Sunday, November 30, 2008

Yes - We Have Been Fooled Again

By Joseph Farah

Way back in 1971, the English rock band the Who had a hit song called "Don't Get Fooled Again."

It was an interesting song for the times – with the air of revolution wafting through America's campuses and streets. This was a song that said it was all futile – with the key lyric line being, "Meet the new boss, same as the old boss."
That's kind of how I feel about the incoming Barack Obama administration.

This is change!

This is the same old, same old.

For the most part, Barack Obama's new prescriptions represent nothing but tired, old, discredited ideas that have failed every time they have been tried in history.
I'm not surprised. In fact, I predicted it.

I even got very specific last August 21 when I boldly proclaimed I knew who would be named defense secretary – no matter who won the election, John McCain or Obama. This week, I was proven right when it was announced Obama had picked the establishment's guy – Robert Gates.

Obama warned that a McCain administration would be Bush III. What we got instead was Clinton-Bush VI.

How did I know?

It all began with my curiosity over a few lines in a campaign speech Obama delivered July 2 in Colorado Springs.

Here's what he said that got my attention – and nobody else's: "We cannot continue to rely on our military in order to achieve the national security objectives we've set. We've got to have a civilian national security force that's just as powerful, just as strong, just as well-funded."

Obama never fully explained what he meant by a "civilian national security force" with a budget equaling our current Defense Department. No reporters ever bothered to ask him. But I kept poking around. I began searching that phrase. I found it had been used previously in a series of speeches by someone else.

That someone else was Robert Gates.

I further discovered that Obama was a big fan of Gates. He told the Army Times in July: "I do think that Secretary Gates has brought a level of realism and professionalism and planning to the job that is worthy of praise. I think that the Pentagon is operating more effectively. I think he has improved greatly the relationships with the Joint Chiefs and the military generally."

I also learned McCain was a big fan of Gates.

It was about this time I got the idea to write my last book, "None of the Above: Why 2008 Is the Year for the Ultimate Protest Vote." I knew there was no substantive difference between Obama and McCain. Neither was going to lead America in a new direction. They were both going to take the nation down the same, old road.

I must note that people thought I was stark, raving insane when I made this proclamation.
I was told by my Republican friends that only McCain would protect America. Only he understood national security and defense issues. My Democrat friends told me there was no way Obama would ever choose a Bush guy to run his Defense Department. After all, he was the anti-war candidate and Bush was the war-monger.

I take no pleasure in being right about this.

I wish I were wrong.

I wish the American people had a real choice in 2008.

But we didn't. The fix was in. Either way, the "permanent establishment" was going to be running the government.

What you see happening with these Cabinet appointments is the proof of what I said.
And I'm still wondering what these guys mean when they talk about a "civilian national security force." I have a feeling no matter what it is, I won't like it.

Meet the new boss. Same as the old boss.

The Observer

Saturday, November 29, 2008

Is The U.S. Constitution Meaningless? It May Be Made That Way - Sooner Than You Think!

The chasm between those who want President-elect Barack Obama to produce his birth certificate to verify his eligibility to hold the nation's highest office and those who simply support the Democrat is widening.

"The Constitution means what we today decide it means," opined one participant on a new WND forum that offers readers an opportunity to express their opinion on the birth certificate dispute.

Meanwhile, as many as 110,000 have signed WND's petition seeking full disclosure of Obama's information.

The petition cites the U.S. Constitution's requirement that no one can be sworn into office as president without being a natural born citizen. It also asserts there are questions about Obama's reported Hawaii birth, that the Democrat has refused repeated calls to document his birth, that activist judges have declined to require him to shed light on the issue and that Hawaii – at the time of Obama's birth – allowed parents whose children were born in other locations to registered the birth there.

Tiger Insert

... 2 Thessalonians 2:3

Don't let anyone deceive you in any way, for (that day will not come) until the rebellion occurs and the man of lawlessness is revealed, the man doomed to destruction.

2 Thessalonians 2:2-4 (in Context)
2 Thessalonians 2 (Whole Chapter)

2 Thessalonians 2:7

For the secret power of lawlessness is already at work; but the one who now holds it back will continue to do so till he is taken out of the way. ...

The Bible refers to an Antichrist spirit existing throughout time, not just a "super Antichrist" at the end, but "lawlessness" is pervasive today and seems to be the M.O. for all political types, conservative or liberal.
End Tiger Insert

WND's petition is available online, and more information is available at this link.

It calls on all controlling legal authorities to take seriously the matter of where and when and to whom Obama was born and whether he qualifies as a "natural-born American citizen," according to Article 2, Section 1 of the Constitution.

To participate, sign the petition here.

Joseph Farah, founder, editor and chief executive officer of the leading independent online news source, said the highly unusual step was needed because the argument cuts to the core of the clear and simple meaning of the Constitution.

Learn about what America can expect from an Obama presidency in Brad O'Leary's blockbuster, "The Audacity of Deceit: Barack Obama's War on American Values."

Farah used his daily column to explain more fully the importance of the issue.

"No news organization or anyone else has investigated this matter more thoroughly, devoted more manpower to it, committed the financial resources to it or taken it more seriously," Farah said. "Yet, despite the obvious lingering questions out there haunting the American conscience, Barack Obama appears ready to waltz to the inauguration and swearing-in ceremonies without so much as proving he was born in America as he claims. That is simply unacceptable. I decided that if no one else was going to take this matter seriously, we would," Farah said.

In WND's forum, the division of opinion seemed unbridgeable.

Said one participant, "The Constitution means what we today decide it means. The Constitution exists to serve the people, not the people to serve the Constitution. … The precise nature and meaning of particular Constitutional clauses is a political question
, to be decided by the people through our elected representatives, and through the judges appointed by the president we elect. That president will be Barack Hussein Obama, for at least the next four years."

Another reader responded: "The Constitution is NOT whatever we decide that it is. Such a concept is nonsense by which we could declare up to mean down and in to mean out. In such a worldview language loses all meaning and purpose and it becomes impossible to know anything at all. The Constitution is what is actually written down in its body and its various amendments. It is NOT whatever the judges declare it to be, no matter how fervently those judges desire for you to believe otherwise. There is a reason that the very first paragraph following the preamble states unequivocally that only Congress is allowed to make law. It means that judges do not get to tell us what the law is. Their Constitutional role is to decide cases, not to fold, spindle, and mutilate whatever they don't like."

Continued another, "We are a nation of laws, not what individuals might wish. And the Constitution is the first and foremost law. … BO has indicated in interviews that he thinks that founding document is too restrictive. Apparently he hopes to operate outside that law, beginning with his refusal to just present his original, long form 'vault' birth certificate and his university records or other documents to prove that he is actually a natural born citizen of the U.S."
"He could very well be pulling off the biggest fraud in U.S. history and thinks he can get away with it," said yet another.

The comments were in response to the forum question: "Barack Obama may have won the presidential election, but is he eligible to serve? That's a question on the minds of millions of Americans eager to see his birth certificate and find out for sure if he was born in the U.S., as he claims.

"At least two of his relatives in Kenya claim to have been present at his birth in Mombasa, Kenya. In addition, the Obama machine has scoffed at requests to see the form of the Hawaiian birth certificate that includes the specific hospital in which the delivery took place. The form released by the campaign does not include that information, leading to suspicions Obama might have been one of the foreign-born babies of the 1960s who were, nonetheless, provided birth certificates by the state of Hawaii."

