As the President has proposed the largest budget increase in 20 years for the National Endowment for the Arts (NEA), now is a good time to look back at an April 22, 2003 Dennis Prager column on artists' values:

Many, perhaps most, great artists are geniuses in one area and underdeveloped elsewhere in life. It seems that when God grants great artistic talent to an individual, that individual is given few other gifts, least of all moral clarity or wisdom.

That is why there is rarely any link between artistic greatness and human greatness. We should no more expect a great actor or composer or painter to be a great human being than we should expect a great lawyer, truck driver, businessman or athlete to be a great human being. Art rarely makes a person wiser or kinder, whether the person is a connoisseur of art or the creator of it.

Those of us who love classical music -- and as an occasional orchestral conductor, I am particularly involved in music -- have long had to confront the lack of connection between genius and goodness or wisdom. Richard Wagner, for example, was one of the world's greatest composers and a racist anti-Semite. Neither Beethoven nor Mozart was known to be a particularly decent human being. Herbert von Karajan, one of the most celebrated conductors of the 20th century, served as Kapellmeister under Adolf Hitler and never apologized for his support of the Nazis. The great African-American singer Paul Robeson passionately supported Joseph Stalin until the day that mass murderer died.

. . . Only those who worship art should be surprised. And there are many of them. With the demise of the worship of God in Europe, secular Westerners began to worship new gods, most especially art and artists. This explains why so many people have asked how Germany, which produced Bach, Mozart and Beethoven, could also produce gas chambers -- as if producing great composers should in some way raise the moral level of that society.

So the next time you see "artists for" or "artists against" some cause, without reading any further, you can pretty much bet your mortgage that whatever it is they are for or against, they are morally wrong. While God may have granted artists little wisdom, He apparently did not skimp on hubris.

To the Left, state funding of their religion (art) is an absolute moral obligation; however, such funding to other religions - especially traditionalist and "unenlightened" Christianity and Judaism - is unconstitutional and corrupting to both church and state.

Let's keep in mind what the Salvation Army would do with our tax dollars versus what the NEA would do. While it has a new chairman who many believe will reverse its moral decay, the fact remains that in the past the NEA's priests have funded many projects with obscene and/or anti-religious content, including homosexual film festivals and blasphemous exhibits, in addition to plenty of just plain undisciplined, unskilled garbage, what historian Paul Johnson calls "fashion art." There is no guarantee this will not recur. Furthermore, in an era of out-of-control federal spending, the government should not waste 140 million tax dollars on what is, at best, a non-essential budget item, similar to the Corporation for Public Broadcasting (see our Jan. 1, 2004 entry).

Use our Take Action page to ask President Bush to reconsider the proposal and privatize the NEA. Ask your other representatives to do the same. A free market in art, like a free market in education, will liberate both the producers and consumers of the product.

(If you find this site useful and would like to help make political devotions a mass movement, please tell others about PoliticalDevotions.com or place a link to it on your website. Then when you've done so, be sure to e-mail me so I can thank you personally! - Tim.)

Posted by Tim at 2:52 AM EST

Updated: Tuesday, February 3, 2004 2:30 AM EST

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The education monopoly's puppets in Washington are attempting to destroy the nation's first federally funded school voucher program. Senators Richard Durbin (D-Ill.) and Ted Kennedy (D-Mass.) say they will introduce legislation in the Senate to repeal the D.C. schools voucher provision included in the appropriations package passed on Jan. 22.

Puffy, power-drunk uber-liberal Kennedy vows "This battle is far from over."

Ralph Neas of the far-left pressure group People for the American Way said, "I do think we have a very good chance to accomplish this legislatively."

This use of the legislative process is an uncharacteristically democratic approach for the Left, which generally seeks to impose its will on the majority through fatwas from judicial tyrants (e.g., the same-sex marriage and Boy Scouts assaults). However, D.C.'s congressional delegate confirms anti-voucher groups are exploring a court challenge against the program, so the old dog really hasn't learned any new tricks.

Of the current crop of Democrat presidential contenders, only Joe Lieberman supports voucher programs, and only as "experiments."

The teachers unions and the democrats know they're cornered. They know this tiny program has immense symbolic significance, and that the proven success of voucher programs foreshadows national education privatization and the end of their powerful monopoly. Use our Take Action page to ask President Bush and your representatives to mount an aggressive defense of the D.C. vouchers program against the legislative and court attacks that are sure to come.

(If you find this site useful and would like to help make political devotions a mass movement, please tell others about PoliticalDevotions.com or place a link to it on your website. Then when you've done so, be sure to e-mail me so I can thank you personally! - Tim.)

Posted by Tim at 12:22 AM EST

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I'm sure somewhere in the vast cannon of FDA regulations there are standards for what can be labeled "wine" - a certain alcohol percentage, etc. And I'll bet there are more than a few folks on the Left who enjoy wine, and would be rather miffed if the courts suddenly forced the FDA to change its definition of wine to "anything anyone wants to put in a bottle and call `wine.'"

Yet that is exactly what the Left wants to do to marriage. If the government calls the union of two people of the same sex a "marriage," then on what logical or ethical basis can it refuse to sanction the union of three or more people of either sex? Or of two or more blood relatives of either sex? Or of any number of people of either sex plus one or more animals (of either sex)? The combinations are limited only by one's imagination.

At its core, the same-sex marriage movement is not about obtaining the few unique rights accruing to marriage. It is about intolerance of heterosexual marriage's existence and of its veneration as a social ideal. It's about using the Left's favored weapon of mass destruction, judicial fiat, to force society to provide the same veneration to homosexual unions. Anything less would be "intolerant" - their new definition of intolerance being "Failure to accept and celebrate a given behavior."

