I am mad about New Orleans and the Katrina disaster, but perhaps not for the reason you think. In support of that, I present some links below that I consider worthy of a browse. Most of them show an anti-Bush, leftist, black-apologist slant. Others reveal atrocities that the American press largely ignored.
The interview with New Orleans Mayor Ray Nagin is revealing. He works overtime to criticize the president when it is his fault exclusively that the people of New Orleans were neither prepared nor willing to evacuate the city, and they had plenty of advance notice. Nagin just did not take it seriously enough to plan, drill, and prepare effectively. Apparently, neither did the governor.
Frankly, I'm mad about how the mayor and governor honored the trust placed in them by the public. I think they did a bad job and want to blame anybody but themselves and the people in the community. I also think I have identified the trouble.
The Real Problems Revealed by Katrina
There are three key problems in the Hurricane Katrina issue:
1. Lack of adequate preparation and response on the local and state level for handling the emergency.
Hurricanes, even bad ones, are no surprise. The city of New Orleans has or should have an enormous income from tourism. The city officials, including police, are so corrupt and self-aggrandizing that they do not properly manage the money and demographics to keep the city safe. They failed to enforce the evacuation requirement or to demand assistance from the state and federal governments sufficiently BEFORE the hurricane hit, and they had plenty of notice. They also failed to do anything to elevate the city or bolster its levees and dikes, blaming the federal government for that.
2. Bad public policy.
All major coastal cities have the prerogative to enact and enforce zoning and building laws that make housing relatively impervious to hurricanes and floods. The policy has been to allow massive welfare projects (neighborhoods) in the city rather than making the taxes and zoning so restrictive that impoverished welfare recipients people must settle elsewhere, away from the coastal areas.
Instead, officials do everything in their power to mollycoddle them. In the case of New Orleans, as TV clearly showed, 99% of the people who remained in the city during the hurricane are black, and as documented in some of the below links by eye witnesses, many blacks raged not only against other blacks, but specifically against the few feckless whites (principally tourists) that got stuck in the city.
It is unconscionably stupid for a city's officials knowingly to allow its communities to be populated mostly by impoverished or criminal blacks, for those are the people who will loot, rape, rob, and murder once law and order breaks down. Police themselves are guaranteed to become looters, brigands, or deserters, rather than to stand firm to their responsibilities, if the city makes a policy of hiring mostly black police officers, and of relaxing quality requirements in the people they choose, as did New Orleans. New Orleans is known to have one of the most corrupt governments and police departments in America. That is because of bad public policy.
Bad public policy is also the reason the states bordering Mexico are subjecting themselves and the rest of America to an invasion from Mexico of illegal immigrants. All of those states should jack up taxes, hire non-Hispanic state border guards, and implement a plan to shoot anyone crossing the border into the US without going through an authorized entry facility. That would stop the invasion within a week or two. Yes, a few people would die, but those would be Mexicans violating the law, not the innocent Americans who fall victim to illegal Mexican immigrants committing crimes in order to get by.
3. Bad genes.
It is an unfortunate realty, as Steve Sailer has so aptly pointed out here, that the average IQ (75 to 80) of New Orleans blacks is lower that the already low IQ (85) of the blacks of the rest of America - its demographic profile is more like that of Haiti. Why? Becasue stupid people cannot and will not evolve or maintain a superior civilization.
While blacks are not alone in being relatively stupid (plenty of Mexicans fit that category, as do plenty of Caucasians), they are 67% of the population of New Orleans, and 99% of the survivors who remained in the city, and they are therfore 99% responsible for the crimes committed during and after Katrina.
One way to see this is that, as much as black civic and religious leaders like Al Sharpton and Jesse Jackson decry white discrimination against blacks, only truly enlightened blacks like Bill Cosby rise up to denounce blacks for their criminial and derelict behavior. Meanwhile, Sharpton and Jackson are doing and recommending absolutely nothing to elevate the IQ of blacks.
They are also fools for ignoring the fact that IQ is a genetic endowment, and for pretending and posturing that whites are the cause of the problems of blacks. They should get down on their knees and thank Almighty God that whites enslaved and brought to America their ancestors. Otherwise, they'd be suffering with the average IQ of 70 that blacks "enjoy" in Africa.
People who distrust blacks, who try to avoid hiring blacks, who don't want to give undeserved handouts to blacks, and who are against affirmative action on behalf of blacks, do so rightly, for the most part. Stupid people make wrong decisions, regardless of what race they are. Since so many blacks are relatively stupid, in general, blacks cannot compete for good jobs, they will always be relatively impoverished, and they will often resort to crime or welfare abuse in order to have their share of the American dream at the expense of others.
I think the question all Americans, including blacks and Mexicans, should ask is: "Would you really want America to be 100% populated by people of your race?" If the answer is yes, then America is in for a bumpy ride down the slippery slope to civilizational oblivion like that being visited upon Mexico, Central America, and sub-Saharan Africa.
The smartest thing (of course it is too much to expect a "smart" decision) the majority of blacks and Mexicans could do is to have themselves permanently sterilized. America does not need more stupid people.
In the final analysis, stupidity, not wind and flood, is the primary cause of the Katrina disaster.
No Bone to Pick with Race
Ooops! Does it seem like I have a bone to pick with blacks and Mexicans? Perhaps I do. Am I unjustified? Look, this is not a racial issue. It is merely coincidental that the average IQ of blacks is 85 and the average IQ of Mexicans is 87. It is not coincidental that people of various races tend to conglomerate in their own communities and endow those with their cultures. It is therefore not coincidental that black "ghettos" are ghetto-like because the residents are poor, and that many are criminal and/or welfare abusers.
There are plenty of stupid white people too. To me it does not matter what a person's race is. It only matters to me that they are not too stupid to come in out of the rain, or to leave when a category 4 or 5 hurricane is bearing down on them.
Charity - a Legitimate Function of Government?
Regardless of who people are, I don't want to pay for their upkeep during normal times, or pay quintuple that cost for evacuating / rescuing them and supporting them after they fail to come in or evacuate when bad weather hits. I believe charity is not the function of government, but rather of the individual, and there are plenty of charities to whom people can and do give money to help survivors of disasters like Katrina.
But note this: if all those survivors had known in advance that there would be no government help, and if they had been forced to leave or prevented from living in the danger zone to begin with, they would either not have been in harm's way, or they would have shouldered the responsibility of relocating themselves, and not relied on society to do it.
My opinion is that if the rest of America has to pay for the support of someone, then those who pay should be entitled to lay down the rules of support, such as where they shall live, the extent to which they shall enjoy the privileges of liberty, and the conditions under which the support will be given. And all of that should be decided by the responsible people living among or near the recipients of the support, not by the recipients themselves, and not by a government.
However, if government is going to rob from those who have and give to the have-nots, then government rightly should impose stiff requirements on the recipients.
Most of the cost of dealing with the hurricane victims who stayed in the city is going to borne by American taxpayers. Not only are most of them welfare recipients or criminals now, but the welfare cost has just risen enormously.
The Philosophy of Government and Property Rights
Government's job is to prevent injustice, not to feed, clothe, and house the misfortunate, lazy, stupid, indigent, or miscreant. Feeding, clothing, and housing are responsibilities of the individual or the individual's guardians.
In our constitution the Fourth Amendment guarantees the right to be secure in our 'persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures.' That is why the government has no right to evacuate people who want to stay in their homes.
On top of that, individuals are rightly obliged to live with the consequences of their actions, however stupid those actions may be. If they choose to live in an area frequently exposed to raging tornadoes, hurricanes, or earthquakes, and all their stuff gets destroyed or blown away every few years, that's their choice, and people in other parts of the nation should not have to pay the cost. That is why government morally should not evacuate people from their homes who do not want to leave. Exceptions to this include the owner of the dwelling demanding evacuation because of being unable to fulfill contractual obligations to keep the dwelling safe, or evacuating children whose parents are negligently exposing them to harm such as epidemic disease.
The Deserved Fate of New Oleans and its Stupid People
It does not have to be this way, though. What if New Orleans were to have had a law that stipulated anybody on public assistance must move 20 miles north, away from the most dangerous hurricane zone, or pay a residence and care tax of $1000 a month? What if the City were to prohibit the erection of public housing that is government subsidized anywhere within 20 miles of the city center? What if the City were to elevate taxes on real estate so high that no building owners would have to raise rents to a level so high that welfare recipients and other poor people would have to move elsewhere?
Frankly, I think New Orleans levees should be blown and the city should be flooded permanently. The state government should give residents 60 days to evacuate all their remaining belongings, then condemn the area against any and all permanent residency. Mississippi and Alabama should do the same to their coastal areas.
The entire coastline from Galveston to Pensacola should be condemned from permanent housing. If it were, there would be no people to evacuate when a storm comes because people would already live farther inland. If it were my choice, I'd convert it all to national parks that people can camp in and visit, but not live in except temporarily as vacationers.
Links
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Racial Reality and the New Orleans Nightmare
VDare.Com
Gangstas in My Neighborhood
Charles Murray and Racial Inequality
Mexicans Murdering Women
Thousand word picture.
Michigan Swat Squads Lay Down Law in South
Europeans Badmouth America's Rugged Individualism
Katrina Sets Record in State-to-State Help
Editorials, Including Those at Conservative Papers, Rip Bush's Hurricane Response
Why So Few First Responders in New Orleans? They're in Iraq!
"Police" Looting a Wal-Mart
UN Peacekeepers in the U.S.?
Why did help take so long to arrive?
New Orleans Mayor... AUDIO
Email From Doctor In New Orleans Reveals Much Horror
Rapes, killings hit Katrina refugees in New Orleans
Homeland Security won't let Red Cross deliver food
White Genocide in New Orleans!
Angry New Orleans Mayor Says Feds Don't Have A Clue
Bush Rejects French Offer of Medical Aid, Water Filters
InfoWars.Com
Prison Planet
New Orleans rocked by huge blasts
Bush personally scrapped a multi-million dollar program to strengthen the dikes
Don't Give Your Hurricane Donations to the Red Cross
Anarchy!
Help New Orleans; Bush Won't Do It
Airboaters stalled by FEMA
Gallup Refuses To Run Poll Asking Americans If Bush Should Be Impeached
LA National Guard Wants Equipment to Come Back From Iraq
Anger in New Orleans as tens of thousands of people left homeless
A Can't-Do Government
Edgar Steele Audio
UPDATED: TRANSCRIPT of mayor's damning interview by Karen Wehrstein
Fri Sep 2nd, 2005 at 07:46:04 PDT
Did this by myself because I couldn't find it: Transcript of NOLA mayor Ray Nagin's interview with Garland Robinette of WWL Radio. Rushed -- I don't know that I got everything right -- but here it is. It's more striking, what he says, when you read it over (or transcribe it ;-) )
Anyone know a way to get it to him, or to WWL -- let me know -- or just send it!
Thanks to santoriello whose audio I used.
Media audio links:
Via Air America
MSNBC
Update: Added more at the top that wasn't included in the clip I heard, thanks to Black Max. Apparently what we have is only the second half of the interview.
Karen Wehrstein's diary :: ::
Ray Nagin: ... and to give me executive powers, to authorize me to dictate and to manage military resources down here, and I'll fix this for you.
[unintelligible]
You call him right now, and you call the governor, and you tell them to delegate the powers that they have to the mayor of New Orleans and we'll get this damn thing fixed.
