“Bozo the Clown For President”

“Bozo the Clown For President”
Vol: 30 Issue: 31 Wednesday, March 31, 2004

An alert and clearly astute reader emailed me to tell me that at long last, “someone has had the courage to tell it like it is about the Bush administration.” However, he wasn’t referring to your humble correspondent — he was referring to former counter-terrorism czar Richard Clarke.

This independent thinker also expressed his disgust at the Bush administration for its ‘cynical use of images of 9/11’ in his campaign commercials, which he claims was a shameful manipulation of the September 11 attacks for political gain. He said he was tired of having a liar in the White House and for that reason, he was certainly going to vote for John Kerry.

It was several minutes before I realized my mouth was hanging open in astonishment. I suppose it shouldn’t have been. During my years as a police officer, I experienced first-hand that phenomenon in which two people witnessed the identical crime but give opposing accounts of what happened.

But even when they gave conflicting testimony, they usually got the basic crime right. I don’t remember a case in which one witness described a murder while the other described a shoplifting incident.

But when it comes to ABB (Anybody But Bush) crowd, it doesn’t matter whether or not there even was a crime scene to describe. The crime is the existence of the Bush administration. Everything else is a lesser included offense.

A few days ago, I quoted Bill Clinton when he said, “You can’t say you hate your government but love your country” and I said that I agreed with that statement. I heard back from lots of people who say, “you can too!”

I disagree. Not to the level to which ABB operates. Anybody But Bush means ANYBODY. John Kerry, Howdy Doody, Ralph Nader, Al Gore, Bozo the Clown . . . the proof is in the rhetoric. It doesn’t matter whether Anybody will be good for the country or bad for the country, as long as it is Anybody But Bush.

Assessment:

Partisan politics is as old as the Union itself, but there have been few times in American history when it has been so destructive to the nation as a whole as has been the case throughout the entire Bush administration.

Partisan politics blocked the Bush transition team from making the transition until mid December. The Bush administration took office before it was even able to fill all its senior positions. Partisan politics prevented most of the Bush appointments from being confirmed. Following the rancor of Election 2000, senior figures in the Democratic Party promised to oppose everything Bush did and work as hard as possible to make his presidency a dismal failure.

They’ve kept their word — to the detriment of America — all America. They fought the Bush economic proposals, so that they could use his record on the economy against him this year.

But in order to use it against him, they had to do all they could to prevent it from succeeding. ‘Loving America’ means wanting America to succeed more than they want the current administration to fail.

I’ve seen no evidence of that. A bad economy hurts all Americans. If you doubt it is a deliberate effort, consider this. The current unemployment rate is the same as it was when Bill Clinton was running for re-election in 1996 — except Clinton was running on the STRENGTH of the economic ‘miracle’ of the 1990’s.

They fought virtually every Bush judicial appointment, creating a critical shortage of federal judges, so that they could make crime an issue they could use against Bush in this election. But crime affects all Americans.

If somebody is murdered by a bad guy out on bond from a backlogged court, it seems a small price to pay, if it will get George Bush. ‘Loving America’ means putting what is good for Americans ahead of what is good for the party.

The White House was forced to reverse itself and risk violating the Separation of Powers to allow Condoleeza Rice to testify in open session under oath because of partisan hopes to discredit the administration.

In effect, the partisans are putting Dr. Rice in front of al-Qaeda as well as the ‘American people’ — not to find out anything new, but to embarrass the administration where possible. It doesn’t matter whether we might be giving al-Qaeda useful information to use against us, provided it helps to get George Bush.

A couple of weeks ago, the Bush administration was under fire because of a two-second clip in a campaign commercial showing Ground Zero shortly after 9/11. The firefighters union says in a statement that it was a cheap trick to use even fleeting images of the real events of 9/11, ABC’s Dianne Sawyer told America.

Richard Clarke has made 9/11 a commercial success by releasing his book and coming before the 9/11 Commission. Nobody seems to mind the fact that he used the events of September 11th to praise the Clinton administration for eight years of failed responses to previous attacks and to blame the Bush adminstration for not pre-empting 9/11.

Tom Daschle defended Clarke, saying, Well, I think it s just very unfortunate that the Republican attack machine is prepared to tear a man s character down for telling the truth.

What ‘truth’? That Clinton did more to defend America against al-Qaeda than the Bush administration? Is there a way to know that? Indeed, Clarke was asked, ‘if the Bush administration had implemented all of your suggestions, would it have prevented September 11?’

In a rare moment of candor, Clarke admitted to the Commission that it wouldn’t have made any difference. So, what ‘truth’? More than that, what ‘attack’? Is it an attack to compare conflicting statements?

Clarke turned his government service on September 11th into a best-selling book that has already earned him millions of dollars. It didn’t seem to bother CBS’s ‘Sixty Minutes’. (Or Tom Daschle, for that matter.)

Partisan loyalty has kept any of the major networks from noting that the Democrats are using September 11th as a hammer to beat the Bush administration into the ground, even as they rail against Bush for his campaign commercial.

This is not the first time Mr. Bush has been accused of using the 9/11 attack for political gain. In May of 2002 the White House was criticized for allowing congressional Republicans to use a picture of the President on Air Force One speaking to the Vice President just hours after the attacks on New York and Washington. Political analysts say the President is once again walking a fine line. David Gregory on the March 4 NBC Nightly News.

Partisan hatred for the Bush administration has done considerable damage to America. It has adversely affected the economy, America’s standing abroad, US foreign policy, US law enforcement capabilities, national security interests, homeland security, and the war on terror. It has hamstrung the Bush administration at a time when ALL of America is in peril, not just the partisans on the left or the right.

Partisan hatred has made the tragedy of September 11th nothing more than a political tool to be used to get George Bush, even if it means exposing America to the risk of future attacks. The original purpose of the 9/11 Commission was to try and find out what went wrong so it doesn’t happen again.

The partisans have made it more difficult to find the facts, hiding them under the ABB blanket, creating the false impression that the only thing we have to do to prevent a future 9/11 is to get rid of George Bush.

John Kerry is arguably the worst offering from the Democratic Party since Jimmy Carter. If he has a plan for how to lead America during the next four years, I’ve yet to discover what it is, apart from NOT being George Bush. But not being George Bush seems to be enough, according to the polls.

To the ABB crowd, it doesn’t matter which candidate is the most qualified to lead America through the perils of the next four years. It only matters that it isn’t George Bush.

It is hard to argue that one can hate one’s government enough to sabotage one’s own country and still claim to love America. If 9/11 can be reduced to being the Bush administration’s fault, the irrational hate and destruction becomes almost manageable. ‘Change administrations, and the Islamists will go away.’ It is a seductive song that only appeals to voters who have the attention span of a gnat.

If hating your government means running Bozo the Clown for president, it’s hard to see that as ‘patriotic’ — no matter how you spin it.

The Culture of Death

The Culture of Death
Vol: 30 Issue: 30 Tuesday, March 30, 2004

Much has been written regarding the true nature of Islam, especially since 9/11. Until the attacks, most Americans knew little or nothing about it and what they did know was probably incorrect.

One of the major failings of the Bush administration has been to minimize Islam’s role in the war against terror, repeating the mantra that “Islam is a religion of peace hijacked by a few murderers” instead of investigating its core teachings first.

Before a gathering of ambassadors in the East Room on the 1st anniversary of the Iraq War, Bush noted; “On a tape claiming responsibility for the atrocities in Madrid, a man is heard to say, ‘We choose death, while you choose life’.”

But not once in the speech did he mention the reason for the terror. The reason is Islam itself. It is Islam that requires all faithful Muslims to conquer the world for Islam, either by voluntary conversion or submission under the sword.

Islam is first of all at war with itself, and secondarily with the rest of the world.

Within Islam are two major sects, the Sunnis and the Shia. Sunnis claim Islam descended directly from Mohammed, while the Shia say the true succession of Islam came through Ali, married to the prophet’s daughter, Fatima.

The eight-year-war between Iran and Iraq during the 1980’s was essentially a war between Sunni Islam and the Shia Republic of Iran. When US forces got inside Iraq, they found hundreds of mass graves containing the bodies of tens of thousands of Shi’ite Iraqis murdered by Saddam’s Sunni-dominated military.

Judaism, and by extension, Christianity, claim their spiritual heritage is descended from Abraham, through the line of Isaac and Jacob.

Islam claims its heritage through Abraham’s elder son, Ishmael. Of Ishmael, Genesis 16:12 tells us, “And he will be a wild man; his hand will be against every man, and every man’s hand against him; and he shall dwell in the presence of all his brethren.”

Islam is a religion born out of blood and the sword, not peace. The secular Muslim scholar Ibn Warraq, author of ‘Why I Am Not a Muslim’ and ‘The Quest for the Historical Muhammed’, points out that, from the approved holy books on the life of Mohammed that the prophet and his band of followers participated in 80 political assassinations in their consolidation of power.

During the 8th century, Islam conquered a wide swath of territory from the Arabian Peninsula all the way to the Iberian Peninsula, which it called “Andalusia.” Today, it is called ‘Spain’.

To Muslims this entire area is called “Dar al Islam” which means, the Zone of Submission. It is a received doctrine of the Koran that no part of the Dar al-Islam ever can be ceded permanently to the infidel. The Moors were kicked out of the Andalusian caliphate in 1493 by the Spanish Reconquest. But Islam has a long memory.

On Oct. 7, 2001, the day the United States began bombing Afghanistan, bin Laden appeared in a videotape, stating, “Let the whole world know that we shall never accept that the tragedy of al-Andalus would be repeated.”

