]

Daniel also speaks of the king of the north. Although some commentators say these events took place at the time of Antiochus Epiphanes, there is what is called the ‘law of dual reference’, and Daniel clearly places the timeframe for these kingdoms — at the ‘time of the end’:

“And at the time of the end shall the king of the south push at him: and the king of the north shall come against him like a whirlwind, with chariots, and with horsemen, and with many ships; and he shall enter into the countries, and shall overflow and pass over.” [Daniel 11:40]

The other global sphere of influence isn’t the king of west. Any references to the west appear to be directed toward Europe.

The fourth sphere of global influence in the last days is the Gog-Magog alliance of Ezekiel 38-39. While it has been in development over the past decade, that development is currently stalled as a consequence of the Russian war against Chechnya.

Recent conciliatory moves towards the Chechens by Russian president Vladimir Putin, however, suggest that is a situation that could change quickly, if other events make it necessary.

Follow The Trends

The difficulty with Bible prophecy is that when one attempts to delve too deeply into details and make predictions based on his own understanding of current events, those predictions often fail, or appear to fail, because other necessary events have not yet taken place.

A good example of this was during the Nazi era, when many identified Hitler as antichrist and Mussolini as the Roman False Prophet and the Holocaust as antichrist’s war against the Jews. There were a lot of similarities, but there was no state of Israel.

But Hitler did set in motion events that resulted in the rebirth of the State of Israel, which set the stage for the fulfillment of Bible prophecies that many of that day believed had failed with Hitler’s suicide. Detractors had a field day making sport of the Bible prophecy nuts.

The point is this. There is much truth to the saying, ‘the devil is in the details.’ Detailed predictions can fail, rendering your testimony worthless. The trends are what prove the accuracy of Bible prophecy.

The Bible says the Arab-Israeli conflict will ultimately be resolved by a leader of the Revived Roman Empire. Europe is far better positioned among the Arab states than the US. The trends suggest it will eventually step in, as it has indicated it wants to, as the principle peace broker for the region.

But right now America holds that position. That doesn’t mean the prophecy that the antichrist will be a leader of the Roman Empire who will confirm a seven year peace covenant has failed. The trends still point to Europe as the eventual successor to America’s failed fifty-year effort to bring peace.

For our witness to be credible, it must be true. The Bible gives an overview that fits every existing political, economic, social and spiritual trend now in evidence on the planet.

Our mission is to provide Christians with intelligence information and how it relates to Bible prophecy, so they can use that information as a witnessing tool. In keeping with that mission, it seems right to issue an occasional exhortation.

We don’t believe we are right on every detail. Occasionally, we are, but that is because we pay attention to the trends.

Peter addresses the consequences of putting the understanding of current events above the reading of Scripture.

“Knowing this first, that there shall come in the last days scoffers, walking after their own lusts, And saying, Where is the promise of his coming? for since the fathers fell asleep, all things continue as they were from the beginning of the creation.” [2Peter 3:3-4]

The principle guide to understanding the signs of the times is the Bible, not the newspaper. The headlines confirm Scripture, not the other way around.

It is an important distinction we need to remain mindful of if we hope to be effective laborers for Christ – for the fields are indeed ‘white with harvest’. May God make us effective witnesses!

But remember. The devil is in the details.

Maranatha!

Courts Swing Like A Pendulum Do’

Courts Swing Like A Pendulum Do’
Vol: 9 Issue: 28 Friday, June 28, 2002

So which is it? Is believing in God unconstitutional or not? The Supreme Court ruled yesterday that school vouchers for religious education is Constitutional. But pledging allegiance to America as ‘one nation under God’ is not, according to the 9th Federal District Court of Appeals. One hears of a judiciary that swings left, or swings right, but in America, it swings like the pendulum on a clock, back and forth, without ever stopping in the middle.

Is it Left? Or Right? Or What?

Decades of Democratic rule in Congress resulted in a judicial population whose worldview leans further left than the American mainstream.

When the White House fell to the Democrats after the Reagan-Bush years, the Congress fell to the Republicans in the next off-year election cycle. Consequently, the last decade has witnessed a lot of re-stacking of the judicial benches with conservative jurists.

For 12 years, every judicial appointment made by the Republican White House faced an uphill Congressional confirmation process by the Democratic majority. Many qualified jurists never made the cut. The most famous of these failed GOP appointments gave America a new adjective.

Destroying a judicial candidate’s reputation as a pretext for rejecting a candidate by dredging up some irrelevant past peccadillo and hammering away at it until the candidate is too damaged to even return to his previous occupation was called “borking”.

Why Do You Think They Call It Dope?

Ronald Reagan nominated Robert Bork for the Supreme Court back in 1987. Bork disclosed that as a student in the 60’s, he experimented with marijuana.

The problem with Bork was that he didn’t deny inhaling — by the time the hearings were done, so was Bork.

It was only the fourth time in the 20th century — to that point — that a Supreme Court nominee had been rejected by the Upper House.

Reagan later nominated Douglas Ginsburg, who withdrew his name from consideration after nine grueling days. Ginsburg also admitted to experimenting with marijuana in the 60’s.

The Democratic leadership in the Senate accused the Reagan administration of stacking the court with ‘potheads’ — but this was before 1992.

(Post-1992, being a pothead meant a good job in a new administration who quietly reversed the standing White House drug testing policy to exclude administration officials).

But it was too late for Bork or Ginsburg.

Public Lynching

President Bush’s nominee, Judge Clarence Thomas, was eviscerated during his Supreme Court confirmation.

The Democrats couldn’t find anybody who would accuse Thomas of smoking marijuana in the 60’s, but were able to find Anita Hill. She was Judge Thomas’ devoted legal clerk who followed him from job to job for more than a decade.

Until Thomas went before the Senate confirmation hearing to become the first black Supreme Court Justice.

Hill, (who is also black) testified that despite her record of following Thomas throughout his career, she was a long-time victim of sexual harassment by her mentor.

(Hill testified that Thomas never actually harrassed her directly, but used double entendre and innuendo, making her claims subjective at best).

After lengthy televised hearings in which Thomas claimed he was being subjected to a high-tech lynching, he was barely confirmed by a vote 52-48 in October 1991. Thomas’ reputation never recovered.

But, then came the Clinton years. Previous experimentation with marijuana became an asset, as the shirt-sleeved, tousle-haired policy wonks took over the Oval Office. The GOP took the majority in both Houses, and the shoe was on the other foot.