[unintelligible]
It's politics, man, and they're playing games and they're spinning, they're out there spinning for the cameras.
Garland Robinette: But can't they just, if nothing else, look at 25 per cent of their energy coming from the state, is not flowing through the pipelines. We're on the verge of anarchy. Can't they understand, if nothing else, they're going to be hurt politically?
RN: I don't know what they're doing. I mean the air conditioning must be good, because I haven't had any in five days. Maybe there's some smoke coming out of the air conditioning unit that's clogging some folks' vision.
GR: Have you talked with the president?
RN: I've talked directly with the president --
GR: What did he say?
RN: -- I've talked to the head of Homeland Security, I've talked to everybody under the sun. I've been out there, man, I flew these helicopters, been in the crowds, talking to people, crying, don't know where their relatives are. I've done it all, man, I tell you man, Garland, I keep hearing that it's coming. This is coming, that is coming, and my answer to that today is: B.S. Where is the beef? Because there's no beef in this city, there is no beef anywhere in southeast Louisiana, and these goddamn ships that are coming, I don't see them.
GR: What did you say to the president of the United States, and what did he say to you?
RN: I basically told him we had an incredible crisis here, and that his flying over in Air Force One does not do it justice. And that I have been all around this city, and I am very frustrated because we are not able to marshall resources, and we're outmanned in just about every respect.
You know the reason why the looters got out of control? Because we had most of our resources saving people, thousands of people, that were stuck in attics, man... old ladies... when you pull off the doggone ventilator vent, and you look down there, and they're standing there in water up to their fricking neck...!
And they don't have a clue what's going on down there. They flew down here one time, two days after the doggone event was over, with TV cameras, AP reporters, all kinds of goddamn -- excuse my French, everybody in America, but I am pissed.
GR: Did you say to the President of the United States, I need the military in here?"
RN: I said I need everything. I will tell you this, I'll give the President some credit on this: he sent one John Wayne dude that can get some stuff done, and his name is [Lieutenant] General [Russel] Honore. And he came off the doggone chopper, and he started cussing and people started moving. And he's getting some stuff done. They ought to give that guy -- if they don't want to give it to me, give him full authority, to get the job done and we can save some people.
GR: What do you need right now to get control of this situation?
RN: I need reinforcements. I need troops, man. I need 500 buses. Man, they were talking about... you know, one of the briefings we had, they were talking about getting public school bus drivers to come down here ... I'm like, you've got to be kidding me! This is a national disaster! Get every doggone Greyhound busline in the country, and get their asses moving to New Orleans. That's them thinking small, man.... this is a major major major deal!
And I can't emphasize this enough, man -- this is crazy! I've got 15,000-20,000 people over at the Convention Centre, it's bursting at the seams. The poor people in Plaquemines parish... they're air-vacc'ing people over here in New Orleans... we don't have anything and we're sharing with our brothers in Plaquemines parish. It's awful down here, man.
GR: Do you believe that the President is seeing this, holding a news conference on it, but can't do anything until [Louisiana Governor] Kathleen Blanco requests him to do it, and do you know whether or not she's made that request?
RN: I have no idea what they're doing, but I'll tell you this. You know, God is looking down on all this... and if they are not doing everything in their power to save people, they are going to pay the price. Because every day that we delay, people are dying... and they're dying by the hundreds, I'm willing to bet you.
We're getting reports and calls that are breaking my heart, from people saying, 'I'm in my attic...I can't take it any more. The water's up to my neck. I don't think I can hold out. And that's happening as we speak.
And you know what really upsets me, Garland. We told everybody the importance of the 17th Street Canal issue. We said, please, please take care of this, we don't care what you do, figure it out.
GR: Who did you say that to?
RN: Everybody -- the governor, Homeland Security, FEMA... you name it, we said it.
They allowed that pumping station, next to Pumping Station 6, to go underwater. Our sewage and waterwork people [unclear] stayed there and endangered their lives. And what happened when that pumping station went down, the water started flowing again in the city, and started getting to levels that probably killed more people.
In addition to that, we had water flowing through the pipes in the city, that's a power station over there. So there's no water flowing on the east bank of Orleans Parish, so critical water supply was destroyed because of lack of action.
GR: Why couldn't they drop the 3,000-pound sandbags or the containers that they were talking about earlier? Was it an engineering feat that couldn't be done?
RN: They said it was some pulleys that they had to manufacture but you know, in a state of emergency, man, you are creative, you figure out ways to get stuff done. Then they told me that they went overnight, they built 17 concrete structures, and they had the pulleys on them and were going to drop them.
I flew over that thing yesterday [Wednesday] and it's in the same shape as it was after the storm hit. There's nothing happening. And they're feeding the public a line of bull. And they're spinning and people are dying down here.
GR: If some of the public called, and they're right, that there's a law that the president, that the federal government, can't do anything without local or state request, would you request martial law?
RN: I've already called for martial law in the city of New Orleans. We did that few days ago.
GR: Did the governor do that, too?
RN: I don't know. I don't think so. We called for martial law when we realized that the looting was getting out of control and we redirected all of our police officers back to patrolling the streets. They were dead tired from saving people. They worked all night because we thought this thing was going to blow wide open last night, and so we redirected all of our resources and we held it under check... I'm not sure we can do that another night, with the current resources.
I'm telling you right now, they're showing all these reports of looting, and doing all that weird stuff, and they are doing that. But people are desperate. They're trying to find food and water. The majority of them.
Now you've got some knuckleheads out there, taking advantage of the lawlessness, this situation where, you know, we can't really control it, and they're doing some awful, awful things. But that's a small [minority] of the people. Most people are looking to try and survive.
Nobody's talked about this: drugs flow in and out of New Orleans and the surrounding metropolitan area so freely it was scary to me. That's what we have an escalation in murders. People don't want to talk about this, but I'm going to talk about it. You have drug addicts that are now walking around this city, looking for a fix. That's the reason why they were breaking into hospitals and drug stores. They're looking for something to take the edge off of their jones, if you will. And right now they don't have anything to take the edge off, and they've finally probably found guns. So what you see is drug-starving, crazy addicts, drug addicts, that are wreaking havoc. And we don't have the manpower to adequately deal with it. We can only target certain sections of the city, and form a perimeter around them, and hope to God that we're not overrun.
GR: You and I must be in the minority, because apparently there's a section of our citizenry out there that thinks because of a law that says the federal government can't come in unless requested by the proper people, that everything that's going on to this point has been done as good as it can possibly be.
RN: Really?
GR: I know you don't feel that way.
RN: Well... did the tsunami victims request? Did they go through a formal process to request? Did Iraq -- did the Iraqi people request that we go in there? Did they ask us to go in there?
What is more important? I tell you, man, I'm probably going to be in a whole bunch of trouble, I'm probably going to be in so much trouble it ain't even funny. You probably won't even want to deal with me after this interview is over.
GR: Well, you and I will be in the funny place together.
RN: But -- we authorized $8 billion to go to Iraq, lickety-quick. After 9/11, we gave the president unprecedented powers -- lickety-quick -- to take care of New York and other places. Now you mean to tell me that a place where most of the oil is coming through... a place that is so unique, when you mention New Orleans anywhere around the world, everybody's eyes light up... you mean to tell me that a place where you probably have thousands of people that have died, and thousands more that are dying every day, that we can't figure out a way to authorize the resources that we need? Come on, man.
You know I'm not one of those drug addicts, I am thinking very clearly. And I don't know whose problem it is. I don't know whether it's the governor's problem, I don't know whether it's the president's problem. But somebody needs to get their ass on a plane, and sit down, the two of them, and figure this out right now."
GR: What can we do here?
RN: Keep talking about it.
GR: Okay, we'll do that What else can we do?
RN: Organize people to write letters, make calls to their congressmen --
GR: Emails...
RN: -- to the president, to the governor. Flood their doggone offices with requests to do something. This is ridiculous.
I don't want to see anybody do any more goddamn press conferences. Put a moratorium on press conferences. Don't do another press conference until the resources are in this city, and they come down to this city, and stand with us, with their military trucks and troops that we can't even count. Don't tell me 40,000 are people coming here, they're not here! It's too goddamn late!
Get off your asses and let's do something. Let's fix the biggest goddamn crisis in the history of this country!
GR: I'll tell you, right now, you're the only politician that's called, and called for arms like this. And whatever it takes, the governor, the president... whatever law precedent it takes, whatever it takes... I bet that the people listening to you are on your side.
RN: Well, I hope so, Garland. I am just... I'm at the point now, where it don't matter. People are dying. They don't have homes. They don't have jobs. The City of New Orleans will never be the same. And it's time.
(Then there's silence. Background studio noise comes up as the microphones self-adjust to pick something up. You hear sniffling... Nagin's in tears. Interviewer too.)
GR: We're both pretty speechless here.
RN: I don't know what to say. I've got to go.
GR: Okay. Keep in touch.
Saturday, September 10, 2005
Wednesday, September 07, 2005
Tax Questions for Congressman Bilirakis
Dear Congressman Michael Bilirakis:
I just ran across this ruling and decided to ask you about it. Note the asterisks I added and the context of the usage of the term "United States."
... [T]he United States** may acquire territory by conquest or by treaty, and may govern it through the exercise of the power of Congress conferred by Section 3 of Article IV of the Constitution .... In exercising this power, Congress is not subject to the same constitutional limitations, as when it is legislating for the United States***. ... And in general the guaranties [sic] of the Constitution, save as they are limitations upon the exercise of executive and legislative power when exerted for or over our insular possessions, extend to them only as Congress, in the exercise of its legislative power over territory belonging to the United States**, has made those guaranties [sic] applicable. [Hooven & Allison Co. v. Evatt, 324 U.S. 652 (1945)]
It is clear to me from this ruling that the term "United States" has at least two meanings. One is the Corporate United States (territories, possessions, enclaves), and the other is the Union of States (the 50 states united under and by the Constitution. The Constitution protects Citizens of the Union of States, but not Corporate United States citizens.
The fact that there are two meanings for United States causes enormous confusion when trying to understand the Internal Revenue Code 26 USC. I have long wondered why Congress would pass laws imposing an income tax that courts have ruled is an excise (indirect) tax, but that in implementation is a direct tax, and therefore unconstitutional. Courts have ruled that the income is not what is being taxed, but rather some activity, and that income is only the means of measuring tax liability, but the tax code actually does tax income. Courts have ruled that the 16th amendment confers no new power of taxation, but the IRS acts like it has the power to take people's money directly, first by taking it from employers (or at the source, such as when you show up to collect your lottery or other gambling winnings), and second, failing that, by taking it right out of your bank account, even without a court order or prior hearing.
Why does the IRS take such liberties when the Constitution prohibits it?
Could it be that when the term "state" is used in the tax code it only refers to the possessions and territories of the USA, and not the 50 states united by the Constitution?
Could it be that when the term "United States" is used in the tax code it only refers to the corporate area of the United States (D.C., territories, possessions, federal enlcaves ceded by states), and not to the 50 states united by the Constitution?
Could it be that the IRS is violating the Constitution because they think I am not under its protection?
Please answer those questions and explain your answers. Please provide some proof.