While areas conquered by Islam are known as Dar al Islam, areas unconquered by Islam also have an Islamic religious name; “Dar al-Harb” or, the Zone of War. Islam demands an armed struggle to bring the rest of the world under the Dar al Islam, offering conversion or the sword. That is a basic principle of the ‘religion of peace’.

We get our word ‘assassin’ from a twelve century Islamic forerunner of Osama bin-Laden named Hasan-i Sabbah. His terrorist group was called ‘the Ismalis’ and al-Qaeda’s secret society was modeled on i-Sabbah’s.

Called the “Old Man in the Mountain” he attracted hundreds of young men by offering training in religious doctrine, devotional discipline and terrorism. i-Sabba singled out for attack those rulers he judged to have been corrupted by power and luxury or who, in his view, were insufficiently dedicated to the principles of Islam.

His followers would steal into palaces in the dead of night and slit the throats of their victims, knowing they would be caught and killed. This disadvantage was offset by a carefully taught theological conviction that, when slain, they would be rewarded instantly with the joys of paradise. These terrorists were called assassins, the Hashishiyyin, because they used hashhish to bolster their courage.

According to accounts brought back by the Crusaders, the Old Man in the Mountain had such control over his followers that he would amuse and terrorize visitors to his castle by ordering a few of his young men to jump off a cliff to demonstrate that they would obey his slightest whim.

Islam is first and foremost, a culture of death. Attorney General John Ashcroft once famously observed that, “Islam is a religion in which God expects your son to die for him. Christianity is a religion in which God sent His Son to die for you.”

Assessment:

The efforts by the Bush administration to separate Islam from terrorism is understandable, given that there are 1.9 billion Muslims in the world and we don’t want to have to fight all of them at once. I don’t for one second believe that Bush believes Islam, at its core, is a religion of peace.

He has advisors, among whom is presumably John Ashcroft, who clearly DOES understand Islam’s true nature.

Disconnecting Islam from terrorism is deemed by the administration to be a political necessity, but it is wrongly being applied to a wartime scenario. The Clinton administration did exactly the same thing, appeasing Islam to the degree that it invaded Serbia in 1999 to install an Islamist government in Kosovo. It treated terrorism as a law enforcement problem, instead of a military one. It didn’t bring peace, either to America or to Kosovo.

It is unlikely that the current administration’s efforts to pretend Islam is a religion of peace hijacked by a few terrorists will bring peace, either. While Crusader America is absent from the prophetic record, the Bible mentions Islam for the first time all the way back in Genesis.

And Daniel says of the antichrist that, while he (the antichrist) personally has no regard for any god himself, “in his estate shall he honour the god of forces: and a god WHOM HIS FATHERS KNEW NOT shall he honour with gold, and silver, and with precious stones, and pleasant things.” (Daniel 11:38, emphasis mine)

In his efforts to settle the ongoing conflict between the Arabs and Jews over Israel, Daniel says the antichrist will ally himself with the forces of Islam;

“Thus shall he do in the most strong holds with a strange god, whom he shall acknowledge and increase with glory: and he shall cause them to rule over many, and shall DIVIDE THE LAND FOR GAIN.” (Daniel 11:39)

Europe is already attempting to insinuate itself into the Arab-Israeli ‘peace process’ and its anti-Israeli bias is the subject of endless secular commentaries and analyses. Islam has a role to play in the last days, as does Europe. America does not.

It is hard to view the whole picture without feeling a bit like a purveyor of gloom and doom. It looks like the writing may truly be on the wall for America sometime within the next few years, both from the predictions of the Holy Writ, and from the headlines of the daily news.

But it is NOT ‘gloom and doom’ — it is proof positive that what appears to be chaos and terror from the perspective of the world, is actually a Divine Plan that has been in motion since Abraham had two sons, Isaac and Jacob. The fact the Plan is coming to fruition in our day means that the Lord of Hosts remains firmly in control of human events. The Bible painstakingly records the details of our current geopolitical world for a purpose.

So that, when we see these things beginning to come to pass, we can have assurance that the same God Who promised chaos and judgment to the world promised He would return for His Church.

“For this we say unto you BY THE WORD OF THE LORD, that we which are alive and remain unto the coming of the Lord shall not prevent them which are asleep. For the Lord himself shall descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of the archangel, and with the trump of God: and the dead in Christ shall rise first: Then we which are alive and remain shall be caught up together with them in the clouds, to meet the Lord in the air: and so shall we ever be with the Lord.” (1st Thessalonians 4:15-17)

What terrifies the world, is, for the Church, the Promise of the Blessed Hope.

“Wherefore, comfort one another with these words.” (1 Thessalonians 4:18)

The Handwriting on the Wall . . .

The Handwriting on the Wall . . .
Vol: 30 Issue: 29 Monday, March 29, 2004

The latest target in the game of ‘Gotcha’ being played out under the guise of an impartial, bi-partisan investigative panel involves pretending National Security Advisor Condoleeza Rice is hiding relevant information by refusing to testify before the panel under oath.

It is a skillfully woven trap, designed, not to obtain any new testimony, but to make political hay for the Democrats. This is another one of those times when partisan politics trumps patriotism. To prove it, I am going to ask you to take off whatever partisan hat you are wearing and look at the unvarnished facts. Facts are funny things — no matter how you twist them, when you let go, they spring back into their orginal shape just like a pair of those expensive glasses I see on TV.

To begin with, let’s look at the political firestorm. John Kerry thundered that if “Condoleeza Rice has time to go on (CBS) “Sixty Minutes”, then she has sixty minutes to testify under oath before the American people.”

Don’t you love the ironic twist here? Kerry is using September 11th as a political football, despite many sincere promises to the contrary. Then he hides behind the ‘American people’ — as if the ‘American people’ are also poring over the reams of secret, classified intelligence information, instead of the Commission.

The facts are these. First, she’s already ‘testified before the American people’ all she is likely to, on pretty much every news program that has more than 16 viewers. Secondly, Dr. Rice testified already, in secret session, to the 9/11 Commission, for more than four hours.

When the facts spring back into their original shape, one wonders what Kerry is talking about. Clearly, the 9/11 Commissioners are comparing what Dr. Rice said on TV to what she told them in secret session. If there was a discrepancy, you can bet the Democrats on the Committee would ensure John Kerry knew exactly what it was five seconds after it was discovered.

So what is the big deal about demanding she testify again in open session? She is unlikely to reveal any classified portions in open session, and it is equally unlikely her public testimony will differ from either her in-camera portion during her last appearance, or from her public statements before the TV talking heads.

Does anybody really believe a second appearance in public before the 9/11 Commission will make her so nervous she will forget her story? Make no mistake about it, Dr. Rice’s story has been rehearsed so often she would answer the same questions the same way in her sleep. That is a given.

The Democrats are demanding that Dr. Rice not only re-appear before the Committee, but also that she testify under oath. Why is that? Do they truly believe that by being sworn, Dr. Rice will suddenly confess that she personally ordered the strike on 9/11 or something? This is real-life, not Perry Mason.

A false statement by Dr. Rice would be every bit as damaging if it were not under oath. Lying under oath was already established to be no big thing during the previous administration. There are literally thousands of pages of written arguments defending Bill Clinton’s perjury while under oath. Since the Democrats already agree that lying under oath is no worse than lying to the ‘American people’ from a podium, why even bark up this tree?

The Left is demanding Dr. Rice’s sworn testimony before the Commission for only one reason. They know she CAN’T comply. But they don’t want the ‘American people’ to know that they know that — they want the ‘American people’ to think she won’t appear because she has something to hide.

One can find the reason Dr. Rice CAN’T comply by reading the Clinton administration’s legal briefs that resulted in National Security Advisor Sandy Berger claiming something called ‘Executive Privilege’. Berger didn’t invent it, neither did Clinton. But they claimed it, and their claims were upheld. ‘Executive Privilege’ was invented by the Founding Fathers and written into the Constitution.

The strategy of the Left is to manuever Dr. Rice into the kind of situation where no matter what she does, she looks guilty of something. Sort of like compelling an answer to the question, “Sooo, do you still beat your wife?” Implicit in the question is an admission of guilt, no matter how it is answered.

I am not mounting a partisan defense of the Bush administration, I am untwisting the Democratic offense to show what is behind the smoke and mirrors. Nothing.

Compelling Dr. Rice to testify under oath violates the Constitutional Separation of Powers and John Kerry and his machine know that. That’s why they are adding the ‘oath’ part.

It is the same tactic used by Yasser Arafat during the peace negotiations. Each time Israel was about to concede something, Arafat would up the ante, adding something that they knew Israel would refuse. When he won the West Bank, he demanded Jerusalem, knowing Israel would refuse.

When, in 1998, to his astonishment, Barak was prepared to hand him a state PLUS share Jerusalem, Arafat added the ‘Right of Return’ because HE KNEW ISRAEL WOULD NOT AGREE and he could continue his war while making it Israel’s fault.

Assessment:

Sound familiar? A lie is a lie, no matter who is spinning it — once you slow down the spin long enough to see the facts, you see the agenda. The ‘American people’ are being lied to — but by the ones running a campaign, so far as I can tell, based entirely on accusations.

I was watching one of those Fox ‘debates’ — the ones where both sides spin the facts so fast all you can hear are the accusations but no responses? — and I heard a Democratic operative make an admission so startling it actually shut him up — when he realized what he had said.

The topic was Richard Clarke, and the Dem’s flack was supposed to defend his credibility. He was confronted with Clarke’s recent statement that now he is out of government, he no longer has to spin the facts. When his opponent asked whether that meant Clarke was lying then, or if it meant he was lying now, the Dem admitted that “maybe Clarke had credibility ‘issues’.”

Astonishingly, he remembered his mission and dismissed Clarke’s credibility ‘issues’ by saying, “But that doesn’t affect what he is saying now.”