Focus on the Family has a quite comprehensive CitizenLink Extra on this subject, featuring detailed arguments on all facets of the issue and tools for contacting the relevant elected representatives.

(If you find this site useful and would like to help make political devotions a mass movement, please tell others about PoliticalDevotions.com or place a link to it on your website. Then when you've done so, be sure to e-mail me so I can thank you personally! - Tim.)

Posted by Tim at 1:00 AM EST

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Focus on the Family's Citizenlink site has an interesting proposal for the Democrat and Republican national committees:

A coalition of pro-family groups is calling on the Republican and Democratic National Committees to create planks in their 2004 party platforms that affirm the United States as "one nation under God" and endorse the public display of the Ten Commandments.

"We're going to put the challenge to them publicly," said the Rev. Rob Schenck of the National Clergy Council, one of the groups behind the campaign. "We'll be showing up at a number of platform committee hearings around the country to urge them to make that clear statement to the American public."

You can join this effort by contacting Ed Gillespie. chairman of the Republican National Committee, and Terry McAuliffe, chairman of the Democratic National Committee, and urging them to create planks that honor the Pledge and Commandments.

You can send an e-mail to both chairmen at this link.

Gee, I wonder which party will readily agree to this request and which party will, at most, ignore it?

(If you find this site useful and would like to help make political devotions a mass movement, please tell others about PoliticalDevotions.com or place a link to it on your website. Then when you've done so, be sure to e-mail me so I can thank you personally! - Tim.)

Posted by Tim at 2:42 AM EST

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This proposed law would require abortion practitioners notify at least one parent of a minor at least 48 hours prior to performing the procedure, except in cases of medical emergency or suspected abuse. ParentalNotification.org's description of the initiative notes:

It is both a statute and a constitutional amendment so the Courts cannot rule it unconstitutional.

Privacy considerations are not granted to minors for obtaining medicines, tattoos, body piercing, marriage licenses, or admission to the armed services. Minors have never had the full complement of "rights" under constitutional law.

Statistics show that states with parental notification for minors seeking abortion promote family communication and allow for parental responsibility.

Polls show that both pro-choice and pro-life individuals favor Parental Notification.

It would be illegal for school counselors and other school personnel to arrange for a minor's abortion without her parent's knowledge.

In a LifeNews.com article, one of the initiative's official proponents, a mother whose teenage daughter had a clandestine abortion, describes the current problem well:

"Your sixteen-year-old daughter cannot get her ears pierced without your permission, but she can have a school nurse drive her to an abortion clinic in the middle of the day without your knowledge. It is not only common sense, it is a safety issue.

"This initiative is about promoting family communication," added Avila. "My goal is to help parents help their daughters."

Parental notification is indeed "common sense," and opinion polls show overwhelming support for notification laws, but no doubt the initiative will be opposed by the same forces aggressively fighting against education privatization and for power grabs such as universal preschool. In its usual ignorance of common sense, left-wing fundamentalist dogma dictates that the state always knows best when it comes to raising your children, and should have power over them under all circumstances and at all ages. Therefore an "enlightened" school nurse can facilitate an abortion of which you the parent (who might be one of those neanderthal pro-lifers) will never be informed.

The initiative's sponsors need 598,000 more signatures by April 15 to add it to the November 2004 ballot. You can request a petition here.

(If you find this site useful and would like to help make political devotions a mass movement, please tell others about PoliticalDevotions.com or place a link to it on your website. Then when you've done so, be sure to e-mail me so I can thank you personally! - Tim.)

Posted by Tim at 12:38 AM EST

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After nine years of debate in Congress, the Senate has given final approval to the nation's first federally funded school voucher program, providing $14 million a year in private school tuition grants to District of Columbia school children. Children First America reports:

The legislation permits Secretary of Education Roderick R. Paige to launch a five-year pilot program designed in consultation with Washington Mayor Anthony A. Williams (D) to provide annual, taxpayer-funded grants of up to $7,500 a year for at least 1,600 District schoolchildren to attend private and parochial schools beginning this fall.

"Opportunity scholarships" would be limited to children in families earning up to 185 percent of the poverty level -- about $36,000 for a family of four -- with priority going to children attending low-performing public schools.

Williams, to the consternation of critics in the District, was a supporter of the voucher program.

The victory revives a national school voucher movement that was left moribund after landslide defeats in voter referenda in 2000 in California and Michigan and follows a Supreme Court decision that upheld their constitutionality 19 months ago.

Nine years of debate over spending 14 stinkin' million dollars. But let's not fool ourselves. The issue is not the $14 million. Stocking the bar in Ted Kennedy's office for the past nine years probably cost $14 million. The core issue is whether left-wing ideologues will control our schools and the raising of our children. The debate dragged on this far (and litigation will continue) because of a powerful teachers union, a powerful anti-religion lobby that seeks to keep funds from parochial schools, and because of a vigorous left that believes the state, not parents, should raise children.

Yet we must celebrate this significant victory. Let's hope it is the camel's nose in the tent, the beginning of a movement that results in the end of the public education monopoly and the start of a free market in education from kindergarten to university. Use our Take Action page to thank the President and your pro-school-choice representatives for winning this victory for D.C. children, and handing a defeat to the anti-school-choice forces. And be sure to reiterate your support for further steps to privatize public education across the board.

(If you find this site useful and would like to help make political devotions a mass movement, please tell others about PoliticalDevotions.com or place a link to it on your website. Then when you've done so, be sure to e-mail me so I can thank you personally! - Tim.)