Now, I have been studying 26 USC in an effort to understand how it is possible that IRS agents can be allowed to take money directly from my income without a court otder or even a hearing. I especially do not understand this in view of the fact that I am not now and, except for breif periods when I was in the Navy, never have been a resident of the Corporate United States (i.e., its territories, possessions, enclaves), and I have never been a citizen of the Corporate United States, but in fact I am a natural born Citizen of the State of Texas and I am now a resident and Citizen of the State of Florida. I am a Citizen of the Union of States but not of the Corporate United States, so why is the IRS messing with me? Could it be that I signed some form at some time in the past, claiming I am a US Citizen, and they interpreted that to mean I was claiming I was a Corporate United States citizen?
I have noticed in my increasingly intense study of 26USC that no statute is supplied that makes me liable for any income tax. Since I am not in the alcohol, tobacco, or firearms manufacturing or importing business, I have not conducted any activity in my entire lifetime that would make me subject to or liable for any income tax for revenue purposes.
As you know from my previous messages to you, I am aware that a direct tax is a tax upon my property, person, or labor, and the Constitution very clearly stipulates that a direct tax must be apportioned among the states and cannot be taken directly from individuals. Since the IRS is very busy stealing my money under the color of law (and is doing the same to most other Americans), and since I have informed the IRS that I am not under the purview of 26USC by virtue of the fact that I have not been doing any taxable activity, they must have some reason for thinking they are right in taking my money. What could that reason be?
Do you think it could be because the protections of the Constitution do not apply to Corporate United States citizens, and the IRS agent dealing with my file thinks I am one of those citizens? If so, will you help me convince them that I am a Citizen of the State of Florida and a natural-born Citizen of the Union of States, but not a citizen of the Corporate United States?
Congressman, either the IRS has a mistaken notion about my citizenship, or they do not understand the constitutional protection I have as a Citizen of the State of Florida, or they are criminals. I believe they are criminals. I do not nave the money to go after them and bring them to justice. The only proper remedy is for YOU to do the job for which you have been hired, and clarify the terminology so there can be no mistaken understanding, either by the courts or by IRS agents: taking taxes directly from American citizens of the Union of States is a criminal violation of the Constitution and an exceeding of authority; using trickery like allowing courts to assume a person is a taxpayer just because they have signed tax forms is fraud; advertising that people ought to pay their taxes as though everyone working for a wage owes a tax on that wage is fraud; intentionally deceiving people into claiming they are United States citizens, knowing they will mean Citizens of the Union of States, but intending to misconstrue that a smeaning a Corporate United States citizen, is criminal fraud.
If you do not agree with my assertions in the above paragraphs, please let me know and tell me why, showing statutory, constitutional, or common law proof. If you do agree, please tell me what you are going to do to make the law clear, hold the IRS accountable for its criminal behavior, and stop their terrifying abuse of Americans.
I have a recommendation. If you are befuddled about this, STUDY and LEARN about it. Hint - you won't get the straight truth from the IRS, nor from the CRS, who just echos Treasury Department propaganda about taxes. You'll have to study outside sources, just as I am doing.
Here's another recommendation. If Congress needs to raise money, do it through the proper avenue for direct taxation, and prohibit the IRS from trying to take money and other property directly from people's paychecks, bank accounts, safety deposit boxes, garages, or houses. Go get the money from the States, or increase tarriffs and excise taxes on foreigners entering America for vacation or residence.
Pease tell me: why aren't you pushing for direct taxation by following the rule of apportionment?
Thanks,
Bob Hurt
I just ran across this ruling and decided to ask you about it. Note the asterisks I added and the context of the usage of the term "United States."
... [T]he United States** may acquire territory by conquest or by treaty, and may govern it through the exercise of the power of Congress conferred by Section 3 of Article IV of the Constitution .... In exercising this power, Congress is not subject to the same constitutional limitations, as when it is legislating for the United States***. ... And in general the guaranties [sic] of the Constitution, save as they are limitations upon the exercise of executive and legislative power when exerted for or over our insular possessions, extend to them only as Congress, in the exercise of its legislative power over territory belonging to the United States**, has made those guaranties [sic] applicable. [Hooven & Allison Co. v. Evatt, 324 U.S. 652 (1945)]
It is clear to me from this ruling that the term "United States" has at least two meanings. One is the Corporate United States (territories, possessions, enclaves), and the other is the Union of States (the 50 states united under and by the Constitution. The Constitution protects Citizens of the Union of States, but not Corporate United States citizens.
The fact that there are two meanings for United States causes enormous confusion when trying to understand the Internal Revenue Code 26 USC. I have long wondered why Congress would pass laws imposing an income tax that courts have ruled is an excise (indirect) tax, but that in implementation is a direct tax, and therefore unconstitutional. Courts have ruled that the income is not what is being taxed, but rather some activity, and that income is only the means of measuring tax liability, but the tax code actually does tax income. Courts have ruled that the 16th amendment confers no new power of taxation, but the IRS acts like it has the power to take people's money directly, first by taking it from employers (or at the source, such as when you show up to collect your lottery or other gambling winnings), and second, failing that, by taking it right out of your bank account, even without a court order or prior hearing.
Why does the IRS take such liberties when the Constitution prohibits it?
Could it be that when the term "state" is used in the tax code it only refers to the possessions and territories of the USA, and not the 50 states united by the Constitution?
Could it be that when the term "United States" is used in the tax code it only refers to the corporate area of the United States (D.C., territories, possessions, federal enlcaves ceded by states), and not to the 50 states united by the Constitution?
Could it be that the IRS is violating the Constitution because they think I am not under its protection?
Please answer those questions and explain your answers. Please provide some proof.
Now, I have been studying 26 USC in an effort to understand how it is possible that IRS agents can be allowed to take money directly from my income without a court otder or even a hearing. I especially do not understand this in view of the fact that I am not now and, except for breif periods when I was in the Navy, never have been a resident of the Corporate United States (i.e., its territories, possessions, enclaves), and I have never been a citizen of the Corporate United States, but in fact I am a natural born Citizen of the State of Texas and I am now a resident and Citizen of the State of Florida. I am a Citizen of the Union of States but not of the Corporate United States, so why is the IRS messing with me? Could it be that I signed some form at some time in the past, claiming I am a US Citizen, and they interpreted that to mean I was claiming I was a Corporate United States citizen?
I have noticed in my increasingly intense study of 26USC that no statute is supplied that makes me liable for any income tax. Since I am not in the alcohol, tobacco, or firearms manufacturing or importing business, I have not conducted any activity in my entire lifetime that would make me subject to or liable for any income tax for revenue purposes.
As you know from my previous messages to you, I am aware that a direct tax is a tax upon my property, person, or labor, and the Constitution very clearly stipulates that a direct tax must be apportioned among the states and cannot be taken directly from individuals. Since the IRS is very busy stealing my money under the color of law (and is doing the same to most other Americans), and since I have informed the IRS that I am not under the purview of 26USC by virtue of the fact that I have not been doing any taxable activity, they must have some reason for thinking they are right in taking my money. What could that reason be?
Do you think it could be because the protections of the Constitution do not apply to Corporate United States citizens, and the IRS agent dealing with my file thinks I am one of those citizens? If so, will you help me convince them that I am a Citizen of the State of Florida and a natural-born Citizen of the Union of States, but not a citizen of the Corporate United States?
Congressman, either the IRS has a mistaken notion about my citizenship, or they do not understand the constitutional protection I have as a Citizen of the State of Florida, or they are criminals. I believe they are criminals. I do not nave the money to go after them and bring them to justice. The only proper remedy is for YOU to do the job for which you have been hired, and clarify the terminology so there can be no mistaken understanding, either by the courts or by IRS agents: taking taxes directly from American citizens of the Union of States is a criminal violation of the Constitution and an exceeding of authority; using trickery like allowing courts to assume a person is a taxpayer just because they have signed tax forms is fraud; advertising that people ought to pay their taxes as though everyone working for a wage owes a tax on that wage is fraud; intentionally deceiving people into claiming they are United States citizens, knowing they will mean Citizens of the Union of States, but intending to misconstrue that a smeaning a Corporate United States citizen, is criminal fraud.
If you do not agree with my assertions in the above paragraphs, please let me know and tell me why, showing statutory, constitutional, or common law proof. If you do agree, please tell me what you are going to do to make the law clear, hold the IRS accountable for its criminal behavior, and stop their terrifying abuse of Americans.
I have a recommendation. If you are befuddled about this, STUDY and LEARN about it. Hint - you won't get the straight truth from the IRS, nor from the CRS, who just echos Treasury Department propaganda about taxes. You'll have to study outside sources, just as I am doing.
Here's another recommendation. If Congress needs to raise money, do it through the proper avenue for direct taxation, and prohibit the IRS from trying to take money and other property directly from people's paychecks, bank accounts, safety deposit boxes, garages, or houses. Go get the money from the States, or increase tarriffs and excise taxes on foreigners entering America for vacation or residence.
Pease tell me: why aren't you pushing for direct taxation by following the rule of apportionment?
Thanks,
Bob Hurt
Wednesday, August 31, 2005
What to Do about Hurricane-Risk Areas
I’ve noticed on TV that hordes of black people struggling to get out of the New Orleans mess left in the wake of Katrina’s devastation. They have no place to go, and no way to get there if they did. Meanwhile, the giant gaps in New Orleans’ protective levees have allowed the lake and river between which the city lies to flood the city.
Since the low average IQ (85) of blacks prevents them from competing for better jobs, I’m not surprised at the fact that the stragglers are mostly black, and that not a few are obese, for they are mostly welfare recipients, residents of projects, and other poor folks. Those who stayed in their homes are dead, dying, being rescued by helicopter, or wading out to nowhere. In the early aftermath of the hurricane, there are few places to go for shelter, food, and water. The domed stadium is the only available shelter, and many are far away from it.
Now I’m hearing reports, also no surprise, that as an exclamation point to the widespread looting by black people, armed black men are robbing fellow stragglers at gunpoint. I guess common looting is too much trouble. Or, maybe they slept late and missed the best loot.
While I’m wondering what can be done to clean up and rebuild the city, I know officials won’t do what really makes the most sense.
1. Conscript all those obese (and other) welfare recipients for clean-up work. It’s about time they did something to earn their keep. They don’t need wages or food stamps. They only need medical care and child care, and meals-for-labor so they can put in a good day’s work. They have no other beneficial use for their time.
2. Shoot any gun-toting marauder on sight.
3. Start a gigantic land fill project and cover New Orleans till the ground is 20 feet above sea level, then rebuild. Actually, it is stupid to build on the constantly changing river silt of the Mississippi delta. New Orleans should be moved 30 miles up-river.
4. Failing that, build a proper sea wall to keep New Orleans from flooding – experts can consult the Dutch on how to do that. An enormous sea wall has been protecting Holland from North Sea flooding quite effectively for years now.
5. Impose large taxes on everybody in risky coastal areas like New Orleans and Biloxi that everybody, especially the poor, must pay, and stockpile that money in interest-earning accounts to cover the cost of defending the city from hurricanes and floods. These taxes should be in the form of property ownership taxes and consumption taxes on everything sold within 30 miles of the coastline, from Destin to Brownsville, and the rate should be based on the history of damage in those areas from hurricanes and other natural disasters. Similar taxes should be applied to the coastal and earthquake zones of California, and the hurricane zones of south Florida.
6. Stop building government-subsidized housing in risky areas like New Orleans. Let society’s freeloaders live elsewhere, like out in the country.
