Jeremiah Wright Follows in the Footsteps of Marxist Leaders

When you read about "liberation theology," you swiftly discover that it has deep roots in Marxist thought. When you read about liberation theology, you quickly see that the "redistribution of wealth" is a central pillar of the movement. And, when you read about "black liberation theology," you find out that the typical class distinction between the proletariat and the bourgeoisie is extended to include the race distinction between the blacks and the whites.

The problem with Marxism from the outset has always been that the beatific portrait of a classless society - with the evil bourgeoisie purged from its ranks - has in actual reality never amounted to more than a sick joke. When we looked at how Stalin and his Communist Party hierarchy lived in relation to the poor, simple proletariat in the U.S.S.R., or whether we looked at how Mao Tse Tung and his Communist party hierarchy lived in relation to the poor, simple proletariat in the People's Republic of China, we saw the same rampant, arrogant, hypocritical corruption and oppression.

And - of course - the oppressor class of rich, wealthy bourgeoisie was immediately replaced by an oppressor class of rich, wealthy Marxists who swiftly employed levels of brutality and control that dwarfed the wildest imaginings of any political system that had come before. In the name of "the people," a State system whose leaders lived unimaginably more luxurious lives than those in whose names they ruled engaged in campaigns of disinformation and brutal terror to keep "the people" under their abject dominion.

It didn't matter where you turned - Kim Jung Il's North Korea or Fidel Castro's Cuba - it was invariably the same thing. Marxism had a perfect track record. The leaders of Marxism preached an idyllic "Absurdity of Hope"-style message promising "change" as the policies of the redistribution of wealth took root throughout the society. But all the while, they were in fact hoarding that wealth for themselves even as they demonized economic and political systems that were in fact far superior to Marxism in producing and providing economic benefit for the poor.

So now we turn to Jeremiah Wright, who has been an advocate of black liberation theology throughout his 35 year-plus tenure at Trinity United Church of Christ. For all those years, he railed against white greed, and the oppressive white society that oppressed the poor class of blacks and usurped its wealth for themselves. He implemented a black value system that included a "Disavowal of the Pursuit of Middleclassness."

And now - just like Joseph Stalin, just like Mao Tse Tung, just like Pol Pot, just like Fidel Castro, just like Kim Jung Il and his father before him, just like so many other Marxists leaders - Jeremiah Wright gets to enjoy his moment when he lavishly lives just like the people he spent his life demonizing.

The Reverend Jeremiah Wright is retiring to a 10,000 square foot, $1.6 million home on the fairway of high-class Tinley Park, courtesy of his loving flock. And the same loving flock has provided him with a $10 million line of church credit to live on.
http://www.slate.com/id/2188414/

The gated country club community, by the way, consists an elite population consisting of 98% lilly white rich people.

Now, I am perfectly willing to admit that I may be the only human being on the face of the planet who thinks he sees massive hypocrisy here. But somehow I just don't interpret "Disavowal of the Pursuit of Middleclassness" to mean, "Bypass middleclassness altogether and go straight for filthy rich."

Jeremiah Wright spent his career screaming for a massive redistribution of wealth. And he got one: from all the families of the mostly poor black congregation to his own wealthy estate on a nearly all white country club. He railed for black separatism under a black value system. But it appears that his black value system simply doesn't suit him any more.

Had Reverend Wright NOT embraced black liberation theology, there would have been nothing wrong with his retiring to such wealth. But when you become the very thing you rail against and urge others to abandon, you become the very definition of "hypocrite."

This doesn't in any way directly condemn Senator Barack Obama, of course, other than to point out just how flawed his judgment truly was in aligning himself with a man like Jeremiah Wright, and to raise the legitimate question as to whether Obama's own "Audacity of Hope" message is as hypocritical and self-serving as the man who was the source of that message turned out to be.

Obama's Democratic Debate Goofs

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Democratic Debate: Promising Armageddon

As a conservative, I obviously found difficulties in a number of issues and statements raised in the Democratic debate last night (April 16). But the candidates response to the issue of the war in Iraq - particularly framed as it was against the even greater issues of a looming nuclear Iran and the threat of a nuclear arms race in the most violent, terrifying, and paranoid region in the world - was downright disturbing.

As I listened to the Democratic candidates, I had a dizzying moment of “deja vu all over again” as I recalled the historic lessons of the disasterous liberal failures that enabled World War II. And I could not help but remember the biblical narratives prohecying that total future apocalypse commonly known as “armageddon.”

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/04/16/us/politics/16text-debate.html?pagewanted=13.

MANDY GARBER of Pittsburgh asked the following question: “So, the real question is, I mean, do the candidates have a real plan to get us out of Iraq or is it just real campaign propaganda? And you know, it’s really unclear. They keep saying we want to bring the troops back, but considering what’s happening on the ground, how is that going to happen?“

CHARLES GIBSON followed up: “Let me just add a little bit to that question, because your communications director in your campaign, Howard Wolfson on a conference call recently was asked, “Is Senator Clinton going to stick to her announced plan of bringing one or two brigades out of Iraq every month whatever the realities on the ground?” And Wolfson said, “I’m giving you a one-word answer so we can be clear about it, the answer is yes.”

So if the military commanders in Iraq came to you on day one and said this kind of withdrawal would destabilize Iraq, it would set back all of the gains that we have made, no matter what, you’re going to order those troops to come home?“

SENATOR CLINTON replied: “Yes, I am, Charlie. And here’s why: You know, thankfully we have a system in our country of civilian control of the military. And our professional military are the best in the world. They give their best advice and then they execute the policies of the president. I have watched this president as he has continued to change the rationale and move the goalposts when it comes to Iraq.

And I am convinced that it is in America’s best interest, it is in the best interest of our military, and I even believe it is in the best interest of Iraq, that upon taking office, I will ask the secretary of Defense and the Joint Chiefs of Staff and my security advisers to immediately put together for me a plan so that I can begin to withdraw within 60 days. I will make it very clear that we will do so in a responsible and careful manner, because obviously, withdrawing troops and equipment is dangerous.

I will also make it clear to the Iraqis that they no longer have a blank check from the president of the United States, because I believe that it will be only through our commitment to withdraw that the Iraqis will begin to do what they have failed to do for all of these years.

I will also begin an intensive diplomatic effort, both within the region and internationally, to begin to try to get other countries to understand the stakes that we all face when it comes to the future of Iraq.

But I have been convinced and very clear that I will begin to withdraw troops within 60 days. And we’ve had other instances in our history where some military commanders have been very publicly opposed to what a president was proposing to do.

But I think it’s important that this decision be made, and I intend to make it.”

CHARLES GIBSON addressed Senator Obama with the same question: “And Senator Obama, your campaign manager, David Plouffe, said, when he is — this is talking about you — when he is elected president, we will be out of Iraq in 16 months at the most; there should be no confusion about that.

So you’d give the same rock-hard pledge, that no matter what the military commanders said, you would give the order: Bring them home.“

SENATOR OBAMA: “Because the commander in chief sets the mission, Charlie. That’s not the role of the generals. And one of the things that’s been interesting about the president’s approach lately has been to say, well, I’m just taking cues from General Petraeus.

Well, the president sets the mission. The general and our troops carry out that mission. And unfortunately we have had a bad mission, set by our civilian leadership, which our military has performed brilliantly. But it is time for us to set a strategy that is going to make the American people safer.

Now, I will always listen to our commanders on the ground with respect to tactics. Once I’ve given them a new mission, that we are going to proceed deliberately in an orderly fashion out of Iraq and we are going to have our combat troops out, we will not have permanent bases there, once I’ve provided that mission, if they come to me and want to adjust tactics, then I will certainly take their recommendations into consideration; but ultimately the buck stops with me as the commander in chief.