Posted by Tim at 12:55 AM EST

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A recent Wall Street Journal editorial focuses on what the editors call "the most profligate Administration since the 1960s":

The bottom line is truly shocking. Passage of the omnibus bill would raise total discretionary spending to more than $900 billion in 2004. By contrast, the eight Clinton-era budgets produced discretionary spending growth from $541 billion 1994 to $649 billion in 2001. Nor can recent increases be blamed on the war. At 18.6%, the increase in non-defense discretionary spending under the 107th Congress (2002-2003) is far and away the biggest in decades. In 2003, total federal spending topped an inflation-adjusted $20,000 per household for the first time since World War II

. . . The truth is that this spending bill is hardly necessary. The government has been running just fine at 2003 spending levels since September (have you noticed?), and can easily continue to do so for the rest of the fiscal year. We realize Mr. Bush is eager for passage of certain line items, such as his program to combat AIDS in Africa, but this bill is literally too high a price to pay, especially in terms of his own credibility. We're not holding our breath for a change of heart, but President Bush can help shore up his conservative base and appeal to many moderate voters by exercising his very first veto here.

Steve Moore of the Club for Growth is correct in calling the 2004 omnibus appropriations bill a "pork-laden monstrosity." Among other atrocities, it includes $50 million for an indoor rain forest in Coralville, Iowa and $2 million for a "golf awareness program" in St. Augustine, Florida. Pork barrel expenditures will total $23 billion in 2004.

Use our Take Action page to ask President Bush to veto the bill, and to demand that your representatives - particularly your Republican ones, who should know better - act to curtail out-of-control discretionary spending. Put them in shock by asking for cancellation of pork barrel projects in your state. Maybe that'll get their attention.

(If you find this site useful and would like to help make political devotions a mass movement, please tell others about PoliticalDevotions.com or place a link to it on your website. Then when you've done so, be sure to e-mail me so I can thank you personally! - Tim.)

Posted by Tim at 1:48 AM EST

Updated: Monday, January 26, 2004 2:13 AM EST

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FrontPage Magazine brings us a detailed and important exploration of the national security implications of the open borders movement. In his introduction, David Horowitz notes that the piece, written by William Hawkins and Erin Anderson,

. . . describes how America's borders have been under assault for forty years with consequences that are measurable and disturbing. The assault has been led by an open borders lobby that is sophisticated and powerful. Many of its components, moreover, have a history of antagonism to American purposes and a record of active support for America's enemies. Its funders are multi-billion dollar entities, who are unaccountable and unscrutinized. They have more discretionary incomes at their disposal to influence these issues than is possessed by either political party, or any business group, or even the federal government itself.

As Hawkins and Anderson show, the open borders campaign was already instrumental in damaging the nation's ability to defend itself before 9/11. Yet not even this terrible event has caused its activists to have second thoughts, or tempered their reckless attacks. Instead, the open borders lobby has expanded its efforts to eliminate America's border controls to include the active defense of terrorists and terrorist organizations and a continuing assault on the very policies the federal government has adopted to defend its citizens from terrorist attacks.

. . . William Hawkins and Erin Anderson have performed an essential public service by tying together the threads of this network and putting its agendas into perspective. The picture they paint is as detailed as it is disturbing and should open a national debate and perhaps congressional hearings on the uses to which taxpayer funds are being directed as the nation faces its post-9/11 threats.

And from the piece itself:

The concept of "open borders" has long been an agenda of the ideological left. Since the 1960s, a vast network -- including hundreds of organizations and tens of thousands of grassroots activists, backed by hundreds of millions of dollars from leftwing foundations -- has waged a sustained campaign to open America's borders to a mass migration from the Third World. Though these groups talk in terms of "human rights," the rights they demand are not the restrictions on government enshrined in the American Bill of Rights, but the claims on society for "equity" and "welfare" and special treatment for designated groups that are the familiar menu of the left and would, if enacted, amount to a revolution in America's existing social order. Which is precisely their intent.

Use our Take Action page to contact your representatives and advocate congressional hearings on the use of taxpayer funds by groups dedicated to the ideological left's open borders policy, which seeks to import and politically exploit a massive underclass and to undermine US efforts to defend against terror attacks.

(If you find this site useful and would like to help make political devotions a mass movement, please tell others about PoliticalDevotions.com or place a link to it on your website. Then when you've done so, be sure to e-mail me so I can thank you personally! - Tim.)

Posted by Tim at 12:14 AM EST

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The Center for Consumer Freedom describes itself as a "nonprofit coalition supported by restaurants, food companies, and consumers" created to defend against the "growing fraternity of ?food cops,' health care enforcers, militant activists, meddling bureaucrats, and violent radicals who think they know ?what's best for you'. . . ."

A cynical industry pressure group? Maybe. Will their actions in opposition to PETA further the spread of moral clarity in the US? Definitely. Their website observes:

Despite its deceptively warm-and-fuzzy public image, People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA) has donated over $150,000 to criminal activists -- including those jailed for arson, burglary, and even attempted murder. In 2001, PETA donated $1,500 to the North American Earth Liberation Front, a criminal organization that the FBI classifies as "domestic terrorists." And since 2000, rank-and-file PETA activists have been arrested over 80 times for breaking various laws during PETA protests. Charges included felony obstruction of government property, criminal mischief, assaulting a cabinet official, felony vandalism, performing obscene acts in public, destruction of federal property, and burglary.

Like millions of other nonprofit groups in the United States (e.g., universities , houses of worship, social service organizations), PETA pays no federal taxes on its income. But few of these other tax-exempt groups share PETA's total disregard for the law. In 2002 PETA collected over $17 million from Americans, avoiding over $3 million in federal income taxes. Because this tax break amounts to a huge subsidy, every American taxpayer is footing the bill for PETA's behavior.

PETA's tax-exempt status was granted by the U.S. government on the basis of the group's willingness to conduct itself in a lawful fashion. We believe that PETA has failed to live up to its end of the bargain, and that the Internal Revenue Service should cancel PETA's tax-exempt status.

