An Open Letter to my Black Evangelical Friends

I am not writing this letter to accuse but rather to advance understanding. And even though I am white, I am not writing as an outsider but as a fellow evangelical, part of the same spiritual family. May I pose some candid questions?

Are you guilty, on any level, of blind allegiance to the Democratic party? And, on Election Day, did any of you compromise your convictions out of racial solidarity?

I have been very open in my criticism of white evangelicals, pointing out how we often put our trust in the Republican party and how we look to the latest candidate as some kind of political savior, only to be disappointed time and time again, complaining that the Republicans wanted our votes but did not stand up for our values. “We won’t get fooled again,” we say, only to repeat the same cycle four years later.

On Election Day morning, I posted an article entitled “A Warning to Moral Conservatives,” raising concerns that if Mitt Romney was elected, we would be making a grave mistake in looking to him to advance our moral and social agenda. I even wrote an article in June entitled “Mitt Romney Is Not the Answer,” and I often told my evangelical radio listeners that I would not argue with them if they could not vote for Romney because he was a Mormon. So, I do understand black Christian reticence towards Romney (for these reasons, among others).

I simply do not understand how my black evangelical friends who so staunchly oppose same-sex marriage and who stand against abortion could cast their vote for the most radically pro-abortion, pro-gay-activist president in our history.

Was there no moral compromise involved in voting for him? Are there no issues that could disqualify him in your eyes? And must Barack Obama be elected and then reelected in order to make up for past injustices, as one black evangelical woman claimed?

In the last few months, black Christian leaders came on my radio show to express their disapproval of the president’s policies, urging their parishioners not to vote for him (without endorsing Romney). And in a recent article, my colleague Bishop Harry Jackson went as far as to say that, “President Obama has become a personality akin to the biblical figure ‘Ishmael’ for the African-American community instead of the ‘child of promise’ we had hoped for. In a nutshell, he has attempted to create a new, unbiblical standard of social justice that promotes abortion, same-sex marriage, a distrust of Israel, and a diminishing of religious liberties.”

Yet when it came to time to vote, the same percentage of black Americans who voted for Obama in 2008 did so again in 2012 (roughly 95%). How can this be? Again, I am not attacking, I am inquiring.

And I am not the only one inquiring. I have been receiving emails and calls from other African American evangelicals asking these same questions.

More disturbingly, some of these black Christians have told me that they have been cut off from family, friends, church members, and even pastors because they opposed the reelection of President Obama. To ask again, how can this be?

One black pastor explained to me that he is convinced that “many African American believers compromised God’s Word during the election in the name of Obama Care and social program such as foods stamps etc.” Is there any truth to this?

If so – and again, I am asking, not accusing – this is not only wrong, it misguided, since Democratic policies have hardly advanced the economic well-being of black America. As noted by Congressman Allen West, “Since 2007, black median household income has declined by 11 percent — the largest decline of all major racial and ethnic groups. . . . In 2011, the poverty rate among black Americans was 27.5 percent. The poverty rate among blacks living in families headed by women is 41 percent.”

To be sure, Republicans have done little to win the confidence of black Americans, and I understand the history of distrust in recent decades. But does this justify the overwhelming black allegiance to the Democratic party?

According to the BlackDignity.org website, “A black baby is three times more likely to be aborted [than] a white baby.” (The BlackGenocide.org website claims the figure is substantially higher; that website should be visited.)

BlackDignity.org also reports that, “Twice as many African-Americans have died from abortion than have died from AIDS, accidents, violent crimes, cancer, and heart disease combined.” And today, in New York City, 60% percent of black babies suffer the fate of abortion, never to see the light of day.

Does it trouble you, my black evangelical friends, that the Democratic platform, not to mention the Democratic National Convention, was almost a celebration of abortion?

In 2008, I warned my listeners that Mr. Obama, if elected, would support the goals of gay activism, including redefining marriage, but many listeners did not believe me. Now that President Obama has actually abused the teaching and example of Jesus to advocate same-sex marriage, how could you vote for him again?

One caller to my program on Monday told me candidly that he was shaking in the voting booth, knowing that he couldn’t support President Obama’s pro-abortion, pro-gay-activist policies. Yet, he confessed, he voted for him because he was black.

Was he alone in doing so? Again, I am not accusing. I am only asking.

Michael Brown

Michael Brown holds a Ph.D. in Near Eastern Languages and Literatures from New York University and has served as a professor at a number of seminaries. He hosts the nationally syndicated, daily talk radio show, the Line of Fire, and his latest book is The Real Kosher Jesus.

http://townhall.com/columnists/michaelbrown/2012/11/13/an_open_letter_to_my_black_evangelical_friends/page/full/

Sex Beats Benghazi

You’ve heard the old adage that sex sells. But as we’re recognizing more and more often, sex wins elections.

Here’s the brutal truth: the American people seem far more interested in what happens in the bedroom than they do what happens on the battlefield. How else to explain the media’s fascination with CIA Director David Petraeus‘ steamy sex scandal, even as they ignore the ramifications for the investigation of four murdered Americans in Benghazi, Libya?

Two days after President Obama won re-election, Petraeus submitted his resignation letter to Obama, supposedly over an affair with biographer Paula Broadwell. The FBI had been investigating the affair; another four-star general had gotten tangentially entangled in the investigation. The story was juicy.