His opponent pointed out that one can’t admit somebody is a liar in one breath, and then point to his present statements as the truth, just because he agrees with them. Despite being exposed, he brushed it all aside and ran down his ‘talking points.’

The 9/11 Commission’s charter created the panel to examine what went wrong prior to 9/11 and make recommendations that would prevent future attacks. The only thing it has accomplished was to supply ammunition for politically motivated, partisan attacks with no thought to the consequences.

It is naive in the extreme to believe John Kerry doesn’t know that al-Qaeda is watching C-SPAN as hard as any American political junkie. Open hearings provide them with a wealth of counter-intelligence information useful to them in avoiding detection and arrest.

During the Battle of Tora Bora, US intelligence pinpointed Osama bin-Laden’s whereabouts by tracking his satellite phone. Senator Arlen Specter blurted that tidbit of information out on CNN, and Osama gave his satellite phone to some unlucky soldier, sent him in the opposite direction, and told him to give him a call when he got there.

We got the satellite phone — and the useful idiot talking on it –but Osama was on his way to Pakistan.

Putting Dr. Rice under oath in public testimony would be of a lot more use to al-Qaeda than it would the ‘American people’ — especially those who might die as a consequence of what al-Qaeda might learn. But partisanship trumps patriotism, and those who want to seize power can’t see anything else.

It’s not about getting Osama bin-Laden, or getting the economy moving again, or getting Iraq settled on the road to democracy or even about getting the answers to what went wrong with the intelligence community that allowed the 9/11 strike in the first place.

Its about getting George Bush, even if it means giving al-Qaeda’s recruiters all the propaganda necessary to prove America is the Great Satan. Read the newspapers and what you find is story after story about the alleged (and so far, unproved) corruption of the Bush administration.

They are all liars, they are only interested in accumulating wealth, they are thieves who are only after Iraqi oil, and they can’t be trusted. That is now a standardized political stump speech, giving it the credibility of truth. What is that based on?

The snowball effect that was caused when the Democrats began charging that the administration misled the country into believing there were weapons of mass destruction in Iraq. When none were found, they found the chink in Bush’s armor — which unfortunately, became the chink in America’s armor. But who cares? It is working.

A new fact to untwist arises. In a year, nobody has found weapons of mass destruction, so ‘Bush lied’. What if next year, we DO find them buried in a hole somewhere in the desert? Or in Syria, where a convoy of tankers was detected entering the country as the first bombs began to fall on Iraq? Or in Lebanon’s Bekaa Valley in the hands of the Syrian-backed Hezbollah guerillas?

Then it would mean Bush DIDN’T lie, wouldn’t it? Isn’t it at least POSSIBLE that weapons will be found? Nobody is saying it is absolutely IMPOSSIBLE that I’ve heard speak. Saddam DID have them. He used them. More than once. Where did they go?

The point here is to look at the cost of the partisan war and to see how it started and who started it. Who and how is fairly obvious. The Democrats have made September 11th their main campaign issue, while denying they are the ones politicizing the murders of 3000 Americans as a springboard to power.

The cost to the ‘American people’ John Kerry thunders about is incalculable. How much damage DOES one do when handing an enemy one propaganda victory after another? In 1998, Bill Clinton was quoted as saying, “You can’t say you love your country and then say you hate your government.” While Clinton was fending off the backlash resulting from being exposed as a serial liar, nonetheless, what he said was true.

The left is adding a new twist to its usual exploitation of class warfare, creating the illusion of a disconnect between the ‘American people’ and their government. The result is a bonanza of intelligence and propaganda material to aid the enemy’s logistical planning and shore up his morale.

Not to mention global anti-American demonstrations supported entirely by the weight of unproved, partisan accusations. But they don’t care. All they want to do is get George Bush. No matter what the cost to the country.

The Bible says that in the last days, the world would be divided into four general spheres of power. The Bible lists the Gog-Magog Alliance, the Kings of the East, the Kings of the South and the revived Roman Empire as the major players in the last days. That covers the Organization of African States, the ASEAN nations, the Russian Federation, and Europe.

There is no mention of a fifth, overarching super power of any kind, let alone something resembling America. But there is what appears to be a description of America’s social structure, written by the Apostle Paul to the Church, represented by Timothy, a young pastor whom Paul was mentoring.

Paul opened his description, saying, “This know also, that in the LAST DAYS perilous times shall come.” (2nd Timothy 3:1)

Paul goes on to describe, without exception, the elements evident in America’s ongoing culture war. Read them with me. If you can remember America two decades ago, see if the shoe fit as comfortably then as now.

“For men shall be lovers of their own selves, covetous, boasters, proud, blasphemers, disobedient to parents, unthankful, unholy, Without natural affection, trucebreakers, false accusers, incontinent, fierce, despisers of those that are good, Traitors, heady, highminded, lovers of pleasures more than lovers of God;” (2nd Timothy 3:2-4)

Paul’s description is dead on the money. Much of America is steadily removing God from society, sees killing the unborn as a woman’s ‘choice’; supports alternative education, denies God’s existence, wants to ignore promises made to the Iraqis, feels no sense of responsibility for making America the most hated nation on earth, sees Christianity as a hateful religion, views the Bible as promoting hatred against gays, and puts partisanship ahead of the national good.

He describes society has “Having a form of godliness, but denying the power thereof:” (v.5) and even describes the rampant immorality that has become no barrier to public service, if you belong to the correct political party. (Indeed, perjury, if it is about sex, isn’t even really a lie.)

“For of this sort are they which creep into houses, and lead captive silly women laden with sins, led away with divers lusts, Ever learning, and never able to come to the knowledge of the truth.” (v.6-7)

As the remaining salt and light, it is our duty to remain watchmen on the wall, giving the warning. The handwriting is clearly on the wall for America, just as it was for Belshazzar’s kingdom.

“And this is the writing that was written, MENE, MENE, TEKEL, UPHARSIN. This is the interpretation of the thing: MENE; God hath numbered thy kingdom, and finished it. TEKEL; Thou art weighed in the balances, and art found wanting. PERES; Thy kingdom is divided, and given to the Medes and Persians.” (Daniel 5:25-28)

America makes no appearance in Bible prophecy during the Tribulation. It has been a mystery to Bible scholars ever since America assumed her role of superpower with the beginning of the Cold War in 1948. How could such a great nation simply vanish from the prophetic record?

It isn’t quite as mysterious now as it was only a few years ago. Not if one reads the signs all around us. Because the King is coming. And He is coming soon!

Tell your friends.

“Through a Glass, Darkly”

“Through a Glass, Darkly”
Vol: 30 Issue: 28 Sunday, March 28, 2004

One of the questions most often posed to me in emails is generally put in the form of a somewhat sneering challenge; usually filled with page after page of Scripture ‘proving’ my teaching concerning the Rapture is false (sometimes saying it is deliberate deception on my part) and demanding, faced with the weight of their ‘evidence’, that I immediately accept whatever alternative they hold to.

I could just as easily send them the Scriptures that support a pre-Tribulational Rapture of the Church (interestingly, some are the same verses), but it would have no more effect on changing their viewpoint than it does on mine.

The timing of the Rapture is easily one of the most divisive issues within the Body of the Christ, something I find extremely interesting. It would seem to me that the issue of when He is coming is important only in understanding the signs of the times, but not terribly important in terms of salvation or issues of eternity, or even in terms of living a Spirit-filled life.

Taken separately from following Bible prophecy, believing in Who is coming, and the certainty of His return, are all that is truly necessary to be a Christian. The timing of that event itself, is largely one of academics.

That being said, we ARE students of Bible prophecy; watchmen on the wall, as I like to express it, and the timing of the Rapture is extremely important to understanding the signs of the times.

We see evidence all around us, and we use that evidence to warn of His soon return. To us, understanding the Rapture is understanding how to rightly divide the Word of Truth. The key to this is understanding Dispensationalism and the division between the Age of the Law, the Age of Grace (Church Age) and the Tribulation (Daniel’s 70th Week).

Dispensationalism teaches that the Dispensation of Grace (Church Age) concludes with the secret Rapture of the Church, followed by the the final 7 years of the Age of the Law. During the Tribulation, the Temple is rebuilt, Temple sacrifice reinstituted, and the price of salvation is martyrdom at the hands of the antichrist. (Tribulation Saints)

There are three basic interpretations of the Rapture; pre-Tribulatonal, mid-tribulational and post-tribulational.

Pre-Trib holds to the view the Lord returns BEFORE the Tribulation. Mid-Trib teaches that the Rapture of the Church will occur in the middle of the 7 year tribulation period. It will occur sometime around the abomination of desolation when the anti-Christ goes into the rebuilt Jewish temple and there claim to be God.

The Post-Trib view teaches that as the Lord Jesus is returning back to earth, God’s people will be ‘caught up’ or raptured at that point in time. They will return to earth with the Lord Jesus Christ.

Each of these views can be supported, to some degree, by Scripture, but only one is correct. I believe it is the one with the fewest problems, which is a Pre-Trib Rapture of the Church.

One of the problems with a mid-Trib view is glaring; it denies the doctrine of imminency. Although the Scriptures teach a SECRET coming, (no man knoweth the day or hour) once the Tribulation begins, one just has to sit down with a calendar. It will be no surprise and it will come at a known time.

Another problem with the mid-Trib Rapture view is that its followers aren’t looking for Christ, they are watching for the anti-Christ, from whom they derive their timetable.

By contrast, I am awaiting Jesus Christ. I never expect to know who the antichrist will be, and frankly, I don’t really care. My purpose, to the degree I even discuss the antichrist in your Omega Letter, is to demonstrate how the world is preparing for his coming — and to remind people that Jesus is coming FIRST!

