Does my Generation Have a Role in America’s Future?

Ronald Reagan, our 40th President, once said the following:

“Freedom is never more than one generation away from extinction. We didn’t pass it on to our children in the bloodstream. It must be fought for, protected, and handed on for them to do the same, or one day we will spend our sunset years telling our children what it was once like in the United States when men were free.”

The consequences of not following this piece of advice from the late President is dawning on us more clearer than ever in our nation today. It is becoming increasingly clear to more and more Americans every day that we have failed to raise a generation full of loyal Americans of faith who will fight for God and their Country to their dying breath. The complacency and inaction by the masses of Americans in recent years can be summed up in just a few words: The distortion of the American dream. When our founding fathers set up a Republic in which liberty could take the place of tyranny, and of which the entrepreneurial spirit would take place over the taxation without representation that existed under the rule of the British, they were pursuing the American dream! In the Declaration of Independence this was titled: The Rights to Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Happiness.
Centuries later, Martin Luther King was to reiterate is in his famous speech, where he said: I have a dream that one day our nation will rise up and live out the true meaning of it’s creed: “We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal.”

It was that spirit of Americanism that broke free of the constraints placed on the people by the British Government that resulted in economic and religious oppression on the colonists, and replaced it with The Great Experiment, where  immigrants came from around the world  in order to pursue happiness in a country where government oppression was non-existent.

But sadly, over time the American dream has been distorted from it’s original meaning, and is now thought to mean something entirely different. Whereas the American Dream used to be interpreted as happiness obtained by thrift and hard work, now when many Americans hear of the American Dream, they think of it as a promise to instant riches.

Due to this shift in thinking, Americans have become lazy. They have failed as a whole to pass on the willingness to fight for and protect our freedom for future generation’s enjoyment. They have grown complacent in their imagined security, convinced that it will always be the way it is now, that we will always live with the freedom and prosperity that we now enjoy and that there is no outstanding threat to that security that could take it away from them.

However, as a direct result of this complacency, we are seeing the demise of the freedoms that so many have fought and died for. We see the evidence of this demise everywhere, from the tragedy of 9/11, to the complete wall of separation of faith in God and the public arena. It is becoming obvious that our laziness has taken it’s toll, and it is a hefty price to pay.

However, I for one still have faith in the future of America. Americans are slowly waking up to the battle at hand, and we are seeing more and more outcry from groups around the country who have had enough of the trampling of their rights, and demand the restoration of their lost liberties. The accessibility and abundance of information in this generation is staggering, however confusing the President may think it is for us to comprehend. I suggest to you that we are seeing an American Revival stronger than any in recent history. Americans are energized and ready to fight diligently (yet peacefully) in order to take back the liberty that has been lost. In spite of the hindrances that our opponents have placed that ensure difficulty for anyone who attempts to educate their children to be protectors of liberty, our citizens have succeeded in bringing up youth who will sustain the spirit of Americanism that used to be so abundant nationwide,

You may question my hope in the youth of tomorrow, after all, it has become clear to most of us that the majority of our youth are asleep to the issues that afflict our country, and either ignorant of or unresponsive to the duties of an American citizen to uphold the liberties of our citizenry. Instead of protecting those liberties that are granted by God and protected by the government and the people alike when the right balance of power is preserved, these entitlement seekers would rather stay asleep to the obligations that they owe their country because they either don’t know or don’t care about the implications of doing otherwise.

But in spite of the large group of opposition by entitlement seekers, I remain hopeful because of the presence of so many others who seek enlightenment rather than entitlement. These brave men and women are unafraid to stand up for what is right, and are prepared for the fight.

I remain hopeful because those who stand with me know their history, and they realize that it has been proven time and time again that when people abide by the principles of life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness for all, there will be prosperity, but when they stray from those principles, there will be destitution.

And lastly, I remain hopeful because our side is faithful to God, and will pray for His supreme guidance every step of the way, comparing their thoughts and actions to that of His Word in case they are inconsistent with His Will for us.

It is the job of our generation to fix the wrongs of it’s predecessors, and to uphold the principles of our founding.

However, it will most certainly not be an easy one. The opposition is large, and as has become obvious in recent times, they are good at organizing. If we are to defeat them, then we must actively oppose them at every turn. Those who would take away our freedoms have been long at work, and there is much to be undone.