PETA is currently under IRS investigation. You can add your name to the Center's petition encouraging U.S. government officials to revoke PETA's tax-exempt status, and use our Take Action page to ask your elected officials to join the effort.

(If you find this site useful and would like to help make political devotions a mass movement, please tell others about PoliticalDevotions.com or place a link to it on your website. Then when you've done so, be sure to e-mail me so I can thank you personally! - Tim.)

Posted by Tim at 1:58 AM EST

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The Home School Legal Defense Association (HSLDA) and other pro-family groups are requesting action on AB 56, a California assembly bill which would lower the compulsory education age from 6 to 5 years of age, and take an incremental step toward a universal preschool program for 3 and 4 year- olds:

AB 56 lowers the compulsory attendance age for entry into school from 6 to 5 years of age. This requirement will apply to all children, whether their parents plan to send them to public school or private school (including private home schools).

AB 56 also makes "free" public preschool available to every child under 5 years of age on a voluntary basis. Should this bill pass, it could easily be followed by legislation to make institutionalized preschool mandatory. Universal preschool has been proposed by legislators in the past and is openly encouraged by proponents of early childhood education.

This bill goes beyond education. It states, "There is a further compelling need in California to ensure that early childhood development programs and services are universally and continuously available for children so that children enter school in optimum health and are emotionally well developed and ready and able to learn.... Therefore, it is the intent of the Legislature to provide.... Universal preschool programs that offer group experiences, developmentally appropriate curricula, and allow for a seamless integration to K-12 education for all children three and four years of age."

Rushing children into formal education will exact a heavy toll on the development of many children and will weaken the role of parents in their lives. This is diametrically opposed to the message parents are currently being given, that parents need to be more involved in their children's lives. AB 56 specifically states, "Children who have secure relationships with family members ... can become self-confident learners." However, parents cannot be more involved when the state either encourages or requires children to be with their parents for less time. Research supports later rather than earlier entry for children for educational development.

Visit this HSLDA page for an analysis of the bill and links to contact information for California legislators. Also, National Review Online has an interesting Q and A on the detrimental effects of preschool/daycare with Brian C. Robertson, author of Day Care Deception: What the Child Care Establishment Isn't Telling Us.

(If you find this site useful and would like to help make political devotions a mass movement, please tell others about PoliticalDevotions.com or place a link to it on your website. Then when you've done so, be sure to e-mail me so I can thank you personally! - Tim.)

Posted by Tim at 1:05 AM EST

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The CIA estimates North Korea now has enough plutonium for one or two nuclear weapons. If its nuclear ambitions remain unchecked, it will soon produce dozens annually and become a Nukes "R" Us, selling to any rogue state or terrorist group.

In addition to the eight declared nuclear nations, two dozen states have research reactors and enough highly enriched uranium to build at least one bomb on their own. The global nuclear inventory comprises more than 30,000 nuclear weapons, and enough highly enriched uranium and plutonium for 240,000 more. Hundreds of the existing weapons are vulnerable to theft.

A nuclear weapon can be created from an amount of uranium a little larger than a softball, and can be easily smuggled across porous US borders or in the 98% of cargo containers not opened for inspection at US ports.

Osama bin Laden's "press spokesman," Sulaiman Abu Ghaith, has announced al Qaeda aspires to "kill 4 million Americans, including 1 million children."

These are the hard facts that confront us in our war to save Western civilization. In a 4000-word essay in the January/February edition of Foreign Affairs, Harvard professor Graham Allison focuses on the Bush administration's need to develop a coherent strategy for combating the nuclear terror threat, and gives a sobering prediction that unless changes occur, a nuclear terror attack on the US within the next decade is "more likely than not."

Allison gives short shrift to the importance of the Iraq war, yet at the same time he offers a workable strategy centered around "Three No's" - no loose nukes, no new nascent nukes, and no new nuclear states. His is not a toothless UN-style appeasement protocol; it includes both the threat and use of military force when necessary. He observes that while enforcement of a doctrine based on the Three No's would be ambitious, it is no more ambitious than enforcement of the Bush Doctrine of regime change in terrorist-harboring states.

Use our Take Action page to advocate to your representatives the adoption of a formal Bush Doctrine of zero tolerance for barbarians with nuclear weapons, employing a strategy akin to Allison's "Three No's."

(If you find this site useful and would like to help make political devotions a mass movement, please tell others about PoliticalDevotions.com or place a link to it on your website. Then when you've done so, be sure to e-mail me so I can thank you personally! - Tim.)

Posted by Tim at 3:13 AM EST

Updated: Monday, April 26, 2004 7:44 AM EDT

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One would think the California Democratic Party couldn't sink any lower than it already has, its elected officials having presided over the destruction of a once-great state, ultimately leading to the recent gubernatorial recall election. But they always seem to find a new low to hit.

In a Jan. 16 FrontPage Magazine article, Steve Emerson exposes California Democratic Party Chairman Art Torres' despicable pandering to radical Islamists in an appearance before the Muslim Public Affairs Council (MPAC) convention:

The incendiary language and the fabricated allegations used against me since 1994 by various radical Islamic groups were chillingly reminiscent of the language used by Art Torres. In fact, the incitement by Torres was lifted directly from the attacks against me by the Council on American Islamic Relations (CAIR), a group created by Hamas front groups in the United States, the American Muslim Council (a Saudi created group whose leader was just indicted on secretly working for Libya in the US and who had been secretly affiliated with Hamas and Al-Qaeda leaders) and the Muslim Public Affairs Council (MPAC). . . .

