60 SCHOLARS CHALLENGE SUPREME COURT ON GAY MARRIAGE WITH STATEMENT CALLING FOR CONSTITUTIONAL RESISTANCE TO "OBERGEFELL V. HODGES"

Statement Calling for Constitutional Resistance to Obergefell v. Hodges 

SEE: https://americanprinciplesproject.org/founding-principles/statement-calling-for-constitutional-resistance-to-obergefell-v-hodges/; republished below in full unedited for informational, educational, and research purposes:

October 8, 2015 | americanprinciplesproject.org

We are scholars and informed citizens deeply concerned by the edict of the Supreme Court of the United States in Obergefell v. Hodges wherein the Court decreed, by the narrowest of margins, that every state in the country must redefine marriage to include same-sex relationships.

The Court’s majority opinion eschewed reliance on the text, logic, structure, or original understanding of the Constitution, as well as the Court’s own interpretative doctrines and precedents, and supplied no compelling reasoning to show why it is unjustified for the laws of the states to sustain marriage as it has been understood for millennia as the union of husband and wife.

The opinion for the Court substituted for traditional—and sound—methods of constitutional interpretation a new and ill-defined jurisprudence of identity—one that abused the moral concept of human dignity.

The four dissenting justices are right to reject the majority opinion in unsparing terms.   

Justice Scalia refers to it as “a naked judicial claim to legislative….power; a claim fundamentally at odds with our system of government.”   

Justice Thomas says the opinion “exalts judges at the expense of the People from whom they derive their authority” as it perverts the meaning of liberty into an entitlement to government action.  

Justice Alito calls attention to the well-established doctrine that the “liberty” guaranteed by the due process clause protects only those rights “that are deeply rooted in this Nation’s history and tradition,” and that it is “beyond dispute that the right to same-sex marriage is not among those rights.” He further points to the opinion’s tendency to reduce the purpose of marriage to “the happiness of persons who choose to marry.” He warns it will be used to “vilify Americans who are unwilling to assent to the new orthodoxy” and is yet another example of the “Court’s abuse of its authority.”   

Chief Justice Roberts says “the Constitution leaves no doubt” that the majority’s “pretentious” opinion is incorrect. It even attempts to “sully those on the other side of the debate” in an “entirely gratuitous” manner.   

If Obergefell is accepted as binding law, the consequences will be grave. Of the results that can be predicted with confidence, four stand out: 

First, society will be harmed by being denied the right to hold out as normative, and particularly desirable, the only type of human relationship that every society must cultivate for its perpetuation. This compelling interest is strengthened by the fact that there is strong evidence to support what common sense suggests, namely, that children fare best when raised by their married mother and father who are both responsible for bringing them into the world and who provide maternal and paternal influences and care.  

Second, individuals and organizations holding to the historic and natural understanding of marriage as a conjugal union—the covenantal partnership of one man and one woman—will be vilified, legally targeted, and denied constitutional rights in order to pressure them to conform to the new orthodoxy.   

Third, the new jurisprudence of dignity is unlimited in principle and will encourage additional claims to redefine marriage and other long-established institutions.

Fourth, the right of all Americans to engage in democratic deliberation, and ultimately self-government, will be decisively undermined. 

Any decision that brings about such evils would be questionable. One lacking anything remotely resembling a warrant in the text, logic, structure, or original understanding of the Constitution must be judged anti-constitutional and illegitimate. Obergefell should be declared to be such, and treated as such, by the other branches of government and by citizens of the United States.

In 1788, James Madison wrote, “The several departments being perfectly co-ordinate by the terms of their common commission, neither of them, it is evident, can pretend to an exclusive or superior right of settling the boundaries between their respective powers.”   

In 1857, Abraham Lincoln said, “Judicial decisions are of greater or less authority as precedents, according to circumstances. That this should be so, accords both with common sense, and the customary understanding of the legal profession.” If a decision “had been made by the unanimous concurrence of the judges, and without any apparent partisan bias, and in accordance with legal public expectation, and with the steady practice of the departments throughout our history, and had been in no part, based on assumed historical facts which are not really true; or, if wanting in some of these, it had been before the court more than once, and had there been affirmed and re-affirmed through a course of years, it then might be, perhaps would be, factious, nay, even revolutionary, to not acquiesce in it as a precedent.” If, however, a decision is “wanting in all these claims to the public confidence,” it is “not factious” to resist it.   

Obergefell is wanting in all these claims to the public confidence. It cannot therefore be taken to have settled the law of the United States.   

Therefore: 

We stand with James Madison and Abraham Lincoln in recognizing that the Constitution is not whatever a majority of Supreme Court justices say it is. 

We remind all officeholders in the United States that they are pledged to uphold the Constitution of the United States, not the will of five members of the Supreme Court.  

We call on all federal and state officeholders: 

To refuse to accept Obergefell as binding precedent for all but the specific plaintiffs in that case.

To recognize the authority of states to define marriage, and the right of federal and state officeholders to act in accordance with those definitions.

To pledge full and mutual legal and political assistance to anyone who refuses to followObergefell for constitutionally protected reasons.

To open forthwith a broad and honest conversation on the means by which Americans may constitutionally resist and overturn the judicial usurpations evident in Obergefell.