We are outnumbered as well. There are few who are willing to join us in our efforts. But we can accomplish our task if we preserver. God bless us as we pursue the American Dream as it was originally conceived.

-Calvin Lyman

In this article you will see how Cap and Trade accomplishes this feat, and who exactly is benefiting from it. It is highly important that we get this information out to as many as possible, so I ask that you click on the “share” button underneath this article and post it to your twitter, facebook, myspace or any other social networking website listed that suits you. Furthermore, I challenge you to look up everything I say and determine for yourself to see if the arguments that I present to you are reliable. After all, if you are debating with a progressive over the effects of Cap and Trade, you need to be able to provide a better defense than “because Glenn Beck or Teens for Liberty said so”.

As I said before, Cap and Trade is disguised as a bill that will reduce carbon output throughout the States. This will supposedly be done by allowing the creation and trading of “carbon credits” between factories in the US. These credits represent carbon dioxide released into the atmosphere. Thus, the more credits, the more carbon dioxide you are allowed to put into the atmosphere. However, if this was really about saving the planet then there would be no allowing of the trading of these credits between factories.

Furthermore, the Cap and Trade legislation, if passed, will enforce regulations on gas emissions by forcing companies that emit more gas to give money to companies that emit less gas (Marxism!), all the while providing the Marxists with a get rich quick fix.

In order for this scheme to work, the progressives need a market for their “carbon credits”. Since they are selling imaginary items, they need to set up a market specifically for those items because no existing market will sell them. Enter the Joyce Foundation. The Joyce Foundation, on whose Board of Directors President Barrack Obama served in 2000 and 2001 gave nearly $1.1 million in two separate grants that were “instrumental in developing and launching the privately-owned Chicago Climate Exchange, which now calls itself “North America’s only cap and trade system for all six greenhouse gases, with global affiliates and projects worldwide.”

Now that the progressives have set up a market for their invisible products, they are in need of investors who will buy into the CCX. Not surprisingly, Al Gore’s company Generation Investment Management is one of the ones to buy into the CCX. Another company to pitch in is Goldman Sachs with the purchase of 10% of the Exchange.It is my opinion that the public trials of Goldman Sachs are just a distraction from the real deal. Goldman Sachs is posing as a scapegoat for Cap and Trade in order to get a piece of the multi trillion dollar pie as an end result.

So now that they have the market and some people who will buy into it, they are going to need the technology to run their new market.

Not to worry, here comes Franklin Reins, former CEO of Fannie Mae, who purchases the patent on November 7th, 2006. November 7th being the day following the Democrat’s take over of Congress. No doubt Reins waited until then so that he would have the assurance that enough members of Congress would back this bill before patenting it.

Side Note- I wonder, what the BoD over at Fannie thought about their CEO buying this technology? Fannie is a Government Sponsored Enterprise whose purpose, as stated in their mission statement: is to “provide liquidity, stability and affordability to the U.S. housing and mortgage markets.”

At this point in our investigation, we see that the progressives have pulled together a get rich quick market on which they can, well, get rich quick on. Furthermore, they can promote their socialist agenda all the while by regulating companies that emit more gas to give money to companies that emit less gas (This is where the Cap and Trade legislation comes in. Although it hasn’t passed yet, Republicans and Democrats are both working on it). They have investors who will buy into the CCX, and they have the technology to fuel this market.

They even have a means of escaping the consequences of their actions when they are caught red handed.

Whenever progressive’s are caught in their trickery, they dissolve into a maze of various progressive networks. For example, you may have heard that ACORN recently disbanded due to video evidence of ACORN speaking to two undercover conservative activists posing as a pimp and prostitute, where the activists ask two employees about how to shield their work from state and federal tax requirements. The supposed pimp also appears to ask the employees how to conceal underage girls from El Salvador brought into the country illegally to work for him.

After this video was produced, we heard of several ACORN chapters disbanding and its Federal funding being revoked. If you were like me, your first reaction was excitement that this shadowy organization that purportedly engaged in voter fraudulence in a close election that ended in favor of a marxist candidate for the Presidency was finally getting what it deserved.

