Human Rights vs. Government Rights

“I see in the near future a crisis approaching that unnerves me and causes me to tremble for the safety of my country. As a result of the war, corporations have been enthroned, and an era of corruption in high places will follow, and the money power of the country will endeavor to prolong its reign by working upon the prejudices of the people until all wealth is aggregated in a few hands and the Republic is destroyed. I feel at this moment more anxiety for the safety of my country than ever before, even in the midst of war.” Abraham Lincoln, 1864

Down through time, during man’s ascendancy on this earth, we have had people who wielded power over us. It probably started out with the biggest and strongest of the group defying anyone in his tribe to stop him from telling them what to do, and backing it up with muscle and a big club.

Over time, as the tribes got bigger, there was probably some kind of system to pick the person who was discerned as the best candidate for the Job. The strongest, the most intelligent, or the one with the most backers, wife’s, or any combination of the above.

At some point in our history…our leaders came to believe that they were picked by ‘God’ or ‘the gods’ to fill the role of leader, and of course this was followed by some leaders thinking they were gods, and they started to picked their own successors. At any rate most of the leaders of humankind have had problems with the power they wielded. Hell, even Solomon was selling his people into slavery to enrich the treasury.

From the written history we have of the Middle Eastern world of Biblical times we know that the Kings and leaders of the time were always going to war to either overthrow another tribe and take their animals, crops, women, gold, tactical location, for sport, or they were defending themselves from bloodthirsty Kings trying to do the same to them. These leaders, almost to the man, turned out to be wicked and corrupt. They had no sense of respect for the rights of humans they purported to represent and guide. The common man has always been cannon fodder for Kings and leaders throughout our human history. Used up and discarded.

As our recorded history continued through the Greeks, Romans, Catholic Popes, Kings in France, England, and elsewhere on the European and Asian continents, Kings and other unelected leaders have consistently taxed and starved and caused their subjects to die in any manner of ghastly ways while they go about spending tax money on and for themselves and their supporters. This has never changed.

Our leaders today; Kings, princes, presidents, military juntas, what have you; continue in this fine tradition even now. Some are more sophisticated than others. The military juntas say they had to take over from freely elected presidents because the president was leading the country the wrong way. So in the ‘interest of the people’ they take over the power.

Russian socialists just don’t seem to die out…they go away for awhile, but they keep sneaking back in, after all the ‘people’ don’t know how to rule themselves…only the party can realize the dream of equality for you. The Chinese, as always, copied and then morph into something hardly recognizable as communism any more.

America started out with high hopes and a radically new form of Government…where the ‘people’ actually had the power to vote out of office those they didn’t like. But, as always, the twin drugs of power and practically unlimited money took over, and men schemed and manipulated the unwritten rules, the laws, and the national parties and the common folk. Propaganda, misdirection, and manipulation of news or information access have been honed into highly effective tools to control people’s thoughts, actions and even thinking processes.

The political parties in America almost totally control the way our people think and act nowadays. They control every bit of money, all transactions of a monetary nature, in practically the whole world, are either now under their control or observation…or the politicians, and the flunky’s that work for them, are actively seeking the means to bring them under their control or observation in the near future.

Nowadays it’s a common practice to award No-Bid contracts worth billions of dollars to your campaign supporters or ex-employer, where in the past this was illegal. Actually this is still illegal, but the politicians just ignore the laws…and we let them get away with it…after all its unpatriotic to question or challenge our leaders. If you were to get too vocal in your protests then you might find yourself on a terrorist watch list, as some anti-war protesters in Maryland found out. Go Here for more.

Our leaders in the last seven years have managed to take away the right to petition a judge for a hearing if you’re arrested. This is a principle of law that goes back hundreds of years, in most countries the world over, and our leaders have decided that we don’t have that right anymore…they didn’t ask…they just took it away. It used to be that those in power had to go before a judge and show cause and ask for permission to search our homes or personal papers or computer…that was also taken away…this was a part of the constitutional law our ancestors fought the American Revolution over, and our leaders swear an oath to uphold.  No matter, we don’t need this protection any more…the poor outgunned federal government needs the power now.

This leader we all suffer under now has even promoted unlisted laws that they can’t tell us about. They are secret laws that you can be prosecuted on…but they can’t tell us exactly what they are and why we need them. We as a people had no input on this; we were not represented in their passing. Again people are put in the place of having no protection from the Kings.

