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REQUIEM

Below are the two final essays to be posted on Allegiance and Duty Betrayed. The first one is written by a friend -- screen name 'Euro-American Scum' -- who, over the past four years, has been the most faithful essayist here. He has written about everything from his pilgrimage to Normandy in 2004 to take part in the 60th–year commemoration of the invasion, to his memories of his tour in Vietnam. His dedication to America’s founding principles ... and those who have sacrificed to preserve them over the past 200+ years ... is unequaled. Thank you, E-A-S. It has been a privilege to include your writing here, and it is a privilege to call you my friend.

The second essay is my own farewell. And with it I thank all of the many regular visitors, and those who may have only dropped in occasionally, for coming here. I hope you learned something. I hope a seed or two was planted. But, even if not, I thank you for stopping by ... 25 March, 2010

6/30/2007

On Bread and Circuses

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After a political loss, leftists do not simply lick their wounds and accept the voice of the people. The stakes in yesterday's 'immigration reform' defeat will magnify beyond all reason the leftist penchant to attack, subvert and destroy those who took victory from their grasp. Elitists, after all, were destined to rule, to dictate, to dole out largesse to the masses. And when the masses do not place them in the positions of power to which they have been called, elitists become enraged, and insatiably vindictive. Civility and law/truth/justice find themselves obscured by the obsession to gain the power that was not won through the normal channels that representative republican government supplies.

We won a victory yesterday. But the citizen activism that was required in order to secure that victory represented a dramatic departure from the norm. We need to fan that activist spark into a flame in order to wrest the reins of power from the growing 'leadership' contingent in Washington that no longer believes in representative government.

Citizenship in a free society requires allegiance, education, strength, endurance, courage, resolve, and action. But it does not require the wearing of rose-colored glasses. Until our leadership addresses the illegal alien problem, until the number of voters who feed at the government socialist welfare/entitlement trough (as forewarned by deTocqueville) can be dramatically reduced, and until we determine to educate our children as to their proud heritage and the dangers posed by relinquishing it, the majority of election and legislation results will continue to fall in favor of powerful liars who can voice the biggest promises to the host of least informed minds.

I posted the essay below (‘A Day for Celebration’) on another website yesterday, and one of the commenters stated that I ought to be more grateful for all the good things President Bush has done (followed by a list of several dozen of the president’s ‘accomplishments’).

I have often written that the factor that is most contributing to our republic’s demise is fact that the majority of Americans simply don’t care. The sense of responsibility (the responsibility to see that we are informed about our proud heritage, to see that we understand the integral part that each of us needs to play in maintaining our liberties and our national sovereignty … and the responsibility to pass those qualities on to our children) that was once an innate and irrevocable part of citizenship has eroded beyond the ability to identify it.

The traditional American values of individual responsibility and civic duty blossomed, in part, from our roots as a frontier society in which everything had to be created from scratch. The old-fashioned sense of ‘community’ that people experienced was never a substitute for personal responsibility. It was a non-necessary, but comfortable, adjunct to it.

Nowadays there are those who are educated, but non-discriminating. They see what Bush has ‘accomplished’, but do not recognize that the large majority of those ‘accomplishments’ are either borderline unconstitutional, or toothless.

Such was the case with the poster I referenced above. He cannot see the forest for the trees. He does not recognize that his list of the president’s ‘accomplishments’ is dwarfed, if not negated, by his all-out support of the recent abominable sovereignty- and economy-undermining 'immigration legislation'.

Without a sense of citizen responsibility, and citizen discernment, a free society’s days are numbered. And, once it is lost, I don’t know how it can be reclaimed.

Post-9/11, there was a flicker of reclamation, but it was never fanned into a flame. Too many diversionary bread-and-circus tactics continually mounted by the mainstream media, Hollywood, and academia. And we allowed ourselves to slip back into our apathetic stupor once again before the year was out.