7. Force insurance companies properly to insure high risk dwellings, and force residents and owners to pay the high premiums required, or don't let them build. As the wretched residents of Florida learned in the wake of 1992’s Andrew, insurance companies won’t even insure homes against hurricane damage any more, and many insurance companies won’t sell insurance here at all. Those who do charge exorbitant rates even in low-risk areas, to make up for the relatively low rates they charge in high-risk areas. If insurance companies were fair, they’d charge outrageously high rates for high risk areas, and give reasonable rates to people in low risk areas. That’ll only happen if the government forces it to happen.
The bottom line is that people need to pay for the privilege of living in risky areas of the country that are guaranteed eventually to cost the entire country a lot of money as a result of natural disasters like hurricanes. There’s no reason people living in Dallas, Baton Rouge, Birmingham, or Orlando should have to pay for hurricane damage in Galveston, New Orleans, Mobile, or Miami. Since such damage is both predictable and inevitable, residents of and visitors to high risk areas should pay for repairing the damages before they occur. Home owners should be required to carry insurance, and should pay the necessary premium.
Populations in risky areas would thin out if visitors and residents were made to pay the real cost in advance, whether through higher taxes, higher insurance premiums, or both. Eventually, the cities would be replaced by RV parks and they would contain only the homes of people who can afford it if the homes get washed away. In the case of New Orleans, I’d miss the French Quarter, but it’s just a tourist trap anyway.
As Earl Pitts would say, Wake Up, America! People who cannot afford the cost of living in high-risk areas should live elsewhere.
Since the low average IQ (85) of blacks prevents them from competing for better jobs, I’m not surprised at the fact that the stragglers are mostly black, and that not a few are obese, for they are mostly welfare recipients, residents of projects, and other poor folks. Those who stayed in their homes are dead, dying, being rescued by helicopter, or wading out to nowhere. In the early aftermath of the hurricane, there are few places to go for shelter, food, and water. The domed stadium is the only available shelter, and many are far away from it.
Now I’m hearing reports, also no surprise, that as an exclamation point to the widespread looting by black people, armed black men are robbing fellow stragglers at gunpoint. I guess common looting is too much trouble. Or, maybe they slept late and missed the best loot.
While I’m wondering what can be done to clean up and rebuild the city, I know officials won’t do what really makes the most sense.
1. Conscript all those obese (and other) welfare recipients for clean-up work. It’s about time they did something to earn their keep. They don’t need wages or food stamps. They only need medical care and child care, and meals-for-labor so they can put in a good day’s work. They have no other beneficial use for their time.
2. Shoot any gun-toting marauder on sight.
3. Start a gigantic land fill project and cover New Orleans till the ground is 20 feet above sea level, then rebuild. Actually, it is stupid to build on the constantly changing river silt of the Mississippi delta. New Orleans should be moved 30 miles up-river.
4. Failing that, build a proper sea wall to keep New Orleans from flooding – experts can consult the Dutch on how to do that. An enormous sea wall has been protecting Holland from North Sea flooding quite effectively for years now.
5. Impose large taxes on everybody in risky coastal areas like New Orleans and Biloxi that everybody, especially the poor, must pay, and stockpile that money in interest-earning accounts to cover the cost of defending the city from hurricanes and floods. These taxes should be in the form of property ownership taxes and consumption taxes on everything sold within 30 miles of the coastline, from Destin to Brownsville, and the rate should be based on the history of damage in those areas from hurricanes and other natural disasters. Similar taxes should be applied to the coastal and earthquake zones of California, and the hurricane zones of south Florida.
6. Stop building government-subsidized housing in risky areas like New Orleans. Let society’s freeloaders live elsewhere, like out in the country.
7. Force insurance companies properly to insure high risk dwellings, and force residents and owners to pay the high premiums required, or don't let them build. As the wretched residents of Florida learned in the wake of 1992’s Andrew, insurance companies won’t even insure homes against hurricane damage any more, and many insurance companies won’t sell insurance here at all. Those who do charge exorbitant rates even in low-risk areas, to make up for the relatively low rates they charge in high-risk areas. If insurance companies were fair, they’d charge outrageously high rates for high risk areas, and give reasonable rates to people in low risk areas. That’ll only happen if the government forces it to happen.
The bottom line is that people need to pay for the privilege of living in risky areas of the country that are guaranteed eventually to cost the entire country a lot of money as a result of natural disasters like hurricanes. There’s no reason people living in Dallas, Baton Rouge, Birmingham, or Orlando should have to pay for hurricane damage in Galveston, New Orleans, Mobile, or Miami. Since such damage is both predictable and inevitable, residents of and visitors to high risk areas should pay for repairing the damages before they occur. Home owners should be required to carry insurance, and should pay the necessary premium.
Populations in risky areas would thin out if visitors and residents were made to pay the real cost in advance, whether through higher taxes, higher insurance premiums, or both. Eventually, the cities would be replaced by RV parks and they would contain only the homes of people who can afford it if the homes get washed away. In the case of New Orleans, I’d miss the French Quarter, but it’s just a tourist trap anyway.
As Earl Pitts would say, Wake Up, America! People who cannot afford the cost of living in high-risk areas should live elsewhere.
The Jew/Muslim Final Solution
Ilana Mercer (also forward to Tamar Jacoby, if possible):
I am writing to you about your 14 November 2004 vdare.com article Muslim Immigration Time Bomb (http://www.vdare.com/misc/mercer_041113_muslim.htm). I agree with your degree of alarm over the legal and illegal immigration of Muslims into America. However, I want to take issue with some points you made, explicit and implicit.
I am a Texan whose parents' ancestry was a Scottish, English, Irish, German, Cherokee mix. As far as I know, I'm not in the least Semitic. My father was Christian Scientist and my mother Baptist. I was reared to be a Baptist. When I was a kid, I thought that, being Christian, I was also Jewish, just as Jesus was.
You see, "Jewish" is a religion, not a race. Your writing makes it seem that you think it is a race. Anybody can become a Jew simply by ascribing to Jewish beliefs. Most people of Hebrew descent think of themselves as Jews (as a racial group), but many of them are Christians or Muslims these days. Semitic people include descendants of the ancient Hebrews as well as racial subgroups in the Arabic Peninsula, Egypt, the Sinai Peninsula, North Africa, Syria, and Iraq. And when you look at who constitutes Jews today, you find many people of mixed racial and national ancestry. Sephardic Jews, for example, are dark-skinned people descended partly from the Moors who invaded Spain and married Jews there.
It is unfortunate that the word Jew has such an indefinite definition. I believe the typical meaning of "Jew" to most Americans is the Ashkenazi Jew, and that definitely is a racial group. Judging from your article, you are in that group.
Until the 1950s American and European Jews of any kind have been persecuted and/or oppressed. I believe the reasons for this were:
1. The clannish nature of Jews - they typically marry and socialize only other Jews of their religion and if possible, only other Jews of their race.
2. The religious nature of Jews - they adhere to religious traditions that make them seem outlandish to others -grooming, attire, social customs, beliefs, rituals.
3. The intelligence of Jews - with an average IQ of 115 among Ashkenazi Jews, most are smarter than nearly everybody else, and so they rise to the top in whatever they undertake.
4. The physical characteristics of Jews - facial features tend to make them stand out from other racial groups.
5. The social nature of Jews - Jews seem universally regarded, even by fellow Jews, as tightwads and shrewd negotiators.
No one is to be blamed for the above characteristics, and only Jews can control their social and religious natures. One cannot rightly tolerate oppression and/or persecution for any of the above characteristics.
However, if we contrast Jews with their arch-enemies, Arabic Muslims, we see similar characteristics. It is true that Muslims claim to have a different religion, but they honor the same prophets and pray to the same God. They are regarded as tightwads. They are arrogant about their religion and its practices. They are endogamous, clannish, and tribal. Many of them are quite intelligent. They have similar physical characteristics, though many of them show Negroid ancestry.
So why is it that Jews and Muslims don't get along with each other? And what could be done to set the stage for social harmony between them? Before addressing that, I want to share a little about my background and understanding about religion and Judaism.
I am no longer a Christian. Those are words I once thought I'd never say.
I was so absolutely certain Jesus died on the cross to save me from my sins that I knew I'd burn in hell if I ever forsake such a belief. Do you recognize anything familiar to your Jewish religion about that belief of mine? It is the practice of sacrifice.
Paul of Tarsus ignored the teachings of Jesus about salvation through the faith-embrace of Sonship with God when he formulated his infamous atonement doctrine. That doctrine is based on belief in the efficacy of the sacrificial death of Jesus, and it is founded on fear of burning in hell forever. It is a religious philosophy that resurrected the practice of human sacrifice from the pagan roots of the Hebrew people.
Much work had been done to eliminate the practice of sacrifice. Abraham was a firm believer in human sacrifice and nearly murdered his son Isaac to appease God. Five hundred years later, Moses instituted the ransom payment in order to wean the Hebrews from the abhorrent practice of murdering or giving to the priesthood their firstborn sons so God would somehow favor them and not stomp on them in vengeful anger for their miserable sins. 1500 years later, Jesus initiated the bread and wine sacrament, a take-off from the Passover feast, to wean his followers finally and fully from the practice of ritual sacrifice.
Think about that. How does sacrifice make any sense? No self-respecting Jew would ever openly question whether, how, or why God would or could be bribed by a sacrifice of any kind to show leniency or favor to his wayward chosen people, but it is a valid question. Why would God, as Paul seemed to believe, require the sacrificial death of his only begotten son, a being nearly his equal, if what Jesus said were true, to atone for sins of others? Where's the justice in that? What need has God of any kind of sacrifice? And even if God demand a sacrifice for appeasement, and if Jesus were in fact divine, wouldn't that be like sacrificing himself to himself, a divine being to another divine being? How does that make sense.
It doesn't, which is why I am neither a Christian nor a Jew. I don't think it ever made sense, and I don't believe God ever demanded anything of his earth children but righteousness - the sincere pursuit of truth, beauty, and goodness.
Most Jews might say monotheism was the core of Judaism. Originally it was, but that changed. The core was the necessity and practice of sacrifice - the pre-Jewish pagan notion of the efficacy of killing a perfect creature to appease God. Sacrifice was the ultimate substitute for righteousness God apparently craved. It was so powerful a linchpin in the Jewish religion that Jews were slavishly bound to it.
Now, inexplicably, and thankfully, Jews no longer practice sacrifice. The racial connection and remaining religious rituals are the main things that bind the Jews of the world together today. Any non-Jew can believe in God, but only Jews have their particular laws and rituals. That, and the fact that so many of the laws make no sense in our modern world, is why so many Jews are becoming less Jewish as time goes by. An enormous number of Jews are not religious at all. Many have drifted over to Christianity. A scant few have wandered over to Islam. A huge number are marrying gentiles of one kind or another. And, Jews do not proselytize. Jewish identity seems to be slowly disappearing.
Therefore, why should people worry that Muslims are so direly opposed to Jews? Why can't Jews, Muslims, and Christians get along with one another?
Until America was founded, providing religious freedom, Jews had as much to fear from Christians as from Muslims. Members of either group would oppress, persecute, and malign them. Because of freedoms guaranteed by the government, that no longer happens. Government-imposed religious freedom is a good thing.
But, as we know from the looting that is going on right now in hurricane-devastated New Orleans and Biloxi, once the government turns its head for an instant, people immediately revert to dog-eat-dog criminality. Today it's the looting. Tomorrow it's the pogroms against the Jews.
How can Jews, Muslims, and Christians be made to get along with and respect one another?
