Tag Archives: Economics

When They Don’t Know What They Don’t Know

As we watch Europe begin to erupt in flames, there seems to be a few groups of people. Those not the least shocked, those totally stunned and those that aren’t shocked and are busy making excuses for whats happening to the totally stunned.

A bit over a month ago, we observed September 11th. Then we had another Omani Muslim try to re-enact September 11th on a FlyDubai airplane. Now we are watching France’s chestnuts roasting by an open fire.

So why do variations of the same terrorism, by the same terrorists keep happening?

From the East Coast

To the West Coast

https://www.prageru.com/videos/did-the-us-deserve-911

POLL: Large Number of Undergraduates Prefer Socialism, Say America “Deserved” 9/11

Every year, the Buckley Institute associated with Yale University polls American undergraduates, and every year the results tell us the unfiltered truth about what mindset a left-wing college education produces. This year’s survey, released during the 250th anniversary of our founding, exposes some terrifying trends.

That college students are overwhelmingly liberal, easily angered, and antagonistic to reasoned debate is no surprise. But what if I told you that 22 percent of college students say America deserved 9/11?

They know nothing. Great job Randi Weingarten and the teachers union! But the effects on education go up many age ranges. I mean look at the leftist professors and those that hired them.

Sharing credit for the abysmal ignorance of many is the “news media”. The recent kerfuffle of President Trump banning a couple of demoncrat propaganda outlets brought that back to the forefront.

Team Trump Drops BRUTAL Receipt on CNN After Network Defends Its “Accurate Reporting” and Seemingly Threatens Lawsuit Over “Illegal” White House Ban

“I am proud to announce that, effective immediately, I am banning Fake News CNN, MSNOW (who recently changed their name from MSNBC due to lack of viewership and credibility!), and Politico (The recipients of an illegal and ridiculous $8 Million Dollar subscription, an All Time Record, directly from the United States Government, under Crooked Joe Biden, in order to keep them “alive.”),” Trump said.

100 DAYS OF HOAXES: White House Brutally Fact-Checks Some of the Most Egregious Hoaxes Peddled by Fake News Media and Democrats

Tis a long an glorious list. They have adorned their hair with the shame of their lies…

Much in the similar fashion of how a cockpit “Brawl” and “Altercation” was reported in the media when the Omani Muslim attempted his 9/11 style attack, we have CBS, or See-BS if you are going for accuracy, reporting on the riots in France. See-BS’s take on them? A Scuffle. Yep, historic buildings being burned to the ground is a “scuffle”. Americans LIGHT UP CBS After Noticing the Word the Outlet Uses to Describe the Horrifying Islamo-Marxist Riots in France

Truly worth a gander at that page to see how some of the respondents to See-BS addressed that word choice.

So more than one institution deserves to be held accountable for the ignorance of people. I saw someone doing a interview at a No Kings rally a couple of weeks ago. Some elderly man was very offended and angry when questioned about Biden’s open border policy. He didn’t believe it, at all, swore the borders had been shut tight during Xiden’s whole term. Nothing could be said to change his elderly demented mind. But it was pretty clear, he truly believed what he was saying. Wow.

He’s lucky, so far the consequences of his ignorance have apparently been pretty pain free for him. For the young mademoiselle in the video it was a bit more expensive. I’ve seen translations of what she said. Basically, that she had marched for them, she supported them, she wanted them to be brought into the country. But this lady’s translations are pretty close, and certainly deeper. So I picked this short video. The look on her face says it all. She had no idea that this is what they are like, it’s not what she was told, she helped bring this on herself and others and there is no going back.

French Journalist Paul Amar Claims Some Businesses Were Left Alone During Attacks in France For One Specific Reason

Amar suggests that, at least in Marseille, there is a very specific reason some shops were left untouched while others were looted and burned.

Amar asserts, “The degree of preparation for that day was very significant. They had the prefect’s address; her residence was set on fire.”

“You can find the town hall’s address; it is always in the city centre.”

“But the prefectures’ address …they had the addresses of quite a few Jewish shop owners.”

“On one street in Marseille, I learned this this morning, all Jewish-owned businesses were set on fire.”

“Businesses run by Muslims were not.”

“That level of preparation raises questions.”

“And the intelligence services knew.

You know who else had a pretty good idea of what was coming? Emmanuel Macron. Or Macaroon. Either way. May I just point out, this article is from May 2026, long before any of this kicked off.