No sooner does an Anna Nicole Smith story run its (months-long) course, than a Paris Hilton story is waiting in the wings to take its place. If you believe that the emphasis on celebrities without character, and the virtual ignoring of stories of genuine heroism (examples of which occur every day in Afghanistan and Iraq), represent innocent oversights, think again. They are blatant examples of the powers that be succeeding in diluting the public’s responsibility to know, to learn and to care about what really matters.

While driving to an out-of-state appointment the other day, my husband and I were listening to what passes for the on-the-hour five minute ‘news’ report on one of the major (ABC?) affiliates. On that particular day, two sentences were devoted to the fact that the last remaining survivor of the raising of the flag on Iwo Jima had passed away. I was so stunned by the brevity and flippant nature of the report that I literally counted the number of sentences devoted to the next ‘story’. It was the ‘story’ of the imminent release of Paris Hilton from jail. And it merited eight full sentences of coverage – four times more than the death of an esteemed member of our ‘greatest generation’.

My husband and I looked at each other, and, without a word being said, simply shook our heads in unspoken agreement that the contents of that five-minute ‘news’ segment represented a microcosm of the ‘bread and circuses’ death knell that the mainstream media is foisting upon the citizenry, each succeeding generation of which knows and appreciates the ‘real America’ less and less than the one that went before.

None of what ails us – from the threat of international terrorism, to the nightmare of illegal immigration, to the unprecedented power of the unelected, unaccountable mainstream media, to the Marxist influence in public education, to the corrupting power of special interest groups, to the purposeful, premeditated destruction of the best healthcare system the world has ever known … -- none of those gargantuan problems could continue to exist if we as a people began to re-value the attendant individual responsibilities that come with being a citizen of a free country: namely being educated and informed, seeking and respecting truth, and demanding accountability from our leadership.

As a nation of free men, we are choosing to die by suicide, because no malevolent force, from within or outside of our borders, can do us as much harm as our own indifference.

No people will tamely surrender their liberties, nor can any be easily subdued, when knowledge is diffused and virtue is preserved. On the contrary, when people are universally ignorant … they will sink under their own weight without the aid of foreign invaders … Samuel Adams in a letter to James Warren, 4 November, 1775

~ joanie

6/28/2007

A Day for Celebration

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A cloture vote on the mis-named Bill to Provide for Comprehensive Immigration Reform (a long but must read for every modern American patriot) went down to resounding defeat on the senate floor this morning. God bless those Americans who believe that representative government still takes precedence over bread and circuses (Paris Hilton is unveiling a new clothing line, don’tcha know?). Those modern American patriots who expended the time and effort to let their views be known have succeeded in derailing a bill that would have eventually spelled the death of our beloved republic, and dealt a major blow to the foundations upon which western civilization rests.

Make no mistake about it. One of the countless reasons that this bill was being pushed so feverishly (and sometimes unconstitutionally) through legislative channels is that our fearless ‘leaders’ (our own president among them) believed that the American citizens’ attention span is short – and that, a year and a half from now, when the teeth of this bill had begun to suck the life blood out of our republic, and a third of the senate is up for re-election, the voters would have by then forgotten who supported this travesty.

We cannot forget. Treason is a high crime. And betrayal leaves a deep, permanent, psychologically disfiguring scar.

The U.S. senatorial oath reads:

I do solemnly swear (or affirm) that I will support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic; that I will bear true faith and allegiance to the same; that I take this obligation freely, without any mental reservation or purpose of evasion; and that I will well and faithfully discharge the duties of the office on which I am about to enter: So help me God.

Below is a listing of those forty-six American senators who voted for cloture in order to shut off debate on a bill that placed the amassing of political power and the interests of business above the U.S. Constitution, and the safety and sovereignty of the United States. Those names written in bold type represent senators who will be running for re-election in 2008.

Make no mistake. Some version of this bill will be re-introduced – if not during this congressional session, then during the next. Every American voter needs to make it his priority to see to it that those senators written in bold below are no longer occupying seats in the senate when that happens.