And what I have to look at is not just the situation in Iraq, but the fact that we continue to see al Qaeda getting stronger in Afghanistan and in Pakistan, we continue to see anti-American sentiment fanned all cross the Middle East, we are overstretched in a way — we do not have a strategic reserve at this point. If there was another crisis that was taking place, we would not have a brigade that we could send to deal with that crisis that isn’t already scheduled to be deployed in Iraq. That is not sustainable. That’s not smart national security policy, and it’s going to change when I’m president.”

GEORGE STEPHANOPOULOS then turned attention to the issue of Iran and the threat it represented to the region: “Senator Obama, let’s stay in the region. Iran continues to pursue a nuclear option. Those weapons, if they got them, would probably pose the greatest threat to Israel. During the Cold War, it was the United States policy to extend deterrence to our NATO allies. An attack on Great Britain would be treated as if it were an attack on the United States. Should it be U.S. policy now to treat an Iranian attack on Israel as if it were an attack on the United States?“

SENATOR OBAMA responded: Well, our first step should be to keep nuclear weapons out of the hands of the Iranians, and that has to be one of our top priorities. And I will make it one of our top priorities when I’m president of the United States.

I have said I will do whatever is required to prevent the Iranians from obtaining nuclear weapons. I believe that that includes direct talks with the Iranians where we are laying out very clearly for them, here are the issues that we find unacceptable, not only development of nuclear weapons but also funding terrorist organizations like Hamas and Hezbollah, as well as their anti-Israel rhetoric and threats towards Israel. I believe that we can offer them carrots and sticks, but we’ve got to directly engage and make absolutely clear to them what our posture is.

Now, my belief is that they should also know that I will take no options off the table when it comes to preventing them from using nuclear weapons or obtaining nuclear weapons, and that would include any threats directed at Israel or any of our allies in the region.”

GEORGE STEPHANOPOULOS: “So you would extend our deterrent to Israel?“

SENATOR OBAMA: “As I’ve said before, I think it is very important that Iran understands that an attack on Israel is an attack on our strongest ally in the region, one that we — one whose security we consider paramount, and that — that would be an act of aggression that we — that I would — that I would consider an attack that is unacceptable, and the United States would take appropriate action.”

GEORGE STEPHANOPOULOS: “Senator Clinton, would you?“

SENATOR CLINTON: “Well, in fact, George, I think that we should be looking to create an umbrella of deterrence that goes much further than just Israel. Of course I would make it clear to the Iranians that an attack on Israel would incur massive retaliation from the United States, but I would do the same with other countries in the region.

You know, we are at a very dangerous point with Iran. The Bush policy has failed. Iran has not been deterred. They continue to try to not only obtain the fissile material for nuclear weapons but they are intent upon and using their efforts to intimidate the region and to have their way when it comes to the support of terrorism in Lebanon and elsewhere.

And I think that this is an opportunity, with skillful diplomacy, for the United States to go to the region and enlist the region in a security agreement vis-a-vis Iran. It would give us three tools we don’t now have.

Number one, we’ve got to begin diplomatic engagement with Iran, and we want the region and the world to understand how serious we are about it. And I would begin those discussions at a low level. I certainly would not meet with Ahmadinejad, because even again today he made light of 9/11 and said he’s not even sure it happened and that people actually died. He’s not someone who would have an opportunity to meet with me in the White House. But I would have a diplomatic process that would engage him.

And secondly, we’ve got to deter other countries from feeling that they have to acquire nuclear weapons. You can’t go to the Saudis or the Kuwaitis or UAE and others who have a legitimate concern about Iran and say: Well, don’t acquire these weapons to defend yourself unless you’re also willing to say we will provide a deterrent backup and we will let the Iranians know that, yes, an attack on Israel would trigger massive retaliation, but so would an attack on those countries that are willing to go under this security umbrella and forswear their own nuclear ambitions.”

Now, I am glad that both candidates want to prevent Iran from developing nuclear weapons, want to prevent the spread of nuclear weapons in the region, and want to promise to protect our allies in the region. I believe these are all very good things.

But I want to focus attention on the fact that withdrawing from Iraq will actually have the very opposite effects from these goals, and will virtually guarantee that none of these goals would be attainable. If the United States abandons Iraq, it will put us on a trajectory toward disaster.

In an earlier article, I attempted to draw some of the parallels between our abandonment of Vietnam between 1973 and 1975, with what would almost certainly happen were we to similarly abandon Iraq. In short, the United States pulled its forces out due to domestic protest after it had painstakingly attained a stable military situation. The 1968 Tet offensive had been a military disaster for the Communist North, and the Viet Cong guerrillas had been annihilated in the American counteroffensive. But the domestic protests, and the scandal that undermined the Nixon presidency, forced the United States to negotiate with the North. Nixon claimed a “Peace with honor,” but the Democratic-controlled Congress refused to honor the American commitment to South Vietnam. Military aid ceased; funds were cut off. And when North Vietnamese tanks rolled on Saigon, the Republic of South Vietnam had nothing to stop them with. A bloodbath of massive proportions followed that spread from Vietnam to Cambodia to Laos. Three million died after the war, and untold numbers of refugee “boat people” perished at sea.

American prestige was terribly undermined as our enemies realized we truly could be defeated, and our allies realized that we would not necessarily keep our promises. The United States soon withdrew its commitments elsewhere, including its backing of the Shah of Iran, who had been the closest American ally in the region. To this very day, our enemies believe that the United States can not stand a prolonged war with casualties, and that we will withdraw - “cut and run” - from our allies and our interests if they can pile up enough bodies.

I think about these things. And I greatly mourn that we may very well be in the process of repeating our same mistakes in nearly exactly the same manner. Only this time the stakes are much, much higher, and the disaster that will surely follow will be much, much worse.

As a student of history, I remember the abject failure of the Western allies to grasp the growing threat of their enemies throughout the 1930s. I remember the refusal of the liberal governments of the Allied powers to comprehend what are now known to have been fundamental realities of naked aggression and looming war. British Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain abandoned his country’s commitment to Czechoslovakia with a promise from Hitler of peace. The liberal, “anti-war” Chamberlain returned home saying, “I believe it is peace in our time!” Chamberlain saw Britain’s policy as a willingness to compromise and a desire for peace. But Hitler saw only weakness, hesitation, and cowardice, and became emboldened for total war. Again and again, the West had had an opportunity to demonstrate its genuine resolve to Hitler, and again and again the West had failed to stand.

In our present day, the Democratic Party has demonstrated a shocking degree of treachery in regard to Iraq. It is their war as much as it is Republicans’ war - because it should be America’s war.

In his 1998 State of the Union Address before the United States Congress, President Clinton told the world, “I say to Saddam Hussein: You cannot deny the will of the world. You have used weapons of mass destruction before. We are determined to deny you the capacity to use them again.” A week later, President Clinton said, “I will say again, one way or the other, we are determined to deny Iraq the capacity to develop weapons of mass destruction and the missiles to deliver them. That is our bottom line.”

On 31 October 1998, President Clinton signed the Iraq Liberation Act into law, saying, “It should be the policy of the United States to seek to remove the regime headed by Saddam Hussein from power in Iraq and to promote the emergence of a democratic government to replace the regime.”