Fewer judicial appointments were blocked, but Zoe Baird, Kimba Wood, and Lani Guinier were all rejected by the GOP dominated House — Baird and Wood for hiring undocumented aliens as nannies [Nannygate, remember?] and Guinier for being so far to the left that, on removing her name from consideration, Clinton himself said he had “come to realize she endorsed views that I, myself, cannot embrace.” Baird and Wood were under consideration for AG and Guinier as assistant AG.

Still, Clinton saw 369 of his judicial nominees approved, even with the GOP control of both Houses. The Republican record during the Clinton years saw 240 Clinton nominees make it to the federal bench, while only one was rejected.

Assessment:

As a consequence of two decades of judicial appointments based on political ideology rather than judicial qualifications, the American judiciary was populated by judges who were appointed based on their political worldview, rather than their judicial record.

This has all but deadlocked the Supreme Court, as evidenced by the Florida election debacle.

When the Democrats recaptured control of the Senate [with the defection of Jim Jeffords to their side], successful judicial nominations by the Bush administration became newsworthy simply because they were so rare.

Currently, there are almost 100 unfilled seats on the judicial bench. The confirmation process is all but non-existent, as the Democrat-controlled majority has systematically blocked almost every judicial nomination Bush has sent to the Hill.

The US Court of Appeals has four vacancies out of twenty-eight seats. There remain 14 unfilled seats on the Federal Court of Appeals.

An examination of the voting records of the various parties over the past decade is interesting. For example, during the entire 105th Congress (1997-1998), every Democratic Senator voted 100% of the time for Clinton’s nominees. In that same session, all 55 GOP Senators voted for Clinton judges more than 90% of the time. And 12 Republicans joined the Democrats in voting for Clinton’s nominees 100% of the time.

Thus, during 1997-1998, over half the Senate (57 members) supported Clinton’s choices 100% of the time.

Since 2001, the Democrats have opposed Bush judicial nominations 100% of the time.

America’s Judicial Crisis

This is all pretty dry stuff, but the two court decisions handed down this week draw attention to the judicial crisis created by two decades of partisan politics.

The same 9th Court of Appeals in California who ruled “one nation, under God’ was an unconstitutional endorsement of religion also ruled that the religious use of marijuana by the Rastafarians is constitutionally protected.

Meanwhile the Supreme Court heard an appeal of a lower court ruling that denied an Ohio school voucher program for religious schools.

It ruled 5-4 Thursday that with using public funds to pay for students to attend religious schools posed no constitutional problems.

The court endorsed a 6-year-old pilot program in inner-city Cleveland that gives parents a tax-supported education stipend. Parents may use the money to opt out of one of the worst-rated public schools systems in the nation.

So, here we have it.

The Pledge of Allegiance is unconstitutional, says the 9th Circuit, while the Supreme Court says school vouchers for attending religious schools is not.

Are both courts reading the same Constitution?

Actually, the phrase ‘separation of church and state’ doesn’t exist in any of the Founding documents. The phrase originated in an 1803 letter written by Thomas Jefferson who was at the time addressing a very narrow issue that in no way even resembled the modern understanding of the term. Today, this extra-Constitutional doctrine is construed to mean any exercise of religious beliefs in public is unconstitutional.

(Unless one is a Rastafarian with a hankering to smoke a joint).

The Constitution is supposed to be above political considerations, which is why the Founders created an independent judiciary.

How independent is a judiciary whose appointments are based on their political worldview? How independent is a judge who owes his confirmation to a vote in which 100% of one party votes for him and 100% of the other party votes against him?

We’ve seen a glimmer of the Clinton legacy to America; endless scandal, moral equivalency, judicial deadlock, and a partisan loyalty so demanding that America seems to have three classes of patriot — Republican lawmakers, Democratic lawmakers and Americans.

Both parties have focused on grabbing a decisive majority in the Congress to the exclusion of all else at a time when America faces the greatest threat to its liberty in US history.

Previous world wars presented a threat to European freedoms – and by extrapolation, threatened democracy everywhere.

But this one threatens us directly.

Bible prophecy outlines the geopolitical alliances that will exist in the last days. It foresaw a revived Roman Empire, the rise of Islam, the restoration of Israel, the developing global government, and the global economy — thousands of years in advance. But on the question of America’s role in the last days, the Bible is silent.

Where is America in Bible Prophecy?

America is the most blessed nation on the face of the earth — particularly in the years since World War II.

In gratitude for those blessings, we’ve declared God ‘dead’, we’ve declared Him unConstitutional, and we have extended religious protection to every faith except Christianity.

We live in a country in which the President of the US can call Islam ‘a religion of peace hijacked by a few terrorists’ and be applauded as ‘enlightened’ — but the same President cannot praise Christianity for fear of running afoul of a non-existent Constitutional ‘doctrine’ that views ‘separation’ as synonymous with ‘abolition’ — but only when applied to Judeo-Christianity.

Where is America in Bible prophecy? Why are Russia and Europe found there and not America? Scripture does provide a clue in the Words of Jesus.

“For unto whomsoever much is given, of him shall be much required” [Luke 12:48]

The ‘Patriot’

The ‘Patriot’
Vol: 9 Issue: 27 Thursday, June 27, 2002

“But whosoever shall deny me before men, him will I also deny before my Father which is in heaven” – Matthew 10:33

Court Protects Children From God

A lawsuit filed by a California doctor who objected to his daughter being exposed to the word “God” resulted in the California 9th Circuit Court ruling the Pledge of Allegiance is unConstitutional.

The ruling, if allowed to stand, would bar schoolchildren from reciting the pledge in the nine Western states covered by the court.

Washington Responds

The stupidity of the court’s ruling is staggering in its scope. At least, ‘stupid’ is the word used by a number of lawmakers, including Senator Robert Byrd of West Virginia.

He went a bit further, including both the ruling and the judge under the same adjective — stupid. Byrd warned from the Senate floor that the judges involved had reached the pinnacles of their careers, since any promotions must be approved by the Senate.

The decision was written by Judge Alfred T. Goodwin, whom Byrd called an “atheist lawyer.”

“I hope his name never comes before this body for any promotion, because he will be remembered,” Byrd said.

Four hours after the ruling was announced, the Senate tabled the legislation it was considering so it could vote on a resolution condemning both the decision and the judge who handed it down.

The condemnatory resolution was passed unanimously, 99-0. Jesse Helms wasn’t there or it would have been 101-0 [Helms was so angry he’d likely have tried to vote twice].