However, after a closer look, it appears that ACORN is not disbanding, but rather transforming. Several chapters have been melting into other progressive groups around the country that share the same goals. Don’t believe me? Hear it from the words of Bertha Lewis, CEO of ACORN:

“First of all, let me set the record straight. Rumors of our demise have been greatly exaggerated. We are transforming, of course. I’ve been transforming this organization since June of 2008. And, yes, we’ve had our financial woes, and, yes, we are fighting an unconstitutional ban on any government funding.”

In an interview with Lewis that National Public Radio’s Tell Me More is airing, the ACORN CEO says:

“We’ve gotten leaner and meaner and some of our state chapters have chosen to go their own way. We haven’t been able to maintain the resources, state by state, that we had. So we have gotten a little bit smaller. We’ve had to change some of our programming, but we’re not dead yet.”

I believe that the ability to find information about such things is a skill that we all must have if we are to succeed, so that we are not entirely dependent on media outlets in order to get our information. On that note, I have provided links to several places where you can get more information on this subject. Again I ask that you please click on the “share” button underneath this article and send this to your twitter page, facebook page, myspace or other social network.

Of course, just because we link to the content below, we do not necessarily endorse their views or source of information. I advise you to use the information provided here and elsewhere with caution, continually checking their accuracy. The spreading of misinformation is very dangerous to our cause.

http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2009/03/25/obama-years-ago-helped-fund-carbon-program-pushing-congress/

http://www.marketswiki.com/mwiki/Chicago_Climate_Exchange

http://www.fanniemae.com/kb/index?page=home&c=aboutus

http://www.swamppolitics.com/news/politics/blog/2010/03/acorn_not_dead_yet_leader_asse.html

http://www.onenewsnow.com/Culture/Default.aspx?id=958482

http://www.foxnews.com/projects/pdf/032509_report00.pdf

If this bill is signed into law on Thursday, it will set up a preliminary vote with only two options. The Puerto Rican population will vote on either maintaining the status of the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico, or changing the status of the commonwealth of Puerto Rico to Statehood. If the majority of the population votes to change “to a different political status”, then a second vote would be scheduled in which voters would decide among three choices:

1. “Independence: Puerto Rico should become fully independent from the United States;”
2. “Sovereignty in Association with the United States: Puerto Rico and the United States should form a political association between sovereign nations that will not be subject to the Territorial Clause of the United States Constitution;” and,
3. “Statehood: Puerto Rico should be admitted as a State of the Union.”

This bill would allow a simple plurality of the people to decide in favor of Statehood if they so chose. The majority of voters have voted against such admittance to the Union three times before, making it clear why this legislation calls for only a plurality of votes between three possible choices.

Another serious danger of passing this legislation would be the fact that Puerto Rico would have the equivalent of 25/50 States in regards to Congressional Representation. In this time of crisis in our country, when the national debt is soaring, our President and his constituents are anti-capitalists, and socialism has already been implemented in areas such as health care and car dealerships(Remember GM? I have an update on that story that I will share with you).

The bottom line is that this push for Puerto Rican Statehood would force Puerto Ricans to vote in a biased ballad, allowing a plurality the opportunity to over rule the opinions of the majority. In addition to this, Puerto Rico would then have the same Congressional Representation as twenty five U.S. States. This is not the time for a 51st State, and the Democratic Majority in Congress is pushing this because they stand to gain several seats in both Houses.

The vote is this Thursday, so please call/e-mail your Representatives urging for them to vote “no” on H.R.2499.

-Calvin

These are the lyrics from Mark Lindsay’s 1969, one hit wonder, Arizona. But, I think we need to add some honorary lyrics to this song!  How about: Arizona, land of the illegal immigrants, or even better! How about: Arizona, where the illegal’s run wild and free. It seems to fit the song perfectly!

Living in Arizona, I know first hand the truthfulness of these lyrics!  Our borders are virtually unprotected allowing hundreds of Mexicans to come across the border illegally each year!  Not only does this steal jobs from us legal Americans, it causes a national security threat!

Just this year, Arizona has lost three American life’s to illegal aliens.  They are pouring across the border in hopes for a better life, they are searching after the American dream!  This is one thing I respect.  They see what our country has to offer!  The only thing they seem not to see though are the laws of the land!  Now, do not get me wrong:  I support immigration 100%.  Its what makes our country great!  We are the melting pot!  But I do not support immigration if it means that immigrants will be coming in illegally!!  ITS ILLEGAL!