After the horror of the 9/11 attacks, the full horror of Islamic terrorists murderous intent was nakedly revealed to a shocked United States. Military and civilian national security authorities alike immediately realized that the attacks would have been far, far worse if the terrorists had been able to obtain WMD capability. And they knew that major terrorist organizations such as al Qaeda were determined to obtain WMD.

President Bush confronted Saddam Hussein over his country’s weapons program, but the Iraqi dictator refused to give the United States a clear picture of his capability. The United States Senate voted 77-23 to authorize President Bush to attack Iraq in 2002; the United States House of Representatives approved the resolution, 296-133. The vote wasn’t even close. The resolution actually passed by wider margins than the 1991 resolution that had empowered President George H.W. Bush to go to war to expel Iraq from Kuwait. That 1991 measure passed 250-183 in the House and 52-47 in the Senate. Furthermore, a clear majority of Democrats in the Senate supported the October 2002 war resolution: 29 Democratic Senators voted “aye” and only 21 “nay.”

On 17 March 2003, Senator Hillary Clinton said on the eve of war, “Tonight, the President gave Saddam Hussein one last chance to avoid war, and the world hopes that Saddam Hussein will finally hear this ultimatum, understand the severity of those words, and act accordingly. While we wish there were more international support for the effort to disarm Saddam Hussein, at this critical juncture it is important for all of us to come together in support of our troops and pray that, if war does occur, this mission is accomplished swiftly and decisively with minimum loss of life and civilian casualties.“

Speaking at the Council on Foreign Relations in New York on 15 December 2003 after celebrating the capture of Saddam Hussein, she declared, “I was one who supported giving President Bush the authority, if necessary, to use force against Saddam Hussein. I believe that that was the right vote” and was one that “I stand by.” The speech she gave that evening is noteworthy given the abject treachery she would come to show in repudiating everything she said that evening.
http://www.cfr.org/publication/6600/remarks_by_senator_hillary_rodham_clinton_transcript.html

Democrats can’t just walk away from a commitment to a war that this nation elected to undertake, can they? But that is exactly what they did. To paraphrase the famous John Kerry flip flop of his failed 2004 presidential campaign, “I voted for that war before I voted against it.” We were at war, but the Democrats turned and ran on Republicans the moment the fighting got fierce. And for simple political opportunism they have spent the five years since talking about Republican war-mongering rather than their own moral cowardice.

UPI reported on story titled, “Negative U.S. media linked to increased insurgent attacks.” The article begins: “Researchers at Harvard say that publicly voiced doubts about the U.S. occupation of Iraq have a measurable “emboldenment effect” on insurgents there. ‘We find that in periods immediately after a spike in anti-resolve statements, the level of insurgent attacks increases,’ says the study, published earlier this month by the National Bureau of Economic Research, a leading U.S. nonprofit economic research organization.”
http://www.washingtontimes.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20080324/FOREIGN/259963993/1003

Can anyone believe that when major Democrats say things such as, “The war is lost” (Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid) that this doesn’t embolden our enemies to stay in the fight?

Somehow, both Democratic presidential candidates as well as the very nearly the entire Democratic political apparatus believes that they have absolutely no responsibility for the war, or to the people of Iraq. They believe they can simply blame it all on Bush and the Republicans and count on an ignorant and increasingly amoral America to go along with their revision of history.

But when they abandon the commitment to Iraq that better and more honorable Americans made to that country, they will be undermining the future of America.

Democrats will be mouthing the mantra, “I believe it is peace in our time!” Even as they set the stage for total Armageddon. Iran - just as Nazi Germany - will see what the Democrats view as high-minded liberal foreign policy as weakness, hesitation, and cowardice. And the next Democratic president will either see that Armageddon arise during his/her own administration, or else he or she will set it up for the next presidential administration just as Jimmy Carter set up the modern state of Iran by betraying the Shah and enabling the Ayatollahs to take over in his stead.

Both Senator Clinton and Senator Obama agreed that we must not allow Iran to develop nuclear weapons. But how will the Democrats - who now universally and roundly condemn President Bush’s decision to attack Iraq without total proof of WMD when he had used WMD repeatedly on his enemies - arrive at the threshhold of certainty? The fact is, we can never be certain what is going on iside a totalitarian state such as Iran (or Iraq). Further, when the Democrats have spent the last five years proclaiming that the war in Iraq was a mistake, how are they now going to be able to say with a straight face, “And we’re willing to make the same mistake with you” to Iran?

Iran will know that 1) all they have to do is continue to develop their nukes in some degree of murkiness, because Democrats can’t go in unless they are ABSOLUTELY CERTAIN Iran has such weapons. So we won’t ever be able to go in there under a Democratic administration. And 2) Iran will know that even if Democrats DID go in (Which they won’t!), they wouldn’t stay the course if the fighting got tough (which it most certainly would). All Iran has to do is keep piling up bodies - even if its just the bodies of their own - and Democrats will turn and run. It is what they do. More than anything else in our generation, cutting and running defines the Democratic Party.

Clinton and Obama also let it be known that Sunni countries like Saudi Arabia and Egypt will trust them when they pledge to defend them from Iran, making their own nuclear programs unneccessary. The problem of a nuclear Iran goes beyond a nuclear Iran: it creates an imbalance of power that will force Sunni nations such as Saudi Arabia, Turkey, and Egypt to develop their own nuclear programs to balance the Shiite Iranians. Think of a nuclear arms race going on in the most radical, terrifying, murderous, and paranoid region in the world. And Sunnis - who we know DON’T get along real well with Shiites, will trust the United States to stick by them through thick and thin? Yeah, right; the Democrats who have spent five years vowing to cut and run from staying in Iraq will now stand by their word to help you, Saudi Arabia and Egypt? (”But we really mean it this time!”).

Allow me to guarantee you that a Democratic administration will see a nuclear Iran. Given their policy on Iraq, it becomes an implicit campaign promise. And it will see a nuclearized Middle East. Democrats have spent forty years proving that they are cowards who will not stand by their allies, and their actions will come home to roost.

A Republican president can say to the Iranians, “We went in to Iran when we thought they might attack us, Iran. And I promise that will do the same to you if you continue your weapons program.” And no one can question that. A Republican president can say to Saudi Arabia, Turkey, and Egypt, “We stayed with Iraq and defended them even when it was difficult, and we’ll do the same for you.” and no one can question that.

Bill Maher vs. Pope Benedict: And the Winner is...

The too-often unfunny comedian Bill Maher’s comments about the pope deserve all the outrage and contempt that the self-righteous media could possibly dump on the man. But it is very unlikly that he will receive more than the most mild criticism.

You think of Don Imus getting dumped over his “nappy headed hoes” comment; you think of the media universe literally coming unglued over Senator George Allen’s use of a single word - “macaca” which I still have never actually heard defined. (Media narrative: “We don’t know what it means, but it just sounds racist to us, coming as it did from a Republican and all.”). Actor Isaiah Washington was fired from his role on Grey’s Anatomy over an anti-gay slur. But when Bill Maher viciously rips the pope and a billion-plus Catholics again and again, the media doesn’t seem to see any problems. It’s a matter of one of their own targeting one of their targets.

Christians - and Catholics, especially - are fair game. I guess when every other group has special protections, somebody has to remain on the “fair game” list. Every propaganda machine needs a villian, after all.