The Death of France – The Secret Report Macron Is Hiding

In April 2024, a classified document landed on Emmanuel Macron’s desk. Seventy-three pages, stamped Secret Défense. The document had one purpose: to answer the question that French politicians had been avoiding for twenty years. What is actually happening to this country — and who is making it happen. Macron read it and locked it in a drawer.

For months, the report sat classified and untouched while the streets of Saint-Denis continued to empty of French faces, while the mosques of Marseille continued to fill, while the call to prayer continued to replace the sound of French in neighborhoods that were, on every map, still France. The president of the Republic knew the answer. He chose not to share it.

Then it leaked. In May 2025, Le Figaro obtained the full document and published it. It was a detailed, deliberate, patient, funded, and coordinated plan across borders. A plan to take over France, not by force, but from the inside. Neighborhood by neighborhood, school by school, sports club by sports club. The name of the document, “Frères Musulmans et Islamisme Politique en France,” – The Muslim Brotherhood and Political Islam in France. This is the plan, detailed, Stage by stage, neighborhood by neighborhood, for the Islamic conquest of France by the Muslim Brotherhood:

Macron abandoned his nation to this. It’s part of why he hates Israel, and why he won’t support the US in a war against the Islamic regime in Iran. He’s scared of his pet muslims. Same with Britain actually.

So far Albania, Belgium, Greece, Italy, Spain and Portugal are also dealing with Muslim riots. Al Jazeera charmingly calls them “Cost of Living Riots”…yes, well. And there are people that still think the Qatari funded Al Jazeera is news. But hey, some think ABC and CNN are as well. In the future there will be no point in going to Europe to see the historic buildings, there may not be many left and it won’t be worth the expense or the danger.

But I digress.

The Italian Prime Minister has had some very strong words for the “thugs”, very strong indeed! Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni Calls Out ‘Gangs of Thugs’ Rioting Across Europe

Macron and wife returned from their Celine Dion concert to make a strong statement about the rioters.

Maybe someone should just tell Macron all the rioters have Covid?

Macron Vows Rioters ‘Must Pay’ as France Surveys Wreckage of Worst Unrest in Years

It’s happening in America as well.

Working-Class Americans in Large Michigan City Reveal in Startling Detail How Foreign Muslims Have Taken Over in Less Than a Decade

Town Gave Muslim School Permission to Bring In 90 Students, Then It Went Rogue and Brought in Hundreds More

And the Commie-Jihadi Mamdani is doing his best to put policies in place so it can happen in New York city.

As France Burns, NYC Council Moves to Bar NYPD’s Strategic Response Group from Protests

Three days before rioters in France burned Limoges’ city hall, damaged roughly 3,000 businesses, and injured 997 police officers and gendarmes, a New York City bill to bar the NYPD’s Strategic Response Group (SRG) from responding to protests gained majority support. The Communities United to Reject Brutality (CURB) Act secured its 26th sponsor on October 14 in the 51-member Council.

The bill would prohibit deploying SRG officers to “any First Amendment event or for the purpose of conducting crowd control.” Covered events include protests, parades, demonstrations, political rallies and other public gatherings. The ban would also apply to the Crowd Management Unit and any successor unit with similar duties, preventing the city from circumventing it by renaming the SRG.

If it were just the ones supportive of this, that wanted it, voted for it, it wouldn’t bother me all that much. But they drag people that fought against it every way they could and were vilified and accused of all sorts of things into the oncoming train wreck that most people should see coming.

But let’s go back to Macron’s statement “paying”.

In America, who is “paying” for all these Muslims and potential rioters?

A report on The Center for Immigration Studies gives us some answers. Data is from 2026.

Traditional welfare programs examined are TANF, SSI, SNAP, WIC, free/subsidized school meals, Medicaid, and public/subsidized housing. The CPS ASEC also calculates eligibility for the “refundable” portion of the Earned Income Tax Credit (EITC) and the Additional Child Tax Credit (ACTC) — cash payment to low-wage workers who pay no federal income tax.

  • Of households headed by non-citizens, 47 percent use one or more traditional welfare programs, 19 percentage points higher than the 28 percent for U.S.-born households. The non-citizen rate rises to 57 percent when eligibility for the EITC or ACTC is added, compared to 34 percent for the U.S.-born.

