This post is a continuation of my previous post, EDITORIAL: Thoughts Whether Or Not We Are Virtuous.  Both my previous post and this one have been prompted by private conversations I have had in connection to my involvement with the Steve Nichols’ Morning Drive talk radio program last week.  To set the table for this post, I had another conversation with the same friend mentioned in my last post.  This time, we discussed the notion of ‘principles’ and how it is connected to the greater discussion of how rights, duty, virtue and morality are all connected.  Once again, I am going to try to keep my comments as neutral as possible and, where this is not possible, as far removed from the people and examples that prompted this private discussion.  I am trying to explain how I see these issues, and why I see them the way I do.  I have no desire to single out any one person or persons in the process.  That would defeat my point — especially given the discussion at hand.

So, the question came up as to what ‘principles’ are and how they work.  For me, they are very much like ‘virtue,’ but they work in a different way.  In the case of virtue, we are dealing with a quality inalienable from the individual and related to how a person acts.  A person is said to be virtuous if and only if they habitually do their duty of their own free will — not by being forced to do so.   Well, ‘principles’ are also inalienable to the individual.  They are — at least theoretically — the set of those things an individual believes that make up his moral perspective on the world.  In other words, ‘principles’ are supposed to be the set of rules governing right and wrong which govern the way a righteous person lives.  If a person has a personal morality, and they habitually live by the standard of their personal morality, they are said to be principled.

However, people often ignore their personal standards of right and wrong, much in the same way they try to push off their responsibilities on to other people.  And, just like those people who push off their duties on to others, the people who ignore or compromise their moral principles often believe they still deserve to be called a principled person.  Here again, I do not understand how people such as this arrive at this conclusion.  If I believe something is wrong but I ignore that belief, or worse, I willingly act in an opposite way, then I am not acting according to my principles.  How can I honestly expect people to then think of me as principled?  It would be like I were walking around naked, but expecting everyone to tell me how nice my new clothes are.

I suppose this should not surprise me.  I do it all the time, and I believe I know better.  Why should I expect others — who have never consciously considered such things — to be any better?  But I do expect them to know and act better — especially when they are in prominent positions of public trust.  One cannot claim to oppose something and then act in such a way that supports, defends or furthers that thing.  If I am against world hunger, but I act in a way that prevents aid from getting to a region suffering from famine, I can tell myself I am ‘principled’ all I want.  The truth remains: I am not acting in a principled manner in this case.  If I make this sort of thing a habit in my life, then I am not and can not be a ‘principled’ person until I change my ways.  It is that simple.

If we dig down to the absolute bedrock of this issue, I believe what we’ll find is the issue of moral compromise.  Principled people do not make moral compromises.  That is why they are said to be principled.  Unfortunately, being a morally principled person usually results in great personal cost — especially in a morally compromised world.  It can also be difficult to see when we are making moral compromises.  If we find ourselves in a position where we know we are being asked to compromise our principles, but it might cost us our job, we could easily convince ourselves that it would be more wrong to put ourselves in a position where we cannot provide for our family.  I only wish morality worked that way.  Then people like Bonhoeffer, Gandhi, and Dr. King could have made their principled stands without paying any penalties.  But that is often how we know we are making a moral stand, living a principled life: the world takes its pound of flesh from us in response to that stand.

Anyway, like I said: I know I am guilty of compromise.  But I try harder every day to look for and avoid them.  This is actually what Jesus was talking about in the passages about not judging.  He does not tell us not to judge.  Anyone who keeps reading that passage will see it ends by telling us the point is to learn how to judge correctly, righteously.  But this requires us to look inward first, so we can see ourselves and the way we live our own lives as we truly are — not as we think we are.  This is supposed to teach us to be sympathetic and charitable toward others, so that, when we judge their actions, we can put ourselves in their shoes.  Now, that does not mean we excuse wrong.  Too many among us have made that conclusion and it is wrong.  It leads directly to the slippery slope of ruin.  But it does mean we should be much more reserved about what we correct in others, and much more gentle in how we do it.  At least, that is how I have come to see this whole issue of rights, morality, duty, virtue and principles.