I’d like to say a few things about Bill Maher. But first let’s let the man speak for himself:

According to Newsmax:

“The comments were made on HBO’s “Real Time with Bill Maher” on Friday, Apr. 11. Maher went into a long monologue on his program comparing the Catholic church to a polygamous cult — the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints — which was raided on Apr. 3 and whose founder, Warren Jeffs, was convicted last year for being an accessory to the rape of a teenage girl. Bill Maher compared the Texas scandal and its latest alleged abuse with the sexual abuse scandal that rocked the Catholic Church in the United States in 2002. http://www.newsmax.com/insidecover/Pope_bill_maher_/2008/04/15/88028.html

These are a few of Maher’s remarks:

“I’d like to tip off law enforcement to an even larger child-abusing religious cult,” Maher told his audience. “Its leader also has a compound, and this guy not only operates outside the bounds of the law, but he used to be a Nazi and he wears funny hats. That’s right, the Pope is coming to America this week and, ladies, he’s single.”

And again:

“If you have a few hundred followers, and you let some of them molest children, they call you a cult leader. If you have a billion, they call you ‘Pope.’ It’s like, if you can’t pay your mortgage, you’re a deadbeat. But if you can’t pay a million mortgages, you’re Bear Stearns and we bail you out. And that is who the Catholic Church is: the Bear Stearns of organized pedophilia — too big, too fat.”

First of all the man is a documented liar. Pope Benedict XVI - like ALL German youth of the time - was conscripted against his will into a German youth organization, from which he fled as soon as he could. He was not a Nazi. He was never a Nazi. If anyone is a Nazi, it is Bill Maher for using Joseph Goebbels-like propaganda tactics to maliciously brand an innocent man with the most despicable charge.

Bill Maher clearly doesn’t mind telling vicious, hateful lies. So it isn’t surprising that he would also talk about the Catholic Church in this manner. I did a little reading on the subject, and discovered that one of the most reliable sources available - the February 2004 research study conducted by the John Jay College of Criminal Justice - found that 81% of the so-called abuse cases involved teen-age boys and up. Stephen Rubino, a lawyer who has represented over 300 alleged victims of priest abuse, estimated 85 percent of the victims have been teen-age boys. And Catholic psychiatrist Dr. Richard Fitzgibbons, who has treated many victims and offending priests, agrees with that figure, noting that 90 percent of his patients are either abused teen-age males or their priest abusers. These were cases of evil abuse against young men who were taken advantage of by certain priests in the worst way, but they were NOT cases of “child molestation” and/or pedophilia. Rather, these cases were the result of a massive homosexual sub-culture within the Catholic Church taking advantage of their positions and the unequal-power-relationships they initiated to have homosexual intercourse with teens and young men.

It turns out that genuine cases of pedophila are MUCH more likely to occur in the public schools than in the Catholic Church. And that the culture of cover-ups, transfers, and

other protective schemes to conceal abusive teachers are likewise FAR more likely to occur in the public school system than in the Catholic Church - especially today. Public school abuses - including both the cases of sexual abuse by teachers and the covering up of such abuses by the administrators and unions - ought to be far more shocking and disturbing, because parents are forced to send their children to public schools whereas they are not so required to send their children to priests. Why doesn’t Bill Maher charicterize public school teachers as pedophiles? If you hate religion, don’t let facts get in the way of a good propaganda campaign. The Catholic League has documented the points I made at: http://www.catholicleague.org/research/abuse_in_social_context.htm

Second, Bill Maher is a bigot.

That’s what he’d call him if he singled out ANY other group of people for such hateful remarks. If I go on a comedic rant about blacks, or Muslims, or gays, or most anyone else, and I’m sure going to hear that label applied to me. And from no less a personage than Bill Maher, to boot.

As a counterexample to Maher, I, along with the overwhelming majority of genuine Christians, would never use rhetoric like Maher’s to describe or ridicule homosexuals in spite of our beliefs about the nature of their lifestyles. We recognize that they are human beings who deserve compassion. So are the one billion Catholics that Maher calls deranged cultists.

Third, Bill Maher is a coward.

I’m sure in his little “yuk-it-up” elitist social gatherings, Maher is routinely praised for his “courage” in “taking on” the Catholic Church, Christianity, and organized religion. But this atheist wouldn’t dare attack and insult and lie about Islam the way he so cavalierly does about Catholicism and Christianity. why not? Because they will go after him and kill him, that’s why. And he won’t go after Jews or Judaism (or rabbis, who have about the same rate of sex-abuse as Catholic priests, by the way) the way he goes after Catholics and Christians, because that really would be “politically incorrect” (the title of his former show), and organizations such as the Anti-Defamation League would rightly make him pay.

Fourth, Bill Mayer is a bully.

Instead of taking on people and organizations that would go after him or undermine his popularity, Maher takes advantage of the fact that Christians believe in turning the other cheek. He takes advantage of their goodness, graciousness, and self-restraint to attack them and hurt them. He takes advantage of the fact that his core audience - which is as vile, as bitter, and as mean as he is - are the type of people who wouldn’t at all mind seeing Christians killed by the tens of thousands in the Coliseum just as they were in the Roman days. He’s no different than the ringleader of a group of thugs in a school yard who single out a particular kid for torment.

Fifth, Bill Maher is a hypocrite.

I mentioned that the overwhelming majority of Catholic priests’ sexual abuse cases were homosexual in nature rather than cases of pedophilia. Let me take a moment to document the homosexual subculture within the Catholic Church before I relate this to Bill Maher. I quote one paragraph from the Ontario Consultants on Religious Tolerance (source: http://www.religioustolerance.org/hom_rcc1.htm). I am including the footnotes in order to better document the following statements, and maintain the numbering of the footnotes as they are found in the article:

* Father Donald Cozzens wrote that several studies have concluded that about 50% of priests and seminarians are gay. 5
* David France of Newsweek, referring to St. John’s Seminary in Camarillo, CA, wrote:
“Depending on whom you ask, gay and bisexual men make up anywhere from 30 percent to 70 percent of the student body at the college and graduate levels.” 3
* Rt. Rev. Helmut Hefner, rector of St. Johns Seminary “accepts that his gay enrollment may be as high as 50 percent.” 3
* Gay journalist Rex Wockner commented: “When I was in the Catholic seminary in my early 20s (St. Meinrad College, St. Meinrad, Ind., 1982-1983; University of St. Mary of the Lake, Mundelein, Ill., 1983-1984), at least 50 percent of the students were gay….At St. Mary of the Lake, the straight students felt like a minority and felt excluded from some aspects of campus life to such an extent that the administration staged a seminar at which we discussed the problem of the straight students feeling left out of things…” 6
* Author and sociologist James G. Wolfe estimated that 55.1% of seminarians were gay. 7

3 David France, “Gays and the Seminary,” MSNBC, 2002-MAY-20, at: http://www.msnbc.com/
5 “Vatican threatens gay purge of priesthood,” The Data Lounge, 2002-MAR-6, at: http://www.datalounge.com/
6 Rex Wockner, “The end of Catholicism in America,” PlanetOut, at: http://www.planetout.com/
7 James G. Wolf, “Gay Priests,” Harper and Row, 1989, Pages 59-60. Cited in Father Donald Cozzens, “The Changing Face of the Priesthood: A reflection on the priest’s crisis of soul,” Liturgical Press, (2000), Page 99.

One of many supporting articles would be http://www.actupny.org/YELL/catholicpriests.html which begins, “Roman Catholic priests in the United States are dying from AIDS-related illnesses at a rate four times higher than the general population and the cause is often concealed on their death certificates, The Kansas City Star reported in a series of stories that started Sunday.” The article goes on to describe the homosexual subculture within the Catholic Church.