The story was also a smokescreen. The week after Petraeus resigned, he was scheduled to testify before the Senate Intelligence Committee. It quickly emerged that he wouldn’t be setting foot inside the committee in the near future. That news followed on the heels of Secretary of State Hillary Clinton‘s announcement that she had no intention of testifying before Congress — she’d be too busy sipping wine in Australia to discuss Ambassador Chris Stevens choking to death on soot and ash in a dingy building in Libya. As for Secretary of Defense Leon Panetta, he’s been anything but forthcoming.

What do those three figures — Petraeus, Clinton, and Panetta — have in common? They’re all likely to be out of the administration within the next month. Petraeus has stepped down; Clinton is leaving; Panetta, rumor has it, will be replaced with former Winter Soldier Sen. John Kerry (D-MA), the ultimate slap in the face to American troops. When all three are gone, the link to Obama is gone, too. They can testify, certainly. But the blame rested on their shoulders. And Obama won’t have to fire them.

The media shows no interest in any of this, however. They’re far more interested in whether Petraeus enjoyed the company of Broadwell on the dunes of Kandahar, or whether he was shtupping a Florida friend of the family on the side. Sex sells. Benghazi doesn’t.

That simple fact rang true throughout the election cycle. When the media had a chance to cover Benghazi originally — when the administration lied day after day about a YouTube video being responsible for a terrorist attack and obfuscated the on-the-ground timeline — the media ignored the story completely. Instead, they covered the ill-articulated comments of Indiana senate candidate Richard Mourdock. Earlier in the election cycle, the media ignored President Obama’s attempt to stifle the religious freedoms of Catholics in favor of hubbub about Sandra “Pay For My Condoms” Fluke.

The media wanted to watch Mitt Romney burn, of course, and honed in on stories designed to emphasize his supposed sexism. But there’s more to it than that. The media is comprised of Baby Boomers and their kids. The Boomers were obsessed with sex in the 1960s — that’s why they tried to tear down all the major institutions of American life, some for good and some for ill. Today, the Boomers justify all sexual behavior as normal; they brought their children up to do the same.

Despite their live and let-live politics, though, the Baby Boomers and their kids still evidence a bizarre fascination with sex. That’s why they obsess about abortion and same-sex marriage. It’s why they were taken in by the Obama lie that Republicans would bar birth control. Sexual politics aren’t everything to the left-leaning Baby Boomers and their offspring; they’re the only thing.

So Benghazi doesn’t matter. But Petraeus’ sex habits do, even if we’re supposed to laugh at them and then claim they’re none of our business. The schizophrenia here boggles the mind.

But psychological dissonance never bothers the Baby Boomers and their kids. They’ve been living with it for too long. So the prurient will continue to beat the virtuous, both in media coverage and in elections.

Ben Shapiro

Ben Shapiro is an attorney, a writer and a Shillman Journalism Fellow at the Freedom Center. He is editor-at-large of Breitbart and author of the best-selling book “Primetime Propaganda: The True Hollywood Story of How the Left Took Over Your TV.”

http://townhall.com/columnists/benshapiro/2012/11/14/sex_beats_benghazi/page/full/

Nice Losers

Mitt Romney now joins the long list of the kinds of presidential candidates favored by the Republican establishment– nice, moderate losers, people with no coherently articulated vision, despite how many ad hoc talking points they may have.

The list of Republican presidential candidates like this goes back at least as far as 1948, when Thomas E. Dewey ran against President Harry Truman. Dewey spoke in lofty generalities while Truman spoke in hard-hitting specifics. Since then, there have been many re-runs of this same scenario, featuring losing Republican presidential candidates John McCain, Bob Dole, Gerald Ford and, when he ran for reelection, George H.W. Bush.

Bush 41 first succeeded when he ran for election as if he were another Ronald Reagan (“Read my lips, no new taxes“), but then lost when he ran for reelection as himself– “kinder and gentler,” disdainful of “the vision thing” and looking at his watch during a debate, when he should have been counter-attacking against the foolish things being said.

This year, Barack Obama had the hard-hitting specifics– such as ending “tax cuts for the rich” who should pay “their fair share,” government “investing” in “the industries of the future” and the like. He had a coherent vision, however warped.

Most of Obama’s arguments were rotten, if you bothered to put them under scrutiny. But someone once said that it is amazing how long the rotten can hold together, if you don’t handle it roughly.

Any number of conservative commentators, both in the print media and on talk radio, examined and exposed the fraudulence of Obama’s “tax cuts for the rich” argument. But did you ever hear Mitt Romney bother to explain the specifics which exposed the flaws in Obama’s argument?

On election night, the rotten held together because Mitt Romney had not handled it roughly with specifics. Romney was too nice to handle Obama’s absurdities roughly. He definitely out-niced Obama– as John McCain had out-niced Obama in 2008, and as Dewey out-niced Truman back in 1948. And these Republicans all lost.

In this year’s first presidential debate, Obama out-niced Romney. But, when he lost out doing that, he then reversed himself, became the attacker, and ultimately the winner on election night, despite a track record that should have buried him in a landslide.

When you look at this as a horse race, there is no question that the Republicans deserved to lose. But the stakes for this great nation, at this crucial juncture in its history and in the history of the world, are far too momentous to look at this election as just a contest between two candidates or two political parties.