... an ignoring of Constitutional Law in this situation can only produce more lawlessness, more mistrust of government. Government is installed to subdue lawlessness not promote it, but we are seeing the opposite occur more and more ... Tiger

The Observer

Wednesday, November 26, 2008

In the Name of Knowledge and Wisdom

HT: The Tigress - 'Cause She's Always Been Much Smarter Than Me!

Frontpage Interview’s guest today is Jonas E. Alexis, a math teacher in Florida and the author of In the Name of Education.

His new book is In the Name of Knowledge and Wisdom: Why Atheists, Sceptics, Agnostics, and Intellectuals Deny Christianity.

FP: Jonas E. Alexis, welcome back to Frontpage Interview.

Alexis: Thanks again, Dr. Glazov. It’s always a pleasure.

FP: What inspired you to write this book?

Alexis: One of the prevailing assumptions that is being propagated by Richard Dawkins, Sam Harris, Daniel Dennett, Christopher Hitchens, to name just a few, is that atheism is based on reason and that religion, particularly Christianity, is based on faith. This is a false assumption. And one of the primary reasons why In the Name of Knowledge and Wisdom was written was to expose the false claims made by the new atheists.

FP: Why has atheism become so popular today?

Alexis: Atheism is so popular because many people—even those who claim to be atheists—do not seriously examine the worldviews and detrimental ideologies that post beneath the surface. The famed mathematician and philosopher Bertrand Russell was an avowed atheist until he debated the philosopher Frederick Copleston. Once Copleston logically showed Russell that atheism is existentially and experientially untenable, Russell immediately changed his atheism into agnosticism. In the Name of Knowledge and Wisdom simply shows that the atheist position is irrational and unliveable.

FP: Tell us about some of the vital contradictions you have found in the atheist position.

Alexis: Let us start with Richard Dawkins, because he claims to follow logic and reason. In chapter two of The God Delusion, he writes, “The God of the Old Testament is arguably the most unpleasant character in all fiction: jealous and proud of it; a petty, unjust, unforgiving control-freak; a vindictive, bloodthirsty ethnic cleanser; a misogynistic, homophobic, racist, infanticidal, genocidal, filicidal, pestilential, megalomaniacal, sadomasochistic, capriciously malevolent bully.”

Those are interesting words—coming from the pen of a person who believes that God does not exist, yet who is still marshalling ridiculous arguments against the very same God. However, in his book River out of Eden, which was written years before The God Delusion came out, Dawkins wrote, “In a universe of blind physical forces and genetic replication, some people are going to get hurt, other people are going to get lucky, and you won’t find any rhyme or reason in it, nor any justice. The universe we observe has precisely the properties we should expect if there is, at bottom, no design, no purpose, no evil, and no good, nothing but blind, pitiless indifference….DNA neither knows nor cares. DNA just is. And we dance to its music.”

So, at bottom, according to Dawkins, there is no design, no purpose, no evil, and no good. How, then, can Dawkins judge the God of the Old Testament if there is no good and no evil? How can he honestly say that what God was doing was “evil”? By what standard is he judging Him? Moreover, could it be that the God of the Old Testament was just “dancing to His DNA”? And if He was, why would Dawkins lambaste Him?

Dawkins’s fundamental philosophy is telling him that there is no good and evil, yet experientially and intellectually he cannot live with it. There is a vital contradiction here. Moreover, Dawkins constantly invokes words like “unjust,” “racist,” and “evil” in his petty and elementary arguments. He never seems to think that he is implicitly saying that he does indeed believe that there is, at bottom, evil and good. In addition, whenever he invokes those types of words, he is simply referring to a moral law that simply says, “It would be immoral of God to be jealous and proud of it; unjust, unforgiving control-freak…”

Now, we all know that whenever there is a moral law, there must be, by definition, a moral lawgiver. Yet that’s what Dawkins is trying to disprove. He has yet to succeed. Dawkins is not the first one to come up with those child-like arguments. French writers during “The Age of Reason” made several attempts to wipe out the notion of God, all to no avail. These include D’Hobach, La Mettrie, Diderot, Voltaire, etc. Diderot for example declared, “I would sacrifice myself if I can annihilate the notion of God.” All those guys are in their grave, and the notion of God has yet to be wiped out.

Even renowned evolutionary biologists H. Allen Orr, David Sloan Wilson, and Massimo Pigliucci have called into question the power that Dawkins once had as an intellectual, since he has made elementary errors in The God Delusion. The atheist philosopher of science Michael Ruse said this of Dawkins: “So long as his understanding of Christianity remains at the sophomoric level, Dawkins does not deserve full attention. It is all very well to sneer at Catholic beliefs about the Virgin Mary, but what reply does Dawkins have to the many theologians (like Jonathan Edwards) who have devoted huge amounts of effort to distinguishing between false beliefs and true ones? What reply does Dawkins have to the contemporary philosopher Alvin Plantinga, who argues that the belief that there are other minds and that others are not just unthinking robots requires a leap of faith akin to the Christian belief in the Deity? Edwards and Plantinga may be wrong, but Dawkins owes them some reply before he gives his cocky negative conclusions.”

What is even more disturbing is that Dawkins is like a bully who does not want to listen to logic, reason, and history. In his mind, there is no way that Darwinian or atheist principles influenced Nazi Germany. All he has to do is to pick up a history book by a reputable historian. Nazi historian Richard Weikart shows in his work From Darwin to Hitler: Evolutionary Ethics, Eugenics, and Racism in Nazi Germany, that social Darwinism was one of the underlying ideologies that drove the Nazi regime into madness. These stubborn facts have been corroborated by science and intellectual historians like Robert Proctor, Ian Robert Dowgiggin, Richard A. Soloway, Daniel Gasman, etc. I have discussed this briefly in In the Name of Knowledge and Wisdom, but I will complete the entire argument in the last book of the trilogy, Education’s Dangerous Idea. So much for Dawkins’s atheism. But what about Sam Harris, the wimp?

Sam Harris writes that his job in his book Letter to a Christian Nation is “to demolish the intellectual and moral pretensions of Christianity in its most committed forms.” Here’s something that readers may find to be funny. Dinesh D’Souza has been begging both Dawkins and Harris to publicly defend their atheist position in debates, with no avail.

As many readers can attest, D’Souza has debated Daniel Dennett, Christopher Hitchens, Peter Singer, Michael Shermer, Dan Barker, and other well-known atheists. He intellectually cut those guys to pieces. Harris and Dawkins are just afraid to meet D’Souza. D’Souza writes: “And my challenges to Dawkins to step into the arena have only met with pathetic rationalization: ‘Richard is simply too busy and smart to debate you Dinesh.’ Busy doing what besides being caught with his pants down by Ben Stein? And I guess he's smart because he doesn't want to risk further embarrassing himself and destroying his public reputation. Won't it be hilarious if the ‘party of faith’ is unafraid of opposing arguments while the ‘party of reason’ cannot withstand the arguments of its critics? This is what Henry James might describe as a most interesting turning of the screw.”

Later on D’Souza wrote, “If atheists are truly the party of reason, and believers like me are truly the party of ‘blind faith,’ how come reason keeps getting its butt kicked?” Here’s what D’Souza says of Harris: “Some atheists have emailed me asking me if I've accepted Sam Harris' offer to a written debate. A few months ago Harris proposed such a debate, and I agreed, but also proposed to Sam that we have an oral debate in the classic format. Written debates strike me as a bit wimpy, since both debaters can get advice and assistance from various experts. The advantage of a f ace-to-face encounter is that it compels each side to think on its feet and make its best case before a live audience. Having himself proposed the written debate, Harris hasn't responded to my counteroffer.” D’Souza, of course, never got a response from Harris. D’Souza finally wrote: “Is there any doubt why Sam Harris seems to have changed his mind about debating me, and why Richard Dawkins is still hiding under his desk? How come these ‘brights’ seem to have fled into the cover of darkness? Do any of the atheist organizations offer an annual Wimp award?”