Now some people will say we get the government we deserve, and that’s true to a certain degree. However I posit that the whole political process in American has been totally subverted and is mostly used to the advantage of the very, very rich and very, very powerful and to the detriment of the common people. America, the United Kingdom, Russia, and China are the most spied upon, politically controlled, and manipulated people in the world now. This is not just my perception, go here for more information

All of our electronic communications (emails, blogs, websites, cell phones and land line phones) are diverted to supercomputers that search and scan for anything out of the ordinary in our thoughts as expressed in our communications. As I’ve already mentioned all monetary transactions are now monitored so the government can get their unfair share of taxes. Billions, even Trillions of dollars of tax money have just disappeared with no explanations to us poor people who work really hard to succeed and pay their taxes. If we use too much cash money…the government suspects us of being drug dealers, money launderers, arms dealers or some such crap, and they promptly investigate. Even ex-Senator Bob Dole was caught up in this silliness.

Our government is inexorably moving to a kind of democratic dictatorship. Where we vote for those that would totally control our whole life…in all respects. They just slowly add things that enslave us. You don’t even notice them sneaking up on you.

Nothing ever truly changes in Kings and politics…it’s all about control, power, and money…always was.

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Religion Wants to Destroy Science

If the Church wants to be successful in changing society’s attitudes toward abortion, pornography, and homosexuality, it is going to have to fight the issue at a foundational level. The foundational basis of evolution needs to be destroyed and the foundational basis of creation restored to its rightful place of importance. Ken Ham, founder, Answers in Genesis (AiG) (science is the foundational basis of evolution)

Ken Ham is arguably one of the most dangerous men in America. He resorts to lies to achieve his ends. His objective is nothing less than the dumbing down and destruction of the American people and society through smothering the minds of our children and the creativity and inquisitiveness we as a society display. As can be gathered from the quote above he wants the sciences to be destroyed and from his other writings he advocates a kind of primal religious teaching of our children and a religiously controlled government.

Ken Ham is the founder of Answers in Genesis and a firm believer and marketer of “creation science”, or Young Earth Creationism (YEC), both of which are early illegitimate cousins of “Intelligent Design”. His real…ultimate goal is to convert the world to his brand of Christianity…whether they want to or not. He is also the ‘owner/operator’ of the ‘Creation Museum’ in Petersburg, Kentucky, a venue he uses to indoctrinate children and their parent and teacher visitors into his version of the “Truth.”

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Since America has the highest percentage of dupe’s religious believers, he is correct in targeting the US first. It is a sad fact that we have a very high number of really dumb citizens…witness Jay Leno’s “Jaywalking” skit on the Tonight Show.

Ham believes that the first book of the Bible…Genesis, is the very foundation of Christianity and it is the literal truth of all human reality. The universe, earth, and humanity are only 6000 or so years old. This is societal and scientific heresy of the highest order.

This man believes that acceptance of evolution, homosexuality, abortion, pornography, racism, use of drugs, and more are directly related…go hand in hand, so his stated solution to solving these problems is the destruction of science.

This, to my mind, is a problem of the first order. Fundamentalist, Evangelical religions are subtly advocating the destruction of the very foundations of our modern society. They advocate the fulfillment of their apocalyptic visions of life. They are trying to make their vision of life self-fulfilling.

We know from history that Christianity (Islam also) has been associated with, or responsible for, or supported; sexual abuse, torture, murder, fraud, deceit, infanticide, slavery, racism, genocide, and probably more I can’t think of right now. We also know from history that secular controlled governments can be responsible for the above-mentioned shameful behavior, but most secular governments can and eventually do change, unlike religions, which are cast in stone.

Do you really think a God, or Jesus, would approve the kind of deception and dishonesty that Ken Ham…and those like him…are using to delude us? Do you think a true religion and a true God would need the manipulations these people are using?

I don’t.

Religion is fundamentally opposed to everything I hold in veneration — courage, clear thinking, honesty, fairness, and, above all, love of the truth. Henry Louis Mencken, American journalist, (1880-1956)

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Heaven or Hell…God or Satan

Below, in today’s post, I am corresponding with a nice young man named Justin. He is in college and is a very evangelical soul. Although I disbelieve in his worldview, I am happy to ‘talk’ with him. I hope you find our discussion as interesting as I do. You-refers to Justin. Me-refers to me. 😉

You: I’m going to try to ignore possible sarcasm in these questions and answer simply. Refers to post Here
Me: What? Me being sarcastic….Noooo 🙂

Me: Did matter always exist in the universe?
You: God began time. God created matter.
Me: Standard non-believer response…who or what created God?

Me: *Did God always exist in the universe?
You: No, God created time. God created the universe.
Me: Standard response, see above.