There is a way that people in general can be encouraged to be loving to each other in spite of their religious, racial, and social differences, and without the need for government force.
1. That way is: start seeing all humans as brothers and sisters.
2. That can only happen if people start seeing God as their Heavenly Father.
Of the three religions in question, Christianity is the only one that fosters that belief. Why? Because even though Christianity is blighted by its abhorrent atonement doctrine, Christians nevertheless do believe what Jesus taught was true.
And let's not forget that nearly all of the earliest followers of Jesus were Jews. That is because his teachings were not at all alien to Judaism. They just ennobled it a bit because they appealed to the noblest religious notions of the Jews: a belief in the basic goodness of God and in the goodness of righteous, moral living. Those same noble religious notions can also be found in Islam, and in other religions as well.
One of my main reasons for writing to you is to refocus just a bit on the salient elements of those teachings of Jesus for the purpose of illustrating how the strife between Christians, Muslims and Jews can be brought gradually to an end. I have summarized it above. It is his so-called gospel, good news for the Jews and the rest of mankind. Jesus began by saying "Repent! The Kingdom of God is at hand." According to all existing first-hand testimony, Jesus' "Gospel of the Kingdom of God" consisted of three elements (let me know if you want to see scriptural proof):
1. Acceptance of the reality of the Fatherhood of God.
2. Belief in the fact of the Brotherhood of Man.
3. Faith in the effectiveness of the supreme human desire to do the Father's will - to be like God.
What in those three points is alien to the spirit of Judaism or Islam? Nothing. They were then and are now good news to all religionists, particularly Jews, Christians, and Muslims. Here's why:
1. Fatherhood of God -
a. Christians already believe this, but the belief is weakened by the philosophically opposing atonement doctrine. Jews and Muslims do not really see God as a Heavenly Father, but more as an all-powerful, mostly beneficent king, and sometimes as a whimsical tyrant. They both believe humans are just God's subjects and he will smash them if they make him mad. Muslims think God has no children (Muhammad was speaking of physical / genetic offspring), so they join Jews in believing Jesus was just a good prophet and not any special son of God. They believe God makes people do the evil, iniquitous things they do. Muslims and Jews claim God loves them, but they wonder how that could be possible when he wantonly and randomly called for the extensive oppression, robbery, rape, enslavement, torture, and murder of his people. What loving God would do that? They say he loves them, but they don't really believe it. They believe he would love them if they were obedient to him. However, all Jews know it is impossible to live by those 613 laws, and Muslims know unrighteous they themselves are from time to time. In other words, they think God only truly loves them and treats them lovingly when they are righteous to his level of expectation.
b. The idea that God is a Heavenly Father automatically means all humans are his children and that he loves them and cherishes them as all fathers do their children. They are not merely his subjects, and since they are his children, then can rightfully expect to grow up spiritually to be like him. This means the universe is a friendly place for them, not fraught with spiritual danger the way it would be if God were merely a divine king and not a father. This is truly good news for both Jews and Muslims, for they can know that God will no more be hateful and whimsically mean to an erring earth child than would a typical, sane parent to his child.
c. Jesus taught that a spirit fragment of the Heavenly Father indwells the human mind, planning that human's ideal eternal destiny and encouraging the human to go in that direction. In fact, I found 18 references in the Old and New Testaments of the Bible that attest to the reality of a divine indwelling of man, so the concept is neither new nor exclusive to Jesus. Muslims claim they believe "The Book" but they don't believe a spirit fragment of the Father indwells their minds, and neither do Jews. Christians give it lip-service, but have no idea what it means. The value of the belief in the indwelling spirit of the Father is that it encourages people to behave and do the right things in life. This belief, fully embraced, can be a powerful influence in resolving difficulties between Muslims, Christians, and Jews.
2. Brotherhood of Man -
a. Jews, Christians, and Muslims are taught the principles of human brotherhood, but among Jews and Muslims it is radically circumscribed. Jews have traditionally interpreted "Love your neighbor as yourself" to mean a Jew should love only fellow Jews, and many have taken that limited definition to mean it is okay with God if they demean, cheat, and even malign non-Jews. Muslims see a "brother" as being only a fellow Muslim. The Qur'an teaches them not to make friends of Jews and Christians, nor with any other non-Muslims who oppose the religion and political force of Islam.
b. Jesus taught that all human beings are our brothers and sisters, and that we should love them and serve them unselfishly and lovingly. He plainly stated that will give us a high estate in heaven. Even the Jewish lawyer to whom he told the Good Samaritan story ended up fully agreeing that the hated good Samaritan was more of a neighbor than the Jews who passed by the beaten and robbed fellow Jew without helping him. To Muslims and Jews, even today, this tenet of the gospel is startlingly good news because it means they now have the motive (as they always did, had they attended to the spirit of their religious teachings) to be good and loving to their fellow humans. It should be clear to you that an embrace of this tenet of the gospel is the key to settling disputes between Muslims and Jews, for it makes the psychological barriers between them dissolve.
3. Faith -
a. Jews, Christians, and Muslims all believe God exists, but they do not have faith that if they strive to be like God they can be like him to the extent their individual capacities allow. Most Jews don't even believe in a life after human death, as thought this is all there is. Muslims actually believe they can go to heaven for oppressing, torturing, and murdering any who resist Islam, for that is "holy" jihad, or struggle against injustice. Even though Jesus couched his gospel in the principle of non-resistance to evil, and even though Muslims claim to believe the gospel, they don't really believe it because the Qur'an is so riddled with instances of Muslims mistreating others just because they are not Muslims. Many religionists are so mired in the utter injustice of fighting against others that they forget their obligation to try to be good. And what is being good all about? It is about being like God.
b. Jesus knew nobody had ever met God. So he patiently explained that he came here with a message of good news from God. Whether or not you believe that, you cannot dispute the wisdom of such a message. Purportedly on orders from God, Jesus encouraged people to have faith that if they sincerely try to discern and do the Father's will, they will become more perfect, or more like God. He plainly exhorted them to be perfect and to "sin no more," as though that were a reasonable expectation. He implied that there was some divine purpose in this, but he did not say what it was. The clearest example of what can happen to such humans who succeed in their striving to find, know, love, and be like God is in the incredible achievements of Enoch, who "walked with God", and Elijah, who achieved terrestrial escape in a "chariot of fire." Apparently, neither of those men had further need of human existence, for they had achieved their purpose for human life - they had developed balanced and majestic personalities. This is good news for all religionists who are devoted to the discovery and embrace of supreme values, for it means they can leave this world without having to die as most people do, and they can go on to the adventures that await them in Heaven. And it is especially good news for Jews and Muslims because it means they can get on with showing their innate abilities to demonstrate a divine and loving nature to one another.
The above gospel portrays a family of God more than a kingdom of God, and it asserts that we are all in the family together.
What does that have to do with your article? This: Muslims do not seem to realize they are in your family. You bemoan the immigration of Muslims because you know that they are singularly ignorant of the principles of the gospel of Jesus, and that even if they knew it, they would not abide by it because it is not spelled out in the Qur'an, and other comments in the Qur'an undermine Muslim devotion to the gospel.
However, you cannot deny that if all Christians, Jews, and Muslims took to heart the above tenets of the gospel, conditions between warring people and ideologies would dramatically improve, and war between them would come to an end. It seems to me that you would do far better to become an evangelist for that gospel than by merely complaining about the immigration problem. Maybe you can do both at the same time. But, you can hardly expect to be effective if you keep ignoring the gospel message while writing your articles.
My point here is that the gospel of Jesus is still the good news today that it was 2000 years ago, its tenets do not oppose basic Judasim or Islam, and you have no valid reason for not embracing and promoting it. I am certain that you, as a Jew in both race and religion, embrace that gospel in your personal, private thinking. You are undoubtedly quite intelligent, and you can see the sense and wisdom of the gospel, but how shall you get Muslims interested in it?
Here is just one idea. You can start telling Muslims these things:
1. The Qur'an promotes the gospel which Jesus brought from Allah, and commands all Muslims to embrace it.
2. Because Muslims do not know what the gospel is, they cannot abide by it, and therefore they must learn it.
3. Militant Muslims who might know the gospel ignoring it because they cannot know it from the Qur'an.
4. This gospel… (tell them what it is, and encourage them to follow it) enables Muslims to embrace their Sonship with God as his Spiritual offspring, and they really can become like God merely by sincerely striving each moment to discern and do his will..
Oops, can you do that and still be a good Jew? I don't know why not. Jesus was a good Jew. The gospel does not oppose the core principles of Judaism. The only problem is that you will have to dip into some resource other than the Tanach to find it so you can tell Muslims where to look it up so as to learn more about it.
Muslims all claim they believe the gospel, so when you imply or state they are ignoring it, you can stimulate them to learn about and follow it. The Qur'an preaches that the gospel of Jesus is good. By threatening humiliation on the day of judgment, Muhammad warned all Muslims to embrace it. Muslims know they ought to embrace it.
Unfortunately, the Qur'an, the Hadiths, and the Sunnahs do not specifically state what that gospel is. Presumably, Muhammad meant for Muslims to learn the gospel from some other source. Most Muslims assume the Qur'an merely restates the gospel without identifying its tenets. They are wrong. I have looked, and it is not codified there.
It is also unfortunate that the New Testament talks about the gospel a lot without enumerating its tenets. That is why Christians, if you ask them, will not clearly give you the 1-2-3 of the gospel as I have in my comments above. You have to study Jesus' teachings in the New Testament's four records (the books of Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John) about him in order to arrive at a proper understanding.
Or, you can dig into the only other record of his life and teachings, one with much better credentials than the New Testament: The Urantia Book (http://urantiabook.org), or you can download a Windows help file version at http://bobhurt.com/urantia.chm. The Urantia Book is a masterpiece of American language literature, it is philosophically consistent from cover to cover, and it purports itself to be the fifth major revealing of truth to this world. The last section of the book, about a third of the overall content, is devoted to the life and teachings of Jesus. There you will find the most complete, concise, succinct, and accurate rendering of his life and teachings. It covers the gospel specifically.
I have spent my whole morning writing this message to you. I hope you can take it to heart and use the gospel to good advantage in encouraging benign relations between Muslims and other people of this world. Certainly a lot of Jews will listen to you, and so might some good Muslims. One Muslim who might be a good listener is Kamal Nawash, president of the Free Muslims Coalition (http://freemuslims.org). I'm sending him a copy of this.
I hope you will pass this message on to all Jews and Muslims of influence. They need to know that the gospel was not intended just for Christians, but for all mankind, and it is ultimately the only path to peace and harmony in our world. It eclipses all other tenets of religion, even while it offends none that are noble. It is worthy of your efforts.
I am writing to you about your 14 November 2004 vdare.com article Muslim Immigration Time Bomb (http://www.vdare.com/misc/mercer_041113_muslim.htm). I agree with your degree of alarm over the legal and illegal immigration of Muslims into America. However, I want to take issue with some points you made, explicit and implicit.
I am a Texan whose parents' ancestry was a Scottish, English, Irish, German, Cherokee mix. As far as I know, I'm not in the least Semitic. My father was Christian Scientist and my mother Baptist. I was reared to be a Baptist. When I was a kid, I thought that, being Christian, I was also Jewish, just as Jesus was.