  • Restrictions on welfare eligibility have a modest impact on non-citizen overall use rates primarily because: 1) non-citizens, including illegal immigrants, can receive benefits on behalf of their U.S.-born children; 2) the bar does not apply to all non-citizens or all programs; 3) some states provide welfare to ineligible immigrants on their own; and 4) most legal immigrants have lived here long enough to qualify for welfare.

  • Compared to the U.S.-born, non-citizen households are much more likely to use one or more traditional welfare programs in 48 states. Adding in EITC/ACTC eligibility, the non-citizen rate is higher in every state.

  • Non-citizen households use one or more traditional welfare programs or have incomes low enough to qualify for the EITC/ACTC or both in all of the states with the largest non-citizen populations. For example, the share is 65 percent in New York, 62 percent in California, 57 percent in Texas, 53 percent in Florida, and 51 percent in both Illinois and New Jersey.

  • In states with larger non-citizen populations, their receipt of traditional welfare and/or EITC/ACTC eligibility exceeds the U.S.-born by the largest margins in Maryland (59 percent for non-citizen vs. 28 percent for the U.S.-born), Arizona (60 percent vs. 30 percent), New York (65 percent vs. 37 percent), and North Carolina (59 percent vs. 33 percent).

  • Non-citizens use traditional welfare or are EITC/ACTC eligible at higher rates than the U.S.-born in states with generous welfare systems, such as Massachusetts (61 percent vs. 36 percent) and Illinois (51 percent vs. 30 percent); and in states with less generous systems, like Arizona (60 percent vs. 30 percent) and Florida (53 percent vs. 30 percent).

  • Use of traditional welfare for non-citizen households tends to be the highest in absolute terms and relative to the U.S.-born for food assistance programs and Medicaid. Eligibility for the EITC and ACTC also significantly exceeds the U.S.-born. Use of traditional cash welfare (TANF and SSI) or housing programs are generally not significantly higher.

  • Heavy non-citizen use of means-tested programs is not explained by their unwillingness to work. A larger share of non-citizen households have a worker than do U.S.-born households. But qualifying for a program reflects income, number of dependents, and sometimes assets, not employment. The relatively low education level of many non-citizens and their resulting low incomes means they or their U.S.-born children often qualify for means-tested programs at high rates.

Here’s another page from the same website. Non-Citizen Use of Welfare by Region and Country of Birth

So, if those “students” in France, Albania, Italy, Belgium, Greece, Spain, Portugal, etc etc are rioting because they feel their schools are inadequate, perhaps it’s because the money for the schools is being sucked out of circulation by those stealing the Louis Vuitton bags? Yes, the numbers I gave are from America, but suspect it’s a similar demographic involved. Actually the numbers in France are probably far higher.

I was listening to a podcast the other day and the topic was immigration and the riots, they aren’t protests, lets not pretend. Someone said look at all they’ve been given and how they act. They’ve been given free housing, welfare, food, everything. Their whole families are supported. They do all this for them and the immigrants still hate them and treat them like this. If they hate them so much why did they move there? The answer was devastatingly simple. They move there because they hate them. They feel Western culture is inferior to their Sharia law, as is detailed in the link at the outline to the Muslim Brotherhood plans, the move to Western countries not to assimilate, but to take over. And if you look at the riots, what do they all have in common? The falestinian flag being proudly waved along with tons of keffiyeh. You would think countries would get a clue and deport anything waving a falestinian flag or wearing a keffiyeh. But they don’t. They welcome them in, well, by the boatload. That flag is the sign of theft, death, destruction and demise of your society. May I just point out Egypt used to have Coptic Christians, Lebanon had Maronite Christians, Turkey was Christian, and Iran was Zoroastrian. It’s not like it hasn’t happened before. And now you can add Francistan. When the “migrants/illegal invaders” get here they are around a bunch of silly children, up to and including senior citizens no doubt, that hate Western culture as well, see no value in it and don’t see it as worth defending. Add in some communists that want to tear down everything and you have a toxic hateful leftist mix.

Watching the Collapse: Why a Sovereign Israel Outlasts the Dying British and French Empires

May I point out Macron called for a two state solution, and recognized a falestinian state. And now he has one.

France’s Two State Solution

Pro-Israel Group Trolls French Government on How to Respond to Protestors: “We call on France to exercise restraint when dispersing the freedom fighters on the streets of Paris”

There are some truly magnificent tweets embedded in that article.