. . . That Mr. Torres chose to legitimize a group that supports Islamic terrorism and that he himself parroted the same incendiary rhetoric issued by MPAC and other extremist organizations shows that the murderous deceit that led to 9/11 is still alive and well, at least in California.

You can express your outrage at the links below:

Find and Contact Your California Legislators

Governor Schwarzenegger's Homepage

Contact The California Democratic Party

Bonus Link: To no one's surprise, the American Library Association (aka "Librarians for Totalitarians") has failed to do the right thing in the Cuban librarian affair (see our 12/29/2003 entry).

(If you find this site useful and would like to help make political devotions a mass movement, please tell others about PoliticalDevotions.com or place a link to it on your website. Then when you've done so, be sure to e-mail me so I can thank you personally! - Tim.)

Posted by Tim at 4:53 AM EST

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In a Jan. 14 guest commentary in National Review Online on the Democrats' lack of a plan for Social Security, Michael Tanner of the Cato Institute offers a good summary of the status quo:

Social Security is not only the largest U.S. government program, accounting for 23 percent of federal spending, it is the largest government program in the world. The Social Security payroll tax is the largest tax paid by the average American working family. In fact, nearly 80 percent of us pay more in Social Security taxes than we do in federal income taxes. At the same time, millions of the elderly rely on Social Security for much, if not most, of their retirement income.

The 68-year-old program is also in crisis. In just 15 years, Social Security will begin to run a deficit, spending more on benefits than it takes in through taxes. The federal IOUs in the Social Security Trust Fund are an accounting measure, not real assets that can be used to fund the program. Unless the program is drastically changed, taxes will have to be raised or benefits cut. But taxes are already so high that younger workers are receiving low, below-market returns from Social Security. Cutting benefits would be a severe burden to millions of low- and middle- income elderly.

While the libertarian Cato Institute's foreign policy is myopic and naive, their analysis of domestic issues is often spot-on. The Cato Social Security Alternative, summarized at the institute's Social Security Choice website (www.SocialSecurity.org ) offers a well thought-out privatization plan which could be implemented immediately, if public opinion drove elected officials to do so.

In fact, President Bush has already stated his position that younger workers should be allowed to invest a portion of their payroll taxes privately through individual accounts. With extensive public support, he could lead a Social Security privatization initiative that would not only save the system, but enable workers to retire much, much wealthier than they would under the current socialist model.

Use our Take Action page to let the President and your representatives know you would like to see complete Social Security privatization, along the lines of the Cato Social Security Alternative model.

Bonus Link: A telling quote from a Wall Street Journal article on rebuilding the Iraqi education system.

When American or international agencies wanted to impose progressive education (learn-through-play) in Iraqi schools, we reminded representatives of these agencies that Iraqis had to decide what they wanted to be taught in the schools and how it would be taught.

Hmm. . . . Prohibiting academics from imposing their will, and allowing parents to decide what children are taught and how. How `bout we try that here in the US?

(If you find this site useful and would like to help make political devotions a mass movement, please tell others about PoliticalDevotions.com or place a link to it on your website. Then when you've done so, be sure to e-mail me so I can thank you personally! - Tim.)

Posted by Tim at 3:17 AM EST

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In her Jan. 14 column, Michelle Malkin targets the nationwide campaign against home schooling waged by liberal political figures and the media. She cites a New Jersey assembly bill - designed to punish home schooling parents for the crimes of the state's own child welfare system - as emblematic of the trend:

Congressman Mark Foley, R-Fla., a member of the House Ways and Means Committee and Co-Chairman of the Congressional Missing and Exploited Children's Caucus, noted at a hearing last year that: "Most people treat their pets better than the state of New Jersey has treated its children." The problem is systemic and nationwide. In Foley's state, 7-year-old Rilya Wilson is just one of 500 missing children in the child welfare system who have vanished. In California, Independent Institute research fellow Wendy McElroy reports, children are rushed into dangerous foster care homes thanks to a toxic combination of perverse financial incentives and lack of accountability for social workers' gross misconduct and neglect.

. . . At bottom, Weinberg's bill [mandating yearly health checks and testing for New Jersey's home-schooled children] is a cynical power grab -- something homeschoolers across the country have been fending off as the movement's success has skyrocketed. "This is about legislators interfering with parental rights," Tricia McQuarrie, a South Jersey homeschooling mother of five, told me. "It's Big Brother." Indeed, legislators and the liberal media (witness CBS News' anti- homeschooling hit piece last October) are pushing for increased regulation of homeschooling parents, including criminal background checks, because the grass-roots movement gravely threatens their socialist agenda of promoting dependency. God forbid children be taught by their own parents without oversight from the all-knowing, all-caring, infallible wizards of the child welfare-public school monopoly!

A crackdown on innocent homeschooling families to cure the incompetence of government child welfare agencies is like a smoker lopping off his ear to treat metastatic lung cancer. It's a bloody wrong cure conceived by a fool who caused his own disease.

Use our Take Action page to express to your representatives and media outlets support for the home schooling movement, and your opposition to government regulation of a phenomenon that has proved, in study after study, to produce educated, successful and well-adjusted children.

Bonus Link: One of the best things about home school is that stuff like this never happens.

(If you find this site useful and would like to help make political devotions a mass movement, please tell others about PoliticalDevotions.com or place a link to it on your website. Then when you've done so, be sure to e-mail me so I can thank you personally! - Tim.)

Posted by Tim at 4:17 AM EST

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The San Diego Union Tribune on Jan. 9 reported:

The city of San Diego has agreed to cancel its lease in Balboa Park with the Boy Scouts, hoping to end the city's role in a 3? -year legal battle with the American Civil Liberties Union.

The Boy Scouts, however, vowed to continue fighting for its 18-acre headquarters even without city support, because it believes its constitutional liberties are at stake. Last month, the group received a letter of support from the U.S. Justice Department, stating the group's predicament raised "substantial concerns" that the group's rights were being violated.

