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Sunday, July 20, 2014

Liberals and "the least of these"

As America endures a massive invasion of illegal immigrants at our southern border, many liberals, whether in the media or on Capitol Hill, are attempting to claim the moral high ground in this matter and remind us that this is all about “the children.”

Slamming those protesting and blocking buses attempting to bring the illegal immigrants into their communities, CNN anchor Ashleigh Banfield, full of false piety, declared “It’s devastating. And God help if you’re ever in need of help and you show up and there’s a bus telling you to get out. This is America. Just read what we’re about.” Jesse Jackson said that “getting support for those children in the humanitarian crisis is the moral and right thing to do.”

Nancy Pelosi went so far as to lecture us that “every person has a spark of divinity in them, and is therefore worthy of respect – what we saw in those rooms was [a] dazzling, sparkling, array of God's children, worthy of respect.”

It is no surprise that the left in America would stoop to using children as pawns in their never-ending quest for political supremacy. When you are willing to take positions that call for the killing of the most vulnerable among us—those in the womb—are there any depths to which one wouldn’t sink?

Obama demonstrated such willingness before he got elected President. Back in 2008, after he described his daughter’s hypothetical pregnancy as a “punishment,” and several weeks prior to the election, candidate Barack Obama was asked by pastor Rick Warren what he thought was, “the greatest moral failure of America.” Obama responded with, “I think America’s greatest moral failure in my lifetime has been that we still don’t abide by that basic precept in Matthew that whatever you do for the least of my brothers, you do for me…”

In justifying their votes for Obamacare, like-minded liberals used similar reasoning.

It is appallingly duplicitous that liberals, whether referencing the “least of us,” or calling for government action on behalf of “the children,” are never talking about the unborn. Whatever moral causes one chooses to champion, nothing compares to the helplessness of an unborn child. In other words, there is no one among us more “least” than the unborn. It is the height of hypocrisy for liberals to preach about “social justice” and reference the “least of us,” while supporting policies which have led to the slaughter of millions still in their mothers’ wombs.

Such duplicity would be enough for any reasonable God-fearing person to abandon liberalism, but sadly this hypocrisy doesn’t stop with abortion. As has been noted ad nauseam, for decades liberals have wrought havoc on the American family and traditional (biblical) American values. In other words, tens-of-millions of American children have suffered and continue to suffer terribly under the Big Government policies of liberals. As Jesse Jackson himself recently noted (see link above), Chicago, like many other American urban areas dominated by liberal politics, is a tremendously dangerous place, especially for young people, and in dire need of help.

Ironically, Jackson, his fellow race pimps, publicity prostitutes, and other like-minded liberals, have helped make black neighborhoods the most dangerous places in the U.S. (Eight of the top 25 are neighborhoods in Detroit and Chicago.) Rarely do liberals look to the biggest reason for the existence of such chaos: the breakdown of the family. (Such breakdown has especially harmed black families.) Instead, they insanely continue to promote politics that directly attack the traditional (biblical) American family.

As was noted on American Thinker last year, in dozens of large cities (pop. 50,000+) all across America—from Savannah to Atlanta, Washington D.C., Philadelphia, Baltimore, Hartford, Buffalo, Cleveland, Cincinnati, St. Louis, Milwaukee, and Detroit—more than half of all families are led by single parents, with the numbers for minorities—especially blacks, being significantly higher.

Of course, most of these single parent homes are led by mothers. The absence of dad is devastating for children in a wide variety of ways. Children from single-parent homes are twice as likely to be suspended or expelled from school and are more than twice as likely to be arrested for a juvenile crime. According to the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, 85% of children with behavioral disorders don’t have a father at home.

Children living without dad are much more likely to abuse drugs, commit suicide, and run away from home. They are more likely to have lower academic achievement along with lower self-esteem. Children born to unwed mothers are about seven times more likely to live in poverty than children with fathers in the home. The correlation between fatherless homes and the negative effects on the family is irrefutable.

Of course, similar irrefutable conclusions with motherless homes can be drawn as well. Thus, despite a recent bogus attempt at painting same-sex parenting as normal and healthy for children, most studies show what common sense and sound morality already reveal: children are always best served by a loving and married mother and father in the home.

