'Tis the Season to be Warring
By Erik Rush (12/25/06)
War: (1): a state of usually open and declared armed hostile conflict between states or nations (2) archaic: soldiers armed and equipped for war (2a): a state of hostility, conflict, or antagonism (2b): a struggle or competition between opposing forces or for a particular end (a class war). - Merriam-Webster’s Dictionary
I was somewhat torn this week whether to write a column addressing the cultural ramifications of Rosie O’Pig and The Gerbil (Donald Trump) duking it out in the media or to deliver something relevant to Christmas. I chose the latter.
In his December 17 article, “Offering Support for a Menorah, Unofficially”, The New York Times’ Martin Forstenzer painted a picture of the city in which I live as an intolerant, anti-Semitic community, focusing on its refusal “to allow a menorah to be displayed downtown during Hanukkah, near a Christmas tree and other Christmas displays.”
This gave rise to an excellent opportunity, as I was able to write a column for the local newspaper the following week in which I expounded upon what a pack of race-baiting, craven, self-serving swine the national press is, thus exposing those on my home turf, as it were, to the sort of broad issue my national readers enjoy. It was disturbing to some in my community that the chickens (or the swine) they’d heard so much about had come home to roost. Others were no doubt pleased…
Relative to the War on Christmas (in essence, just one battle being fought in the Culture War), America is split around 33.3% as to those who believe it exists, those who don’t, and those who aren’t sure or don’t care. It’s become a perennial media favorite during the Yuletide season over the last few years.
One of the Forstenzer’s talking points addressed the City Council’s concern – given the Supreme Court’s view of Christmas trees as “generic secular displays” – that opening up to one religious display would reasonably incite any and every religious group, quasi-religious group and cult to demand equal treatment.
In answer, a reader of the local paper wrote in a letter to the editor: “The community at large would welcome the menorah.”
Well, of course it would – and I’d wager there are only a handful of people who wouldn’t. Unfortunately, the barriers to “just saying yes” are complicated if not numerous.
“I think the City Council is trying to cover themselves legally, but they’re shortsighted about the long-term implications of how this impacts groups,” commented a city resident in the Times article. While the second part of the statement smacks of politically-correct dogma, the individual did touch on the nature of the city’s difficult position – which presented the opportunity for the Times and other agitators to place this northern Colorado city of around 100,000 souls in their crosshairs.
With regard to all displays and things aesthetic, there are agreements and conditions in place between the city’s Downtown Development Authority, the city itself, and area business owners (these might be likened to community covenants). Changing them would be a time-consuming and tedious task, and violating them would initiate a suefest. There’s also a pesky regulation that prohibits no unattended displays standing overnight in the area (which, for the record, is not menorah-specific).
It bears mentioning here that the city (which comes down to its residents) brought on an unintended consequence, painting itself into a corner with wide brushes of law, regulation and politically-correct sensitivities.
As with the recent Christmas tree/Sea-Tac Airport controversy, there is of course the customary klatsch of big-city civil attorneys poised to napalm and strafe at the first signal from the menorah sponsoring Jewish Center, the rabbi of which has heretofore shown a great deal of class concerning the whole thing. The city was in the unenviable position of having to brace for a suefest no matter what action they took – or didn’t take.
In typical fashion, the Times (which many Americans now realize is only slightly to the right of Izvestia), viewed reality itself, the expressed sympathies of city residents, mayor and Council, as well as cooperation between the city and the Jewish Center as non sequitur. The menorah won’t be allowed, so we’re all a bunch of Nazis – a line of reasoning Joseph Goebbels would have appreciated.
Which brings me to what so many of us already know: The far Left’s program of undermining all aspects of Christianity in America does indeed exist. For the last 40 years, the national press has done more to foment class, ethnic and religious tension than any separatist group, for purposes both ideological and financial.
I included a definition of “war” at the opening of this piece. The last variation of Webster’s designation is the one most applicable to the Culture War. “(2b): a struggle or competition between opposing forces or for a particular end (a class war).”
What, then, is the object of war – besides winning? To defeat the enemy, of course. Defeat. Negate. Nullify. Destroy. Now, while I’m not advocating a purge of any and every American who leans too far to the Left, I have no problem whatever with disenfranchising any and every American who leans too far to the Left. This would be quite fair in my view, since ideology crosses all ethnic, religious and socioeconomic lines. How this is to be accomplished remains to be seen, but it must be done before the United States of America ceases to exist in its present form or is sufficiently threatened that our citizenry will accept a government that summarily puts Leftists to the sword.
Americans who use subverted and convoluted constitutional arguments to effectively nullify the Constitution itself remind me of Lenin, who intended to “sell the Western businessmen the rope with which we will hang them.” And we’re the businessmen. Lenin may have failed – but this doesn’t guarantee the American neo-socialists do likewise. Besides, who wants a century of that kind of government?
The answer: Only a few. Will we let them win?
That answer, I believe, lies with us. America is a nation of law – but laws can be changed or perverted, wholesale or piecemeal. For the greater part, Americans respect their constitutional guarantees, some, to a fault. They’re so concerned with violating anyone’s civil rights (misappropriated or misinterpreted though they may be) that they’re allowing that piecemeal transmogrification of our system of law.
Once upon a time in a land not so far away, there was a law that said one must denounce their neighbors so that the government could haul them off to death camps. How many “good citizens” turned Jews in because it was the law of the land rather than due to any animosity toward their Jewish neighbors?
It’s time for us to be the “better citizens” who did otherwise, despite the risks involved.
In Scripture (Romans 13: 1-2), we are admonished to obey our governments and lawmakers – but I doubt Christ would have advocated cooperating with the Gestapo.
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