Bennett (R-UT)
Craig (R-ID)
Graham (R-SC)
Gregg (R-NH)
Hagel (R-NE)
Kyl (R-AZ)
Lott (R-MS)
Lugar (R-IN)
Martinez (R-FL)
McCain (R-AZ)
Snowe (R-ME)
Specter (R-PA)


Akaka (D-HI)
Biden (D-DE)
Boxer (D-CA)
Cantwell (D-WA)
Cardin (D-MD)
Carper (D-DE)
Casey (D-PA)
Clinton (D-NY)
Conrad (D-ND)
Dodd (D-CT)
Durbin (D-IL)
Feingold (D-WI)
Feinstein (D-CA)
Inouye (D-HI)
Kennedy (D-MA)
Kerry (D-MA)
Klobuchar (D-MN)
Kohl (D-WI)
Lautenberg (D-NJ)
Leahy (D-VT)
Levin (D-MI)
Lieberman (ID-CT)
Lincoln (D-AR)
Menendez (D-NJ)
Mikulski (D-MD)
Murray (D-WA)
Nelson (D-FL)
Obama (D-IL)
Reed (D-RI)
Reid (D-NV)
Salazar (D-CO)
Schumer (D-NY)
Whitehouse (D-RI)
Wyden (D-OR)


Recent polls revealed that as many as eighty percent of the American electorate disapproved of S.1639. November 2008 will tell us how many of those eighty percent were weak in their disapproval or have attention spans calibrated in nano-seconds. But, for the time being, today should be a day of celebration. Although the scoundrels will not rest until our republic is unraveled, they have been at least temporarily corralled.

Between now and November 2008, it has become even more imperative for every informed American to educate those in our families, neighborhoods, and workplaces who are still not aware of what this bill entailed, and its abominable far-reaching anti-liberty, anti-American, anti-representative-government ramifications for us all.

~ joanie

6/08/2007

The Unraveling of America

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It has little to do with the biased media. They are merely a tool, gripped powerfully by unseen hands with evil intent. It has much more to do with the behind-the-scenes puppetmasters, and their passively receptive audience.

During her two-century-plus history, America has faced many threats -- domestic, foreign, moral, military, economic …

The integrity, and unbridled courage, of the majority of her citizenry – whether they be in leadership positions, or ‘average Joes’ -- has always paved the way to victory over hardship and tragedy. And that same integrity and courage has always sought and succeeded in achieving the preservation of liberty.

I believe past historical precedent is no longer valid. I believe we have reached critical mass ...

... for four basic reasons:

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For what I believe is the first time in our history, the majority of our ‘leadership’ in Washington bears more allegiance to an agenda, or a cadre of special interest groups, than it does to the liberty, safety and sovereignty of our republic and its people.

Take a good look at our ‘leaders’ in Washington. Do you trust the majority of them? I mean trust them to make the weighty decisions about the direction in which our republic is moving, and the momentous, no-turning-back decisions that will determine how, when and where we will face our enemies?

Surely we have experienced corruption, and self-serving or agenda-driven policymaking, on the federal level before. But never to this degree. And never by as many people in power who hold both our proud national heritage and our Constitution in utter disdain.

I believe that the allegiance of the majority in power (both republicans and democrats) lies more in the amassing of personal or political power, the realization of left-leaning, globally-oriented political agendas, and the desire to please powerful special interest groups, than it does in honoring their oath of allegiance to this country and its people.

And the average American is simply too busy to pay much attention to the dangerously unprecedented erosion in the character, motives and allegiance of his leadership in Washington.

Just take a look at the past political and personal history of the current front-runner for the presidency in 2008. Hillary Clinton was an integral part of her husband’s eight-year administration. From all reliable accounts, she may as well have been co-president. She had intimate knowledge of all, and played a role in most, of the decisions made, and crimes committed, during her husband’s entire political career.