FP: Can you talk a bit about the wish fulfillment idea?

Alexis: Modern atheists, as D’Souza writes, have fled under many covers of darkness. And one of those covers of darkness is the wish fulfillment idea. Roughly speaking, the wish fulfillment proposition states that human beings, in order to cope with the problems of life such as pain, suffering, and evil, invent things that will make them feel better.20Religion, therefore, is an invention of the mind. From this principle, it follows that God, Satan, angels, are simply fantasy. The German writer and atheist Ludwig Feuerbach followed this line of reasoning in his book The Essence of Christianity. And even long before Feuerbach, this idea also appeared in one form or another in the writing of British intellectual Thomas Hobbes, particularly his famous work Leviathan. Then Sigmund Freud, Karl Marx, and even Vladimir Lenin, followed suit. I will discuss this at length in the up-coming book, Education’s Dangerous Idea. But let us just think for a moment.

It is conceivable that people would invent heaven or God in order to face the difficulties of life, because heaven, for example, is portrayed as a place of no suffering and no pain. But why would a person invent depressing things like hell? Why would the Bible give such a grim picture of the place? Atheist Steven Pinker makes its clear that it makes no sense to invent things that threaten one’s survival. Doesn’t Hell’s description threaten one’s survival? Furthermore, why would a person invent things like, “Thou shalt not commit adultery”; “Thou shalt not steal”; “Thou shalt not lie with mankind, as with womankind: it is abomination”? To invoke wish fulfillment in order to explain Christianity away simply does not work! Let us throw it in the trashcan of history once and for all. Moreover, the wish fulfillment hypothesis is itself a wish fulfillment. Again, these issues will be discussed in more detail in Education’s Dangerous Idea: Why Christianity Offers the Best Explanations for Life and Why other Alternatives Fails. In the Name of Knowledge and Wisdom is just the tip of the iceberg.

FP: Why is nihilism so rampant in our pop culture today?Alexis: Nihilism is so rampant for various reasons. The German philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche made the point that if God dead, then anything is permitted. Nietzsche, unlike our modern atheists, was willing to follow atheism to its “logical” conclusion. Nietzsche then replaced the Judeo-Christian God with the Greek god Dionysus. This topic is too vast and cannot be discussed in a thirty-second sound bite. It will be fully discussed in our next book. But what is courageous about Nietzsche is that he was not dancing around and playing semantic games like Richard Dawkins or Sam Harris. According to Nietzsche’s philosophy, moral values do not exist without God—and he was right. T hat does not mean that an atheist cannot be moral. But an atheist cannot defend his moral principle against another! He cannot logically say Hitler was wrong or George Mueller was right. In a nutshell, nihilism is so rampant because the nihilistic culture has no moral framework or principle upon which a person should base his or her life.

FP: What danger is there to a society embracing the concept that God is dead -- as the German philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche proposed in the nineteenth century?

Alexis: G. K. Chesterton made the point that “the first affect of not believing in God is to believe in anything.” Among the “anything” that people begin to believe is the idea that all “truth” is relative. This, by the way, is a self-defeating position. If all truth is relative, then the statement that “a ll truth is relative” is either a relative statement in itself, or it is an absolute claim. It cannot be both. If it is a relative claim, then why not include other statements such as “all truth is not relative”? Moreover, it does not take a student of philosophy to show that the claim is absolutely ridiculous. If the statement is relative, we can easily dismiss it on the basis of uncertainty because the person making the claim is not even sure that the claim is right or wrong.

If it is not relative, then the person making the claiming is positing a “truth” claim—an absolute claim. So, when Jesus for example says that He is the only way to come to the Father, He was not making an irrational claim! Now, an atheist can dismiss the claim or reject it, but he will do so not on the basis of logic and reason. This again is an interesting discussion that needs further development, and we will do so in our next work. Time has failed to talk about the ideologies that are found throughout Daniel Dennett’s books. I think I am in agreement with mathematician, biologist and philosopher David Berlinski when he said in an interview: “We lose something in the literary and intellectual culture. You get a guy like Daniel Dennett, whose greatest intelle ctual achievement was growing that stupid beard of his, masquerading as a scientific expert on Darwinian theory, staring at the camera, and no one is dousing him with a bucket of water. It’s incredible.”

FP: Can you talk a bit about your own spiritual journey?

Alexis: I was raised in a large family (seven children) and my parents became devout Christians around 1972. They gave up almost everything they had to raise us right, but we as children never understood what Christianity was all about. My uncle was a chemistry teacher who gave up on Christianity right after his sister died, and some of us picked up some of his worldviews quickly. He then began to be very discontent with the teachings of Christianity, and on many occasions he would use his intellectual gift to attack some churches. He was a very loving and caring man—a moral man. But he was somewhat dissatisfied, in my estimation, with some churches. Yet my mom was very serious about the Christian life, though she was not an intellectual.

Around the age of thirteen, I remember I was doing some reading in the living room and I overheard a conversation between my uncle and a Christian that revolved around Christianity. He basically cut that Christian to pieces intellectually—and I myself felt sorry for that poor guy. I stopped my reading and left the living room with a rage. I then concluded, “If this Christian stuff cannot withstand an intellectual and experiential examination, why should a person bet his life on it? Why should a person live a life that is basically a lie?”

To make a long story short, until I was around fifteen, my life was plagued with doubts, confusion, and questions, but those deep-seated questions remained secret and never revealed them openly, and I wrestled with them most of my teens—until I found Jesus Christ and fell in love with Christianity. Ever since He came to my life, I stopped looking for the answers to my deep-seated questions because He provided responses to them all. But other questions that I had never thought of before came up very quickly. To set the record straight, I went on a quest to find out whether Christianity can take the challenge posed by skeptics, atheists, agnostics, and intellectuals.

Then, in a relatively short time, I began to do extensive research to find the answers to my questions: why atheists, skeptics, and intellectuals mistrust or hate Christianity. I was studying mathematics with a minor in philosophy, so Bertrand Russell was a good place to start. The renowned historian Paul Johnson said that Russell was “the anti-God” intellectual in the last century. Russell, by all accounts, was a renowned mathematician and logician, so I thought his book, Why I Am Not a Christian, was based on rigorous rules of logic and consistency. However, I was quite disappointed and was embarrassed that Russell was making elementary errors in his reasoning. I thought, “He’s got to be kidding. Has he been smoking?” (He loved the pipe.)
Russell’s faulty premises and conclusions were so obvious that a person needn’t be a mathematician to see that they are categorically false. I have examined many of them in In the Name of Education and In the Name of Knowledge and Wisdom. Russell’s Why I Am Not a Christian was one of my wake-up calls, and I thought, “How can such a trenchant mathematician fail to follow his own logical rule when it comes to examine Christianity? Is there something going on here?”

Then I began to study the history of other atheist writers and existentialist philosophers such as Albert Camus, Jean Paul Sartre, Friedrich Nietzsche, Ayn Rand, Ernst Haeckel, Margaret Mead, Madelyn O’Hair, Percy Bysshe Shelley, David Hume, Voltaire, D’Holbach, Diderot, Aldous Huxley, T. H. Huxley, Julian Huxley, Oscar Wilde, Isaac Asimov, Carl Sagan, and all the way up to our modern atheists. All of them did not reject and attack Christianity because the evidence was lacking; many of them rejected it because, as Aldous Huxley and Shelley and Russell put it and as many others would agree, Christianity interferes with their sexual mores.