We emphasize that the course of action we are here advocating is neither extreme nor disrespectful of the rule of law. Lincoln regarded the claim of supremacy for the Supreme Court in matters of constitutional interpretation as incompatible with the republican principles of the Constitution. Our position is summed up in Lincoln’s First Inaugural Address: 

I do not forget the position assumed by some that constitutional questions are to be decided by the Supreme Court, nor do I deny that such decisions must be binding in any case upon the parties to a suit as to the object of that suit, while they are also entitled to very high respect and consideration in all parallel cases by other departments of the government. And while it is obviously possible that such decision may be erroneous in any given case, still the evil effect following it, being limited to that particular case, with the chance that it may be overruled and never become a precedent for other cases, can better be borne than could the evils of a different practice. At the same time, the candid citizen must confess that if the policy of the government upon vital questions affecting the whole people is to be irrevocably fixed by decisions of the Supreme Court, the instant they are made in ordinary litigation between parties in personal actions, the people will have ceased to be their own rulers, having to that extent practically resigned their government into the hands of that eminent tribunal.

The proper understanding and definition of marriage is self-evidently a vital question affecting the whole people. To treat as “settled” and “the law of the land” the decision of five Supreme Court justices who, by their own admission, can find no warrant for their ruling in the text, logic, structure, or original understanding of the Constitution, would indeed be to resign our government into the hands of that eminent tribunal. That is something that no citizen or statesman who wishes to sustain the great experiment in ordered liberty bequeathed to us by our Founding Fathers should be willing to do. 

Signatories

(Institutional affiliations are for identification purposes only)

Bradley C. S. Watson, Philip M. McKenna Chair in American and Western Political Thought and Professor of Politics, Saint Vincent College

John C. Eastman, Henry Salvatori Professor of Law & Community Service, Dale E. Fowler School of Law at Chapman University

George W. Dent, Jr., Professor of Law, Case Western Reserve University School of Law

Robert P. George, McCormick Professor of Jurisprudence, Princeton University, Founder of American Principles Project

Matthew J. Franck, Director, William E. and Carol G. Simon Center for Religion and the Constitution, Witherspoon Institute

Daniel J. Mahoney, Augustine Chair in Distinguished Scholarship, Assumption College

Stephen H. Balch, Director, Institute for the Study of Western Civilization, Texas Tech University

Mickey G. Craig, William & Berniece Grewcock Professor of Politics, Hillsdale College

Paul Moreno, William and Berniece Chair in US Constitutional History, Hillsdale College

Lucas E. Morel, Class of 1960 Professor of Ethics and Politics, Washington and Lee University

Joseph M. Knippenberg, Professor of Politics, Oglethorpe University

Susan Hanssen, Associate Professor of History, University of Dallas

Wm. Barclay Allen, Dean Emeritus, Michigan State University

Daniel C. Palm, Professor of Politics and International Relations, Azusa Pacific University

Lynn D. Wardle, Bruce C. Hafen Professor of Law, J. Reuben Clark Law School, Brigham Young University

Scott FitzGibbon, Professor of Law, Boston College Law School

Stephen Casey, Casey Law Office, P.C.

James C. Phillips, J.D.

Joshua W. Schulz, Associate Professor of Philosophy, DeSales University

John S. Baker, Jr., Professor Emeritus of Law, Louisiana State University Law Center

Ralph A. Rossum, Salvatori Professor of American Constitutionalism, Claremont McKenna College

Walter Schumm, Professor of Family Studies, Kansas State University

Anne Hendershott, Director of the Veritas Center for Ethics in Public Life, Franciscan University of Steubenville 

Gerard V. Bradley, Professor of Law, University of Notre Dame

Christopher Wolfe, Professor of Politics, University of Dallas

Michael D. Breidenbach, Assistant Professor of History, Ave Maria University

Robert Koons, Professor of Philosophy, University of Texas at Austin

Stephen M. Krason, Professor of Political Science and Legal Studies, Franciscan University of Steubenville; President, Society of Catholic Social Scientists

Micah J. Watson, William-Spoelhof Teacher-Chair in Political Science, Calvin College

Daniel Robinson, Fellow, Faculty of Philosophy, University of Oxford

David Novak, J. Richard and Dorothy Shiff Chair of Jewish Studies and Professor of Religion and Philosophy, University of Toronto

Adam J. MacLeod, Associate Professor of Law, Thomas Goode Jones School of Law, Faulkner University

Robert Lowry Clinton, Emeritus Professor of Political Science, Southern Illinois University Carbondale

Colleen Sheehan, Professor of Political Science, Villanova University

Peter W. Wood, President, National Association of Scholars

Michael M. Uhlmann, Professor of Politics and Policy, Claremont Graduate University

John Agresto, Former president of St. John’s College, Santa Fe, and the American University of Iraq

Mark T. Mitchell, Professor of Government, Patrick Henry College

Carol M. Swain, Professor of Political Science and Law, Vanderbilt University

Nathan Schlueter, Associate Professor of Philosophy, Hillsdale College

J. Daryl Charles, Affiliated Scholar, John Jay Institute

Ted McAllister, Edward L. Gaylord Chair and Associate Professor of Public Policy, Pepperdine University