This week when the story about a new immigration bill in Arizona hit the national news I was thrilled! This bill will crack down on illegal immigrants and will give the police authority to question suspected illegal immigrants.  Although the national news makes this out as if Arizona is split over this issue, here locally we are thrilled!  We are tired of illegal’s taking our jobs and killing our people!

Last week this really hit me hard.  One of my good friends was shot twice ,by an illegal, in an attempted to break into his house.  This is why this bill needs to be passed!  I am not saying that all illegal immigrants are bad people.  All I am saying is that illegals are in fact illegal, and we MUST do something to stop these people from crossing our borders illegally.

-Daniel

The fact is that government does not have the right or obligation to take control over our health care system. Instead this is a right that is reserved for either the State or the people. Would you like to know where this is said in the Constitution? The Tenth Amendment states that:

The powers delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people.

The Federal Government simply does not have the authority to initiate an overhaul of our health care system, as is seen in the Tenth Amendment.

“I pledge allegiance to the Flag of the United States of America and to the Republic for which it stands, one nation, under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.” 

    The original Pledge of Allegiance was written by Francis Bellamy.  He wrote The Pledge for a popular children’s magazine The Youth’s Companion as part of the National Public-School Celebration of Columbus Day.   It originally read like this,” I pledge allegiance to my Flag and to the Republic for which it stands one nation indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.”   It stayed this way for 66 years until a man named Louis A. Bowman saw the need to add “under God” to the pledge.  He knew that a nation that lacked God was a nation heading for troubled waters.   Louis knew that it was not the United States government that governed America;  it was God himself who set our laws into place and more importantly hardwired morals and absolute truths into us. 

             You see a government isn’t here to necessarily make new rules, just enforce them.  The reason is simple, God has already given us our rules that we need to live by!  These rules were molded into us when we were created as humans.  And if that’s not enough has God flat out told us how we need to live our life’s.  It’s called the Ten Commandments!  If Americans actually picked up and read their bibles they would know this!  So that leaves us with this question:  what would happen if God is taken out of our country?   The answer is a simple one: all hell would break loose!  After all, what is a nation without morals? 

          Let’s imagine use our imaginations for a second.  Imagine you are on a cruise of the Atlantic ocean.  While on your cruise, you are going to stop at ten completely separated and isolated islands.  In fact they have no communication between other islands or the rest of civilization.  When you stop at the first one you start to notice something: their pnly laws are those of their morals.  Its illegal to steal, cheat ,lie, kill ect…  After island one you go to number two.  After getting off you begin to see an eerie resemblance to the first island you visited.  They have the same basic laws!  After number two you go to three and notice the same thing, 3 to 4,4 to 5, and on you notice the exact same thing.  Now why is this? God is the reason.  He put these truths into them.    If they are taken out, there would be no differential between good and bad!  Black and white becomes an endless gray.   A murderer would be looked at the same as a hero;  Hitler would be at the same level as George Washington.  Could you imagine?  Without morals people could murder their neighbor, steal a car, bake cookies for their kids, buy a present for their spouse, all this in a days work!!  They wouldn’t know that they did anything wrong at all! 

       America need to realize that we are governed by God and that He is the one who makes our rules and laws.  As Americans it is our reasonability to pick up our Bibles and realize what right and wrong is.  And not only will our morals be clearly defined, we will find Life.  Life that only Jesus Christ our Savior can offer.  Life that was paid for through the murder of an innocent Man.  

~ John 3:16

“Almighty God, we acknowledge our dependence upon Thee, and we beg Thy blessings upon us, our parents, our teachers, and our country.” These were the simple words that children said everyday after entering their school house. This prayer was the foundation of our school system. It kept the children fearing our one true God.

Yet in 1962 a supreme court examined this 22 word prayer and declared it illegal to recite any longer in public schools. This was just the start of the total decline of our public schools. This court case was the first of its kind, one that eliminated prayer in schools, but as we fast forward through history we will see that it most definitely was not the last.

-Just one year later the court case Abington School District v. Schempp found bible reading over the intercom illegal.

-Epperson v. Arkansas, 89 S. Ct. 266 (1968): State statue banning teaching of evolution is unconstitutional. A state cannot alter any element in a course of study in order to promote a religious point of view. A state’s attempt to hide behind a nonreligious motivation will not be given credence unless that state can show a secular reason as the foundation for its actions.

