The true story of Thanksgiving

There was no freedom of religion in the early 1600s. If you did not believe in the same religion that King James I wanted, and you worshiped God in the way you wanted instead of what King James wanted, you were treated as a common criminal. You were hunted down, put in prison, or even killed.

These individuals wanted to be left alone to worship the way they wanted, and in 1608 they moved out of their homeland of England to Holland. But there was much hardship in Holland too, so the Pilgrims decided to leave England for America. But they stopped back in England first to receive funding from the Virginia Company. Then in August of 1620, 102 Pilgrims set out for America in a ship called the Mayflower.

During the ride across the ocean much discussion ensued as to what form of government to create. While still on the Mayflower in 1620, the Mayflower Compact was signed, and one of the signers was William Bradford. The Pact said that all goods and services, and all land, would be owned by the mass community, and the profits would be doled out equally among the masses.

When they landed in November they found a land that was cold, shelter less, and not very welcoming. In fact, in that first harsh winter over half of the Pilgrims died. When Spring finally arrived, the Indians taught them how to build shelters and to plant corn, fish for cod, and skin beavers to be used as coats.

The fact that an Indian tribe, lead by Massosoit, was a blessing from God in itself, because without his blessing the other Indian tribes would have pulverised the Pilgrims. This was also a blessing because a pirate named black took advantage of his friendship and took many of his people.

They did better at this point, but things did not go as well as Bradford, the original governor of the community, had expected. He decided that while the Mayflower Pact sounded like a good idea, since no one owned anything, and there was no incentive to work more than the minimum, there were many crops that went unplanted, and much that wasn't taken care of, and productivity was very poor. People did whatever the minimum was needed of them, and then they quit. What the Pilgrims had created here was an early form of socialism.

By 1623 the harvest was so poor that starvation and death became a problem almost as bad as when the colonists first arrived. They had the know how and the potential for having good crops, but this wasn't happening.

Bradford realized this pact was not working. He wrote: "The experience that we had in this common course and condition, tried sundry years...that by taking away property, and bringing community into a common wealth, would make them happy and flourishing – as if they were wiser than God." Yet he realized it did not work as expected.

Bradford decided to take an idea from the Bible. He gave every person a plot of land to take care of as their own. If they did well, they were able to keep part of the profits as an incentive to work hard. They were allowed to market and profit from what they sold. In effect, he turned loose the power of the marketplace. He created the worlds first capitalistic government.

The following harvest was abounding. It was not abounding because of help from the Indians, but because a socialistic government was replaced by a capitalistic one. On this, Bradford wrote: "This had very good success, for it made all hands industrious, so as much more corn was planted than otherwise would have been."

The Pilgrims did so well that they set up stands where they exchanged goods and services with the Indians, and they used profits from this to pay back their debt in England. In fact, the colony started to do so well economically that many Pilgrims decided to migrate to the colonies. This was called the Great Puritan Migration.

For helping them come up with a new system that worked to produce the bountiful crops, they decided to have a roast to give thanks to the Lord. There were some Indians at this celebration, but not as many as we and are kids are taught in school.

Now the Pilgrims were also thankful for the Indians for helping them and even protecting them. Yet that was not the main Intent of that celebration. The main intent was to thank God for teaching them an effective government.

The history books tell us that the first Thanksgiving was celebrated to give thanks to the Indians for helping the Pilgrims survive after that first hard winter. Sure the crops were improved that second November, but there was no celebration. There was no celebration until socialism was quashed and a capitalistic government was formed and the economy of the colony prospered. This is what the colonists celebrated on that first Thanksgiving. The date was August 9th.

However, since William Bradford's original notes were lost for many years, the story of  Indians saving colonists and this being the reason for the first Thanksgiving became common. And when Thanksgiving was made a national holiday by Congress in George Washington's first year in office, November 26 was selected as the day. And even while Bradford's journals were discovered, this false date and the false story of the first Thanksgiving were not corrected.

The unfortunate result of this fallacy not being corrected is that the lessons of Bradford were not learned. Carl Marx, Stalin, Lennon, Hitler, Mussolini, all played with various forms of socialism, and none of them worked.  Even today, in both the Europe and the United States, forms of socialism continue to exist. Perhaps if the true story of Thanksgiving were known, the failures of the past would not be repeated over and over again.

Further reading:

• Smithsonian: What as on the menu at the first Thanksgiving?

Reduce Poverty By Teaching How America Became Great

I recently had an opportunity to sit down with Rush Limbaugh. We discussed why people outside our nation are envious of us and want to bring down our great nation, as opposed to trying to become more like us. We also discussed what needs to be done to increase prosperity around the world. Here are the transcripts.

Me.  Hi Rush.  Long time listener. It's an honor to have this opportunity to talk with you. 

Rush. Thank you, sir. 

Me.  There are a lot of people who, I don't know if they hate America, but they seem to be envious of us. They see how prosperous we are.  But instead of trying to understand how America became so prosperous, they talk bad about America.  They say that we are overly materialistic. They say that we have become prosperous at the expense of other people or other nations. You have people like the pope saying we need to create a larger government to take money from greedy Americans and share it with poor people in America and poor nations around the world. They say that we need to keep our borders open and allow anyone who wants in in. You even have people inside our own country who think this, such as Obama, which explains why he won't do anything about the invasion of immigrants. What do you think?