David R. Upham, Associate Professor of Politics, University of Dallas

Thomas D’Andrea, Fellow, Wolfson College, University of Cambridge; Director, Institute for the Study of Philosophy, Politics, and Religion

Daniel Mark, Assistant Professor of Political Science, Villanova University

Hadley P. Arkes, Edward N. Ney Professor of Jurisprudence  Emeritus, Amherst College; Director, James Wilson Institute on Naturals Right and the American Founding 

Philip Bess, Professor of Architecture, University of Notre Dame

Jeffery J. Ventrella, Senior Counsel and Senior Vice-President of Student Training and Development, Alliance Defending Freedom

Teresa S. Collett, Professor of Law, University of St. Thomas School of Law

Jay Bergman, Professor of History, Central Connecticut State University

Robert L. McFarland, Associate Dean of External Affairs and Associate Professor of Law, Thomas Goode Jones School of Law, Faulkner University

Carson Holloway, Associate Professor Political Science, University of Nebraska, Omaha

Gary D. Glenn, Distinguished Teaching Professor Emeritus, Northern Illinois University

Paul A. Rahe, Charles O. Lee and Louise K. Lee Chair in Western Heritage, Hillsdale College

Angelo Codevilla, Professor Emeritus, Boston University

Bradley P. Jacob, Associate Professor of Law, Regent University School of Law

Raymond B. Marcin, Professor of Law Emeritus, The Catholic University of America

Matthew Spalding, Associate Vice President and Dean, Allen P. Kirby Center for Constitutional Studies and Citizenship, Hillsdale College

James A. Davids, Associate Professor of Law, Regent University School of Law

Ken Masugi, Senior Fellow, Claremont Institute

Edward J. Erler, Professor of Political Science Emeritus, California State University, San Bernardino

James W. (Jim) Richardson, Board of Directors, Christian Legal Society

Robert F. Sasseen, President and Professor of Politics Emeritus, University of Dallas

Lynne Marie Kohm, John Brown McCarty Professor of Family Law and Associate Dean of Faculty Development and External Affairs, Regent University School of Law

Steven D. Smith, Warren Distinguished Professor of Law, University of San Diego

OBAMA SPENT $4.4 MILLION TAX DOLLARS ON GOLF AND PRIVATE FUNDRAISERS IN TWO MONTHS

OBAMA SPENT $4.4 MILLION TAX DOLLARS ON GOLF AND PRIVATE FUNDRAISERS IN TWO MONTHS

Documents show astounding cost to Americans of President's jaunts

by STEVE WATSON

SEE: http://www.infowars.com/obama-spent-4-4-million-tax-dollars-on-golf-and-private-fundraisers-in-two-months/; republished below 

in full unedited for informational, educational, and research purposes:

Documents obtained by the political watchdog Judicial Watch this week show that in just two months the President spent close to $4.5 million on golfing and fundraising trips.

The records were obtained from the U.S. Department of the Air Force as part of of Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request.

They reveal that Obama’s February and March golf vacations and fundraisers came to a whopping $4,436,245.50 in travel expenses ALONE.

The security costs of the trips to Palm Springs and Palm City, as well as fundraising trips to Chicago and LA, have not yet been revealed by the Secret Service.

According to Judicial Watch, the documents show:

• Obama’s February 14, 2015, golf outing to Palm Springs required a five-hour flight, costing taxpayers a total of $1,031,685.
• Transportation for Obama’s February 19 day trip to Chicago cost taxpayers $619,011.00.
• Transportation for Obama’s March 2015 fundraising trip to Los Angeles cost taxpayers $1,980,835.20.
• Obama’s March 28, 2015, golf outing to Palm city required a 3.9-hour flight, costing taxpayers $804,870.30.

The report notes that in Palm Springs Obama spent the whole weekend at the luxurious Sunnylands country club, while the trip to LA was mostly about appearing on “Jimmy Kimmel Live” and raking in up to $33,400 per couple for attendance to a private DNC fundraiser.

The two golf outings alone cost taxpayers $1,836,555 in travel expenses. Obama played a total of five rounds of golf, equating to a cost of $20,406 per hole. The two fundraising trips totaled $2.59 million.

“Taxpayers should be outraged that Barack Obama’s wastes 4.4 million of their precious tax dollars on golf vacations and political fundraising,” said Judicial Watch President Tom Fitton.

“And to make matters worse, the Secret Service has simply refused to respond to our requests for documents about the security costs of these controversial trips. The Obama travel scandal is about abuse of office, abuse of the taxpayer, and contempt for the rule of law.” Fitton urged.

Last year, in the same two months, Obama spent nearly $3 million for flight expenses alone to play golf in Palm Springs and Key Largo.

The Obamas have spent tens of millions in tax dollars to vacation around 40 times in the past six years. To date, the known travel expenses of the Obamas and Vice President Joe Biden exceed $61million, according to Judicial Watch.

OBAMA: CHRISTIANS HAVE AN "US VERSUS THEM MINDSET"~WHAT ABOUT HIS "US VS. THEM" RELIGION OF DIVIDE & CONQUER THAT PERSECUTES CHRISTIANS & PATRIOTS?