France Gets Brutally Trolled Over Riots: Told to Give Its ‘Brave Warriors’ Humanitarian Aid

“We call on France to exercise restraint when dispersing the freedom fighters on the streets of Paris,” the account wrote. “These brave warriors for justice must receive immediate humanitarian aid, and their safety must be guaranteed in accordance with international law. Failure to comply will leave us no choice but to bring a case before the ICJ, in close cooperation with that renowned champion of human rights, Afghanistan.”

But the cost of mass importation of Muslims isn’t just in dollars. It’s in the loss of the culture. I think it was Dan Burmawi that pointed out, Muslims don’t have to take over to affect your civilization.

One in five Norwegian women have been raped. Every night of the year a Norwegian woman is raped in Oslo. The police in Oslo have now confirmed every single woman raped in the city over the last three years was raped by a migrant.

What a French Antifa Activist Told Another Woman Amid the Riots Is Downright Insane

A French woman says that the rioters and looters broke into her building and threatened her with rape while she was holding her child in her arms.

“That’s collateral damage” responds the feminist activist Bettina Zourli who holds a Master’s in gender studies and focuses her work on gender norms, motherhood, reproductive rights, and voluntary childlessness (“childfree”)

She describes herself as “feminist, childfree and Antifa”

Zourli also says that all the stores getting looted also constitute a case of collateral damage and that the revolution, which she supports, must be violent.

She has lectured in gender studies, including at the University of Lille and Université Rennes

And

Christmas without “Christmas”?

According to the report shared here, GB News reporter Ben Leo visited a major London tourist destination to investigate why traditional “Christmas Market” signs had been replaced with names such as “Winter Market.”

Stallholders reportedly told him on camera that they had been instructed not to use the word “Christmas” or offer the traditional Christmas greeting, supposedly to avoid offending Muslims and other minorities.

If accurate, this raises a simple question: Why must celebrating one tradition require hiding another?

London can celebrate Ramadan publicly, with illuminated signs and events, while also openly celebrating Christmas. Respect should work both ways.

Erasing the identity of the host country is not inclusion. People of different faiths can live together without demanding that their neighbors conceal their heritage.

Why? Because it’s not about assimilation, it’s about dominance.

Mid-terms are fast approaching, and I understand there are some voters who are disillusioned for one reason or another.

The petrol situation

Then there are those staunch Republicans Thom Tillis and John Cornyn who are publicly rooting for Republicans to lose because the public got wise to them and they lost their primaries.

But if you look at what’s at stake, I really think conservatives need to show up in droves and vote, because the demoncrats will show up and vote early and often. And that doesn’t count the illegal invaders draining our coffers. My best advice is don’t vote for anything with a “D” after it’s name. I don’t want to see our country where the “D” stands for damned. That is what the left has planned. The masks are off, they aren’t hiding it. There are many that don’t know what they don’t know, then there are those that do know and try to gaslight. We know, go vote.

Lessons from Francistan

I will leave you with this very informative little movie from Victor Davis Hanson. The man really is a gem.

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Coroniacs: Drinking the Kool Aid

“They don’t have a right to object. That is the rule and that is the regulation, and they have to comply with that.’ Governor Andrew Cuomo (Democrat, New York), in forcing nursing homes to take COVID-19 patients, resulting in thousands of nursing home deaths, NBC News, 4/25/20. On May 17, when questioned about his decisions, reports RedState, Cuomo said: ‘Older people, vulnerable people, are going to die from this virus. That is going to happen…[W]e can’t keep everyone alive”.1

They drank the Kool Aide

“We’re all in this together” is a government slogan oft repeated by its witless mouthpieces: movie stars, professional athletes, entertainers, and elite cultural dilettantes. Unlike waitresses, hair stylists, restaurant and hotel workers, officials who slammed businesses shut still receive a check squeezed from the taxes of those they put out of work. Where is the “we” in all this suffering? Is it government of the people when officials can strike at any moment, like a cobra, destroying the lives and businesses Americans labored long and hard to build? We?

“Question Authority” was the de rigueur bumper sticker pasted on the Volvos of Bay area liberals when I was a policeman2 in California.