The ACLU filed the lawsuit against the city and the Boy Scouts in August 2000, two months after the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that the Boy Scouts could refuse to admit gay troop members or troop leaders. The lawsuit said the city showed favoritism toward a religious organization by leasing the Scouts land for $1 a year.

The city's settlement was announced yesterday, though the City Council made the decision Dec. 9 in a closed session. As part of the deal, the city agreed to pay $790,000 of the ACLU's legal fees and $160,000 in court costs.

The city also agreed to drop its defense of a separate but similar lease of land at Fiesta Island. That matter is still pending in San Diego federal court but could go to trial this year.

In the Bizarro World of the judicial tyrants, a non-sectarian youth organization whose members believe in God magically becomes a "religious organization" and, even more magically, civic support of such an organization becomes a violation of the US Constitution's establishment clause. And for its efforts to fight the crime of open belief in God, the ACLU will be rewarded with nearly $1 million in legal fees to continue its assault on the Boy Scouts and other manifestations of traditional values - values which the Constitution's framers would have overwhelmingly supported.

You can contact the Justice Department here, and ask that it use all its powers to support the Scouts in these lawsuits. You can also express your disgust to the San Diego City Council here, and make a financial contribution to the Scouts here.

(If you find this site useful and would like to help make political devotions a mass movement, please tell others about PoliticalDevotions.com or place a link to it on your website. Then when you've done so, be sure to e-mail me so I can thank you personally! - Tim.)

Posted by Tim at 3:47 AM EST

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BBC "chat show" host Robert Kilroy-Silk has been under relentless fire from a British Moslem pressure group and his own government since publication in the Sunday Express of a piece in which he criticized the Arab world. Unfortunately it seems the only place this column can be read in its entirely is in an abominably formatted press release from the tolerant souls at the Muslim Council of Britian.

Some excerpts from Kilroy-Silk's column:

. . . After all, the Arab countries are not exactly shining examples of civilisation, are they? Few of them make much contribution to the welfare of the rest of the world. Indeed, apart from oil - which was discovered, is produced and is paid for by the West - what do they contribute? Can you think of anything? Anything really useful? Anything really valuable? Something we really need, could not do without? No, nor can I. Indeed, the Arab countries put together export less than Finland.

We're told that the Arabs loathe us. Really? For liberating the Iraqis? For subsidising the lifestyles of people in Egypt and Jordan, to name but two, for giving them vast amounts of aid? For providing them with science, medicine, technology and all the other benefits of the West? They should go down on their knees and thank God for the munificence of the United States.

What do they think we feel about them? That we adore them for the way they murdered more than 3,000 civilians on September 11 and then danced in the hot, dusty streets to celebrate the murders? That we admire them for the cold-blooded killings in Mombasa, Yemen and elsewhere? That we admire them for being suicide bombers, limb-amputators, women repressors? I don't think the Arab states should start a debate about what is really loathsome.

But why, in any case, should we be concerned that they feel angry and loathe us? The Arab world has not exactly earned our respect, has it? Iran is a vile, terrorist-supporting regime - part of the axis of evil. So is the Saddam Hussein-supporting Syria. So is Libya. Indeed, most of them chant support for Saddam.

That is to say they support an evil dictator who has gassed hundreds of thousands of their fellow Arabs and tortured and murdered thousands more. How can they do this and expect our respect?

Why do they imagine that only they can feel anger, call people loathsome? It is the equivalent of all the European nations coming out in support of Hitler the moment he was attacked by the US, because he was European, despite the fact that he was attempting to exterminate the Jews - and Arabs.

Moreover, the people who claim we are loathsome are currently threatening our civilian populations with chemical and biological weapons. They are promising to let suicide bombers loose in Western and American cities. They are trying to terrorise us, disrupt our lives. And then they expect us to be careful of their sensibilities?

We have thousands of asylum seekers from Iran, Iraq, Algeria, Egypt, Libya, Yemen, Saudi Arabia and other Arab countries living happily in this country on social security. This shows what their own people think of the Arab regimes, doesn't it? There is not one single British asylum seeker in any Arab country. That says it all about which country deserves the epithet loathsome.

Given that Kilroy-Silk has said the column as he originally wrote it referred to Arab regimes and not every last individual Arab, and except for an erroneous designation of Iran as an Arab country, exactly what in this piece is untrue? Initially, the head of an Arab organization actually agreed with Kilroy-Silk, but later backpedaled.

Not only has he been suspended from his BBC program, but in an Orwellian twist Kilroy-Silk also faces a police investigation and possible criminal prosecution under the "Public Order Act" for committing the thought crime of accurately describing the Arab world. An excerpt from The Scotsman is chilling:

The Commission for Racial Equality has referred the matter to the police.

Trevor Phillips, head of the CRE, said he expected the MP-turned-presenter to be prosecuted for inciting racial hatred.

Mr Phillips said on Sky News: "Well this is now a matter for the police. What will happen is the police will investigate it, look at the Public Order Act and assess whether this could be interpreted as an incitement of racial hatred. There are clear legal tests for that.

"If it is then it will go the Crown Prosecution Service who will then discuss whether there's a case to be made and if there is a case to be made, Mr Kilroy-Silk will be prosecuted.

"I have to say, if it's deemed not to be a breach of the laws on racial hatred, we will have to have a pretty good look at those laws."

Just out of curiosity, how many radical Moslem organizations in Britain have been prosecuted for "incitement of racial hatred" against Jews under the Public Order Act?

For what it's worth, you can express your outrage over the suspension to the BBC at its contact page. You can also use our Take Action page to ask the US State Department to put down their wine glasses and lodge a protest with the British government against restrictive speech laws that reasonable people would associate with Saudi Arabia rather than a free democracy.

