In the wake of America’s loss this past Saturday of a true Christian patriot, Howard Phillips, I am reminded of my response to a web post that I read a few months back. In commenting on an article posted at forbes.com, an individual stated that “My natural desire is that a new group of Founding Fathers would arise in the spirit of the original Founding Fathers.” My response to that individual was that America already has patriots in our midst with the spirit of America’s Founding Fathers, we’re just not electing them to office these days.  While the ratio of those with the spirit of the founders may be lessor today than it was in 1776, that spirit of respect for the Creator, honor for His laws and treasuring of the blessings of liberty, is still present in a handful of true patriots that this generation has been blessed with. Chief among those patriots has been Howard Phillips.

As I consider the God honoring, Constitution upholding, liberty loving men of this generation who possess the knowledge, intellect, experience and skills necessary to make them fit for the Presidency of our great nation, only a handful come to mind, with Howard topping the list. Had Howard been born a couple hundred years earlier, I am persuaded we would have found him in attendance at the Constitutional Convention and would likely see his name affixed to the Declaration of Independence. I expect Howard would have been found competing with Patrick Henry for the privilege of saying “Give me Liberty or Give me Death!” Today Howard has obtained that liberty.

The primary difference between Howard Phillips (and the handful like him in our generation) and the founding fathers, is that the people of the founding era saw fit to elect God honoring men of high moral character to public offices. In contrast, our present generation sentences such men to obscurity, choosing instead to be governed and lead by opportunists, power seekers, narcissists, man pleasers and those who are unprincipled enough to buy our vote with favors purchased at the expense of our neighbor. Had Howard lived during our nation’s founding era, I expect the American’s of that time would have elected him to high office, perhaps even the Presidency.

But rejection by the masses never bothered Howard, as I recall his commenting after a resounding election defeat, “we may have a right to be disappointed, but never to be discouraged,” as he continued to march forward for the the righteous cause undaunted. Rejection by this world didn’t bother Howard and it should not be a source of consternation for the rest of us. We should recall the words of Hebrews, chapter 11, which remind us that those who choose the path of faith and of honoring the Lord are commonly rejected by this world with “cruel mockings and scourgings, yea, moreover of bonds and imprisonment: They were stoned, they were sawn asunder, were tempted, were slain with the sword: they wandered about in sheepskins and goatskins; being destitute, afflicted, tormented; ‘OF WHOM THE WORLD WAS NOT WORTHY.‘”

While none of us can by our own deeds make ourselves worthy of entrance into the joy of our Lord, we can know that on April 20, 2013, our friend, Howard Phillips, heard those words that we all long to hear – “Well done, thou good and faithful servant.”

May those of us who were blessed to know His servant remember the things that we learned from him and emulate his devotion to God, country, Constitution and the principles of liberty. The greatest honor that we can bring to our friend, Howard Phillips, is to go forth and be the example to the next generation that he has been to us, teaching them to honor God, obey His laws, uphold the Constitution and offer ourselves as the Lord’s instruments for the healing of the land.

PS. For those who were not privileged to have known Howard Phillips, my condolences. You missed an opportunity to learn how to think like a Christian patriot and apply the principles of the U.S. Constitution in the manner that the founders intended. Every speech that Howard gave was a lesson in Constitutionalism. It’s one thing to hear the words, but it’s quite another to be challenged by the spirit that goes with the words. They say that some things are taught and some things are caught. I am grateful to have caught what Howard taught.

I am mindful of the first words that bubbled up within me upon seeing the twin towers falling on 9-11, “America, how long will you be proud?”  That is to say, how long will we trust in ourselves, thinking we don’t need God, that we are sufficient in ourselves, can fix our own problems and meet our own needs?

We can’t meet our own needs.  We are totally inadequate to the task.  Man was never designed to meet His own needs.  Man was made to be connected to his Creator who is the only source sufficient for the meeting of our needs. We will either draw near to Him, trust in Him, connect with Him and with that which flows from Him, or we will drift away from Him, become disconnected from Him, become disconnected from His protection and provision and become increasingly depraved and increasingly the source of our own ills.

I am not talking about railing against liberals or the unsaved as being the source of judgment on America.  We, the Christian right, need to start examining ourselves and being honest about exactly who and what we are placing our trust in, both in our personal lives and in our political activism.  Are we really trusting in God, or are we unwittingly placing trust in man and the arm of the flesh (Jeremiah 17:5) as we look to political powers and institutions for our hope?  Once our own heart is right, once our trust is placed squarely where it belongs and our foot set on the prescribed path, it then becomes our duty to take the message of God, His word, His ways and of trust in Him to the lost, to the world and even to the liberal, in meekness teaching them how to recover themselves from the snare of the enemy (2 Timothy 2:24-26) and bring their land back to the place of God’s blessing, protection and provision.

This may be a more decidedly spiritual message than you’re accustomed to hearing from a political party chairman, but I would be remiss if I did not occasionally remind us that politics alone has no power to save, heal, or restore a nation. Politics and political parties are at best tools – tools that can be used to implement elements of God’s will for the healing of the land if and when we put ourselves and our political activities in His hands to be used for His purposes and for His glory.

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The LORD is my strength and my shield; my heart trusted in him, and I am helped: therefore my heart greatly rejoiceth; and with my song will I praise him. (Psalms 28:7)

It is better to trust in the Lord than to put confidence in man. It is better to trust in the Lord than to put confidence in princes. (Psalms 118:8-9)

Our soul waiteth for the LORD: he is our help and our shield. (Psalms 33:20)

I will both lay me down in peace, and sleep: for thou, LORD, only makest me dwell in safety. (Psalms 4:8)

The horse is prepared against the day of battle: but safety is of the LORD. (Proverbs 21:31)

Wherefore ye shall do my statutes, and keep my judgments, and do them; and ye shall dwell in the land in safety. (Leviticus 25:18)

FREE RESOURCE!

While no Christian should ever fear, all of us need to occasionally bolster our faith in the defense against fear. To that end, I would like to recommend the book, “Your Promise of Protection,” a study on the power of the 91st Psalm. The hard copy edition of this book sells for $5.99, but the online version can be viewed or downloaded FREE! Check it out now and start building boldness of faith for the days to come.

Thanks to the wisdom of America’s founders and the separation of powers which they built into our form of government, there is ample opportunity to stop any usurpation by any branch of government at any level. The checks on tyranny are redundant almost to the point of the absurd. For usurpation to succeed in this land, we the people would have to fail ourselves by electing to at least a half dozen different levels of government, servants who either do not understand the simple instructions that we have given to them in the plain text of the U.S. Constitution, or who understand, but hold those instructions in contempt, or who understand, but lack the courage to perform their duty and their sworn oath to uphold the Constitution.

Using ObamaCare as an example, let’s see how many checks against usurpation are built into our system of government.

IS OBAMACARE LAWFUL?

First we must answer the question, “is ObamaCare lawful?” If something is lawful, it is our duty to obey it. If something is unlawful, it is our duty to resist it.

What makes something lawful? Someone waiving a magic wand or saying, “I decree it?” Bills passed or orders issued are not law just because someone says so. Laws, and the legislative bodies that pass them, must derive their authority from a source as all authority works by “chain of command.” A subordinate in a chain of command can never do what his superior has not authorized and have it treated as law.