The decision created a bi-partisan united front more quickly and with more unanimous conviction by lawmakers than the war we are fighting against determined lunatics who have dedicated themselves to America’s destruction. And with good reason.

If God is unconstitutional, then our destruction is virtually assured.

Senate Majority Leader Tom Daschle, D-S.D., said the decison was, “Nuts. Just nuts.. . .I think we need to send a clear message that the Congress disagrees, the Congress is going to intervene, the Congress is going to do all that it can do to live up to the expectations of the American people,” Daschle said.

“What’s next?” asked Rep. Roy Blunt, R-Texas. “Will our courts, in their zeal to abolish all religious faith from public arenas, outlaw ‘God Bless America’ too?”

Joe Liebermann called for a Constitutional amendment to make sure God remains in the Pledge.

President Bush’s spokesman, Ari Fleischer, branded the appeals court decision “ridiculous” and said the Justice Department would fight it. “The view of the White House is that this was a wrong decision,” Fleischer said.

The House and Senate recite the pledge every morning before starting work – the House since 1988 and the Senate since 1999.

After voting to condemn the judge, the Senate met on the Capitol Building steps to recite the Pledge, in public, with special emphasis on the phrase, “One nation, under God”.

The Atheist Speaks

The atheist who filed the case, Dr. Michael A. Newdow gave an interview on CNN. In it, he admitted that the Pledge of Allegiance wasn’t what bothered him. That was just an excuse to bring about the lawsuit.

It all started when Newdow, an atheist, had an epiphany buying soap in Florida six years ago. He looked down to see “In God We Trust” on his money, got offended and starting filing lawsuits against the government for injecting religion into public life.

Using his 8-year-old daughter for legal standing after he moved to California, Newdow convinced the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit that forcing her to recite “one nation under God” amounted to government endorsement of religion.

He said he used his daughter in the lawsuit because “you have to play games with the court” to get legal standing. An earlier lawsuit challenging the pledge was tossed out by a judge because his daughter wasn’t old enough for school at the time.

The Right To Steal the Rights of Others

Newdow says he’s a patriot defending the Constitution, but his words prove he is just as agenda-driven as those whose ‘rights’ he claims to be ‘defending’ by seeking to overturn the rights of others.

He argues the Constitution grants the right not to believe in God.

Evidently, that is a ‘right’ that should be imposed involuntarily on all of America to protect his 2nd grader from having to hear that anybody else does.

His right not to believe in God is more important, ruled the court, than my right not to believe in Michael Newdow, who by definition, is his own god.

“The words were put there by very wise people, and I think it should be upheld.”

But then Newdow let slip his real agenda: “And when atheists are the majority in this country, those people who believe in God will be protected by this decision as much as I am.” Ahh.

Memo to Dr. Newdow: It says “In God WE Trust” not, “In God I trust”. You have the right not to believe in anything. But what about the rest of us, and our rights? There are lots of Americans who DO trust in God. As Newdow himself noted, atheists are NOT the majority.

In 21st century America, selfishness is a much more common virtue than selflessness –maybe because the God Who blessed us with such bounty gives us more opportunities to be selfish than selfless.

September 11 demonstrated the kind of selflessness we are capable of. But it took the murder of thousands to bring it out.

The court noted that the U.S. Supreme Court has said students cannot hold religious invocations at graduations and cannot be compelled to recite the pledge.

But when the pledge is recited in a classroom, the appeals court said, a student who objects is confronted with an “unacceptable choice between participating and protesting.”

It evidently never occurred to anybody that there was a third choice. Not participating. What is more fair than that?

If 17 kids want to play baseball and one doesn’t — is it reasonable for the school to cancel the game, or let the one kid go play what he wants?

Instead, the court ruled the whole country has to change to satisfy one kid’s selfish parent with an axe to grind against any religion except his.

An ‘acceptable choice’ — to my mind, anyway — would be for the one kid not to say it and leave the rest of the country alone.

Or so it would seem. Maybe I’m just no good at math.

Newdow’s argument in a nutshell can be expressed this way. “I don’t like it, millions do. Instead of accepting the will of the majority, I will make the majority bend to mine.”

Newdow says he has thrown the country into a tailspin only partly out of ‘conviction’ — if such is possible for an atheist.

“I’m not a crusader,” he said. “This is interesting and it’s fun.”

Assessment:

You have to hand it to his guy. The entire Senate condemned the ruling. The President of the United States took time away from a G-8 meeting to denounce the ruling from abroad. The entire country is incensed, with the exception of those few morons who think it’s all about them.

Ok, don’t like moron? Too harsh? “The fool hath said in his heart, There is no God.” [Psalms 14:1, 53:1]

Take it up with Him.

But to Newdow, this wasn’t really about his daughter’s rights. As he said, it is ‘interesting and it’s fun.’

Dr. Newdow also has a degree in law. It’s a good thing he practices medicine. He talks way too much to be an effective lawyer.

Newdow told the San Fransciso Chronicle that his family was not particularly religious growing up, but he considers atheism a ‘religion’ – his words, not mine.

So in Newdow’s world, only his religious rights count. Why is that? Because Newdow believes in Newdow. Evidently, since most of the rest of us believe in God, Newdow feels left out.

Newdow said he recognizes that politicians need to invoke God because more than 90 percent of the country claims to be religious.

Newdow — The Greatest American?

“I hope that they would think I am one of the greatest Americans,” said Newdow. “I am upholding the constitution. I’m a patriot.”

Sorry, Doctor. The ‘greatest’ Americans make sacrifices FOR their country, not demand sacrifices FROM it.

A ‘patriot?’ Let’s boil this line of reasoning down a bit.

Newdow views atheism as a religion. He admittedly used his daughter to get legal standing for his lawsuits. Why would that be necessary?

As he admits, 90% of America ‘is religious’ — but they hold to a different religion that he does.

[BTW, atheism, or secular humanism, was ruled a religion by the Supreme Court. Torcaso v. Watkins (1961) held that secular humanism is a ‘religion’ and ordered the extension of 501(c)3 religious tax exemption status to its ‘clergy’].

So, in ‘defense of democracy’, Dr. ‘Patriot’ sued to have his religious views elevated above those of 90% of America.

He admittedly used his second grade daughter to advance his own religious agenda because he couldn’t get legal standing on the merits of his real argument.

[I wonder how she’ll feel about it when she grows up? William Murray, Madeline Murray O’Hair’s son, grew up to be a fundamentalist Christian preacher. They never spoke again]

His agenda is so selfish as to be staggering, yet he portrays himself as a patriot. He argued, and the 9th Circuit agreed, that his child has only two choices regarding the Pledge. Either participate, or protest. Neither is acceptable, ruled the court.