The mid-Tribulation view is not widely followed for these reasons, among others.

The post-Tribulation view shares the same glaring problem as the mid-Tribbers; the denial of imminency. It will be even easier to pinpoint the return of Christ, given the Bible gives the exact number of days between the ‘abomination of desolation’ (Matthew 24:15; 2nd Thessalonians 2:4) and the return of the Messiah.

“And from the time that the daily sacrifice shall be taken away, and the abomination that maketh desolate set up, there shall be a thousand two hundred and ninety days.” (Daniel 12:11)

Compare that to Jesus’ Words; “But of that day and hour knoweth no man, no, not the angels of heaven, but my Father only. ” (Matthew 24:36) If the post-Trib view is correct, that secret is hidden only until the revelation of antichrist. So it shares the same second flaw with the mid-Trib view; both of these interpretations make the coming of antichrist the seminal event in prophecy, with the secret coming of Christ for His Church a secondary Plan.

The post-Tribulation view also doesn’t pass the logic test. The post-Trib interpretation is that Jesus Raptures the Church, who then return with Him at the Battle of Armageddon. “And the armies which were in heaven followed him upon white horses, clothed in fine linen, white and clean.” (Revelation 19:14) The ‘fine linen, white and clean’ are the garments of those Washed in the Blood of the Lamb.

So, Jesus leaves heaven with ‘ten thousands’ of empty white horses. As He descends, God’s people are Raptured, presumably translated from this earth to the back of a white horse on its way back!

Scripture tells us that, as the return of the Lord for His Church draws near, it will be as in the days of Lot and Noah. Noah warned of impending judgement for 120 years without a single convert. Life went on as normal, until the floods came, and ‘took them all away’. (Matthew 24:39)

Similarly, Lot lived in a big city, surrounded by immorality so repugnant to God that He decided to judge the wicked city with Divine judgement. Lot was secretly removed from the unsuspecting city before judgment was executed. But to the inhabitants of Sodom and Gomorrah, life went on as usual until the moment of judgment fell.

Consider the consequences of the Tribulation Period. Widespread death and destruction, the annihilation of 3/4’s of the human race, miraculous judgments like the sea turned to blood and a ruined ecology, disease, famine and catastrophe . . . hardly fits with the days of Lot OR Noah.

“And as it was in the days of Noe, so shall it be also in the days of the Son of man. They did eat, they drank, they married wives, they were given in marriage, until the day that Noe entered into the ark, and the flood came, and destroyed them all.” (Luke 17:28-30)

The next problem with this view is what happens next. According to Scripture, the earth is repopulated during the Millennial Kingdom period.

If all God’s people are raptured as the Lord Jesus returns that will leave only the wicked on earth when He returns. The wicked will be destroyed as they will NEVER inherit the kingdom of God.

So if the wicked are destroyed and God’s people are all raptured then who will be left to enter into the 1000 year Kingdom?

When people go into the 1000 year kingdom they will not have their eternal bodies but will be just like we are today.

They will marry and have children. After the rapture all God’s people will have their eternal bodies leaving no mortals left on earth to go into the 1000 year kingdom.

The post-Trib view is widely received, despite its problems. It’s adherents generally also believe that Israel plays no important role in the last days, since the promises of God to Israel were passed on to the Church after the Jews rejected their Messiah.

That is also one of the reasons that post-Tribulationists are so hostile to Dispensationalists and pre-Tribulationists; our ‘wrong-headed’ support for Israel based on our belief that God has a Plan for Israel that doesn’t include the Church. It explains the blatantly anti-Semitic nature of many mainstream churches. It is at the root of the ‘Christian anti-semitism’ that was responsible for centuries of persecution of the Jews by the Church.

It explains the ‘Christ-killer’ label that is used to incite anti-Semitic actions and to justify anti-Semitism as a worldview. To some Christians, the crowd’s demands, “Then answered all the people, and said, His Blood be on us, and on our children,” (Matthew 27:25) carries more weight than Jesus Himself, when He said, ” Father, forgive them; for they know not what they do,” (Luke 23:34)

That is not intended to characterize all people who hold to a post-Tribulation worldview, but explain the teachings of post-Tribulationalism and some of the reasons for their hostility to the pre-Tribulationist view.

Assessment:

The Dispensationalist, pre-Tribulationist view of the Rapture is the only one consistent with the teachings of the Scriptures. It allows for a secret, signless, Rapture of the Church, as taught by Our Lord.

It teaches that the Restrainer of evil is removed (the indwelt, Spirit-filled Church) which allows for the unrestrained evil of the antichrist. While the Holy Spirit will remain on the earth during the Tribulation, the Church does not.

The pre-Tribulation Rapture of the Church is not awaiting the antichrist, it is awaiting the Christ, which is wholly consistent with Scriptures that promise a special crown for those who await His coming. Everything harmonizes with the Scriptures without the necessity to allegorize or spiritualize a literal teaching in order to make it work.

Now to the point. Every day we attempt to document some current event relevant to Bible prophecy. In point of fact, we haven’t documented a single FULFILLMENT of a Bible prophecy since the restoration of Israel in 1948 — and that is a prophecy in the process of fulfillment. Israel has been restored, the Jews regathered to their ancient homeland, but their national redemption is yet future.

What we are witnessing are more like shadows in the sense that one can see a shadow of a man, but not his features. From the shadow, you can identify with certainty that it is of a man, but that is about all you can say for sure.

Paul describes it as ‘seeing through a glass darkly’;

“For now we see through a glass, darkly; but then face to face: now I know in part; but then shall I know even as also I am known.” (1 Corinthians 13:12)

There are things we KNOW, and there are things unknown. We know, for example, that the government of the antichrist during the Tribulation will control the global economy, global government and global religious system. While we don’t know who he is, the development, in this generation, of these three distinct systems, casts the shadow of the antichrist. We see, but darkly, how it all plays out.

We know that the world will be divided into four distinct spheres of world power; Gog-Magog, the Kings of the East, the Kings of the South and the revived Roman Empire. The Bible makes no mention of a fifth, overarching superpower.

We see the development of those four Biblical spheres of global power, while the future of America is tenuous, to say the least. We are at war from without, at war from within, and blissfully ignorant of the perils posed by both. We see, in part, and we know in part, but darkly.

But all we see are shadows of the coming Tribulation. The Bible says that these events are NOT fulfilled until the Tribulation Period begins. These events were given, not as a warning to the Church, but as the ‘signs of His coming’ to enoourage the Church, particularly the Church of the last days.

The signs of His coming, and the unfolding of Bible prophecy, were given as a sign to a ‘wicked and adulterous generation’ which ‘seeketh after a sign’.

We see through a glass, darkly. We know things in part, and we see shadows in the signs of what is to come.

We KNOW that the Lord is coming for His Church before the antichrist is revealed.

It is the shadows that frighten us.

Historical Peek Into the Future

Historical Peek Into the Future
Vol: 30 Issue: 27 Saturday, March 27, 2004

Historical Peek Into the Future

By 1933, Adolph Hitler gave voice to sentiments deeply ingrained in a much wider culture than Germany. The patterns of economic, social, and personal persecution of European Jews were well established across Europe — that responsibility for the Holocaust rested mainly on Germany was because they were the first to put thoughts into action, not because they were the first to entertain those thoughts.

Once words became deeds, the Nazis had no shortage of volunteers across Europe to help them track down, transport, rob and ultimately shovel the bulk of European Jewry into ovens.

In 1933, 600,000 Jews lived in Germany: 20 percent were immigrants from Eastern Europe and 80 percent were German citizens. Many were descendants of Jews who had settled in Germany for nearly 2,000 years. They were socially integrated and participated in German intellectual, cultural, economic, and political life.

Among the first to feel the toe of the Nazi jackboot were the Jewish intellectuals. Once the Jewish perspective was removed from social discourse, it became much easier to paint a portrait of a ‘typical’ Jew without being inconvenienced by contradictory opinion.

Although the Holocaust is a topic I have studied at great length, I’ve never been able to fully absorb how the Holocaust could have been possible in the first place.

In my mind’s eye, those who participated in the butchery of the innocents –simply because they were Jews — aren’t people in the sense of people I’ve met or people I know. Although only a generation ahead of me, they remain a mystery to me.

But I know such people existed. History says so.

Hitler was appointed Chancellor of Germany in January, 1933. By March, Dachau was open. By April, Jews were systematically barred from holding teaching seats at universities. Jewish shops and businesses became the target of organized boycotts. On May 10, the first book burnings were held, prompting Heinriche Heine’s prescient comment, “Whenever they burn books, they will also, in the end, burn people.”

After the Holocaust, the surviving Jews declared “never again” and made their way back to their ancestral homeland, signalling the resumption of the countdown to the 70th Week of Daniel.

The Germans apologized. The Europeans apologized. Israel forgave them.

[Except for Britain. Since they fought on the side of the Allies, they were never forced to face their complicity — but that is grist for another mill]

The anti-Semitism that gave rise to the Holocaust didn’t die off with the generation who perpetrated it — it just went underground, where it continued to bubble.

That there is a world-wide rise in anti-Semitism is beyond dispute. A reading of the anti-Israeli resolutions passed by the UN establish that beyond all doubt, including the increasing frequency with which they are now being passed.

Mona Baker, a University of Manchester Institute of Science and Technology professor in England, admitted that she fired two professors specifically because they were Jews. Specifically, because they were Israeli Jews. When interviewed by the London Telegraph, Professor Baker admitted, “I deplore the Israeli state. Miriam [dismissed Professor Miriam Shlesinger] knew that was how I felt and that they would have to go because of the current situation.”