 

Before we begin, a little background is in order.  This will be a random post.  It has not been written to fit into any of my ‘themed’ series on this blog page.  It was inspired by a conversation I was having with a friend of my in connection to a conversation I was having with a listener to Steve Nichols’ Morning Drive talk radio show out of Valdosta, Georgia.  Normally, I prefer to use specific examples when I write.  I feel they make it easier to understand what I am trying to communicate.  However, in this case, I’d have to write a post about the conversation and then write this one responding to that conversation.  I think I did enough of that last week with my posts to ‘Richard.’  Therefore, in the interest of keeping this post relevant to random readers, I have decided to ‘generalize’ the topic at hand.

The topic is complicated.  I was discussing morality: more specifically, how duty and virtue are related to the concept of morality.  In the end, my friend and I seem to have arrived at the conclusion that duty is something we are all responsible for doing, but virtue is the act of actually performing that duty.  In other words, we all have duties to each other.  They are part of the Social Contract that formed our society.  If we believe in God, we have duties to Him, as well.  However, having a duty does not make one a moral or virtuous person.  Only those people who actually perform their duties can be called moral or virtuous.

Unfortunately, there are far too many people in this world who seem to think they can claim to be virtuous by transferring their duty to some one or something else.  This simply is not the case  A duty belongs to the individual.  It is inherent to that individual.  It cannot be taken or given away — not even by agreement.  Similarly, virtue only applies to the person who performs their individual duty.  Thus, even if an individual could transfer an individual duty, they still could not claim to be virtuous.  if the person or thing they transferred that duty to performed that transferred duty, then that person or thing could claim to be virtuous, but not the person who transferred their duty.  In fact, the person who passed of their duty would rightfully be could dishonest, dishonorable, evil, sinful, unethical, unrighteous, wicked: take your pick, they are all antonyms of virtuous.

I honestly do not know a better way to explain what I am trying to say than to use Scripture.  Therefore, I’ll start with a meme I have already used; a meme that makes my point clearly and forcefully:

Jesus placed a personal, individual duty on His disciples (followers) to care for those who are truly in need.  Christ never said to put this duty off on government.  In fact, Jesus said to give to the Caesar (government) that which is Caesar’s (government’s), and to give to God that which is God’s.  If a believer were to try to put off the commandment to be charitable onto government, this would not be a virtuous act.  Among other reasons, it would be disobedient to the Lord. But it would also destroy the notion of charity.  This is because taxes are not voluntary, and charity demands a voluntary act of will.  It is part of the very definition of charity.  So, if one puts their duty to be charitable off on government, then charity is destroyed and replaced by theft masquerading as charity.  That is how the devil works, not God or His people.

Jesus gave us other examples.  He said to honor our father and mother.  Well, first, we no longer understand what it means to ‘honor’ our parents, so we go astray right from the start.  But setting this aside, many believers have assumed that this commandment ends when we leave our parents’ household.  It doesn’t, so we go wrong again.  In most cases, we have learned to put off our duty to our parents onto government and/or insurance companies.  In most cases, we expect the government to provide for our elderly parents.  There is no virtue n this.  In some cases, we may pay for a retirement or nursing home, but there is no virtue in this, either.  This is because, even if we pay for it, we are still putting off our individual duty to care for (not provide for) our parents onto the retirement or nursing home.  The Lord said we — personally — are to honor (i.e. obey and care for, etc) our parents.  That command is personal to each believer and ends with the death of both of the believer’s parents.

I could beat this point for a long time, but I have to assume the reader either sees it by now, or the reader likely never will.  Either way, the fact that duty cannot be transferred, and that there is no virtue in trying to do so are Truths with a capital ‘T.’ We all have duties.  If we do them willingly, we are virtuous.  If we ignore them, we are not virtuous.  If we seek to push them off on others, or worse, to force others to do them for us, then we are the opposite of virtuous (dishonest, dishonorable, evil, sinful, unethical, unrighteous, wicked).  No amount of mental or logical gymnastics will change this.  All an attempt to alter this Truth does is add to the ‘not virtuous’ behavior a person may have already done.  This is because we have a duty to the truth, therefore, trying to twist the truth is not virtuous.

