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제목 美대선 거칠어지나 /Letter from 2012 in Obama’s America
글쓴이 동아일보 등록일 2008-10-28
출처 동아일보, World Net Daily 조회수 2072


다음은 동아일보 
http://www.donga.com 에 있는 기사입니다.

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분야 : 국제   2008.10.28(화) 03:00 편집


美대선 거칠어지나

 



“역전 자신있다”
26일 미국 오하이오 주 제인스빌의 한 고등학교 체육관에서 존 매케인 공화당 대선후보가 지지자들을 향해 손을 흔들고 있다. 제인스빌=AP 연합뉴스
초조해진 극우파 ‘섬뜩한 편지’ 공세
 
 

“오바마 찍으면 제2 홀로코스트 일어날 것”

오바마측 “패색 짙어지자 절망감 드러내”

미국 대통령선거가 7일 앞으로 다가왔지만 버락 오바마 민주당 후보와 존 매케인 공화당 후보의 지지율 격차는 7.6%포인트(주요 여론조사 평균)로 그다지 좁혀들 기미를 보이지 않고 있다.

패색이 짙어가는 상황에서 미국 내 강경 보수파 그룹들은 현실로 다가오는 듯한 ‘오바마 대통령 시대’를 저지하기 위한 총공세에 나서는 양상이다.

보수파 기독교 단체인 가족행동포커스(Focus on the Family Action)는 최근 ‘2012년 오바마 시대로부터의 편지’라는 e메일을 대거 발송했다.

“오바마 대통령이 해외 파병을 주저한 결과 미국 내 4개 도시가 테러 공격을 당해 수백 명이 숨지고, 러시아는 발트 해 국가들과 동유럽에 발을 뻗친다. 이스라엘은 핵 공격을 당하고, 이라크는 테러조직 알 카에다가 점령한다….”

“6 대 3으로 리버럴 성향 판사가 주도권을 쥔 대법원은 동성애 결혼을 합법화하고, 보이 스카우트가 동성애자를 지도자로 채용하는 걸 거부하지 못하도록 하며, 동성애자인 지도자가 소년들과 한 텐트에서 야영하는 걸 허용한다. 보이 스카우트는 항의 표시로 스스로 해산해버릴 수도 있다.”

이뿐이 아니다. 한 기독교 근본주의 계통의 잡지 발행인은 독자에게 보내는 편지에서 “오바마 시대에는 동성애와 낙태권이 강화되고, 세금은 오르며, 기독교를 증오하는 사람들의 목소리가 커질 것”이라며 “그가 당선되면 우리가 알고 있는 삶은 끝날 것”이라고 주장했다.

 

격전지인 펜실베이니아 주에서는 “오바마 후보에게 투표하면 제2의 홀로코스트가 발생할 것”이라는 e메일이 7만5000여 유대인 유권자들에게 발송됐다.

 

샌드라 슐츠 뉴먼 전 펜실베이니아 주 대법관 등 유대계 공화당 지도자 3명의 서명이 담긴 이 e메일은 “수많은 우리 조상이 1930, 40년대 경고신호를 무시한 게 결국 불행한 사태로 이어졌다”며 “11월 4일에 잘못된 결정을 해서는 안 된다”고 경고하고 있다.

‘최후의 심판일 시나리오’처럼 섬뜩하게 들리는 이런 주장을 따져보면 사실관계의 왜곡이 태반이다.

해외 파병 및 군사력 사용에 대한 오바마 후보의 정책은 공화당과 별다른 차이가 없다(워싱턴포스트 27일자 분석). 그는 이란과 북한 핵문제, 테러 대책에도 강경하다. 동성애자의 권리를 옹호하지만 동성애 결혼 합법화는 각 주가 알아서 판단할 문제라는 견해를 고수하고 있다.

오바마 캠프는 이런 공세에 대해 “패배에 직면한 절망감의 반영”이라고 반박하면서 “매케인 후보가 명확히 선을 그어야 한다”고 비판하고 있다.

보수파 내부에선 “패배의식을 떨쳐버리자”는 목소리도 쏟아져 나오고 있다.

미첼매드슨 그룹의 아론 미시킨 컨설턴트는 27일 위클리스탠더드 기고문에서 “역대 대선을 보면 부동층은 결국은 좀 더 안전한 선택을 하기 마련”이라며 “굳이 브래들리 효과가 아니더라도 부동층은 투표일 당일 매케인 쪽으로 기울 것”이라고 주장했다.

워싱턴=이기홍 특파원 sechepa@donga.com

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한국인 79% “누가 되느냐에 따라 국익 영향”

갤럽 조사 70개국 중 최고

 

한국인들은 미국 대통령선거에서 누가 이기느냐에 따라 국익에 미치는 영향이 다를 것이라고 생각하는 비율이 상대적으로 매우 높은 것으로 조사됐다. 여론조사기관인 갤럽은 27일 한국을 포함한 70개국 응답자를 상대로 9월에 실시한 미국 대선 관련 국제여론조사 결과를 웹사이트에 공개했다.

‘누가 당선되기를 바라느냐’는 질문에 대한 70개국 국민의 답변 평균을 보면 버락 오바마 민주당 후보가 30%, 존 매케인 공화당 후보가 8%의 지지를 받았고 ‘의견 없음, 모른다, 답변거절’이 62%였다.

1000명을 상대로 조사한 한국의 경우 50% 대 24%로 오바마 후보 지지자가 많았다.

‘누가 당선되느냐에 따라 귀하의 나라에 미치는 영향에 차이가 있을 것으로 보느냐’는 질문에 대한 70개국 응답 평균은 ‘차이가 있을 것’ 31%, ‘차이가 없을 것’ 21%였다.

‘차이가 있을 것’이란 의견의 비율이 가장 높은 나라는 한국이었다. 응답자의 79%가 차이가 있을 것이라고 답했고, 12%만이 차이가 없을 것이라고 답했다.

갤럽은 “한국인들의 그런 견해는 한미 자유무역협정(FTA) 합의 내용에 오바마 후보는 반대하고 매케인 후보는 찬성하고 있는 데 따라 일정 부분 영향을 받았으며, 북한 문제에 대한 후보들의 견해 역시 요인이 된 것으로 보인다”고 해석했다. 한국에 이어 영국(63%포인트) 프랑스(56%포인트) 캐나다(53%포인트) 호주(55%포인트) 등도 차이가 있을 것이라고 보는 응답자 비율이 높았다.

워싱턴=이기홍 특파원 sechepa@donga.com


동영상 제공: 로이터/동아닷컴 특약

 

 

 

 

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다음은 http://ap.google.com 에 있는 AP의 기사입니다.

 

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Christian right intensifies attacks on Obama

Terrorist strikes on four American cities. Russia rolling into Eastern Europe. Israel hit by a nuclear bomb. Gay marriage in every state. The end of the Boy Scouts.

 

All are plausible scenarios if Democrat Barack Obama is elected president, according to a new addition to the campaign conversation called "Letter from 2012 in Obama's America," produced by the conservative Christian group Focus on the Family Action.

 

The imagined look into the future is part of an escalation in rhetoric from Christian right activists who are trying to paint Obama in the worst possible terms as the campaign heads into the final stretch and polls show the Democrat ahead.

 

Although hard-edge attacks are common late in campaigns, the tenor of the strikes against Obama illustrate just how worried conservative Christian activists are about what should happen to their causes and influence if Democrats seize control of both Congress and the White House.

 

"It looks like, walks like, talks like and smells like desperation to me," said the Rev. Kirbyjon Caldwell of Houston, an Obama supporter who backed President Bush in the past two elections. The Methodist pastor called the 2012 letter "false and ridiculous." He said it showed that some Christian conservative leaders fear that Obama's faith-based appeals to voters are working.

 

Like other political advocacy groups, Christian right groups often raise worries about an election's consequences to mobilize voters. In the early 1980s, for example, direct mail from the Moral Majority warned that Congress would turn a blind eye to "smut peddlers" dangling pornography to children.

