WASHINGTON, D.C., NOT BAGHDAD, THREATENING OUR LIBERTIES

Not since the Bolshevik revolution in Russia and the Nazi takeover in
Germany has a western nation seen the kind of collapse of individual
freedom that the United States of America is currently seeing. Under
President George W. Bush, the constitutional protections of our liberties
are speedily vanishing. News reports of the demise of our freedoms are so
common it is difficult to keep up with all of them.

For example, the August 16 edition of Newsweek reports, "Rep. Porter
Goss, President Bush's nominee to head the CIA, recently introduced
legislation that would give the president new authority to direct CIA agents
to conduct law-enforcement operations inside the United States -
including arresting American citizens.
"The legislation, introduced by Goss on June 16 and touted as an
'intelligence reform' bill, would substantially restructure the U.S.
intelligence community by giving the director of the Central Intelligence (DCI)
broad new powers to oversee its various components scattered throughout
the government."
Another report of America's dissolving liberties was published by World
Net Daily on June 21, 2004. It said, "President Bush plans to unveil
next month a sweeping mental health initiative that recommends screening
for every citizen and promotes the use of expensive antidepressants and
antipsychotic drugs favored by supporters of the administration."

Can anyone imagine anything more Orwellian than allowing the federal
government to be given the power to "screen" every American citizen? This
is right out of Huxley's "Brave New World."
Another disturbing report comes from The New American. It told how the
U.S. Supreme Court has upheld the "right" of President Bush to suspend
habeas corpus protections of U.S. citizens. The vote was 8-1 with only
Justice Antonin Scalia dissenting.
The New American report said, "In an unusually pointed dissent, Justice
Antonin Scalia condemned the majority decision for eviscerating the
habeas corpus guarantee, which prevents the government from indefinitely
imprisoning individuals without formal criminal charges or legal
recourse.
"Invoking Alexander Hamilton's warning against Americans 'resort[ing]
to repose and security to institutions which have a tendency to destroy
their civil and political rights,' Scalia observes: 'The Founders
warned us about the risk, and equipped us with a Constitution designed to
deal with it.' However, he concludes, 'the Court has proceeded to meet
the current emergency in a manner the Constitution doesn't envision'- one
that may ultimately prove deadlier to our system of ordered liberty
than anything al-Qaeda could inflict on us."
All Americans need to remember that it doesn't matter one iota whether
it is a fascist-leaning conservative or a socialist-leaning liberal who
attempts to steal our God-given liberties: each is equally a tyrant and
should be vigorously opposed by liberty-loving people everywhere! Well
did Benjamin Franklin say, "Rebellion to tyrants is obedience to God."
The American people also need to realize that we are in a fight to
preserve our liberties and that the major source of this attack against our
freedoms is coming, not from Baghdad, but from Washington, D.C.
Therefore, be they Democrats or Republicans, men or women, whites or
blacks, conservatives or liberals, Christians or pagans, all who attempt
to use their political or judicial offices to trample our
constitutionally protected liberties must be met with unyielding resistance!
© 2004 Pastor Chuck Baldwin - All Rights Reserved