BIBLICAL SEPARATION REQUIRES CHRISTIANS TO SEE EVIL, EXPOSE IT, AND TREAT IT AS AN ENEMY OF THE SOUL

OBAMA IS THAT EVIL

2 Corinthians 6:14-18-"Be ye not unequally yoked together with unbelievers: for what fellowship hath righteousness with unrighteousness? and what communion hath light with darkness? And what concord hath Christ with Belial? or what part hath he that believeth with an infidel? And what agreement hath the temple of God with idols? for ye are the temple of the living God; as God hath said, I will dwell in them, and walk in them; and I will be their God, and they shall be my people. Wherefore come out from among them, and be ye separate, saith the Lord, and touch not the unclean thing; and I will receive you, and will be a Father unto you, and ye shall be my sons and daughters, saith the Lord Almighty."

Ephesians 5:5-11-"For this ye know, that no whoremonger, nor unclean person, nor covetous man, who is an idolater, hath any inheritance in the kingdom of Christ and of God. Let no man deceive you with vain words: for because of these things cometh the wrath of God upon the children of disobedience. Be not ye therefore partakers with them. For ye were sometimes darkness, but now are ye light in the Lord: walk as children of light: (For the fruit of the Spirit is in all goodness and righteousness and truth;) proving what is acceptable unto the Lord. And have no fellowship with the unfruitful works of darkness, but rather reprove them." 

ANDY STANLEY'S "PASTOR IN CHIEF" IMPOSTOR, POSING AS ALLEGED CHRISTIAN, BUT REALLY AN APOSTATE, NARCISSIST, LIAR, USER, MANIPULATOR, ISLAMIC TERRORIST, CHRISTIAN PERSECUTOR & AMERICA HATER

http://apprising.org/2013/01/22/andy-stanley-president-obama-should-be-called-pastor-in-chief/

ISLAM DISPLAYS AN "US VERSUS THEM" MENTALITY, FREQUENTLY IN A VIOLENT WAY

"Us-versus-them" Obama 

Again Slams Christianity

BY SELWYN DUKE

SEE: http://www.thenewamerican.com/usnews/item/21774-us-versus-them-obama-again-slams-christianity; republished below in full unedited for informational, educational, and research purposes:

Some have mockingly called Barack Obama “Dear Reader” for his reliance on a Teleprompter. But considering that while speaking extemporaneously he has uttered comments such as Middle American voters “cling to guns or religion or antipathy to people who aren't like them” and women shouldn’t be “punished with a baby,” his recourse to such technology is no mystery. And now we learn that, again, when the Telee's away Obama’s tongue will play.

The latest revelatory comment was made during a conversation the president had with Pulitzer Prize-winning author Marilynne Robinson for a New York Review of Books piece published Monday. While discussing Gilead, the author’s book about a 1950s Iowa pastor, Obama asked, “How do you reconcile the idea of faith being really important to you and you caring a lot about taking faith seriously with the fact that, at least in our democracy and our civic discourse, it seems as if folks who take religion the most seriously sometimes are also those who are suspicious of those not like them?” The president also said, “Sometimes Christian interpretation seems to posit an ‘us versus them [mindset].’”

Perhaps Obama got this impression attending Trinity United Church of Christ for 20 years and listening to the man he called his mentor, friend, and uncle — Jeremiah Wright — call our nation the “US of KKKA” and spew venom such as “God d*** America!"? Then again, many critics would aver that Obama was merely projecting.

After all, there was that 2010 Univision radio interview in which the president stated that Hispanic voters needed to say, “We’re gonna punish our enemies.” Even worse, though, was a speech Obama gave to a mainly black audience at Hampton University in Virginia on June 5, 2007. As Dr. Thomas Sowell reported in 2012:

In his speech — delivered in a ghetto-style accent that Obama doesn't use anywhere except when he is addressing a black audience — he charged the federal government with not showing the same concern for the people of New Orleans after hurricane Katrina hit as they had shown for the people of New York after the 9/11 attacks, or the people of Florida after hurricane Andrew hit.

Departing from his prepared remarks, he mentioned the Stafford Act, which requires communities receiving federal disaster relief to contribute 10 percent as much as the federal government does.

Senator Obama, as he was then, pointed out that this requirement was waived in the case of New York and Florida because the people there were considered to be "part of the American family." But the people in New Orleans — predominantly black — "they don't care about as much," according to Barack Obama.

Except that none of this was true. As Sowell explained, “Less than two weeks earlier, on May 24, 2007, the United States Senate had in fact voted 80-14 to waive the Stafford Act requirement for New Orleans, as it had waived that requirement for New York and Florida. More federal money was spent rebuilding New Orleans than was spent in New York after 9/11 and in Florida after hurricane Andrew, combined.”

Us versus them?

Yet there’s a kicker, too — and it’s a shocker. As Sowell pointed out, Obama could claim to not have been present in church during even one instance when Wright used hateful rhetoric. But the U.S. Senate actually takes attendance.

And Obama was present for the May 24, 2007 Stafford Act vote.