What’s more, as has been noted before, the same-sex marriage movement is nothing more than a means to an end: the full-on legitimization of homosexuality. With full legal protection, homosexuality, in all of its forms and in spite of its extreme dangers, is being promoted as normal and healthy. Of course, school children are targets.

In addition to destroying the biblical family model, another favorite cause of liberals, man-made global warming, which, of course requires Big Government solutions, also set its sights on children. Since 1970, when the “Earth Day” nonsense began, American school children have been targets as well as pawns (“Save the planet—for the children!”).

For decades now, liberals have shamelessly used children, as well as other vulnerable citizens, to further their Big Government agenda. At the same time, supporting and/or promoting everything from the welfare state, to same-sex marriage, homosexuality, homosexual adoption, transgenderism, pornography, abortion, global warming, and so on, liberals have waged continuous war on the biblical family and biblical values. Of course, “the least” of us, “the children,” suffer the most. Remember this the next time a Democrat and their lackeys in the media want to take action “for the children.”

(See this column on American Thinker.)

Copyright 2014, Trevor Grant Thomas
At the Intersection of Politics, Science, Faith, and Reason.
Trevor and his wife Michelle are the authors of: Debt Free Living in a Debt Filled World
tthomas@trevorgrantthomas.com

13 comments:

  1. Not sure I buy into any part of the current political distraction that is the "illegal kids crossing the border" story, but I did think this comment worthy of note: You accuse the left in America of "using children as pawns in their never-ending quest for political supremacy". That may or may not be true, but if the religious right uses unborn human embryos as political pawns, who is stooping lower?

    And although I've pointed it out before, WHY does the right not target fertility clinincs where hundreds of fertilized human eggs are discarded every day?

    If all fertilized eggs are human beings with a right to life, why does the political right hold a double standard clearly delineated between a fertilized egg in a woman's fallopian tube that has not implanted in the uterine wall and a fertilized egg in a fertility clinic test tube that has not been implanted? When you can adequately explain that, I might understand your argument. Since I know you can't explain it, I expect another artful dodge.

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    1. You're right, Kiev. There's not enough outrage from the pro-life community about IVF clinics destroying embryos. Thanks for bringing that to our attention so we can do something about it.

      The families I know who have used IVF have implanted all of their embryos so that none would be destroyed. Other couples choose to donate their embryos to couples who can't have children of their own. There are ways to approach even something as controversial as IVF without violating one's conscience.

      Delete
  2. The mess at the border is, sadly, very real and one of the most contentious issues currently facing the U.S.

    The "religious right" did not (and usually does not) seek the political war that surrounds abortion. This was the doing of the left.

    Yes, there should be more concern when it comes to fertility clinics and human embryos, though I'm not sure about "hundreds discarded every day." There was more focus on this when GW Bush was President when the embryonic stem cell debate was raging.

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  3. Well that was just pitiful. Comon, you guys can do better than that.

    Where are the legions of pro-lifers protesting at these clinics DEMANDING an immediate stop to the destruction of excess fertilized embryos? They don't exist. They never existed. Where are the internet based pro-life zealots posting names and addresses of the doctors who create and discard those fertilized embryos? Can you show me a target list? No? Have either of you prayed in front of a fertility clinic that God might intervene on behalf of those unborn children discarded every day? Of course I know the answer to that is no as well. Have you collected money to fund extended storage of frozen embryos that might otherwise be discarded? No? How many of your women have lined up as volunteers to receive implantation of these unwanted fertilized eggs and carry them to full gestation? None?

    These unborn children should be easy enough to save, yet the pro-life community wastes neither a nickle of their money nor a minute of their time attempting to do so. Instead you guys prefer to attack women at their most vulnerable moment, and you consistently do that when you could be saving the children discarded at those clinics.

    You seem to have one thing in common with the Taliban: it's all about hazing and oppressing women and attacking your political opposition by any means. Reading from your article above and most of your typical political tripe at AT, that is the distinct message I am getting.

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  4. You protest too much Kiev. I didn't say there was no concern. The facts (if you even bothered to really find out) are that programs exist for the adoption of embryos (http://www.lifenews.com/2011/06/29/what-is-the-pro-life-catholic-view-of-human-embryo-adoption/) (http://www.nrlc.org/archive/news/2004/NRL10/Embryo_Adoption.htm) and the pro-life community is practically unanimous in their position on frozen embryos.