For Richard Lewontin of Harvard, he just cannot accept “a Divine foot at the door.” Many of those people died slowly, miserably, and pathetically. That includes Russell, Karl Marx, Sigmund Freud, Carl Jung, Madelyn O’Hair, Wilde, Nietzsche, Rand, D’Holbach, Arthur Schopenhauer, Sartre, Rousseau, etc. It was then that Paul’s bold declaration in the first chapter of the book of Romans began to make sense to me beyond any shadow of a doubt. As Paul implies, when honest atheists and skeptics look at the evidence objectively, they will be convinced that their own atheist worldview is bankrupt: “For the invisible things of him from the creation of the world are clearly seen, being understood by the things that are made, even his eternal power and Godhead; so that they are without excuse” (Romans 1:20). Paul goes on to say that one of the reasons why many reject this “eternal power and Godhead” is because of sexual immorality.

Now, why should anyone bet his life on the words of Jesus Christ? There are various reasons, and time will fail to discuss them all here (Education’s Dangerous Idea will describe many of them). One of the most compelling reasons is that Christianity emphatically declares that there is a life after death. Every single person, according to Christianity, will spend his eternity either with the Creator or separated from the Creator—for ever. That is a bold declaration.

From an intellectual standpoint, let us suppose, as the famed mathematician and inventor Blaise Pascal argued, that Christianity is wrong and that there is no such thing as life after death. Christians will not lose anything if they later found out that this whole business was a hoax. But what if the atheists and skeptics are wrong? What if there is an ultimate judgment? What if Christ’s words are true? What if Hebrews 10:31 is true, which says that it is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God”? Some skeptics would say, “What about other religions? Don’t they provide other alternatives? Should not a person consider them?” I will set the record straight in the last book of the trilogy.

In a nutshell, I put my trust in Jesus Christ because He intellectually, existentially, experientially, logically, and eternally offers the best explanations for life’s deepest questions—questions of origin, morality, meaning, and destiny. No other system offers such compelling and satisfying answers—not even the atheist system. In fact, those who have followed the atheist system to the end have come up with bitter disappointments.

Jean Paul Sartre, on his deathbed, admitted that his atheism abandoned him and seemed to have foreseen that he would be in deep trouble after life. Similarly, the renowned British atheist Thomas Hobbes, known for his work such as Leviathan, made the following statement on his deathbed, “I am about to take my last voyage—a great leap in the dark.” Friedrich Nietzsche was perhaps the loneliest and the most miserable philosopher who ever lived. We will document this in our next book. Schopenhauer was another miserable guy. As the intellectual historian, mathematician, and sceptic Alston Chase confessed, “A life without God is hard to live.”

While Christians put their trust in the words of Jesus, the average atheist will put his trust in the proposition that there is no life after death, for which he has no substantial evidence. Think about this for a moment. The evidence for and against the proposition that there is life after death is unavailable from a scientific standpoint. No honest atheist and scientist can affirm or deny it based on the scientific data. So, we have to look at the historical life and death of Jesus Christ to test His words because this is an important question and it has too many repercussions if it turns out to be true.

Many honest skeptics and former atheists have done just that. That includes Simon Greenleaf, who founded Harvard’s school of law, the famed skeptic William Ramsay, former atheist Lee Strobel, etc. Antony Flew just shifted his atheist worldview into some form of deism over last few years. Let us conclude with the words of Jesus Himself who accepts every challenge proposed by honest sceptic: “And ye shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free” (John 8:32). I think the evidence is very clear, and all of us should go to whichever direction it is pointed.

FP: Jonas E. Alexis, thank you for joining Frontpage Interview.

Alexis: Thank you so much, Dr. Glazov. It was a pleasure.

Jamie Glazov is Frontpage Magazine's managing editor. He holds a Ph.D. in History with a specialty in U.S. and Canadian foreign policy. He edited and wrote the introduction to David Horowitz’s Left Illusions. He is also the co-editor (with David Horowitz) of The Hate America Left and the author of Canadian Policy Toward Khrushchev’s Soviet Union (McGill-Queens University Press, 2002) and 15 Tips on How to be a Good Leftist. To see his previous symposiums, interviews and articles Click Here. Email him at jglazov@rogers.com.

The Observer

Tuesday, November 25, 2008

The Western World Continues Its Fall

Westerners Welcome Harems

By Daniel Pipes
FrontPageMagazine.com Tuesday, November 25, 2008


A Scottish judge recently bent the law to benefit a polygamous household. The case involved a Muslim male who drove 64 miles per hour in a 30 mph zone – usually grounds for an automatic loss of one's driving license. The defendant's lawyer explained his client's need to speed: "He has one wife in Motherwell and another in Glasgow and sleeps with one one night and stays with the other the next on an alternate basis. Without his driving licence he would be unable to do this on a regular basis." Sympathetic to the polygamist's plight, the judge permitted him to retain his license.

Monogamy, this ruling suggests, long a foundation of Western civilization, is silently eroding under the challenge of Islamic law. Should current trends continue, polygamy could soon be commonplace.

Since the 1950s, Muslim populations have grown in Western Europe and North America via immigration and conversion; with their presence has grown the Islamic form of polygyny (one man married to more than one woman). Estimates find 2,000 or more British polygamous men, 14,000 or 15,000-20,000 harems in Italy, 30,000 harems in France, and 50,000-100,000 polygamists in the United States.

Some imams openly acknowledge conducting polygamous marriage ceremonies: Khalil Chami reports that he is asked almost weekly to conduct such ceremonies in Sydney. Aly Hindy reports having "blessed" more than 30 such nuptials in Toronto.

Social acceptance is also growing. Academics justify it, while politicians blithely meet with polygamists or declare that Westerners should "find a way to live with it" and journalists describe polygamy with empathy, sympathy, and compassion. Islamists argue polygamy's virtues and call for its official recognition.


Polygamy has made key legal advances in 2008. (For fuller details, see my blog, "Harems Accepted in the West.") At least six Western jurisdictions now permit harems on the condition that these were contracted in jurisdictions where polygamy is legal, including India and Muslim-majority countries from Indonesia to Saudi Arabia to Morocco.

United Kingdom: Bigamy is punishable by up to seven years in jail but the law recognizes harems already formed in polygamy-tolerant countries. The Department of Work and Pensions pays couples up to £92.80 (US$140) a week in social benefits, and each multiculturally-named "additional spouse" receives £33.65. The Treasury states that "Where a man and a woman are married under a law which permits polygamy, and either of them has an additional spouse, the Tax Credits (Polygamous Marriages) Regulations 2003 allow them to claim tax credits as a polygamous unit." Additionally, harems may be eligible for additional housing benefits to reflect their need for larger properties.

The Netherlands: The Dutch justice minister, Ernst Hirsch Ballin, has announced that polygamous Muslim marriages should not be dealt with through the legal system but via dialogue.

Belgium: The Constitutional Court took steps to ease the reunification of harems formed outside the country.

Italy: A court in Bologna allowed a Muslim male immigrant to bring the mothers of his two children into the country on the grounds that the polygamous marriages had been legally contracted.

Australia: The Australian newspaper reports "it is illegal to enter into a polygamous marriage. But the federal government, like Britain, recognises relationships that have been legally recognised overseas, including polygamous marriages. This allows second wives and children to claim welfare and benefits."