In other words, either Obama had a serious case of amnesia, or, as Sowell suggests, he was engaging in demagoguery, dividing people, and rubbing resentments “raw” in the name of political power and “fundamental change.” Sowell certainly has drawn his conclusion — he dubbed the president “Phony in Chief.”

Transitioning from how Obama talks to “us” to how he treats “them,” quite telling is a story related by economist and gun-rights advocate Dr. John Lott on Mark Levin’s October 2 radio show. Speaking about the time he and Obama were both in the University of Chicago’s employ, Lott mentioned that Obama didn’t attend the gatherings at which the staff exchanged ideas; he seemed wholly uninterested in what others had to say. The one exception, however, was an instance when he showed up and asked a fairly unintelligible question. Lott then saw Obama after the event and, trying to make friends and conversation, said (I’m paraphrasing), “You know, your question was interesting, but I think more people would have understood it if…” Lott never got to finish.

Because Obama, cold as ice, just turned his back.

Lott reports that when he would occasionally see Obama in the street at future times and extend a greeting, the reaction was the same. For the sin of having disagreed with president-to-be, Lott was dead to him.

Us versus them?

Perhaps Barack Obama has a religion all his own.

_______________________________________________________________

SEE ALSO: http://www.charismanews.com/culture/52654-obama-calls-out-serious-christians-for-us-versus-them-mentality; republished below in full unedited for informational, educational, and research purposes:

"Obama Calls Out 'Serious' Christians for 

'Us Versus Them' Mentality"

BY JESSILYN JUSTICE

Christians in the United States have an "us versus them" mentality and are inherently suspicious, or so Barack Obama ponders in a new interview.  

The president sat down with Gilead author Marilynne Robinson in a roles-reversed interview in which Obama asked the questions. Robinson's novel delves into the spiritual battles facing America through the eyes of a Midwestern pastor.  

In light of attacks on religious freedom across the country as well as the murder of Christians in Oregon, the president asked the author about a believer's role in democracy: "But you've struggled with the fact that here in the United States, sometimes Christian interpretation (of democracy) seems to posit an 'us versus them,'" Obama says.

"How do you reconcile the idea of faith being really important to you and you caring a lot about taking faith seriously with the fact that, at least in our democracy and our civic discourse, it seems as if folks who take religion the most seriously sometimes are also those who are suspicious of those not like them?" 

But inherent Christian values are under fire, even in the land of the free: Gay couples sue private businesses for refusing products so frequently lawmakers scramble to protect religious rights.  

Doctors lose their jobs for speaking out, and atheist groups harass schools and teachers into bowing to an anti-God agenda. 

According to Robinson, though, those who take their faith seriously should be ready to encounter difficulty.  

"I mean, when people are turning in on themselves—and God knows, arming themselves and so on—against the imagined other, they're not taking their Christianity seriously," Robinson says. "I don't know—I mean, this has happened over and over again in the history of Christianity, there's no question about that, or other religions, as we know. But Christianity is profoundly counterintuitive—'Love thy neighbor as thyself'—which I think properly understood means your neighbor is as worthy of love as you are, not that you're actually going to be capable of this sort of superhuman feat. But you're supposed to run against the grain. It's supposed to be difficult. It's supposed to be a challenge." 

For Robinson, it appears as if vocal Christianity has no place in the public square.  

"Well, I believe that people are images of God," she tells Obama. "There's no alternative that is theologically respectable to treating people in terms of that understanding. What can I say? It seems to me as if democracy is the logical, the inevitable consequence of this kind of religious humanism at its highest level. And it (applies) to everyone. It's the human image. It's not any loyalty or tradition or anything else; it's being human that enlists the respect, the love of God being implied in it." 

But according to Emory University Law Professor John Witte, Christianity and democracy complement and challenge each other.  

"Christianity provides democracy with a system of beliefs that integrates its concerns for liberty and responsibility, individuality and community," Witte writes. "Democracy's commitment to religious freedom opens new opportunities to Christianity and challenges the church to extend its mission and ministry. Democracy's commitment to religious equality forces Christianity to stand on its own feet and on an equal footing with all other religions."

But is it really "equal footing" when Christian persecution is largely ignored, and when it's brought to the spotlight, the president himself calls them "suspicious"? 

________________________________________________________________

Obama Asks Novelist About ‘Suspicious’ Christians with ‘Us Versus Them’ Mentality

BY HEATHER CLARK

SEE: http://christiannews.net/2015/10/14/obama-asks-novelist-about-suspicious-christians-with-us-versus-them-mentality/;

republished below in full unedited for informational, educational, and research purposes:

DES MOINES, Iowa — Following release of interview footage with Barack Obama and Pulitzer Prize-winning novelist Marilynne Robinson, some are expressing concern about Obama’s remarks regarding those of the Christian faith.

“Tell me a little bit about how your interest in Christianity converges with your concerns about democracy,” Obama asked Robinson, being the interviewer.

“Well, I believe that people are images of God. There’s no alternative that is theologically respectable to treating people in terms of that understanding,” the novelist replied. “It seems to me as if democracy is the logical, the inevitable consequence of this kind of religious humanism at its highest level. And it [applies] to everyone. It’s the human image. It’s not any loyalty or tradition or anything else; it’s being human that enlists the respect, the love of God being implied in it.”