Question Authority

Having metamorphosed from the larval to the adult stage of the liberal life cycle, they now are the authority and chief dispensers of government Kool Aid. Those who once urged Americans to question government authority now wield the club of censorship beating down voices that…question authority. Citizens who dare to exercise their Bill of Rights, they arrest. “Drinking the Kool Aid” is a phrase with horrific antecedents and it is instructive to reprise its origin.

[Disclaimer: I am not a doctor nor a theologian. Observations with respect to denominational practices are for elucidation only].

Jim Jones, a self-avowed communist, grew up a bright charismatic young man in Indiana. His Marxist views were well known but proved no impediment to the Methodist Church’s District Superintendent ordaining him a minister. His support for racial integration in the 1950s was another matter. Methodist leaders asked him to leave so Jones formed his own church, the “Wind of Deliverance”.3 While attending big-tent revivals, he learned the lucrative connection between experiential based religion and fundraising. Jones adopted those methods.4

In 1965, Jones renamed his church the Peoples Temple and moved it to San Francisco where he adopted the name “The Prophet”. By the mid-1970s, Jones was rich and hobnobbed with powerful state politicians and mover and shakers. Newspaper journalists learned from ex-cult members there was a dark side to the Peoples Temple and began investigations. Reports of embezzlement, stealing church member’s money, and drug use, began circulating in newspapers. Fearing legal consequences, in 1977 Jones moved his cult to Guyana, South America where he established Jonestown as a socialist agricultural commune. He ruled it with an iron fist. He confiscated drivers’ licenses and passports and meted out punishment for rules infractions including beatings and interning people in dirt holes. Family members stateside heard these stories and pressured their Congressman to investigate. On November 14 1978, California U.S. Representative Leo Ryan led an unofficial delegation to Jonestown. Four days later, his work finished, Ryan, his entourage, and 14 defectors, headed to the local airstrip. Jones feared what they would reveal so he ordered the Ryan party assassinated. His hit squad attacked at the airstrip murdering the Congressman and four others. When Jones learned the others escaped, he knew they would head straight for the police. He decided mass suicide was the only answer. His lieutenants mixed up a concoction of Flavor Aid and cyanide.5 They filled cups for the obedient and syringes for the reluctant. When the Guyanese police arrived, they found 913 dead cult members, 276 of which were children. Jones was dead by an apparent self-inflicted gunshot to the head.6 Over time, the term “drinking the Kool Aid” came to mean people who accept, embrace, and believe what political organizations, union leaders, the media, and so forth, tell them uncritically, rejecting evidence to the contrary. For them, propaganda is gospel.

This past Saturday I entered an almost empty Ace Hardware store. By the time I made it to the checkout counters, the store was packed out. I stood in line behind a sullen faced middle-aged man wearing a black United Auto Workers Union Ford T-shirt. Once at the counter, he told the teenaged Asian girl behind a plastic shield, to spray the counter before he would touch it. When she asked a colleague where the bottle was, he became angry. “You don’t know where it is means you are not spraying down the counter between each customer,” he barked angrily at her. He was wearing no mask. I wanted to yell, “Drop the Kool Aid and leave her alone you Coroniac!”

I am stunned by the willingness of Americans to drink the government’s Kool Aid with respect to edicts that have eviscerated the economy and imprisoned people in their homes. Even churches have fallen in line without questioning the efficacy and legality of these diktats. Who is asking how executives, be they mayors, county executives, governors, or the president, acquired legislative powers to make laws to which are appended police enforcement? Who is asking if government is violating the Bill of Rights? Who is asking if government lockdown edicts are constitutional? Even so-called reopening policies reflect ingestion of government’s Kool Aid.

Great Clips Hair Salons require online appointments. They have removed waiting room chairs. Once there, patrons must wait in hot cars until summoned by a stylist. Ten people may have their haircut at one time but they cannot permit two or three to wait in the lounge, masks or not? Many doctor, dentist, and physical therapy offices permit only patient entry. If chauffeured, drivers must remain in their cars, in the heat, unable to find a bathroom mask or no mask. A young man I know passed his driver’s test. In order to complete the process at the license bureau, he had to book an appointment online. The problem is they are booked for over a month. However, they allow “walk-ins”. This requires people to line up and wait until the end of the day. He waited five hours, in 90+-degree heat, outside. His father waited two hours in his car. The closest bathroom is behind a dumpster. This is safe? “Customers”, when they finally make it inside, are required to wear a mask. Clerks behind the counter are and were not. Rumors several people died and those waiting in line simply stepped over their bodies remain unsubstantiated. Government requires people to have a driver’s license and then makes no provision for them to do so under less than inhumane conditions. They do not care. They are the government.