The accomplishments of William Jefferson Clinton’s two terms in office represented the most evil, treasonous, criminal era in American history. The repercussions of his (and her) criminality and treason have left permanent, potentially deadly, scars on this nation. They have sold our land and secrets to the highest bidder, armed our ideological enemies, and emboldened those who seek our annihilation.

A careful study of their crimes and their motives paints a picture of two megalomaniacal people who place no value on truth, who believe themselves to be above the law, and who disdain everything that America’s Founders held sacred.

I assume that most readers here are aware of at least the majority of the Clintons’ crimes/borderline crimes and treasonous activities. And yet the average American voter either (1) hasn’t cared enough to learn about them over the past decade, (2) knows about them and considers them irrelevant, or (3) has forgotten them.

As a result, the co-conspirator in all of the above may well become the leader of the free world in eighteen months.

I believe that the reason for this sorry state of affairs rests in the fact that character and integrity no longer sit at the top of the list of leadership prerequisites. The desire to be ‘taken care of’ does.

Enter elitist rule (which bears no allegiance to our republic), stage left.

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For what I believe is the first time in our history, our public education system is geared, more than it is not, toward indoctrination of America’s youth so as to raise succeeding generations who are (a) ignorant (and possibly even ashamed) of the glorious history of western civilization, (b) incapable of serious critical or analytical thought, (c) disdainful of earned prosperity and the pillars of capitalism, and (d) infused with beliefs about bogus environmental concerns, multicultural dogma, and phony ‘tolerance’ issues ... while at the same time virtually ignorant in the academic subjects upon which a free society must be based.

Our public education system has found itself incrementally hijacked by socialist/Marxist-leaning decision-makers over the past fifty-plus years. Children indoctrinated as mentioned above are much more likely to be submissive to government control, and much less likely to see America as historically unique, or deserving of pride …and defense.

The federal Department of Education (which conservative politicians have promised to abolish for decades), and the state education departments, continuously hand down more stringent left-leaning guidelines under which teachers must teach. America’s teachers are told, by leftist decision-makers who care little about the quality of local education, what and how to teach. And if the content of the what, or the method of the how, is something that a dedicated master teacher knows to be lies (as in the case of revisionist history and the politically-motivated theory of global warming, just to name two of dozens of bogus disciplines), that teacher risks the ruination of his career, should he refuse to teach his charges that which he knows to be untrue.

The NEA and the AFT are two of the most influential lobbying organizations in Washington, and, over the past five decades, their agenda has both eroded the quality of public education and the recognition and rewarding of teachers of merit, and increased the stranglehold that Washington has over decisions that should be made by American citizens at the local level. Children’s best interests, and their future as responsible, productive citizens, have taken a definite back seat to the promoting of a leftist agenda, and the entrenchment of lackluster teachers, bogus curricula, and mediocre teaching methods.

In addition to playing a primary role in the decline in public school education, the NEA (the association to which more than ninety percent of the teachers who teach our children belong) actively pursues non-educational leftist social agendas, and they financially support such groups as NOW, the Gay and Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation, and People for the American Way. Both directly and indirectly, financially and philosophically, the NEA supports abortion on demand, Planned Parenthood, federally-funded child care from birth through third grade, school-based healthcare and family planning services, gun control, environmentalism, the normalization of homosexuality, children’s access to all media and material including pornography, and an increased role of the UN in American affairs, especially as regards children.

Attend a local school board meeting someday and you will see just how concerned the average American parent is about this dangerous decline in the quality and direction of their child’s education. Unless an increase in taxes, or termination of a sports program, is on the agenda, you will be pretty safe in assuming that the number of parents in attendance is at or near zero.

And American colleges and universities, with few exceptions, have become nothing more than leftist indoctrination centers, with the study of the glorious history of western civilization now either banned or ‘revised’, and replaced by emphasis on neo-Marxist philosophy, reverence for ‘multiculturalism’, and a general disdain for anything American or capitalist – while, at the same time, ‘feel good’ courses have made large inroads in displacing in-depth study of the genuine arts and sciences.