 

"Everyone uses fear in the last part of a campaign, but evangelicals are especially theologically prone to those sorts of arguments," said Clyde Wilcox, a Georgetown University political scientist. "There's a long tradition of predicting doom and gloom."

 

But the tone this election year is sharper than usual and the volume has turned up as Nov. 4 nears.

Steve Strang, publisher of Charisma magazine, a Pentecostal publication, titled one of his recent weekly e-mails to readers, "Life As We Know It Will End If Obama is Elected."

 

Strang said gay rights and abortion rights would be strengthened in an Obama administration, taxes would rise and "people who hate Christianity will be emboldened to attack our freedoms."

 

Separately, a group called the Christian Anti-Defamation Commission has posted a series of videos on its site and on YouTube called "7 Reasons Barack Obama is not a Christian."

 

The commission accuses Obama of "subtle diabolical deceit" in saying he is Christian, while he believes that people can be saved through other faiths.

 

But among the strongest pieces this year is Focus on the Family Action's letter which has been posted on the group's Web site and making the e-mail rounds. Signed by "A Christian from 2012," it claims a series of events could logically happen based on the group's interpretation of Obama's record, Democratic Party positions, recent court rulings and other trends.

 

Among the claims:

 

_ A 6-3 liberal majority Supreme Court that results in rulings like one making gay marriage the law of the land and another forcing the Boy Scouts to "hire homosexual scoutmasters and allow them to sleep in tents with young boys." (In the imagined scenario, The Boy Scouts choose to disband rather than obey).

 

_ A series of domestic and international disasters based on Obama's "reluctance to send troops overseas." That includes terrorist attacks on U.S. soil that kill hundreds, Russia occupying the Baltic states and Eastern European countries including Poland and the Czech Republic, and al-Qaida overwhelming Iraq.

 

_ Nationalized health care with long lines for surgery and no access to hospitals for people over 80.

The goal was to "articulate the big picture," said Carrie Gordon Earll, senior director of public policy for Focus on the Family Action. "If it is a doomsday picture, then it's a realistic picture," she said.

 

Obama favors abortion rights and supports civil unions for same-sex couples, but says states should make their own decisions about marriage. He said he would intensify diplomatic pressure on Iran over its nuclear ambitions and add troops in Afghanistan.

 

On taxes, Obama has proposed an increase on the 5 percent of taxpayers who make more than $250,000 a year and advocates cuts for those who make less. His health care plan calls for the government to subsidize coverage for millions of Americans who otherwise couldn't afford it.

 

One of the clear targets of this latest conservative Christian push against the Democrat is younger evangelicals who might be considering him. The letter posits that young evangelicals provide the margin that let Obama defeat John McCain. But Margaret Feinberg, a Denver-area evangelical author, predicted failure.

 

"Young evangelicals are tired — like most people at this point in the election — and rhetoric which is fear-based, strong-arms the listener, and states opinion as fact will only polarize rather than further the informed, balanced discussion that younger voters are hungry for," she said.

 

In an interview, Strang said there are fewer state ballot measures to motivate conservative voters this election year and that the financial meltdown is distracting some voters from the abortion issue. But he said a last-minute push by conservative Christians in 2004 was key to Bush's re-election and predicted they could play the same role in 2008.

Kim Conger, a political scientist at Iowa State University, said a late push for evangelical voters did help Bush in 2004, "but it is a very different thing than getting people excited about John McCain," even with Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin as his vice presidential pick.

 

Phil Burress, head of the Ohio-based Citizens for Community Values, said the dynamics were quite different in 2004, when conservative Christians spent some energy calling Democrat John Kerry a flip-flopper but were mostly motivated by enthusiasm for George W. Bush.

 

Now, there is less excitement about McCain than fear of an Obama presidency, Burress said.

"This reminds me of when I was a school kid, when I had to go out in the hall and bury my head in my hands because of the atom bomb," he said.

 

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다음은 World Net Daily  http://wnd.com 에 있는 기사입니다.

 

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Monday, October 27, 2008


WorldNetDaily Exclusive


Obama spells 'persecution,' warns Focus on the Family

Analysts see same-sex marriage, Fairness Doctrine on horizon


Posted: October 22, 2008


10:53 pm Eastern

By Art Moore


WorldNetDaily


James Dobson

What would America look like after four years of a Barack Obama administration?

 

"Hardship," "persecution" and "suffering" are among the prospects in a hypothetical letter from a "Christian from 2012" released today by evangelical leader James Dobson's political activist group Focus on the Family Action.

 

Titled "Letter from 2012 in Obama’s America," the piece clearly targets the many evangelical Christians seeking "change," particularly the young, who could tip the election in favor of the Illinois Democrat. At the end of the letter, the fictional Christian laments that these people "simply did not realize Obama's far-left agenda would take away many of our freedoms as a nation, perhaps permanently," pointing to a new, liberal-majority Supreme Court unlikely to change for 30 more years.

 

"I get tears in my eyes and a lump in my throat," says the fictional writer. "Now in October of 2012, after seeing what has happened in the last four years," America is no longer "the land of the free and the home of the brave."

 

"Many of our freedoms have been taken away by a liberal Supreme Court and a majority of Democrats in both the House and the Senate, and hardly any brave citizen dares to resist the new government policies any more," the letter writer says.

 

Focus on the Family Action, established as a separate legal entity from Focus on the Family, has expanded abilities under the IRS code to lobby for political change.

 

Carrie Gordon Earll, senior director of public policy for Focus on the Family Action, affirmed to WND the letter is designed to address a "concerted effort by Obama and Democrats to capture people of faith since 2004."

 

"Certainly, I think, younger evangelicals may be swayed by the rhetoric and charisma of Obama without really having the historical perspective of what allowing liberal Democrats to control government would do," she said.

 

"I think a lot of Americans are not connecting the dots, that this would be the first time since 1965 that liberals have dominated the White House, Congress and, potentially, the Supreme Court."

 

Earll affirmed that Dobson has not endorsed Republican nominee Sen. John McCain but plans to vote for him.

(Story continues below)

 

In a preface, Focus on the Family Action explains the letter is a "What if?" exercise, but insists "that does not make it empty speculation, because every future 'event' described here is based on established legal and political trends that can already be abundantly documented and that only need a 'tipping point' such as the election of Senator Obama and a Democratic House and Senate to begin to put them into place."

 

Focus adds that evangelicals on both sides of the election should "continue to respect and cherish each other's friendship as well as the freedom people have in the United States to differ on these issues and to freely speak our opinions about them to one another."

 

Nevertheless, the footnoted letter anticipates an America, under Obama, that realizes the worst fears of Dobson and his millions of supporters.

 

Among the possible developments by 2012:

  • Six liberal justices sit on the Supreme Court after the immediate resignation of John Paul Stevens and Ruth Bader Ginsburg and the later resignations of Antonin Scalia and Anthony Kennedy.

  • Homosexual marriage has been ruled a constitutional right that must be respected by all 50 states.

  • The Boy Scouts have disbanded rather than obey a decision forcing them to allow homosexual scoutmasters. (The Scouts already had been kicked out of public facilities because of an expansion of the 1964 Civil Rights Act to cover people who engage in homosexual behavior.)

  • Elementary schools have compulsory training in varieties of gender identity. Courts rule parents cannot opt out their children, because the training is deemed essential to psychological health.

  • Evangelical and Catholic adoption agencies cease to exist after the Supreme Court rules they must agree to place children with homosexuals or lose their licenses.

  • Church buildings are now considered a "public accommodation" by the United States Supreme Court, and churches have no freedom to refuse to allow their buildings to be used for wedding ceremonies for homosexual couples.

  • High schools are no longer free to allow "see you at the pole" meetings where students pray together or any student Bible studies even before or after school.

  • The Supreme Court barred public schools in all 50 states from allowing churches to rent their facilities, even on Sundays, when school was not in session.

  • Obama signed the Freedom of Choice Act, as he promised the Planned Parenthood Action Fund last year, nullifying hundreds of state laws that had created even the slightest barrier to abortion.

  • The Supreme Court in 2011 nullified all Federal Communications Commission restrictions on obscene speech or visual content in radio and TV broadcasts, and television programs at all hours of the day now contain explicit portrayals of sexual acts.