America’s founders rightly understood the chain of command as beginning with their Creator, the Lord God, ruler of heaven and earth, who delegated to His creation, Man, a certain measure of authority, or rights, as noted in our Declaration of Independence. Man then institutes civil government by the “consent of the governed” (Declaration of Independence), who cede a portion of their God-given authority to the government that they institute. In America, we first delegated a measure of our authority to our respective states, which in turn conferred an even smaller portion of that authority upon the federal government which they created. The U.S. Constitution is the document whereby the states spelled out in detail the exact amount of authority that was being delegated to the federal government with the Ninth and Tenth Amendments reaffirming that “if we didn’t specifically charge the federal government with doing something, then it doesn’t have the power to do it.”

So the answer to our question can be found by simply reading the plain text of the U.S. Constitution and looking for the section on health care – which by the way, doesn’t exist. Thus Congress passing, and the President signing, the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act has all the legal authority and force of law of a group of children getting together and voting that the moon should be made of cheese. No one delegated them the authority to do it and they don’t have the power. For more on the unconstitutionality of ObamaCare, please see U.S. Congressman Scott Garrett’s “Top Ten Reasons ObamaCare is Unconstitutional” (http://tinyurl.com/b2q98sn) or listen to Walter Williams’ excellent commentary on the topic (http://tinyurl.com/a5z5m4b).

THE CHECKS AGAINST USURPATION

The FIRST place where an illegal, immoral, unconstitutional act like this should have been stopped is in Congress itself. Either the House or the Senate (both Democrat controlled at the time) could have honored the plain text of the Constitution and just said “NO!”

The SECOND place for a bill lacking Constitutional basis to be stopped is the President (Democrat) who has the duty to veto such a bill.

The THIRD place where this usurpation should have been stopped is the U.S. Supreme Court (Republican majority of appointees), which has the duty of announcing to the legislative and executive branches when they have overstepped their bounds by passing a law that is not a law. While the court rightly acknowledged that the federal government lacks the authority to require the citizens of the several states to purchase a product they don’t want, it instead turned around and in an act of blind faith in a taxing power that doesn’t exist, declared that the federal government has the authority to tax people for failing to purchase that same product which they cannot be compelled to purchase. This supposed “Health Care Tax” is neither uniform, apportioned among the states, nor a tax on income and thus fails all three Constitutional requirements for a tax.

That brings us to where we are today. So is there anything left that can be done to stop ObamaCare? The answer is “YES,” there’s plenty.

THE CHECKS ON USURPATION YET AVAILABLE TO US

The FOURTH place that this usurpation can be stopped is in the U.S. House of Representatives (now Republican controlled). It is fully within the Constitutional purview of the House, which holds the purse strings (see U.S. Constitution, Article I, Section 7, first paragraph), to withhold funding from any and all agencies engaged in the implementation or administration of this unconstitutional act. However, this would require a bold, hard-nosed, “draw a line in the sand” act of defiance by the same Republican controlled House that so far has capitulated to Obama’s every demand for more deficit spending. It’s hard to imagine that they would suddenly find their backbone now, especially after we just rewarded them with reelection.

In the face of a gutless U.S. House that will not exercise any resistance against this egregious violation of our health care freedoms, it falls to state and local government to interpose.

The FIFTH line of defense against usurpation is your state governor (30 states have Republican governors, 19 Democrat, 1 independent). Governors also swear an oath to uphold both their state and the U.S. Constitutions. Several governors are saying that they will not implement ObamaCare in their state. But beware, their “not implementing” ObamaCare is not necessarily the same as protecting you from this federal overreach. Most of the “not implementing” talk is centered around the provision of the act that calls on states to set up a “health exchange” and participate in an expansion of the Medicaid program. While choosing not to implement such provisions would help slow down the implementation of ObamaCare, it doesn’t stop it as the federal government has plans to implement these provisions for the states should states fail to do so.

This “not implementing” is not at all the same as a governor publicly declaring the unconstitutionality of the health care act, declaring the citizens of the state to be free from its requirements, then charging the state police with protecting the citizens of the state from this unconstitutional overreach by arresting any federal agent attempting to enforce its mandates on the residents of the state. This may sound extreme, but I am fully persuaded it is exactly what the framers of the Constitution had in mind, especially when they drafted the Ninth and Tenth Amendments, and is precisely what Thomas Jefferson, James Madison, Patrick Henry or others of the venerated founders would do were they a state governor today.

The SIXTH protection, and perhaps the best recourse left to us, is nullification by state legislatures (27 of which are Republican controlled, 17 Democrat, 5 split and Nebraska is non-partisan). Excellent model legislation has already been drafted and only awaits the action of a state legislature with the courage necessary to adopt it. This is not wimpy model legislation that merely opts out of implementing health exchanges or expanding Medicaid. This model legislation not only declares the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act null and void, but calls for the fining or imprisonment of any agent attempting to enforce provisions of ObamaCare in that state. You can read the model legislation for yourself here – http://tinyurl.com/ayl5vsb – then contact your state legislator and implore them to defend your right to health care freedom by sponsoring this legislation. Nearly all of the states have governors and legislative majorities that are of the same party, so if either of the dominant parties actually cares about our Constitutionally-protected rights, then at least 17 to 27 or so of the states could nullify this egregious act tomorrow and stop it dead in its tracks.

This idea of interposition and nullification by states might sound strange to some who are not familiar with it. Please know that it is nothing new, but was actually understood and intended by the same men who gave us our Constitution. Learn more about it at the following links.

• “States can Stop ObamaCare“ by Richard Mack – http://tinyurl.com/agkqn66
• MP3 audio file on “Interposition“ by Dr. Herb Titus – http://tinyurl.com/ayyyhlo
• Video on “Nullification“ by Thomas Woods – http://tinyurl.com/a88t9hq

By the way, there is similar model legislation available for both state and county nullification of federal attempts at gun control. Check it out at http://tinyurl.com/9w9lweu.

The SEVENTH and final defense left to us is the County Sheriff. The sheriff is the highest law enforcement official in the land. While the state and federal governments have only the limited authority delegated to them by the state and federal constitutions, the county sheriff receives his authority directly from the citizens who elect him to protect their lives, their liberty and their property from both criminals who violate the law and from any branch of government that oversteps its jurisdictional bounds. For an in-depth look at the authority of the county sheriff to interpose on behalf of his citizens, check out this video by Sheriff Richard Mack https://vimeo.com/28224647.

Though I am not aware of any county sheriffs who are planning to resist the implementation of ObamaCare, 256 sheriffs are currently identified as vowing to “uphold and defend the Constitution against Obama’s unlawful gun control measures” according to an article at http://cspoa.org/sheriffs-gun-rights. While these 256 sheriffs certainly are to be applauded, and supported by the citizens of their counties, there are a total of 3,033 counties in the U.S., leaving us a long way to go before the rights of all Americans are secure.

While I honor those sheriffs who are taking a stand, I must admit that I find it a bit difficult to ask a sheriff to put his neck on the line for a people who have elected a President who ignores the Constitution, U.S. Representatives who won’t stand up for the Constitution, Supreme Court Justices (by appointment of the Presidents that we’ve elected) who twist the meaning of the Constitution, governors who do not interpose to protect our rights and state legislatures without the courage to nullify a blatantly unconstitutional act. When we the people elect such to represent us, what makes us think we deserve a county sheriff who will protect us from the very people that we’ve elected at all the other levels of government?