I started out by telling you this post was inspired by a conversation I had with a friend.  My friend is the one who boiled this issue down to duty and virtue: we all have duties, but only the virtuous person does them willingly.  I was happy to accept this definition –mostly because it seems to be true (capital ‘T’).  But there is another aspect of this general discussion my friend and I did not discuss: that is the flaw in human nature that seems to drive so many of us to avoid taking personal responsibility for ourselves and our actions.  I suppose that should be the topic for another post, but it is what is at the heart of the desire to push off our personal duties onto other people.  We want others to be responsible, even if we are the one who did or was supposed to do it.  This troubles me a great deal, especially when the people seeking to avoid responsibility also expect to be counted as virtuous.  I’m sorry, I cannot and will never understand how such people arrive at this position: where they can tell other people to do their work and expect to be given the credit for having done that work.  The most charitable explanation I can think of is that they have blinded themselves through their own pride and arrogance.  Honestly, I hope this is the case, because the only other option I can think of is much, much less charitable — and that is that they are most likely just wicked or evil people.  🙁

 

 

As I constantly try to explain, there are rules for how to properly think our way through things.  In my continuing efforts to help others learn these rules, I am going to continue to use the caller known as ‘Richard’ on Steve Nichols Morning Drive talk radio show as a learning opportunity to teach that just that keeps on giving.  In this case, I am going to use a message ‘Richard’ sent to one of Steve’s listeners to demonstrate why we shouldn’t just accept what people tell us — especially when they do not provide any sources to support their assertions.  However, before we begin, I would like to let Steve’s listeners know that I checked with Steve to make sure he was OK with me writing this post before I wrote it.  Contrary to him saying otherwise, I consider the risk of violence from ‘Richard’ to be very real and I do not want to place others in danger without first consulting with them (and yes, I am serious about this — and I have good reason to be).  So, with that said, here is the message from ‘Richard’ that was shared with me:

Hi [name redacted]. This is in response to your comment on my comment that sex education reduces abortion. You said that abstinence and morals decreases abortions. What you advocate with regard to sex education was the way it was before 1930. The abortion numbers were around 1.5 to 2 million per year between 1890 and 1930. That’s an abortion rate 320 percent higher than the current one if you factor in the population. There’s nothing wrong with teaching abstinence but if you teach that alone, the number of abortions could triple based on historical evidence. During that time between 1890 and 1930 they also had protestant prayer in the public schools. People still had sex but were uneducated about it resulting in a super large number of pregnancies and termination of them. Abortion was illegal then too resulting in from 1 to 1.5 million deaths of women from self performed and back ally abortions yearly. Would you want to go back to all that? I didn’t mean to suggest that prayer in school caused people to have sex and get pregnant but there’s no evidence that it ever prevented it. The abortion rate has been going down since 1930 and the number of them performed per year since 1990. Also the annual rate of women dying from abortion is down 93 percent since 1973. If you care about human life, why would you ever ever want to go back to the past? Always enjoy chatting with [name redacted] and hearing you on the radio. Enjoy your weekend and I know you like myself will be praying for the people in the Carolinas. [sic]

OK, whenever you encounter a claim like this, the first thing you should do is look for some sort of citation telling you where you can find the data used to support the claims being made.  In this case, that claim is that there were 1.5 – 2 million annual abortions from 1898 through 1930.  If this citation is not provided, that is usually a good indication that you should be suspicious.  Therefore, in cases such as this one — where the citation is not offered — it is unwise to accept anything that is said until after you check to see if it is true.  I have done this.  I have spent the past few days looking for the Data  ‘Richard’ supposedly used to support the claims he made in this message.  Guess what I discovered?  I discovered that ‘Richard’ is not telling people the truth.  Here is how I know I can safely say this:

First, simple reason should tell us that there is something wrong with ‘Richards’ claims.  Before 1970, abortion was illegal in this country.  This means that it is unlikely that there will be any official data on the number of abortions — legal or otherwise — before 1970.  It would be like looking for official records on the number of times people bought illegal drugs every year.  The best you could do is make an estimate, and, just like drug use, there is no real baseline by which to establish anything more than a guess about how many abortions there might have been before 1970.  This was enough for me to be suspicious of ‘Richard’s’ claim from the start, but I know better than to stop there.  I wanted to look deeper.

Let’s start by remembering what ‘Richard’ said:

The abortion numbers were around 1.5 to 2 million per year between 1890 and 1930. That’s an abortion rate 320 percent higher than the current one if you factor in the population.

I checked for his data.  I found a consistent trend in the sources listed on the first 2 pages of my Google search.  This is the easiest of those sources I found for the laymen to understand (this includes me):

Historical abortion statistics, United States

compiled by Wm. Robert Johnston
last updated 23 February 2017

According to this source, the total number of reported (i.e. known) abortions in the United States between 1898 and 1930 was 10!  Not 10 million, not 1.5 – 2 million per year: 10!  There are only 10 known abortions in the 42 years ‘Richard’ cites! Before I do the math for you, remember: ‘Richard’ said:

That’s an abortion rate 320 percent higher than the current one if you factor in the population.

