Oak Leaves

Righteous Judgment (by Lloyd Phillips) - There is a much promoted misrepresentation from the teachings of Jesus that he taught we should never judge. This is an incongruous teaching. He did, in fact, teach his followers they should be able to judge properly without being judgmental. He instructed them to first get the log out of their own eye so they could help their companion to get the speck from his eye. The idea was to judge properly and accurately, not critically or from a biased view point.

The People’s Right to Choose and Change Government (by Lloyd Phillips) - The Declaration of Independence was a magnificent presentation of the grievances of the American Colonies against an overreaching and overbearing government. It also laid out in spectacular wording for the first time the basic principles of freedom and liberty.

Three Deadly EMP Myths The U.S. Government Won’t Talk About…(by Damian Campbell) - Imagine a day when the United States of America goes dark. Cars, stores, trains, and planes stop. The computers we’ve built our lives around shut down—and won’t ever turn on again. One minute everything is fine, and the next… The power goes out. You’re in complete darkness. Every household across the country is shut down. The fact is this isn’t some myth or bad sci-fi movie. An EMP isn’t science fiction to China, Russia, or terrorists. It’s a very real thing, and could destroy our way of life. That said, you may be wondering…

The Restoration of America: William McGuffey and the McGuffey Eclectic Readers (by Karla Perry) - American children of the mid-nineteenth century were essentially educated by the works of one man, William Holmes McGuffey. The McGuffey Eclectic Readers sold 120 million copies between 1836 and 1920. These sales are comparable only to the Bible and Webster’s Dictionary.

Why the Founders Chose a Republic (by Karla Perry) - When Benjamin Franklin emerged from The Constitutional Convention that convened from May 25 to September 17, 1787 to address the problems facing post Revolutionary War America, he was asked by a passerby what was the outcome of the assembly. Franklin responded, “It’s a Republic, if you can keep it.”

Reining in Political Pendulum Shifts (by Debra Durstewitz ) - The Occupy Wall Street movement that started in New York on September 17 still has quite a way to go to establish a cohesive message or to solidify into a political movement. If its predecessor, the Tea Party, is any indication, that process should take about a year. What is clear, however, is that America is now watching and waiting as the counter-swing of the political pendulum comes to a state of equilibrium.

The Restoration of America: John Locke (by Karla Perry) - Jefferson penned the Declaration of Independence, but it was Locke who provided the political philosophy it popularized. Modernity champions John Locke as a secular Enlightenment fellow, at best a Deist. In actuality, he espoused a Christian worldview deriving his political philosophy from the Bible.

Saudi Arabia's Curriculum of Intolerance (Report Summarization by Margaret Mayfield & Bill NeSmith) - According to the Center for Religious Freedom of the Hudson Institute and their published report entitled ‘Saudi Arabia’s Curriculum of Intolerance,' it has become quite clear that extreme Islamist ideologies have been gaining adherents throughout the world. Where they are implemented as governing ideologies, we see a brutally enforced hierarchy of group rights, favoring Muslims over non-Muslims, men over women, and a dominate Muslim sect over other Muslims, with individual rights and freedoms subordinated for all.