-Lemon v. Kurtzman, 91 S. Ct. 2105 (1971)

Established the three part test for determining if an action of government violates First Amendment’s separation of church and state:
1) the government action must have a secular purpose;
2) its primary purpose must not be to inhibit or to advance religion;
3) there must be no excessive entanglement between government and religion.

-Stone v. Graham, 449 U.S. 39 (1980)

Court finds posting of the Ten Commandments in schools unconstitutional.

-Wallace v. Jaffree, 105 S. Ct. 2479 (1985)

State’s moment of silence at public school statute is unconstitutional where legislative record reveals that motivation for statute was the encouragement of prayer. Court majority silent on whether “pure” moment of silence scheme, with no bias in favor of prayer or any other mental process, would be constitutional.

-Edwards v. Aquillard, 107 S. Ct. 2573 (1987)

Unconstitutional for state to require teaching of “creation science” in all instances in which evolution is taught. Statute had a clear religious motivation.

-Lee v. Weisman, 112 S. Ct. 2649 (1992)

Unconstitutional for a school district to provide any clergy to perform nondenominational prayer at elementary or secondary school graduation. It involves government sponsorship of worship.

-Church of Lukumi Babalu Ave., Inc. v. Hialeah, 113 S. Ct. 2217 (1993)

City’s ban on killing animals for religious sacrifices, while allowing sport killing and hunting, was unconstitutional discrimination against the Santeria religion.

These lawsuits thrive off of one thing: separation of church and state.

The people who back this lawsuits claim that religion in schools and public places are unconstitutional and need to be removed from schools. But there is one thing they conveniently seem to overlook: nowhere in the constitution is separation of church and state found! You can look all you want, but you will never find it! The phrase can actually be found in a LETTER written by Thomas Jefferson FIFTEEN YEARS after the constitution was written. The letter was addressed to the Danbury Baptist Association comforting them that they could continue worshiping as they would. Jefferson said that worship was not a “favor” to them granted by the state, rather it was a right that the state couldn’t infringe upon . ( BECK 287)

In Jefferson’s letter he says that the STATE should stay out of the CHURCH. Not the other way around. Most of our founding fathers were religious men. They recognized the need to fear a God and they saw that God was the one who created them. They based their beliefs off the bible, which they read and studied everyday so that in turn, they could build a nation on God’s principles. A nation that rose above the rest of the world. A nation of freedom and liberty, and most of all, a nation that feared God with all of their hearts.

As I wrap up, here are a few statistics since the prayer has been out of school:

1962:                                            1990:

# of unmarried couples .44(million)                               2.8(million)

Living together:

#of violent crimes in

Schools:                                .25(million)                              1.7(Million)

Pre-marital sex:                     22%                                           70%

Birth rate for unwed Girls(per 1,000)                        13                                         37

Look at the numbers, and look at the facts. The absence of prayer in schools has led to a violent, unmoral nation.

Most of us have heard of Joseph Stalin, ruler of the Soviet Union during World War II, leader of the Communist Party in the Soviet Union, who fought against the Allied Forces while under a non-aggression pact with Nazi-Germany, and then turned around and fought with the Allied forces in order to defeat Hitler. Joseph Stalin was also responsible for the Holodomor, a horrific incident where the whole country of Ukraine was starved in order to crush their individualist spirit, and some people became so insane that they reverted to cannibalism.

Your history books tell you of Mao Tse Tung, a Dictator who took over the Chinese government, turning it into the People’s Republic of China, a Communist government that the country is still under today.

Mao caused 14 to 20 million deaths from starvation during the ‘Great Leap Forward’, during which farmers were sent to collectivist farms, and anyone who refused to join them was killed. Tens of thousands were killed and millions of lives were ruined during the ‘Cultural Revolution’.  Mao, then  leader of the Communist Party, initiated a political and economic upheaval of the country that led to the country descending near anarchism. When Mao died, he left China in shambles.