Rush.  Let's start with the pope. It's almost as if in his mind and in the minds of many other people, in fact, that you have the world, and it is what it is and then there's this one place in the world where it's much, much, much better than anywhere else in the world. It's richer. It has more opportunity. It has more freedom and more liberty. It's vastly more prosperous. The standard of living is way, way higher. It's got all kinds of weapons to protect itself and so forth. It's just better, it's just demonstrably better. 

Me. Uh huh.

Rush. And then the rest of the world is kind of eating the dust of this one really special place. And it's as though nobody ever stops to ask how did this one special place become special? They just assume that it was made that way, or that fate, or maybe in this case God, ordained it. And because there's only one special place in all the world, one place that's so much better, so much more advanced, so much more prosperous, however you want to define and characterize it, this place is so special, but it just happened. It's just the way it is. 

Me.  Exactly.

Rush.  And, as such, everybody else in the world is entitled to go there, simply because it exists. Everybody's entitled to go there, and anybody who wants to go there should be permitted to go there. And there ought not be any complaining about it, because in this special place, this one place that is far and away better than anywhere else on earth, everybody that's there was once from someplace else.

So everybody that's there had to go there to get there. So why should people going there to get there today not be permitted when everybody in the past was? No, I'm talking about the United States of America, not the Vatican. One special place, United States of America. It's far and away superior to every other place on earth, in terms of lifestyles, liberty, and freedom. In terms of the human condition, there's no place like it. 

Me. Exactly. 

Rush.  It's so special, everybody wants to go there. And there's not a thought given to how it got special. It's just assumed it was made that way, I guess. It's just assumed that it's just there. And it's also assumed that it's always going to be there. Call it the golden goose or whatever you want but everybody saying that we have no right to keep anybody out because nobody kept us out, we all had to get here. Nobody here now actually started here. Of course, that's no longer true.

But the whole construct of this is that, yeah, this is a special place, but not because of anything the people here did to make it special. It just happens to be. And the people who were here are here simply by winning life's lottery. It's all fate; it's all luck. And if anybody else in the world wants to come to this one special place, then nobody has the right to tell them they can't because we are all immigrants.

And nobody ever stops to ask in this debate, nobody ever stops to consider how did it get special? Because it wasn't made that way. We didn't just wake up one day and here is the United States of America, and it is the gem, the shining city on the hill, however you want to describe it, it had to be built. It was not there. But from the moment it began to be built, isn't it interesting that everybody in the world who heard about it wanted to go there?

Me.  It is.

Rush.  Maybe I should change the tense. Everybody who heard about it wanted to come here. And now the people who lead this special place don't seem to have any appreciation for how it became special. In fact, if they have anything, it's guilt over how it became special. And so they either want to open the borders and let anybody in because it's not fair that we are here and we're able to get here and others who want to come here are not, it just isn't fair.

So this special place in the world, the United States of America, it just happened. It just is. And it's our responsibility, as those who are lucky and fortunate enough, to happen to have been born here. It is incumbent upon us to share that same luck and good fortune with everybody else. Otherwise we are mean, selfish, polarized, partisan, extremist, racist, sexist, bigot, homophobe, whatever. 

Me.  And Greedy. 

Rush.  So it seems even from the pope, immigrants, anybody who doesn't live here, has an automatic right to come here just because there's no other place like it on earth. And what is never discussed is how it got so special. How did it happen? Why is it so prosperous? Why is it so free?

See, the correct thing to do would be to answer those questions and spread those answers all over the world. And that's what, to me, if I had the ability to command the attention of the peoples of the world, that's what I would tell them. I certainly wouldn't stand for policies that are gonna end up destroying this special place, because once this special place is destroyed and is no longer special, then where is everybody gonna go?

Me.  So, basically, rather than look at America as the model and trying to reproduce it, rather it seems everyone wants to tear it down.  I think it points to the root of the problem we have in this culture and around the world. There's envy and there's a begrudgingness. Envy is something that can be a positive because I can be envious or you can be envious of someone's possessions and use that as a positive to try to strive to achieve whatever you need to, to get those possessions in terms of a job, education, whatever it is. And neighbors can be envious of what the other person has yet still be happy for what they have and the relationship will endure. However the problem we have is a begrudgingness. People see what other people have and they don't want them to have it. And if neighbors have a begrudging feeling towards their friends' possessions, eventually it's gonna eat away and destroy the relationship and they're gonna look at ways to try to take away what their friends have.

Rush.  There's no question, that happens in neighborhoods, I mean, that happens among friends. I mean, you're right, that's a natural human emotion. That's called jealousy. That's called covetousness. If you covet what somebody else has.

Me.  Right. And that's why I think the problem is people are so busy worrying what other people have and looking for ways of taking it away from them, they don't appreciate the things they have, and people can really work on not looking to take away what everyone else has, you know, look at it as a positive. I'd much rather be in a country where the median income was maybe a hundred thousand dollars because it tells me, okay, I have a chance of getting that median income, rather than living in a country where no one has anything so I can't be jealous of someone's fancy cars.