  • As a result of a reversal of its 5-4 decision in the D.C. gun-ownership case, it is now illegal for private citizens to own guns for self-defense in eight states, and the number is growing with increasing Democratic control of state legislatures and governorships

  • Parents' freedom to teach their children at home has been severely restricted nationwide after the Supreme Court followed the legal reasoning of a Feb. 28, 2008, ruling by the Second District Court of Appeal in California.

The letter also "recalls" a President Obama fulfilling his campaign promise to withdraw U.S. troops from Iraq, resulting in a flood of al-Qaida operatives from Syria and Iran pouring into Iraq and completely overwhelming Iraqi security forces.

 

"A Taliban-like oppression has now taken over in Iraq, and hundreds of thousands of 'American sympathizers' have been labeled as traitors, imprisoned, tortured, and killed," the letter says. "The number put to death may soon reach into the millions. Al-Qaida leaders have been emboldened by what they are calling this American 'defeat' and their ranks are swelling in dozens of countries."

 

The letter also looks back at an explosion of terrorist bombs in two large and two small U.S. cities, killing hundreds and spreading fear across the nation.

 

"President Obama in each case has vowed 'to pursue and arrest and prosecute those responsible,' but no arrests have yet been made," the letter says.

 

Obama 'tested'

 

The hypothetical letter plays on vice presidential candidate Joe Biden's warning to fundraisers last Sunday in Seattle that some hostile foreign country will test the inexperienced Obama in his first six months of office.

 

In early 2009, the letter says, Russia "followed the pattern they had begun in Georgia in 2008 and sent troops to occupy and re-take several Eastern European countries, starting with the Ukraine, Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania."

 

But the Russians don't stop there, occupying over the next three years former satellite nations, including Poland, Hungary, the Czech Republic and Bulgaria, "with no military response from the U.S. or the U.N."

 

By 2012, health care has been nationalized with a single payer system patterned after the United Kingdom and Canada.

 

"The great benefit is that medical care is now free for everyone – if you can get it," the letter writer says. "Now that health care is free it seems that everybody wants more of it. The waiting list for prostate cancer surgery is 3 years. The waiting list for ovarian cancer is 2 years."

 

Care also has been limited for older Americans, the letter says.

 

"Because medical resources now must be rationed carefully by the government, people over 80 have essentially no access to hospitals or surgical procedures. Their 'duty' is increasingly thought to be to go home to die, so that they don't drain scarce resources from the medical system."

 

Devastated economy

 

The letter says many Christians voted for Obama because they thought his tax policies were more fair and his "middle class tax cuts" would bring the economy out of its 2008 crisis.

 

"But once he took office he followed the consistent pattern of the Democratic Party and the pattern of his own past record and asked Congress for a large tax increase," the letter says. "He explained that the deficit had grown so large under President Bush, and the needs of the nation were so great, that we simply couldn't afford to cut taxes at the present time."

 

Several of Obama's economic policies have hurt the poor most of all, says the letter, because they have decreased production, increased inflation and increased unemployment, leading to a prolonged recession.

 

"Tax rates have gone up on personal income, dividends, capital gains, corporations and inheritance transfers. The amount of income subject to Social Security tax has nearly doubled."

 

The effect on the economy has been devastating, says the letter.

 

"When critics objected that Obama's tax policies were leading to inflation and unemployment, he responded that our goal should not be merely to increase America's materialism and wealth and prosperity, but to obtain a more just distribution of wealth, even if it costs everybody a little to achieve that important goal," the letter says.

 

The Focus on the Family Action letter also sees gas at $7 a gallon, because Obama has refused to allow any additional drilling in the U.S. But many Democrats openly applaud the high prices since they reduce oil consumption and thus lower carbon dioxide output.

 

Goodbye to talk radio

 

Another development is restoration of the "Fairness Doctrine," which required that radio stations provide "equal time" for alternative views on political questions.

 

As a result, "nearly all conservative stations have now gone out of business or switched to alternative formats such as country or gospel or other music. Conservative talk radio, for all intents and purposes, was shut down by the end of 2010."

 

The fictional letter writer concludes that Christian share much of the blame, having chosen Obama because they believed he "sounded so thoughtful, so reasonable."

 

"And during the campaign, after he had won the Democratic nomination, he seemed to be moving to the center in his speeches, moving away from his earlier far-left record," the letter says. "No one thought he would enact such a far-left, extreme liberal agenda."

 

Earlier in the letter, the fictional writer notes that after many Supreme Court decisions, particularly those that restricted free speech, Obama "publicly expressed strong personal disapproval of the decision and said that the Supreme Court had gone far beyond anything that he ever expected or thought that it would do."

 

"But he has also stated repeatedly that he had sworn to 'preserve, protect, and defend the Constitution of the United States,' and, now that the Supreme Court had ruled, he had no choice but to uphold the law, for these decisions were now the law of the land."

 

Americans should have known what they were getting into by choosing Obama, the letter says, his record "was all there for anyone to see."

 

"The agenda of the ACLU, the agenda of liberal activist judges in their dissenting opinions, the agenda of the homosexual activists, the agenda of the environmental activists, the agenda of the National Education Association, the agenda of the global warming activists, the agenda of the abortion rights activists, the agenda of the gun control activists, the agenda of the euthanasia supporters, the agenda of the one-world government pacifists, the agenda of far-left groups in Canada and Europe – all of these agendas were there in plain sight, and all of these groups provided huge support for Senator Obama. The liberal agenda was all there. But too many people just didn't want to see it. Christians didn't take time to find out who Barack Obama was when they voted for him. Why did they risk our nation's future on him? It was a mistake that changed the course of history."

 

Click here to read the complete letter.

 

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1
Letter from 2012 in Obama’s America