There are indeed many checks and balances against tyranny – seven that are named in this article, four of which still remain to us to stave off ObamaCare and gun control as well for that matter. Nevertheless, none of these checks are of any effect if we the people are willing to check our ballot for candidates who either do not understand the Constitutional principles of liberty or are not willing to defend them.

We’ve been discussing the departure of the Christian-conservative-religious right from the Biblical and Constitutional values that we have told ourselves we were contending for. We looked at an allegorical example of how this has happened gradually and subtly over a generation or more without our even noticing our departure from the God prescribed path or the departure of His presence and favor upon our political endeavors. But can such a thing really happen? Is there a historical precedent for it?

Not only is there precedent for it, but it’s been documented over and over in the Bible. A classic example is the story found in 1 Samuel chapter 4. Israel, God’s covenant people (read: the Christian-conservative-religious right) was in a spiritually wayward state due at least in part to the high priest’s corrupt sons. They still had their religious relics (the ark of the covenant, tabernacle, priests), but were not walking in vital relationship with the Lord. They had begun to serve other gods. Apparently their spiritual condition had come upon them gradually enough that they hadn’t even noticed their departure from God, nor the absence of His presence and favor.

When they lost a battle with the Philistines in 1 Samuel 4:1-2, they failed to realize their spiritually backslidden condition and the departure of the presence and favor of God. In a move of classic, carnal, religious mentality, they decided to trot out a religious relic believing that would help – they said (and I paraphrase here) “let’s go up to Shilo and get that gold plated religious box (ark of the covenant) out of the tabernacle, maybe ‘it’ (not God) can save us” (1 Sam 4:1-3). But trusting in a religious relic didn’t help as the Philistines not only beat them again, but stole from them the very relic that they were trusting in.

There appears to have been at least one woman in Israel with some perceptiveness as she named her son, who was born in the midst of that event, “Ichabod,” meaning “no glory,” as she declared “The glory has departed from Israel” (1 Sam 4:21-22). Now I realize that she was referring to the loss of the ark, but there’s no way the ark would have been stolen had the presence of God – His glory (splendor, honor), not already departed from the people of Israel.

But there’s more to the story. Eli was the High Priest (spiritual authority) and judge (political authority) over Israel in those days. 1 Samuel 2:12-17 tells us that Eli’s sons were evil and that they did “make the LORD’S people to transgress” (1 Sam 2:24). 1 Samuel 3:13 makes it very clear that God held Eli responsible for the actions of his sons, so much so that God told Eli that his toleration of their evil deeds would cost his lineage the priesthood, that they would be “cut off” (1 Sam 2:31), “because his sons made themselves vile, and he restrained them not” (1 Sam 3:13).

Today, “we the church” (spiritual) and “we the people” (political) are the spiritual and political authority in the land. We, like a parent, produce the offspring of political parties and movements through our establishing and supporting of the same. When those institutions go astray and “make the people to transgress” the Biblical or Constitutional standards, then we, the Christian-conservative-religious right, are as responsible for tolerating such as Eli was responsible for the conduct of his sons.

The Christian-conservative-religious right is not a victim of the neo-con establishment leadership of the Republican Party nor of the compromised candidates that they promote. We’re not the victims of these, we’re their enablers, so long as we support, participate in, vote for or have anything to do with such. Based on the example of God’s dealings with Eli, the Christian-conservative-religious right that has created and supported the now compromised conservative movement, Republican Party, or Biblically unqualified and Constitutionally unfit candidates, can expect to be held responsible for the actions of these and be “cut off” for tolerating it.

Am I forecasting the demise or even the end of America? No, No, No – Not at all! America was born in revival, forged in a great awakening, established in an act of reliance upon divine providence and given a Constitution that secured God’s blessings of liberty on the land. As Benjamin Franklin noted, “And if a sparrow cannot fall to the ground without His notice, is it probable that an empire can rise without His aid?” America is no accident. God placed this nation here on purpose, for His purpose, and His purpose will not be thwarted.

The only question is who, what and which generation will offer themselves to the use of His purpose. My concern is that this year’s elections marked the Christian-conservative-religious right’s step across the line of demarcation and the disqualification of its institutions and movements from use as an instrument for God’s healing and restoring of the land just like Eli and his sons disqualified themselves from the priesthood in Israel.

But to me that’s good news as it should SET US FREE from obligation to and continued reliance upon a debauched political party, a movement that has gone astray and candidates that do not represent Biblical and Constitutional principles. It should SET US FREE from the self degradation that comes from the quest for political power and the continual prostituting of ourselves to get it. It should SET US FREE to return to God, to humble ourselves under His mighty hand, to repent and return to His right paths free from concern for political affiliations, political clout, political power or a seat at the table. It should SET US FREE to turn to God and ask Him to restore to us the knowledge of His pure and right ways and to walk in them free of any concern for the outcome.

I’m not calling for withdrawal from the political arena. I’m calling for liberation from any entity or movement that has departed from the Biblical and Constitutional path. I’m calling for political activism to return to its only just and legitimate purpose – the declaring of the will of the sovereign and the counsels of His wisdom for a civil society.

If we raise up and support candidates for public office who honor God, uphold the Constitution and advocate for liberty and they lose at the ballot box, then we will have the victory of knowing that we have honored God and that He will honor us (“For those who honor Me I will honor” 1 Sam 2:30). And if we give ourselves to supporting such candidates and they win, then we win the honor of having been found as vessels fit for the master’s use in bringing healing to the land.

Let 2012 be the year of liberation from compromised political institutions and concern for winning at the ballot box. Let 2013 be the first year of returning to God and God alone; of returning to His right paths; of asking Him to restore to us the knowledge of the principles of good government once understood by our nation’s founders and the courage to not stray from them.

God never needed the conservative movement, the conservative movement needed God. God never needed the Republican Party, the Republican Party needed God. Any party, movement or ism that does not have the LORD as its first, last and only purpose and His presence and glory as its strength and hope, is just a dead, gutted fish, waiting to rot and stink.

God is not looking for a political party or movement that is strong enough to give Him the victory, He is looking for a people who are fully committed to Him so that he can show them His strength.

For the eyes of the LORD run to and fro throughout the whole earth, to shew himself strong in the behalf of them whose heart is perfect toward him…(2 Chronicles 16:9)

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Ichabod – The Real Message of the 2012 Election, can be purchased as a paperback book at lulu.com (click here for direct link).

In Part 1 of this series we looked at the departure of the Christian-conservative-religious right from the Biblical and Constitutional principles that it once represented. We saw how that departure was documented in black and white in the 2012 primary elections. Remember, the primary election is where the Christian-conservative-religious right (which predominately votes Republican and serves as that party’s base of support) chooses the candidates who best represent their values and which they want to be represented by in the general election. We observed that when Christian and conservative voters were confronted with a number of strongly Biblical and Constitutional candidates to choose from in the primary election, in almost every case they rejected those candidates in favor of secularists, humanists, socialists and even some pro-sodomites and pro-abortionists.

The question is, how did this happen? After decades of believing that we were engaging in political activism for the purpose of preserving Biblical values and Constitutional principles, how could we suddenly find ourselves pushing aside candidates who embody our professed values and instead willfully select a slate of secularists, humanists and even socialists to represent us? Part of the answer is that this did not happen overnight. This is the fruit of something that has been at work for a generation or more.

As I pondered and prayed over the matter, seeking understanding, the following allegory came to me.