Obama then cited some of Robinson’s concerns about Christians.

“But you’ve struggled with the fact that here in the United States, sometimes Christian interpretation seems to posit an ‘us versus them,’ and those are sometimes the loudest voices,” he said. “But sometimes I think you also get frustrated with kind of the wishy-washy, more liberal versions where anything goes.”

The president then asks a question regarding his view that those who take religion seriously are “suspicious” of those with different beliefs.

“How do you reconcile the idea of faith being really important to you and you caring a lot about taking faith seriously with the fact that, at least in our democracy and our civic discourse, it seems as if folks who take religion the most seriously sometimes are also those who are suspicious of those not like them?” Obama asked.

“Well, I don’t know how seriously they do take their Christianity, because if you take something seriously, you’re ready to encounter difficulty, run the risk, whatever. I mean, when people are turning in on themselves—and God knows, arming themselves and so on—against the imagined other, they’re not taking their Christianity seriously,” Robinson replied.

Some note that Obama has made critical statements about Christians on a number of occasions during his presidency, including a comment during a prayer breakfast in April.

“I do reflect on the fact that as a Christian, I am supposed to love. And I have to say that sometimes when I listen to less than loving expressions by Christians, I get concerned,” he said.

“Lest we get on our high horse and think this is unique to some other place, remember that during the Crusades and the Inquisition, people committed terrible deeds in the name of Christ,” Obama also stated in February.

“The Crusades were a defense against Islamic aggression and takeover of [Catholic]-held lands. These were bloody wars that went on for centuries, but not because the [Catholics] liked war—but because the Islamic aggressors would not stop waging war, much like they do today,” Martin Mawyer of Christian Action Network wrote in response at that time.

“Did Obama mention the Islamic aggression during the Crusades during Ramadan? Did he ever take the opportunity at a Muslim holiday or gathering to chide the Muslims for getting up on their ‘high horse; about their religion?” he asked. “Of course not. He only tells it like (he thinks) it is when there is a Christian gathering, and only in strident anti-Christian tones.”

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VIDEOS:

THE "MAC DADDY" BARRY SOETORO" FROM HAWAII:

2013

2013

2015

JEFF RENSE INTERVIEWS MIA POPE 2013

OBAMA SPENT $4.4 MILLION TAX DOLLARS ON GOLF AND PRIVATE FUNDRAISERS IN TWO MONTHS

Documents show astounding cost to Americans of President's jaunts

by STEVE WATSON

SEE: http://www.infowars.com/obama-spent-4-4-million-tax-dollars-on-golf-and-private-fundraisers-in-two-months/; republished below 

in full unedited for informational, educational, and research purposes:

Documents obtained by the political watchdog Judicial Watch this week show that in just two months the President spent close to $4.5 million on golfing and fundraising trips.

The records were obtained from the U.S. Department of the Air Force as part of of Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request.

They reveal that Obama’s February and March golf vacations and fundraisers came to a whopping $4,436,245.50 in travel expenses ALONE.

The security costs of the trips to Palm Springs and Palm City, as well as fundraising trips to Chicago and LA, have not yet been revealed by the Secret Service.

According to Judicial Watch, the documents show:

• Obama’s February 14, 2015, golf outing to Palm Springs required a five-hour flight, costing taxpayers a total of $1,031,685.
• Transportation for Obama’s February 19 day trip to Chicago cost taxpayers $619,011.00.
• Transportation for Obama’s March 2015 fundraising trip to Los Angeles cost taxpayers $1,980,835.20.
• Obama’s March 28, 2015, golf outing to Palm city required a 3.9-hour flight, costing taxpayers $804,870.30.

The report notes that in Palm Springs Obama spent the whole weekend at the luxurious Sunnylands country club, while the trip to LA was mostly about appearing on “Jimmy Kimmel Live” and raking in up to $33,400 per couple for attendance to a private DNC fundraiser.

The two golf outings alone cost taxpayers $1,836,555 in travel expenses. Obama played a total of five rounds of golf, equating to a cost of $20,406 per hole. The two fundraising trips totaled $2.59 million.

“Taxpayers should be outraged that Barack Obama’s wastes 4.4 million of their precious tax dollars on golf vacations and political fundraising,” said Judicial Watch President Tom Fitton.

“And to make matters worse, the Secret Service has simply refused to respond to our requests for documents about the security costs of these controversial trips. The Obama travel scandal is about abuse of office, abuse of the taxpayer, and contempt for the rule of law.” Fitton urged.

Last year, in the same two months, Obama spent nearly $3 million for flight expenses alone to play golf in Palm Springs and Key Largo.

The Obamas have spent tens of millions in tax dollars to vacation around 40 times in the past six years. To date, the known travel expenses of the Obamas and Vice President Joe Biden exceed $61million, according to Judicial Watch.

New Obama Terror Czar Will Target Conservatives, Christians

BY ALEX NEWMAN

SEE: http://www.thenewamerican.com/usnews/crime/item/21785-new-obama-terror-czar-will-target-conservatives-christians;

republished below in full unedited for informational, educational, and research purposes:

The Obama administration's increasingly controversial Justice Department, in partnership with the ultra-leftist Southern Poverty Law Center, announced the creation of a new czar position to focus on “domestic terrorism” — especially the alleged threat from Christians and Americans with “anti-government” views. While ostensibly created to serve as a coordination office overseeing domestic terror cases, critics and analysts are sounding the alarm, warning that the administration is plotting to go after its political opponents with the full force of the federal government.