Rush.  Exactly. But let me refocus the question, because I was not speaking per se. I'm glad you called to enable me to make this clarification. When I asked the question when others around the world look at the US, why don't they seek to emulate it and spread that specialness all over the world rather than everybody trying to get here. You're right, there's someone to tear it down. But the answer to the question, "Who wants to tear it down?" I'm asking about other leaders, powerful people, people who have the ability to lead movements that would emulate the United States around the world or Americans who would try to proselytize about the American way of life.

We've had those. And they've been called renegades and conquerors and imperialists and so forth. But the real reason is that most of the world's leaders are tyrants. That's another reason that we are special and why we are so hell-bent opposed and frightened of tyrants. We don't want dictators, which is what most people live under. Most people were born to tyranny and bondage and dictatorship, and most, to this day, are still subject to it in one way or another, or in many ways. Those people, the tyran... Do you think Fidel Castro wants his people to be free? Do you think Raul Castro wants his people to be free? Do you think Stalin, old Joe, wanted his people to be free, or Lenin? Do you think Hitler wanted his people to be free? How about the ChiComs? Do you really think they want their people to be free? 

Me. No. 

Rush.  No. They want them to be controlled. 

The leaders in these tyrannies and dictatorships do very well economically. They are literal thieves. They plunder and steal the national wealth of the countries they lead, a la the Castros, a la the Soviet leaders. Look at the oligarchs even today there, Putin and his buddies. The thing that stands in the way of that is a free people and a runway economy. A growing economy with prosperity for all. That's, again, what explains, illustrates, defines the specialness or uniqueness of the United States, and it really is a rarity. 

Me.  Most people want to make their nations like ours, but their leaders don't want that. So most people around the world continue to have their natural rights denied. 

Rush.  My question was all of these leaders that I'm talking about, these tyrants and dictators, if you listen to them, what are the names of their countries? The People's Republic of whatever. The people don't have a say in anything in these countries. The leaders who claim to be for the little guy, who claim to care about the oppressed, who claim they're gonna get even with the rich, claim they're gonna get even with those who have their jackbooted thugs on the necks of the little guy, don't mean it.

If they did, they would be trying to emulate the United States, and they would attempt to seek the stature and credit one would attain from founding, establishing, leading such a nation, such a prosperous nation. But that's not who these people are. They're dictators. They're tyrants. They rule by the use of force and intimidation and imprisonment. And that is the story for most of the people in the world. And in light of that fact, it infuriates me even more when I have to listen to people both in this country and visitors to this country blame us for the problems in the world. 

Me.  And they do try to blame us.  They blame us for all the poverty of the world, such as the pope is saying nearly every day; that we need to spread the wealth rather than create it. 

Rush.  It really steams me. It really ticks me off when they start going down this road of climate change and how we're destroying the world and we are destroying the planet. I can't tell you, I get so insulted, I get so angry when I hear this. The dictators, and many others who seek to run and rule countries, do not want a free people.

Me. So if these dictators truly wanted to help people. If the pope truly wanted to help the poor, what is it that he ought to be preaching. What is it that dictators need to be doing to truly create wealth and benefit the people of theire countries.?

Rush.  You cannot distribute wealth or redistribute it unless what happens first? 

Me.  It has to be created. 

Rush. Sure, the U.S. is going to give 350 million, governmentally, and that's probably not the last figure. Privately, U.S. citizens are going to donate even more, probably double that amount before it's all said and done. Where does this money come from?

Me.  Capitalism.  

Rush.  So the real point of this, to me, as a great economic exercise, is to note that the real important thing that makes all this possible is the creation of wealth. Many of our nation's teachers also don't realize why poverty in developing countries is declining at such a rapid rate." It's not because of the redistribution of wealth. It's because of the redistribution of resources and the redistribution of capitalism, something I have long advocated on this program. We don't need any more wealth redistribution. We need a more widespread distribution of capitalism, and it's happening.

Me.  Right.

Rush. I have an interesting story that cleared yesterday from, of all places, the San Francisco Chronicle, and it is a piece by Jim Klauder, who is a vice president for the Foundation for Teaching Economics, which is a nonprofit organization dedicated to improving economic understanding amongst the peoples of the world, and listen to some of this. Here's the headline to the story: "Ignorance Shrouds Capitalism's Profound Impact on Reducing Poverty ? It should come as heartening news that 2004 was one of the most prosperous years in history. Not because the U.S. economy grew by a solid 4.3%, but because developing countries experienced an explosive 6.1% economic growth. According to a recent study by the World Bank, 2004's growth reflected 'an expansion without precedent over the past 30 years.' Equally encouraging, the report notes that 'the rapid growth of developing economies ... has produced a spectacular, if not historic, fall in poverty.'

Me.   So why don't teachers teach this? Why is it that our kids don't learn that it's capitalism that creates wealth?

Rush.  They have to be taught themselves that capitalism is good for the poor because they think it's bad. They think capitalism is bad. It's like the left's definition of trickle-down economics. The left defines trickle-down economics as the rich leaving their homes, going to the park, robbing the homeless of what they have, and getting even richer. I know it makes no sense, but that's how they argue it. They argue that rich people become rich because they steal from the poor or they deprive the poor of their "fair share" or what have you. It's bogus. It's outrageous. It's stupid.

Me. So what should teachers be teaching?