The third choice, that of simply not participating, was not considered.

Newdow argued, and the court agreed, that the only fair way was to force every child in a nine state area to meet the demands of one little girl too young to have an opinion in the first place.

The decision is sure to be overturned. It is hard to imagine upholding a law that puts a the agenda of single person ahead of the rights of millions to acknowledge the Source of our freedoms and blessing.

I would like to go on record at this point by agreeing with the entire United States Senate, Republican, Democrat or other. The ruling was stupid. The judges were stupid. But not Michael Newdow.

He isn’t stupid. He’s a liar.

Either in the interviews in which he said he was using his daughter to gain legal standing for a different case, or in court, when he swore his purpose was to prevent the Pledge of Allegiance to the United States of America from damaging his 2nd grade daughter.

He isn’t a patriot.

A patriot puts his country ahead of himself, not the other way around. He isn’t upholding the Constitution.

It says “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the government for a redress of grievances.”

According to a 1925 Supreme Court decision authored by Justice McReynolds, liberty ”denotes not merely freedom from bodily restraint but also the right of the individual to contract, to engage in any of the common occupations of life, to acquire useful knowledge, to marry, establish a home and bring up children, to worship God according to the dictates of his own conscience, and generally to enjoy those privileges long recognized at common law as essential to the orderly pursuit of happiness by free men.’

What about the right of the people to peaceably assemble or to worship God according to the dictates of their consciences? Acknowleging America as a nation under God affords me more than merely the pursuit of happiness, it is happiness defined.

How is restricting our Constitutional freedoms ‘patriotic’?

Who Came First? America? Or God?

If acknowledging God means ‘establishing’ a religion, Who came first? America? or God? It is difficult to ‘establish’ anything that preexisted the ‘establishing authority’ — which Newdow successfully argued was the US Congress.

The Puritans believed in God before there was an America or a Constitution. God was well established before the first Puritan got on the first ship heading west from England.

If the Pledge of Allegiance is unConstitutional because it contains the phrase, ‘under God’ then it follows that the Declaration of Independence is also unConstitutional.

Taken to the extremes of idiocy, [and I have no doubt one day that extreme will be met] the Constitution itself can be termed unConstitutional, since it acknowleges a Republic governed by Constitutional law rooted in Biblical law. All life, liberty and property are deemed Constitutionally protected because of that Biblical Law.

What the 9th Circuit Court did was establish Newdow’s religion — atheism — as the state religion of the American West — a clear-cut, unambiguous, undeniable violation of the Establishment Clause of the Constitution.

Patriot, Dr. Newdow? For stealing from children the right to pledge allegiance to America and acknowledge the Author of its blessings?

I think not. ‘Selfish opportunist’ comes a lot closer.

PA Schedules Elections

PA Schedules Elections
Vol: 9 Issue: 26 Wednesday, June 26, 2002

Following President Bush’s outline of his vision of a two state solution for the Middle East — a solution that specifically excludes Yasser Arafat — the PA announced it would hold general elections in January.

Saeb Erekat made the announcement, but he said it had nothing to do with President Bush. “Many of you may think, ‘Are we submitting this or saying this in response to President Bush’s speech?’ We are saying this in response to Palestinian needs. We’re saying this because we have been working on this reform for months,” Erekat said.

Sure. It’s an amazing coincidence.

Assessment:

I confess to starting and restarting this sentence at least a dozen times, trying to come up with a way to approach Erekat’s comment without using the usual adjectives. How does one produce the literary equivalent to open-mouthed astonishment?

The question, ‘how stupid does he think the rest of the world is?’ unfortunately answers itself. Stupid enough to believe everything else they’ve been saying for the last decade.

Despite the fact most of it was as transparent as Erekat’s ‘coincidental’ announcement that for months, they’ve been working on the same reforms Bush just happened to impose as conditions on any future Palestinian state.

Evidently, months ago, somebody at the Palestinian Authority suddenly looked up and said, “Hey! Y’know what? I just realized that we haven’t had an election in seven years!”

Upon being confronted with this shocking oversight, it was decided that something must be done. But they wisely decided to keep this plan to themselves.

And, it seems that while they were having this discussion, somebody else piped up and said, “Hey! Y’know what? The original Oslo terms gave us autonomy over municipal governments under our administration. And guess what! I just realized that in more than ten years, we’ve never, ever, ever had municipal elections! I wonder who is running our towns?”

So, it was decided, long before President Bush made his speech, that the Palestinian Authority would also have their first ever municipal elections next March.

See, President Bush didn’t have to make that speech saying that the Palestinians could only have a state if they got new leaders. There’s nothing wrong with the old ones! All by themselves, without any prodding at all, they had ALREADY decided that they’d do some government stuff. Just as if they were a real government.

Like Erekat said, they are responding to ‘Palestinian needs’ for an election.

Until now, the Palestinians had no need for an election. No need for elected city councils or mayors. They certainly had no need for an election for president or for seats on the Palestinian legislative council. They already had elections for that– once.

But due to unforeseen circumstances — the destruction of their cities, complete anarchy, people being lynched in the streets — no garbage collection! — and a little matter of a misplaced three or four billion dollars — it appears that Arafat feels his people ‘need’ an election.

Let ’em blow off a little steam. Make ’em feel like they are involved in the planning of their own destruction. It’s just a little thing, really.

And if they like it, why, maybe we’ll even do it again.

How stupid does he think the rest of the world is?

News Flash: Dateline Jericho — From the BBC 26 June, 2002

“Palestinians Announce Poll Date” “The BBC’s Jeremy Cooke in Jericho says all the indications are that Mr Arafat will be re-elected, as there are no obvious credible challengers.”

Any questions?

BBC Report

Three Years To Statehood Without Arafat

Three Years To Statehood Without Arafat
Vol: 9 Issue: 25 Tuesday, June 25, 2002

President Bush gave his anticipated speech outlining his vision for the Middle East peace process. The White House didn’t give the speech that many expected.

Instead of embracing the Saudi peace plan as expected, Bush drove what many hope was the final nail into the coffin of Yasser Arafat’s rule over the Palestinian Authority.

Bush called for new Palestinian leadership “not compromised by terror” — a clear reference to Arafat without calling him by name, and falling just short of declaring Arafat a terrorist.