Ontario, Canada: Canadian law calls for polygamy to be punished by a prison term but the Ontario Family Law Act accepts "a marriage that is actually or potentially polygamous, if it was celebrated in a jurisdiction whose system of law recognizes it as valid."

Thus, for the cost of two airplane tickets, Muslims potentially can evade Western laws. (One wonders when Mormons will also wake to this gambit.) Rare countries (such as Ireland) still reject harems; generally, as David Rusin of Islamist Watch notes, "governments tend to look the other way as the conjugal mores of seventh-century Arabia … take root in our backyards."

At a time when Western marriage norms are already under challenge, Muslims are testing legal loopholes and even seeking taxpayer support for multiple brides. This development has vast significance: just as the concept of one man, one woman marriage has shaped the West's economic, cultural, and political development, the advance of Islamic law (Shari‘a) will profoundly change life as we know it.
... this is part and parcel to the continuing attacks on the West as per the Global Jihad. The West, of course, is obliging and willing to lose the battle! - Tiger
The Observer

Monday, November 24, 2008

Evangelicals -- A Drag on or Essential to the GOP?

... David, you've got it wrong also! The "Evangelical" Right Can Do Without the Republicans and have already chosen to do so! Some have gone over to the Dems which better suits their liberalized version of pseudo-Christianity. The others have decided to simply stop voting for EVIL - Democrat or Republican! - Tiger

by David Limbaugh
11/21/2008

A good friend of mine (let's call him Bob) is convinced that unless the GOP puts abortion "aside as its focal point, it simply cannot win and regain power." That's especially interesting in light of Kathleen Parker's latest column, which disses the evangelical wing of the GOP.

Bob's point is that "we've lost a majority of women over this issue as they have become one-issue voters." It's not only liberal women but also others who believe it's simply not the government's business.

Kathleen Parker broadens the point considerably beyond abortion: "The evangelical, right-wing, oogedy-boogedy branch of the GOP is what ails the erstwhile conservative party and will continue to afflict and marginalize its constituents if reckoning doesn't soon cometh." Since the 1980s or so, says Parker, the GOP "has become increasingly beholden to an element that used to be relegated to wooden crates on street corners. … The GOP has surrendered its high ground to its lowest brows. In the process, the party has alienated its non-base constituents."

I'll resist the temptation to respond specifically to Kathleen's uncharitable indictment of us knuckle draggers because I like Kathleen personally and because I want to respond to her and Bob's overlapping contention that certain social conservatives are dragging the party down.

Bob's opinion is largely based on his personal conversations with women, and Kathleen writes, "If one were to eavesdrop on private conservations among the party intelligentsia, one would hear precisely that … armband religion is killing the Republican Party." But do their anecdotal reports justify their conclusions?

2004 exit poll data reveal that President Bush got 55 percent of the male vote and 48 percent of the female vote, while 2008 data show that McCain got 48 percent of the male vote and 43 percent of the female vote. McCain's percentage of the male vote dropped more than his percentage of the female vote, so it's hard to see how alienated women made the difference.

Plus Karl Rove tells us that there were 4.1 million fewer Republicans voting this year than in 2004, some of whom he believed turned independent or Democratic for this election, which might validate Kathleen's thesis, except that Rove says that most of those 4.1 million "simply stayed home."

What's even more interesting is there was an almost identical drop-off (4.1 million) of those voters who attend religious services more than once a week (evangelicals, anyone?).

I'm thinking Bob needs to avoid angry women, and Kathleen should steer clear of those intelligentsia types, for there is another 2008 exit poll gem they might not have seen. Top issues for voters were: economy (63 percent); war in Iraq (10 percent); terrorism (9 percent); and health care (9 percent). It appears that neither abortion nor any other social issue even made honorable mention.

It's not debatable that Obama had a vastly superior organization and "ground game" and did an infinitely better job than McCain of marketing himself and inspiring voters with his charisma and his nebulous message of hope and change. Despite all these advantages, McCain -- largely because of the jolt of enthusiasm he injected into his anemic campaign by naming the conspicuously pro-life Christian Sarah Palin his running mate -- was surging ahead in the national polls right before the subprime meltdown reared its game-changing head. Though Democratic policies and actions mostly caused it, Republicans got the blame -- and McCain was finished.

Considering all those unique factors in 2008, it's premature to say this election represents the emergence of a sustained national power shift in favor of the Democrats -- though admittedly, current demographic trends are problematic for the GOP.

But if social issues were so advantageous for Obama, why did he hide and distort his record on abortion? Why did he not brag about the liberal activist judges he is sure to appoint? Why did he attempt -- other than when he thought his microphone was off in San Francisco -- to paint himself as a mainstream Christian who wants to reduce abortions? Why did mainstream media debate moderators deliberately avoid these issues?

I believe Kathleen is wrong in saying "either the Republican Party needs a new base -- or the nation may need a new party." The opposite is true: The party needs to quit betraying the base, on both social and economic issues.

I do believe some of my fellow Christian conservatives are too single issue-oriented and am appalled that so many stayed home, given the gravity of the stakes in this election. But the fact remains that it was McCain's underemphasis rather than overemphasis of the social issues that cost him Republican votes.

But the far more important answer to Bob and Kathleen is that the Republican Party can no more do without pro-lifers than human beings can survive without hearts. It's who they are. There's already a party stressing economic conservatism nearly to the exclusion of social issues, and the last time I checked, our beloved Libertarians weren't garnering a great percentage of the vote.
The Observer

Friday, November 21, 2008

I've Said It Before, I'll Say It Again - America Is Being Attacked On A Daily Basis! - How Our 'War On Terror' Has Missed The Real Battle!

'Stealth Jihad' Reveals A New War on U.S. Soil

by Rowan Scarborough
11/20/2008

Since the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks, Robert Spencer [whose “Jihad Watch” is featured weekly in HUMAN EVENTS] has been a one-man warning system against radical Islam.

A scholar who has spent most of his professional life studying Islam, his string of books dissects the world's largest religion as a bastion of intolerance and hate, justified by the teachings of spiritual leader Mohammed and various holy men.

As one of his previous titles, the "Politically Incorrect Guide to Islam," suggests, Spencer does not buckle in fear of the type of backlash that can materialize as a death-threatening fatwa against a critical author.

Now comes a new warning from Spencer. In "Stealth Jihad: How Radical Islam Is Subverting America without Guns or Bombs," Spencer factually outlines how Muslim radicals are methodically undercutting American values of individual freedom, quoting leaders of this anti-American movement who say their ultimately goal is the creation of an Islamic state right here in the good old U.S.A.

Say it can't happen? Just look at our kinsmen in Europe. Their guilt, and tolerance for anything anti-Western have nurtured a growing population of fanatics. Mosques have sprung up where firebrand clergy preach hate and violence. Some Muslim neighborhoods have become no-go zones for non-believers who dare not trespass where harsh Sharia law reigns. "

Such segregated Muslim communities are spreading throughout Europe at an alarming pace," Spencer writes.

The author travels back a decade to Toledo, Ohio, site of an Arab youth conference. One speaker is Sheikh Yusuf al-Qaradawi, a member of the Muslim Brotherhood. The decades-old Brotherhood here, and abroad, has been a spawning ground for Jihadists, both outwardly violent or stealthy converters.

"We will conquer Europe, we will conquer America," Qaradawi told the young. "Not through sword but through Da'wa [Islamic proselytizing]."

Spencer interprets: "This is the Brotherhood's agenda for Western countries to conquer them by stealth."