A Baptist pastor with whom I am acquainted sent an email to church members detailing protocols for reopening. He admonished members to trust and obey his and the leadership team’s decisions. He based protocols on the “wisdom” of local political officials, upon whom he “leaned” along with the word, prayer, and “discernment and discretion to lead G-d’s church each step of the way”. He removed 100 chairs from the church auditorium to enforce “social distancing”. Considering this church is typically packed out, members arrive early to save seats and even rows for habitually tardy family members and friends, where will they sit? Coffee is no longer available in the Coffee House. Why? Does Red China’s Virus contaminate the boiling hot water? More likely, Church leaders cannot trust adults to obey County edicts limiting human gatherings to ten or less. Apparently, “science” has determined if 10 people or less congregate, they are safe but add one more, and they all die. A “Welcome Team” will be at the entry door, armed with clipboards, taking down names of attendees. Why is that, so the church will know whom to contact if someone later tests positive? Who does the contact tracing, the Church or government officials? The pastor did not say. Forget nursery and Sunday school classes. Canceled. The ten-people rule? Where will they go, the auditorium?7

This Church prohibits all forms of physical social interaction including handshakes and hugs. Does this include family members who live together, arrive together, and sit together? They do not say. They banned early entry. Would be seat-savers must line up, six feet apart, at the one entry door. Ushers will ensure proper government mandated distancing. Only one person may enter at a time. What is the rationale for six feet as opposed to seven, or eight, or twelve? When I move up in line, taking the place of the man who was in front of me, won’t I enter the wake of his exhalatory backwash? Social distancing applies to potty breaks as well. Ushers guard bathroom doors to ensure members, standing in lines inevitably long, maintain proper separation. Worse, they allow only one person in at a time. One person at a time? Bathroom guards had better collect cellphones, makeup, and magazines or it could get ugly. Ushers wipe down bathroom doors and knobs between each use but not toilet handles or sink faucets. For Diabetics who often most go frequently, these protocols are untenable. Church dismissal is single file with each person maintaining proper distance. The pastor writes that Romans 13: 1-2 requires people to obey their secular rulers (city, county, state, and federal). Remarkably, the church requires no one to wear a mask. This is truly odd. He adds that Ephesians 4 requires members to preserve unity by supporting and obeying these reopening rules. 8 One wonders, who made them, the DMV?

Policies like those of hair salons, doctor’s and government offices, and churches are feel good window dressing. They calm Henny Pennys and placate politicians who revel in fashioning red tape and hoops through which people must jump. If the pandemic remains that deadly, why reopen at all? If infections reappear, does that mean these measures failed? Then what, close forever? If to ask these questions engenders anger in response, is it because those imposing draconian protocols share no interest in their efficacy and legality? Where to begin with respect to Biblical support for unquestioning obedience and asking no questions. We begin with the New Testament Bereans.

Acts 17 finds Paul, formerly Saul a Pharisee, on a missionary tour through Greece and Asia Minor. On this mission, Paul visits various synagogues where he discusses and debates with local Jews over who Jesus is. When it became unsafe for Paul to remain in Thessalonica (modern day Greece), the brethren sent him to Berea. The Jews in this Greek town were renowned for studying everything they read, including the Scriptures, and testing their veracity.9 I will follow this model.

In Romans 13: 1-2, Paul writes, “Everyone is to be in subjection to the governing authorities. For these is no authority except from G-d, and those which exist, are established by G-d. Therefore whoever resists has opposed the ordinance of G-d; and they who have opposed will receive condemnation upon themselves”.10 Is Paul referring to ecclesiastical or secular civilian authorities considering the latter were pagan or heathen. English and European Kings fastened onto Romans 13 to claim a divine right to rule. This meant no one could question the monarch’s rule. Manegold of Lautenbach (1030-1106), a theologian, priest, and member of the Church Canon, addressed Romans 13 writing that people choose their rulers. Their function is to “protect the good, destroy the wicked, and administer justice to every man”.11 Justice refers to administration of G-d’s Law. By entering into a compact (covenant) with a ruler, the people also enter into one with G-d. The people and their governors are under equal obligation to obey the terms of the compact. Should the ruler violate the terms of the pact, the “people are justly and reasonably released from its obligation to obey him. For he was the first to break the faith that bound them together”.12 Manegold argued the king’s authority within the pact is derived from “the consent of the people” and not from conquest or divine right. English bishop John of Salisbury (1115-1180) contended that if government disobeys the law, secular or divine, it becomes the duty of people to oppose their ruler as “resistance to tyranny” is obligatory.13

