From: RobertArvay@msn.com   
      
   Politics, Policy and Principle   
   —by Robert Arvay   
      
   The United States is founded on a principle, which is the sanctity of the   
   individual.  According to that principle, all of us are created equal.  Our   
   rights come from God. Those rights can be violated, but never forfeit.  We   
   govern ourselves, lending    
   temporary power to representatives, whose powers we the people can revoke at   
   any time, for any reason, and without permission.  These rights are absolute.   
      
   There are is an opposing principle, known variously as collectivism, socialism   
   and communism, all of which have in common that they are invariably associated   
   with brutal tyrannies wherever they are practiced.  In those tyrannies, there   
   is no sanctity of    
   the individual.  He exists solely as an instrument of the state, and only so   
   long as he is needed by those in power.   
      
   His rights are recognized only as crumbs from the government, revocable by it   
   at any moment, including the rights to life and liberty.  No deviation from   
   government policy is tolerated; the slightest hint of disloyalty brings   
   punishment, including the    
   most horrific ever devised by the minds of evil men.   
      
   Which of those two principles is ascendant in the policies of the United   
   States government?     
      
   Clearly, we are increasingly being governed by the adage, “You did not build   
   that,” the implication being that the fruit of your labor is not your own;   
   it belongs to the state.  There is a man in the Oval Office who is telling us   
   that our rights are    
   not absolute, the implication being that the government decides what our   
   rights are, and can limit or revoke them as it sees fit.   
      
   If one asks, where did we go wrong, the answer can be found in the abrogation   
   of the most essential fact, which is that our rights come from God.  If a   
   society forgets that, then it is denying God, and therefore, cutting off the   
   Tree of Liberty at its    
   very root.   
      
   Are we doomed?  “Moral truth is vindicated by the ruin that follows, when it   
   has been repudiated.” -- Bishop Fulton J. Sheen, (1895 – 1979)   
      
   Some more quotes from him:   
      
   “[The] Brotherhood of man, without the Fatherhood of God [must fail].”   
   "Only those who live by faith really know what is happening in the world."   
      
   I am not a Catholic, but I find this message is for all of us.  If America   
   falls, it will not be due to bad politics, or failed policies, for these would   
   not occur were the basic principle applied, that of the inherent sanctity of   
   the individual.  It is    
   not a man’s race that makes him sacred, nor his religion, nor his ancestors,   
   but rather, his immortal soul, created by, and redeemed by, God.     
      
   I expect that America will indeed fall, and will do so in the lifetime of   
   people now living.     
      
   However, I hold hope that from its ashes will rise a new America, one in which   
   the ideals which gave rise to it, and the false gods which destroyed it, will   
   never again be forgotten.     
      
   If the tree of Liberty must be nourished with the blood of patriots and   
   tyrants, may it savor mine as that of a patriot.   
   -   
      
   --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05   
    * Origin: you cannot sedate... all the things you hate (1:229/2)