    Most of us don't hear about the life/death issues concerning frozen embryos because such issues are not often covered by the media. In other words it is not an issue that is good for sensational headlines, unless of course, politics enters the fray as during the Bush presidency.

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  5. Quote: "In other words it is not an issue that is good for sensational headlines"

    So you care more about sensational headlines than saving the lives of these children? I sensed that priority, especially after reading and considering your consistent underlying propaganda message, -which is progressives in general and democrats in particular are the root cause of sin and the problems of civil society.

    Could it be your lack of urgency is an indication that deep down you don't really consider them to be children? Or is it just that political propaganda is more important than saving God's innocent children?

    "You protest too much Kiev."

    Yea, tell that to the sensationalistic baby shaker who wrote the article above. You care more about children conceived through fornication than you care about those discarded by fertility clinics. The reason is it serves your agenda, which is entirely political and partisan. I have a message for you: Progressives and democrats are not the cause of single-parent families. I already pointed out the per-capita divorce rate is higher in red states, but you ignored that. Progressives and democrats are not the cause of divorce, adultery, fornication, domestic violence, drug addiction, homosexuality, or unplanned pregnancy. These things have existed since the day Adam and Eve left Eden in shame.

    Do you suppose you consistently blame progressives and democrats for the tribulations of man because you are projecting your own shame? Trevor, I have seen the color of your character. You should look deeply into a mirror and consider your own reflection with humility. The Pharisees who plotted to destroy Jesus and his message were supposedly moral men and leaders of the church, but they had to answer before God for their immoral acts and their corrupt political agenda. You will too.

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    1. Here's the thing, Kiev....When a woman enters an abortion clinic, we know what she's doing: killing her baby or babies. When a woman enters a fertility clinic, she is trying to HAVE a baby. Because of privacy issues, we don't know how many embryos a woman might have, how many she has had implanted, how many she has left, etc. There's no way that we could know those things, and there's no way we're going to picket a fertility clinic that is trying to help families have babies.

      As I said before, there are people who adopt the unused embryos, and many other people would take them if they were available, but for some reason many couples would rather have their embryos destroyed than to have them implanted in another woman and have another family raise them.

      I think you jump to too many conclusions and try to judge the motives of pro-life people without knowing all the facts.

      Delete
  6. I didn't say anything about my care of headlines (and you know it). I said that because this issue does not garner many headlines, most people (on both sides) have not heard about and thus not thought much about (and thus acted little) frozen embryos.

    Also, as DWW implies, fertility clinics generally exist to help children arrive in the world.

    I also never said that progressives and democrats alone are the cause of divorce, homosexuality, et al. What I said was that the politics (and to a great extent, their personal practices/beliefs) of liberals supports/promotes (and thus encourages) these behaviors, which are terrible for our country.

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  7. Quote:
    “As DWW implies, fertility clinics generally exist to help children arrive in the world.”

    I have a philosophical question for you: If a fertility clinic can allow a patient to successfully become pregnant, and if the successful procedure results in (A) one or more fertilized eggs being discarded or destroyed, or (B) the possibility that one or more of a number of successful simultaneous implantations (implanted embryos) must be “reduced” or pruned from the womb to improve statistical chances of one healthy delivery, is that fertility treatment process something you accept and approve on moral grounds?

    Does the ability to create a life allow an exception or an exemption for the sin of murder? You are perfectly equipped to answer this question, as you have God’s word. So answer.

    I will further address something DWW said:

    “Here's the thing, Kiev... When a woman enters an abortion clinic, we know what she's doing: killing her baby or babies.”

    Is that all that Planned Parenthood does? No, it’s not. Planned Parenthood offers services besides abortion. So you don’t actually know anything, you only assume. And yet we know perfectly well how Trevor feels about PP.

    “When a woman enters a fertility clinic, she is trying to HAVE a baby. Because of privacy issues, we don't know how many embryos a woman might have, how many she has had implanted, how many she has left, etc. There's no way that we could know those things, and there's no way we're going to picket a fertility clinic that is trying to help families have babies.”