Quite aside from the immediate effects of particular policies, Barack Obama has repeatedly circumvented the laws, including the Constitution of the United States, in ways and on a scale that pushes this nation in the direction of arbitrary one-man rule.

Now that Obama will be in a position to appoint Supreme Court justices who can rubber stamp his evasions of the law and usurpations of power, this country may be unrecognizable in a few years as the America that once led the world in freedom, as well as in many other things.

Barack Obama’s boast, on the eve of the election of 2008– “We are five days away from fundamentally transforming the United States of America“– can now be carried out, without fear of ever having to face the voters again.

This “transforming” project extends far beyond fundamental internal institutions, or even the polarization and corruption of the people themselves, with goodies handed out in exchange for their surrendering their birthright of freedom.

Obama will now also have more “flexibility,” as he told Russian President Medvedev, to transform the international order, where he has long shown that he thinks America has too much power and influence. A nuclear Iran can change that. Forever.

Have you noticed how many of our enemies in other countries have been rooting for Obama? You or your children may yet have reason to recall that as a bitter memory of a warning sign ignored on election day in 2012.

Thomas Sowell

Thomas Sowell is a senior fellow at the Hoover Institute and author of  The Housing Boom and Bust.

http://townhall.com/columnists/thomassowell/2012/11/13/creators_oped/page/full/

What Went Wrong Last Tuesday

Disbelief is the word that defines the Republican state of mind in the wake of the 2012 re-election of President Barack Obama.

The obvious questions are: “How can Americans have re-elected a president who has presided over an economy where unemployment still hovers at 8 percent ?”

And, “How can Americans have re-elected a president who still doesn’t grasp that his big government policies are what have blocked our economic recovery?”

The Republican Party needs to take responsibility for this disaster.

Nothing in the outcome of this election is a surprise. The realities which produced these election results have been looming before us not for months, but for years.

Yet Republicans have made a point of ignoring it all. Now, “the chickens have come home to roost.”

What are these realities?

The profound changing demographics of the nation. And, the challenge of getting a nation that is already addicted to government off it.

I wrote last April regarding an analysis done by Ron Brownstein in National Journal: “Brownstein estimates that Barack Obama could be re-elected with as little as 39 percent of the white vote. He notes that in 2008, when Obama was elected with just 43 percent of the white vote, it was the first time ever that a presidential candidate was victorious with double digit losses of white voters.”

In a column I wrote a month ago, I noted: “What was once the exception to the rule in America – not being white, not being married, not have traditional views on family, sex, and abortion – is becoming the rule. And these constituencies are becoming sufficiently large to elect a president.”

A nation doesn’t change overnight. Yet, Republicans have been in chronic denial about what has been happening.

Ironically, the Republican political establishment, and particularly this year’s candidate Mitt Romney, presented themselves as the party of businessmen who know how economies work.

Well, businessmen pay attention to their markets. They make sure they understand their product and present it clearly and that they stay attuned to their customer base.

Republican Party operatives ignored both -clear definition of their product and savvy marketing to a diverse base of customers.

Instead, they chose wishful thinking. Simply hope that more and more white voters will turn out and vote Republican to make up for their shrinking part of the electorate.

When polls showed what was really happening, these same Republican operatives chose to deny them too, charging they were biased.

We can win our country back.

Low and middle-income blacks and Latinos are hurt disproportionately by a sluggish economy that can only be revived by less government spending and regulation, and low taxes. They just need someone to care to focus on their communities and explain these dynamics to them.

They need to get their kids out of public schools, a cause which only conservatives champion.

And they need to understand that they have everything to gain by getting out of the entitlement programs that the left tells them they need.

The last thing low-income earners need is to pay payroll taxes when they could save this money and build wealth. And the last thing they need is government bureaucrats running their health care.

When the only message blacks and Latinos get is from left wing politicians and media telling them they need government to take care of them, what can we expect but what we just saw in this election?

Business is also about knowing that there is no short cut around hard work.

Republicans must do more than showcase a few black and brown faces at their convention every four years and call this outreach.

Conservatives must get into black and Latino communities, talk to their clergy and community leaders, and explain how conservative policies of limited government and traditional values will save their communities and our nation.

Star Parker

Star Parker is founder and president of CURE, the Center for Urban Renewal and Education, a 501c3 think tank which explores and promotes market based public policy to fight poverty, as well as author of the newly revised Uncle Sam‘s Plantation: How Big Government Enslaves America’s Poor and What We Can do About It.

http://townhall.com/columnists/starparker/2012/11/12/conservatives_can_win_over_blacks_and_latinos/page/full/

Obama Likely Won Re-Election Through Election Fraud

There were many factors that hurt Mitt Romney and favored Barack Obama in the 2012 presidential election. The Democrats portrayed Romney in the worst light possible; as a wealthy, out of touch millionaire who wanted to return women to the 1800′s. The left wing media predictably did everything it could to perpetuate that false caricature. Obama’s race was an advantage; voters of all persuasions, particularly minorities, still cannot get over the allure of the first black president. The 47% of Americans on welfare were predisposed to vote for the food stamp president over Romney, wanting the free goodies to keep on giving, despite the long-term unsustainability.

In spite of those odds, polls indicated that Romney was going to win the election. The economy is close to Great Depression era conditions, and unemployment is almost as high as when Obama entered office. Economic conditions became so dire after Obama took office it prompted the rise of an entire new movement, the Tea Party. Presidents rarely win reelection when the economy is in the tank.