When the Palestinian people have new leaders, new institutions and new security arrangements with their neighbors, the United States of America will support the creation of a Palestinian state, whose borders and certain aspects of its sovereignty will be provisional until resolved as part of a final settlement in the Middle East, Bush said.

Most Palestinian leaders — not to mention the European press — were outraged by the Bush speech, which was timed to be delivered just before midnight in the Middle East.

Arafat was caught off-balance, initially calling the speech, “a serious effort to push the peace process forward” before sending out an indignant Saeb Erekat to denounce any effort to remove Arafat through new elections.

Bush set a high standard for US recognition of Palestinian statehood — a standard that would break the back of the terrorist stranglehold on the Palestinian government. In fact, he set the standard so high he all but ruled it out.

“If Palestinians embrace democracy, confront corruption, and firmly reject terror, they can count on America’s support for creation of a provisional state of Palestine.”

If the Palestinians embrace democracy — they will be the first Arab state in history to do so in practice, rather than in name.

If they were to confront corruption, the entire Palestinian Authority would soon stand where only six months ago, so-called ‘Israeli collaborators’ had stood — in front of a Palestinian firing squad.

It sounds harsh, but no harsher than the penalty meted out by those same corrupt officials to ordinary Palestinian citizens whose crime of wanting peace and a better life cost them their lives.

And a firing squad is a far more merciful death than being beaten and stomped to death by a cheering crowd, dragged through the streets and then hanged in Manger Square.

If the Palestinians were to firmly reject terror, the only state in the Middle East with whom the Palestinians would enjoy mutual recognition would be Israel.

Once what Bush said had sunk in, Arafat’s initial reaction to the speech as “a serious effort to push the peace process forward” was replaced with a more typical response.

Palestinian Cabinet Minister Saeb Erekat said the call for a new leadership was “not acceptable”.

Palestinian Cabinet Secretary Ahmed Abdel Rahman said Bush had “mixed up” the concepts of terrorism and resistance to Israeli occupation.

Rahman fell back on the tired old argument that Arafat was “directly elected leader in free and fair elections… and President Bush must respect the choice of the Palestinian people”.

Assessment:

Rahman ignored the fact Arafat’s [and the entire PA leadership’s] terms expired three years ago after Arafat suspended elections. And that the new leadership of which President Bush was referring would come about as a consequence of ‘direct free and fair elections’.

The speech represented a middle of the road approach to what is a split in the Bush cabinet regarding the right way to move forward.

On one side of the schism is Colin Powell and the State Department, who still favor all things Saudi — including the ‘new’ Saudi peace plan that calls for the implementation of UN Resolutions 242 and 339 and a return to 1967 borders.

[Resolution 242 was passed in 1967 following the 1967 Six Days War, 339 passed in 1973 following the Yom Kippur War. What’s new here?]

The other camp, supported by Vice President Cheney and Defense Secretary Rumsfeld share Israel’s philosophical opposition to rewarding Palestinian terrorism with statehood.

The Bush plan falls somewhere in the middle. It contains no provision for rewarding terror. But it does contain a provision for eventual Palestinian statehood along the lines of the 1967 borders.

Under the Bush plan, Israel is under no obligation to negotiate with the Palestinians unless those reforms are met.

President Bush’s speech is intended to be the kiss of death for the regime of Yasser Arafat.

In most respects, it was brilliant. But there remains one fatal flaw in the carefully planned diplomatic trap.

In the event the Palestinians do hold free and fair elections, what happens if Arafat wins?

Bush may not have considered that possibility, but you can bet that Jerusalem is already drawing up contingency plans to prevent that from happening.

“We Are Not Censors”

“We Are Not Censors”
Vol: 9 Issue: 24 Monday, June 24, 2002

After being inundated with complaints by subscribers of the anti-Semitic bias of both the BBC and CNN news networks, it was rumored that Israeli satellite TV provider YES-TV was planning to drop both from their lineup.

The chairman of YES’s largest shareholder Bezeq Israel Telecom, who also holds a seat on YES-TV’s board of directors, requested the satellite provider pull CNN off the air for 24 hours to protest their slanted coverage.

Ido Dissentshik withdrew his request after YES-TV contacted CNN. “CNN has said they will review the way they cover the Israeli-Palestinian situation to see whether or not they are balanced,” he said. Pulling the network feed for 24 hours, he said, “was no longer necessary.”

CNN’s chief news executive Eason Jordan issued a straight-faced denial of any bias on his network in an interview with Israeli television. As he sees it, “CNN is not pro-Palestinian or anti-Israeli. We are fair, we are responsible in our reporting, we try to be as accurate as we possibly can be. It’s not to suggest we are perfect, however. On occasion we make mistakes but it’s not because of any bias.”

Sure. In the midst of his denial of being pro-Palestinian, Jordan also admitted he was proactively taking action: “Last week, at my own initiative, I put out a policy across CNN that said we will not televise (the videotapes),” he said.

Israeli radio also quoted him as saying the network would no longer show footage of Palestinian suicide bombers’ families. [Do you recall CNN profiling any Israeli victims of suicide bombers?] Neither does YES-TV.

Wow. At ‘his own iniative’. That means nobody above him had to tell him his coverage was biased. [I thought he said they were ‘fair and responsible in their reporting’]?

Ted Turner, founder and now vice chairman of CNN owner AOL Time Warner Inc., wasn’t demonstrating bias when he said last week that the Israeli military was engaged in “terrorism” against the Palestinians that could be compared to Palestinian suicide bomber attacks on Israelis.

Turner’s comments were published on the morning of a suicide bus bombing in Jerusalem that killed 19 people.

The BBC World News cable network was also contacted regarding their overt pro-Palestinian bias. To their credit, they chose not to issue a denial, rather than to tell a lie. When contacted on the issue, the BBC’s senior Jerusalem producer, Simon Wilson said the “BBC would respond later”.

In the end, instead of dropping CNN, YES-TV added the Fox News Network, which is considered by Israelis to be more balanced in it’s coverage of the Arab-Israeli conflict.

But YES-TV, and all three Israeli cable companies are considering removing CNN and the BBC from the basic cable package. If Israelis have to pay to hear CNN or the BBC explain to the victims of Palestinian terror that they deserved it, CNN and the BBC are unlikely to find Israel a profitable market.

Assessment:

First off, these events provide us with another reason why Israel is America’s natural ally in the Middle East — and this is important.

YES-TV issued a public statement in answer to their subscribers complaints.