There was a time when America was primarily on the straight and narrow path prescribed by our Creator. Oh yes, we sometimes swerved and swayed to this side of the road or that and sometimes even got off in the ditch. There have been occasional scoundrels in our midst who used the power of government for greedy gain. Yet over all, we continued to acknowledge the Sovereign of the universe, the fact that His was the right path that we should follow and that the Constitutionally prescribed form of government that He had blessed our land with should be observed and upheld.

Then there came a time when some began to openly reject the rule of the Sovereign and worked to take our nation off His path and to subvert the principles that our nation had been founded on and the Constitution that was given to secure the blessings of liberty and keep us on the right path. And so conservatism and the religious right were born in an attempt to resist the subverting influences and keep America on the Biblical and Constitutional path.

But over time the Christian-conservative-religious right began to wander off the path and into the woods beside the road, being enticed by the allure of the forest of political power. We began to trust in that power and think it to be something – something that we needed if we were to “save ourselves” from our enemies. And so we began to sell small portions of our birthright to the establishment that claimed to be the owners of the forest of political power whenever they demanded it of us in exchange for a seat at their table.

Eventually the allure of political power drew us deeper and deeper into the forest. Oh, we still had God in sight as we tracked a course parallel to His Biblically prescribed path and to the Constitutional road that our nation’s founders had set us on and so we assured ourselves that all was alright. But we continued to wander farther and farther off into the forest, trusting more and more in political power to save us from our opponents. We were now so deep in the forest that we were only catching glimpses of God and His path as we looked back over our shoulder, occasionally spying Him between the trees. We assured ourselves that all our political endeavors were for the purpose of getting the nation back to God’s right path, but first we had to get just a little more political power, which meant straying just a little farther into the forest; one more compromise in order to win at the ballot box; one more birth right to be sold to get our hands on the bowl of political pottage.

I believe that 2012 marks the year that the Christian-conservative-religious right finally wandered so far into the woods that we have now lost sight of the Biblically and Constitutionally prescribed path that our Creator once so graciously set this nation upon. The Christian-conservative-religious right is now completely lost in a forest of human reason and the quest for raw political power, oblivious to the fact that we’ve come to a fork in the road where God’s path went one way and we’ve gone another – that His presence, blessing and empowering has departed from our political endeavors because we’ve departed from Him and from His path and have, as the Bible puts it, “gone a whoring” after political power, party and a seat at the table, selling ourselves to the power brokers who assure us that their man can win in November.

Please don’t be fooled by the fact that we still use some Christian jargon or that we have candidates who use certain buzz words that we deceive ourselves into believing means that they are Christian or conservative and that it somehow makes whatever they do okay. When Christians, conservatives and the religious right reject overtly God honoring, Biblically sound and Constitutionally correct candidates during a primary election in favor of being represented by secularists, humanists, socialists, even some pro-sodomites and pro-abortionists, half of whose policies violate the very Constitution that they swear an oath before God to uphold and defend, all so that we can “win in November,” then the Christian-conservative-religious right has lost its way whether we’re willing to admit it or not.

It might be hard to believe that while calling ourselves Christian, thinking ourselves conservative and surrounding ourselves with Christian-conservative-religious right rhetoric, we could stray from the path, have God’s presence depart and not even notice. However, it happened to Israel over and over and it often took being smacked up-side the head with a stinging defeat before they woke up and realized that the glory had departed. In part 3 of this series we will look at a Biblical example of this very thing.

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Ichabod – The Real Message of the 2012 Election, can be purchased as a paperback book at lulu.com (click here for direct link).

For a month now, the Christian-conservative-religious right has been reeling from the outcome of the 2012 elections like a boxer staggering under the effect of a near knockout blow. While some are vowing to return to the ring with renewed fervor, others are in a funk, despairing the outcome of the election. The odd fact of the matter is that despite the emotional trauma suffered by conservatives, the 2012 elections didn’t really change anything. We have the same President, the same party still controls the U.S. House of Representatives and the same party is in control in the Senate. Even the party control of state governorships only changed by one state. So if nothing has changed, why the despair?

I believe the real story of the 2012 elections is not the outcome registered at the ballot box on November 6, but rather the evidencing of the real state of the Christian-conservative-religious right. Perhaps the despair being expressed is the result of a subconscious realization as to the spiritual condition of the religious right – a condition that is causing the spirit of some to cry out “Ichabod” (no glory) sensing that “The glory is departed” from the political institutions and movements in which the Christian-conservative-religious right has for so long trusted (1 Samuel 4:21-22).

I have been politically active as a Christian and a Constitutionist for about two decades now. I’ve served in leadership capacities, headed up events and activities, assisted in campaigns and served as chairman of a political party. I’ve crossed paths with most of those in my community who would be labeled “conservative” and am personally acquainted with nearly all of the seriously Christian and Constitutional political activists in the region. Though not everyone in those circles has supported all of my political activities (primarily due to my activism being of a mostly third party and independent nature), yet nearly all have agreed as to the basic values and indicated that we’re all part of the same team working toward the same goal of honoring God, restoring Constitutional governance, preserving liberty and upholding the philosophical ideals of America’s founders.

Though there have always been some differences of strategy within our ranks, I’ve always had the sense of being surrounded by compatriots who were marching toward the same general goal. However, sometime in July of this year, I found myself with a sense that something had changed. It was as though I was still running the same race, but most of the people that I thought I was running the race with had disappeared – like they had taken a different turn in the road and I was now running the course alone.

I could have thought that it was just my imagination, the result of battle fatigue, or a mild case of discouragement, had it not been for my state’s August primary election. That election revealed the actual state of the Christian-conservative-religious right and documented its departure from the values that it had so long espoused. In that election, conservatives rejected nearly every God honoring, Constitution upholding, liberty loving candidate on the ballot in preference of secularist, humanist, socialist and even pro-sodomite candidates.

Now being primarily engaged in third party and independent politics, I’m accustomed to having my candidates rejected by a populace that is, in my opinion, illogically locked in to a two party paradigm. However, in this case it was overtly God honoring, Constitution upholding, liberty loving Republican candidates who were rejected right down the line. Remember, this was not the general election where we just have a “D” verses an “R” and people trying to choose the better of the two, or where we can blame “liberals” for the outcome. This was the primary election where the Christian-conservative-religious right (which typically associates with the Republican Party) chooses the candidates that best reflect their own values and who they want to be represented by in the general election.

This year’s primary election was quite notable in that it featured a number of unusually and overtly God honoring, Constitution upholding, liberty loving candidates. We had a Christian pastor who ran an aggressive campaign for Governor as a Republican who openly acknowledged God and espoused the values of traditional conservatism and the religious right. There was actually a second “liberty” pastor running as an independent. Both were rejected by the Christian-conservative-religious right receiving just 3.2% and 0.7% of the vote respectively. Instead, conservative voters overwhelmingly chose to be represented by a man who I judge to be a secularist, humanist, and a practitioner of “socialism lite” whose campaign came out in opposition to the Boy Scouts prohibition on homosexuals and who, as the sitting State Attorney General, was leading a suit against a family owned drug store for refusing to sell an abortion pill.

We had a very well qualified Attorney General candidate who has been a leader in defending marriage against the assault of the homosexual lobby, was strongly Constitutional in his views and has even traveled the state speaking at events hosted by a Christian ministry. But again, the Christian-conservative-religious right chose, by a margin of 4-1, the other Republican candidate – a man who, while serving on the King County Council, voted in support of homosexual marriage and whose voting record while on the council was in 99% agreement with the Democrat candidate for Attorney General who also served on that council.