Rush.  The poor get out of poverty by virtue of capitalism and opportunity: the creation of wealth.  This culture, if spread to the rest of the world, would be the greatest thing that could happen for the people of the rest of the world

Me.  We are running out of time. Do you have any concluding words. 

Rush.  Well, if they (the left, dictators) really cared about the little guy, if they really cared about the little guy, and want the little guy to have an improved life, more contentment, more happiness, then the United States is what you would emulate. You certainly wouldn't tear it down. So it must not be true when they tell us what they really want is to help and assist and elevate the little guy, 'cause they don't elevate anybody. The people I'm talking about try to make things fair by punishing and penalizing people at the top. They seek equality and fairness by reaching for the lowest common denominator they can find. Equally shared misery seems to be what their utopia is. 

Me.  If you could influence all the people of the world...

Rush. So if I had the good fortune of having the ability to influence people all over the world every time I spoke, I would do my best to make sure people understood why the United States of America is special, and then I would suggest that everybody who wants to come here, "I don't blame you, fine and dandy, there's a legal mechanism for this. We're not denying people the right to come to our country. There's a legal way to do it." That's another thing people forget, including the pope.  We're not talking about being anti-immigrant. We're talking about obeying the law. The law exists for lots of reasons. In this case, the law exists to maintain the integrity of this special place. We allow immigrants here, happily so.

Me.  Right.

Rush.  You have this special place, you want it to remain special, you better find out why it became special. And then after that, as I say, if I had the ability to influence people all over the world just by speaking or writing, one of my objectives would be to find out how this special place became special and then tell everybody. "If you want what happens in the US, it can happen where you are, too. This is how." And I'm not talking about replicating our history with wars and this kind of thing. I'm talking about economic systems, human rights systems, everything that is combined to make this place special. This is no means the only place that can be special. Isn't it odd that it's the only place that is? And isn't it even further intriguing, so many people want to blow it up. Why? Obviously it's a threat. There hasn't been a military force like the United States of America in the history of the world.

Me.  Thanks, Rush, for taking time from your busy schedule for this interview. I could listen to your wisdom all day long.

Rush.  Thank you. 

Further reading:

• Rush Limbaugh: Our freedom threatens the world's tyrants
• Rush Limbaugh: How liberalism advances
• Rush Limbaugh: Redistribute capitalism, not wealth

Why do democrats hate success?

So on April 14, 2015, at a round table in Monticello, Ohio, Hillary Clinton said, "“There’s something wrong when CEOs make 300 times more than the American worker.” This statement bothers me and I'm going to explain why.

I do not know if CEOs actually do make 300 times more than the average American worker.  However, what I do know is that CEOs make a lot more money than the average worker.  Many CEOs make six figure incomes.  

Hillary Clinton has made it clear that she sees this as unfair. She would like to do something to bring CEOs down to the same level as everyone else, perhaps by taxing them more.  

It seems to me this is quite common among democrats.  They see people who succeed and they want to punish them; tax them; bring them down to earth.  They say things like, "It's not fair that they make so much money," or, "This is why I hate capitalism, because greedy people get rich at the expense of everyone else."

I see such statements as odd. I think we should put people who succeed up on a pedestal, and instead of scolding success as the result of greed, they should show other people how they can succeed too.  Instead of punishing the rich and talking bad about them, we should teach other people how they too can get rich.  

I think democrats actually think there is a limited money supply. They think if one person is rich it's at the expense of other people.  But this is not true.  There is enough money in this world so that every person can become rich.

You know, in order to get rich you have to spend a lot of time and money on a good college education.  You'll have to work hard and take risks.  You'll probably have to be willing to relocate yourself and your family where the jobs are.  And while they make a lot of money, there is a lot of responsibility and a high risk you'll be fired if you fail.

These are things most of us are not willing to do, so that's why most of us make average wages.

So we should put them on a pediatal, not chide and punish them with federal regulations and taxes

The government can try to make everyone equal, but the government cannot make people rich.  Surely, if you read any history book, you'll see that it has been tried a hundreds of times throughout history, and has failed every time.  Liberalism fails time and time again.  

But government will not make people rich, only the free market system can do that; only capitalism can do that. Government makes people poor.  If you tax people who succeed so they make the same as every one else, then everyone will be poor.  This has been proven again and again and again over the years.  

Look at the Soviet Union as a good example. They had the perfect fascist government over there that was supposed to make every person equal.  The only problem was that there was no incentive for people to do the work, so food did not get planted, and food that was planted did not make it's way to plates.  

Like money, there is plenty of food in the world too.  The way to put food on plates, and the way to put money in banks, is to get the government out of the way, to create an economic environment where any one who makes the effort and takes the risks has an opportunity to succeed.  

In other words, we should respect and honor CEOs for making more than the average worker.  They have very important jobs, and work very hard to get where they are.  They take risks, and when they succeed they get paid heavily.  Instead of talking bad about them, and instead of calling them names like "Greedy," we should show others how they can do it too.

This is yet another reason why I am not voting for Hillary Clinton in 2016. 

God Created the United States

I wrote before how God created capitalism.  Here I would like to explain how God, through Christianity, created a world where freedom and personal liberties are appreciated and respected.  In other words: God created the United States.

First we must understand that 99.9 percent of all governments ever created prior to the signing of the United States Constitution did not respect personal liberties. Essentially, the leader or leaders of nations created rules people were forced to follow. Those who did not comply were punished harshly, sometimes with their lives.