You see, "Jewish" is a religion, not a race. Your writing makes it seem that you think it is a race. Anybody can become a Jew simply by ascribing to Jewish beliefs. Most people of Hebrew descent think of themselves as Jews (as a racial group), but many of them are Christians or Muslims these days. Semitic people include descendants of the ancient Hebrews as well as racial subgroups in the Arabic Peninsula, Egypt, the Sinai Peninsula, North Africa, Syria, and Iraq. And when you look at who constitutes Jews today, you find many people of mixed racial and national ancestry. Sephardic Jews, for example, are dark-skinned people descended partly from the Moors who invaded Spain and married Jews there.
It is unfortunate that the word Jew has such an indefinite definition. I believe the typical meaning of "Jew" to most Americans is the Ashkenazi Jew, and that definitely is a racial group. Judging from your article, you are in that group.
Until the 1950s American and European Jews of any kind have been persecuted and/or oppressed. I believe the reasons for this were:
1. The clannish nature of Jews - they typically marry and socialize only other Jews of their religion and if possible, only other Jews of their race.
2. The religious nature of Jews - they adhere to religious traditions that make them seem outlandish to others -grooming, attire, social customs, beliefs, rituals.
3. The intelligence of Jews - with an average IQ of 115 among Ashkenazi Jews, most are smarter than nearly everybody else, and so they rise to the top in whatever they undertake.
4. The physical characteristics of Jews - facial features tend to make them stand out from other racial groups.
5. The social nature of Jews - Jews seem universally regarded, even by fellow Jews, as tightwads and shrewd negotiators.
No one is to be blamed for the above characteristics, and only Jews can control their social and religious natures. One cannot rightly tolerate oppression and/or persecution for any of the above characteristics.
However, if we contrast Jews with their arch-enemies, Arabic Muslims, we see similar characteristics. It is true that Muslims claim to have a different religion, but they honor the same prophets and pray to the same God. They are regarded as tightwads. They are arrogant about their religion and its practices. They are endogamous, clannish, and tribal. Many of them are quite intelligent. They have similar physical characteristics, though many of them show Negroid ancestry.
So why is it that Jews and Muslims don't get along with each other? And what could be done to set the stage for social harmony between them? Before addressing that, I want to share a little about my background and understanding about religion and Judaism.
I am no longer a Christian. Those are words I once thought I'd never say.
I was so absolutely certain Jesus died on the cross to save me from my sins that I knew I'd burn in hell if I ever forsake such a belief. Do you recognize anything familiar to your Jewish religion about that belief of mine? It is the practice of sacrifice.
Paul of Tarsus ignored the teachings of Jesus about salvation through the faith-embrace of Sonship with God when he formulated his infamous atonement doctrine. That doctrine is based on belief in the efficacy of the sacrificial death of Jesus, and it is founded on fear of burning in hell forever. It is a religious philosophy that resurrected the practice of human sacrifice from the pagan roots of the Hebrew people.
Much work had been done to eliminate the practice of sacrifice. Abraham was a firm believer in human sacrifice and nearly murdered his son Isaac to appease God. Five hundred years later, Moses instituted the ransom payment in order to wean the Hebrews from the abhorrent practice of murdering or giving to the priesthood their firstborn sons so God would somehow favor them and not stomp on them in vengeful anger for their miserable sins. 1500 years later, Jesus initiated the bread and wine sacrament, a take-off from the Passover feast, to wean his followers finally and fully from the practice of ritual sacrifice.
Think about that. How does sacrifice make any sense? No self-respecting Jew would ever openly question whether, how, or why God would or could be bribed by a sacrifice of any kind to show leniency or favor to his wayward chosen people, but it is a valid question. Why would God, as Paul seemed to believe, require the sacrificial death of his only begotten son, a being nearly his equal, if what Jesus said were true, to atone for sins of others? Where's the justice in that? What need has God of any kind of sacrifice? And even if God demand a sacrifice for appeasement, and if Jesus were in fact divine, wouldn't that be like sacrificing himself to himself, a divine being to another divine being? How does that make sense.
It doesn't, which is why I am neither a Christian nor a Jew. I don't think it ever made sense, and I don't believe God ever demanded anything of his earth children but righteousness - the sincere pursuit of truth, beauty, and goodness.
Most Jews might say monotheism was the core of Judaism. Originally it was, but that changed. The core was the necessity and practice of sacrifice - the pre-Jewish pagan notion of the efficacy of killing a perfect creature to appease God. Sacrifice was the ultimate substitute for righteousness God apparently craved. It was so powerful a linchpin in the Jewish religion that Jews were slavishly bound to it.
Now, inexplicably, and thankfully, Jews no longer practice sacrifice. The racial connection and remaining religious rituals are the main things that bind the Jews of the world together today. Any non-Jew can believe in God, but only Jews have their particular laws and rituals. That, and the fact that so many of the laws make no sense in our modern world, is why so many Jews are becoming less Jewish as time goes by. An enormous number of Jews are not religious at all. Many have drifted over to Christianity. A scant few have wandered over to Islam. A huge number are marrying gentiles of one kind or another. And, Jews do not proselytize. Jewish identity seems to be slowly disappearing.
Therefore, why should people worry that Muslims are so direly opposed to Jews? Why can't Jews, Muslims, and Christians get along with one another?
Until America was founded, providing religious freedom, Jews had as much to fear from Christians as from Muslims. Members of either group would oppress, persecute, and malign them. Because of freedoms guaranteed by the government, that no longer happens. Government-imposed religious freedom is a good thing.
But, as we know from the looting that is going on right now in hurricane-devastated New Orleans and Biloxi, once the government turns its head for an instant, people immediately revert to dog-eat-dog criminality. Today it's the looting. Tomorrow it's the pogroms against the Jews.
How can Jews, Muslims, and Christians be made to get along with and respect one another?
There is a way that people in general can be encouraged to be loving to each other in spite of their religious, racial, and social differences, and without the need for government force.
1. That way is: start seeing all humans as brothers and sisters.
2. That can only happen if people start seeing God as their Heavenly Father.
Of the three religions in question, Christianity is the only one that fosters that belief. Why? Because even though Christianity is blighted by its abhorrent atonement doctrine, Christians nevertheless do believe what Jesus taught was true.
And let's not forget that nearly all of the earliest followers of Jesus were Jews. That is because his teachings were not at all alien to Judaism. They just ennobled it a bit because they appealed to the noblest religious notions of the Jews: a belief in the basic goodness of God and in the goodness of righteous, moral living. Those same noble religious notions can also be found in Islam, and in other religions as well.
One of my main reasons for writing to you is to refocus just a bit on the salient elements of those teachings of Jesus for the purpose of illustrating how the strife between Christians, Muslims and Jews can be brought gradually to an end. I have summarized it above. It is his so-called gospel, good news for the Jews and the rest of mankind. Jesus began by saying "Repent! The Kingdom of God is at hand." According to all existing first-hand testimony, Jesus' "Gospel of the Kingdom of God" consisted of three elements (let me know if you want to see scriptural proof):
1. Acceptance of the reality of the Fatherhood of God.
2. Belief in the fact of the Brotherhood of Man.
3. Faith in the effectiveness of the supreme human desire to do the Father's will - to be like God.
What in those three points is alien to the spirit of Judaism or Islam? Nothing. They were then and are now good news to all religionists, particularly Jews, Christians, and Muslims. Here's why:
1. Fatherhood of God -
a. Christians already believe this, but the belief is weakened by the philosophically opposing atonement doctrine. Jews and Muslims do not really see God as a Heavenly Father, but more as an all-powerful, mostly beneficent king, and sometimes as a whimsical tyrant. They both believe humans are just God's subjects and he will smash them if they make him mad. Muslims think God has no children (Muhammad was speaking of physical / genetic offspring), so they join Jews in believing Jesus was just a good prophet and not any special son of God. They believe God makes people do the evil, iniquitous things they do. Muslims and Jews claim God loves them, but they wonder how that could be possible when he wantonly and randomly called for the extensive oppression, robbery, rape, enslavement, torture, and murder of his people. What loving God would do that? They say he loves them, but they don't really believe it. They believe he would love them if they were obedient to him. However, all Jews know it is impossible to live by those 613 laws, and Muslims know unrighteous they themselves are from time to time. In other words, they think God only truly loves them and treats them lovingly when they are righteous to his level of expectation.
b. The idea that God is a Heavenly Father automatically means all humans are his children and that he loves them and cherishes them as all fathers do their children. They are not merely his subjects, and since they are his children, then can rightfully expect to grow up spiritually to be like him. This means the universe is a friendly place for them, not fraught with spiritual danger the way it would be if God were merely a divine king and not a father. This is truly good news for both Jews and Muslims, for they can know that God will no more be hateful and whimsically mean to an erring earth child than would a typical, sane parent to his child.
c. Jesus taught that a spirit fragment of the Heavenly Father indwells the human mind, planning that human's ideal eternal destiny and encouraging the human to go in that direction. In fact, I found 18 references in the Old and New Testaments of the Bible that attest to the reality of a divine indwelling of man, so the concept is neither new nor exclusive to Jesus. Muslims claim they believe "The Book" but they don't believe a spirit fragment of the Father indwells their minds, and neither do Jews. Christians give it lip-service, but have no idea what it means. The value of the belief in the indwelling spirit of the Father is that it encourages people to behave and do the right things in life. This belief, fully embraced, can be a powerful influence in resolving difficulties between Muslims, Christians, and Jews.
2. Brotherhood of Man -
a. Jews, Christians, and Muslims are taught the principles of human brotherhood, but among Jews and Muslims it is radically circumscribed. Jews have traditionally interpreted "Love your neighbor as yourself" to mean a Jew should love only fellow Jews, and many have taken that limited definition to mean it is okay with God if they demean, cheat, and even malign non-Jews. Muslims see a "brother" as being only a fellow Muslim. The Qur'an teaches them not to make friends of Jews and Christians, nor with any other non-Muslims who oppose the religion and political force of Islam.
b. Jesus taught that all human beings are our brothers and sisters, and that we should love them and serve them unselfishly and lovingly. He plainly stated that will give us a high estate in heaven. Even the Jewish lawyer to whom he told the Good Samaritan story ended up fully agreeing that the hated good Samaritan was more of a neighbor than the Jews who passed by the beaten and robbed fellow Jew without helping him. To Muslims and Jews, even today, this tenet of the gospel is startlingly good news because it means they now have the motive (as they always did, had they attended to the spirit of their religious teachings) to be good and loving to their fellow humans. It should be clear to you that an embrace of this tenet of the gospel is the key to settling disputes between Muslims and Jews, for it makes the psychological barriers between them dissolve.