What will the United States be like if Senator Obama is elected? The most reliable way
of predicting people’s future actions is by looking at their past actions. Jesus himself
taught, “You will recognize them by their fruits” (Matthew 7:16). Anyone who has hired
employees knows that – the best predictor of a person’s future job performance is not
what he tells you he can do but what he has actually done in the past.
So here is a picture of the changes that are likely or at least very possible if Senator
Obama is elected and the far-Left segments of the Democratic Party gain control of the
White House, the Congress, and perhaps then the Supreme Court. The entire letter is
written as a “What if?” exercise, but that does not make it empty speculation, because
every future “event” described here is based on established legal and political trends that
can be abundantly documented and that only need a “tipping point” such as the election
of Senator Obama and a Democratic House and Senate to begin to put them into place.
Every past event named in this letter (everything prior to October 22, 2008) is established
fact.
This letter is not “predicting” that all of the imaginative future “events” named in this letter
will happen. But it is saying that each one of these changes could happen and also that
each change would be the natural outcome of (a) published legal opinions by liberal
judges, (b) trends seen in states with liberal-dominated courts such as California and
Massachusetts, (c) recent promises, practices and legislative initiatives of the current
liberal leadership of the Democratic Party and (d) Senator Obama’s actions, voting record
and public promises to the far-Left groups that won the nomination for him.
Many of these changes, if they occur, will have significant implications for Christians. This
letter is addressed particularly to their concerns so they will be aware of what is at stake
before the November 4 election.
Some will respond to this letter by saying, “Well, I hope hardship and even persecution
come to the church. It will strengthen the church!” But hoping for suffering is wrong. It is
similar to saying, “I hope I get some serious illness because it will strengthen my faith.”
Jesus taught us to pray the opposite: “And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from
evil” (Matt. 6:13). Paul urged us to pray not for persecution but “for kings and all who are
in high positions, that we may lead a peaceful and quiet life, godly and dignified in every
way” (1 Tim. 2:2). So Christians should hope and pray that such difficult times do not
come. But if they do come, then it will be right to trust God to bring good out of them and
also bring them to an end.
Of course, there are many evangelical Christians supporting Senator Obama as well as
many supporting Senator McCain. Christians on both sides should continue to respect
and cherish one another’s friendship as well as the freedom people have in the United
States to differ on these issues and to freely speak their opinions about them to one
another.
2
October 22, 2012
Dear friends,
I can hardly sing “The Star Spangled Banner” any more. When I hear the words,
O say, does that star spangled banner yet wave
O’er the land of the free and the home of the brave?
I get tears in my eyes and a lump in my throat. Now in October of 2012, after seeing what
has happened in the last four years, I don’t think I can still answer, “Yes,” to that question. We
are not “the land of the free and the home of the brave.” Many of our freedoms have been taken
away by a liberal Supreme Court and a Democratic majority in both the House and the Senate,
and hardly any brave citizen dares to resist the new government policies any more.
The 2008 election was closer than anybody expected, but Barack Obama still won. Many
Christians voted for Obama – younger evangelicals actually provided him with the needed
margin to defeat John McCain – but they didn’t think he would really follow through on the far-
Left policies that had marked his career. They were wrong.
The Supreme Court
On January 20, 2009, President Obama’s inauguration went smoothly, and he spoke
eloquently of reaching out to Republicans who would work with him. Even in the next month,
when Justices Ruth Bader Ginsburg and John Paul Stevens announced they would step down
from the Supreme Court, nobody was very surprised – Ginsburg was already 75 years-old and in
ill health,1 and Stevens was 88. President Obama nominated two far-Left, American Civil
Liberties Union-oriented judges, and the Democratic Senate confirmed them quickly. They are
brilliant, articulate and in their early 40s, so they can expect to stay on the court for 30 or 40
years. But things seemed the same because the court retained its 4-4 split between liberals and
conservatives, with Justice Anthony Kennedy as the swing vote.
The decisive changes on the Supreme Court started in June, when Justice Kennedy
resigned – he was 72 and had grown weary of the unrelenting responsibility. His replacement –
another young liberal Obama appointment – gave a 5-4 majority to justices who were eager to
create laws from the bench. The four conservative justices who remained — John Roberts,
Antonin Scalia, Clarence Thomas and Samuel Alito — were suddenly in the minority.
Then in August 2009, two months after Kennedy resigned, Justice Scalia unexpectedly
announced his resignation due to health reasons and by October 2009 another Obama
appointment took his oath and joined the court.
1 “Election could decide fate of Roe, other big court issues,” USA Today, October 6, 2008.
3
The three remaining conservatives (known as “originalists” because they hold that the
meaning of the Constitution is its “original public meaning”) kept objecting that the role of the
Supreme Court should not be to create laws but only to interpret the Constitution and the laws
that had been passed by Congress and the state legislatures. But the six liberal justices paid no
attention. They decided cases in light of their understanding of the needs of society, and they
took more and more precedents not from the U. S. Constitution but from international laws.
From the end of 2009, Justices Roberts, Thomas, and Alito have been constantly outvoted 6-3,
and they are essentially powerless. It might be 20 or 30 years before enough new appointments
could be made to change the far-Left dominance of the Supreme Court.
Finally the far-Left had the highest prize: complete control of the Supreme Court. And
they set about quickly to expedite cases by which they would enact the entire agenda of the far
Left in American politics – everything they had hoped for and more took just a few key
decisions.
Same-sex “marriage”
The most far-reaching transformation of American society came from the Supreme
Court’s stunning affirmation, in early 2010, that homosexual “marriage” was a “constitutional”
right that had to be respected by all 50 states because laws barring same-sex “marriage” violated
the Equal Protection clause of the U.S. Constitution. Suddenly, homosexual “marriage” was the
law of the land in all 50 states, and no state legislature, no state Supreme Court, no state
Constitutional amendment, not even Congress, had any power to change it. The Supreme Court
had ruled, and the discussion was over. This was a blatant example of creating law by the court,
for homosexual “marriage” was mentioned nowhere in the Constitution, nor would any of the
authors have imagined that same-sex “marriage” could be derived from their words. But it just
followed the precedents that had been set by state supreme courts in Massachusetts (2003),2
California (2008)3 and Connecticut (2008).4
President Obama repeated his declaration that he personally was against same-sex
“marriage”, but he told the nation there was nothing he could do. The Supreme Court had ruled,
and it was now the law of the land. The president asked the nation to support the decision.
After that decision, many other policies changed, and several previous Supreme Court
cases were reversed rather quickly — raising the question, “Is America still the land of the free?”
(1) Boy Scouts: “The land of the free”? The Boy Scouts no longer exist as an
organization. They chose to disband rather than be forced to obey the Supreme Court decision
that they would have to hire homosexual scoutmasters and allow them to sleep in tents with
young boys. (This was to be expected with a change in the court, since the 2000 decision Boy
Scouts of America v. Dale, which affirmed the right of the Boy Scouts as a private organization
2 Goodridge v. Department of Health, decided by the Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts, November 18, 2003.
3 In re: Marriage Cases, decided by the California State Supreme Court, May 15, 2008.
4 Kerrigan v, Commissioner of Public Health, decided by the Connecticut State Supreme Court, October 10, 2008.
4
to dismiss a homosexual scoutmaster, was a 5-4 decision, with Stevens, Ginsburg, Souter and
Breyer dissenting even then.) 5
It had become increasingly difficult for the Boy Scouts to find meeting places anyway,
because in 2009 Congress passed and President Obama signed an expansion of the Civil Rights
Act of 1964, which extended federal civil rights protections to people engaging in homosexual
behavior. So the Boy Scouts had already been kicked out of all public facilities.
(2) Elementary schools: “The land of the free”? Elementary schools now include
compulsory training in varieties of gender identity in Grade 1, including the goodness of
homosexuality as one possible personal choice. Many parents tried to “opt out” their children
from such sessions, but the courts have ruled they cannot do this, noting that education experts in
the government have decided that such training is essential to children’s psychological health.
Many Christian teachers objected to teaching first-graders that homosexual behavior was
morally neutral and equal to heterosexuality. They said it violated their consciences to have to
teach something the Bible viewed as morally wrong. But state after state ruled that their refusal
to teach positively about homosexuality was the equivalent of hate speech, and they had to teach
it or be fired. Tens of thousands of Christian teachers either quit or were fired, and there are