Baker asked Shlesinger and Professor Gideon Toury to resign after she signed on to a petition calling on academics world-wide to participate in a boycott of Israel. She fired the two Israeli professors as part of her participation in the boycott, or, as she put it, “my interpretation of what a boycott of Israel means”. She added: “Many people in Europe have signed a boycott against Israel. Israel has gone beyond just war crimes.”

Professor Baker, who refused to disclose where she was born, claimed that her actions were supported by a growing number of academics across Britain and in Germany.

The dismissals raised no public opposition from within British universities. American Professor Stephen Greenblatt of Harvard blasted British intellectuals while visiting to pick up an honorary degree from London University.

Greenblatt called Baker’s actions “repellent”, “dangerous” and “intellectually and morally bankrupt”.

Greenblatt described any policy of singling out a group for collective punishment as “grotesque”. He added: “Excluding scholars because of the passports that they carry or because of their skin color, religion or political party, corrupts the integrity of intellectual work.”

I found it interesting to note that when British academia did step up to the plate, they were careful to disassociate Baker’s actions from anti-Semitism, condemning the stifling of academic thought, without suggesting any repugnance at the anti-Semitism that prompted it.

Said Francis Robinson, a professor of history at London University; “”Whatever anyone feels about Israel, this is absolutely appalling. Certainly there are strong feelings, not often spoken but nevertheless strongly felt, shared by the majority of British liberal intellectuals about the problems with Israel. Nonetheless, this sounds dreadful. It runs counter to the very principles of academic freedom.”

How’s that for a condemnation of the practice of firing intellectuals simply because they are Israeli Jews? Although a majority of British intellectuals share Baker’s hatred of Israel, this “sounds” (note that it SOUNDS dreadful, not that it IS dreadful).

There are almost two hundred countries in the world body. Israel stands unique among them. Israelis are universally hated as ‘occupiers’ and ‘racist oppressors’ — even by members of the academic elite.

Nobody can argue that these shining lights of academic excellence don’t know that Israel’s ‘occupation’ is of land granted them in 1917 by the same authority that later drew the boundaries of Transjordan, Syria, Lebanon, Kuwait and Iraq.

If Israel is an occupation force within those boundaries, then the same status can be [and often is] argued by the Kurds of Iraq.

Except that when Saddam declared the British-drawn boundaries around Kuwait null and void, the world launched the Persian Gulf war on the grounds those borders were legitimate.

Neither are they ignorant of the terms of the Oslo Agreement, a desperate effort on behalf of Israel to ‘unoccupy’ the so-called Occupied Territories.

[The Israeli ‘occupation’ reminds me of the old story about the Roman soldier who called out that he had captured a handful of prisoners outside their perimeter. When told to bring them in, he replied, “they won’t let me.”]

These academics aren’t ignorant of the fact that since Oslo, Arafat has unilaterally, deliberately and systematically sabotaged every effort to end Israel’s unwilling occupation of the territory seized as a buffer zone after pushing back the invading Arab armines in 1967.

As to the charge of being racist, these brilliant and knowledgeable intellectuals must be able to follow Michael Melchior’s syllogism, offered at the UN Conference on Racism at the Durban Conference in South Africa.

There, Melchior pointed out Israel’s uniqueness was not a result of racism. Israelis, he noted, are ‘people of a particular birth, irrespective of religion, and people of a particular religion, irrespective of birth.’

To call democratic, multi-ethnic Israel, [Melchior noted Israel is a land in which one can hear 86 different languages spoken] ‘racist’ in a conflict in which its enemies consist of ethnic Arab dictatorships is to turn logic upside down.

Can these academic luminaries not know these things? Don’t they have books?

Assessment:

It is impossible for me to believe anyone could be so stupid, but I remind you that I have still never been able to see the generation of Europeans before me as fully human, either. So I admit an inability to see things from the perspective of the anti-Semite, although I try mightily.

I say all that to say that maybe some of these academics are that stupid, I just don’t see how.

But if they aren’t that stupid, then that leaves only one other explanation. They hate Israel because it consists of Jews who claim their birthright came by Divine Decree.

They hate that fact so much that they willingly reject the political decree that created the Jewish state [the Balfour Declaration – 1917] out of hand, while simultaneously defending the sanctity of the Arab borders issued by that same authority — the British Crown.’

They hate them because they are Jews.

In His Word, God explains the purpose of Bible prophecy. In Isaiah 43:9 He issues a challenge to the false gods of this world. “Let all the nations be gathered together, and let the people be assembled: who among them can declare this, and shew us former things? let them bring forth their witnesses, that they may be justified: or let them hear, and say, It is truth.”

The gist of the challenge is clear. God says, “Here is My evidence. I’ll tell you what will happen in advance. Who among your gods will do the same?”

Since the god of this world cannot prophecy, he cannot countenance the evidence of his impotence. God promised Jerusalem would be restored to the Jews — after two thousand years of pointing to the fact Jerusalem was not in Jewish hands as evidence of prophecy defeated, suddenly, Jerusalem proves the opposite.

After 2000 years of Jewish pogroms and Diaspora — evidence to the world that the Bible was not true — the Jewish state exists, as the Bible said it would.

The reaction from the god of this world is evident in the fury of his assault against the symbol of his eventual defeat.

The Bible identifies one of the principle signs of the final generation is the existence of a Jewish Israel restored to the Land of Promise. In that generation, the Bible says, Israel will be the most hated nation on the face of the earth.

Zechariah says the entire world will gather against Israel over Jerusalem in the closing hours of the last generation.

“And in that day will I make Jerusalem a burdensome stone for all people: all that burden themselves with it shall be cut in pieces, though all the people of the earth be gathered together against it.” [Zechariah 12:2]

There is no natural explanation for the global anti-Semitism that is bubbling back to the surface of European political discourse.

Israel is a European-style democracy, the Arab states are repressive dictatorships.

Israel is an economic and financial powerhouse, the Arab states are Third World client states.

Judaism presents no discernible threat to the safety and stability of the Western world. Islam, the religion practiced by most Arab states, is directly responsible for the terror attacks that are responsible for the deaths of tens of thousands.

The majority of Muslims may not be terrorists, but the majority of terrorists are still Muslim.

Even the politics of oil doesn’t adequately explain it. There are plenty of alternative oil sources. There are more untapped, but mapped and plotted oil reserves in Russia than in the entire Middle East.

The only explanation for anti-Semitism and anti-Israelism is the Bible. God said it would happen in the last days.

Defying recent history, common sense, logic and all political reality, we see exactly the picture outlined more than two thousand years before coming together before our eyes.

And it all came together in a single generation. The last generation. This generation.

The Choice

The Choice
Vol: 30 Issue: 26 Friday, March 26, 2004

We got a puppy last week. It was not an easy decision — we lost our ol’ pal, Droopy Dawg, to cancer in 2002 after nearly fourteen years of constant companionship.

We weren’t even planning to get a puppy — it just sort of happened. About all we had agreed to was to walk through a couple of pet stores and see how we felt about it. Besides, if nothing else, we’d get to pet a lot of puppies — is there anything more fun than being accosted by a passel o’ puppies?

They were all adorable — they are puppies, and Gayle and I are dog-lovers, with all that implies. We wanted to take them all, but there wasn’t one in particular that stood out from the rest.

By about the third pet store, we had pretty much decided we’d seen all we wanted to see, and that we just weren’t ready — yet — to make the committment. The pain of losing Droopy was still fresh in our minds — indeed, about the only thing we had decided firmly was that we would select a smaller breed with a longer life expectancy than ol’ Droop.

It was in that third pet store that our world was changed. The puppy room was separated from the main store by a petting room, so that the puppies could see us through the windows but were in fact two rooms away.

They were rows of cages of cute little puppies of various breeds, all vying for our attention. One of them, I noticed, seemed quite disinterested in the whole exercise. While the rest of them did all the things puppies do in pet shops to attract attention to themselves, this one just laid there, looking bored. I thought she might be sick.

We looked at them all, and didn’t really see anything that grabbed us. After a few minutes, they all calmed down, and as we turned to leave, the disinterested one sat up, looked me straight in the eye, and barked once.

I asked the clerk to bring me that one.

She was an ugly little thing, a cross between a poodle and a beagle, but when the clerk handed her over, she crawled up, put her head under my neck, sighed once, and relaxed. She had picked her owner.

Assessment:

She is a great little dog — er. . , since she weighs 7 lbs, maybe I should call her a ‘doggette’. We took her to the vet, treated the inevitable infestations one expects in a puppy from a pet shop, bought her a little bed, a collar a leash and she became part of our family.

We housebroke her before suppertime that day. When she figured out what we expected of her, and went to the door to signal her need, I let her out, remarking to Gayle that she was a little ‘Einstein’. We thought we had found her name.

The dog didn’t care for the name, and wouldn’t acknowlege it. Old habits die hard, though, and several times, without thinking, we’d slip and call her ‘Droop’ — to which she would respond immediately. She became Droopy Two.

The other day, I was sitting with the little bundle of fluff on my lap, thinking about all the puppies we looked at. I wondered what happened to them, since, as I said, I am a dog-lover. I loved them sight unseen, but the one I wanted wasn’t the one I chose — I would have been happy with any of them, I’m sure — it was the one that chose me.

That was what made her special — that was what made her, for want of a better word, ‘worthy’ of inclusion in my family, to the exclusion of all the other puppies that I loved unconditionally simply because they were puppies.

The thought occurred to me that it was analogous, although not a perfect analogy, to my relationship with the Lord. The Bible says that God loves all men, but not all men will become part of God’s forever family. Only those who choose Him.

‘Choice’ is very important to God. That is why He imbued us with ‘free will’ — we are created in His Image, and in His likeness, but we can choose whom we will serve.