Well, the math says differently.  In fact, if we assume that the ration of men to women in 1930 was 1:1 (a generous assumption in this case that actually helps ‘Richard’s’ claim), then there were 0.000032 abortions per 1000 women in 1930.  [I used the U.S. Census data from 1930 to make this calculation]. According to the information in the link I provided above, in 2017, the abortion rate was 14.6 per 1000 women.  Now, my math is a little rusty, but I think this is something on the order of a 45,624,900% increase in the rate of abortion since 1930!!!*  Let me say that again;

The actual data on known abortions in the U.S. shows a 45,624,900% increase in abortions since 1930.*

If we want to, we can stop right here and dismiss everything else ‘Richard’ has to say in his message to Steve’s listener.  We have just shown that he is wildly incorrect about his primary claim, therefore, we have no reason to believe anything else he has to say will be correct.  No, this does not mean he is wrong, or that this one mistake makes the rest of what he has to say wrong.  Making those assumptions would be a fallacy.  No, as an evaluation of ‘Richard’s’ character, we would be justified if we dismissed all his other claims.  But we’re not going to stop here.  We are going to address two more claims in ‘Richard’s’ message.  ‘Richard’ also said:

During that time between 1890 and 1930 they also had protestant prayer in the public schools. People still had sex but were uneducated about it resulting in a super large number of pregnancies and termination of them. Abortion was illegal then too resulting in from 1 to 1.5 million deaths of women from self performed and back ally abortions yearly.

Remember, we have just demonstrated that there were 10 total abortions in the 42 year period ‘Richard’ addresses.  Now let’s look at the claim there were 1 – 1.5 million deaths due to failed abortions every year during this same period.  In order for there to have been 1 – 1.5 million deaths per year because of bad abortion attempts during this same period, it would mean that there was 1 death due to a failed abortion attempt for every two to three  woman who actually delivered a baby.  That is 1/4 to 1/3 of all women who got pregnant every year.  This number not only defies reason, I couldn’t find a single link that provided any data to support this claim.  But there is more.  According to the data we do have on known abortions in this time period, ‘Richard’s’ claim about the number of women who died due to failed abortions would mean that — statistically speaking — 100% of all attempted abortions failed!  ‘Statistically speaking’, this is impossible!

Finally, in regard to the affect of prayer in school, ‘Richard’ says this:

I didn’t mean to suggest that prayer in school caused people to have sex and get pregnant but there’s no evidence that it ever prevented it.

Well, just do some quick Googling here and you will find data such as this:

A. Young People

1. For 15 years before 1963 pregnancies in girls ages 15 through 19 years had been no more than 15 per thousand After 1963 pregnancies increased 187% in the next 15 years.

2. For younger girls, ages 10 to 14 years, pregnancies since 1963 are up 553%.

3. Before 1963 sexually transmitted diseases among students were 400 per 100,000. Since 1963, they were up 226% in the next 12 years.

You will also find this information (the information in this post will really surprise most readers):

RIGHT REASONING: How To Decide Which Side To Believe When You Don’t Have The Facts?

In the science of Sociology, the information presented in these last two links is said to show a ‘correlation.’  This means there is a connection of some sort between two or more observations.  In this case, those observations would be the end of school prayer and the increase of teenage pregnancy and the spread of STD’s among school-age children.  In most every case where the correlation is as strong as it is in these links, it is said to be ‘causal,’ which means that one observation causes another.  In this case, that means the information I just presented shows that the removal of school prayer is at least partially to blame for the increase in teen pregnancy and STD’s.  This directly contradicts ‘Richard’s’ claim.

We have now demonstrated that ‘Richard’ is wrong about three of the claims he made in his message to Steve’s listener.  But he is also wrong about his assertion that we are more moral today than in the past.  If a decrease in abortion is used as a measure of increased morality, then we are on the magnitude of hundreds of thousands of times less moral than we were in the period from 1898 to 1930.  Furthermore, the data does — in fact — suggest that the removal of prayer from our schools is directly linked to the increase in teenage pregnancy and STD rates.  That would be evidence to support the Founders’ assertions that morality is directly tied to religion.  Since the data on religiosity in America shows a steady decline, that is still further indication that we are becoming less moral as a society over time.