Note it carefully: “We are not censors and will not decide for our subscribers what to see and what not to see,” said CEO Shlomo Liran.

Imagine those words emanating from state-owned television anywhere else in the Middle East. Damascus? Baghdad? Riyadh? Amman? Beirut? Gaza? Tripoli? Cairo?

“We are not censors”.

Here’s why that is so important. Israel is a democracy surrounded by a sea of dictatorships. Not a sham democracy — not a ‘people’s democracy’ or ‘people’s republic.

[Countries whose deeds prove they are representative democracies don’t need to explain it in their names – the ‘people’ already know it].

Yet the only genuine Western-style democracy in the Middle East is also the most hated nation on earth.

Iraq has more friends than Israel. On any given anti-Israel resolution voted on by the UN, Israel can count on the support [most of the time] of the US, Micronesia and the Marshall Islands.

To many Israelis, the voice of the US is CNN. The voice of Europe is the BBC. To most Israelis, these networks are also the voice of Yasser Arafat.

To get what they perceive to be balanced news coverage, Israel turned to Australian-owned FoxNews network.

Why is that? Why would the only genuine democracy in the entire region — a friend to the West with a uniquely parallel political agenda — be the most hated nation on earth? [Even America has more real friends than Israel].

Is it because of their policies? Apart from attempting to survive, Israeli policies parallel those of the Western democracies.

Not one single Arab state shares the cosmopolitan worldview of Europe, Canada or the US. Not one could be called a truly open society. Every single one is racist. None offer genuine religious freedom.

Not one Arab state has a human rights record that equals Israel’s. Especially given Israel’s fifty-two year ongoing war against enemies in their midst.

Indeed, the Palestinians have fared far better at the hands of Israelis than they have at the hands of their Arab ‘brothers’.

When Syria faced a Palestinian uprising at Hama, ten thousand people disappeared without a trace. Thirty thousand were killed outright. A third of the city was turned into a parking lot.

The Syrian regime raided hospitals and killed all the wounded there without making any distinction between civilians and combatants.

When Jordan faced a PLO uprising in September, 1970, King Jussein of Jordan sent his troops in. By the end of September, three thousand Palestinians lay dead.

After eighteen months of combat, Israel, one of the most militarily powerful nations on earth, has killed about fifteen hundred Palestinians. Yet Israel was immediately condemned for war crimes.

A search of the UN archives show no UN resolutions against Hafez Assad for Hama or King Hussein for Black September. No international threat of war. No European boycotts of Jordan or Syria.

There is no natural reason to explain why Israel need fear anti-Israel bias from the voices of democracy in Europe or America. Indeed, it defies natural explanation.

Because the explanation is supernatural. The Bible says that when Israel once again took her place among the nations of the earth after millennia of dispersion, the timeclock would restart and begin counting down the remaining hours of the final generation before the return of Christ.

Israel stands as a visible reminder that God remains on the Throne. He said Israel would be reborn, and that it would survive against all odds, despite the fact it would be hated ‘without cause’. So hated, according to prophecy, that the last great war of humanity would be over the city of Jerusalem and the existence of a Jewish state.

The enemies of God know that the destruction of Israel would break Scripture. God said of His Word, “My word shall not return to me void.” [Isaiah 55:11]

That won’t happen. But the attempt will bring about the cataclysmic period that Jesus called a time of ‘great tribulation, such as was not since the beginning of the world to this time, no, nor ever shall be.’ [Matthew 24:21]

Message From al-Qaeda

Message From al-Qaeda
Vol: 9 Issue: 23 Sunday, June 23, 2002

In a tape aired on Qatari-based al Jezeera, an al-Qaeda spokesman took responsibility on behalf of al-Qaeda for the suicide attack at a Tunisian synagogue in April. The spokesman also said al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden was “alive and “in good health.”

It was the first direct claim of al Qaeda involvement in the blast near El Ghriba synagogue on the resort island of Djerba in April which killed 21 people, including 14 Germans.

“This operation was carried out by al Qaeda network. A youth could not see his brothers in Palestine butchered and murdered…(while) he saw Jews cavorting in Djerba,” Sulaiman bu Ghaith said in the undated recording broadcast by al-Jazeera.

“So this spirit of jihad surged and he (the al Qaeda member) carried out this successful operation, may God accept it,” said bu Ghaith, who emerged as an al Qaeda spokesman after the September 11 attacks, which Washington blames on al Qaeda.

Bu Ghaith said the United States had not defeated al Qaeda during its military campaign on Afghanistan and warned the United States to get ready for another attack.

“As long as America insists on its unjust and biased policy toward Muslims in favor of Jews and Christians around the world, then God willing we will continue to hit it anywhere in the world,” said bu Ghaith, a Kuwaiti-born cleric.

“America knows the truth of what we say. We have the ability to carry out our threats and in the coming days and months we will prove to world the truth of what we say,” he said.

“I want to reassure Muslims that Sheikh Osama bin Laden is in good health, thank God, and that all that is rumored about Sheikh Osama bin Laden being injured or sick in Tora Bora is not true,” he said. “The whole world…will discover that in an interview with Osama bin Laden soon, God willing, which will appear on television screens.”

According to Abu Bu Ghaith “98 percent” of al Qaeda leaders, including Osama bin Laden and his deputy Ayman Zawahri, had survived the Afghanistan campaign and were “going about their work.”

Assessment:

Is this more propaganda? Probably, but for propaganda to be successful, it must contain a kernel of truth at its core to give in authenticity. For example, if bin-Laden is alive, and presents himself holding a dated newspaper, then the part about ‘98% of al-Qaeda’s leadership surviving’ will likely be accepted by the Western press as fact, whether true or not.

bu Ghaith told al Jezeera — and the Arab world — “God gave us a historic and great victory that broke the backs of Americans and broke the back of the greatest power in the world.”

And having it reported in the Western press that al-Qaeda remains intact as fact is all the bona fides al-Qaeda needs to convince the disaffected Muslim peasant that maybe America’s back can be broken, after all.

The tape also contained an element of truth one can only hope the Western world can grasp before it is too late. America is a target because of its ‘biased policy that favors Jews and Christians’.

In this statement is a logical syllogism. Since America is the enemy because it ‘favors Jews and Christians’ — then it follows that Jews and Christians are the real enemy.

America is merely a place where they are conveniently concentrated.

This is a religious war. A war against Christians and Jews, according to someone who ought to know, considering he is the one making that declaration. This isn’t a political war, it is a war of ideologies.