“And if it seem evil unto you to serve the LORD, choose you this day whom ye will serve; whether the gods which your fathers served that were on the other side of the flood, or the gods of the Amorites, in whose land ye dwell: but as for me and my house, we will serve the LORD. ” (Joshua 24:15)

“I call heaven and earth to record this day against you, that I have set before you life and death, blessing and cursing: therefore choose life, that both thou and thy seed may live:” (Deuteronomy 30:19)

“For I have no pleasure in the death of him that dieth, saith the Lord GOD: wherefore turn yourselves, and live ye.” (Ezekiel 18:32)

Scripture says that the issue of choice is a two-way street.

“For all have sinned, and come short of the glory of God;”, writes Paul to the Romans (3:23)

But those who choose to accept the free gift of redemption secured for us at the Cross will not have to stand before the Righteous Judge clothed in our sins.

“Even the righteousness of God which is by faith of Jesus Christ unto all and upon all them that believe: for there is no difference:” (Romans 3:22)

“To declare, I say, at this time his righteousness: that he might be just, and the justifier of him which believeth in Jesus. Where is boasting then? It is excluded. By what law? of works? Nay: but by the law of faith.” (Romans 3:26-27)

Once Droopy chose us, and we chose Droopy, she became part of our family. From our perspective, it is an unbreakable contract. Hers, too.

We can expect at least as much from a loving God. If we choose to accept His gift.

“In hope of eternal life, which God, that cannot lie, promised before the world began;” (Titus 1:2)

An unbreakable contract.

Cheering the Enemy

Cheering the Enemy
Vol: 30 Issue: 25 Thursday, March 25, 2004

It is hard to imagine anything more important to ultimate victory in any conflict than national morale. The carpet bombing of Germany and Japan in World War Two was designed to break the national morale of the enemy.

The Battle of Britain was part of Hitler’s ‘Operation Sea Lion’ — his planned invasion of Britain. When it failed, Hitler ordered the bombing of London in an effort to break the will of Great Britain.

Both sides deployed their most skilled propagandists in an effort to shore up national morale for a single reason, eloquently articulated by Abraham Lincoln quoting Scripture during a Civil War speech; ‘A house divided cannot stand.’

In her testimony before the 9/11 Commission, Madeline Allbright somewhat ironically noted the need for unity in the fight against terror.

I say ‘somewhat ironically’ since she and her fellow Clintonites have been working around-the-clock to discredit the Bush administration in public since the day he took office. The resulting “not my president” and “anybody but Bush” campaigns have done nothing but spread disunity since.

They’ve talked down the economy, hoping to dampen enthusiasm and investment, thereby creating a self-fulfilling prophecy that they could then seize as a campaign issue.

Take unemployment, currently at 5.5%, nationally. That is the same level as it was when Clinton was campaigning for re-election in 1996, based on the strength of the Clinton-Gore economy.

I know people that are CONVINCED we are in the midst of an economic meltdown based on the same numbers that convinced them the economy of the 90’s was a Clinton ‘miracle’.

The presidential campaign is a rehash of the most divisive and vicious election in living memory, except this isn’t 2000 anymore. We can’t afford to lose national morale and still expect to prevail in the war on terror. Iraq proves that.

It remains incomprehensible to me that anyone could argue against the removal of Saddam Hussein from power. It is the equivalent to arguing against removing Adolph Hitler before he grew strong enough to launch World War Two.

But millions marched against it to mark the first anniversary of Iraq’s liberation, while there was virtually zero opposition to the removal of Slobodon Milosevic in 1999. The Serbian War was conducted without UN approval, just like Iraq. And there was far less at stake in terms of US national interests in Serbia than the risk posed by Saddam Hussein.

The rantings of John Kerry, Howard Dean and Al Sharpton on the campaign trail were augmented by the whisperings from various former members of the Clinton administration about how Bush’s poor leadership led to the 9/11 attacks in the first place.

The United States has never been more divided since Abraham Lincoln noted that a ‘house divided cannot stand.’

Assessment:

The politics of destruction and innuendo, rather than on issues and leadership, is a sad commentary on the times in which we live — but more than that, it is an unrecognized peril. While at war with an faceless, stateless enemy abroad, we are fighting an internal culture war instead, and in so doing, handing victory after victory to our enemy.

The New York Times has become an unwitting (one hopes) propaganda tool in the hands of al-Qaeda, who can use America’s own ‘newspaper of record’ to prove to new recruits that they are, indeed, fighting a ‘Great Satan’. It’s leader is a liar — it says so in black and white. He is a coward who shirked his military duty.

The nation is corrupt — it gives preferential treatment to the rich and conducts its foreign policy based on profits, ‘blood for oil diplomacy’, according to some of its own leaders, dutifully quoted by the New York Times.

It isn’t just the New York Times. Any would-be terrorist with a satellite dish can hear the same things from the lips of America’s most trusted news anchors; Dan Rather, Peter Jennings, Tom Brokaw, or read how evil America has become from the pen of America’s most-trusted newsman, Walter Cronkite, (whose columns are regularly published by the New York Times).

They can hear former presidents like Jimmy Carter and Bill Clinton repeatedly criticize their government and its policies, both at home and abroad.

If an al-Qaeda recruit needed more convincing, he could turn to CNN to find out how evil the Israelis are, followed by a story about how unfairly America treats the Palestinians or how unswervingly it supports Israel.

To the would-be terrorist, it provides a convincing recruiting argument. To the terrorist cells already in operation, it boosts morale and provides hope that they just might win. Nobody wants to sacrifice themselves needlessly; but if they can see that sacrifice as a step toward ultimate victory, it’s a different story.

It is fair to say the Bush administration understands the importance of national unity to ultimate victory. Bush preaches it at every opportunity. During his campaign, he made national unity a campaign issue, saying he wanted to be president of ALL the people.

Ever since 9/11, the Clintonites have been quietly (and sometimes not so quietly) pointing the finger of blame at the Bush administration. On the eve of the 9/11 hearings, Richard Clarke released an alleged ‘tell-all book blaming Bush outright for the attacks on September 11.

The worst of it is, President Bush could have passed on to President Clinton some of the blame for the September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks only 230 days into his administration. After all, Clintonia was warned about al Qaeda — by al Qaeda. al Qaeda was linked with the 1993 World Trade Center bombing that killed six and wounded 1,000.

Clinton was president when al Qaeda bombs killed 231 people at U.S. Embassies in Kenya and Tanzania in 1998. Seven years after terrorists tried to destroy the World Trade Center, the Clinton administration failed to prevent Osama bin Laden’s operation from attacking the destroyer USS Cole in 2000, an attack that left 17 dead.

Bush didn’t point the finger at Mr. Clinton. As former Gov. Pete Wilson, who is on the president’s Foreign Intelligence Advisory Board, noted, “Bush was willing to give them a pass on this because he thought this was a time for unity, not partisan sniping.”

Bush’s reward? The Clinton machine is blaming Bush.

We should be blaming al-Qaeda.

Where is America in prophecy? In the ‘perilous times’ stage.

“This know also, that in the last days perilous times shall come. For men shall be lovers of their own selves, covetous, boasters, proud, blasphemers, disobedient to parents, unthankful, unholy, Without natural affection, trucebreakers, false accusers, incontinent, fierce, despisers of those that are good, Traitors, heady, highminded, lovers of pleasures more than lovers of God; Having a form of godliness, but denying the power thereof: from such turn away.” (2nd Timothy 3:1-5)

America’s Epitaph? Supremes To Decide

America’s Epitaph? Supremes To Decide
Vol: 30 Issue: 24 Wednesday, March 24, 2004

The Supreme Court is hearing arguments from a California atheist who has launched a one-man crusade to have the phrase “one nation, under God” removed from the Pledge of Allegiance.

Dr. Michael Newdow, a physician who is also a lawyer, sued in a California court, alleging that his daughter was being ‘brainwashed’ by being forced to say the words ‘under God’.

Newdow does not have custody of his daughter. His ex-wife is a born-again Christian — and so is his daughter, who not only does NOT have an objection to pledging allegiance ‘under God’, but who accepts it as the truth.

The fact that the law required Newdow to obtain consent from the girl’s mother, Sandra Banning, in order to file on the girl’s behalf, and failed to get it, was completely ignored by the court.

Despite the obvious fact that Newdow’s entire suit is rooted in his personal domestic problems, the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals ignored that, gave him a legal standing — despite his non-custodial status — and, in the end, decided in his favor. That was it! (“God is fired, by order of the 9th Circuit Court. All rise!”)

The Supreme Court will hear the case without its most conservative member, Justice Antonin Scalia, who bowed out after Newdow requested he recuse himself, so the deck is somewhat ‘stacked’ against God. (Scalia had criticized the 9th Circuit Court ruling at a religious rally last year.)

Newdow is comparing his case to to the issue of segregation in schools, which the Supreme Court took up 50 years ago in Brown v. Board of Education.

However, if the Supreme Court decides the case based on Newdow’s argument, “Aren’t we a better nation because we got rid of that stuff?”, he stands a good chance of losing. Most of the Justices are old enough to remember America fifty years ago.

Assessment:

In any case, the Constitutional issue before the Supremes doesn’t seem that complicated; are the words ‘under God’ a case of a state-established religion? The relevant Amendment deals primarily with freedom of speech, but begins with a two-part statement intended to guarantee freedom of religion as well; “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof,” it says.

The phrase, ‘under God’, was not part of the original Pledge of Allegiance as written in 1892. It was inserted by Congress exactly fifty years ago, during the Cold War. At the time, America had just begun its fifty year face-off with the godless Communists of the USSR, and Congress felt inserting the phrase would impart God’s blessing on us.