The path to a world where personal liberties were respected began with the birth of Jesus.

Father Oscar Lukefahr, in his 1994 book "The Catechism Handbook," explained that Jesus summoned the 12 apostles as the first teachers, and Peter was their head.  Peter's successor is the Pope, and the successor of the apostles are the bishops, so their pastoral office comes from Christ. (1, page 40)

He said the job of the Bishops is to teach the truths taught by Christ in the Christian Bible, and they do so with the help of priests, who share the truth with the laity. (1, pages 40-41)

The laity consists of all the members of the Church who are not committed by vows to religious life.  They are the key to spreading the truths taught by the Bible. They, in essence, are the "front line of the Church," said Father Lukefahr. "Their role is to bring Christ to the world -- into social, political, and economic realms of human existence."  (1, pages 40-41)

As I explained in my previous post, God gave individual people the right to choose.  This is proven in Psalm 1, (or see image) which states that God gives us the right to choose either good or bad, with either choice bringing about its inevitable consequences.

The website of the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops explains Psalm #1.  It says that the Bible usually refers to the right path as "the way," which essentially means a way of living or following a moral code.  A good example of a moral code is the 10 commandments, although there are many other moral codes.

Essentially, following a moral code leads to good conduct and a direct path to Heaven.  Not following a moral code leads to wickedness and a direct path to Hell. (2)

The bottom line here is that God gives individuals the right to choose.  In this regard, it is HE who gave us liberty.  God gave the people Natural Rights, or inalienable rights, or those rights or liberties that we are born with and that only governments can take away.

With only a few scattered exceptions, most governments throughout the course of history required people to give up their natural rights for the good of the nation or collective.  It was exactly this that British citizens were unhappy with, and why they forced King John to sign the Magna Carta on June 15, 1215.

The founding fathers wrote frequently of natural rights, and how they yearned to create a Constitution that would protect them.  It was under this premise Thomas Jefferson wrote the Declaration of Independence, which states quite clearly:

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.--That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed...

He was essentially saying here that God gives people "natural rights" that can only be taken away by governments.

That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness.

The United States Constitution was further created in an attempt to protect these natural rights.  Just to make sure they were not misinterpreted by future generations, many states insisted they be specifically listed in the document before they would sign it.  It was this that inspired James Madison to write the first ten amendments, or the Bill of Rights.

So God gives individuals natural rights.  Each individual has the right to choose, and God holds them accountable for the consequences of those choices. The founding fathers created the documents necessary to allow individuals the ability to cherish those natural rights.

They also understood that natural rights are unchanging, and so they created a Constitution, and signed it on June 21, 1788, that was meant to protect natural rights for all time.  It was meant to be very difficult to change in order to prevent those in power from abusing the powers given to them.

Various founding fathers, even those who were not true Christians, wrote about the importance of Christianity in government.  Stephen McDowell, writing for the Providence Foundation, preferred to use Noah Webster's writings as the best example of the founding father's thoughts on Christianity's influence on the evolution of freedom.

McDowell said:

The primary reason civil liberty could be developed in America was because the people understood biblical law and lived according to the principles set forth in the law and the gospel. Their internal self-government and Christian character, and their understanding of important biblical concepts such as covenant and rule of law, allowed them to be able to develop external civil liberty and constitutionalism. (3)

He referred to an 1829 letter from Noah Webster to James Madison, where Webster said...

...that the christian religion, in its purity, is the basis or rather the source of all genuine freedom in government.. . . I am persuaded that no civil government of a republican form can exist and be durable, in which the principles of that religion have not a controlling influence. (3)(4)

Madison, therefore, according to McDowell, believed that...

...in order for America to be free and prosper, the youth and adults of America must be educated in governmental principles of liberty, which could only be found in the christian religion.  (3) 

So it was through the path of Christianity that lead to the United States, the first nation to protect and defend natural rights from governments.  Since the signing of the U.S. Constitution, freedom has spread to over 175 nations.

References:

1. Lukefahr, Father Oscar, "The Catechism Handbook," 1994, United States
2. "Psalms, Chapter 1," United States Conference of Catholic Bishops, http://www.usccb.org/bible/psalms/1:1, accessed on 12/17/14
3. McDowell, Stephen, "Noah Webster, God’s Law, and the United States Constitution:The Influence of the Bible on the Development of American Constitutionalism," Providence Foundation, http://providencefoundation.com/?page_id=1948, accessed 12/17/14
4. Webster to James Madison, 16 October 1829, Madison Papers, Series 2, Library of Congress. Quoted in Defining Noah Webster, Mind and Morals in the Early Republic, by K. Alan Snyder, New York: University Press of America, 1990, p. 253.

Denver students protest American Capitalism

Hundreds of student protesters walked out of class in Denver, Colorado's largest school district, on Tuesday, September 23, to protest capitalism and Americanism. They walked out of class because because, as protesters said, they are being "propagandized with pro-American themes."

They were protesting because of a school board proposal to only provide instructional materials that present positive aspects of the nation and its heritage.  It would establish a committee to regularly review texts and course plans, starting with Advanced Placement history, to make sure materials "promote citizenship, patriotism, essentials and benefits of the free-market system, respect for authority and respect for individual rights' and don't 'encourage or condone civil disorder, social strike or disregard of the law."