Now, before I add an aside to this post, let me predict what ‘Richard’ will do in response to this post.  If he reads it, ‘Richard’ will most likely respond by attacking me, as well as Dr. Barton.  If he addresses the data I have presented, he will dismiss it.  However, it is most likely that he will ignore it all together. Instead of trying to deal with the reality of the numbers, he will try to destroy the character of the people presenting it (i.e. me and/or Dr. Barton).  This is the fallacy of ad hominem attack, also known as ‘against the man.’

 

A SHORT ASIDE:

‘Richard’ is correct in pointing out the fact that there has been a decline in abortions in recent years.  However, if you look into this, you will find there is no ‘consensus’ as to why this is happening.  they will look at the availability of free abortion clinics.  they will suggest it is connected to easier access to birth control.  they even credit sex education for the decrease.  Well, there are several other very likely ‘culprits’ that no one has addressed — because they do not fit the PC narrative.  This is where my Sociology degree actually has served me well.

Over the last couple decades, the people who would normally have abortions have been having fewer children.  This is connected to the phenomenon we call ‘the me generation.’  In short, people are too self-focused to want to be bothered raising children, so they have been taking precautions to prevent pregnancy.  On the surface, this would appear to be connected to better access of contraception and sex education, but that explanation ignores the fact that, because of this trend, over several generations, the number of younger women goes down.  Now think about it.  If you have fewer women total, then you are going to have fewer abortions.  Now, admittedly, this is why we use ratios, but the problem there is that the socio-economic status of the women in question is not addressed.  In short, the yuppies selfish lifestyles throw off the numbers because it is not accounted for — especially in regards to this next observation.

Sine the 1990’s, the legal and illegal immigrants coming to this country have primarily come from parts of the world where abortion is a taboo!  For those coming from Central and South America, their Catholic influences lead to increased birth rates and almost no abortions.  The same applies to the influx of Muslims over the last decade.  Islam encourages Muslims to have many children and frowns on abortion.  This, combined with the fact that younger women have been shying away from having children makes for a statistical mess.  And that is because the vast majority of the people studying the abortion figures never even consider the things I just mentioned.  I know.  I read some of the abstracts in the studies I looked at before i wrote this post (abstracts are the technical details behind a study — the type of stuff that makes the average person’s eyes bleed and head explode).

Still, as I always tell my readers, you are free to dismiss me.  It does not matter.  You have to decide what you will believe for yourself — and why.  But I know that, if the reader follows behind me, they will find I have not falsely presented any of this material, and that is because i don’t have to.  🙂

 

ADDITIONAL READING:

UNDERSTANDING THE CONSTITUTION: STOP IT! Abortion is NOT and Has NEVER Been a “Constitutional Right!”

Roe v. Wade is not only bad law, it is flt-out unconstitutional and the Supreme Court knew it — still knows it.  Just read that link.  The founders considered it murder to cause the death of a child after the point of the quickening.  In their day, this was usually the first point where a woman knew she was actually pregnant, so…  From the time that it could be known a woman was pregnant, the child was protected by law!  What’s more, I have never encountered a definition of ‘human‘ that excludes the unborn child that I could not also break.  If the reader wants to try, feel free, but be prepared to have your argument broken.  That said, please, do not read this challenge or my words as an attack or judgment upon anyone who has had an abortion.  Personally, I believe there are two victims in every abortion: the child and his or her mother. 🙁

 

* I mean it when I say I may have done the math wrong on this one.  The rate of abortions in 1930 would have been 0.000032 per 1000 women (61388500 women divided into the 2 known abortions, then multiplied by 100 known abortions to get the number of abortions per 1000 women).  In 2017, it was 14.6 per 1000 women.  I then performed the calculations according to this link to arrive at an increase of 45,624,900%!  Again, my math is rusty, and I know I could be wrong, but only by a decimal place or two.  Either way, the increase is huge, and it is not favorable to ‘Richard’s’ claims.

 

If you read this blog for very long, you will find me talking about fallacies.  Fallacies are mistakes in the process of reasoning and critical thinking.  Another way to think of it is a fallacy is a logic trick, or as an attempt to cheat in an argument.  We encounter fallacies every day, it’s just that the majority of us do not recognize them for what they are.  The purpose of this series is to help us learn the most common fallacies, how they work and how to spot them in our daily lives.  The particular fallacy discussed in this post is called ‘False Dilemma.’