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The American voting populace is reaching critical mass. The complexion of the electorate is changing so dramatically that the ‘average American’ as you and I know him – the honest, hard-working American who comprehends the roots of our republican form of government and wants to preserve it at all costs -- will soon become a minority participant in all elections.

The machinations of those in office who seek power over their countrymen have seen to it that three elements of our society are growing exponentially, and the combination of those three will eventually dictate the direction in which we head as a nation: (a) the ever-increasing number of illegals (thousands of them invading this country every day), whose ‘rights’ are championed by those who know that there is power in numbers, and who are refusing to stem those numbers so as to increase their political power, (b) the ever-increasing proportion of the citizenry that has been purposely diverted from the truth by bread and circuses, and purposefully ‘dumbed down’ by the aforementioned educational establishment, and (c) the ever-increasing number of people who are dependent on the burgeoning entitlement/nanny state for their very existence.

All three groups portend ever-increasing ballot-box power for the political elite, and a deeper sink into the quicksand of tyranny by a burgeoning majority that bears no resemblance to the former, and soon-to-be-overshadowed, ‘heartland of America’. We are about to be displaced by millions of voters who have no idea what made America great … nor do they care. They simply want to reap the benefits of more than two centuries of selfless sacrifice freely and courageously offered by those who must now be looking down upon us through tears of grief over what we have done with our precious inheritance.

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For the first time in our history, we are facing an external enemy with uniquely defined characteristics. It is not contained within a distinct border. It has many faces. It is far more vile, bloodthirsty, obsessed, and powerful than even the most educated and informed of us are able to comprehend.

And many of our leaders either do not recognize the historically (throughout the history of mankind) unprecedented threat that this enemy poses, or they choose to minimize that threat for reasons that can only be explained under the heading of ignorance or treason.

Our ‘leaders’ more often than not re-define or bury the truth, when it threatens to interfere with their agenda or decrease what they see as deserved power ... even when standing face-to-face with this malevolence.

I daresay that, in America 2007, the majority in congress consider the Constitutionally-granted liberties of their constituents, the lives of their countrymen, the sovereignty of this republic, and the sanctity of the Constitution they have sworn to uphold and defend, negotiable … under the right circumstances.

None of the above four circumstances has ever existed before in the history of our republic. Not to the degree that they exist now. All four of them are expanding. And any one of them can potentially bring America down.

The frog is starting to sweat ... and wondering why.

~ joanie

6/07/2007

America's Insidious Descent
Toward the Third World

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Somewhere in the dark recesses of their souls, an increasing number of Americans fear the eventuality of an ultimate confrontation with Mexico over the disputed territories, formerly known as the Southwestern United States. But visions of the affair as a horde of brass-buttoned soldiers, marching on San Jacinto with bayoneted muskets to retake it, are woefully mistaken.

Were that the case, the overt threat would be obvious and recognizable. America could certainly rally and respond with sufficient force to decisively win the battle. But no such events are taking place. In their stead, a much less dramatic scenario promises far greater detriment to the country, though its protracted nature renders it less shocking, and therefore more likely to succeed. In fact, in many respects, it already has.

A far better picture of America's future can be seen in the formerly tidy and wholesome town of Lexington Nebraska, situated as it is in the prime of the Heartland. Over the years, it metamorphosed to a horrendous degree. No doubt, had its inhabitants been forewarned of its fate a mere two decades ago, none would have believed the transformation to be within the realm of possibility.

Once a prim and quiet farm town, Lexington's major industry was for many years a New Holland tractor factory, which brought to it the stability of America's former manufacturing prowess. Many of its residents were employed there, with decent paying and skilled jobs. But in 1986, New Holland outsourced, and the plant was subsequently sold and converted to a meat packing facility, whereupon the local workers were systematically supplanted by a massive importation of illegals.