hardly any evangelical teachers in public schools any more.
Non-Christians found this hard to understand. “Why not just teach what the school says
even if it’s not your personal opinion? So what? We can’t have every teacher deciding what he
or she wants to teach, can we?”
But the Christian teachers kept coming back to something Jesus said: “Whoever causes
one of these little ones who believe in me to sin, it would be better for him to have a great
millstone fastened around his neck and to be drowned in the depth of the sea” (Matthew 18:6).
And they quit by the thousands, no matter the personal cost, rather than commit what they
believed to be a direct sin against God.
In addition, many private Christian schools decided to shut down after the Supreme Court
ruled that anti-discrimination laws that include sexual orientation extended to private institutions
such as schools,6 and that private schools also had to obey the law and teach that homosexuality
and heterosexuality are both morally good choices.
(3) Adoption agencies: “The land of the free”? There are no more Roman Catholic or
evangelical Protestant adoption agencies in the United States. Following earlier rulings in New
York 7and Massachusetts,8 the U.S. Supreme Court in 2011 ruled that these agencies had to agree
to place children with homosexual couples or lose their licenses. Just as the Catholic Charities
adoption agency had closed down for this reason in Massachusetts in 2006,9 so all similar
agencies across the United States have now closed down rather than violate their consciences
about the moral wrong of homosexual behavior.
Christian parents seeking to adopt have tried going through secular adoption agencies,
but they are increasingly excluding parents with “narrow” or dangerous views on religion or
homosexuality.
5 Boy Scouts of America v. Dale, decided by the United States Supreme Court, June 28, 2000.
6 Maggie Gallagher, “Banned in Boston,” The Weekly Standard, May 15, 2006
7 http://www.adopthelp.com/alternativeadoptions/alternatives2.html
8 Gallagher, op.cit
9 Patricia Wen, “Catholic Charities stuns state, ends adoptions,” Boston Globe March 11, 2006
5
(4) Businesses with government contracts: “The land of the free”? All businesses that
have government contracts at the national, state or local level now have to provide
documentation of equal benefits for same-sex couples. This was needed to overcome “systemic
discrimination” against them and followed on a national level the pattern of policies already in
place in San Francisco, Los Angeles and Seattle.10
(5) Public broadcasting: “The land of the free”? The Bible can no longer be freely
preached over radio or television stations when the subject matter includes such “offensive”
doctrines as criticizing homosexual behavior. The Supreme Court agreed that these could be kept
off the air as prohibited “hate speech” that is likely to incite violence and discrimination. These
policies followed broadcasting and print restrictions that were in place prior to 2008 in Canada11
and Sweden.12
(6) Doctors and lawyers: “The land of the free”? Physicians who refuse to provide
artificial insemination for lesbian couples now face significant fines or loss of their license to
practice medicine, following the reasoning of a decision of the California Supreme Court in
North Coast Women's Care Medical Group v. Superior Court of San Diego County (Benitez),
which was announced August 18, 2008.13 As a result, many Christian physicians have retired or
left the practices of family medicine and obstetrics & gynecology. Lawyers who refuse to handle
adoption cases for same-sex couples similarly now lose their licenses to practice law.
(7) Counselors and social workers: “The land of the free”? All other professionals who
are licensed by individual states are also prohibited from discriminating against homosexuals.
Social workers and counselors, even counselors in church staff positions, who refuse to provide
“professional, appropriately nurturing marriage counseling” for homosexual couples lose their
counseling licenses.14 Thousands of Christians have left these professions as a result.
(8) Homosexual weddings: “The land of the free”? Church buildings are now considered
a “public accommodation” by the Supreme Court, and churches have no freedom to refuse to
allow their buildings to be used for wedding ceremonies for homosexual couples. If they refuse,
they lose their tax-exempt status, and they are increasingly becoming subject to fines and antidiscrimination
lawsuits.15
(9) Homosexual church staff members: “The land of the free”? While churches are still
free to turn down homosexual applicants for the job of senior pastor, churches and parachurch
organizations are no longer free to reject homosexual applicants for staff positions such as parttime
youth pastor or director of counseling. Those that have rejected homosexual applicants have
had their tax-exempt status revoked, and now the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission
has begun to impose heavy fines for each instance of such “discrimination,” which, they say, is
“contrary to the U.S. Constitution as defined by the Supreme Court.” These fines follow the
10 http://www.azpolicy.org/pdf/GFI/H4HomosexualDomesticPartnerBenefits.pdf
11 John Henry Weston, “Canadian Broadcast Regulators: Gay Toronto Radio OK, Catholic Radio No Way”
LifeSite.com, April 6, 2006.
12 Same-Sex “Marriage” and the Fate of Religious Liberty, Heritage Foundation Symposium, May 22, 2008.
13 North Coast Women’s Care Medical Group v. Benitez, decided by the California State Supreme Court, August 18,
2008.
14 The Alliance Defense Fund (ADF) presently has a case involving a woman who was fired by the Centers for
Disease Control for declining to offer counseling for a same-sex relationship, but referred the client to another
counselor who would help. See Walden v. Centers for Disease Control, filed in federal district court, July 14, 2008.
15 Robert Bluey, “’Marriage’ Changes May Shake Churches’ Tax Exemptions,” CNSNews.com, February 23, 2004.
6
pattern of a precedent-setting case in February 2008, in which the Diocese of Hereford in the
Church of England was fined $94,000 (47,000 UK pounds) for turning down a homosexual
applicant for a youth ministry position.16
(10) Homosexuals in the military: One change regarding the status of homosexuals did
not wait for any Supreme Court decision. In the first week after his inauguration, President
Obama invited homosexual rights leaders from around the United States to join him at the White
House as he signed an executive order directing all branches of the military to abandon their
“don’t ask, don’t tell” policy and to start actively recruiting homosexuals.17 As a result,
homosexuals are now given special bonuses for enlisting in military service (to attempt to
compensate for past discrimination), and all new recruits, and all active-duty and reserve
personnel, are compelled to take many hours of “sensitivity training” to ensure they demonstrate
positive attitudes toward those with different sexual orientations and practices. Any one who
seems hesitant or who objects is routinely passed over for promotion. In addition, any chaplain
who holds to an interpretation of Scripture that homosexual conduct is morally wrong and
therefore does not espouse “mainstream values,” is dismissed from the military.18 This is not “the
land of the free” for them.
Religious speech in the public square
(11) High schools: “The land of the free”? High schools are no longer free to allow “See
You at the Pole” meetings where students pray together, or any student Bible studies even before
or after school. The Supreme Court ruled this is considered speech that is both “proselytizing”
and involves “worship,” special categories of speech which, as liberal Justice John Paul Stevens
argued in his dissent in Good News Club v. Milford Central School (2001), should not be
allowed in public schools, since it is in a different category from other kinds of speech.19 (Justice
Souter filed a similar dissent, which Justice Ginsburg joined). The new 6-3 liberal majority on
the Supreme Court followed his reasoning and outlawed any use of school property for any kind
of religious meeting, even outside of normal school hours. In addition, Christian students cannot
raise religious objections to curriculum material that promotes homosexual behavior.
(12) Church use of school property: “The land of the free”? Tens of thousands of young
churches suddenly had no place to meet when the Supreme Court ruled that public schools in all
50 states had to stop allowing churches to rent their facilities — even on Sundays, when school
was not in session. The court said this was an unconstitutional use of government property for a
religious purpose. Most of these churches have been unable to find any suitable place to meet.
Public libraries and public parks are similarly excluded from allowing churches to use their
facilities. Once again, the reasoning of liberal Justices Stevens, Souter, and Ginsburg in 2001 in
Good News Club (see above) was able to garner 6-3 support with the new court.
(13) Campus ministries: “The land of the free”? Campus organizations such as Campus
Crusade for Christ, InterVarsity, Navigators, Baptist Campus Ministry, and Reformed University
Fellowship have shrunk to skeleton organizations, and in many states they have ceased to exist.
16 See http://www.christian.org.uk/news/20080212/47000-fine-for-bishop-sued-by-homosexual-youth-worker/
17 See http://www.cnn.com/2008/POLITICS/04/10/obama.gay.ap/index.html
18 See http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2006/10/03/politics/main2057198.shtml?source=RSSattr=U.S._2057198
19 Good News Club v. Milford Central Schools, dissent written by Associate Justice John Paul Stevens, June 11,
2001.
7
After the Supreme Court ruled that “proselytizing” speech and “worship” speech did not have the
same First Amendment protection as other speech, and after it declared same-sex “marriage” to
be the law of the United States, a subsequent Supreme Court decision predictably ruled that
universities had to prohibit campus organizations that promote “hate speech” and have
discriminatory policies. Therefore these Christian ministries have been prohibited from use of