So how did Romney lose a race that numerous reputable polls and pundits predicted would be an easy win, based on historical patterns? The most realistic explanation is voter fraud in a few swing states. According to the Columbus Dispatch, one out of every five registered voters in Ohio is ineligible to vote. In at least two counties in Ohio, the number of registered voters exceeded the number of eligible adults who are of voting age. In northwestern Ohio’s Wood County, there are 109 registered voters for every 100 people eligible to vote. An additional 31 of Ohio’s 88 counties have voter registration rates over 90%, which most voting experts regard as suspicious. Obama miraculously won 100% of the vote in 21 districts in Cleveland, and received over 99% of the vote where GOP inspectors were illegally removed.

The inflated numbers can’t just reflect voters who have moved, because the average voting registration level nationwide is only 70%. The vast majority of voters over the 70% level are not voting because they want to, they are voting because someone is getting them to cast a vote, one way or another. Those 31 counties are most likely the largest counties in Ohio, representing a majority of Ohio voters. This means the number of votes cast above the 70% typical voter registration level easily tops 100,000, the margin Obama won Ohio by.

Videographer James O’Keefe, known for his undercover videos exposing left wing fraud, caught a Virginia Democratic Congressman’s son on video in October explaining how to commit voter fraud. Patrick Moran, the son of Rep. Jim Moran, told O’Keefe’s videographer that in order to make a vote for someone else, you’d need two pieces of identification, such as a utility bill, explaining, “they can fake a utility bill with ease, you know?” He went on to advise the videographer that he should also call the voter and pretend to be a polling company in order to make sure the voter isn’t intending to vote. He said that Democrat attorneys would be located in the polling places to assist him if challenged casting one of these illegal votes.

In another video, O’Keefe’s videographer tells a DNC staffer from Obama’s Organizing for America that she intends to vote in both Texas and Florida. The staffer laughs and says, “It’s cool.” The staffer then prints out a voter registration form for the undercover videographer and advises her on what to do if she gets caught.

These are just the known instances of attempted voter fraud. How many instances occurred that were not discovered? Obama’s Organizing for America looked up voters in swing states – many who would not have bothered voting otherwise – and got them to vote. How did they get them to vote? They may have given them rides to the polls, they may have offered to fill out and return their ballots for them, or they may have voted ballots for the ones who were not going to vote.

Many on the left believe there is nothing wrong with committing fraud in order to ensure Obama’s reelection. It is a common tenet on the left that the ends justify the means. Saul Alinsky, the 1960′s radical who inspired Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama, taught community organizers like Obama that dishonesty is acceptable if it achieves your political goals. And when caught, Alinsky teaches radicals to deny the wrongdoing and change the topic to put their accusers on the defensive. One Obama supporter brazenly posted on Facebook that he was voting four times for Obama, asserting that the ends justify the means.

Aiding Obama’s win was a devious suppression of the conservative vote. The conservative-leaning military vote has decreased drastically since 2010 due to the so-called Military Voter Protection Act that was enacted into law the year before. It has made it so difficult for overseas military personnel to obtain absentee ballots that in Virginia and Ohio there has been a 70% decrease in requests for ballots since 2008. In Virginia, almost 30,000 fewer overseas military voters requested ballots than in 2008. In Ohio, more than 20,000 fewer overseas military voters requested ballots. This is significant considering Obama won in both states by a little over 100,000 votes.

Voter fraud has been in the works for years. At least 52 employees of the left wing group ACORN have been convicted of voter registration fraud. ACORN itself was convicted of the crime of “compensation,” paying its registration canvassers bonuses to exceed their quotas. In 2008, 36% of ACORN’s voter registrations were invalidated. Left wing political pundit Chris Matthews admitted last year that pretending to call someone from a polling company, then voting their ballot for them, has been happening in big cities since the 1950′s. He admitted he knows that kind of voter fraud takes place in Philadelphia.

Strong-arming people into voting who really have no desire to vote undermines our form of government. People do not choose to vote because they are uninformed about the issues and candidates, are lazy, cynical, or are content with the status quo. Voting someone else’s ballot for them is cheating the system and essentially giving yourself two votes.

When people claim that Obama won because the economy was improving, or because Americans generally think he is doing a good job, it is not true. He won through dishonest methods and rhetoric. Many of the votes cast in the swing states were cajoled, some legally and perhaps even more illegally, into supporting him. If voter fraud becomes acceptable, then maybe Donald Trump is right: it’s time for a revolution.

Rachel Alexander

Rachel Alexander is the editor of the Intellectual Conservative.

http://townhall.com/columnists/rachelalexander/2012/11/11/obama_likely_won_reelection_through_election_fraud/page/full/

An Open Letter to Mitt Romney

Editor’s note: A version of this piece first appeared at USAToday.com.

Dear Mitt,

I have awakened on November 7 to learn that your bid for the presidency was unsuccessful. In the midst of the disappointment that I share with you, I want to thank you for devoting years of your life to the wearisome task of running for president. Millions of Americans are grateful to you.