Hitler, Stalin and Mao dominate 20th Century history classes, but Che Guevara seemingly does not. Che was a Marxist revolutionary who fought in the Cuban Revolution to overthrow Fidel Castro, the dictator who was then holding power. Many of the early leaders of the Cuban Revolution favored a democratic or democratic-socialist direction for the new Cuba. But not Che, Che held steadfast to his pro-Soviet Faction. his faction was the one who won in the end. Che founded “labor camps”, that were eventually used to kill gays, dissidents, and people infected with AIDS. Che was a murderer and a terrorist. In a famous essay that he wrote, Che expressed several disturbing thoughts, including the following:

“Hatred as an element of struggle; unbending hatred for the enemy, which pushes a human being beyond his natural limitations, making him into an effective, violent, selective, and cold-blooded killing machine. This is what our soldiers must become …”

Che was a killer, whose goal in life was to kill large amounts of people, and kill himself in the process. He spent his days leading several guerrilla movements that impeded the attempts at Democracy in Cuba. He died in 1967, leading a Bolivian guerrilla movement that did not enlist a single Bolivian peasant. Che was a enemy of Latin-American democracy, and also largely responsible for the deaths of hundreds of thousands of people.

But many Americans don’t seem to get this.In recent Hollywood films, such as Walter Salle’s  Motorcycle Diaries, Che is painted out to be a revolutionary hero, while in reality he was an enemy of freedom.  This delusional fascination over Che has climbed to the point  where websites like http://www.moreorless.au.com, that profile heroes and killers of the 20th Century, list Che as a hero. Wikipedia has some pretty words to say about Che:

Over forty years after his execution, Che’s life and legacy still remain a contentious issue. The contradictions of his ethos at various points in his life have created a complex character of unending duality.

As a result of his perceived martyrdom, poetic invocations for class struggle, and desire to create the consciousness of a new man driven by moral rather than material incentives, Guevara evolved into a quintessential icon of leftist-inspired movements. An array of notable individuals have viewed Che Guevara as a hero; for example, Nelson Mandela referred to him as “an inspiration for every human being who loves freedom”

Che’s philosophies were very similar to those held by Hitler, Stalin or Mao, and most Americans wouldn’t think twice about singing praises to Hitler or Mao(Except Anita Dunn). Next time someone tells you that we need to implement communism in some form or fashion here in the united States, explain to them that communism has failed, over and over again, that it does nothing but create death, suffering, and tyranny; and produce tyrants like Che, Mao, Stalin and Hitler.

Youth and their Impact on America’s Future

Ronald Reagan, our country’s fortieth President, once said that:

“Freedom is never more than one generation away from extinction. We didn’t pass it to our children in the bloodstream. It must be fought for, protected, and handed on for them to do the same, or one day we will spend our sunset years telling our children and our children’s children what it was once like in the United States where men were free –”

The former President was absolutely right.

The future of a great country, in our case America, is constantly in the hands of the next generation of Americans. Thus it is highly important that younger generations are trained to be good stewards of the country that they inherit. It is a citizen’s responsibility to follow critical issues, to raise awareness on any particular areas where changes need to be made in our country, and to vote for leaders who will lead according to the constitutional principles that our nation was founded upon.

Our present generation of young people is severely lacking people with the desire or understanding necessary to effect change in our country in this time when it is greatly needed, and this includes citizens who don’t vote, as well as politicians who make decisions based on how they will effect his or her ratings, rather than how they will effect the country as a whole.

In this speech I want to impress on you the importance of retaking America’s future by getting young people more involved in the political process.

We live in a time when Judeo-Christian values are constantly being attacked in the public realm, and the foundation that our country was built upon is being violently assaulted by those who want to undermine the principles for which early Americans stood for when they formed our country, and of which the present majority continue to uphold.

If American citizens stop caring about the consequences of such attacks, then we will lose our freedoms that so many people have lived and died for. A Harvard IOP survey conducted in the Fall of 2009,which interviewed two thousand Americans ages 18-29, shows disheartening results.

75% of the citizens interviewed said no when asked if they considered themselves to be politically engaged or politically active. 25% of the citizens polled did not even register to vote for the November 4th, 2008 presidential election.

There are dire consequences when almost a whole generation isn’t politically engaged, and large amounts of young people don’t even vote. It’s just as President Reagan said: If a whole generation fails to protect its freedoms, then those freedoms will be taken away.