Similar results were experienced for a Constitutionist running for Secretary of State under the Constitution Party banner and a Christian reformer seeking the Superintendent of Education post (non partisan). The only strongly Christian, Constitutional, advocate for liberty running for one of the ten statewide offices who was sent on to the general election by conservative voters, was in a race where he was the only Republican candidate. In other words, conservatives who were committed to voting “R” had no choice but to vote for him in the primary, though he did lose in the general election.

Lest you think this is just a phenomenon of Washington state’s famous liberalism now manifesting even among Republican voters, here where I live, in famously conservative eastern Washington, the Christian-conservative-religious right rejected a well respected Christian Constitutionist Republican candidate for the U.S. House – a man known for his teaching of Biblical and Constitutional principles of government and for his radio commentaries on the same. Instead, conservatives chose to be represented by the incumbent establishment puppet who has only a 63% Constitutional voting record and who voted for the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) that authorized the indefinite detention of American citizens.

In one legislative district here in eastern Washington, there was no Democrat in the race, only two Republicans. The incumbent, who commonly votes with the Democrats in the legislature, co-sponsored our state’s now infamous gay marriage bill while the challenger, known for her presentations of the Institute on the Constitution course, was solidly pro Biblical marriage. The result? The Constitutional Republican challenger received little support from conservatives and apparently none from the Republican party, being outspent 10-1, as one of the more conservative areas of the state opted for the pro-sodomite liberal Republican incumbent.

And it’s not just happening here in Washington, as the Presidential race bore out. After enduring years of campaigning and many months of primary elections, the Christian-conservative-religious right chose to give just 0.2% of the popular vote and 1 Republican Convention delegate to the openly Christian and traditional religious right message of U.S. Representative Michele Bachmann (MN). Conservatives gave 10% of the popular vote and 154 delegates to the pro liberty and Constitutionally limited government message of Congressman Ron Paul (TX). But though confronted with strongly God honoring and Constitution upholding candidates, the Christian-conservative-religious right which identifies with the Republican Party and serves as its base of support, chose to give 52% of the popular vote and 1,489 delegates to Mitt Romney, a Wall Street insider and establishment front man who presided over making Massachusetts the first state to adopt homosexual marriage; a man with a “D-” rating on Second Amendment gun rights and a flip-flopping stand on abortion; a man, who as best as I can tell, did not represent one tenet of traditional conservatism.

The big story of the 2012 elections is not the defeat of the conservative right by the liberal left, but the departure of the Christian-conservative-religious right from the values that it once espoused and which it sadly still thinks that it represents.

Remember, we’re not talking here about liberals beating conservatives in the general election. We’re talking about who the Christian-conservative-religious right chose for itself in the primary election.

One might argue that the primary election results were the work of the Republican Party leadership which in every case backed the more liberal, neo-con, establishment candidate, contending that “this is the candidate that can beat the Democrat in the general election.” Of course in nearly every case those candidates lost in the general election and Christian-conservative-religious right voters compromised their values in vain. However, most voters are not that politically plugged in and I doubt that the majority even knew which candidates the Republican Party leadership were promoting.

So how do I explain this wholesale departure from Biblical values, Constitutional principles and the traditional tenets of conservatism by the very people, movements and organizations that claim to be the guardians of those values? It’s not logical and I contend that it’s not even natural. There is a supernatural factor involved when an entire segment of society that espouses a clear and identifiable ideology, in mass turns and runs in the opposite direction of their professed values.

When I saw the primary election results, it struck me that it was really a form of just judgment. Not a judgment of vengeance, but of what is just – spiritual justice. If you’re not committed to loving truth above all, then you’ll end up believing a lie. If you’re not devoted to righteousness at all costs, then you’ll end up falling for unrighteousness. And if you’re not “trusting in the Lord with all your might,” then you’ll begin to trust in other things – things like political power and the clout of man-made political parties and institutions. And once you learn to trust in political power to save you, you’ll do whatever you’re told you have to do to get your hands on it.

This departure from the traditional Christian worldview, Biblical values, Constitutional principles and the governing philosophies of our nation’s founders did not happen overnight. This is part of a process that has been at work for a generation or more.

In Part 2 of this message, we will look at the process whereby this departure has taken place.

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Ichabod – The Real Message of the 2012 Election, can be purchased as a paperback book at lulu.com (click here for direct link).

“Moreover thou shalt provide out of all the people able men, such as fear God, men of truth, hating covetousness; and place such over them, to be rulers of thousands, and rulers of hundreds, rulers of fifties, and rulers of tens:”

We have a bad habit of glossing over things that we’ve heard before and just saying “yeah, yeah, I’ve heard that before, it’s in the Bible” and moving on to the next topic without pondering the depth of the meaning and its application in our lives. So let’s take a closer look at each of the four criteria contained in that verse and get a clearer picture of exactly what kind of civil leaders God is instructing us to choose.

Able Men

This is more than just someone with a degree behind their name, or someone who has climbed the political ladder, has experience in government and “knows the system.” It’s more than just having made some money, knowing how to smile for the camera and being called “electable.” A man can have all that and still be called a fool in God’s book.

This is talking about selecting leaders who have proven themselves in making right, wise and honorable decisions in life that have tended toward success and who have produced the kind of fruit in their own life and house that we should want in our corporate house of a community, state or the nation. We can see this same principle at work in 1 Tim 3:4-5 with regard to the selection of leaders within the church. What a man produces by being the head over his marriage, family, business or whatever other affairs of life he has had responsibility in, is the same fruit that he will produce if we make him the head over our corporate household.

This is someone who, if need be, you would entrust your business affairs to, or give guardianship over your children knowing that they would raise them to be Godly, respectable and successful members of society like themselves. In reality, this is exactly what we do every time we cast our ballot, we turn over a portion of the authority to govern our own life, household, business and that of our neighbor as well, to someone who hopefully will be “able” in governing our affairs in a manner that will tend toward our corporate success.

Such as Fear God

Fearing God is not to be confused with mere church attendance or someone saying of a candidate “I hear they’re a Christian,” or some equally inane idea that the church in America appears to have substituted for “The Fear of The LORD.”

According to Vine’s Complete Expository Dictionary of Old Testament Words, the word translated “fear” (Hebrew – yare’) means “standing in awe….reverence, whereby an individual recognizes the power and position of the individual revered and renders him proper respect. In this sense, the word may imply submission to a proper ethical relationship to God.”

So a person who “fears God” would stand in awe of his Creator, recognizing His position of authority as the God of Heaven and Earth – the sovereign to whom both men and nations owe their allegiance.

Like America’s founders, a civil leader who posses, and is possessed by, the fear of God, would understand that God is the sovereign; that all civil law must comport with His revealed will; that any law that does not comply with the law of the sovereign is no law at all. A candidate for public office who does not demonstrate nor articulate this understanding, either lacks the fear of God or has grown forgetful that the sovereignty of the Creator extends to His creation and have had their understanding so darkened as to believe the satanic lie that the laws of the Creator have no place in governing his creation.

Men of Truth

Truth is much more than the absence of a lie. The Hebrew word translated “truth” in this passage carries the ideas of firmness, faithfulness, sureness, stability, continuance and reliableness. Adam Clark’s commentary on this passage describes men of truth as “Honest and true in their own hearts and lives; speaking the truth, and judging according to the truth.”