You have been one of my heroes for the past 48 years. I still recall vividly the valiant cross country race you ran at our Cranbrook Homecoming in October of 1964—a race when you willed yourself to run faster than you ever had until, near the end, oxygen starvation set in, causing you first to stagger, then to collapse just 30 yards from the finish line. I can still see your face, ashen and contorted in pain, as you ignored the torture of the cinders on the track scraping against soft skin and began to crawl. Even though every other runner passed you, and you had nothing to gain—other than surcease of agony—from dragging yourself to the finish line, you refused to quit until you reached your goal. Your brave effort touched me deeply. That’s when I learned that you were special—a man of character, commitment, heart and guts, someone who embodied the indomitable American spirit.

I also admired your exuberant joie de vivre. You loved life, and I can see that your great capacity for love found abundantly happy fulfillment in your life with your wife and sons. I also remember your friendship with Chester, our night watchman at Cranbrook. At prep school, there can be a tendency to disregard the support staff, to take them for granted like the furniture, but you reached out to that good, simple, kind, salt-of-the-earth security guard. (Just for the record, I befriended Chester, too, during my senior year, so I feel we share that bond.)

Nobody can doubt your love for our country. Whereas your opponent concentrated on lining up support from key special interest groups, your focus was more akin to the patriotic statesman than the opportunistic politician—it was so clear that you wanted to get our country back on track. As we can now see, that wasn’t to be.

What occurs to me is that, by losing the election, you might have been spared a cruel fate. If elected, you would have inherited an economic mess. The problem isn’t just the looming fiscal cliff and debt ceiling, but the overall financial situation of our government is clearly unsustainable and nonviable. Entitlement spending has mushroomed so that it—combined with interest on the national debt—now consumes virtually every dollar of tax revenue. That means that the various departments and agencies that we normally think of as “the federal government,” from the Pentagon through the EPA and everything in between, is being run on borrowed (or “quantitatively eased”) dollars. No president could trim entitlement spending or shut down enough of the government to stanch the flood of red ink. Government indebtedness will continue to balloon and our currency will continue to be debauched, and it would have been impossible for you, given the prevalent attitudes of the people, to halt that insidious process. You might have tried by firing Ben Bernanke and replacing him with someone who would stop quantitative easing, but that would have caused interest rates to rise and the federal government to become insolvent, triggering a crisis that would have made you a vilified president.

The presidency at this juncture in history strikes me as an impossible job. Both domestic and foreign policy seem to be Gordian knots that no mere mortal can cut. I know, though, that you would have valiantly been willing to give your all in the attempt to help your country at this difficult time. Your path as president would have been as excruciating as those last 30 yards of that cross country race you ran so long ago, but you would have addressed the challenge with the same determination and commitment as you did then. Now those awful burdens you would have been willing to shoulder fall on your opponent, and we’ll see what kind of shoulders he has.

You gave years of your life for the chance to be of service to your country, Mitt, and you lived by our school motto, “Aim High.” You did us proud.

Mark W. Hendrickson

Dr. Mark W. Hendrickson is an adjunct faculty member, economist, and fellow for economic and social policy with The Center for Vision & Values at Grove City College.

http://townhall.com/columnists/markwhendrickson/2012/11/10/an_open_letter_to_mitt_romney/page/full/

United We Stand!!! Will President Obama Truly Bring the Nation Together? Part 1

This election cycle has been one of the most interesting in modern history. Most observers agree that the nation was split down the middle on their opinions of the character and vision of the candidates. Without assigning blame, I would like to ask the question: How is it that a campaign of Hope and Change has resulted in such division?

The answer is as simple as the question is puzzling. Our primary division stems from two things: justice concerns among minorities (Blacks, Hispanic, and Asian) and a very liberal agenda concerning personal liberty, energy strategy, and foreign policy. These are questions, according to President Obama, about the foundational values we want the nation to be built upon. It seems to me that whites in the nation are still leaning slightly more toward conservative values. Unfortunately the GOP minorities (blacks, Hispanics, and Asians) who represent almost 1 out of 4 voters, feel that there is no place for them in the Republican ranks.

For years, I have presented the fact that many African Americans and Hispanics have voted on justice issues such as poverty while evangelical Christians focused on righteousness issues. Rush Limbaugh is wrong when he said that the divide in the nation has to do with those who believe in “Santa Claus” and those who don’t. Rush’s rhetoric sounds good but is not based in reality. The Obama campaign forced the nation to look at several “moral issues” that were based on a different kind of grid. If the GOP had spoken a concrete vision concerning revitalization of urban America, systematic immigration reform, and a unifying vision of the support of traditional marriage; they would have won with a landslide.

In a very real sense the presidential race was about choosing what kind of foundation the nation will rest upon for the immediate future. The administration masterfully played on the fears of minorities and the desires of half a dozen liberal agendas – the radical green movement, gay marriage advocates, etc.

The 2012 presidential election is very important because of the profound directional decisions the president has before him. This president will likely choose at least two Supreme Court justices, determine the size of government, set the direction of foreign policy in a post Islamic spring era, and decide the shape of our national healthcare system for a decade beyond his term.

History will look back on this time and say that Barack Obama was either the most transformational president or the worst president in history. His power has not come from a coherent plan or vision which he rightly demanded from Governor Romney. His strength has come from the fact that many segments of the electorate who have felt disenfranchised believe that he understands them better than anyone on the conservative side of the ledger.