Not all Islamists want to wait for the fruits of a stealth Jihad. Seven years ago, 19 Islamic fanatics struck this country. Al Qaeda cells still plan to attack American again.

That's why Spencer's findings are more important than ever. Americans should be as vigilant as ever. But, in fact, Muslim radicals are beginning to achieve victimhood status. It's not only the pages of the ultra liberal New York Times, Hollywood and various Islamic activists that are anointing the newly aggrieved. Even within the supposedly hard-line Bush Administration, bureaucrats are pushing to end the phrase "war on terror" and to vanquish such terms as "Islamic terrorist."

Look at the sympathies our popular culture bestows on horrible Muslim regimes, such as the one in Sudan. In 2007, a British school teacher, Gillian Gibbons, was a jailed for "insulting religion." Her crime: She allowed students to name a teddy bear "Mohammed."

On ABC's "The View," you might expect the collection of liberal hosts to come to the teacher's defense. But here's what Whoopi Goldberg said: "I find that maybe we are not -- and I say 'we' just as European and Americans -- we're not as anxious to learn the customs before we go places. It's just one of the reasons we're called the ugly Americans."

This, of course, falls right into the hands of the likes of Osama bin Laden, who view such debates as sure signs of Western weakness and ultimate defeat.

He is counting on our guilt. How is "Stealth Jihad" revealing itself in the U.S.? Spencer lists the ways: There was, for example, the notorious case of Islamic lawyers’ filing a law suit to punish a group of airline passengers who dared to question the suspicious behavior of some fellow travelers. Thankfully, Republicans in Congress came to the rescue, forcing Democrats to go along with them in passing legislation to protect passengers from such frivolous, and intimidating, law suits.

The list goes on. Muslim cab drivers suddenly discover that some passengers actually carry alcohol. The cabbies refuse service. How do local town fathers react? They try to reach an accommodation rather than doing the right thing and pulling the drivers' permits.

Then there's the case of Lina Morales, whose crime was to eat a bacon, lettuce and tomato sandwich. Her company's CEO, a Muslim, fired her for eating pork in the work place. "Our point of view," he said, "is to respect the laws of the land and the laws of the land as I understand it is to accommodate people's right to practice their religions if you can."

In California, seventh graders get to read "History Alive! The Medieval World and Beyond." This is how the book describes Jihad: "Muslims should fulfill jihad with the heart, tongue, and hand. Muslims use the heart in their struggle to resist evil. The tongue may convince others to take up worthy causes, such as funding research. Hands may perform good works and correct wrong."

Spencer went through the book and reports, "It gives no idea that Muslims have ever viewed jihad as involving, in whole or part, warfare against unbelievers, or have ever waged war on that basis." At the center of "Stealth Jihad" in this country, Spencer argues, is CAIR, the Council on American-Islamic Relations. With chapters across the U.S., CAIR has emerged as a sort of American Civil Liberties Union -- but just for Muslims.

The author make the case that the organization is really a front for hardened Islamists who want the destruction of Israel and the end of Western democracies.

Of course, CAIR fetches sympathetic treatment from the New York Times and other liberal publications. But what is most troubling are the sympathies that lie within federal and local governments. The FBI uses CAIR representatives to teach agents about Islam. So do state and town law enforcement agencies.

This alliance comes even while the Justice Department labeled CAIR an unindicted co-conspirator in its prosecution of a Dallas charity it says is a front for Hamas, a U.S.-designated terror group.

Spencer offers a way to stop this creeping Islamization of America. But his proposals seem unlikely to take hold. For example, he urges Americans "to take pride in our own culture" at a time when the political left, which thrives on blaming-America-first, is about to take control of Washington.

He suggests that we "end Muslim immigration into the United States" -- a measure not likely to be endorsed by Republicans, much less Democrats.

Spencer leaves readers with a dire scenario unless some action is taken.

"If Western Europe does become Islamized, as demographic trends suggest, before too long America will be facing a world that is drastically different and more forbidding than today. And the same process of Islamization will proceed here -- unless enough people wake up in time to head it off."

... Those who read this post and especially those who know me understand how much I support our troops. This article in no way denigrates them. As a Ranger and former member of the 20th S.F. Group I can tell you that this "War On Terror" is neither a "conventional" or "unconventional" war; to use the older terms. It's a terrorist war. In a terrorist war any means of attack will be used against you - any. Just as German children turned in their parents to Nazi authorities for befriending a Jew, uninformed people here are accepting and promoting Sharia and "Jihad" - even Presidents! You must not look for Democrats or Republicans to help; you must look for people who understand "Jihad". - Tiger
The Observer

Garner - Washington Times

The Observer

Thursday, November 20, 2008

Fox: Cavuto Cong Joe Knollenberg Its Not Your Money

A Republican Congressman from Michigan illustrates why the Republican Party is no longer relevant. YOUR TAX DOLLARS ARE NOT YOUR MONEY!

Oh! That Religion of Peace!

Rape as 'Resistance'

By Nonie Darwish
FrontPageMagazine.com Thursday, November 20, 2008

On October 31, 2008, an Egyptian female lawyer by the name of Nagla Al-Imam suggested on the Arab TV channel “Al-Arabiya” that Arab men should sexually harass Israeli women, stating: “Leave the land so we won’t rape you.” She then argued that Israeli young girls and women are fair game for all Arab men and that there is nothing wrong in using this kind of threat as a form of resistance.

Does Ms. Al-Imam know the consequences of her message to sexually repressed young Muslim men? Does she have any human feelings towards the suffering of a woman being raped, even if she is an enemy? Isn’t she worried about the impact of this ‘license to rape’ on the character of young Muslim men and its impact on society as a whole?

Doesn’t her suggestion confirm the existence of Muslim Sharia laws that allow the sexual slavery of captive women in time of war? Doesn’t she know that such statements and action by Muslim men will increase the worldwide fear of Islam?

All of this is not very good for those who want to improve the image of Islam.

Things said and done, even by intellectuals, in the Middle East, personally no longer surprise me anymore. What I always ask myself is: Where are the protests of the so-called ‘moderate’ Muslims? Where are the voices of those who want to ‘educate’ and give ‘sensitivity training’ to the American public about how Islam is a religion of peace? Why are they not shouting “not in the name of my religion”?

I found it amusing to see the moral compass of the Muslim world when I watched an interview with the Egyptian cleric Zaghloul Al Naggar, who said on Iqra TV on September 11, 2008, that Muslims must reform the moral corruption of the West. Or when I listen to Muslim leadership say that we should take the opportunity of the financial crisis in the West to spread Islam. We, Arabs and Muslims, must think of how low we will allow our morality to go for (presumably) land we can hardly see on the map of the Arab world. If that will not wake the West up, I do not know what will.

All Religions (including Atheism) have a common problem. The people who organize, evangelize, and operate them are; well, people! At times we don't seem to know if it's a pure religious ideal expressing itself or man's perverted influence rearing its ugly head. I believe this is why God warns against the worship of man and idols - our zealousness overrides the "holy" sometimes. The Judeo-Christian world tries to deal with this; successfully at times and sometimes not. Just look at Biblical history. The New Covenant had to come, the Reformation had to happen; etc ...