(We eventually won that war without firing a shot. And a recent AP poll found that almost 9 out of 10 Americans want the Pledge left as it is.)

The Amendment that the Supremes will be re-interpreting was inserted by the Founding Fathers in an historical context. America was founded by Pilgrims seeking freedom from being forced to join the state-sponsored Church of England. They wanted the freedom to worship as they chose.

Hence, the Founding Fathers wanted to ensure no similar state-sponsored religion could take root in the New World — not to remove God, but to ensure His place couldn’t be usurped by a state church.

That is the reason for the second half of the sentence, “or prohibiting the free exercise thereof.”

Does acknowledging God constitute the ‘establishment’ of a religion? Which religion would THAT be? Is there a religion WITHOUT a ‘god’? This is the crux of the case.

In deciding a 1961 case styled as, “Torcaso v. Watkins”, Justice Black wrote, “Among the religions in this country which do not teach what would generally be considered a belief in the existence of God are Buddhism, Taoism, Ethical Culture, Secular Humanism, and others.”

Existing case law says that there are ‘religions’ without a ‘god’, and there are religions WITH a ‘god’. Islam acknowleges a god. Christianity acknowledges a God. So does Judaism. So does native American cultures who worship a ‘Great Spirit’ whom they also revere as a ‘god’ Which of these ‘religions’ is being elevated over another to the level of state-sponsorship by the inclusion of ‘under God’ in the Pledge?

More than that, if the phrase is struck from the Pledge by the Supremes, it becomes a case of upholding one provision of the Amendment by breaking the other. If the religious rights of Secular Humanist Michael Newdow are ruled superior to the religious rights of 90% of Americans, (according to the polls) then the guarantee of freedom of religion is stolen by judicial fiat and replaced with the Secular Humanist religious worldview, which argues, not for freedom of religion, but for freedom only for religions without a ‘god’.

So much for the legal arguments, which seem pretty cut-and-dried, from the perspective of logic. What is at stake is enormous.

The Declaration of Independence acknowledges a Creator, and it is BECAUSE of that acknowledgment that our Bill of Rights are guaranteed. America is unique in that respect, from all other nations. Since the Founding Documents acknowledge human rights as emanating from the Creator, and NOT from government, only the Creator can take them away. They are forever removed from government control. Newdow’s Secular Humanist religion denies the existence of a Creator God.

If the Supreme Court rules that acknowledging a Creator is an unconstitutional establishment of religion, then those ‘inalienable rights’ are granted by nobody, and therefore are as sacred as the grantor of them.

According to the Declaration, Michael Newdow’s right NOT to believe in God is sacred only because God gave him that right and forbade the state from interfering with it. Ironically, if Newdow wins, he will have destroyed the foundation for his own freedom, along with that of every other American.

In the last days, the Bible says that the antichrist will control a global religious system that has ‘two horns like a lamb, but spake as a dragon’ (Rev 13:11); one Paul describes as ‘having a form of godliness but denying the power thereof” (2nd Timothy 3:5)

It also makes no mention of America in prophecy. The Congress inserted the phrase ‘under God’ to ask His protection during the Cold War. We are now at war with what is arguably a more dangerous enemy, since there is no restraining threat of mutually assured destruction, and at the same time, debating whether or not to continue to seek His protection.

“And with all deceivableness of unrighteousness in them that perish; because they received not the love of the truth, that they might be saved. And for this cause God shall send them strong delusion, that they should believe a lie: That they all might be damned who believed not the truth, but had pleasure in unrighteousness.” (2nd Thessalonians 2:10-12)

When the Supreme Court writes its decision on the Newdow case this summer, it may also be writing America’s epitaph.

Analysis: After Yassin . . .

Analysis: After Yassin . . .
Vol: 30 Issue: 23 Tuesday, March 23, 2004

Analysis: After Yassin . . .

In a ridiculous sort of way, Yasser Arafat feels that he has been upstaged by Sheik Ahmed Yassin, whose killing by the Israelis sparked protests in the Arab world by millions of demonstrators.

It underscored to Arafat just how weak his Palestinian Authority has become, compared to Hamas. And all that popular outpouring of grief made him a wee bit jealous.

After Yassin’s killing, Arafat’s aides were all over the airwaves — not so much to condemn Yassin’s killing as to get Arafat a little sympathetic press coverage by speculating that he might be next.

“Arafat feels he is threatened, and we feel he’s threatened because when they target Sheik Yassin, they are not far from Arafat,” said Palestinian Communications Minister Azzam Ahmed.

The PA certainly condemned the killing of Yassin — they’d condemn the killing of a Palestinian goat if the Israelis did it. But the condemnation statements from the PA sounded more perfunctory than heartfelt — in point of fact, the PA was worried that Hamas is planning a coup against it and, if anything, Yassin s death strengthens the PA’s hand.

The IDF didn’t just eliminate a threat to the Jewish State; it also eliminated a threat to the efficacy of Arafat’s non-state administration. And if he plays his cards right, Arafat can get almost as much sympathy as if Israel really did hit him, too, only without being blown to smithereens in the process.

In a sense, the killing of Yassin was a victory for the terrorists, particularly in Europe. The editorial pages across Europe condemned Ariel Sharon across-the-board as the REAL terrorist, as if Sheik Yassin was really a humanitarian sort of guy invariably described as a ‘paraplegic cleric’ instead of the murderous mastermind at whose direction hundreds have been murdered and thousands maimed.

The French daily, ‘Le Figaro’, accused Sharon of “having acted solely in accordance with military logic in ordering the extra-judicial killing” of Yassin. The paper also criticized the United States for its guarded response to the death of the man it referred to as ‘the cleric’.

In Luxembourg, the ‘Wort’ wrote that “Yassin s killing is further proof of how the peace plan envisaged by the US, EU and Russia has been rubbished by Sharon who has tried at every opportunity to sabotage it, thereby making it impossible for the creation of a Palestinian state.”

The paper said that Yassin s death had opened up a Pandora s Box from which ‘all conceivable evils’ will escape.

The Italian paper, ‘Il Messagero’, said it fears the conflict could spread to other countries identified as Israel s allies, in particular the United States. The paper wrote that the Intifada was limited to within Israel and that Yassin had many times stipulated that Hamas s goal was to free Palestinians and not to embark on a world wide campaign of terror.

With the death of Yassin, Il Messagero expressed concerns that Palestinian militants could now join up with Osama bin Laden s Al Qaeda terrorist network and take the fight ‘overseas’.

Capitalizing on European fears, Al Jazeera ran a web poll asking readers the question, “Do you support that Palestinians transfer their [reprisal] operations outside Palestine [against Israeli interests and targets abroad]?”

So far, those who were in favor of transferring the “vengeance operations” constituted 61% of the voters, against 39% who believed reprisals should be kept inside Israel and the Palestinian territories.

The number of people who participated in this opinion poll, which will last till March 25, has reached 48,112 voters so far.

Assessment:

The Europeans are terrified. So terrified that they are distancing themselves from any appearance of solidarity with either Israel or the United States. Since that is the goal of terror, the terrorists are winning.

Despite Yassin’s long and bloody career, his open admission that his goal to was destroy the Jewish State and kill every Jew on what he claimed as ‘Palestinian land’, his publicly issued fatwas calling for every observant Muslim to kill an American, and his huge body count (more than any other Palestinian terror group), virtually every state on earth condemned Israel.

Most Western newspapers feted Yassin as if he had been the Pope. An editorial-obituary in the Houston Chronicle subtitled its story, “Hamas Leader Known for Compassion, Violence”. I read the piece carefully looking for the part where Yassin’s ‘compassionate’ side deserved top billing over violence.

In the entire piece, what its author termed ‘compassion’ was found in a single sentence, saying, “At the same time, Yassin built a network of health, education and welfare services funded privately from donations collected worldwide that helped thousands of Palestinians.”

The reason Yassin built that network wasn’t to help the Palestinians, it was to gain their support. And to use that support (financial and moral) to further his violent campaign against Israel. But Yassin’s ‘compassion’ got top billing when examining his life.

If Israel were to finally take out Yasser Arafat, you can bet that his obit headline will read something like, Israel Assassinates Nobel Peace Prize Winner” instead of “Israel Kills Terrorist Leader”.

But it seems unlikely that the Israelis will take any action against Yasser Arafat. Why should they? He’s safely tucked away in his Ramallah compound; too afraid to step outside his front door for fear an Israeli Predator might target him, too.

It is interesting that for much of the past thirty years, Arafat has been a merchant of violent death, sending thousands to their deaths, both attackers and victims. With all his babble about becoming a ‘martyr for the cause of Palestine’ he refused to even step out the front door of his compound to rouse the rabble gathered at his doorstep.

Israel would be foolish to waste a missile on the pathetic shell of the old terrorist. It is better for Israel to ignore a live coward than create a dead martyr.

Not a single country, including the United States, missed a chance to condemn Israel. The mildest condemnation came from the US State Department, who termed the killing of Yassin ‘very troubling’.

Although virtually the entire civilized world recognized Hamas as a deadly terrorist group, and Sheik Yassin as its leader, to them, Israel is worse, and Sharon is worse.

They fear that calling a spade a spade will bring the wrath of Hamas or al-Qaeda down on them. So instead, they curse Israel and fete the terrorists.

Appeasing the terrorists by cursing Israel won’t grant them immunity from terrorist attacks. The promise of Scripture says exactly the opposite.

The Bible recorded God’s promise to Abraham, given some four thousand years ago.

That promise has never been repealed, something that Washington would do well to remember in the days ahead.