I don’t point out that the maliciously characterized “pedophile priests” have actually been homosexuals in order to attack homosexuals or homosexuality in this context. Most of these homosexual priests - the overwhelming majority of the time - seem to have faithfully practiced their vows of abstinence. The statistics demonstrate that a tiny minority of priests perpetuated all the abuses. Rather, I bring this up in order to reveal what a hypocrite Bill Maher is. This man, who has made so much of these abuse cases within the Catholic Church, is a hard-core liberal activist. Homosexuals are very much one of the groups of people that he and people like him have shielded. One of the main reasons people like Bill Maher have so vindictively attacked Christianity and Catholicism has been because Christians and Catholics have condemned homosexuality. And for Maher to lay at the feet of Catholicism what more deservedly lays at the feet of people whose rights he defends is the basest form of hypocrite.

The Catholic Church could have done a much better job of dealing with the abuse cases by aggressively purging homosexuals from its priesthood - which would have brought the ire of liberals like Bill Maher. Instead, they tolerated this massive homosexual presence within their midst for decades - and Bill Maher attacks the Catholic church for tolerating a group of people that he demand they tolerate!

Thus I conclude my case that Bill Maher - and quite frankly every one who agrees with him - is a lying, bigoted, hypocritical, bullying coward.

The Catholic Church is a flawed organization, without a doubt. But when I look at all the good that Catholics have done in the world, and then look at the fruits of people like Bill Maher, it is not the Catholic Church that looks bad.

Taxes and Stupid: When Less of One Means More of the Other

Gallup Poll conducted a survey between 6-9 April, asking, "Are Americans paying Their fair share in federal taxes, paying too much or pay to little?" Here are the results, with the figure on the right representing "too little":

Middle-income People 4% (pay too little)
Lower-income people 13%
Upper-income people 63%
Corporations 73%

Okay. So that's what a survey of 1,021 adults thought (with a margin of error at +/- 3%).

Democrats ubiquitiously claim that "It's time for wealthy Americans and corporations to pay their fair share!" And - judging by this poll, anyway - it appears that they have won the case in the minds of Americans.

The only problem is that these people are completely wrong.

According to the Congressional Budget Office figures (Historical Effective Federal Tax Rates: 1979-2005, released December 2007) on "Individual Income Taxes," the:

Top 1% Pays 38.8%
Top 20% Pays 86.3%
Top 40% Pays 99.5%
Bottom 60% Pays 0.6%

The actual facts are just the opposite from what we are routinely told, aren't they? Let me put it in capital letters so you can see it better: THE WEALTHIEST 40% OF AMERICANS PAY 99.5% OF THE INCOME TAXES!!! And they're not paying their fair share? The Democrats and the media have won the case in the culture by misrepresenting the truth.

When the Bush tax cuts took effect, it threw a lot of people (in that 60% group) off the tax roles entirely, and created a new lower tax rate (people who'd been paying 15% rate paid a 10% rate, etc).

Corporations pay a 35% federal tax rate. Republican Presidential hopeful John McCain wants to reduce that to 25%. Why? He is trying to make the U.S. more competitive! The world average corporate income tax rate for industrial democracies is 24%. The 35% rate - the 2nd highest corporate tax rate in the world - makes the U.S. less competitive.

Now, the rare few Democrats who aren't entirely stupid point to the payroll taxes as evidence that the rich - in spite of what you've read above - don't pay their fair share. People who earn over $1 million pay 18% of the total federal tax bill; those between $200,000 and $1,000,000 pay 23%; and those between $100,000-$200,000 pay 25% of the total tax. But payroll taxes - which hit middle income people the hardest - are those taxes that pay into Social Security and Medicare. The wealthy are practically banned from these programs (if they use their own retirements funds, they don't qualify - and they certainly don't get more "benefit" than anyone else in these programs).

Conservatives have frequently talked about lowering the payroll taxes - which DO effect the middle class' bottom line - and who screams about it? Democrats! Because they claim (rightly) that it would hurt Social Security and Medicare.

Here's another issue: the United States currently has a 67,000 plus page tax code! Does that sound like the pathway to efficiency to anyone? We have an incredibly non-competitive and inefficient economy because of this idiocy. Democrats have done to our economy what the EPA did to our car engines in the mid-1970s.

What we need to do is to return to the 1986 Bill Bradley - Ronald Reagan Commission compromise that lowered tax rates but removed loopholes. But Democrats in the 22 years that have followed have encouraged unwise behavior by adding tax loopholes (for pet projects such as efficient cars, community colleges, ethanol, etc.). Obviously, Republicans have fed from this trough as well, but let's not be dumb as to who keeps this mindset going.

We need to return to the Bradley-Reagan mindset to eliminate these breaks and return to a competitive and efficient economy. Every time the government hands out another loophole, they are deliberately encouraging an embrace of an inefficiency. It's a way of saying that we (the government bureaucracy) want to turn something that people would not rationally do into a tax break loophole so they will do what they would not do otherwise. That's not the path to a healthy economy. It's the guaranteed path to a dysfunctional, schizophrenic economy.

Democrats and the media outlets rail at the wealthy, and blame "tax breaks that benefit the rich" for virtually every ill facing society. But stop and ask yourself, "Who gave me my job?" Was it a poor guy, or was it a rich guy? Unless you are working on straight commission for one of those guys on the city street corner who wash car windows at traffic signals, you probably got your job from a rich guy. Now, as long as that rich guy is making a sufficient profit, you have your job. But what happens if he isn't making a profit anymore? What happens if you decide to vote for people who will raise his taxes, increase his costs, and lower his profits? Congratulations: you lose your job.

This demagoguery has got to stop. The wealthy create jobs by investing in markets that supply funds, by starting businesses themselves, and by managing their assets wisely. The Democrats - who routinely divide people into groups according to race, gender, and sexual orientation - want to play their Ace card and divide people into economic classes as well. Realize that's already been tried by Karl Marx, and it didn't turn out too well.

Obama's 'Cling to Religion' Remark Reveals Marxist Worldview

What should we make of Barack Obama as we evaluate him as a potential president of the United States?

In a previous article, I explained the profound connection between the "black liberation theology" of the Rev. Jeremiah Wright and the "liberation theology" that emerged from Latin America in the early 1970s. The former is a branch from the tree of the latter, and the roots of liberation theology are Marxist to the core.

When the Marxist Sandinistas wanted to spread revolution to Nicaragua - which was well over 90% Roman Catholic - they realized that they had to enlist the cooperation of the Catholic clergy if they wanted to have any hope of installing a Marxist regime. To this end, a small group of Marxist-Catholic theologians concocted the combination of carefully selected teachings of Jesus with the teachings of Marx as a way of justifying violent revolution to overthrow capitalism and any government that supported it.

These "liberation theologians" saw every biblical criticism of the rich as a mandate to "expropriate from the expropriators" (in Marx's words), and viewed every expression of compassion for the poor as a call for an uprising by proletariat peasants and workers against capitalist oppression. Rather than viewing Marxism through the lens of Christianity, they viewed Christianity through the lens of Marxism. As early as 1972 (the same year Jeremiah Wright came to the Trinity United Church of Christ in Chicago), the Catholic Church (at the 1972 Sucre CELAM conference) was officially repudiating this new theology as heresy.

John Paul II criticized liberation theology at the 1979 Puebla CELAM conference, saying, "this conception of Christ as a political figure, a revolutionary, as the subversive of Nazareth, does not tally with the Church's catechisms." Former Cardinal Ratzinger - now Pope Benedict XVI - strongly opposed certain elements of liberation theology. Through the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, led by Ratzinger, the Vatican twice condemned the liberationist acceptance of Marxism and violence (first in 1984 and again in 1986). http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liberation_theology

Black liberation theology does little more than particularize the Marxist doctrine of class struggle specifically to blacks.