A Spiritual War

America is hardly a Christian nation in practice, but, despite what the ACLU would have us believe, it is a Christian nation in principle and was so intended by its Founders. Our founding documents acknowledge America as a republic and asked for [and was granted] the blessing of God. The God of the Bible. The God of Abraham, Isaac and Joseph. The God of both Christian and Jew. America remains governed by those same principles, as much as our courts attempt to deny it.

Thus, ‘American’ is the semantic equivalent to ‘Christian or Jew’ to our enemy. It is as much a war against God as it is against America and Israel. Those nations are merely visible symbols of Islam’s real, traditional enemy.

The god of Islam is Allah. Allah is not the God of the Christians and Jews. God says of Himself “I change not”.

For Allah and God to be the same Deity would require God to reinvent Himself more times than Yasser Arafat.

Our enemy is more than just al-Qaeda, it is the spiritual philosophy behind it. To deny that is to deny reality.

America s Trojan Horse

al Jezeera aired the statements from al-Qaeda in short segments for maximum effect. The Arab network says the recorded statements were taped recently because he referred to the controversy in the United States about whether U.S. authorities might have had information to prevent the devastating attacks on U.S. cities.

In al-Qaeda’s view, “We believe we are still at the beginning of the war and it is only a stage and we are still at the beginning of the road.”

Islamic apologists claim that real Islam does not endorse suicide attacks. One can cite chapter and verse justification for killing those who do not convert to Islam directly from the Koran.

Islam is a very demanding religion, requiring great material sacrifice on the part of its adherents.

So demanding that it is hard to imagine someone submitting to its rigid requirements if they didn’t believe it was all true.

Another argument often offered is that the Bible also contains exhortations to war, especially in the Old Testament.

The Bible gives accounts of the wars of the Jews. That is not the same as making war an element of doctrine.

The facts are these. The philosophy [or spirit, if you will] of Islam is at war with the philosophy [or Spirit] of Judeo-Christianity.

Not all Americans are Christians or Jews, but all are enemies of al-Qaeda. But ALL of al-Qaeda is Muslim.

Is this, then, a logical syllogism that proves all Muslims are al-Qaeda? I would argue that it does not.

Instead it establishes a logical truth that is even more dangerous. It proves that all Muslims are potentially al-Qaeda. There’s no way to tell which is which.

Not until after it is too late.

King Abdullah: Arafat Has Lost Control

King Abdullah: Arafat Has Lost Control
Vol: 9 Issue: 22 Saturday, June 22, 2002

Jordan’s King Hussein said out loud what the rest of the world’s leaders have been thinking , telling a Belgian paper that Arafat has lost control of the extremist elements of Palestinian society.

For years, said the king, he had held the view that Arafat was able to contain Palestinian sentiments, including within the extremist groups, but that was not the situation today.

The king also said the US administration was out of its element and doesn’t fully comprehend the seriousness of the situation.

“The American are sure that a visit by (Secretary of State) Collin Powell to the region is enough to clam the situation,” he reportedly said.

The king also said that if the Israeli-Palestinian conflict continues, the political situation of the entire region will deteriorate. “I have made clear,” he said, “that the worst is not yet behind us.”

Administration Still Sorting Out Political Invention

President Bush put off his anticipated announcement of his interim vision thing, a kind of fuzzy form of temporary statehood for which there is no historical precedent.

The speech explaining the plan was put off, ostensibly because it might not sound right for the president to talk of two states side-by-side, living in peace, while one side continues to attack the other side while they lay asleep in their homes.

Making a speech at such a time might sound insincere . . . better to make the announcement in between atrocities.

As cynical as that makes the administration sound, it is better than revealing that King Hussein is right.

The administration evidently took another look at the plan and decided that, as is, it couldn’t survive the first press conference. Can a temporary state join the United Nations? Can it issue its own currency? What happens if the new Palestinian state doesn’t want peace after they get their temporary state?

What about the million or so Jews now living inside what would be the new state? Would the world insist on forcible mass deportations of Jews — again?

Clearly, King Hussein has a point. There’s an old saying to the effect that when you don’t know what to do, the best course of action is usually to do nothing. While it is obvious that Washington can’t ignore the Middle East, it is equally obvious it doesn’t know what to do.

Inventing a brand new classification of geopolitical reality as a solution is like applying a tourniquet to a head wound. Sometimes, less is more.

EU A Bit Confused As Well

If the US doesn’t have a grasp of the seriousness of the situation in the region, it could be argued the the EU doesn’t have a clue regarding its politics.

The EU has its own plan, one that calls for the establishment of a Palestinian state based on the 1967 borders.

The EU would also offer economic aid to peace-building, including the reconstruction of the Palestinian economy, and help in monitoring peace. “The message from the Europeans will be that we need a new political push, which might be an international conference or something else,” said Javier Solana, EU High Representative for Foreign and Security Policy,

“What form this takes is not that important,” he said. “The important thing is that there be a political push, a perspective for getting out of the terrible situation in which we are now.”

What Do You Mean, ‘We?’

Europe has been attempting to insinuate itself into the Middle East peace process since there has been anything going on that could approximately fit the term. But Israel doesn’t trust the Europeans. Sixty years is not a long time, historically speaking.

Contemporaneously, Europe has done little to give Israel any reason to believe it is a neutral observer. European anti-Semitism isn’t confined to the working classes.

Europe’s leaders have made their bias clear in recent months, from French Ambassador Daniel Bernard’s reference to Israel as “that sh**ty little country” to European eagerness to vindicate its own history by branding Israel ‘war criminals’ following the Battle of Jenin.

Leaders of the 15-nation bloc, meeting for a two-day summit will issue a call for a Palestinian state when they end talks Saturday on the grounds that it would ensure security for both sides within recognized borders.

How the mere declaration of statehood will ensure security for Israel remains somewhat fuzzy in the European plan. Hmmmm.

Assessment:

The Biblical prophecies for the last days indicate ever escalating chaos in the Middle East, particularly over the question of Jerusalem and the continued existence of Israel. Little pieces of the puzzle continue to fall into place.

Tiny details, like a reference in Ezekiel’s account of the mid-Tribulation Gog-Magog war. “And thou shalt say, I will go up to the land of unwalled villages; I will go to them that are at rest, that dwell safely, all of them dwelling without walls, and having neither bars nor gates” [- Ezekiel 38:11]

In Ezekiel’s day, it was a common practice to build walls around cities as a defense against attack. Jerusalem is a walled city. So is Damascus. The Great Wall of China was built to keep out invaders.