This has much more to do with character, integrity and honor than it does with simply making factual statements. This is what a previous generation referred to as “a man or his word” and sometimes described such a man by saying “his word is his bond.” This is a man whose word and a handshake are a much greater surety than any legal contract executed by a dozen lawyers. This is the man spoken of in Psalm 15:4 that “sweareth to his own hurt, and changeth not.”

A man of truth is a statesman who represents himself to be exactly what he is and who, while in office, does exactly what he said he would do. In this, I can have more respect for a lot of liberals who represent themselves to be the liberals that they are than what I can for many who run as conservatives, then once elected, raise taxes, increase the national debt and bailout Wall Street.

Hating Covetousness

Some translations render this as hating “unjust gain.” Now we all know that covetousness, greed, avarice, lusting for money, position or power is wrong, but notice, this verse is not merely saying that civil leaders ought not have covetousness in themselves, it says they are to “Hate” it both in themselves and others.

We obviously ought not give our vote to greedy grabbers who are just looking to climb the political ladder. However, this passage would actually instruct us not to give our vote to anyone who tolerates covetousness in those around them or who has anything less than utter contempt for every manner of exploitative unjust gain.

I am by no means talking about implementing so called “social justice” where government tries to “make” everyone equal. I’m talking about Godly justice where government “treats” everyone equal and protects the weak from exploitation by the rich, the powerful, the mega corporations and the Wall Street banksters. Believe it or not, the Bible actually has a lot to say about justice. We would do well to read it sometime.

The U.S. Constitution

Now I realize that the U.S. Constitution isn’t actually mentioned in the passage that we’re studying, or anywhere in the Bible for that matter. However, those who we elect to public office will swear an oath to uphold the Constitution – the supreme law of our land. So how can one be called a “man of truth” if he does not fulfill his oath by strictly adhering to the highest law of the land?

To be a man of truth and exercise true fidelity to our nation’s founding documents (Declaration of Independence, Constitution, Bill of Rights), a person is going to have to comprehend the actual meaning of the documents and the original intent of their framers. To do this, they are going to have to study the documents themselves, then study those who drafted and/or signed them, then study the philosophies and principles upon which those documents were established. Only after this will a person be capable of implementing the actual intent of the documents and of administering Constitutional governance and protecting the God given rights to life, liberty and property as America’s founders intended.

While the qualities described in Exodus 18:21 are more spiritual in nature and are matters of character that can be harder to assess, especially without personal acquaintance with the candidate, adherence to the principles of the U.S. Constitution can be easier to detect. It will require that we, the Christian voter, study our nation’s Constitution and be acquainted with the founding principles. However, it shouldn’t take long before you find yourself able to detect statements, actions, votes in Congress and policies proposed by candidates that conflict with the clear text of the document or the rights to life, liberty and property.

Choose the Blessing

Choosing to be blessed is as simple as obeying God and walking in His ways.

• ….Blessed is the man that feareth the LORD, that delighteth greatly in his commandments. (Psalm 112:1)
• Blessed is every one that feareth the LORD; that walketh in his ways. (Plasm 128:1)
• Blessed is the man that walketh not in the counsel of the ungodly….But his delight is in the law of the LORD. (Psalm 1:1-2)

This isn’t about earning blessing by being good enough. This is about keeping ourselves in the safe place, the blessed place that God has provided for us, by following all of His instructions – instructions that have been given for our benefit to lead us and guide us to the place where the blessing is.

God wants America blessed – He wants all the nations of the earth to be blessed. He has given us plain and simple instructions as to what kind of civil leaders to select in order to be blessed. So why would we be so foolish as to depart from His loving counsels designed for our protection and venture outside of the safe place, outside of the blessed place?

Let’s choose to bless ourselves and our land by choosing God’s way – the blessed way.

Now this may be a new and possibly shocking idea to some, the thought that both Democrat and Republican administered government has been giving us substantially the same policies and that their demonization of each other is effectively a ruse, but let me ask this – in the last quarter century, how much has really changed? Since 1988 we have had a Republican President paired with a Democrat Congress (1988-1992), a Democrat President and a Democrat Congress (1992-1994), a Democrat President and a Republican Congress (1994-2000), a Republican President and a Republican Congress (2000-2006), a Republican President and a Democrat Congress (2006-2008), a Democrat President and a Democrat Congress (2008-2010), and a Democrat President paired with a Democrat Senate and Republican controlled House (2010-2012). We have tried every possible configuration of political power, from all Democrat control, to giving the reins of government fully to the Republicans. But again I ask, in all that time and through all those changes of the guard, what exactly has changed? The only noticeable change that I have observed is the national debt – it keeps going up – every time. Everything else remains pretty much the same.

What do I mean when I say everything remains pretty much the same? I mean that undeclared wars continue from one administration to the next; government grows ever bigger, never smaller; extra Constitutional and downright un-Constitutional agencies, policies and programs continue and even expand without regard for which party might currently be in power; executive orders continue from one administration to the next and are only added to, never rescinded, despite how evil the incoming administration says the outgoing one was; more and more “entangling foreign alliances” are entered into by each administration since George H.W. Bush first introduced us to the “New World Order;” the borders remain breached; jobs are outsourced; real income, when adjusted for inflation, has steadily decreased since the 1970s; God’s laws are replaced with the rationales of secular humanism; socialism increases; freedom decreases; the Constitution, along with the intent of its framers, is ignored; government spending increases; debt increases; and the un-Constitutional Federal Reserve plunders the nation through debt, inflation and the unending creation of more fiat currency. Show me a Congress or a President in the last quarter century that even significantly slowed the onslaught of these things, much less turned the tide back toward liberty, limited government or fiscal sanity.

Nevertheless, the demonization of one party, personality or faction by another continues as our favorite commentators or talk hosts assure us that we are in eminent peril and that only the elephants can save us from the donkeys, or vice versa. How many times have I heard people say “I fear that if Obama is reelected, the country will not survive another four years.” I’m sure the liberal left was saying the same thing when Bush was in office and of course the conservatives were similarly horrified by Bill Clinton before that.

So what’s up with all this demonization when it’s plain to see that whichever of the two establishment parties is in power, they keep heading the train down the same track? And it’s not just happening at the federal level. I have friends who have served in state legislatures who acknowledge that the same things are happening at the state level. Democrats have been thrown out to give power to Republicans, yet the state’s policies continue heading down the track to socialism.

I acknowledge that the real issue here is a spiritual one and the root of it lies in the spiritual condition of “we the people,” and I don’t mean “them the liberals,” I mean “us the church.” But that’s a subject for another time.

My friend’s recent Facebook comments reminded me of a speech I once heard Howard Phillips give in which he referred to the “Bogeyman” factor. It’s really nothing new. Parents have used the threat of a bogeyman to frighten disobedient children into compliance for centuries, if not millenniums.

However, today’s adults are far too intellectual to be frightened by some fictional character. No, we need something more tangible to frighten us. Thus the demonization of one establishment party, or its candidate, by the other in an attempt to frighten the party’s base of support into compliance so they will toe the party line and give their money and their vote to whomever they are told can save them from the bogeyman.

You see, sometimes political parties become so abusive of their base of support that the people begin to threaten to leave the plantation. Their supporters start to talk about returning to the Constitution, or supporting a grassroots candidate who has not been certified and approved by the establishment, or worse yet, they start talking about a “third party.” When that happens, what’s the establishment to do? How can they keep their supporters in line? Thus enters the bogeyman, that specter of terror and fright calculated to bring the people back to the only party deemed able to save them from the object of their fears.