Me: Was there ‘nothingness’ everywhere that was filled up with a sentient cloud of electrons or atoms? Or was there absolutely nothing there…but, somehow, something…was a God?
You: There was God. Then he created.
Me: See above.

Me: Were we, and our universe, as we know it, purposely created to ‘glorify’ a cloud of sentient nothingness?
You: We were created to glorify God and enjoy Him forever.
Me: Again with the ‘glorify’ thing. What is it with all Gods that we have to glorify them? Doesn’t he realize that the human race has evolved away from the wide-eyed innocence that priests in the past could count on for easy obedience in the flock? The church leaders couldn’t come up with anything better than he needs to be glorified? God doesn’t need to be glorified. Satan doesn’t need to be glorified…this ‘glorified’ crap needs to be re-examined. It sounds like an easy way out of explaining a phenomenon that really needs to be re-examined in the light of our better understanding of the world, and the universe, and human motives. Besides, how is God’s wife (Asherah) going to feel, if we go around glorifying him and leave her out? J

Me: Are we even real? Could we be a dream that a cloud of nothingness is dreaming? Shades of Matrix 🙂
You: We are real. Interestingly, it is the Christian worldview which states that we are real and the laws of nature are unchanging that allows science to take place.
Me: Well, actually I was being a little sarcastic there. The laws of nature, so far, don’t need a God to explain things. They’re a little fuzzy on the very beginning of things, as even I will allow for the possibility of ‘God’ or something having started it (time…the universe), but after it was here, natural processes can account for everything. We still come back to the conundrum of who created the creator. “He was always there” doesn’t cut it in my humble estimation.

Me: Why would a God set up a paradise, with a snake/Satan that he knew would cause Eve to “Sin”? and Why was Satan…the sinner…even around then, or allowed to be in the garden?
You: God was not surprised. He allowed people to do what they did as part of His prearranged plan. God gets all the proper glory and credit in the end.
Me: So, let me get this straight; God, even in the beginning, was setting up this little plot to terrorize and murder mankind? He sets up this drama so the glory and credit will fall on him when we go through this horrible experience that is our human history? Man, that’s Evil with a capitol E. Who needs Satan when we have a God that can plot all of this from the beginning of time? *^{see asterisk below}

Me: How was Satan even considered evil or sinful, when there was no evil or sin existing at the time?
You: Satan began to think of Himself like God. That was wrong. Through Adam the curse of sin entered mankind who was made in the image of God.
Me: Yea, those youngsters that we create get all full of themselves when they hit the teen years. We humans all seem to attribute anthropomorphism to our creations. If we are made in his image, I picture a 6’6″ human shape floating around in space, trying to figure out which end is up. Obviously not true that we are made in his image.

Me: Why was Satan even allowed to be around later in this fairy tale?
You: Not a fairy tale. However, see above comment on prearranged plan.
Me: *See above asterisked comment. That’s really Evil to plan something like that.

Me: Why would an intelligent cloud of nothingness set up the trap for his creations (us), knowing what the outcome would be? Isn’t that kind of like leaving a very sharp butcher knife in front of your one-year-old kid?
You: Not an intelligent cloud of nothingness. He is the Creator. He is God. See comment on prearranged plan.
Me: That God is Evil.

Me: Why would a God even create an evil being?
You: Does cold exist? It is the absence of heat. Does darkness exist? It is the absence of light. Does evil exist? It is the absence of God.
Me: I believe that is flawed logic. You are using physical phenomena that have no relationship to metaphysical reasoning. Yes there is good and evil in this world, and they are opposites in our logic. But, the absence of God does not mean all that’s left is evil? I have no sense of God in my mind, and I am far from evil. In my logic of un-belief, you really have no God directing your actions, and I believe you are probably not evil.

Me: Why is God so directly involved with the killing of so many humans?
You: I do not tell you what to do with your broken microwave. Please be respectful by not telling God how to initiate His justice against a rebellious creation.
Me: Well, the thing is…I’m one of the creatures that your God goes around indiscriminately killing and maiming with His Love. His ‘plan’ as described by various church leaders and evangelical civilians….sucks.

Me: Who tempted Satan to sin…why? If there was no sin before, what was the sin?
You: *Humans did not sin because they were tempted by Satan.* They did so because they chose to do so. You could say they were morally neutral unlike humans today who are inclined towards sin. I am speculating here as I have not done a study on it, but perhaps the angels were created morally neutral.
Me: * I’m sorry, did I miss something here? Didn’t Satan in the form of a snake, tempt Eve to take that fateful bite? Because he is an evil, arrogant, conniving, devilishly convincing fast talker. Here was poor Adam and Eve, literal ‘babes in the woods’ in a world that, to them, was brand new…they had no history to draw on, no instruction classes on the evil ways of some creatures, nothing to base critical decisions on. How gullible are we as young people…before we have had some bad experiences? And, if as you suggest earlier, this is just a pre-arranged plot…that’s just Evil.