So from the point of view of orthodox Christianity and Roman Catholic teaching, black liberation theology is simply the poisonous fruit from a poisonous tree. Elements of liberation theology are partially true, but as is the case so often, these partial truths amount to complete lies when they are stripped of their context and bundled in a package of Marxist dialectic.

When revelations of the Rev. Jeremiah Wright's racist, anti-American remarks first began to surface, Democratic supporters of Barack Obama claimed that these were just a few comments that were taken out of context. But when one considers black liberation theology, and when one listens to the words of numerous other black liberation theology theologians, this defense quickly becomes untenable.

When Jeremiah Wright talked about "white greed" in his now-famous "Audacity of Hope" message, he was perfectly expounding on black liberation thought. When he claimed that white America deliberately created the AIDS virus as a genocide against blacks, he was accurately exegeting black liberation ideology of class based warfare against the oppressed black class. Or, if expressed negatively, when Wright said that anti-crack cocaine penalties were instituted by racist legislators for the purpose of incarcerating as many blacks as possible, how was that in any way contrary to his central theological beliefs? When he denounced Israel as a Zionist state that imposed "injustice and … racism" on Palestinians, how was this not in perfect accord with his theology? When Wright railed against "AmeriKKKa" in his sermons, just how was that contrary to black liberation thought? And when Wright lectured American society that it deserved 9/11, was this in any way out of bounds with either the teachings of black liberation theologians or the Marxism from which they derived their message?

John Perazzo put it this way: "When we read the writings, public statements, and sermons of Rev. Wright, we quickly notice his unmistakable conviction that America is a nation infested with racism, prejudice, and injustices that make life very difficult for black people. As he declared in one of his sermons: "Racism is how this country was founded and how this country is still run!... We [Americans] believe in white supremacy and black inferiority and believe it more than we believe in God."" http://www.frontpagemag.com/Articles/Read.aspx?GUID=c19d4d91-618e-40d3-a5d9-c07d7a87a5ba

Given Wright's profound hostility for both the U.S. and Israel, is it in any way surprising that he so very publicly embraced and acclaimed the virulently anti-American, anti-Semitic Nation of Islam leader Louis Farrakhan? Jeremiah Wright says, "When Minister Farrakhan speaks, Black America listens."

For his part, the recently retired, recently hidden away from media scrutiny, Rev. Jeremiah Wright himself laid to rest any claim that he really didn't mean what the hateful explosions taken from his sermons seemed to mean. The Reverend came back from the visit to Africa (and demonstrated why Barack Obama probably wishes he'd stay in Africa) and performed a marriage ceremony at Trinity United Church. He could have just conducted a simple wedding ceremony, but he chose not to. He could have acknowledged how wrong and hurtful his words have been, but he chose not to. He could have attempted to claim that what appeared to be such hateful words had been somehow taken out of context, but he chose not to. Rather, at a sacred ceremony celebrating the union of a man and a wife, the same pastor who had similarly joined in matrimony the hands of Barack and Michelle Obama once again used his pulpit as a platform to angrily blast away at those who had exposed his message.

What does any of this have to do with Senator and presidential hopeful Barack Obama? Nothing, if you listen to the spin of Obamasupporters. Senator Obama always managed to be consistently and conveniently absent whenever these statements - and however many like them - rang through Trinity United Church, and, besides, you can't convict Barack Obama with guilt by association. Barack Obama hasn't said anything like this, after all.

Well, not so fast.

It simply stretches credulity to believe that Barack Obama never heard a hateful word come out of Jeremiah Wright's mouth during his twenty years in the church.

In his 1993 memoir "Dreams from My Father," Obama in his own words recalled his first meeting with Wright in 1985 in vivid detail. The pastor warned the young, politically ambitious, up-and-coming community activist that getting involved with Trinity might turn off other black clergy because of the church's radical reputation. In other words, he was warned from the get-go.

John Perazo writes, "American voters ought to have more than a passing interest in the fact that when Barack Obama formally joined TUCC in 1991, he tacitly accepted this same Jeremiah Wright as a spiritual mentor. Moreover, he pledged allegiance to the church's race-conscious "Black Value System" that encourages blacks to patronize black-only businesses, support black leaders, and avoid becoming "entrapped" by the pursuit of a "black middle-classness" whose ideals presumably would erode their sense of African identity and render them "captive" to white culture."

Both the title of Obama's second book, The Audacity of Hope, and the theme for his keynote address at the Democratic National Convention in 2004 came right out of Wright's sermons. "If you want to understand where Barack gets his feeling and rhetoric from," says the Rev. Jim Wallis, a leader of the religious left who knows both men, "just look at Jeremiah Wright."

But none of his core theology? None of his ideas or beliefs? Preposterous.

It is frankly impossible not to see the profound impact Jeremiah Wright has had on Barack Obama. Their relationship - and Wright's influence - goes far deeper than the surface realities that Rev. Wright married Barack and Michelle Obama and baptized their children.

We have already heard Wright's poison come out of the mouth of Michelle Obama. Her expression of her lack of pride in her country throughout her adult life, and her comment that "America is a mean place in 2008," could have come right out of her pastor's mouth. Her feelings are certainly incongruous with her own privileged history as a Harvord University graduate or her high-paying position with a hospital in Chicago, to say the least.

But what about Barack Obama?

A lot of the connections between Jeremiah Wright and Barack Obama are insidiously camoflaged by Obama's polished rhetoric to avoid the overt bitterness and racism of his mentor but essentially preserve Wright's message. For example, in his "Audacity of Hope" message, Jeremiah Wright railed against "white greed." Barack Obama's message is, "The biggest problem facing America is greed." Now, Senator Obama, are you referring to the greed of poor, oppressed blacks, or to the white greed that your pastor talked about in that sermon that inspired your book? Senator?

But now we've got a naked expression of black liberation theology Marxism revealed in all its polished prose.

"You go into some of these small towns in Pennsylvania and, like a lot of small towns in the Midwest, the jobs have been gone now for 25 years and nothing's replaced them. And it's not surprising then they get bitter, they cling to guns, or religion, or antipathy to people who aren't like them, or anti-immigrant sentiment, or anti-trade sentiments as a way to explain their frustrations," Obama said at an April 6 fundraiser in San Francisco.

Hillary Clinton immediately pounced on the "elitism and condescension" of Obama's message (and c'mon, it's just not every day someone with $150 million gets to say stuff like this and mean it!). And, yeah, it sure is those things, being that it is a message explaining to wealthy liberal San Franciscans the uncomprehending stupidity of white working class Pennsylvanians, who can only dully cling to guns and religion the way a frightened child might cling to a teddy bear.
Some analysts picked up on the "bitter" part of the explanation. Others picked up on the "cling" part.

I want to make sure you pick up on the Marxist part.

Karl Marx famously claimed that religion was an opiate of the masses. He was explaining his view that the wealthy bourgeoise cynically used religion as a device to keep the poor, simple proletariat happy in their misery and squalor so they would find it immoral to rise up and overthrow their capitalists oppressors.

Immediatly after the flareup over his remarks, Barack Obama, speaking from Muncie, Indiana on April 12, said, "I said something that everybody knows is true, which is that there are a whole bunch of folks in small towns in Pennsylvania, in towns right here in Indiana, in my hometown in Illinois, who are bitter.

"So I said well you know when you're bitter you turn to what you can count on. So people they vote about guns, or they take comfort from their faith and their family and their community."
Well, I would agree that everyone who views the world through the Marxist perception of liberation theology, dialectic materialism, and religion-as-opiate, might know that it's true. But everyone else should frankly have a lot of problems with Obama's views.