Now this kind of thing would be unheard of after WWII, when patriotism was at its highest. It's the kind of thing that was not needed because it's what American parents wanted, expected.  You expected teachers to teach patriotism.  You wanted them to teach American history.

You wanted them to teach patriotism. You wanted them to teach the benefits of capitalism, because that was the only system historically proven to allow those kids to take risks and have the opportunity to make something of themselves someday.

Capitalism is the only system that will allow these kucklehead kids to take chances. Socialism, the only alternative, and what liberalism and progressivism is based upon, only allows people dibs on other people's money (called taxes) that you can take and use as your own, but their is no pride in knowing that you succeeded on your own, if you actually do find success.

Usually only the priviledged few succeed in a socialist nation, while anyone can find success, if they are willing to take chances, in a capitalist nation like the United States.

So parents used to just assume this kind of stuff was taught in American schools, and now it has to be written.  And when it is written people who lack knowledge of our history are out there protesting it.    

It used to be expected that you would teach the truth about American history.  It used to be that parents and students were proud of their heritage, and proud of their country.  

Capitalism is free thought, open discourse, and individualism

"Think for yourself," was something my grandma told me when I was a kid. After mulling those words over and over in my mind the past 30 years, now I'm starting to wonder if they meant more than what they imply on the surface.

Bill O'Reilly, in his May 14, 2014 column"Americans Expensive Indoctrination Camps, said the following:

Universities were once bastions of free thought and open discourse, but that is no longer the case, not if your "free thought" is based on Christian or conservative principles. According to a recent poll by researchers at UCLA, 63% of college professors identify themselves as "liberal" or "far left," while just 12% are "conservative" or "far right." And the imbalance has only been getting worse (or better, depending on your perspective) in recent years. Loons like Ward Churchill used to be the exception, but not any more.

Liberalism is basically a modern spin on old progressivism which was a spin on socialism.  While many of my liberal friends will argue that those are three different things, I would argue that they are all the same in that they all champion for redistribution of wealth, or taking from those who make and distributing it to those who make little.  In essence, that is the same thing.

The idea behind the progressive movement was that experts (mainly liberal experts) in Washington were to decide what's best for you.  The idea behind this was that most people are out for themselves, and left to their own devices would only do things to benefit themselves.  This only generates chaos.  Capitalism, on the other hand, resulted in chaos: you had some people who got rich at the expense of the poor.

The entire premise of socialism/ progressivism/ liberalism is that people are not smart enough, or too selfish, to make decisions that were good for the collective.  Therefore, laws must be enacted, or programs, that nudge them one way or another.  In this way, they lose personal liberties; they lose their natural right to make free individual choices (such as whether or not to purchase healthcare, whether or not to support efforts to decrease carbon emissions).

Socialism/ Progressivism/ Liberalism is based on idealism, where there is an ideal world we yearn for. The ultimate goal is a world that is free from man made pollution, where every person receives equal pay, and everyone has healthcare.  This is a dream goal, and the only way to accomplish it is to make laws, or to somehow nudge people into doing the right thing for the collective.  This system would ultimately lead to an end to chaos.

In other words, the capitalist, or individualist, idea of individualism, or free thought, would have to come to an end.  Every decision you make now should be based on the collective goal of creating this perfect goal.

There is an old adage that young people tend to be more liberal, and as they age they become more conservative.  The reason for this, one my presume, is because as we develop experience we realize that Utopian dreams are not possible; that the best results come from free thought.

It is this, I think, that my grandma was referring to when she said, "Think for yourself."  Capitalism is based on a system of trusting the chaos that results from individualism, or free thought.  The opportunity is always there that you might benefit from your creativity, and this is an incentive to try to make it work.  It is for this reason that capitalism is the greatest economic system ever instigated by any government.

So while schools used to be bastions of "free thought and open discourse," they are now places where liberal experts try to indoctrinate our children. It is at this point in your life that you have to hope that old wisdom is remembered by your children, lest they be indoctrinated.

China to become #1 world economy this year?

The United States became the world economic leader in 1872.  So that means the U.S. has been the economic leader of the world for 142 years. That streak is pegged to come to an end in 2014.

Ulyssess S. Grant was President in 1872. Experts predict, based on analysis of economic data, China will surpass the U.S. as the most dominant economic nation sometime this year.

This is stunning, and it will happen under Obama. I'm not saying I'm blaming Obama for the collapse of the American economic system, although he did nothing to turn things around.  He said he was going to, although, to this point, none of his economic strategies have worked.

Statistics show that the U.S. had an abysmal 1% of 1% (that's 0.1%) economic growth in the first quarter of 2014.  The Obama administration is blaming it on cold weather.

Now, let's delve a little deeper into this.  Consider statistics between 2011 and 2013.  During this time, the American economy grew 7.6%.  However, during this time the Chinese economy grew 24%

Obviously, there is something the Chinese are doing that's driving their economy, something the U.S. is not doing.  And I know what it is: it's capitalism.

Communist leaders, after years of watching how successful capitalism works, has adapted a capitalistic economic system.  The U.S. has gone in the opposite direction.  The result here is a rising Chinese economy and a declining U.S. economy.