Thomas Aquinas also addressed Romans 13 noting Paul referred only to those authorities who “derive their authority legitimately from G-d” and not those who come to power through illegal means (conquest, coup, and so forth). G-d is not the author of disorder, anarchy, and lawlessness. If a legitimate authority commands people to commit an immoral or illegal act, they are obligated to resist.14 In 1579, French theologian Philippe du Plessis Mornay wrote Vindiciae Contra Tyrannos (vindication of resistance to tyrants) in which he argued “governmental leaders are bound by the same laws of G-d as anyone else”. Kings rule as “delegates” of G-d. Their authority is limited to administering G-d’s law and justice.15 Mornay agreed with Paul that government is ordained by G-d but, as an institution in general rather than an endorsement of any specific form of government. Absent the personal rule of G-d on earth, without government, mankind tends toward anarchy and lawlessness ultimately leading to rejection of G-d. However, people are to oppose tyrannical government because it provokes resistance, which may spark rebellion resulting in anarchy.16

America for the most part was a Judeo-Christian nation at the time of the Revolution. Her various denominations, Baptists, Catholics, Congregationalists, Lutherans, Presbyterians, and so forth, agreed Romans 13 means people are not to “overthrow government as an institution and live in anarchy nor does this passage mean they had to submit to every civil law”. The template by which people determine if resistance is legal is to ask; is the intent simply to overthrow unpopular rulers, or is it to restore an aspect of G-d’s law wounded by the actions of their rulers? If resistance is to “bad laws, bad acts, or bad governments”, then it is justified.17 Americans resisting violations of their Bill of Rights would not be in violation of Romans 13.

No executive at any level of government has the right to legislate. This is the proper and constitutional role of City Councils, State Assemblies, and the federal Congress. Any law that includes punishment and deprivation of rights must be subject to a veto by the people. The diktats of executives violate the legislative process and as such are immune from consent of the governed. No level of government has the authority to violate, let alone suspend Constitutional rights. In the lead up to the War of Independence, America’s religious leaders, in pulpits, militias, and in the Continental Army were at the forefront of resistance to tyrannical British rule. They carried Bibles and rifles. Today, in the face of harsh rules fastened on the necks of Americans, they are nowhere to be found.

Finally, in Ephesians 4, Paul declares that the Church has unity because it is one body through Christ with one Lord, one faith, one baptism, and one doctrine. He is calling for unity in faith and doctrine. Obedience to that one faith is what demonstrates unity, not obedience to the edicts of secular authorities passed on by church leaders having no bearing on theological doctrine. Religious leaders must be prudent when using Scripture in support of secular civil law. Family and friends ask me if we will return to “normal”. Considering the amount of Kool Aid Americans are consuming, this is a good question.

“Lockdown U.S.A. bears little resemblance to America. It is a grim, oppressed place, with empty streets and closed stores and snitches. Masked pedestrians, few and far between, trudge to permitted destinations, following one-way arrows painted on sidewalks and in grocery aisles. Tattles and scolds socially regulate their fellow citizens on proper maskage, calling those who question this depraved new normal ‘murderers’ and ‘granny killers’.18

Covid fears

11 Rush Limbaugh, “Teachable Moment: This Is What Socialism Looks Like” The Limbaugh Letter 6 (June 2020), 10.

22 The Word program attempts to change any word designating one of the two sexes (gender refers to femininity or masculinity of nouns) to some ambiguous trendy hermaphroditic word and I have to change it back. Considering how hard it is to teach people there are but two sexes, it’s the science, after all, my computer is probably hopeless.

44 I visited a Pentecostal Church wherein services culminated with people working themselves up into a shaking sweating lather, and then passed out on the floor. Ushers collected money in large KFC buckets with the minister exhorting church members to make them clink and heavy with coin. At another conservative church in the Midwest, I will not mention the denomination but it requires full emersion for baptism, the pastor “caught” me reading a book on English history and “warned” me against the dangers of “head-knowledge”. I am a retired history teacher…

55 It was not Kool Aid. The manufacturer of Kool Aid attempted to educate people that it was not their product, nevertheless, the name stuck.