IMO, Islam is unique. It seems to be bent on evil no matter what "reforms" may be interjected historically. BTW, I have known too many good, decent Muslim men to believe that a Muslim cannot clamor after God and not find Him. Islam the religion, however, is another thing entirely. To me, it is a mistake to even speak of Islam as a member of the "big 3" monotheistic religions. - Tiger

The Observer

Wednesday, November 19, 2008

Tuesday, November 18, 2008

Sparks Fly As 'Gay' Activist Mob Swarms Christians

Residents of homosexual district: 'We're going to kill you. We know who you are'
Amerika! This is your future.
Hundreds of homosexual activists rushed out of bars and swarmed a group of Christians who were singing songs in San Francisco's Castro District – and some even threatened to kill the worshippers.

A group of Christians had been singing and praying in the "gay" district for several days, but they never expected an angry mob would run them out. However, that's what happened Friday night.

One woman who was attacked told her story at Pastor Lou Engle's Justice House of Prayer in San Francisco. She said the group's fellowship had been peaceful for several nights before the riot.

"People would come stand with us and join us," she said. "We got to pray for some people."
See Video Below:

Chased out of the Castro District - 11-14-08

Monday, November 17, 2008

America's Relentless Desire To Destroy Israel

As if G.W. Bush and Condi Rice weren't bad enough, now the man who created the "Office of the President Elect" out of thin air, "that one" who is potentially "that man of lawlessness", has declared that Israel should, "revert to its pre-1967 borders in return for official diplomatic recognition by the Arab world".

Barack Hussein Obama is about to wade into the Mideast peace process in a major way. He is going to push a plan that will have Israel revert to its 1967 borders in exchange for recognition by Arab nations. But such a plan will cede the high ground to Israel’s enemies, giving them a strategic vantage point over the nation’s cities.

A senior Obama adviser told the London Times that Obama will throw his support behind a 2002 Saudi peace initiative that also has been endorsed by Israeli Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni, the Arab League, and Israeli President Shimon Peres.

Under the plan:

- Israel would be able to veto the return of Arab refugees expelled in 1948.

- Israel would restore the Golan Heights to Syria.

- Palestinians would be allowed to establish a state capital in east Jerusalem.

According to the senior adviser, Obama has said privately that Israel would be "crazy" to reject such a plan, since it would "give them peace with the Muslim world."

(Some text taken from © 2008 Newsmax. All rights reserved.)

BTW, could B. Hussein Obama be "that man of lawlessness"? What if Philip Berg, Esq. is correct and Obama is really a Kenyan or Indonesian? If he is and if he remains President it would make United States law and the U.S. Constitution, like the Republican Party, completely irrelevant!

What about the religious angle? Many promote a pseudo-biblical idea that the temple in Jerusalem has to be rebuilt and the sacrifices restarted in order for the "Antichrist" to cease the sacrifices (very convoluted, I'd say). IMO the Bible doesn't say this at all. The ceasing of the sacrifices occurred with the advent of Christ. Christ IS THE TEMPLE. The reference in the book of Daniel refers to Christ, not the Antichrist. This is a classic conflict of Catholic teaching verses Reformation-Early Church teaching. Here's more on that if you're interested. In other words, Israel could very well be wiped off the face of the earth and it would not alter Biblical prophecy (altar? : ) - no pun intended).

The Observer

Garner - Washington Times

The Observer

Sunday, November 16, 2008

Friday, November 14, 2008

The Republican Party Is The Wrong Place For Sarah Palin

Thursday: Nov. 13th

The Republican Governors Conference Press Guidelines promised that Alaska Governor Sarah Palin would “take approximately 20 minutes of questions” at today’s morning press conference. Instead, this press conference, attended by 150 local and national media and taped by 26 video cameras, disintegrated into a fiasco when Texas Governor Rick Perry shut it down after only five minutes and four questions.

Eight other governors assembled on the stage, all men, seemed visibly uncomfortable with the “Palin at center stage” format. When Perry stepped in front of Palin at the podium to announce it was over just as it was getting started, Palin looked irritated, and the media shouted, “You’ve got to be kidding,” “This is ridiculous,” "Come on,” and “We were promised more questions.”

Forty minutes later, at a larger gathering attended by most the seventeen governors at the Conference, Bill Kristol of The Weekly Standard may have given the reason why Palin was reined in: envy. Said Kristol, “This is not the Republican Governors Association. This is really the Republican Presidential Candidates Association.” ...

... in the area of policy, she repeatedly noted that the Republican leadership in Washington had over the last decade betrayed the conservative principles and values of the Party, and that it is up to Republic governors, not to the failed GOP leadership in Washington, to lead the GOP back to power.

... Sarah, you're better than that wretched hive of scum and villainy! - Tiger

The Observer

Legal Challenges Spring Up Across U.S., Demand Proof of Eligibility for Office

More than a half-dozen legal challenges have been filed in federal and state courts demanding President-elect Barack Obama's decertification from ballots or seeking to halt elector meetings, claiming he has failed to prove his U.S. citizenship status.

An Obama campaign spokeswoman told WND the complaints are unfounded.
"All I can tell you is that it is just pure garbage," she said. "There have been several lawsuits, but they have been dismissed."

WND is tracking the progress of many cases across the U.S., including the following:

Ohio

David M. Neal of Turtlecreek Township, Ohio, filed suit in Warren Common Pleas Court in October to force Ohio Secretary of State Jennifer Brunner to request documents from the Federal Elections Commission, the Democratic National Committee, the Ohio Democratic Party and Obama to show the presidential candidate was born in Hawaii, the Cincinnati Enquirer reported.

Warren County Magistrate Andrew Hasselbach denied Neal's request, saying, "The onus is upon one who challenges such public officer to demonstrate an abuse of discretion by admissible evidence – not hearsay, conclusory allegations or pure speculation."

Connecticut

Connecticut resident Cort Wrotnowski challenged the authenticity of Obama's birth certificate on Oct. 31, and asked the court to order Secretary of State Susan Bysiewicz to verify Obama's citizenship before allowing the candidate to appear on the state ballot. State Supreme Court Chief Justice Chase T. Rogers threw out the case for lack of jurisdiction within a half hour of reviewing it.

"I have not seen the ruling yet," Wrotnowski told WND. "So, in reality, the case was not heard on its merits. … Currently, we are assembling information for another and better try."

Washington

As WND reported earlier, Steven Marquis of Fall City, Wash., filed suit Oct. 9 in Washington State Superior Court, calling for Secretary of State Sam Reed to determine whether Obama is a citizen before Election Day. Marquis released a statement saying the state has the authority to "prevent the wholesale disenfranchisement of voters" who might have otherwise had the opportunity to choose a qualified candidate should records show Obama is not a natural-born U.S. citizen.

Marquis said Obama's Hawaii birth certificate isn't evidence that the president-elect is a natural-born citizen because it doesn't reveal the hospital where Obama was born, a doctor's name or the baby's footprint, the Associated Press reported.

Superior Court Judge John Erlick dismissed the lawsuit, claiming the secretary of state does not have authority to inquire about Obama's birth certificate. He also said Marquis failed to name Obama as a party to the lawsuit.

Get the book that started it all – Jerome Corsi's "The Obama Nation," personally autographed for only $24.95

New Jersey

In Leo C. Donofrio v. Nina Mitchell Wells, Secretary of State of the State of New Jersey, retired attorney and New Jersey resident Leo. C. Donofrio asked the U.S. Supreme Court for an emergency stay on Nov. 3 prohibiting three candidates from appearing on New Jersey's ballots: Republican candidate John McCain, Democratic candidate Barack Obama and Socialist Worker's Party candidate Roger Calero.

Donofrio claimed the candidates are not "natural born citizens" as enumerated in Article 2, Section 1, of the Constitution of the United States, which states, "No person except a natural born citizen of the United States, at the time of adoption of this Constitution, shall be eligible to the office of President."

