The inane clown posse Republican Presidential nominating process is but a day away and every demented, “anti-everything but bombing Iran” candidate has had their moment of top-tier media attention. We adorably have these silly little contests and pretend that corn syrup farmers pave the way for the party nominating process, but the Conservative Supreme Court’s Citizen United decision essentially put the final nail in the coffin of direct democracy by the people and now Super Pacs– special interest groups that can spend unlimited amounts of money (soft monies), but are forbidden from coordinating spending with a candidate or a campaign-dominate the nominating process. In fact, the GOP candidates have spent $10 million just in the month of December on radio and TV ads intended to scare the crap out of corn-syrup farmers, with Rick Perry spending $2.86 million to remind voters why the other candidates aren’t as crazy and unqualified as he is. But let’s face it: no matter how much it irks dyed-in-the-wool conservatives, Mitt Romney is the inevitable nominee. But Ron Paul has certainly showed promise as of late and may find himself placing second in the over-hyped Iowa Caucus. So it’s imperative to ensure that all the greatly exaggerated fervor surrounding Ron Paul and some of his Libertarian beliefs are properly delineated.
With his commitment to principle and historical party ideology as well as consistency and authenticity, Ron Paul has attracted a wise swath of followers who are politically divergent. His open declarations of wanting to end the fruitless War on Drugs and legalize marijuana–a position that would be akin to a Republican quoting Keynes and Betty Friedan–and believes in a non-interventionist foreign policy–a position that would also be akin to a Republican quoting Keynes and Betty Friedan.
But Ron Paul has also attracted racist white dudes in white hoods (see Stormfront) and irrational, paranoid, conspiracy-theory, gun-touting nut jobs that spend their days in the attic of their gun clubs, clinging to their guns and short wave radios and shouting “Don’t Tread on Me”. Moreover, some of these Ron Paul supporters, or “Paulbots“, make Gary Busey look lie George Clooney and Dale Gribble from King of the Hill look like Brian Griffin from Family Guy. Ron Paul, though usually hated by most right-wing fundamentalists, recently heralded the support of a known religious nut job who previously called for the execution of homosexuals and, scary enough, believes Ron Paul’s strident federalism will beget on a theocracy on the state and local level. In other wards, fascism on the national level: bad; fascism on the state and local level: good. Similarly, christofascism (Christian Taleban) on the national level: bad; christofascism on the state and local level: good. A very disconcerting pattern indeed.
Ron Paul prides himself on being a staunch Constitutionalist and has a school girl like crush on the Founding Fathers, but does he really understand the constitution and truly love the Founders ?
An article recently found on LewRockwell.com, an uber-libertarian site that was founded by proponent of Austrian school economics and Libertarian commentator Lew Rockwell, suggests other wise.
Here is an article, entitled War on Religion, written by Ron Paul back in 2003, which might as well have been ghostwritten by Rick Santorum. In it you will see that Ron Paul, despite adoring Thomas Jefferson–the inventor of the Separation of church and state–flagrantly belies the musings of Jefferson by stating how there shouldn’t be any separation.
(Warning:) Paulbots may want to look away as this article contains actual information that may cause you to suddenly shoot yourselves in the foot or kick over your Mountain Dew.
As we celebrate another Yuletide season, it’s hard not to notice that Christmas in America simply doesn’t feel the same anymore. Although an overwhelming majority of Americans celebrate Christmas, and those who don’t celebrate it overwhelmingly accept and respect our nation’s Christmas traditions, a certain shared public sentiment slowly has disappeared. The Christmas spirit, marked by a wonderful feeling of goodwill among men, is in danger of being lost in the ongoing war against religion.
Through perverse court decisions and years of cultural indoctrination, the elitist, secular Left has managed to convince many in our nation that religion must be driven from public view. The justification is always that someone, somewhere, might possibly be offended or feel uncomfortable living in the midst of a largely Christian society, so all must yield to the fragile sensibilities of the few. The ultimate goal of the anti-religious elites is to transform America into a completely secular nation, a nation that is legally and culturally biased against Christianity.
This growing bias explains why many of our wonderful Christmas traditions have been lost. Christmas pageants and plays, including Handel’s Messiah, have been banned from schools and community halls. Nativity scenes have been ordered removed from town squares, and even criticized as offensive when placed on private church lawns. Office Christmas parties have become taboo, replaced by colorless seasonal parties to ensure no employees feel threatened by a “hostile environment.” Even wholly non-religious decorations featuring Santa Claus, snowmen, and the like have been called into question as Christmas symbols that might cause discomfort. Earlier this month, firemen near Chicago reluctantly removed Christmas decorations from their firehouse after a complaint by some embittered busybody. Most noticeably, however, the once commonplace refrain of “Merry Christmas” has been replaced by the vague, ubiquitous “Happy Holidays.” But what holiday? Is Christmas some kind of secret, a word that cannot be uttered in public? Why have we allowed the secularists to intimidate us into downplaying our most cherished and meaningful Christian celebration?
The notion of a rigid separation between church and state has no basis in either the text of the Constitution or the writings of our Founding Fathers. On the contrary, our Founders’ political views were strongly informed by their religious beliefs. Certainly the drafters of the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution, both replete with references to God, would be aghast at the federal government’s hostility to religion. The establishment clause of the First Amendment was simply intended to forbid the creation of an official state church like the Church of England, not to drive religion out of public life.
The Founding Fathers envisioned a robustly Christian yet religiously tolerant America, with churches serving as vital institutions that would eclipse the state in importance. Throughout our nation’s history, churches have done what no government can ever do, namely teach morality and civility. Moral and civil individuals are largely governed by their own sense of right and wrong, and hence have little need for external government. This is the real reason the collectivist Left hates religion: Churches as institutions compete with the state for the people’s allegiance, and many devout people put their faith in God before their faith in the state. Knowing this, the secularists wage an ongoing war against religion, chipping away bit by bit at our nation’s Christian heritage. Christmas itself may soon be a casualty of that war.
Dr. Ron Paul is a Republican member of Congress from Texas.
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