Being the better of two evils was a powerful political advantage for the president. Since May 2012, I have spoken with hundreds of faith leaders who described themselves as being caught between “the devil and the deep blue sea.” For them, Mitt Romney represented white privilege and in this period of American disillusionment with politics-as-usual, President Obama’s first election unified many folks. He was elected because we as a people wanted to turn our economy around and to end to five things:

1. Partisanship and game playing in government

2. Racism and social division

3. Reckless national spending under George Bush

4. Irresponsible corporate greed and corruption

5. An era of perceived US war mongering

It is obvious that President Obama has not fixed the economy; even the most optimistic of the president’s supporters are not expecting his policies to produce immediate results. President Clinton’s brilliant national convention speech gave President Obama a “Get Out of Jail Free” card, when he stated that no one could have turned the economy around in such a short time.

At that point of the campaign, candidate Romney could have still won the race by shifting to clearer discussions about capitalism, government, renewing blighted urban areas, and social issues. Focusing on objective economic and tax measures should have been of interest to most Americans. Unfortunately for Romney, economics alone were not on the minds of the electorate.

….To be continued…

Harry R. Jackson, Jr.

Bishop Harry Jackson is chairman of the High Impact Leadership Coalition and senior pastor of Hope Christian Church in Beltsville, MD, and co-authored, Personal Faith, Public Policy [FrontLine; March 2008] with Tony Perkins, president of the Family Research Council.

http://townhall.com/columnists/harryrjacksonjr/2012/11/10/united_we_stand_will_president_obama_truly_bring_the_nation_together_part_1/page/full/

A Personal Note to President Obama

<a href=”http://ad.doubleclick.net/jump/slm.townhall/columnists;sz=225×200;pos=mag;tile=4;ord=10298689?”><img src=”http://ad.doubleclick.net/ad/slm.townhall/columnists;sz=225×200;pos=mag;tile=4;ord=10298689?&#8221; border=0 width=225 height=200 alt=”Click Here!Dear Mr. President:

You must be tired. Please take some time off. You worked very hard to get re-elected. As a loyal American, I want you in good health, and that means some rest and relaxation once in a while.

But when you ramp it up again, I hope you will consider some suggestions from a citizen who’s a bit disappointed in your overall performance. Please understand that I am not looking at this from an ideological perspective, but rather from a sports point-of-view.

I want American leadership to win the game. That means improving the economy, bolstering protection for the folks and running an honest operation from the White House. At this point in history, that’s what winning means to me.

Let’s take the economy first. Apparently, you believe that massive government spending can create well-paying jobs in the private sector. But after four years and almost a trillion dollars of federal money being fed into the economy, it hasn’t worked. Unemployment is about the same as it was when you took over in 2009, and wages are down sharply.

You spent a ton of our money, Mr. President, and we didn’t even get a T-shirt.

Now, I know some of my fellow citizens see it differently and voted for you believing your economic vision is sound. But let’s be honest: The voter breakdown clearly shows that folks receiving some kind of government largesse supported you big-time, while those avidly competing in the marketplace voted for Gov. Romney.

It was no accident that the day after your victory, the stock market plummeted 313 points.

So I hope you’ll rethink the big spending and begin to make it easier for small-business people to make money. When they are flush, the job market surges. When they feel threatened, hiring shuts down.

I well understand that the “tax the rich” mantra got you some political currency. But we both know that strategy will do little to stimulate anything other than jealousy.

On the security front, may I suggest that you be a stand-up guy? Please hold a press conference and tell the folks what you know about the terror attack in Libya and why things are such a mess. This “we’re investigating” stuff is a ruse. Telling us what you know does not impede an investigation.

Dodging Libya hurt your honesty index. And that hurts the country. It is very important that the folks trust you even if they don’t like you. Take that from me. My television program has been top-rated for nearly 13 years, and it’s not because I’m Dale Carnegie. Most Americans respect straightforward talk even if they are annoyed by it.

In closing, congratulations on your victory. You and your guy Axelrod designed a campaign that Romney’s Boston boys could not match. But that’s not what’s important now. Fixing the economy is.

Do that, and your legacy will be assured. Fail, and all hell will break loose.

Bill O’Reilly

Bill O’Reilly is host of the Fox News show “The O’Reilly Factor” and author of “Who’s Looking Out For You?” and Pinheads and Patriots.

http://townhall.com/columnists/billoreilly/2012/11/10/a_personal_note_to_president_obama/page/full/

Hollywood Won 2012?

The television industry loves to claim that all of the sex, violence and foul-mouthed language it displays has zero harmful effects on children. On the other hand, they would never dream of telling their advertisers that their paid messages on TV have no effect. So does the entertainment industry have an impact or doesn’t it?

 

The answer is that Tinseltown certainly has an effect, and when that effect is felt in the political arena, the hell with pretending they don’t. They openly celebrate.

After the 2012 election, the surprising (if narrow) victories for liberals drew a thumbs-up commentary from former Washington Post reporter Sharon Waxman at The Wrap website. She credited Hollywood.

“Hollywood should be euphoric today. The entertainment industry woke up to election results that reflect a country a lot more like the fictional place they’ve been depicting on screens large and small for decades: more ethnically diverse, more gay-friendly, with powerful women and where it’s just fine to light up a spliff.”

The black president won re-election, alongside the first openly lesbian U.S. senator. Voters approved gay marriage referendums in four states and marijuana legalization measures in two states. Waxman added exit poll numbers for minorities: Latinos voted for Obama by 75 to 23 and Asians by 73 to 26. “The affirmation of liberal values in this election is remarkable,” she claimed.