3. Faith -
a. Jews, Christians, and Muslims all believe God exists, but they do not have faith that if they strive to be like God they can be like him to the extent their individual capacities allow. Most Jews don't even believe in a life after human death, as thought this is all there is. Muslims actually believe they can go to heaven for oppressing, torturing, and murdering any who resist Islam, for that is "holy" jihad, or struggle against injustice. Even though Jesus couched his gospel in the principle of non-resistance to evil, and even though Muslims claim to believe the gospel, they don't really believe it because the Qur'an is so riddled with instances of Muslims mistreating others just because they are not Muslims. Many religionists are so mired in the utter injustice of fighting against others that they forget their obligation to try to be good. And what is being good all about? It is about being like God.
b. Jesus knew nobody had ever met God. So he patiently explained that he came here with a message of good news from God. Whether or not you believe that, you cannot dispute the wisdom of such a message. Purportedly on orders from God, Jesus encouraged people to have faith that if they sincerely try to discern and do the Father's will, they will become more perfect, or more like God. He plainly exhorted them to be perfect and to "sin no more," as though that were a reasonable expectation. He implied that there was some divine purpose in this, but he did not say what it was. The clearest example of what can happen to such humans who succeed in their striving to find, know, love, and be like God is in the incredible achievements of Enoch, who "walked with God", and Elijah, who achieved terrestrial escape in a "chariot of fire." Apparently, neither of those men had further need of human existence, for they had achieved their purpose for human life - they had developed balanced and majestic personalities. This is good news for all religionists who are devoted to the discovery and embrace of supreme values, for it means they can leave this world without having to die as most people do, and they can go on to the adventures that await them in Heaven. And it is especially good news for Jews and Muslims because it means they can get on with showing their innate abilities to demonstrate a divine and loving nature to one another.
The above gospel portrays a family of God more than a kingdom of God, and it asserts that we are all in the family together.
What does that have to do with your article? This: Muslims do not seem to realize they are in your family. You bemoan the immigration of Muslims because you know that they are singularly ignorant of the principles of the gospel of Jesus, and that even if they knew it, they would not abide by it because it is not spelled out in the Qur'an, and other comments in the Qur'an undermine Muslim devotion to the gospel.
However, you cannot deny that if all Christians, Jews, and Muslims took to heart the above tenets of the gospel, conditions between warring people and ideologies would dramatically improve, and war between them would come to an end. It seems to me that you would do far better to become an evangelist for that gospel than by merely complaining about the immigration problem. Maybe you can do both at the same time. But, you can hardly expect to be effective if you keep ignoring the gospel message while writing your articles.
My point here is that the gospel of Jesus is still the good news today that it was 2000 years ago, its tenets do not oppose basic Judasim or Islam, and you have no valid reason for not embracing and promoting it. I am certain that you, as a Jew in both race and religion, embrace that gospel in your personal, private thinking. You are undoubtedly quite intelligent, and you can see the sense and wisdom of the gospel, but how shall you get Muslims interested in it?
Here is just one idea. You can start telling Muslims these things:
1. The Qur'an promotes the gospel which Jesus brought from Allah, and commands all Muslims to embrace it.
2. Because Muslims do not know what the gospel is, they cannot abide by it, and therefore they must learn it.
3. Militant Muslims who might know the gospel ignoring it because they cannot know it from the Qur'an.
4. This gospel… (tell them what it is, and encourage them to follow it) enables Muslims to embrace their Sonship with God as his Spiritual offspring, and they really can become like God merely by sincerely striving each moment to discern and do his will..
Oops, can you do that and still be a good Jew? I don't know why not. Jesus was a good Jew. The gospel does not oppose the core principles of Judaism. The only problem is that you will have to dip into some resource other than the Tanach to find it so you can tell Muslims where to look it up so as to learn more about it.
Muslims all claim they believe the gospel, so when you imply or state they are ignoring it, you can stimulate them to learn about and follow it. The Qur'an preaches that the gospel of Jesus is good. By threatening humiliation on the day of judgment, Muhammad warned all Muslims to embrace it. Muslims know they ought to embrace it.
Unfortunately, the Qur'an, the Hadiths, and the Sunnahs do not specifically state what that gospel is. Presumably, Muhammad meant for Muslims to learn the gospel from some other source. Most Muslims assume the Qur'an merely restates the gospel without identifying its tenets. They are wrong. I have looked, and it is not codified there.
It is also unfortunate that the New Testament talks about the gospel a lot without enumerating its tenets. That is why Christians, if you ask them, will not clearly give you the 1-2-3 of the gospel as I have in my comments above. You have to study Jesus' teachings in the New Testament's four records (the books of Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John) about him in order to arrive at a proper understanding.
Or, you can dig into the only other record of his life and teachings, one with much better credentials than the New Testament: The Urantia Book (http://urantiabook.org), or you can download a Windows help file version at http://bobhurt.com/urantia.chm. The Urantia Book is a masterpiece of American language literature, it is philosophically consistent from cover to cover, and it purports itself to be the fifth major revealing of truth to this world. The last section of the book, about a third of the overall content, is devoted to the life and teachings of Jesus. There you will find the most complete, concise, succinct, and accurate rendering of his life and teachings. It covers the gospel specifically.
I have spent my whole morning writing this message to you. I hope you can take it to heart and use the gospel to good advantage in encouraging benign relations between Muslims and other people of this world. Certainly a lot of Jews will listen to you, and so might some good Muslims. One Muslim who might be a good listener is Kamal Nawash, president of the Free Muslims Coalition (http://freemuslims.org). I'm sending him a copy of this.
I hope you will pass this message on to all Jews and Muslims of influence. They need to know that the gospel was not intended just for Christians, but for all mankind, and it is ultimately the only path to peace and harmony in our world. It eclipses all other tenets of religion, even while it offends none that are noble. It is worthy of your efforts.
Friday, August 26, 2005
IRS Sued for Billions in Tampa
A few years ago, David Bosset of Spring Hill, Floridda, made history by being one of the few employers to win a $25,000 refund from the IRS for overpaying employee withholding tax. He won the refund by asserting his employees were resident citizens and a withholding agent by definition in the IRS code may withhold taxes only from the incomes of non-resident aliens.
Now Bosset has one-upped himself. On 31 May 2005, he filed a multi-billion-dollar lawsuit against the federal district court in Tampa, Florida, naming as defendants some IRS agents and the IRS as a private corporation. This is not a lawsuit against the government.
In the suit, Bosset alleges fraud by the IRS, and the 67-page complaint (available at http://bosset.com) proves it very thoroughly. It does not attack the IRS law (Title 26 United States Code) as either illegal or unconstitutional. It asserts that the IRS routinely defrauds people out of money by exceeding its authority, and conspiring to make people think they owe income tax when in actuality they do not.
Bosset provides a mechanism whereby others who have been abused by the IRS can join the lawsuit as plaintiffs. The cost is $500, a paltry fee for such a monumental opportunity to bring the IRS to justice for its many years of criminal abuse of innocent victims throughout America.
The lawsuit seeks $4 billion in punitive damages.
It's high time.
Now Bosset has one-upped himself. On 31 May 2005, he filed a multi-billion-dollar lawsuit against the federal district court in Tampa, Florida, naming as defendants some IRS agents and the IRS as a private corporation. This is not a lawsuit against the government.
In the suit, Bosset alleges fraud by the IRS, and the 67-page complaint (available at http://bosset.com) proves it very thoroughly. It does not attack the IRS law (Title 26 United States Code) as either illegal or unconstitutional. It asserts that the IRS routinely defrauds people out of money by exceeding its authority, and conspiring to make people think they owe income tax when in actuality they do not.
Bosset provides a mechanism whereby others who have been abused by the IRS can join the lawsuit as plaintiffs. The cost is $500, a paltry fee for such a monumental opportunity to bring the IRS to justice for its many years of criminal abuse of innocent victims throughout America.
The lawsuit seeks $4 billion in punitive damages.
It's high time.
Tuesday, August 16, 2005
Sincere Questions for All Christians to Answer
Here are some questions that all Christians need to answer. They test one's knowledge of the teachings of Jesus and the relevance of those teachings. They also bring the one who answers face-to-face with the Plan of Salvation presented to this world by Jesus of Nazareth nearly 2000 years ago.
Note that you can answer in a comment to this post, right here on this blog.
1. What are the tenets of the gospel Jesus taught throughout his public ministry, and what Bible references can you show for corroborating support?
2. How do you interpret those tenets of the gospel, and in what ways were they both good and news to the Jews and Gentiles of Jesus' day?
3. Do you believe God is our Heavenly Father (Luke 11:13, Matthew 6:14, 6:26, 6:32, 18:35)?
4. Do you believe as God's children all humans are your brothers and sisters (Matthew 5:9, 5:45, 12:50, 18:3, Luke 16:8, John 12:36)?
5. Do you believe your sins are forgiven iff you forgive the sins of others (Matthew 6:14-15, Matthew 18:21-35, Luke 17:23)?
6. Do you believe you live forever if you love God and your fellow man (Luke 10:25-28), and that the only way to show love for others and have a high estate in heaven is to serve them unselfishly and lovingly (Matthew 18:4, Matthew 23:11, Luke 22:26, John 13:5-17)?
7. How do you explain Jesus' comment that "The Kingdom of God is within you? (Luke 17:21)"
8. What did Jesus mean when he told others to "Be ye therefore perfect even as your Father in heaven is perfect" (Matthew 5:48) and "Go and sin no more" (John 5:14, 8:11), is it really possible to be perfect, sin no more, and do the will of God (Mark 3:35), and if not, why did Jesus so command his followers?
9. Why was the need to love others (John 13:35, 15:12, 15:17) so important that Jesus repeated it?
10. Is it possible to obey Jesus' commandments (John 14:15)? If no, then why did Jesus not only tell his apostles to do that, but also tell them to tell everybody else in the world to do it (Matthew 28:19-20)? If yes, what will be the result in one's life, one's character, and one's power of personality?
11. Why did God send Jesus to this world with his gospel message? What is his ulterior motive regarding our eternal destiny?
Note that you can answer in a comment to this post, right here on this blog.
1. What are the tenets of the gospel Jesus taught throughout his public ministry, and what Bible references can you show for corroborating support?
2. How do you interpret those tenets of the gospel, and in what ways were they both good and news to the Jews and Gentiles of Jesus' day?
3. Do you believe God is our Heavenly Father (Luke 11:13, Matthew 6:14, 6:26, 6:32, 18:35)?
4. Do you believe as God's children all humans are your brothers and sisters (Matthew 5:9, 5:45, 12:50, 18:3, Luke 16:8, John 12:36)?
5. Do you believe your sins are forgiven iff you forgive the sins of others (Matthew 6:14-15, Matthew 18:21-35, Luke 17:23)?
6. Do you believe you live forever if you love God and your fellow man (Luke 10:25-28), and that the only way to show love for others and have a high estate in heaven is to serve them unselfishly and lovingly (Matthew 18:4, Matthew 23:11, Luke 22:26, John 13:5-17)?
7. How do you explain Jesus' comment that "The Kingdom of God is within you? (Luke 17:21)"
8. What did Jesus mean when he told others to "Be ye therefore perfect even as your Father in heaven is perfect" (Matthew 5:48) and "Go and sin no more" (John 5:14, 8:11), is it really possible to be perfect, sin no more, and do the will of God (Mark 3:35), and if not, why did Jesus so command his followers?
9. Why was the need to love others (John 13:35, 15:12, 15:17) so important that Jesus repeated it?
10. Is it possible to obey Jesus' commandments (John 14:15)? If no, then why did Jesus not only tell his apostles to do that, but also tell them to tell everybody else in the world to do it (Matthew 28:19-20)? If yes, what will be the result in one's life, one's character, and one's power of personality?
11. Why did God send Jesus to this world with his gospel message? What is his ulterior motive regarding our eternal destiny?
Sunday, August 07, 2005
Circular Simultaneity of Civilization
Professor Leny Mendoza Strobel:
I just read your April 2003 http://www.oovrag.com/essays/essay2003b-6.shtml essay A Hundred Years of American Tutelage And We Are Still Uncivilized, in regard to the “otherness” of Filipino expatriates, and I thought I’d write some comments. First of all, I enjoyed you style of writing, and the cogent points you made. It was a good read. But, there is more I want to say.