False dilemma can be thought of as the ‘black-or-white,’ or the ‘either-or‘ fallacy — mostly because this is the way the majority of us will encounter it.  Please read the full explanation of ‘false dilemma‘ by following the links I have provided.  They will give you a formal understanding of this fallacy.  However, I want to do my best to bring this down to ‘kitchen table talk’ for you.  I hope I succeed.

The most common way we will see this fallacy presented to us is in a news article, and editorial or a discussion where the person trying to persuade us to see things there way frames their point in a way that leaves us with one of two or three choices.  When they do this, they will usually present the choices so that one — the choice they prefer — looks much more acceptable than the other choice(s).  When they do this, unless these are — in fact — the only choices, and they have been presented in a totally factual way — the person who is trying to convince you to agree with them is using a fallacy.  In other words, they are using a logic trick, or they are trying to cheat to win their argument.  Here are a few examples:

Suppose someone shows you a story about the desperate plight of the homeless.  Then they tell you that no one is providing for their needs except the government.  Finally, they present you with the choice: either you should vote to help the homeless, or you are greedy or heartless.  This is a ‘false dilemma’ fallacy that I have paraphrased, but it came directly from actual news stories.

Here is another example:

Suppose I show you screen captures of several tweets from Donald Trump, and the screen captures I use are clearly outside the norm of typical Presidential commentary.  Then I tell you that these tweets prove that Donald Trump is either mentally unstable, or lacks the intellectual understanding necessary to be President.  This is also ‘false dilemma.’  Why?  Simple: there is another rational explanation.  It is possible that Donald Trump intentionally sends out these tweets just to aggravate and distract the media as well as his political opponents.  If this is the case, then that is an explanation where the President is neither intellectually nor mentally unqualified.  Here again, I pulled this example from recent headlines, and I will leave you with a thought that will demonstrate why the media has been intentionally committing false dilemma in this regard.  Have you ever noticed that there is a correlation between when President Trump puts out a crazy sounding tweet and when he is doing something behind the scenes that we only find out about after he succeeds in getting it done?  Well, that could easily be evidence that Trump is tweeting with a purpose, and that this tactic has — so far — been wildly successful. 

This is how false dilemma works and, now that you know how to spot it, if you start looking, you will find it being used everywhere — and by people on all sides of the political isle. So do that: start looking for it, and when you find it, decide however you want, but know that the person who presented that false dilemma is most likely trying to trick you.

This past week, I spent a great deal of time addressing a guy known as ‘Richard.’  ‘Richard’ is a regular caller to the Steve Nichols Morning Drive talk radio show.  ‘Richard’ is not his real name.  From what I have learned, this caller refuses to give his real name.  So I wrote two posts addressing some of the messages ‘Richard’ has sent me this past week.  Originally, my intention was to demonstrate how people like ‘Richard’ think, and how they respond when they are challenged by someone who knows how to deal with their fallacious reasoning.  I have also been listening to Steve and his audience and how they have reacted to my posts to ‘Richard.’  Well, as I listened to Steve wrap up for the week, it suddenly dawned on me.  I have instinctively understood the central point I was trying to make all along, but I failed to actually explain it to those who were reading my posts to ‘Richard.’  For this, I apologize.  I left it to readers to just figure it out for themselves, but — at the risk of sounding arrogant (and please, forgive me if I do so) — I should have known that there would be many readers for whom my real point would not be readily apparent.  So, if the reader will indulge me, I’d like to explain something I should have addressed all along — Liberal Misdirection.

Now, I also realize that it already appears to many as though I am just trying to beat up on ‘Richard,’ and I do not want to further this perception.  Therefore, I am going to use an entirely different example to make my point.  However, if the reader is familiar with ‘Richard,’ and how he operates, I have no doubt the reader will recognize ‘Richard’ in the example I am about to give.  Here is the example we will use for this post:

If we listen to the political commentary in our society today, we will hear a common refrain: ‘The system doesn’t work.’  If we listen closely enough, we will also discover that the ‘system’ is defined as the system of government given to us by our Founders (i.e. The Constitution), along with our Capitalist economy.  To put it another way, we will hear voices that claim our Founder’s system and the Capitalist way are old, antiquated, broken and no longer work for our modern times.  If the reader is honest with themselves — especially if the reader is sympathetic toward this particular opinion — then the reader no doubt knows that this is true: there is a common theme in our current political dialogue to this affect.  Now let me show you why all of this is misdirection.