    Incurious. The proper term is incurious. This is what you are in regards to whether or not fertilized eggs (children) are being discarded as a result of this process. That term has a relevant history. Political historians said GW Bush was “remarkably incurious” to know whether the invasion of Iraq was based on a falsehood. He didn’t care to know if hundreds of thousands of innocent people died because of a false claim his administration made about WMD in Iraq. He even made jokes about possibly finding WMD under a sofa.

    If God’s word is clear that a fertilized egg is a child, your faith compels you to make the same effort to save every child. You could file lawsuits and demand new laws to secure the safety of these innocent lives. But you don’t. Therefore I question your faith and your agenda which is implemented through Trevor’s “hatchet job” commentaries and articles.

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  8. The purposeful destruction, no matter the motivation, would be wrong. Again, virtually all pro-lifers are united in this and efforts are made, but again, are not headline grabbing.

    Planned Parenthood exists for abortions. Yes they offer other "services," but they exist to provide abortions.

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  9. RE PP:
    "Planned Parenthood exists for abortions. Yes they offer other "services," but they exist to provide abortions."

    You answered for DWW? That's either very generous or a Freudian slip. As for the purpose of PP that would be to encourage an outcome where every child is planned and every family is healthy. You of course will accuse PP of murdering for profit, but the fertility clinics do that as well, and you give them a pass when your faith allows NO PASS, and NO EXCEPTIONS.

    Going back a bit for a little unfinished business "Hobby Lobby: We’re Teetering on the Edge": I assume you're not a fan of Al Stewart. That's a shame. One of my faves, along with Steely Dan (example CD: Showbiz Kids), Rush (Moving Pictures), Midnight Oil (Diesel And Dust), and acoustic harpist Andreas Vollenweider (Trilogy).

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  10. No slips. Comments like these are open for all to see and respond. Besides, it doesn't appear that you addressed it specifically to DWW.

    Yeah, not much a fan of Al Stewart. When it comes to secular music, I like a lot of the Eagles, Don Henley's solo stuff, some of Bruce Hornsby, Journey, Bryan Adams, The Police, Richard Marx, and so on. Along with the aforementioned and among others, my IPhone has every thing from ABBA to Alan Jackson. Bing Crosby, Matt Redman, Michael W. Smith, O'Brother Where Art Thou music, Peter Gabriel, Steven Curtis Chapman, Third Day, and several Vineyard worship songs. In fact, for the first time since I can't remember when, I purchased two songs tonight: Phillip Phillps' Home (my boys like it), and ABBA's Dancing Queen (my daughter likes it).

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  11. Yes, there's been a very strange ABBA revival as of late. Perhaps a sign of the coming apocolypse.

    As for the rest, I appreciate the edginess of Don Henley's solo material compared with the Eagles, although their song "On The Border" was notable. Henley's song "A Month Of Sundays" from Building The Perfect Beast is a favorite. Sting is just the opposite. The Police were edgier than his solo stuff but Fields Of Gold was good. Journey was never the same after Steve Perry left and took his voice out of the mix. Peter Gabriel is definitely in my collection, as is Pink Floyd and The Clash. Forgot to mention Bob Dylan earlier. I should kick myself for that.

    Anyways, If you appreciate great sax solos and unusual, interesting lyrics, you should try Al Stewart. Could be an acquired taste. It's odd that Stewart appears to have aged so much while Mick Jager still doesn't look a day over 40. I'm thinking somebody made a deal with the Devil.

    Lately I've been listening to a lot of music from vintage jazz bands. This includes Lionel Hampton, Harry James, Stan Kenton, Gene Krupa, Duke Ellington, Benny Goodman, and Glenn Miller. I must admit I would not normally have bought this kind of music, but I found a 3 volume, 15 CD set called "The Great Big Band Collection" at a yard sale and discovered it quite by accident. I have tried to find duplicates of this set on amazon and ebay, but only find a few individual CDs listed. No one else is selling the complete set. I stumbled across a reference to a 4th volume of this set with 5 more CDs, but I can't find it anywhere and it's driving me crazy. I think most of this was recorded in Germany. It's original music, digitally remastered from magnetic tape recordings made in the 1930s and 1940s. The music is very clean. Tape hiss and flutter is practically non-existent. Example songs include the hits "Ain’t Misbehavin’ and "I Don’t Want To Walk Without You". Meh… part of me worries I like this stuff because I'm getting old. Such is life...

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