As you can see from my photo below, I am 62, Caucasian, and male. I’m smiling because I am happily married to a little brown woman. She could be from the Philippine Islands (P.I.), but she isn’t. She is Puerto Rican. I was born in
The Civilizing Question Has Been Mooted
You mentioned a couple of books you read that opened your mind to some profound thoughts about the so-called civilizing process Caucasians have imposed on inferior races of people, and you poignantly pointed out the harsh possibility that the process was all wrong because there is no arbiter of which civilization is superior. You suggested it is better to have ancestors, roots, and relatives than somebody else’s civilization. I was somewhat intrigued by those assertions, for they do highlight important questions that deserve concrete answers. More importantly, they highlight a salient reality: major elements of every racial group that has undergone a civilizing process at the hands of another racial group would provide a concrete answer that is not only different from its civilizer’s answer, but also begs to be “right”, which it usually isn’t, in the grand scheme of things. You’ll see why I say that as you read on.
As you know from the American involvement with the P.I. since 1898,
After all, who’s to say the hustle and bustle of American cities and towns and the cushy lives of most Americans are at all superior to the dawn-to-dusk struggle for survival of the American wigwam, teepee, or pueblo dwellers, or of the marauding, pillaging, enslaving, woman-stealing, jungle-dwelling Muslim Moros of the Sulu Archipelago? Who’s to say Catholicism and Calvinism of the conquering Caucasians are superior religions to Islam, animism, polytheistic idol worship, or praise of Mother Earth and the Great Spirit?
Miraculously, I agree with you that those are interesting questions, and that the answers are troublesome, if one is to be honest. But you, being excessively politically correct (in keeping with modern tradition for university professors), not to mention somewhat feminist, will feel so uncomfortable with a spate of those answers that getting an honest discussion out of you will be like extracting teeth from a chicken. I’ll give it a try, though.
Inferior IQ and It’s Impact on Wealth
Ooops, did I just say “inferior races of people” in the fourth paragraph above this one? I thought maybe that would raise your hackles, and now I think I should explain. If you grab a copy of
It is widely acknowledged in honest academic circles that IQ is very much a function of genetics, and is less affected by culture. African blacks, for example, have an average IQ of 70, while American blacks have an average IQ of 85. The IQ difference is a testament to better diet, better education, and better access to better genes in
There are few rational, educated, honest people who will argue against the suggestion that sub-Saharan African civilization is equal or superior to American civilization. The continent is still plagued by dozens of different languages, oppressive poverty, rampant crime, abusive government corruption, miserable education, low productivity, illegitimate births, epidemic disease (like AIDS and malaria), internecine warfare, and primitive religion (Voodoo, animism, and Islam are alive and well there). I don’t know a single American black person who would want to live in black
American Red people would be more noticeably demanding the same thing – the preservation of their languages and customs (with the exception of a couple of tribes, they had no written language) – if only more of them had survived the disease and war of the white man.
It is instructive in assessing the relative merits of the world’s civilizations to consider the conclusions of La Griffe du Lion:
“Thus, for a technologically sophisticated society, Smart Fraction Theory asserts that a nation's per capita GDP is determined by the population fraction with IQ greater than or equal to some threshold IQ. Consistent with the data of
Figure 3. Least squares fit of Smart Fraction Theory to the data of
To explain the lower GDP of the higher IQ Northeastern Asian countries, the above formula is revised thusly:
“in market economies, per capita GDP is directly proportional to the population fraction with verbal IQ equal to or greater than 106.” [see graph at http://www.lagriffedulion.f2s.com/sft2fig6.gif - When smart fractions are calculated from verbal IQs, the appearance of NE Asian points is unremarkable.]
That is because Northeastern Asians (and their Amerindian relatives) are 6.5 points lower in verbal IQ than are Caucasians, albeit higher in cognitive IQ. That difference adversely affects their GDP. The “other” category in the graph includes Pacific Islanders like Filipinos.
Figure 6. When smart fractions are calculated from verbal IQs, the appearance of NE Asian points is unremarkable.
The Law of the Survival of the Fittest is Being Outgrown
Here’s the issue, and it is one you singularly failed to elucidate from your ivory tower: in ages past, when disparate peoples have come together, war, conquest, and some kind of civilizing process have served as a fulfillment of the law of the survival of the fittest. They have always been a way of saying: “We do not agree with your ideas, your civilization, or your stewardship of land, so we are going to civilize you, enslave you, or wipe you out, and become the new stewards.” Conquest and genocide were justified by that law alone, no matter how they might precipitate a crisis of anguish in our consciences.
But that is changing. Our world is making a transition. Laws in legitimate nations now prohibit slavery and grant universal suffrage, allowing their responsible adult citizens to vote. International laws prohibit, but do not yet prevent, a stronger nation from invading and conquering a weaker one whimsically and without provocation. “Civilized” nations now petition the United Nation for approval before undertaking invasions. National and international laws protect weaker minorities from abuse by stronger majorities. In short, the world is becoming more civilized. Far from being perfect, it is effectively disrupting and unbalancing the populations because it is undermining the law of the survival of the fittest. It is not replacing that law with one that achieves the same natural purpose – culling and reducing degenerate and inferior genetic stocks of the planet.
That is a new threat to world civilization, one that politically correct professors hate to discuss publicly. Since the law now protects inferior people, and since they tend to out-procreate superior people, the inferior people are burgeoning while the superior diminish in number. This causes politicians to pander to those of the inferior groups who are allowed to vote. Inferior people are less lawful and economically productive, and more poverty-stricken. Their immoral behavior has graver consequences, such as rampant teen pregnancies among
Yes, you can complain about the civilizing process because nobody wants to be “civilized” or dispossessed by somebody else. And you can complain that wars of conquest are usually genocidal, particularly against the crème of the race, which are usually the first ones to fight the invaders and die as a result. That gives rise to this question:
- What are you offering as an alternative to the law of the survival of the fittest that will achieve its main benefit peacefully?
No longer do most nations invade others to colonize them.
Yes,
Now there are only two groups of people on this world who invade other countries by stealth, to destroy them from within, and to “civilize” them according to their own corrupt and demonic ideologies: Communists and Muslims. Observers of history have only witnessed the menace of Communism at work for the past century, but we see 14 centuries of the menace of Islam at work, now having conquered a fifth of the world’s people and a sixth of its land mass. And note this: from the honest observer’s point of view, both Islam and Communism seem to be superior ideologies to those held by the bulk of the peoples they have conquered. The horrors Islam and Communism have visited upon conquered people have actually resulted in improvements in the general conditions of before. Nevertheless, the conquered people have merely exchanged one kind of dictatorship for another. I do not consider that to be very civilizing, but at least it is a step in the right direction.
The Real Question: What are the Benefits of War?
I believe you are too preoccupied with the wrongness of stronger people bending weaker people to their will. You are missing the important question:
- What are the benefits of war?
When you are able to answer that question, I’d love to see your laundry list of benefits, and I invite you to share it with me. Then, you need to answer the really important question:
- How can the benefits of war be achieved through peaceful means?
How to Replace the Law of the Survival of the Fittest Peacefully: Eugenics
I wish to propose an answer to the question of alternatives to the law of the survival of the fittest:
- Involuntary sterilization of the least fit
- Massive promotion of intelligent mate selection
- Special education and vocational direction for the stupid
Note that implementing my proposals will diminish your complaint about the forcible civilizing of inferior people, so their won’t be any “otherness” to cloud their thoughts about who they are. For, if inferior people do not exist, there will be no motive to subjugate them, civilize them, and steal or control of their natural resources.
Unfortunately, Americans do not, in general support the involuntary sterilization of undesirable gene groups. Hitler made that an unpopular alternative, and university professors almost universally denounce the practice as being politically incorrect, uncivilized, and a dastardly usurpation of people’s natural right to procreate more of their own kind.
There is another way of looking at it. Science teaches us the precise result that accrues when two people of inferior IQ mate and procreate. The children will also have low IQ. You could view this as a process by which two people, parents, inject an innocent child, their offspring, with a serum that makes the child stupid and unable to prosper lawfully in society. Were you to do the same thing with a hypodermic needle to a child on a public street in
The truth of this is made evident by certain facts, and I present them for illustration purposes. In
A wise and benevolent society is obliged by decency to prohibit the perpetuation of inferior genes that debilitate people and destroy civilization.
I’m certain your motherly instinct drives you to complain that such programs will deprive men and women who don’t make the cut of the joy of creating and rearing families. That is not necessarily so. There are enough people in this world with IQs above 95 to supply sufficient sperm and egg to qualified husband/wife couples of low IQ. Every couple that is morally and financially fit should be able to parent children.
I’m guessing you want to argue that stupid people have just as much right to live as smart people. Well, no, that’s not true. Remember that our eugenics plan is intended to replace war and genocide as means of eliminating inferior people. In reality, stupid people do not have as much right to be brought into existence as do smart people. In fact, if society so dictates, they have no right at all. And because the law of the survival of the fittest would have killed them off anyway, they have no natural right either. The idea of eugenics laws is to provide a mechanism by which intelligent people can ensure future generations will be as able or more able to solve the problems of life as they are.
Why the Philippines
Yes, the
- First of all, there is a practical limit to how much innately stupid people can be taught – the average IQ in the
- Second, social growth is always agonizingly slow because people resist change (so we need a few more centuries to see the real good that can result).
- Third,
- Fourth, America is being deluged with stupid immigrants from third world nations, not to mention a burgeoning of the stupid already in its gene pool, and that “dumbing-down” process is impacting both government and academia, further suppressing the establishment of benign eugenics laws. On a world-wide scale with the
Frankly, I think it might have been better for the
In the final analysis, an honest observer must conclude that the civilizations of
Some Questions and Answers About Life
In closing this lengthy and unbidden correspondence, I am minded to ask you three questions that will lead you to a better recognition of what you already know – that regardless of how people express their individual, family, tribe, or nation existences, some things are superior to others. It is not just a matter of equality of all choices of religion, government, and human relationship. There is such a thing as social, national, and spiritual progress. And some civilizations foster progress more than do others. That is evident in our respective quality of life.
- What is the meaning of life?
- What is the value of life?
- What is the purpose of life?
- What is the mission of life?
When you honestly face these questions, here are the answers you will find:
- The meaning of life is its adaptability.
- The value of life is its progressability.
- The purpose of life is to develop a balanced and magnificent personality.
- The mission of life is to evolve sublime relationships – to be like God in consummate devotion to truth, beauty, and goodness.
A civilization is good to the extent that it fosters human progress through the above answers to a condition where people are smart, prosperous, fit, able, and benign. And note that any rational human being, regardless of roots, naturally craves living in such a civilization. So many people dream of coming to
The Implications for Civilization
When you survey the various civilizations and religions of the world, and stack them up against 1-4 above, you then clearly can see some rise in value to humanity like cream that rises to the surface of milk. It is unquestionably far more civilized to erect modern sanitation and plumbing systems (such as are found in Manila) than to defecate in a forest latrine and walk five miles every day to bring water back home from the nearest river, into which your neighbors are defecating (a condition typical of remote areas of Mindinao and the Sulu Archipelago).
But the
I thank you for taking your time to read this, and for the energy and thought you put into your essay. I welcome any feedback you might have to my comments.
Sincerely,
Bob Hurt
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