campus buildings, campus bulletin boards, advertising in campus newspapers, and use of
dormitory rooms or common rooms for Bible studies.20 Their staff members are no longer
allowed on university property. The only ministries allowed to function on campuses are “nondiscriminatory”
ministries that agree to allow practicing homosexuals and members of other
religions on their governing boards. With the new Supreme Court appointed by President
Obama, the long years of liberal opposition to these evangelical ministries finally bore fruit, and
only liberal ministries are left on campuses.
(14) Pledge of Allegiance: “The land of the free”? Public school teachers are no longer
free to lead students in the Pledge of Allegiance to the flag of the United States. The 9th Circuit
U. S. Court of Appeals heard a new challenge to the phrase “under God” in the Pledge, and, as it
had in 2002 in Newdow v. United States Congress, Elk Grove Unified School District, et al., it
held the wording to be unconstitutional. Now the Supreme Court has upheld this decision.
Abortion
(15) Freedom of Choice Act: Congress lost no time in solidifying abortion rights under
President Obama. In fact, Obama had promised, “The first thing I’ll do as president is sign the
Freedom of Choice Act” (July 17, 2007, speech to the Planned Parenthood Action Fund).21
This federal law immediately nullified hundreds of state laws that had created even the
slightest barrier to abortion.22 States can no longer require parental involvement for minors who
wish to have an abortion, waiting period, informed consent rules, restrictions on tax-payer
funding or restrictions on late-term abortions. The act reversed the Hyde Amendment, so the
government now funds Medicaid abortions for any reason. As a result, the number of abortions
has increased dramatically. The Freedom of Choice Act also reversed the Partial Birth Abortion
Ban Act of 2003, so infants can be killed outright just seconds before they would be born. States
whose laws were overturned challenged the law in court but it was upheld by the Obama
Supreme Court. “The land of the free”? There is no freedom for these infants who are killed by
the millions.
(16) Nurses and abortions: “The land of the free”? Nurses are no longer free to refuse to
participate in abortions for reasons of conscience.23 If they refuse to participate, they lose their
jobs, for they are now failing to comply with federal law. Many Christian nurses have left the
health care field rather than violate their consciences. A number of Christian nurses challenged
their loss of jobs in court, but the Supreme Court ruled that medical professionals do not have the
20 These cases are unfortunately common on many public university campuses. ADF has several examples from
public universities such as the University of Wisconsin-Madison, Rutgers University, University of California-San
Diego, to name just a few.
21 See http://www.citizenlink.org/CLtopstories/A000007601.cfm
22 The Freedom of Choice Act: Endangering Women and Silencing the Voices of Everyday Americans, See
http://www.aul.org/FOCA
23 The Freedom of Choice Act: Endangering Women and Silencing the Voices of Everyday Americans, See
http://www.aul.org/FOCA
8
freedom to refuse nonessential, elective care on the basis of conscience. In its decision, the
Supreme Court followed the reasoning of the California Supreme Court in the 2008 Benitez case
(see section (6) above).24
(17) Doctors and abortions: “The land of the free”? The same restrictions apply to
doctors: Doctors who refuse to perform abortions can no longer be licensed to deliver babies at
hospitals in any state. As a result, many Christian doctors have left family medicine and
obstetrics, and many have retired.
Pornography
(18) Pornography: “The land of the free”? It’s almost impossible to keep children from
seeing pornography. The Supreme Court in 2011 nullified all Federal Communications
Commission restrictions on obscene speech or visual content in radio and television broadcasts.
As a result, television programs at all hours of the day contain explicit portrayals of sexual acts.
The court applied more broadly the “Miller test” from the 1973 decision in Miller v. California,
by which a work could not be found obscene unless “the work, taken as a whole, lacks serious
literary, artistic, political, and scientific value.” In the 2011 decision, the court essentially found
that any pornographic work had some measure of “serious artistic value,” at least according to
some observers, and thus any censorship of pornographic material was an unconstitutional
restriction on the First Amendment. In addition, all city and county laws restricting pornography
were struck down by this decision. As a result, pornographic magazines are openly displayed in
gas stations, grocery stores and on newsstands (as they have been in some European countries for
several years).
Gun ownership
(19) Guns: “The land of the free”? It is illegal for private citizens to own guns for selfdefense
in eight states, and the number is growing with increasing Democratic control of state
legislatures and governorships. This was the result of a 6-3 Supreme Court decision in which the
court reversed its 5-4 decision that had upheld private gun ownership in District of Columbia v.
Heller (2008).25 In the new decision, a response to test cases from Oregon, Massachusetts, and
Vermont, the court adopted the view of the Second Amendment that had been defended in Heller
by the four liberal justices, Stevens, Souter, Ginsburg and Breyer.26
In this new decision, the court specified that “the right of the people to keep and bear
arms” was limited to that purpose specified in the Second Amendment, namely, to those people
who were part of a “well regulated militia” in the various states. To those who argued that this
view was not the “original intent” of the framers, they pointed to a long history of dispute over
the interpretation of the expression and then said that, in any case, the Constitution was an
“evolving” document that must change with the times, and so what may have been applicable in
1790 need no longer be decisive. Therefore they allowed cities and states to limit gun ownership
24 North Coast, op.cit.
25 District of Columbia v. Heller, decided by the United States Supreme Court, June 26, 2008.
26 Ibid,
9
to active-duty military personnel and police officers. Citizens in those areas who are discovered
owning guns have been subjected to heavy fines and imprisonment. Inner-city violent crime has
increased dramatically.
Education
(20) Home schooling: “The land of the free”? Parents’ freedom to teach their children at
home has been severely restricted. The Supreme Court, to the delight of the National Education
Association, followed the legal reasoning of a February 28, 2008, ruling in Re: Rachel L by the
2nd District Court of Appeal in California (although that ruling was later reversed).27 In the later
case, the Supreme Court declared that home schooling was a violation of state educational
requirements except in cases where the parents (a) had an education certificate from an
accredited state program., (b) agreed to use state-approved textbooks in all courses, and (c)
agreed not to teach their children that homosexual conduct is wrong, or that Jesus is the only way
to God, since these ideas have been found to hinder students’ social adjustment and acceptance
of other lifestyles and beliefs, and to run counter to the state’s interest in educating its children to
be good citizens. Parents found in violation of this ruling have been subject to prosecutions for
truancy violation, resulting in heavy fines and eventual removal of their children from the
home.28 Thousands of home schooling parents, seeing no alternative in the United States, have
begun to emigrate to other countries, particularly Australia29and New Zealand,30 where home
schooling is still quite prevalent.
President Obama’s response to the Supreme Court
After many of these decisions, especially those that restricted religious speech in public
places, President Obama publicly expressed strong personal disapproval of the decision and said
that the Supreme Court had gone far beyond what he ever expected. But he has also stated
repeatedly that he had sworn to “preserve, protect, and defend the Constitution of the United
States,” and, now that the Supreme Court had ruled, he had no choice but to uphold the law, for
these decisions were the law of the land.
Military policy
In his role as commander in chief, President Obama has been reluctant to send our armed
forces to any new overseas commitment.
(21) Iraq: “The home of the brave”? President Obama fulfilled his campaign promise and
began regular withdrawal of U.S. troops from Iraq, completing it in the promised 16 months, by
27 In re; Rachel L, decided by California Court of Appeal, Second District, August 8, 2008.
28 Alan Sears, What began in Germany has come to the U.S.
See http://www.alliancedefensefund.org/issues/religiousfreedom/default.aspx?cid=4431
29 http://homeschooling.families.com/blog/homeschooling-around-the-world-australia-amp-new-zealand
30 http://homeschooling.families.com/blog/homeschooling-around-the-world-australia-amp-new-zealand
10
April 2010.31 All was peaceful during those months, but then in May 2010, Al-Qaida operatives
from Syria and Iran poured into Iraq and completely overwhelmed the Iraqi security forces. A
Taliban-like oppression has taken over in Iraq, and hundreds of thousands of “American
sympathizers” have been labeled as traitors, imprisoned, tortured, and killed. The number put to
death may soon reach the millions.
Al-Qaida leaders have been emboldened by what they are calling the American “defeat”
and their ranks are swelling in dozens of countries.
(22) Terrorist attacks: “The home of the brave”? President Obama directed U.S.
intelligence services to cease all wiretapping of alleged terrorist phone calls unless they first
obtained a warrant for each case. Terrorists captured overseas, instead of being tried in military
tribunals, are given full trials in the U.S. court system, and they have to be allowed access to a
number of government secrets to prepare their defense.
Since 2009, terrorist bombs have exploded in two large and two small U.S. cities, killing