The impetus for the Obama DOJ's new focus on conservatives, libertarians, Christians, and others appears to be the Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC), widely viewed as an “anti-Christian hate group” and strongly criticized even by mainstream voices on the Left. Civil rights attorney and Southern Center for Human Rights President Stephen Bright, citing investigations and even a federal judge, lambasted SPLC founder Morris Dees as a “con man and fraud” who takes advantage of “naive, well-meaning people.”

Ironically, the SPLC was implicated in an actual domestic terrorism case, one of the few, just over two years ago. The attack involved a deranged homosexual activist, relying on the far-left group's “hate” propaganda, who tried to massacre employees of the Family Research Council, a pro-family group falsely characterized as a “hate group” by the SPLC. “We’ve been pushing for something like this for quite a few years,” declared SPLC mouthpiece Mark Potok about the new domestic terror czar. “We feel like it’s very much a step forward, although we’ll have to see how it plays out.”

The announcement of the new domestic extremism czar position was made at George Washington University by Obama's Assistant Attorney General for National Security John Carlin, a Harvard lawyer. “We need to make sure we have the mechanisms in place so that we can continue to remain just as focused on the domestic terrorism threat while addressing the international terrorism threat,” Carlin said in a question-and-answer session after his speech, which was co-hosted by the SPLC. “The new DT [Domestic Terror] Counsel will not only help ensure that DT cases are properly coordinated by will also play a key role in our headquarters-level efforts to identify trends to help shape our strategy, and to analyze legal gaps or enhancements required to ensure we can combat these threats.”

What bureaucrat might fill the position was not immediately clear. But when it comes to what the Obama administration is looking for, Carlin offered more details. “Homegrown violent extremists can be motivated by any viewpoint on the full spectrum of hate — anti-government views, racism, bigotry, anarchy and other despicable beliefs,” Carlin explained, without explaining how being opposed to government was hateful or why people's views should concern the federal government. “When it comes to hate and intolerance, no single ideology governs.” But if Carlin's views on what constitutes “hate” and “anti-government” views are anything like the SPLC's, Americans should expect Obama's new terror czar to step up its escalating anti-constitutional attacks and intimidation against Christian groups, forces that stand for traditional (or biblical) marriage, pro-family organizations, pro-life groups, constitutionalist organizations, and more.

The SPLC specializes in smearing conservatives and Christians by, among other tactics, sandwiching peaceful activists between National Socialists (Nazis) and Ku Klux Klan groups. The group refers to the John Birch Society, for example, the parent organization of this magazine, as “Chief among the Patriot groups,” with the word patriot, in SPLC-speak, used to connote something negative, namely "anti-government," though the JBS is not anti-government in the slightest, only anti-lawless or -tyrannical government. The SPLC also demonizes as “hate groups” everything from mainstream pro-family organizations to voices that criticize radical Islamism. On top of that, the SPLC has been widely ridiculed for wildly inflating its lists of both “hate” groups and “patriot” groups, even listing defunct websites run by a single person or the “Granny Warriors” as targets in its outlandish propaganda materials.

But critics say it is the SPLC and its allies, in fact, that deserve more scrutiny — and not just because the group's hate propaganda inspired terrorist Floyd Corkins to buy a gun and try to murder as many innocent employees of a mainstream pro-family group as possible, and then shove Chi-fil-A sandwiches in his victims' mouths. In fact, the SPLC's views are so radical that the mainstream American Family Association, with millions of supporters, labels it an “anti-Christian hate group,” and numerous prominent voices on the Left have denounced the SPLC as well.While the SPLC's ramblings are occasionally taken seriously by anti-Christian bigots in government and the establishement media, most conservative and libertarian organizations and individuals consider it a badge of honor to be slandered by the SPLC. Still, its methodology has long been the subject of ridicule, and it has become increasingly marginalized as an extremist group among sensible Americans.  

Despite the stench of the SPLC's reputation — even prominent leftists have blasted the outfit and its founder as money-grubbing scam artists that bilk and terrorize donors while demonizing those whose views it disagrees with — Carlin had nothing but praise for the outfit. Groups like the SPLC, which has long been openly associated with communists, terrorists, and other radicals, “dedicate themselves to examining what the threat is, observing it, and reporting on it,” Carlin claimed, apparently with a straight face. Of course, in reality, the opposite is true, as even other arms of the Obama administration and growing swaths of the establishment media have slowly started to realize. “I can say, based on our briefings, that as I said in my opening remarks, we very much think that the domestic terrorism threat is a real and present threat that demands to be addressed in new, creative ways,” Carlin continued, adding that the “Southern Poverty Law Center and other groups in this space are very important.”