Personally, I think we should be happy for the Chinese, because it's evidence of what conservatives have been saying all along: capitalism works.  That the U.S. is falling is evidence of the failures of the progressive movement here.

Capitalism creates success, progressivism creates chaos

Wherever liberalism has been tried it has failed. On the other hand, wherever conservatism has been tried it has succeeded. In fact, conservatism has made life so great in America that many people take it for granted; they have little concept of how hard life was before it existed.

By the way, the liberal movement in the U.S. used to be called the progressive movement. Of course a name is just a name. They'd probably use Communism or Socialism if those names weren't already tarnished. For the sake of simplicity, we'll simply refer to them all as progressives.

On a similar note, conservatism is the same as capitalism. So, for the sake of simplicity, we'll just refer to it as capitalism. So we have capitalism verses progressivism.

Walter Williams, professor of economics at George Mason University, gave us the following quote: 

"Prior to capitalism, the way people amassed great wealth was by looting, plundering and enslaving their fellow man. Capitalism made it possible to become wealthy by serving your fellow man."

I love that quote.   It explains why countries that embrace capitalism prosper, because people have freedom and liberty.  It explains why countries that embrace progressivism fail, because no one can get anywhere.

In progressive nations you have to be a member of the party, and the party steals and loots what you earn in order to redistribute it.  By taking your money, you become imprisoned in the system.  You are forced to stay in poverty.  In order to gain anything you are forced to steal and loot, just as the system does to you.

Capitalism frees people to provide services and products people are willing to pay for, and if you hit it big, you get really wealthy. If you don't hit it big but do reasonably well, you'll do reasonably well.  Countries that exist under unfettered capitalism prosper, and examples of this are the Harding/ Coolidge economy of the 1920s, the Kennedy economy of the 1960s, the Reagan economy of the 1980s, the W. Bush economy of the 2000s, and the current Chinese economy.

Capitalism is made up of people who are forever dreaming about coming up with ways to make life better. Capitalism is about improving the quality of life, improving the standard of living for as many people as possible.

Progressives try to make everyone the same, and when everyone is the same, you have no wealthy people.  When you have no wealthy people, you have no incentive to improve your lot in life.

Lacking the opportunity to improve your life, people become lazy.  No new jobs are created, and therefore everyone is equally poor.  That's fine, because the goal of progressivism is equality for everyone.  In other words, progressivism creates poverty.  Poverty creates desperation, and desperate people loot and steal.  

Capitalists know it's impossible for everybody to be the same. It creates an environment for, if you are willing to take risks, you may become wealthy. When you have people with money, they will take risks that create jobs. When people are working and making money, they are happy and content. When people are happy and content, they are not desperate and do not have a need to loot and steal.

Progressives create an environment that stakes one group of people against the other, and it is from here that class envy develops: the rich hate the poor who are stealing from them, and the poor think the rich are making money at their expense. The poor think it's unfair the rich have all that money, so they devise ways to steal it from the rich. So the government solves this problem by trying to create an idealist world where everyone is the same, and where they all make the same amount of money. But all this does is force people to steal and loot in order to survive.

Socialism is a never ending cycle.  They say they are doing it "for your own good."  They assume people are too stupid to make wise decisions with their money, so they devise ways to take it from you and spend it for you.  Yet since they are paying your bills, they believe they can tell you what you can eat so you can stay healthy.  They say they are doing this "for your own good," but it's really to keep their costs down.  

Progressivism sounds good to the people; it feels good.  But when it's put into place, all it does is create little train wrecks wherever it is instigated.  They take over healthcare so more people can have it, but in return healthcare gets worse. They take over economies to redistribute wealth, and all they do is create an environment where groups of people hate each other.  

Progressives never elevate the people at the bottom.  They always try to penalize the people at the top and take away from them and blame them for the inequities and the problems in society.

But it doesn't stop with economics. They go after what people say. You can't say things that hurt people's feelings, and you definitely can't judge people for bad behavior.  

They have to make sure that anything that creates human triumph is discredited, because that sends the wrong signal to a liberal or socialist or communist government. You can't have exceptions on the plus side.  You can't earn wealth while there are still people in poverty.  You simply can't.

They hate God, because God is the antithesis of their form of government.  God teaches freedom, liberty, personal choice, individualism, and conservatism. They can't have that; God sends the wrong signal to a liberal or socialist or communist government 

They also try to keep people uneducated and lie to people . They twist history to suit their own agenda.  They create medial fairness laws, and never allow conservative voices to be heard.  And, most important, they don't want their people to see how well people live in other nations, because that would make them want capitalism for themselves.  

That's why the Chinese Government controls the media and the Internet.  Once people see freedom their whole system will be defeated, it will crumble to the ground, so they keep people stupid by lying to them and preventing them from becoming educated. If a person learns too much he is thrown in prison or murdered. A good example of this is the Tienanmen Square masacre. 

In Russia, under the Soviet leadership, Russians were told how bad it was in America, and because they had no way of learning the truth, they believed it. People who became educated, or who learned how well Americans really had it, were murdered amid what the government would chime as a mass epidemic of disease.  They were able to mask the truth because there was no world media.

Some actually even credit, along with the arms movement, Hollywood for the fall of the Soviet Union. Hollywood showed the Soviets how well Americans had it under this thing called "capitalism." 