(If you find this site useful and would like to help make political devotions a mass movement, please tell others about PoliticalDevotions.com or place a link to it on your website. Then when you've done so, be sure to e-mail me so I can thank you personally! - Tim.)

Posted by Tim at 3:46 AM EST

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Robert Duvall has always been my favorite actor, and in a 60 Minutes II interview airing Wednesday night, he also proves that he's not your average Hollywood Useful Idiot when dealing with despotic regimes. The Washington Post reports:

. . . the Oscar-winning performer sharply criticized filmmaker and DreamWorks SKG studio co-founder Steven Spielberg for visiting Cuba in November 2002.

"Spielberg went down there recently and said, 'The best seven hours I ever spent was actually with Fidel Castro.' Now, what I want to ask him, ... 'Would you consider building a little annex on the Holocaust museum, or at least across the street, to honor the dead Cubans that Castro killed.' That's very presumptuous of him to go there," Duvall told Charlie Rose, according to excerpts of the interview released by CBS.

The actor, who won an Academy Award for his role in the 1983 film "Tender Mercies," added, "I'll never work at DreamWorks again, but I don't care about working there anyway."

Spielberg's spokesman says attribution of the remark to Speielberg is "totally false," but the Washington Post article notes

Spielberg spent four days in Cuba, launching a showcase of eight of his movies, meeting with Cuban filmmakers and paying visits to Havana's largest synagogue and a memorial to Holocaust victims at the city's Jewish cemetery.

The Oscar-winning director of "Saving Private Ryan" and "Schindler's List" also dined with Fidel Castro, spending about eight hours with the Cuban leader discussing art, politics and history.

Maybe the quote, which Spielberg's people imply is a fabrication from the state-controlled Cuban press, is "totally false," but it sure doesn't sound like Spielberg spent the eight hours haranguing Castro for the murder, torture and imprisonment he has brought upon the Cuban people for the past 40-plus years.

Let Spielberg know his companies will not see another dime of your money until he renounces, or at least explains, this apparent cozy relationship with Castro. Then purchase or rent "Tender Mercies," and enjoy Robert Duvall in the finest performance ever put on film.

(If you find this site useful and would like to help make political devotions a mass movement, please tell others about PoliticalDevotions.com or place a link to it on your website. Then when you've done so, be sure to e-mail me so I can thank you personally! - Tim.)

Posted by Tim at 6:41 AM EST

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Finally, a bit of good news.

An editorial in yesterday's Wall Street Journal focuses on the new Proliferation Security Initiative (PSI) which, in only a few months, has shown itself to be the answer to UN fecklessness in WMD interdiction.

With the help of the German government (no kidding, the German government), the US in a recent PSI operation diverted a freighter bound for Libya and seized thousands of parts for centrifuges, used to manufacture nuclear weapons. Not so coincidentally, last week Libyan dictator Moammar Gadhafi agreed to open his weapons sites to arms inspections. The Journal notes:

It remains to be seen whether Gadhafi will actually dismantle his program, but at least it's been exposed--no thanks, by the way, to the U.N. agency charged with monitoring such things. Libya's nuclear program was news to the International Atomic Energy Agency, whose inspectors somehow missed it entirely--after they'd earlier missed secret programs in North Korea and Iran.

The PSI offers a better way than traditional arms control to enforce global norms in the age of proliferating WMD. The PSI allies--11 and growing--have agreed to interdict shipments of WMD, delivery systems and related materials at sea, in the air and on land. The original 11 . . . have since been joined by Canada, Denmark, Norway, Singapore and Turkey, which are all offering military support. Meanwhile, more than 50 nations have signed on to PSI's principles and may be called on should their help be needed.

But don't mistake PSI for a multilateral institution in the conventional sense. There's no headquarters, no secretary-general, no talkfests--and, perhaps most important of all, no French or Russian veto. "PSI is an activity, not an organization," a senior Administration official tells us. It's an action-oriented group that "needs to be agile and move fast."

As PSI grows, the U.S. official contemplates "dozens of other countries participating" in dozens of different ways. Call it mix-and-match multilateralism. Countries participate or not, depending on the need at hand and on their own capabilities. The one common thread is U.S. leadership.

Use our Take Action page to express your support for this new and effective initiative which the Wall Street Journal characterizes as "a herald of the real new world order, multilateralism with teeth."

(If you find this site useful and would like to help make political devotions a mass movement, please tell others about PoliticalDevotions.com or place a link to it on your website. Then when you've done so, be sure to e-mail me so I can thank you personally! - Tim.)

Posted by Tim at 3:20 AM EST

Updated: Monday, April 26, 2004 7:47 AM EDT

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In recent columns, Michelle Malkin and Phyllis Schlafly deal with President Bush's misguided proposal to grant legal status and removal of the threat of deportation to millions of illegal immigrants. Malkin notes the proposal would turn the ailing Social Security system into "an international relief fund for illegal alien workers who used counterfeit Social Security cards and stolen numbers to secure illegal jobs." She continues:

Reporter Joel Mowbray, who first exposed this treachery a year ago, noted that this raw deal may well cost overburdened U.S. taxpayers $345 billion over the next 20 years. Probably much more. As we know from experience, Social Security projections are notoriously off the mark.

The bureaucrats call this scheme "totalization." Try total prostration. The proposed agreement is nothing more than a transfer of wealth from those who play by the rules to those who willingly and knowingly mock our own immigration and tax laws. What are we doing promising lifetime Social Security paychecks to day laborers in Juarez when we can't even guarantee those benefits to workers here at home?