As I said in the beginning, Obama isn’t that much different from Bush. He is continuing the same wars as Bush, the same deficit spending (albeit at a somewhat increased pace, but only with the cooperation of a Republican controlled House), the same socialization of medicine (Bush had the prescription drug plan, Obama has Obamacare and Romney wants Romneycare), the same bailing out of “too big to fail” banks and corporations, the same subversion of national sovereignty and immersion into the institutions of the new world order, and the same implementation of the modern “Homeland Security” police state that taps our phones without a warrant and seizes control of our airports demanding to see what’s in granny’s underpants. Nothing has changed, it’s only progressed from one level to the next, from one administration to the next. It’s like one administration opens the door and the next walks through it.

Though Barack Obama is indeed a threat to our freedom and a menace to our Constitutional form of government, he isn’t the only villain in the story of the assault being waged on our beloved republic. Obama is just the current bogeyman being used by the Republican branch of the governing duopoly to scare conservatives into voting for the chosen and anointed “R” candidate that we’re told can save us from the evil and dreaded “D.” Never mind the fact that the “Rs” continue all of the socialist, new world order, big government policies and deficit spending habits of the “Ds,” we can’t address those things right now because first we have to “save ourselves from the bogeyman.”

Before Obama, the Republican Party looked to Nancy Pelosi to fill the role of bogeyman. The party faithful had started to go off reservation, attending Tea Parties, threatening to throw out the RINOS, or maybe even start a third party. But within a year or two, the Republican Party and its operatives had convinced conservatives that they needed to come back to the Republican plantation and invest their political capital in the only party that could save them from the big bad Pelosi monster and the band of ghoulish Democrats that had taken control of Congress. And so the Republican Party was returned to power in the House of Representatives in 2010. That would be the same Republican controlled House of Representatives that provides all of the deficit spending that Obama is being demonized for, as the Constitution requires that all spending bills originate in the House.

When we were ramping up to the 2008 Presidential election cycle, Hillary Clinton was initially cast, and very effectively so I might add, in the starring role of that year’s production of “Bogey-girl Runs for President.” Hillary was so frightening to conservatives that they were lining up to support any “R” that anyone suggested might be able to beat her long before anyone had a clue who the nominees might actually be. And before that there was the Al Gore incarnation of the boogieman back in 2000, and ….

Roseanne Roseannadanna was right when she said “it just goes to show you, it’s always something – if it ain’t one thing, it’s another.” No matter how “not-conservative” the current Republican running for any given office happens to be, there’s always some reason why we have to vote for them anyway lest some greater evil befall us. If it isn’t Obama that frightens us, it’s Harry Reid. If it isn’t Harry Reid it’s … There’s always someone or something to fear – something that the Republican operatives and talk radio hosts tell us only the Republican Party can save us from, though it never really does.

There’s always some reason or another why this just isn’t a good year for Christians, conservatives or Constitutionists to take a stand for principle and support a non establishment candidate or third party that actually represents their values. Maybe next time, but this time we have to save ourselves from the bogeyman.

And so we keep throwing one party out and putting the other in and the more things change the more they stay the same as nothing of substance ever really changes. There’s always a reason to be frightened back into supporting a party that isn’t really going to change anything and there’s always a bogeyman out there that can be used to do the job.

Yes, fear really is a great motivator and an effective tool for bringing people into bondage. As the author of all fear, Satan has learned to use it well and appears to be giving lessons to the establishment party powers that be.

The fear of man bringeth a snare: but whoso putteth his trust in the LORD shall be safe.

Proverbs 29:25

Today I received the daily blog email of a Christian organization telling about the great Christian-conservative leaders who are touting this year’s platform as the “Best GOP Platform Yet.” After reviewing some of the key platform components, the article concludes by asking the question, “how can any biblical Christian vote for Barack Obama?”

Now most who are paying attention realize that rejecting Mitt Romney does not require that anyone vote for Barack Obama as there are plenty of alternatives out there. In most states there will be half a dozen or more Presidential candidates on the ballot representing enough political flavors to satisfy most any palate.

So my question is not “how can any biblical Christian vote for Barack Obama” as that is a red herring question founded on a flawed premise. My question is “why should anyone care what’s in the new Republican Platform seeing as they never follow it anyway?”

For all practical purposes, once the Republican convention is over, the platform is ‘dead and buried.’ I can’t remember the last time anyone so much as referred to the Republican platform once the convention was over, much less followed it.

The Republicans have had plenty of opportunities to act on their platform – from George Bush the First becoming President in 1988, to the Republican Revolution of 1994 when they took control of Congress, to George Bush the Second and a Republican Congress holding all the reins of power for six years, to the current Republican controlled house which holds the purse strings and has it in their power to end all deficit spending and cut off every unconstitutional program and agency. To be honest, I can’t remember one time when Republicans have implemented one element of their own platform – perhaps in a state legislature somewhere sometime long ago and far away, but not at the federal level.

Nevertheless, once every four years some of the oldest died in the wool Republican diehard conservatives announce what a wonderful platform the Republican Party has just adopted, why ‘it may be the best one yet.’ This proclamation is usually followed by Christians and conservatives everywhere jumping for joy and declaring victory over all the forces of evil, as though America has been saved and freedom restored. Then they immediately line up and vote for an establishment picked Presidential nominee who hasn’t read the platform, doesn’t care what’s in it and will never follow it.

And do you suppose it will be any different this year? Already these same Christians and conservatives who ask how any biblical Christian could vote for Obama are lining up in lockstep to vote for a nominee who constitutes little more than ‘Obama lite’ – a globalist, socialist, pro-homosexual, with no intentions of securing the borders, balancing the budget, abolishing the department of education, auditing the Federal Reserve or implementing any of the other tenets of traditional conservatism. A candidate with a “D-” rating on gun rights; a candidate who implemented the socialized medicine program that Obamacare is patterned after; a candidate who supports TARP (Wall Street bailouts); a candidate who will continue the subversion of our national sovereignty and our amalgamation into Republican George HW Bush’s ‘New World Order.’

The only real purpose that the Republican Party platform serves is that of a public relations tool designed to keep gullible Christians and conservatives pacified as the establishment throws them a bone every four years, then goes off and does whatever it wants knowing it will be able to enjoy the full support of the religious right so long as they are reminded from time to time that, “we let you have a conservative platform, we’re the good guys, we have an “R” after our name, so keep supporting us.”

The chief cornerstone of freedom that I am talking about is the ability to choose those who will govern us and to have our voices heard in the public arena of political debate. While none of our God given rights should ever be compromised, some can, from time to time, be infringed upon without losing freedom as a whole. We may not approve of an encroachment in a particular area – a new rule or regulation, a new tax, the licensing of a liberty, etc, but so long as free and open elections still exist, the people have a voice and can even place onto the ballot and elect to office representatives of “we the people” who can right the wrong. However, once a people begin to lose access to the ballot, and thereby their voice in the public forum, then freedom in its entirety is in peril.

We do still have elections in America and for the most part they are open to “we the people.” However, access to the ballot is not as free and easy as you might think and even the access that exists is under attack by some. For freedom to flourish, the people, the common man, every man, must be afforded equal opportunity to enter the public forum, have their name placed on the ballot and have their views and concerns heard in the political arena.