Modern commentators interpret the reference to a land of ‘unwalled villages’ as symbolic of a time of temporary peace.

The interpretation that sees Ezekiel 38:11 as depicting a period of false peace is accurate — it is confirmed by both Daniel and Zechariah, for example.

But Ezekiel’s reference to a land of ‘unwalled villages’ is intriguing. In the 21st century world of smart bombs, stealth aircraft, InterContinental Ballistic Missiles [ICBMs] and cruise missiles, walls are redundant.

Except that Israel has decided to erect an electronic fence the length of the West Bank, hoping to deter suicide bombers.

Daniel 9 says that eventually, Europe does achieve her goal of usurping the peace process. And that its leader is able to hammer out what looks like a genuine peace.

The fence Israel is building today to wall out the suicide bombers will come down with great pomp and circumstance one day with the announcement of peace. Just like the Berlin Wall did.

A ‘land of unwalled villages’ — a minor piece in a larger puzzle. But it provides insight into the incredible accuracy of Bible prophecy for the last days.

Bible prophecy is a bit like a road map. You can tell where you started and where you are going from looking at the map. But to plot where you are, you need specific landmarks or mile-markers.

Specific references, like the ancient practice of walling out an enemy, being revived as a 21st century tactic, by the very nation Ezekiel makes reference to . . .whew!

Added together with other signs like the Revived Roman Empire, global government, global economy, wars, earthquakes, the Islamic global terror alliance. . . the very existence of Israel itself — it all fits together in a tightly wrapped package.

A package that says ‘do not open until just before Jesus returns’.

We are seeing what we are seeing. And the Bible said what it said centuries before the events we are eye witnessing were even possible. You aren’t confused. You haven’t been brainwashed — unless you can look around you and still buy the argument that it is all a big coincidence.

Believing the Bible doesn’t mean you check your brain at the door — it means to begin to use it.

The Bible has met every test, withstood every attack made on it, historically, scientifically, archeologically — for two thousand years.

It is the only Book among the sacred writings of the human race to claim 100% accuracy in things past, present and to come.

In all the generations past, among all the philosophers and thinkers who dedicated their lives to disproving Scripture, if one had managed to conclusively disprove a single word of Scripture, God would be proved a liar, and the Judeo-Christian ethic would evaporate, together with most of its adherents.

That has not happened. Scripture remains unbroken. Since it has withstood all tests so far, there is no reason to doubt that it will fail on the things yet to come.

The mile markers on the Biblical roadmap say the human race is approaching its destination. These are the last days spoken of by Jesus when He said, “And when these things begin to come to pass, then look up, and lift up your heads; for your redemption draweth nigh. ” Luke 21:28

If you are a Christian, it s time to get excited! If not, it is time to get your business straight with the Redeemer. He purchased a Pardon for you at the Cross.

You need only claim it and you too can look up and lift up your head in eager anticipation of the coming King.

We live in perilous times; to the world in general, things appear to be chaotic and out of control. But what scares the world encourages the Christian.

If you don t know Christ, but want to know how you can, click here.

Arafat Accepts 2000 Peace Proposal But This is 2002

Arafat Accepts 2000 Peace Proposal But This is 2002
Vol: 9 Issue: 21 Friday, June 21, 2002

Now that Yasser Arafat has been informed of Israel s redesigned land for peace deal, he s changed his mind about the deal offered him by Ehud Barak at Camp David in 2000.

Arafat said today that he d like to take that deal after all. Asked if he accepted the plan Clinton charted in December 2000 after peace talks between Arafat and then-Israeli leader Ehud Barak at Camp David, Maryland, collapsed in July, Arafat told Akiva Eldar of the Ha’aretz newspaper: “Yes, I do.”

But Clinton left office in January 2001. Barak was kicked out by the voters shortly thereafter. The US and Israel both regard the 2000 offer as having expired.

As Arafat was telling Ha aretz that he was willing to accept the 2000 peace offer, Israel buried 39 victims of three back to back terror attacks against civilian women and children.

Funerals like those of Rachel Shabo, 40, and her three children, Neria, 16, Zvi, 12 and Avishai, 5, are becoming daily occurrences. So are the claims of responsibility being issued by members of Arafat’s own forces.

More Than Statistics

Distance and culture tend to blunt the impact, to a degree, of the destruction of the Shabo family. We don t know them, or anything about them. They become statistics. But they are not.

Allow me a personal illustration.

My father settled in our area when he returned from combat after World War II. When we gather next month for our family reunion, the family he founded fifty years ago some 74 of us will come together for a picnic in a public park.

There are too many of us to fit in anybody s back yard. It takes a public park to hold the offspring of a single human being after only two generations.

In Israel, too many families have been cut off. Too many family reunions are taking place in graveyards. As one Israeli headline lamented, The House of Israel is Crying.

Operation Determined Path

Fed up with constant attacks coming from territory Israel turned over to the Palestinians as part of the Oslo land-for-peace process, Ariel Sharon turned the concept on his head.

To this point, the process has worked like this. In exchange for peace, Yasser Arafat demanded more land. Once Israel gave him the land, he used that land to stage attacks against what remained of Israel.

Then he d demand more land in exchange for halting the attacks, get the land, launch more attacks, and so on.

That is what the Arabs call land for peace . The mainstream press calls it a cycle of violence that the press says is partly Israel s fault. The mafia calls it a protection racket. To paraphrase the Bard, a rose by any other name still smells.

The Repo Man

The Oslo process has been spun like a top. Over the last decade, each parcel of land surrendered for peace has been used to widen Arafat s war.

The only role Israel could play in stopping the cycle of violence would be to surrender what land remains.

That fact is so painfully obvious that having to point it out is mute testimony to the power of the propaganda machine.

After meeting with his cabinet, Ariel Sharon outlined the new land for peace equation. Every time the Palestinians commit an act of war against Israel, Israel will take back some of the land it had previously exchanged for a peace that never materialized.

Assessment:

It is a simple act of sequestration. Israel paid for something it never received. It wants the purchase price refunded.

The Bush administration is about to outline its vision for peace in the Middle East.

But it is based on the old land-for-peace formula, including an eventual return to pre-1967 borders, a loss of sovereignty over parts of Jerusalem and Jewish holy places.

In order to work, Israel will have to trust its security to the very people sworn to its destruction. That is unlikely to happen. Especially now.

An Israeli website, Gamla, has a banner it offers free to webmasters.

The banner proclaims, When somebody says he is going to kill you . . . Believe Him.