Unbelievably, the White House is trying to convince us to embrace this global ripoff because it "rewards work." No, it rewards criminal behavior. The plan will siphon off the hard-earned tax dollars of American workers who may never see a dime of their confiscated earnings and fork it over to foreigners guilty of at least four acts of federal law-breaking: crossing the border illegally, working illegally, engaging in tax fraud and using bogus documents.

Schlafly points to the debacle caused by the prior "one-time" amnesty:

In 1986, the United States granted what was promised to be a one- time legalization - then honestly called amnesty. That sent a message to others to enter illegally and wait for the next amnesty.

The administrations of Presidents Bush I, Clinton and Bush II have flagrantly failed to use our resources "to cope with" those who afterward violated the "process of entry." And so the illegal-alien problem quadrupled.

Not only did the 1986 amnesty transform millions of illegal aliens into lawful permanent residents, but after they became U.S. citizens they could import their relatives. Congress never investigated how many additional millions entered the United States or the massive document fraud that was involved in the process.

Let's put aside for a moment the issue of unfairness to legal immigrants in allowing someone else to jump in ahead of the waiting line, and let's also put aside the obvious national security implications of a policy encouraging illegal border crossings through Mexico by people who could be seeking anything from farm employment to an opportunity to detonate nuclear devices in ten US cities in order to finally bring the Great Satan under the rule of Allah.

There are those on both the left and right who, to serve their special interests, advocate open borders. Those of us who have lived our entire lives in California know the reality of open borders. I urge anyone who lived in the San Fernando Valley 35 years ago to take a drive through it today then try to claim with a straight face that it has benefitted from swelling illegal immigration. US immigration policy has done nothing to improve the lot of Mexico, and has only served to extend its Third World culture across US borders.

As Congress debates the new proposal, let them know you are among the two-thirds of Americans who, according to a Zogby International poll, believe those residing illegally in the US should not be allowed to stay.

(If you find this site useful and would like to help make political devotions a mass movement, please tell others about PoliticalDevotions.com or place a link to it on your website. Then when you've done so, be sure to e-mail me so I can thank you personally! - Tim.)

Posted by Tim at 6:48 AM EST

Updated: Saturday, January 10, 2004 2:39 AM EST

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Here's some excerpts from the executive summary of a revealing new report on American poverty by the Heritage Foundation:

The average "poor" person, as defined by the government, has a living standard far higher than the public imagines. The following are facts about persons defined as "poor" by the Census Bureau, taken from various government reports:

Forty-six percent of all poor households actually own their own homes. The average home owned by persons classified as poor by the Census Bureau is a three-bedroom house with one-and-a-half baths, a garage, and a porch or patio.

Seventy-six percent of poor households have air conditioning. By contrast, 30 years ago, only 36 percent of the entire U.S. population enjoyed air conditioning.

Only 6 percent of poor households are overcrowded. More than two-thirds have more than two rooms per person.

The typical poor American has more living space than the average individual living in Paris, London, Vienna, Athens, and other cities throughout Europe. (These comparisons are to the average citizens in foreign countries, not to those classified as poor.)

Nearly three-quarters of poor households own a car; 30 percent own two or more cars.

Ninety-seven percent of poor households have a color television; over half own two or more color televisions.

Seventy-eight percent have a VCR or DVD player; 62 percent have cable or satellite TV reception.

Seventy-three percent own microwave ovens, more than half have a stereo, and a third have an automatic dishwasher.

[Ed. note: So someone like me who owns no DVD player or working dishwasher is what, sub-poor?]

Overall, the typical American defined as poor by the government has a car, air conditioning, a refrigerator, a stove, a clothes washer and dryer, and a microwave. He has two color televisions, cable or satellite TV reception, a VCR or DVD player, and a stereo. He is able to obtain medical care. His home is in good repair and is not overcrowded. By his own report, his family is not hungry, and he had sufficient funds in the past year to meet his family's essential needs. While this individual's life is not opulent, it is equally far from the popular images of dire poverty conveyed by the press, liberal activists, and politicians.

. . .The good news is that the poverty that does exist in the United States can readily be reduced, particularly among children. There are two main reasons that American children are poor: Their parents don't work much, and their fathers are absent from the home.

One point the executive summary does not mention is what an insult such a redefinition of the term "poverty" is to those who are truly poor around the world. We in the pampered West have real problems understanding concepts like "poverty" and "evil," but those who have actually lived with them, like the "New Europe" nations formerly under Soviet domination, know what these terms mean, in a way that we, without the same experience, cannot.

The summary concludes:

Yet, although work and marriage are reliable ladders out of poverty, the welfare system perversely remains hostile to both. Major programs such as food stamps, public housing, and Medicaid continue to reward idleness and penalize marriage. If welfare could be turned around to encourage work and marriage, the nation's remaining poverty would quickly be reduced.

Use our Take Action page to ask your representatives to support the completion of welfare reform by enacting laws that encourage recipients to use those "reliable ladders out of poverty" - work and marriage.

Bonus Links:

This week brings another spot-on Dennis Prager column - Jimmy Carter: "Compassion for Mordor".

And for those of us who were wondering. . . "Pat Robertson: God Says Bush Will Win in 2004." Whew, that's a relief.

And finally...

Newsweek's Howard Fineman: "Do you see Jesus Christ as the son of God and believe in him as the route to salvation and eternal life?"

Howard Dean: "I certainly see him as the son of God. I think whether I'm saved or not is not gonna be up to me."

Huh??

(If you find this site useful and would like to help make political devotions a mass movement, please tell others about PoliticalDevotions.com or place a link to it on your website. Then when you've done so, be sure to e-mail me so I can thank you personally! - Tim.)

Posted by Tim at 9:11 AM EST

Updated: Tuesday, January 13, 2004 3:21 AM EST

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