When there wasn't television Stalin could simply murder people and get away with it, but because he couldn't do that anymore, there was no way to stop Russians from watching TV and seeing what Hollywood offered.  Of course, when watching TV, they also saw American news, and were alerted of what was really going on in America; that Americans weren't evil and wicked, their own government was. So the Soviet Union collapsed in 1991.

Another thing that helped Stalin's movement was the fact that the progressivess in the U.S. controlled the media, and so they were able ignore the failures of the same movement in Russia.  Yet advancements in technology made it so the media became worldwide, and so the modern media made it so Russian leaders could no longer hide the failures of communism, the progressive movement in Russia.

Progressive leaders can no longer kill to get their way.  They can no longer control the media to get their way.  So the only method left is to make it so people don't make much money.  If you take away their money you take away their freedom. They accomplish this by by taking from anyone who makes money and redistribute it to the poor.  

It's for this reason socialist/ progressive/ liberal leaders constantly attack the rich, and it's for this reason they encourage class warfare and envy for achievers.  They attack corporations, and they attack rich people (except rich people who donate to their causes like George Soros). 

Capitalists make it so people can make money serving other people. Serving means making iPhones, televisions, cable TV, Internet, fast food, medicine, cars, etc. It means easy access to food and other essentials of life.

In socialist nations the food is aplenty, but no one wants to harvest it, so the people go hungry.  Hungry people are forced to steal and loot in order to satisfy basic needs.  

When socialists see something needs to be done, the government has to force people to do it.  Because the government takes any money people make, no one wants to do it.  

In a capitalist society, when someone has an idea, a product or service that will benefit others, he he has incentive to make it work because he knows he will get to keep any money he makes, or donate it to charities of his choice.  

Capitalism allows people to harness creativity.  It encourages creativity. Creativity is the main source of productivity.  All the good in the world today, therefore, was caused by capitalism/ conservatism.  

Despite this, too many people are tricked into believing the cause of it all is government.  Yet all government does is take away prosperity.  All government does is destroy wealth.  The only time the government rewards you with wealth, the only time it lets you keep your money, is when you use it to support the cause. 

Capitalism is always evaluated against dreams. Progressives/ Socialists/ Liberals/ believe that, if you do as they say, they can create a Utopia.  Utopia is a dream. It's a fantasy where everything's perfect; where there's no pain; where there's no suffering; where everybody has whatever the socialists/ liberals/ progressives think is important today.  In their Utopia, in their dream world, everybody's got health care. Everybody has a house, has an electric car. It's a dream. It doesn't exist. It's an idealistic dream.  

Capitalism is hard, cold reality. There's no question it is by far and away the best economic organizing system of human beings there's ever been.

So capitalism, which is a proven, demonstrable, there hasn't been any other legitimate world superpower, economic and everything combined, except the United States of America. Although some people in America today, the progressives, the liberals, are trying to make it so America no longer is a superpower.  They think this will help them create their perfect world.

There have been wealthy societies before America, but very few people participated in that. The rest were slaves or common, ordinary, everyday nothings who made all the wealth possible but never shared in it. There's been wealthy places but there's never been a wealthy superpower.

The United States developed, fed, clothed, protected, defended, provided for, took care of disasters, the world over. No other country has ever been able to do that.

And yet there's this constant battle in this country. The United States is unfair, it's unjust, it's racist, sexist, bigoted, homophobic, it's immoral, it's run by white guys. None of that has ever been true.

But let me ask you a question. What else has a chance when evaluated against a fantasy or a dream? Let's say, for example, you have this fantasy of the perfect woman or man, and you really think she or he exists. I mean, every aspect of your dream, every aspect of your fantasy, you hold out for it. Guess what? Your life is going to be miserable because it doesn't exist.

Take any other fantasy, any other dream, any other figment of your imagination where there is perfection and then evaluate that against reality, and I guarantee you reality is gonna lose every time.

Capitalism is reality and it's got more to recommend it than any other way or system. But compared to the Utopian dreams of liberalism and socialism and communism, it is always going to come up short with the dreamers and the fantasizers. And when those people end up in power, like now, then you end up with real problems. And we have them. But we'll come out of it.

So capitalism, the very idea that created this superpower, is said to be a failure because it's evaluated against fantasies. There never has been a successful socialist country. There's never been a successful communist country.

So when progressives talk to the people, they always talk in terms of "what will happen" if we continue charging "forward." In fact, "Forward," was Obama's campaign slogan in 2012, the same slogan that was used by another famous progressive by the name of Mussolini.  It was also used by a famous evil progressive in Germany in the 1930s.

Anyway, they keep talking about how, if we continue to do what they say, we will eventually get to, move forward to, this Euphoric world they always talk about. But we keep doing what they say, keep being tricked into believing it, and all that happens is chaos.

Yet that doesn't matter.  Progressives continue saying things like, "The only reason progressive ideas have failed in the past is because of capitalism." But when they are in charge, when they get their way, they destroy everything they touch.

The bottom line is, no progressive nation has ever succeeded.  The only thing progressivism succeeds at is failing and creating chaos.

In fact, you can always tell when progressives are in charge because of the chaos they create.  While the progressive agenda aims for a euphoric world, the only euphoria ever seen is when conservatives are in charge.