I also noticed that on this second go-around, Senator Obama didn't add his "antipathy to people who aren't like them, or anti-immigrant sentiment, or anti-trade sentiments" remarks to his revised list of "what [working class Pennsylvanians] can count on." Adding those little items to the security provided by religious belief and the right to bear arms somehow just doesn't sound as good, does it?

At the CNN "Compassion Forum" on April 13, Obama explained that "Religion is a bulwark, a foundation, when other things aren't going well." Okay. Just as long as we don't think that religion actually reflects simple reality, or that people are religious because there is a Creator God who cares about us and has a plan for our lives. Thank God (well, er, thank the liberal equivalent of God, anyway) that Barack Obama isn't one of those fundamentalists, right, San Francisco? Otherwise, he might oppose abortion and the homosexual social agenda.

Eventually, the crushing impact of the poll numbers - which now have Senator Hillary Clinton up by 20 points in Pennsylvania - will force Senator Obama to do a better job of distancing himself from his formerly expressed views. Just as with the previous firestorm over the Rev. Wright's hate-speech, the Obama campaign seems to be progressing from a casual dismissal, to a few casual words of dismissive explanation, to a half-hearted apology, and - if all else fails - to a full-blown speech. Only this time, it will be his very own words that are at issue.

Iraq, Vietnam, and the Consequences of Abandonment

Liberals credit themselves with ending the Vietnam War (a war, I must remind you, that was started by Democrats in the first place under John Kennedy, massively expanded by Lyndon Johnson, and ultimately ended by a Richard Nixon - whose "peace with honor" agreement would be subsequently betrayed by the Democratic Congress). Please let me assure you that - when Democrats talk about Vietnam - they do NOT want you to know their historic role in the war or its horific aftermath. A little bit of history is fascinating given the current political war over the war in Iraq.

First of all, it is important to understand why the United States decided to fight in Vietnam in the first place. And the straightforward answer is that we went in with the strategic goal of containing Communist expansion. In 1956, Soviet Premier Nikita Khrushchev struck the tone with his "We Will Bury You" speech. While Khrushchev most likely did not intend a declaration of war between the superpowers, he was clearly stating the U.S.S.R.'s intention to overwhelm Western democracies in a campaign of attrition. Communism was aggressively expanding throughout the world. And the world had changed dramatically in a very short time, as Soviet tanks rolled across Eastern Europe to erect the Iron Curtain, and communist revolutions began to spring up in one third world nation after another. The United States was forced to choose between fighting aggressive communist expansion overseas, or fighting with fewer allies when it arrived upon our doorstep.

Under the Eisenhower administration, military advisors and U.S. assistance were deemed sufficient to check communist expansion. But by 1960, Democratic President John F. Kennedy realized that more assistance would be needed. As the French colonialists began their withdraw from Indochina beginning in 1956, Eisenhower's and then Kennedy's administrations realized that more and more assistance would be needed to prevent one Southeast Asian nation after another from toppling. The United States stepped up its commitment to anti-communists governments in the region througout the term of the Kennedy administration.

The Vietnam War can rightly be seen as one battle in the Cold War. Certainly, it was the largest and costliest of those battles, but it was the nexxus in which the United States attempted to check aggressive communist expansion by violent revolution. Seen in isolation, it was a failure (i.e. we pulled out and left); seen in relation to the overall proxy wars against communism, it was a qualified success. The United States' efforts enabled Burma and Thailand time to build up resistance to communist revloutions. After the fall of Vietnam to communism, Laos and Cambodia toppled as well.

Proof of the truth - and the consequences - of the so-called "Domino Theory" can be seen in the bloody aftermath of the U.S. withdrawel from Southeast Asia beginning in 1973. But as bad as the Indochinese campaign went for the United States, the overall campaign did successfully limit communist expansionism. Ultimately, the United States would win the Cold War, with the collapse of the Berlin Wall and of the Soviet Empire it represented, in 1989.

By all strategic and tactical standards, The 1968 Tet Offensive launched by the Vietnamese communists was a complete disaster for North Vietnam. The dreaded Viet Cong - the local fighters who could attack Americans and then vanish in the jungle to their villages until they decided to strike again - were anhiliated and ceased to exist after Tet. From that point on, the war became conventional - with North Vietnamese Army regulars increasingly having to infiltrate into South Vietnam in order to carry on the war. The war increasingly became "winnable" as it increasingly became more and more conventional in its nature.

However, American liberals - arguing that the American military was lying about the war - pressed hard for a complete withdrawal from Vietnam and from Southeast Asia. Just as today, the Democratic Party increasingly began to support resolutions to end the war. Just as today, The American media played a major role in spreading the idea that America was not only losing the war, but was also routinely committing the most barbaric war atrocities.

Ultimately, the increasingly stridant liberal outcries against the war, combined with the weakening of a scandal-plagued President Nixon, undermined all American efforts to continue to support the war effort. As part of the deal with both North and South Vietnam that provided the pretext of an “honorable withdrawal” of U.S. forces from Vietnam in 1973, the Nixon administration promised the South Vietnamese a continuation of supplies, logistical support, and even air strikes as needed to stop Communist incursions into South Vietnam. The South Vietnamese naïvely believed the pledge of support. But the North Vietnamese, realizing that America had grown weary with the war in Vietnam, quickly broke every one of the few promises they had made. When hostilities resumed, the Democrat controlled Congress refused to fund America's national promise.

The Army of the Republic of Vietnam continued fighting the North for two more years as President Ford pleaded with the Democratic Congress to fund the relief effort. The Democrats sent a denial: in so doing, they were sentencing millions of Vietnamese allied with America to death, prison, or life on the run as refugees.

The footage of the last American helicopter taking off from the embassy compound as thousands of terrorized Vietnamese watched and begged for help epitomized America's abandoment of its commitment and will literally live in infamy.

To better describe the cowardly American betrayal and the holocuast that followed, I cite the final paragraph of DiscoverTheNetworks (at http://www.discoverthenetworks.org/guideDesc.asp?catid=100&type=issue).
"The first act of the newly elected Democrat Congress was a vote to cut off funding for South Vietnam and Cambodia's Lon Nol government in January 1975. After U.S. funding was cut, the regimes of South Vietnam and Cambodia were quickly overrun by the communists, who would go on to slaughter some 2.5 million Indochinese peasants."

That number - shocking as it is - is undoubtedly quite low. Nearly two million human beings in this murderous tally would come from Cambodia and the Killing Fields of Pol Pot in 1975 alone. As for the holocaust that was to befall South Vietnam, John E. Carey - beseeching America not to make the same mistake yet again - writes, "When America left Vietnam in 1975, the communists came south, sweeping away the former South Vietnam, and imprisoning or killing untold numbers of freedom-loving Vietnamese. More than 900,000 South Vietnamese were sent to concentration camps. Millions lost everything: homes, family, jobs and all possessions. A vast migration called the Vietnam Diaspora ensued. Something like three million people left Vietnam, many in small, undependable boats. Many of these “boat people“ succumbed to starvation, the ravages of the sea, or murdering pirates." http://www.nowpublic.com/before_we_select_a_rapid_draw_down_of_u_s_forces_in_iraq_recall_how_many_twisted_in_the_wind_in_1975

The wikipedia article on the Army of the Republic of Vietnam takes up the theme of the historic lesson of precipitous withdrawel and abandonment. "Without the necessary funds and a collapse in South Vietnamese troop and civilian morale, South Vietnam found it impossible to defeat the North Vietnamese army. Moreover, the withdrawal of U.S. aid encouraged North Vietnam to begin an intense military offensive against South Vietnam. This was strengthened by the fact that while Nixon had promised Thieu a "severe retaliation" if the Communists broke the 1973 Paris Peace Accords, the new American administration [i.e. the new Democrat-controlled Congress] did not think itself bound to this promise." http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Army_of_the_Republic_of_Vietnam

Numerous American and international experts have repeatedly pointed out that any precipitous withdrawel from Iraq will undoubtedly result in a brand new bloodbath as violent jihadism takes root and the fragile Shiite-Sunni relationship ruptures into violence. Furthermore, they point out that this abandonment will damage U.S. credibility for years to come - and far more than it did after we abandoned Vietnam in 1975.