Me: If there is no sin in heaven how did Satan sin? Do sins just pop-up, so to speak?
You: You have an incorrect presupposition. Take that away before reading this next sentence. Satan chose to have a rebellious attitude and thus sinned.
Me: Well we know from your exegesis that this was pre-arranged for him to act this way. He was destined from the moment of his creation to be sinful. So I guess God was just setting up this universe and us to be puppets in a play.

ME: What happens if we get to heaven and, God forgive…have a sinful thought?
You: Christians are born again and given a new nature. When in Heaven, there will be no sin. How exactly will that work? There are multiple theories, but I don’t think that is specifically laid out in the Bible. God created the universe. He can handle it.
Me: Ah, there it is. We are born again. The theory that explains it all.

Me: Since there is no visible heaven, will we be among the stars, on earth, another planet, or in our own imagination/minds?
You: Your question has a presupposition. Take that away before reading this next sentence. From my understanding, Earth will be restored and Christians will have access to it and Heaven while the unredeemed will be in Hell.
Me: So the earth will be like new again, and we (well…you) will live on it…and in heaven. Just Christians though. So approximately 40 to 80 billion souls will burn in hell?

Me: Where exactly do you think hell is, and why would a ‘loving God’ want to burn and torture people in it for eternity?
You: Hell is God’s place of justice. God is love. He loves life, therefore he hates murder, Love requires hate in a sense. God is loving and just, therefore Hell must exist. As it is just, it cannot be defined as torture.
Me: I’m sorry, but that’s some really bad logic there. 🙂 I’ll take the last part first: “As it is just, it cannot be defined as torture.” I think that’s what George Bush and Dick Cheney are rationalizing to themselves as they torture people. The rest of what you’re saying here is just so convoluted I can’t even wrap my brain around it enough to reply. I worry about your soul, in a metaphorical way.

Me: Did you ever examine your belief that Santa Claus is not real, and why you think that way? It’s because of the evidence…right?
You: Yes
Me: Give me something real.

Me: Do you Really believe that a ‘Universe Creating God’ would make up this little story of sin and redemption you claim we are all living?
You: No, I do not believe God would make up the story. It is not little either.
Me: You’re right; it’s not little. In most of the above discussion you assert that God did make up the conflict, from ‘the beginning.’ You’re trying to confuse me, right?

Me: Why do you still believe the Bible is the real inerrant word of a God, when you have been shown the many errors in it?
You: Your question has a presupposition. Examined correctly, there are no errors in the Bible. Secondly, I know the perfect God so His Word cannot error.
Me: “Examined correctly.” Those two words speak volumes about Christian Apologetics and the faith in general.

Me: Jesus was, without a doubt, preaching of the second coming of the ‘Kingdom of God’ in the near future, and here we are two thousand years later, still falling for it. Why?
You: People redeemed are part of God’s Kingdom. Christ’s return is coming soon in God’s accounting of time. Be ready.
Me: This doesn’t answer the question. Jesus was preaching the soon to come, new Kingdom of God, the second coming. Where is it? He said some of the same people he was preaching to would still be alive when it happened. If his words were inerrant, as all the words are (?), what happened?

Me: Evidence that believers cannot reach a consensus on the Bible (or the Koran for that matter) is found all over the Christian and Jewish communities. They disagree with each other…sometimes violently…over interpretations of their so-called Holy Script. That alone, is testament to the non-holy status of the Bible, and their sects founded on it. If the Bible and religion were true…the divisions would not even be there. The whole world would be under its sway.
You: You presuppose that if God wrote it, everybody would agree. You’re simply wrong on this point.
Me: Well, I think you’re wrong. 🙂 If there were a ‘True God’ out there in our world, the whole earth would know it, and the nightly network news would be doing interviews. That wouldn’t be something that would be denied in our world today…if the proofs were there. You have to step away from this little ‘Pre-planned By God’ drama. In the ancient world these mythical stories couldn’t be denied because not only wasn’t there enough knowledge about ‘things.’, but people were very gullible. They were not educated and hardly had knowledge of things further than their own horizons.
As people get educated and learn about the real world, these purposely planted superstitions fade away. There is no observable supernatural or magic phenomenon operating in our world. There is not any evidence or proofs that there ever was. A real God operating in our universe requires that magic be true…it isn’t.

Shalom

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