hundreds, and the entire country is fearful, for no place seems safe. President Obama in each
case has vowed “to pursue and arrest and prosecute those responsible,” but no arrests have been
made. However, he has challenged the nation to increase foreign aid to the poorer nations that
were the breeding grounds for terrorism, so people could have an opportunity to escape from the
cycles of poverty and violence in which generations had been trapped.
(23) Russia: “The home of the brave”? As Vice President Joe Biden had predicted on
Oct. 20, 2008, some hostile foreign countries “tested” President Obama in his first few months in
office. 32 The first test came from Russia. In early 2009, they followed the pattern they had begun
in Georgia in 2008 and sent troops to occupy and re-take several Eastern European countries,
starting with the Ukraine, Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania. President Obama appealed to the United
Nations (UN), taking the same approach he had in his initial statements when Russia invaded
Georgia in August 2008: “Now is the time for Georgia and Russia to show restraint, and to avoid
an escalation to full scale war,” and “All sides should enter into direct talks on behalf of stability
in Georgia, and the United States, the United Nations Security Council, and the international
community should fully support a peaceful resolution to this crisis,”33 But Russia sits on the
Security Council, and no U.N. action has yet been taken.
Then in the next three years, Russia occupied additional countries that had been previous
Soviet satellite nations, including Poland, Hungary, the Czech Republic and Bulgaria, with no
military response from the U.S. or the U.N. NATO heads of state have severely condemned
Russia’s actions each time but they could never reach consensus on military action. Liberal
television commentators in both the U.S. and Europe have uniformly expressed deep regret at the
loss of freedom of these countries but have also observed that “the U.S. cannot be the world’s
policeman.”
President Obama’s popularity dropped somewhat after each of these crises, but media
criticism was remarkably muted. And Vice President Joe Biden reminded the nation that on
October 20, 2008, he had predicted that Russia might be one of “four or five scenarios” where an
“international crisis” would arise. “It will not be six months before the world tests Barack Obama
like they did John Kennedy,” he said. And Obama will have to make “some incredibly tough
31 “Obama Calls Iraq War a ‘Dangerous Distraction,” CNN.com, July 15, 2008
http://www.cnn.com/2008/POLITICS/07/15/obama.iraq/index.html?eref=rss_topstories
32 See http://www.nypost.com/seven/10212008/news/politics/joe_doh_puts_o_in_crisis_mode_134547.htm
33 Barack Obama Statement on Georgia Crisis, August 8, 2008
11
decisions,” and that “it's not gonna be apparent initially, it's not gonna be apparent that we're
right."34
(24) Latin America: President Obama has also moved to deepen U.S. ties and U.S. trade
with communist regimes in Cuba, Venezuela and Bolivia, regimes that had long enjoyed the
favor of far-Left factions in the Democratic Party. Several other Latin American countries seem
ready to succumb to insurgent communist revolutionary factions funded and armed by millions
of petrodollars from Hugo Chavez in Venezuela.
(25) Israel: “The home of the brave”? In mid-2010, Iran launched a nuclear bomb that
exploded in the middle of Tel Aviv, destroying much of that city. They then demanded that Israel
cede huge amounts of territory to the Palestinians, and after an anguished all-night Cabinet
meeting, Israel’s prime minister agreed. Israel is reduced to a much smaller country, hardly able
to defend itself, and its future remains uncertain. President Obama said he abhorred what Iran
had done and he hoped the U.N. would unanimously condemn this crime against humanity. He
also declared that the U.S. would be part of any international peacekeeping force if authorized by
the U.N., but the Muslim nations in the U.N. have so far prevented any action.
Health care
(26) Health care systems: The new Congress under President Obama passed a
nationalized “single provider” health care system, in which the U.S. government is the provider
of all health care in the United States, following the pattern of nationalized medicine in the
United Kingdom and Canada. The great benefit is that medical care is now free for everyone -- if
you can get it. Now that health care is free, it seems everybody wants more of it. The waiting list
for prostate cancer surgery is 3 years. The waiting list for ovarian cancer is 2 years. Just as the
Canadian experience had shown prior to 2008 with its nationalized health care, so in the U.S.
only a small number of MRIs are performed — down 90% from 2008 — because they are too
expensive, and they discover more problems that need treatment, so they are almost never
authorized.
(27) Limited care for older Americans: “The land of the free”? Because medical
resources must be rationed carefully by the government, people older than 80 have essentially no
access to hospitals or surgical procedures. Their “duty” is increasingly thought to be to go home
to die, so they don’t drain scarce resources from the medical system. Euthanasia is becoming
more and more common.
Taxes, the economy and the poor:
Many Christians who voted for Obama did so because they thought his tax policies were
fairer and his “middle-class tax cuts” would bring the economy out of its 2008 crisis. But once he
took office, he followed the consistent pattern of the Democratic Party and his own record and
asked Congress for a large tax increase. He explained the deficit had grown so large under
President Bush, and the needs of the nation were so great, that we couldn’t afford to cut taxes.
And several of Obama’s economic policies have hurt the poor because they have
decreased production and increased inflation and unemployment. Here is what happened:
34 ABC News online, Oct. 20, 2008.
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(28) Taxes: Tax rates have gone up on personal income, dividends, capital gains,
corporations, and inheritance transfers. The amount of income subject to Social Security tax has
nearly doubled. The effect on the economy has been devastating. We have experienced a
prolonged recession. Everyone has been hurt by this, but the poor have been hurt most. In dozens
of cities, there are no jobs to be found.
It turns out that the people President Obama called “the rich” were not all that rich. They
were just ordinary people who worked hard, saved, and built small businesses that provided jobs
and brought economic growth. They kept inventing new and better ways to produce things and
bring prices down. They produced the goods and services that gave us the highest standard of
living in history. They provided the competition that kept prices low. And the top 50% of earners
were already paying 97% of income taxes collected by the U.S. government in 2006.
President Obama increased their tax burden so much that many business owners decided
they didn’t want to work any harder when the government was taking so much away. “The land
of the free?” Not for the most productive workers in the American economy. Just as nearly 2
million citizens in the decade prior to 2008 had moved out of California and New York when
the Democrats had control and kept raising state taxes, many of these entrepreneurs have moved
their money, their factories, and often themselves, overseas. So many jobs have been lost that
welfare rolls have swelled, and President Obama is calling for more taxes to meet the needs of
those without work.
However, Obama’s tax bill still included “tax credits” for the lowest 40% of earners, who
were said to “need the most help.” Since the bottom 40% were not paying any federal income
taxes in the first place, these “tax cuts” were actually a gigantic redistribution of income, a huge
welfare payment, a way to “spread the wealth around,”35 as Obama told “Joe the Plumber” on
October 13, 2008.
When critics objected that Obama’s tax policies were leading to inflation and
unemployment, he responded that our goal should not be merely to increase America’s
materialism and wealth and prosperity, but to obtain a more just distribution of wealth, even if it
costs everybody a little to achieve that important goal.
(29) Budget deficit: The federal budget deficit has increased dramatically under President
Obama, in spite of higher tax rates. Increasing tax rates on “the rich” did nothing to reduce the
deficit because the economy shrank so much with reduced investment that the total dollars
collected in taxes actually decreased — even though most people’s tax rate is now higher. As
numerous economists had predicted, higher tax rates meant that the government took in less
money. When reporters asked Obama why he still favored higher taxes on the rich when it
brought in no more money, he replied that it was important that the rich pay their fair share.
(30) Union organizing: “The land of the free”? In 2009, Congress passed and President
Obama quickly signed a “card check” program that nullified the requirement for secret ballots
when voting on whether workers wanted a union shop.36 Now the union has to get signatures
from a majority of workers in any business, and unions around the country are using strong-arm
tactics to intimidate anyone who stands in their way. Several industries are completely
unionized, and prices of goods produced by those industries have shot up as a result.
(31) Energy: World demand for oil continues to climb, and prices keep going up, but
President Obama for four years has refused to allow additional drilling for oil in the United
35 “Obama to Plumber: My Plan Will 'Spread the Wealth Around'”, Fox News.com. October 13, 2008.
Seehttp://elections.foxnews.com/2008/10/13/obama-plumber-plan-spread-wealth/comments/
36 Donald Lambro, “Obama supports union organizing,” Washington Times, July 31, 2008.
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States or offshore. Gas costs more than $7 per gallon, and many Democrats openly applaud this,
since high prices reduce oil consumption and thus reduce carbon dioxide output. But working
Americans are hit hard by these costs.
Nuclear energy would provide a substitute for oil in some cases, and could generate