I am going to come back to our example here in just a moment.  First, I want to ask you something.  Suppose you just bought a brand new Chevy, and it works great.  You love it.  but I keep telling you that your car is old and broken and doesn’t work anymore.  You try to tell me that Your car if fine, there is nothing wrong with it, but I insist you are crazy.  For whatever reason, you just want to hold on to your gas-guzzling, smoke-producing old, broken down car.  Finally, you tell me to show you what car you are talking about and I say fine, I will.  I take you outside and I point to my old, broken down Ford (sorry Ford O:-) ).  Then I say, “See, your car is old, broken down and does not work anymore.    It needs to be replaced.  Why can’t you see and admit that?  Now stop holding on to it and let’s buy a new one.”  How are you going to deal with me — especially when you suddenly realize I honestly believe my old broken Ford is the car you are driving?

OK, now let’s go back to our example.  In our example, the system our Founders gave us — including Capitalism — is actually your new Chevy!  In the whole of human history, your car has only been around for the last 200-250 years.  That means your car is new.  In fact, it is the newest car on the market today.  On the other hand, what I have is an old car that has been around much longer.  Truth be told, my car is as old as human history, itself.  I am the one driving the old, broken system, but I refuse to believe that.  I believe your car, your system, is the broken system.  Now, how do we deal with this — because this is actually the reality we are facing!

I imagine the average reader’s first reaction to my last words will be something like, “What?!  What do you mean by that?”  It’s simple: I mean we are not using the system our Founders gave us, nor are we operating under free-market Capitalism!  Everywhere we look, our leaders tell us we are, but they are me: they are telling you that your new Chevy is the problem when — in reality — it is my old, broken Ford that is causing everyone all the trouble we’re experiencing.  By this, I mean to tell you that our current system of government is closer to the old ways of human government than it is to the system our Founders designed, and our leaders are deliberately telling you the exact opposite is true.  In short, they are lying to us.  It is classic misdirection.  They feed us  lie, then they have us fight over that lie while they slowly build the system they want.

When people say, “America is exceptional,” what they mean is that America is the exception to the rule.  Before the birth of this nation, human history had been the story of one man or a small group of elites ruling over the masses.  Our Founders changed this; for the first time in recorded history, the People were allowed to rule themselves.  The system they designed is the new system, and it still works.  The problem is, since the late 1800’s, the Progressives have slowly been replacing the Founders’ system with a version of the old system (this is actually why they call themselves ‘Progressives:’ because they progress toward their goals a piece at a time, not all at once by revolution).  They have done this so successfully, and for so long, today, we are no longer under the Founders’ system; we are under a new version of the old ways — which is exactly why things no longer work.  The old ways are based on force.  Americans — as a People — are based in Liberty.  So, when people at the top start trying to force their will on freedom-loving people, it causes friction.  What happens when you have friction?  Things start to get hot.  Look at our society today: are things getting hot?

Now, I do not expect the reader to believe me.  This is because I know that our leaders have been knowingly and intentionally lying to this nation for more than 100 years.  I have read their words where they openly boasted that they would do exactly what they have done.  They have even done it the way they said they would.  But I also know — if the reader will take some time to look into this — the reader will find that I am absolutely correct in saying we are closer to Fascism today than we are to our Founders Classic Liberal system.  Fascism is based on the rule of authority; our Founders’ system is based on the rule of law.  The Founders system is new and still works.  The old system of control is just that — old — and it has never worked.  But the people who seek to rule over us have succeeded in convincing a large part of our society that it is the Founders’ system that is broken and needs to be replaced.  This is because they succeeded in lying to us.  They have used misdirection to focus our rage on the cure rather than their disease.  To use another analogy: by making us turn against the very things that could save us, they have given us an auto-immune disease.  Worse, they have even trained us to inoculate ourselves against any cure by teaching us not to look into or think about things for ourselves.

What I am going to ask the reader to do now is look into what I am saying.  Find out what the Founders actually gave us and how it has been changed by the thing we call ‘Liberal/Progressivism.’  Then I would ask the reader to start looking for signs of this practice of misdirection in their world.  Look for it in the news; in their entertainment media; in their schools or their children’s’ schools; from our politicians; even on our talk radio shows.  If you never see it, fine.  Then you have proven to yourself that I am wrong.  However, I do not believe that an honest attempt to learn our founding and then look for misdirection will fail.  I believe, if the reader does what I ask, they will start seeing this misdirection everywhere, because it is in just about everything they feed us to consume today.  This is all I ask, please…