Initial changes to the character of the town were subtle. Doors that once had been safely left open all night were now locked. Lawn furniture and bicycles no longer adorned the yards, since they might not be there in the morning. Nevertheless, the resilient townspeople made necessary adjustments and attempted to continue with their lives.

As the influx increased however, the degree to which the former charm of Lexington was eventually eradicated was astounding. Its fate should send shudders through the spine of any throughout the rest of the nation, who hope for a country to bequeath to their children.

Much of the town now reflects the squalor not previously seen this side of the Mexican border. Even in the town's modernized zone, which passes just south of Lexington near I-80, businesses reflect the ethnic tidal wave that has overwhelmed it.

It is all but impossible for American youths to gain employment at the local fast food franchises, since virtually all business behind the counters is conducted in Spanish, making it difficult to avoid disturbing notion that businesses might eventually post signs saying: "Americanos need not apply." The town has inarguably become Balkanized.

Yet Lexington is hardly an isolated example. Nor is it among the most severe that has ravaged traditional America. Rather, it is striking only in that it so starkly represents the plight of much of America's southern border, while being vastly separated from that region. If this can happen in Nebraska, no part of the country remains immune to the ravages of such an incursion.

A similar disaster looms over America's food supply, and may be much more far reaching since it is not confined to any geographical location. Its onset will not be heralded by guards showing up at the front door to enforce changes in the state food regulations, or demanding that hapless citizens only patronize the state store.
Rather, the entirety of available food will gradually degrade, and in fact already has, with the ominous collaboration of the United States Government.

For example, Americans are being purposefully denied the ability to know the origin of the beef they eat. "Country of Origin Labeling" (COOL), an essential facet of keeping America's beef producers competitive on the world market, has been systematically stonewalled at the highest levels of the U.S. Department of Agriculture.

For some time now, the USDA, along with multinational corporate interests, have worked feverishly to eradicate quality differences between domestic and foreign beef supplies, while preventing consumers from knowing that those differences exist. While free trade advocates rightly decry "protectionism," the current agenda demonstrates nothing short of protectionism for the foreign beef producers.

From the recent pet-food catastrophe, to the revelations of toxins in Chinese made toothpaste along with seafood imports that were produced in the most unsanitary of conditions, Americans now face renewed risks to their health that many decades ago had been eliminated from domestic production. Yet as time goes on, the food and health industries reflect less and less of America's formerly high standards.

If pragmatism prevails above all else as the ultimate driving force behind the "global economy," the food supplies and commodities of other nations will never be lifted to America's former standards. Instead, America's food supplies, and in consequence its entire standard of living, will sink to that of the rest of the world.

It is of little comfort that such incidents are at present fairly isolated. At one time they would have been unheard of. A dangerous first step has been taken in the direction of acceptable risk and degradation where none would have been allowed in the past. Eventually all supplies will decline in quality as producers seek to compete against ultra-cheapened imports.

It is easy enough to allow these problems to expand, and then declare them "unmanageable," as is reflected in the callous indifference of the government to the southern border invasion and the importation of sub-standard beef.

More alarming still is that the law itself changing, ever more resembling its role within third world tyrannies. No longer the "glue" by which a free society retains its cohesion, the law is ever more being used as it is in the "undeveloped world" where it is a means of manipulating and controlling the masses. The total lack of enforcement of America's southern border is itself reflective of a banana republic.

"Justice" has been totally abominated, with honorable border guards serving jail time while border-jumping criminal thugs go free, the legal fate of each no longer determined on basis of any harm they might have inflicted on decent society, but rather on the threat they pose to the established order.

Fortunately, Americans yet have time to fix things. If they fully awaken to the impending danger, they will realize that they still retain the option next election cycle of "throwing the bums out."

"Whenever any form of government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the right of the people to alter or abolish it." So read the Declaration of Independence, a document written only fifteen months after the citizens of another Lexington, realizing that no other justice was to be forthcoming, took matters into their own hands.

by Chris Adamo

RenewAmerica