William Shawcross - who saw the hell Vietnam descended into after America left - warns against inflicting the same disaster on Iraq in an article available at: http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/world/iraq/article2326682.ece. In the same way that Vietnam was one major battle in an overall war against violent communist totalitarian expansion by armed revolution, Iraq is one major battle in the war against a growing fascistic form of Islam.

Make no mistake: violent Islamic jihadism has been exponentially building for over sixty years, beginning with the rise of the Islamic Brotherhood in Egyptan prisons. The United States was brutally introduced to the building threat of Islamic militarism beginning with the in 1979 Iranian Revolution and subsequent seizing of American hostages taken from the U.S. Embassy in Tehran, and again with the 1983 Bombing of U.S. Marine barracks in Lebanon. Throughout the Clinton Administration, the United States suffered repeated attacks on its own sovereign territory, from the 1st World Trade Center bombing on 26 February 1993, to the simultaneous 8 July 1998 bombings of two American embassies in Africa, to the 12 October 2000 bombing of the U.S.S. Cole. In addition to these attacks, the 3 October 1993 "Blackhawk Down" ambush by Muslim warlord Mohammed Adid's forces - and the humiliating withdrawel - must also be noted.

The 9/11 attacks - as terrible as they were - would have been far more terrible had they been carried out with weapons of mass destruction. Rather than sustaining 3,000 deaths, 30,000, 300,000, or even 3,000,000 Americans could become casualties. Therefore the United States policy became 1) the pursuit of the terrorists who attacked us; and 2) the pursuit of anti-U.S. governments that had the willingness and ability to arm terrorists with WMD.

Iraq, which was known to have had WMD (they used them repeatedly on their own people) also had ties to terror (for example, Saddam Hussein paid $25,000 to the families of suicide bombers; U.S. intelligence found evidence of senior-level links between Iraq and terrorists including al Qaeda; terrorist camps inside Iraq trained thousands of terrorists - including al Qaeda terrorists - under Saddam's rule; and former Clinton administration CIA director James Woolsey believes that Ramsay Yousef - who participated in the first World Trade Center bombing and who entered the United States on a forged Iraqi passport, was an agent of Iraqi intelligence).

Under the Bush doctrine, it was simply unacceptable to allow the possibility of terrorists obtaining WMD. "You are either with us or against us" was a statement that the vague, nebulous policy of indecision would be replaced by an active defense of the United States. And the most likely scenario of terrorists obtaining such weapons was that an anti-American, pro-Islamic nation-state would provide weapons of mass destruction.

President Bush therefore - under the valid authorities of both the ceasefire agreement won by President George H.W. Bush and by the U.N. resolutions - demanded that Iraq totally destroy its WMD program and open itself to inspection that it had done so. Saddam Hussein refused (some have speculated that he did not want to reveal that his country was essentially declawed in the hostile Arab landscape). In any event, without that confirmation, President Bush followed through with his "... or else" and invaded.

There was another motivation to the invasion of Iraq, however. Many believed that if Saddam could be deposed, and a pro-democratic government could be implemented in the heart of the Islamic world, that a powerful alternative to the militant Islamicism that was increasingly dominating the Islamic world could be created. Iraq was as good of a candidate for such an experiment as any: it was officially secular; it had a higher level of education than most other Arab states; and it offered more rights to women than most Arab states.

Thus there was a negative reason to invade as well as a legitimate hope for a positive outcome following an invasion.

Five years and counting after the invasion, it is now widely acknowledged that we went in with too small of a force for the subsequent occupation/counter-insurgency, and that we allowed the social and political structure of Iraq to deteriorate far more than we should have as a result.
Previous failures acknoweledged, it remains the case that the relatively new strategy of the surge has demonstrated that American forces can remain in Iraq with few casualties. We therefore need to ignore Democrats' demands to cut and run - whether on a timetable for "organized" withdrawel or otherwise - and remain a powerful presence in Iraq, or we will be doomed to repeat some very bad history.

It has taken time, blood, and determination, but American forces in Iraq have gradually but steadily won the loyalty and support of increasing numbers of Iraqis, most significantly the sheiks. We won their cooperation by promising that we would not abandon them, that we would stick by them, that we would offer our aid. If we go back on our promises now - and abandom these brave men and women to their deaths - we will lose credibility with potential Arab allies throughout the Islamic world. And it is unlikely that we will ever be able to regain it.
Allow me to end with two historic withdrawels, and the mindset of our enemies who determined to use our lack of resolve against us.

Bui Tin, a member of the North Vietnamese General Staff, was interviewed in Wall Street Journal on Thursday, 3 August 1995. Part of the interview reads as follows:

"Question: How did Hanoi intend to defeat the Americans?
Answer: By fighting a long war which would break their will to help South Vietnam. Ho Chi Minh said, "We don't need to win military victories, we only need to hit them until they give up and get out."

Q: Was the American antiwar movement important to Hanoi's victory?
A: It was essential to our strategy. Support of the war from our rear was completely secure while the American rear was vulnerable. Every day our leadership would listen to world news over the radio at 9 a.m. to follow the growth of the American antiwar movement. Visits to Hanoi by people like Jane Fonda, and former Attorney General Ramsey Clark and ministers gave us confidence that we should hold on in the face of battlefield reverses. We were elated when Jane Fonda, wearing a red Vietnamese dress, said at a press conference that she was ashamed of American actions in the war and that she would struggle along with us.

Q: Did the Politburo pay attention to these visits?
A: Keenly.

Q: Why?
A: Those people represented the conscience of America. The conscience of America was part of its war-making capability, and we were turning that power in our favor. America lost because of its democracy; through dissent and protest it lost the ability to mobilize a will to win." http://www.grunt.com/scuttlebutt/corps-stories/vietnam/north.asp

In his 1996 "Declaration of War Against the Americans," Osama bin Laden cited the U.S. retreat from Somalia in 1993 and went on to say: "You have been disgraced by Allah and you withdrew. The extent of your impotence and weaknesses has become very clear," he said. “When people see a strong horse and a weak horse, by nature they will like the strong horse.”

Osama bin Laden also said, "We have seen in the last decade the decline of American power and the weakness of the American soldier who is ready to wage Cold Wars, but unprepared to fight long wars. This was proven in Beirut in 1983 when the Marines fled after two explosions. It also proves they can run in less than 24 hours, and this was also repeated in Somalia (in 1993)." http://www.jfednepa.org/mark%20silverberg/papertiger.html

Osama bin Laden went on television to say, "This proves the U.S. is a paper tiger."

Leaving Iraq without establishing a free and stable Iraq will prove Osama bin Laden right. All any terrorist entity or rogue nation has to do to prevail over the United States is to kill and keep on killing - their own people along with Americans, if necessary - until we lose the will to continue fighting. It remains up to the collective will of the American people to prove him wrong. Abandoning Iraq simply must not be an option.