“And I will bless them that bless thee, and curse him that curseth thee: and in thee shall all families of the earth be blessed.” (Genesis 12:3)

Blood, Terror, and Lies

Blood, Terror, and Lies
Vol: 30 Issue: 22 Monday, March 22, 2004

While a disgruntled former administration anti-terrorism official was on CBS concocting whoppers that would make Burger King jealous, on the other side of the world, Hamas now has an opening for a new spiritual leader.

The two incidents stand in stark contrast. The Israeli decision to take out Sheik Ahmed Yassin, the founder of Hamas often referred to as Israel’s Osama bin-Laden, was made despite the fact it guarantees a massive counter-strike by Hamas against it.

Knowing this, and understanding what is at stake, the strike had the full support of both the government and the population upon which any counter-strike will be visited.

On our side of the world, the man who headed America’s counterterrorism effort for eight years turned on his own government in a shameless effort to politicize terror to advance his own personal agenda.

Knowing this, and understanding what is at stake, Richard Clarke has the full support of the media and that segment of the population who couldn’t care less what it means to America in general provided it means defeating George Bush in November.

Both these stories are important, and both have long-range implications for America, and so I am going to try and cover both in today’s briefing.

The first is the death of Sheik Yassin. Yassin formed Hamas in 1987 for the purpose of inflicting terror on Israel during the first intifada. In 1987, Yassin was sentenced to life in prison for the kidnapping and murder of two Israeli soldiers. Israel released him in 1997 in a futile effort to keep the Oslo Agreement from collapsing.

Sheik Yassin was a very bad guy. Although himself a wheel-chair bound quadraplegic, he was the inspiration for Hamas as well as its founder, and was also Hamas’ banker. Yassin was the boss of Hamas in the same sense bin-Laden is the boss of al-Qaeda.

In 2003, in an interview with Fox News, Yassin issued a Fatwa on American television in which he ordered all Muslims to kill Americans wherever they are found, if America sets one foot on Iraqi soil. (Osama bin-Laden issued a similar Fatwa against the United States two months after 9/11)

In response to the killing of Yassin, Hamas issued a communique in which it said Israel could not have killed Yassin with America’s permission and hinted that Hamas would expand its target environment to include the United States.

This is not idle talk, saber-rattling rhetoric. This is a serious threat to every individual American citizen. This is a threat every bit as real as that posed by a terrorist strolling down Broadway in New York City with explosives strapped to his middle.

A Fatwa, once issued, becomes part of Sharia Law. Sharia is analogous to codified law in Western society. It consists of the Koran, the Sunnah, and a constantly evolving collection of Fatwas or rulings that deal with every aspect of Islamic life from ideology to practical daily matters. Throughout Islamic history, Imams and Mullahs have issued Fatwas, which have the force of law among Muslims, similar to a ruling by a Western court.

As in the West, these rulings can be confirmed or overturned by a higher authority, by issuing a Fiqh.

That is why the Osama bin Laden tape that was released to the world on Dec. 21, 2001, remains so important. The tape contained several significant Fatwas, and made reference to several well-established Fiqhs, in effect linking them to the Fatwas. Because these Fatwas have gone unchallenged by higher Islamic authority, they are now part of Islamic law, and must be observed by all Muslims.

Another element that determines the “strength” or ultimate authority of a Fatwa, is who issues it. bin-Laden has serious credibility in the Muslim world.

So did Sheik Ahmed Yassin, as can be seen by the reaction of the Muslim world to his killing. It is important to note that not one Muslim cleric has issued a Fiqh cancelling the Fatwas of death against America. There are thousands who could — not one, to my knowledge, that has.

That means the Fatwas ordering our deaths stand with the full force of Sharia law and it is the legal duty of every observant Muslim to obey them.

Yet to read the coverage of Yassin’s killing in the Western press, Yassin was a victim of the Israelis, a poor, crippled sheik whose shattered, bloodstained wheelchair is on the front page of most American newspapers.

Virtually all American press refer to the incident as an ‘assassination’ as if Yassin were some respected head of state instead of Osama bin-Laden’s Palestinian counterpart. (Should the US finally kill Osama, will the New York Times call it an ‘assassination’? If it turns out that the body being tested for DNA is Ayman al Zawahri, killed by Force 121 along the Afghan-Pak border, did we ‘assassinate’ him?)

The United Kingdom’s Foreign Secretary, Jack Straw, formally condemned the killing of Yassin. Soon after, the European Union issued a condemnation, saying Israel’s killing of the leader of Hamas ‘violates international law and undermines the search for peace’ in the Middle East. Hmmm. Leaving Israel’s Osama bin-Laden in place to order more terror attacks ‘undermines the search for peace’? Are they kidding?

The Poles say the any retaliation by Hamas could inflame the Middle East and then spread to Europe. In Europe, the terrorists are winning the war.

Arab League spokesman Hossam Zaki, who is in Tunis preparing for the Arab League summit, which begins later this week, called it a ‘personification of terrorism’ by the Israeli government.

The leader of Egypt’s banned radical Islamist group, the Muslim Brotherhood, Mohammed Mahdi Akef, also issued a warning, saying, “There can be no life for the Americans and Zionists in the region” and “We will not rest until [Israelis] are expelled.

Assessment:

So much for the ‘blood and terror’ portion of today’s briefing. Now we move to the ‘lies’ part.

Richard Clarke went on CBS Sixty Minutes in what was the most shameless and transparent betrayal since former Bush Treasury Secretary Paul O’Neill. During the Clinton administration and for part of the Bush administration, Clarke served as America’s anti-terrorism czar.

After 9/11, when Bush created the Department of Homeland Security, he took a look at Clarke’s track record and appointed Tom Ridge to head it. Clarke politicked to get appointed Assistant Secretary of Homeland Security, but was instead ‘promoted’ to Special Advisor for Cyberspace Security on October 9th. He ‘retired’ a month later and decided to write a ‘tell-all’ book about what a terrible job Bush has done in prosecuting the war on terror.

That he was grossly incompetent to the job is obvious, as I said, from his record. Clarke was America’s terrorism czar for eight years, and Bush kept him on when he assumed the presidency. The first terrorist attack against the US on Bush’s watch took place on September 11. Bush had been in office eight months.

But it was during the 8 years of Bill Clinton that al-Qaeda prospered and grew by repeatedly attacking American interests with impunity.

*1993: Shot down US helicopters and killed US servicemen in Somalia

*1994: Plotted to assassinate Pope John Paul II during his visit to Manila

*1995: Plotted to kill President Clinton during a visit to the Philippines

*1995: Plot to to bomb simultaneously, in midair, a dozen US trans-Pacific flights was discovered and thwarted at the last moment

*1998: Conducted the bombings of the US Embassies in Nairobi, Kenya, and Dar es Salaam, Tanzania, that killed at least 301 individuals and injured more than 5,000 others

*1999: Attempt to carry out terrorist operations against US and Israeli tourists visiting Jordan for millennial celebrations was discovered just in time by Jordanian authorities

*1999: In another millenium plot, bomber was caught en route to Los Angeles International Airport *2000: Bombed the USS Cole in the port of Aden, Yemen, killing 17 US Navy members, and injuring another 39

Clarke proposed the following responses to al-Qaeda during his eight year tenure. The bombing of an aspirin factory in the Sudan that was later proved unconnected to al-Qaeda in 1998, followed up by the use of 22 million-dollar cruise missiles to destroy an empty $12 tent in Afghanistan.

On several occasions, the Clinton administration had opportunities to kill bin-Laden, but were advised against it by White House lawyers. When the Sudan offered to turn bin-Laden over for arrest in 1996, the offer was turned down because the adminstration didn’t have ‘enough evidence’ for a conviction.

To criticize the Bush administration’s efforts to protect Americans against terrorism, long after their own ineptitute had allowed al Qaeda to grow bold and powerful, is contemptible. The book that he was plugging on CBS was neatly timed for release just before the upcoming election. Clarke is hoping to be Homeland Security Secretary in a Kerry administration — the politics are transparent.

And even Democrat Joe Liebermann says he is lying about the Bush administration planning to attack Iraq in response to 9/11. As Liebermann said, and almost NOBODY reported, “I was there. The Bush administration’s focus was on al-Qaeda from the beginning.”

We have discussed the international black eye America gets every time a ‘whistle-blower’ like Clarke, or a politician greedy for power, puts a private agenda ahead of the public good. It is patently obvious that is what is going on here, yet CBS chose to air Clarke’s concoction of lies and innuendo unchallenged, as if each word were gospel truth.

Here’s what Sixty Minutes forgot to mention. CBS is owned by Viacom, who also owns the publisher of Clarke’s book. Cozy.

For CBS it was a ‘win-win’ situation; a change to slam Bush, plug Kerry and make millions for its sibling company, all at the same time. Unlike a paid campaign commercial, this message was brought to you by CBS’s commerical sponsors. Does that bug you as much as it does me?

“He that is greedy of gain troubleth his own house; but he that hateth gifts shall live,” Proverbs 15:27 tells us.

Now, to connect the dots between the death of Ahmed Yassin and Richard Clarke. Sheik Ahmed Yassin, like Osama bin-Laden, issued a legal ruling requiring observant Muslims to kill Americans. His death at the hands of the Israelis elevated his status to that of a martyr and consequently, elevated the authoritative status of his religious edict to kill Americans.

Richard Clarke’s assessment of the American administration is that it is corrupt and dishonest and cowardly and incompetent. And therefore, to the observant Muslim being recruited by al-Qaeda, deserving of the death sentence imposed on it and its people.

Blood, terror, and lies. A potent cocktail. Where is America in prophecy?

When Solomon was composing the Book of Proverbs, he warned that, “He that troubleth his own house shall inherit the wind: and the fool shall be servant to the wise of heart.” (Proverbs 11:29)

“And a man’s foes shall be they of his own household.” (Matthew 10:36)