Waxman conceded that almost half the country voted for Mitt Romney. She guessed: “The rejection of the Republican Party agenda was more of a factor than an embrace of left-wing values.”

Where to start? The left certainly can — and should — take the credit for the civil rights crusade. But that was half of a century ago. Why not give Abe Lincoln — yup, Republicans, the credit?

Forty-four states don’t have gay marriage legislation. Since 1998, in 28 states where it’s been proposed, every single ballot initiative to uphold traditional marriage has passed, including blue states like Hawaii and California, although the size of the majorities faded over time.

How did Tolerant Tinseltown handle it? The passage of California’s Proposition 8 in 2008, fervently expected to fail in the Year of Obama, led to a vicious round of anti-Mormon sentiment and blacklisting for opposing “history,” and at least two Mormons were forced into resignations from entertainment jobs for making $1,000 donations to the Prop 8 campaign.

Forward to 2012, and the Mormon Church didn’t want to get involved in state referendums in Maine, Maryland, Minnesota, and Washington because it might interfere with electing the first Mormon president. The Catholic Church and evangelical pro-family activists in these states failed to mobilize enough opposition.

Still, the media declared the victory emanated from television sets across America in HD — for Highly Democratic — and there’s truth here.

The Hollywood Reporter conducted a poll with the research firm Penn Schoen Berland on October 29 and announced that shows with gay characters, like ABC’s “Modern Family,” Fox’s “Glee” and NBC’s “The New Normal” are helping drive voters to “historically unprecedented support of gay marriage.” (Did you hear that, conservatives who regularly ignore Hollywood because, really, who cares?)

Asked about how the shows influenced them, 27 percent said gay-promotional TV shows made them more pro-gay marriage, and 6 percent more opposed. Obama voters watched and 30 percent grew more supportive, to 2 percent less supportive. Surprisingly, the shows were also winning over Romney voters: 13 percent became more pro-gay marriage, while 12 percent were more opposed. (Did you hear that, pro-family conservatives?)

Pollster Mark Penn insisted young people are the most influenced. “Almost twice as many voters under 35 say these shows made them more in favor of gay marriage compared with voters over 35 — 38 percent versus just 20 percent. Impressionable young people are more open to changing their views and behavior, based on what they’re watching.”

But the networks want to deny impressionable young people are swayed by the sensationalism in their programs. The evidence to the contrary is overwhelming.

Liberals are twice as likely to watch these shows, but over the past decade, the Hollywood Reporter poll found about three times as many voters have become more for gay marriage as against — 31 percent pro, 10 percent anti.

Gay activists and their media allies now routinely cite “Glee” and “Modern Family” as proof of the historical inevitability of social liberalism. After the election, former Republican pollster Matthew Dowd cracked the Republicans were a “‘Mad Men’ party in a ‘Modern Family’ world.” In other words, they’re 50 years behind the times.

These same liberals continue to lament that democracy is being destroyed by corporate money sloshing all over the television during the ad breaks, presumably because of their impact in a medium where they claim the entertainment sponsored doesn’t have an impact on impressionable folks — except when the impact furthers the destruction of social mores they like to champion publicly. Did you follow that?

Brent Bozell

Founder and President of the Media Research Center, Brent Bozell runs the largest media watchdog organization in America.

http://townhall.com/columnists/brentbozell/2012/11/09/hollywood_won_2012/page/full/

Aftermath: Lessons from the 2012 Election

The 2012 U.S. election is over, and more than 100 million Americans  participated in the great exercise of democracy — fulfilling the  franchise of the vote. Even with some votes not yet counted and some  issues as yet clarified, a general picture of the election is clearly in  view, and the impact of this election will be both massive and  enduring.

Several lessons emerge in the immediate aftermath of the election and Christians should consider them carefully.

A Decisive Victory

First,  we must recognize that President Barack Obama won a decisive and clear  victory, surging to over 300 votes in the Electoral College before  midnight. Against the expectations of many, the President held his 2008  coalition together. Voting intensity among younger Americans,  African-Americans, Hispanics, and other crucial constituencies held  firm. Once the election results started coming in, an Obama victory came  quickly into view.

Barack Obama avoided the ignominy of an  electoral repudiation and may also have won the popular vote. The  decisive nature of his win spared the nation the agonies of the 2000  election and points to a major political realignment. Other issues also  became clear. The election returns and voting data indicate that  President Obama’s “evolution” on the issue of same-sex marriage cost him  nothing. That probably surprised both sides in that controversy.

Christians  must now pray for our President. As the Apostle Paul instructs us,  “First of all, then, I urge that supplications, prayers, intercessions,  and thanksgivings be made for all people, for kings and all who are in  high positions, that we may lead a peaceful and quiet life, godly and  dignified in every way.” (1 Timothy 2:1-2 ESV) We should eagerly and  urgently pray for our President. We should pray for his health and his  family, for his stamina and his character. We should even pray that he  and his administration will be remembered as one of the greatest of our  nation’s history, measured even by the convictions that are most  important to us.

We are rightly and deeply concerned. We must pray  that God will change President Obama’s heart on a host of issues,  ranging from the sanctity of unborn life to the integrity of marriage.  We must push back against his contraception mandate that tramples upon  religious liberty. Given the trajectory of his first term in office, we  are urgently concerned about a second term, knowing that the President  will never again face the electorate.