Perhaps no other group of radical leftists has done more to take away our freedoms than the ACLU (American Civil Liberties Union). The ACLU has been attacking Christian principles since it’s founding by Roger Baldwin in 1920. The American Civil Liberties Union is against everything that we Christians believe in. The Bible, the traditional family, the institution of marriage, even Christmas. Disguised as the protectors of freedom, with a militia of attorneys at its disposal, the ACLU is a force to be reckoned with. Throughout it’s history, the ACLU has done much to further its goal of pushing religion, particularly Christianity, out of the public realm. Some of its recent victories include removing the Ten Commandments from public schools, and legalizing gay marriage in New Hampshire,  Connecticut, Iowa, Massachusetts and Vermont, without the consent of the majority in those states.

The ACLU has been largely successful in it’s anti-God crusade. And I believe that this is because of the lack of public outcry of the ACLU’s actions from Americans in recent years. There is really no other explanation for such an outrage. 96% of Americans when asked will tell you that they believe in a God.

The ACLU and others who want to destroy our liberties will only attempt to do so if they think that they can succeed. If the majority of Americans just stand by and do nothing, then who else is going to protect our liberties?

But there is hope.

When Americans voice their opinions loud enough, they will be heard. When Michael Newdow, an atheist from Sacramento California, called for the Supreme Court to remove the  words “under God” from the Pledge of Allegiance, the ACLU, who would normally be in the thick of the fight, was strangely silent.

It turns out that 9 out of 10 Americans were against the exclusion of the words “under God” in the Pledge. The ACLU knew that the odds were completely against them at the time, so they decided not to get involved, because doing so would risk their already feeble public appeal.

In November 2005, Newdow went on to attack our national motto: “In God We Trust”, protesting that the phrase should not be included on currency and bank notes. In 2006, a Federal Judge rejected this lawsuit as well.

You see, in order to preserve our freedoms, the next generation of Americans, meaning you and me, must show our adversaries,  groups like the ACLU, that we will not allow them to take our freedoms. And if we do so, then we will be triumphant.

So what can we younger people do to protect our liberties?

Well, you can start by getting informed. Get to know the issues that afflict our country, and what needs to be done about it. Get the facts, and form your own opinions.

We may not be able to vote yet, but we can certainly support candidates who will lead effectively. You can send e-mails to your representatives on the local, state, or

national levels. Giving them your input, and telling them how you hope that they will vote on issues that concern you, and who knows, maybe one day in the future you will run for a political office. You would be in a position to put into motion much needed change in our country.

It is common for young people like you and me to feel that we don’t have much to offer in the field of politics, and that we can’t make much of a difference at such a young age.

I personally do not believe that to be true. It is my opinion that the earlier that people start thinking about such things, the better.

In November of 2005, eighteen year old Michael Sessions ran for the position of mayor in Hillsdale Missouri, and succeeded in defeating his 5 1-year-old incumbent, Mayor Douglas Ingles.

Sessions launched his campaign with the $700 that he made at a summer job, one month before the election. Sessions won his campaign with the help of Brandon Thomas, his seventeen-year old campaign manager. Many other younger people were involved in his campaign, and his message is primarily for young people. The teenage mayor still attended high-school when he was first elected mayor,  and now attends Hillsdale College. When he began the job, Michael used his bedroom as his office, earning $250 a month for his services.

“Age has nothing to do with ability,” said Valerie G. Van Opynen, a 49 year old artist, and resident of. “He’s done more good for this city in his first 15 minutes than the last administration ever did. This is the most excited I’ve seen this town in the five years I’ve been here.”

“Age has nothing to do with ability.” This is an important lesson that we should all take to heart.

In 1983, Brian Zimmerman, an 11 year old boy from Crabb, Texas, was elected as mayor of the community with a landslide of 23 votes out of 30 cast. The goal of his campaign was to incorporate the city in order to avoid annexation from neighboring cities such as Houston, although doing so would push him out of his position as Mayor because of Texas State laws prohibiting minors to hold office as mayor.

During his time as mayor of the Crabb community of roughly 200 people, Brian reportedly paved one of the town’s roads.
In 1988, his story was chronicled in a movie called “Lone Star Kid”.

I will admit, this story is a little far fetched, so whether or not you choose to believe in it is your choice. However, if it is, than it is a truly remarkable event.

As you can see, young people can enter the political realm, and can make a difference, either as an active citizen, or even in a political office.

I hope that my speech has shown you the importance of young people to America’s future, and more importantly, to persuade you to be active in the political process throughout your entire life.

Thank you.