electricity to power electric cars, but environmentalist legal challenges have prevented the
construction of nuclear plants, and the courts have been leaning so far in a pro-environmentalist
direction that nobody expects the construction of nuclear plants for several decades, if ever.
Obama keeps reminding people we cannot guarantee it will be safe.
As for coal, President Obama directed the Environmental Protection Agency to
implement strict new carbon emission standards that drove many coal-powered electric plants
out of business. The country has less total electric power available than in 2008, and periodic
blackouts to conserve energy occur on a regular schedule throughout the nation. The price of
electricity has tripled in places like California, which also faces rolling blackouts during peak
energy periods. The impact on our economy, and our homes, has been devastating.
Talk radio
Through the actions of the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) and Congress,
Democrats were able to largely silence the largest source of conservative opposition: talk radio.
(32) Fairness Doctrine: “The land of the free”? By the summer of 2009, the five-member
FCC was controlled by Democratic appointees – including a chairman appointed by President
Obama. The “Fairness Doctrine” became a topic of FCC consideration following pressure from
Democratic congressional leaders who initially did not have sufficient votes to pass the measure.
The FCC quickly implemented the “Fairness Doctrine,” which requires that radio stations
provide “equal time” for alternative views on political or policy issues.
As a result, all radio stations have to provide equal time to contrasting views for every
political or policy-related program they broadcast by talk show hosts like Rush Limbaugh, Laura
Ingraham, Sean Hannity, Dennis Prager, Janet Parshall, Michael Medved and Hugh Hewitt, and
broadcasters like Dr. James Dobson. Every conservative talk show is followed by an instant
rebuttal to the program by a liberal “watchdog” group. Many listeners gave up in frustration,
advertising (and donation) revenues dropped dramatically, and nearly all conservative stations
have gone out of business or switched to alternative formats such as country or gospel or other
music. Conservative talk radio, for all intents and purposes, was shut down by the end of 2010.
In order to solidify the Fairness Doctrine at the FCC, Congress in 2010 passed, and
President Obama signed, legislation making it permanent.
Many legal scholars had predicted the Fairness Doctrine would be declared
unconstitutional by the Supreme Court. But the liberal Obama court upheld it easily. Of course,
this bill fit the deeper purpose of the liberal-Left wing of American politics, which trumps all
other purposes, and that is getting and increasing its power so as to impose its agenda on the
nation. It was not surprising the liberal Supreme Court went along.
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Christian publishers
(33) Christian books: After the Supreme Court legalized same “sex marriage,”
homosexual-activist groups targeted three large Christian book publishers that had publications
arguing that homosexual conduct was wrong based on the teachings of the Bible. The activists
staged marches and protests at Barnes & Noble stores around the country, demanding the stores
remove all books published by these “hate-mongering” publishers. Barnes & Noble resisted for a
time, but the protests continued, there was vandalism and secret defacing of books, and
eventually the cost was too great and Barnes & Noble gave in. The same thing happened at
Borders and other chains. Then they staged a massive nationwide computer attack on
Amazon.com, with the same demands, and the same result. As a result, those evangelical
publishers could no longer distribute any of their books through any of these bookstore chains.
Any Christian publisher that dares to print works critical of homosexual behavior faces the same
fate. As a result, several Christian publishers have gone out of business.
Prosecution of Bush administration officials
(34) Criminal charges against Republican officials: In his first week in office, Obama
followed President Clinton’s precedent and fired all 93 U.S. attorneys, replacing them with his
own appointments, including the most active members of the American Civil Liberties Union
(ACLU). President Obama argued this was not a selective political action like what President
Bush had done, because Obama had fired all of them, conservatives and liberals alike.
The Justice Department soon began to file criminal and civil charges against nearly every
Bush administration official who had any involvement with the Iraq war.37 During his campaign,
Senator Obama said, “What I would want to do is to have my Justice Department and my
Attorney General immediately review the information that's already there and to find out are
there inquiries that need to be pursued.”38 In order to facilitate these proceedings, President
Obama rescinded President Bush’s executive order that had prevented presidential papers from
being released, and millions of pages of previously secret White House papers were posted on
the Internet. ACLU attorneys have spent four years poring over these papers looking for possible
violations of law. Dozens of Bush officials, from the Cabinet level on down, are in jail, and most
of them are also bankrupt from legal costs.
Where is the opposition?
Has America completely lost God’s favor and protection as a nation? If it has, is this
surprising? How can God continue to bless a nation whose official policies promote blatant
violation of God’s commands regarding the protection of human life, and sexual morality? Why
should God bless any nation that elects officials who remove people’s freedom of religion and
freedom of speech and freedom even to raise their own children? His Word says,
“Righteousness exalts a nation, but sin is a reproach to any people” (Prov. 14:34).
37 http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2008/04/15/obama-would-immediately-r_n_96690.html and
http://www.philly.com/philly/blogs/attytood/Barack_on_torture.html
38 Ibid.
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Many brave Christian men and women tried to resist these laws, and some Christian legal
agencies tried to defend them, but they couldn’t resist the power of a 6-3 liberal majority on the
Supreme Court. It seems many of the bravest ones went to jail or were driven to bankruptcy. And
many of their reputations have been destroyed by a relentless press and the endless repetition of
false accusations.
The same question written in “The Star Spangled Banner” by Francis Scott Key in 1814
rings in the air:
O say, does that star spangled banner yet wave
O’er the land of the free and the home of the brave?
Now in October 2012, after seeing what has happened in the last four years, the answer to that
question is “No.” Our freedoms have been systematically taken away. Many of “the brave” are in
jail. We are no longer “the land of the free and the home of the brave.”
How did this happen?
When did this all start? Christians share a lot of the blame. In 2008, many evangelicals
thought Senator Obama was an opportunity for a “change,” and they voted for him. They did not
realize Obama’s far-Left agenda would take away many of our freedoms, perhaps permanently
(it is unlikely the Supreme Court can be changed for perhaps 30 years). Christians did not realize
that by electing Barack Obama — rated the most liberal U.S. senator in 2007 — 39 they would
allow the law, in the hands of a liberal Congress and Supreme Court, to become a great
instrument of oppression.
Many people thought he sounded so thoughtful, so reasonable. And during the campaign,
after he had won the Democratic nomination, he seemed to be moving to the center in his
speeches, moving away from his far-Left record. No one thought he would enact such a far-Left,
extreme liberal agenda.
But the record was all there for anyone to see. The agenda of the ACLU, the agenda of
liberal activist judges in their dissenting opinions, the agenda of the homosexual activists, the
agenda of the environmental activists, the agenda of the National Education Association, the
agenda of the global-warming activists, the agenda of the abortion-rights activists, the agenda of
the gun-control activists, the agenda of the euthanasia supporters, the agenda of the one-world
government pacifists, the agenda of far-Left groups in Canada and Europe – all of these agendas
were there in plain sight, and all of these groups provided huge support for Senator Obama. The
liberal agenda was all there. But too many people just didn’t want to see it.
Christians didn’t take time to find out who Barack Obama was when they voted for him.
Why did they risk our nation’s future on him? It was a mistake that changed the course of
history.
39 Brian Friel, “Obama: Most Liberal Senator in 2007,” National Journal’s 2007 Vote Ratings,
http://nj.nationaljournal.com/voteratings/, January 31, 2008
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What about our faith?
Personally, I don’t know how we are going to get through tomorrow, for these are
difficult times. But my faith in the Lord remains strong. I still believe that “for those who love
God all things work together for good, for those who are called according to his purpose” (Rom.
8:28). I still believe “kingship belongs to the LORD, and he rules over the nations” (Psalm
22:28). I still believe our salvation comes from no earthly government for “there is salvation in
no one else” than Jesus Christ (Acts 4:12). I still believe God is sovereign over all history, and
though I don’t know why he has allowed these events, it is still his purpose that will ultimately
be accomplished. He alone can say of all history, “There is none like me, declaring the end from
the beginning and from ancient times things not yet done, saying, “My counsel shall stand, and I
will accomplish all my purpose” (Isaiah 46:9-10).
Sincerely,
A Christian from 2012
© 2008 Focus on the Family Action, Inc.
This letter may be reproduced without change and in its entirety for noncommercial and nonpolitical purposes without prior
permission from Focus on the Family Action.