As the President  acknowledged in his speech last night, our nation faces huge challenges.  We must pray that President Obama will lead in a spirit of national  unity and mutual respect, bringing Americans together to resolve these  ominous problems. Incredible responsibility now rests on his shoulders.  He has won a second term, now he must rightly lead.

A Divided Electorate

As  morning dawned, the election of 2012 looms as one of the closest in  American history. At 2:00 a.m., only 240,000 votes out of more than 103  million cast separated President Obama and Gov. Mitt Romney. That is a  margin of .3% and would rank the election as the third closest, falling  behind the slim margins of the 1960 election between John F. Kennedy and  Richard M. Nixon and the 1880 election between James Garfield and  Winfield S. Hancock.

The margin in the Electoral College is  significant, but the popular vote reveals a deeply divided nation. The  nation is divided politically, but that divide points to a division at  the level of worldview. The 2012 election makes clear that Americans are  divided over fundamental questions. Americans are divided into camps  that define and see the world in fundamentally different terms. The  election did not cause this division, it merely revealed it. This deep  division at the level of worldview presents President Obama with a  daunting political challenge, but a worldview crisis is an even greater  challenge for the church.

A Changed and Changing Electorate

Fundamental  changes to the American electorate also became evident. Vast  demographic changes mean that the electorate is far more ethnically,  culturally, and ideologically diverse. The electorate is becoming more  secular. Recent studies have indicated that the single greatest  predictor of voting patterns is the frequency of church attendance. Far  fewer Americans now attend church, and a recent study indicated that  fully 20% of all Americans identify with no religious preference at all.  The secularizing of the electorate will have monumental consequences.

America  is becoming more urbanized, and this also changes voting patterns.  Younger voters are disproportionately identified in ethnic terms,  pointing to long-term electoral shifts. Fewer Americans are married and  fewer have children in the home. This, too, changes voting habits. These  are just a few of the factors pointing to a fundamental change in the  nation.

The Demise of the Republican Coalition

Though  many Republicans will draw encouragement from the popular vote, the  Electoral College now confronts the Republican Party as a massive  problem. The map just does not add up for Republicans in terms of the  present reality, much less the shape of the future. Put simply, the  Republican Party cannot win unless it becomes the party of aspiration  for younger Americans and Hispanic Americans. Otherwise, it will soon  become a retirement community for aging conservatives. The party’s  position on immigration is disastrous, and it is at odds with the  party’s own values.

No party can win if it is seen as  heartless. No party can win if it appeals only to white and older  Americans. No party can win if it looks more like the way to the past  than the way to the future. The Republican Party could not defeat a  sitting President with a weak economy and catastrophic unemployment. As  columnist George Will has said, a party that cannot win under these  circumstances might need to look for another line of work.

The  Republican Party will surely enter into a period of intense  self-examination and a struggle for the future shape and direction of  the party. That fight will be necessary, and it will be important to  those of us who are concerned about a range of issues.

A Catastrophe on Moral Issues

Evangelical  Christians must see the 2012 election as a catastrophe for crucial  moral concerns. The election of President Obama returns a radically  pro-abortion President to the White House, soon after he had endorsed  same-sex marriage. President Obama is likely to have the opportunity to  appoint one or more justices to the U.S. Supreme Court, and they are  almost sure to agree with his constitutional philosophy.

Furthermore,  at least two states, Maine and Maryland, legalized same-sex marriage  last night. Washington State is likely to join them once the votes there  are counted. An effort to pass a constitutional amendment preventing  same-sex marriage went down to defeat in Minnesota. These came after 33  states had passed some measure defining marriage as the union of a man  and a woman. After 33 victories, last night brought multiple defeats.

Other states considered issues ranging  from abortion and marijuana to assisted suicide. While not all were  lost, the moral shift was evident in the voting patterns.

Clearly,  we face a new moral landscape in America, and huge challenge to those  of us who care passionately about these issues. We face a worldview  challenge that is far greater than any political challenge, as we must  learn how to winsomely convince Americans to share our moral convictions  about marriage, sex, the sanctity of life, and a range of moral issues.  This will not be easy. It is, however, an urgent call to action.

More than the Presidency Was at Stake

Scores  of other offices were at stake in the 2012 election, and at every  level. The lack of complete election results leaves many unanswered  questions this morning, but one big fact is known — the U.S. Senate  will remain in Democratic hands. As a matter of fact, this election may  well point to a liberal shift in that body. The election of Elizabeth  Warren (MA) and Tammy Baldwin (WI) and the re-election of Sherrod Brown  (OH) point in this direction. Tammy Baldwin becomes the first openly-gay  candidate elected to the U.S. Senate.

It’s Not Really About Politics

Christians  must never see political action as an end, but only as a means. We can  never seek salvation through the voting booth, and we must never look  for a political messiah. Nevertheless, Christians do bear a political  responsibility, established in love of God and love of neighbor. We are  rightly concerned about this world, but only to a limited extent. Our  main concern is the Gospel of Jesus Christ.

Being in the world but  not of the world has never been easy. The 2012 election underlines the  challenges we now face and the responsibilities we dare not neglect.

http://www.albertmohler.com/2012/11/07/aftermath-lessons-from-the-2012-election/