He wrote, Obama is not eligible for the presidency "even if it were proved he was born in Hawaii, since … Senator Obama's father was born in Kenya and therefore, having been born with split and competing loyalties, candidate Obama is not a 'natural born citizen' …"

"Republican candidate John McCain was born in Panama," the request states. "Socialist Workers Party candidate Roger Calero was born in Nicaragua. And the birthplace of Democratic candidate Barack Obama has not been verified by Respondent."

Donofrio said Panama has never been considered U.S. soil, and that McCain is merely a citizen at birth by statute, and not a "natural born citizen."

With three ineligible presidential candidates on ballots, Donofrio warned, New Jersey voters will "witness firsthand the fraud their electoral process has become."

Justice David Souter denied Donofrio's application on Nov. 6. However, his case is still pending as an emergency stay application. Donofrio is resubmitting his request for an emergency stay of the national election results and Electoral College meeting to Justice Clarence Thomas.

Pennsylvania

As WND reported earlier, prominent Pennsylvania Democrat and attorney Philip J. Berg filed suit in U.S. District Court three months ago claiming Obama is not a natural-born U.S. citizen.
Berg claimed that by failing to respond Obama has legally "admitted" to the lawsuit's accusations, including the charge that the Democratic candidate was born in Mombosa, Kenya.
U.S. District Judge R. Barclay Surrick dismissed Berg's argument on Oct, 24, ruling that he lacked standing to bring the case. He said Berg's allegations were "too vague and too attenuated."

"This is a question of who has standing to uphold our Constitution," Berg told Jeff Schreiber of America's Right blog. "If I don't have standing, if you don't have standing, if your neighbor doesn't have standing to question the eligibility of an individual to be president of the United States – the commander in chief, the most powerful person in the world – then who does?"
Berg filed a writ of certiorari in the U.S. Supreme Court on Oct.30, to force Obama to produce his birth certificate. Justice David Souter rejected an emergency appeal on Nov. 3, for the court to halt the tabulation of the 2008 presidential election results until Obama documented his eligibility to run for office. However, Souter set a schedule for a response from Obama, the DNC and all co-defendants on or before Dec. 1.

"I look forward to receiving Defendant Obama's response to the Writ and am hopeful the U.S. Supreme Court will review Berg v. Obama," Berg wrote in a Nov. 7 statement. "I believe Mr. Obama is not a consitutionally-qualified natural-born citizen and is ineligible to assume the office of the President of the United States."

Georgia

Rev. Tom Terry of Atlanta, Ga., appealed to the Georgia Supreme Court the day before the election to determine authenticity of Obama's original birth certificate and his qualifications to be president.

"I bear no personal ill will against Barack Obama," Terry, an independent, said in a statement. "In fact, his election solely on the basis as the first African-American president-elect is a very positive thing for our nation. However, as an American, I have very grave concerns about Mr. Obama's possible divided loyalties since he has strenuously and vigorously fought every request and every legal effort to force him to release his original birth certificate for public review and scrutiny. I think that is significant."

On Oct 24, Georgia Superior Court Judge Jerry W. Baxter denied Terry's request for an injunction against Secretary of State Karen Handel.

"I don't think you have standing to bring this suit," he said. "I think that the attorney general has argued the law. I think he is correct. I think you are not a lawyer."

Terry is appealing his suit even though Obama didn't win Georgia because he said he wants to set an example for other states. He is asking the court to direct Georgia Secretary of State Karen Handel to decertify all votes for Obama.

"Hopefully, this action will be noticed by other states and they will also take a serious look at the meaning of Georgia's Supreme Court's actions," he said. "It is apropos that the Latin motto in the Georgia Supreme Court is interpreted: 'Let justice be done, though the heavens fall.' I think if the Court rules in my favor, that motto will come alive with meaning and impact."

Hawaii

On Oct. 17, Andy Martin filed a writ of mandamus in Hawaii's Supreme Court to compel Gov. Linda Lingle to release a certified copy of Obama's vital statistics record. His request to expedite the circuit court was denied on Oct. 22.

Martin now has a pending case seeking access to Obama's original 1961 typewritten birth certificate. The circuit court hearing is set to begin Nov. 18.

The saga continues …

Several unconfirmed reports also indicate that citizens of Utah, Wyoming, Florida, New York, North Carolina, Texas, California and Virginia have also filed lawsuits or requested court orders to verify Obama's citizenship status.

As reported earlier, WND senior investigative reporter Jerome Corsi traveled both to Kenya and Hawaii to investigate issues surrounding Obama's birth.
But his discoveries only raised more questions.

The governor's office in Hawaii said he had a valid certificate but rejected requests for access and left ambiguous its origin – leaving some to wonder if the certificate on file with the Department of Health indicates a Hawaiian birth or whether it was generated after the Obama family registered a Kenyan birth in Hawaii.

The Obama campaign posted a certification of live birth, a document stating the baby was born on Aug. 4, 1961. However, according to the Department of Hawaiian Home Lands, there is a difference between the two documents. A certification of live birth is not an authentication of Hawaiian birth, and critics say the procedure could have allowed Obama's mother to have the baby elsewhere, return to the U.S. and obtain the document in Hawaii.

The Department of Hawaiian Home Lands makes a distinction between the two:

In order to process your application, DHHL utilizes information that is found only on the original Certificate of Live Birth, which is either black or green. This is a more complete record of your birth than the Certification of Live Birth (a computer-generated printout). Submitting the original Certificate of Live Birth will save you time and money since the computer-generated Certification requires additional verification by DHHL.

However, Andy Martin has specifically requested verification of the original 1961 type-written certificate of live birth – or, as the Department of Hawaiian Home Lands describes it, the "more complete record" of Obama's birth.

Further adding to complications, Obama's half-sister, Maya Soetoro, has named two different Hawaii hospitals where Obama could have been born. In a November 2004 interview with the Rainbow Newsletter, Maya told reporters her half-brother Sen. Barack Obama was born on Aug. 4, 1961, at Queens Medical Center in Honolulu; then in February 2008, Maya told reporters for the Honolulu Star-Bulletin that Obama was at the Kapiolani Medical Center for Women and Children.

But a video posted on YouTube features Obama's Kenyan grandmother Sarah claiming to have witnessed Obama's birth in Kenya.

Seeking to settle the issue, Hawaii Department of Health Director Director Chiyome Fukino released an Oct. 31 statement saying, "State law (Hawai'i Revised Statutes §338-18) prohibits the release of a certified birth certificate to persons who do not have a tangible interest in the vital record. Therefore, I as Director of Health for the State of Hawai'i, along with the Registrar of Vital Statistics who has statutory authority to oversee and maintain these type of vital records, have personally seen and verified that the Hawai'i State Department of Health has Sen. Obama's original birth certificate on record in accordance with state policies and procedures."

The statement does not clarify whether "the record" is a certification of live birth or a Hawaiian certificate of live birth.

Before the election, WND retained a top private investigator in Hawaii with extensive FBI training and tasked him with visiting both the Queens Medical Center and the Kaliolani Medical Center to investigate claims that Obama birth certificates existed at either hospital.

However, the private investigator reported that sheriff's deputies were stationed at both hospitals to fend off press inquiries about Obama's birth certificate.

When WND asked the Obama campaign spokeswoman why Obama simply hasn't released the original 1961 certificate of live birth to make the lawsuits go away, she replied, "I have no idea. I think they released what they chose to release, and Hawaii has confirmed that he was born in Hawaii, so I don't know what else you want."
The Observer