66 Britannica.

77 The Pastor’s Email, My files, 25 May 2020.

88 IBID.

99 Editors, Holy Bible, New American Standard Bible (La Habra, California, The Lockman Foundation, 1995), 107.

1010 IBID. 127.

1111 Robert J. Hutchinson, The Politically Incorrect Guide to the Bible (Washington, D.C., Regnery Publishing, Inc., 2007), 206.

1212 IBID. 206.

1313 IBID. 206-207.

1414 IBID. 208.

1515 IBID. 209.

1616 David Barton, “Was the American Revolution a Biblically Justified Act”? Wallbuilders Press at http://www.wallbuilders.com/resources/search/detail.php?ResourceID=46

1717 IBID.

1818 Limbaugh, 10.

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By the Numbers

In recent years, victim disarmament advocates have been making more use of international firearms homicide rate comparisons. The United Kingdom used to be their go-to example, but that’s largely fallen by the wayside since, not only has its crime rate been growing as America’s has dropped, but they were outed for faking their low numbers.

These days, the line is, “The United States has the highest firearms murder rate of any developed nation,” along with assorted variations on the theme. Typically, they also throw in the fact that we have far more guns per person than any other country (I see that as a point of pride). When they want a specific example, they point to Australia and its post-Port Arthur confiscation and proclaim, “Australia hasn’t had a mass shooting since,” carefully ignoring at least four mass shootings (using the anti-rights Gun Violence Archive’s definition of 4+ people shot, not counting the shooter). And then there’s the low confiscation compliance rate which has caused them to hold multiple “amnesties.”

Now, it’s true that Australia’s firearm-related homicide rate is only 0.16/100K, compared to the United States at 3.60/100K. But we’re allegedly talking about developed nations.

The United States is ranked first in the world by Gross Domestic Product. Australia comes in at number 13. Australia’s GDP is roughly one-fifteenth of the United States, less than 7% of ours. Peaceful Sweden is another country that the gun people controllers like to point to, with its 0.19/100K firearm homicide rate. But we’re talking economics, too. Sweden’s GDP ranks 23rd, well behind even Australia, and is just one thirty-sixth that of the US.

Instead, let’s try a country quite close by which is closer to Australia’s GDP than Sweden’s.

Our southern neighbor Mexico ranks 15th, with a GDP 83% of Australia’s. For that matter, there’s Brazil in the #9 slot. If Sweden is economically developed surely Brazil counts. But the gun grabbers don’t like to talk about them for some reason.

Said reason being:

Firearms-related homicide rates per 100K

Australia (13) 0.16
Sweden (23) 0.19
United States (1) 3.60
Mexico (15) 6.34
Brazil (9) 19.99

At this, the controllers are screeching that GDP is meaningless, that GDP per capita is the indicator of development. Well, no; that’s more an indicator of average wealth than development. And by per capita GDP Mexico does trail the US’s #7 ranking at #70. I think that says more about wealth distribution than development.

With Chinese made goods filling most department stores, I think we can agree that China is an industrially developed nation. They are producing that stuff we’re importing.

So is Mexico. Let’s look at our imports from various countries. We get $14.3 billion worth of vehicles from China. But we get $75.2 billion worth of vehicles from Mexico. That’s more than than we import from Japan, Korea, Germany, or any other country.

For total imports, Mexico is our second largest provider, behind China and ahead of Canada.

Yes, they’re developed. And with 15 guns per 100 people they have a firearms homicide rate almost double that of the US with 101 guns per hundred people. Brazil, with a mere 8 guns per 100 people, still manages a firearms homicide rate 5.5 times ours.

If guns and gun ownership were the problem, the United States would have depopulated itself decades ago.

Louisiana ranks 13th in gun ownership, but #1 in murder rate. Maryland is 43rd in gun ownership, but #5 in murder rate. Baltimore alone has a murder rate of 55.4/100K (and note that Maryland has strong gun control laws).

It isn’t the guns or the honest owners.


Carl is an unpaid TZP volunteer. If you found this post useful, please consider dropping something in his tip jar.

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