Archive for January, 2008
By Alan Caruba
The end of a year, any year, is a good time to give some consideration to the reason we have arrived at a particular state of affairs and whether a new direction is required. This is particularly true at a time when the campaigns to be the party’s choice for the presidency is more drenched in debate of religious issues and assertions, than in domestic and foreign policy issues.
The religious views of President George W. Bush may have gotten us to where we are at this point and our national policies could do with far less of it and a far more dispassionate review of our history. Our greatest need is to literally protect and preserve the republic.
I think I first noticed a problem when Bush used the word “crusade” to describe what the U.S. was doing in the Middle East. A born-again Christian, Bush has worn his faith on his sleeve ever since, during the 2000 campaign, he announced that Jesus was his favorite philosopher.
Americans generally are believers. They are predominantly Christian and they have always expected their president to demonstrate some faith in God. We have historically encountered problems when a president believes he was chosen by God for the position and that his actions are sanctioned by God. It’s one thing to pray for guidance. It is quite another to believe one’s action are divinely authorized and approved.
Woodrow Wilson believed God wanted him to be President and, with considerable irony, was re-elected on the slogan, “He kept us out of the war”. When Germany began to attack American ships providing military and other provisions to England, he put American troops into battle in a strictly European war. The result was a disastrous 1919 Treaty of Versailles that became a roadmap to World War II and some present problems.
The U.S. Senate had the good sense to reject membership in Wilson’s dream of a League of Nations, but following the end of World War II, Franklin D. Roosevelt’s legacy was the United Nations, an international institution that ignores genocides, embraces intolerance, and is seeking to foist a totally bogus “global warming” crisis on the world.
By Warner Todd Huston
On December 22nd a 69 year-old pro-life activist who was standing atop his automobile and protesting in front of the Hillcrest Abortion Clinic in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania was physically attacked by an abortion supporter and thrown to the ground with enough force to knock him unconscious. Doctors even worried for a time that the elderly man might perish from the attack. And here, nearly 7 days out from this attack, there aren’t any accounts of the attack in the MSM. As I searched for the story myself, I found two and only two Internet hits for it. Why the silence from the MSM? Can you imagine the MSM swarm that would have occurred if it had been a pro-lifer that attacked an abortion supporter? The cacophony would have been deafening if a pro-lifer had been the one to get violent.
The American Society for the Defense of Tradition, Family and Property issued the first story to hit the net a few days ago. Also, a Catholic PRWire and media advisory from Catholic Online was released on the 28th. But the MSM has remained silent on the matter.
Here is the account from the TFP:
When Mr. Snell tried to counsel the woman, his words were cut short when the man became furious, jumped the fence and, in the words of Mr. McTernan, "leaped on the vehicle with Ed and catapulted him off of the vehicle and onto the ground." Mr. Snell hit his back and head on the pavement and was knocked unconscious.
His medical report outlines the extent of his injuries: "multiple trauma, right subarachnoid hemorrhage (bleeding in the area between the brain and the tissues that cover the brain), compression fractures of four vertebrae (T3, T4, T5 and T10), right scapula fracture and fracture of the fourth and fifth ribs." Before doctors were able to stop the bleeding in his head, they even feared Mr. Snell would die.
An elderly man almost dies from an attack by an abortion supporter and the MSM is mum.