Those watching the political game from the bleachers may not realize it, but getting a candidate on the ballot is not always easy. Ballot access laws vary from state to state. Depending on the state and the office being sought, requirements can range from paying a simple filing fee to having to collect tens of thousands of petition signatures. One thing is quite consistent in most of the states and that is the existence of a tiered structure that segregates citizens into different classes such as major parties, minor parties or independents, then applies different ballot access requirements to each. It appears that in the spirit of “equality before the law,” those who make the laws (Democrats and Republicans) have determined by their infinite wisdom that the best way to make sure that all the citizens are treated equally is to require that those who reject the established powers of the “major parties” and choose to identify with another group, party or individual, are assigned second class status and given extra hoops to jump through before they can appear on the ballot and enjoy being treated equally.

While this practice has not eliminated the ability of those outside the “major party” establishment to appear on the ballot and have their opinions heard, it has greatly hindered those who dissent from the views of the dominant political powers from entering the public forum. While this practice cannot exactly be labeled as dictatorial or totalitarian, it certainly does favor the creation of an oligarchy that has over the years gathered to itself ever increasing power.

However, it appears that simply having the playing field tilted in their favor is no longer enough to satisfy the lust of some who love power as they have now begun to resort to lawsuits in an attempt to remove competitors from the ballot.

It’s funny, but as those who lust for power get more and more of it, they grow increasingly fearful of losing their position of power, so they resort to ever more oppressive tactics in an attempt to get even more power in the hope that it will enable them to retain the power that they have. I have personally witnessed this very phenomenon in individuals who lie, cheat and seek to control others on a personal level.

It can be seen in the pages of history as well. King Saul, knowing that he had disobeyed God and had been rejected from being king over Israel, busied himself with attempts to kill David thinking he could thwart God’s plan for replacing him by killing the man that God had anointed to take his place. Dictators and tyrants throughout history, Joseph Stalin being a good example, have kept themselves busy falsely accusing and executing individuals or even wiping out whole districts or segments of the population for fear that someone might be plotting against them and they might lose their grip on power. It shouldn’t be surprising though as Satan himself, the ultimate and original power monger, is growing, and will grow, ever more wild and frantic in his attempts to hold on to power over men as he sees his inevitable demise approaching at the end of this age and the power that he lusted for slipping through his fingers. Actually, tyrants and oppressors are merely reflecting the nature of Satan, the one who taught them to trust in and lust for power in the first place.

In similar fashion, some in America who trust in political might and who are unwilling to share even the crumbs of it that fall from their table, are now engaging in overt attacks on the right of “we the people” to access the ballot and take part in the political debate. They are challenging the ballot access efforts of some third party candidates in an attempt to have them blocked or thrown off the ballot despite their having cleared monumental hurdles in acquiring the necessary number of ballot access petitions. One third party official personally admitted to me that this year’s attacks against the party’s ballot access efforts are unprecedented in the party’s 25 year history.

In Virginia, the Board of Elections has asked the state’s Attorney General to “investigate” the petitions being submitted by the Constitution Party to have its Presidential candidate, former Congressman Virgil Goode, placed on the ballot. Interestingly, the challenge coincides with the first time in the party’s history that it has had a Presidential candidate shown to be polling at 9% and deemed to have a probability of affecting the outcome of the election in that state. A longtime Democrat strategist was quoted in a Washington Times article as saying, “You’d have to be on the Mars rover not to know that Republicans don’t want Goode on the ballot.”

The Constitution Party of Virginia has issued a statement requesting that the Virginia Attorney General investigating the matter, also look into whether state election officials were influenced by or working with political operatives.

In Pennsylvania, the Republican Party has directly challenged the ballot petitions submitted by both the Constitution and Libertarian parties despite the fact that both parties submitted far more signatures than required by the already onerous ballot access laws of that state. An Associated Press article titled, Republicans Work to get Third-Party Hopefuls off State Ballot, points out that “analysts say Republicans are probably worried that conservatives dissatisfied with their presidential candidate, Mitt Romney, will defect to Constitution or Libertarian party candidates.” That assessment is validated by the fact that the Republican Party chose to challenge only the two parties most likely to snatch up conservatives who are repulsed by the idea of voting for Romney, but no similar challenge was issued to any of the left leaning third parties.

In a thinly veiled attempt to justify the action, a Republican spokeswoman offers the absurd claim that they are concerned that Democrats are behind the petitions. Oh yes, those pesky Democrats are always going around putting pro-liberty, pro-Second Amendment, pro-life and pro-Constitutionallylimited government candidates on the ballot.

To add an intimidation factor, the Constitution and Libertarian parties are under threat of having to pay the Republican Party’s court costs should the Republican Party succeed in denying these parties access to the ballot. The Republican Party has employed three law firms and is represented by five attorneys, putting Constitution and Libertarian party folk, whose chief assets consist of the shirt on their back, at risk of having to pay perhaps as much as $100,000.

In California, the newly implemented “top two” primary election system has effectively hamstrung the ability of any new parties to get on the ballot. The measure that implemented the top two primary was backed by business interests, health insurance corporations and “liberal Republican millionaires, like Charlie Munger Jr.” in the words of one article. Interestingly, the ACLU of Southern California is now going to bat for disenfranchised voters and third parties, suing the California Secretary of State on behalf of the Justice Party and the Constitution Party of California, which seek to have their nominees for President included on the November ballot.

On a brighter note, a victory for this most fundamental of freedoms has been won in Tennessee, but not without a fight. In 2010 a federal judge struck down the state’s ballot access law as unconstitutional. So what was the response from the Tennessee General Assembly? Pass a new law that still puts minor party and independent candidates at a disadvantage. In the wake of a suite against the new law by the Constitution and Green parties, a court has declared the state’s new ballot access law to also be unjustly oppressive of “we the people’s” right to access the public ballot and further deemed the law a violation of freedom of speech.

A Tennessee attorney involved in the case who is a seasoned veteran of both the court room and the political arena, stated that he was “amazed at how hard the state and its AG [attorney general] has fought to keep any dissenting voice from being on the ballot. Not just the CP [Constitution Party] but also the Greens and Libertarians. Not challenging our signatures but appeal of every court decision in our favor as long as possible, filing motions to make the appeal last longer, and objecting to attorney fees etc.”

I am hopeful that the current assault on third party candidates in Virginia and Pennsylvania will be thwarted and that the right of “we the people” to access the ballot will be upheld. However, the fact remains that these and other candidates seeking to bring an alternative voice to the political debate will not be on the ballot in several states where third party and independent candidates have effectively been legislated out of existence. Even when they manage to overcome onerous ballot access requirements, they are still at risk of being sued off the ballot by “major parties” who threaten to huff and puff and blow their house down.

I’ll be the first to admit that we need to be thankful for the level of freedom and access to the ballot that we have in America, but we also need to jealously defend the freedom that we have and work to restore the rights that have been subverted. Just because there is more than one candidate on the ballot, or even more than one party, it doesn’t mean you have truly free elections. Free elections only exist when every citizen and every group of citizens have the same access to the ballot and the same ability to have their voices heard as the dominant political powers of the day.

A chief cornerstone of our freedom, of our republican form of government and of our right to have our voice heard in the political arena, is indeed in peril and the assault is coming from the established political powers who seem unwilling to share access to the public ballot with “we the people.”