Ironically, Carlin also discredited much of his argument about anti-government activists by touting a debunked “study” claiming that alleged “right-wing extremists,” apparently hiding under every bed, have become a bigger threat to America than Islamic terrorists — many of whom have been armed and openly supported by the Obama administration, prompting even retired U.S. generals to argue that Obama had “switched sides” in the terror war. The propaganda “study” in question, produced by the statist George Soros-funded New America Foundation (no link to this magazine), has been widely ridiculed as a pathetic attempt at propaganda on par with Obama administration efforts to demonize conservatives, libertarians, Ron Paul supporters, veterans, pro-life activists, liberty lovers, and more as potential terrorists and extremists in various official reports.

A report on “right-wing extremism” produced by Obama's Department of Homeland Security warning of veterans and conservatives was eventually withdrawn after it went public. The DHS was subjected to merciless ridicule once the sources, many of which were known hoax websites, emerged. But other, similar propaganda continues to be pumped out, at taxpayer expense. And the New America report, while not directly affiliated with the administration, has been blasted for major flaws that provide evidence of deliberate manipulation to achieve the desired result — demonizing political opponents.    

A recent article on Obama's new czar hunting right-wing extremists by Leo Hohmann at WND, for example, pointed out that the New America study cited a mentally ill, drug-abusing, anti-Christian terrorist motivated by National Socialism as an example of “right-wing terrorism.” Other alleged examples of “right-wing terrorism” included a 2004 bank robbery, an armed home robbery in 2009, and a few non-political shootings of police. In all, the “study” managed to find or invent 48 victims of “right-wing terrorism” since the September 11 attacks killed 3,000 Americans. When it comes to Islamist terrorism, though, the “study” failed to include everything from Chattanooga shooter Muhammad Youssef Abdulazeez's recent attack that killed five U.S. servicemen to John Muhammad's Washington, D.C., shooting spree that left 10 dead back in 2002. Despite being debunked, the pseudo-study was regurgitated by Carlin and some leftist media outlets without noting its obvious flaws.  

Critics, though, are already warning that Obama's new domestic terror czar is no joke. Bryan Fischer, writing on the pro-family One News Now site, blasted the president's “abiding hostility to people of Christian faith” — as exemplified most recently by the new terror czar position and Obama's apparent belief that Christians are a threat to national security. “If you are a sincerely devoted follower of Jesus Christ, your president believes you are a potential domestic terrorist,” Fischer wrote, pointing to Obama's new domestic terror czar job and the statements made by Carlin and the SPLC. “And where, pray tell, does this threat come from? From the Muslim Brotherhood, which has a stated goal of exterminating Western civilization and sabotaging our miserable house from within? Nope. From ISIS, which is actively recruiting jihadists in all 50 states? Nope. Jihadists who are sneaking into the United States disguised as Syrian refugees? Nope.”

Blasting the “thoroughly discredited” SPLC, “which is so blatantly and maliciously biased against Christians that other parts of Obama's administration – the FBI, the Pentagon, and the U.S. Army – are getting as far away from the SPLC as they can,” Fischer said Obama and his “minions” consider the Family Research Council and the American Family Association to be the “real threat.”  He also noted that the SPLC's “intelligence project director,” who teamed up with the DOJ, had admitted to a reporter that the SPLC classifies groups “on the basis of ideology.” “In other words, the SPLC will vilify groups because of what they believe, not because of what they do or because they have demonstrated any propensity toward violence,” Fischer noted, citing the SPLC operative's own admission that the groups demonized by the SPLC are not targeted based on whether they are violent or not, but “on the basis of ideology.”  

“Do we disagree with the homosexual lobby about homosexuality? Of course. Do we hate them? Absolutely not. Do we advocate violence against them? Never have, never will. We are simply determined to tell the moral, spiritual, and physical truth about non-normative sexual behavior,” Fischer continued, blasting the SPLC's attacks on pro-family groups based on the far-left outfit's own subjective hatred of what those groups say. “Bottom line: disagreement is not hatred, and the truth is not hate speech. Somebody needs to tell that to the president.” Of course, Obama already knows that, yet has demonstrated repeatedly his disdain for Christians — especially those who “bitterly” cling to their guns and Bibles.

Indeed, so outrageous and brazen has the administration's anti-Christian bigotry become, that the Obama Defense Department was exposed teaching U.S. troops that Evangelical Christians, Catholics, and Orthodox Jews were “religious extremists” in the same category with Hamas and al-Qaeda. Just last week, Obama and the United Nations launched a global jihad against extremism, promising to stamp out “anti-Muslim bigotry” wherever it may be hiding. Also last week, Obama was again demonizing Christians, suggesting that the most devoted followers of Christ Jesus are actually xenophobes "suspicious of those not like them.”

In its final year in office, the Obama administration seems to be becoming a caricature of itself — an angry, petulant, paranoid, anti-American spectacle that would almost appear to be a comedy act if the implications for liberty and constitutional government were not so extreme.

Unsurprisingly, the new domestic terror czar announcement, and especially its links to the radical SPLC, has sparked a firestorm of outrage. However, the American people overwhelmingly elected Republicans to Congress so they could stop Obama and his “fundamental transformation” of America. A good place to start would be to examine the DOJ and its latest  antics. If they are unconstitutional, or chill free speech in any way, they should be defunded immediately. If lawmakers find that the Justice Department is playing politics and demonizing, spying on, or threatening peaceful Americans for their political or religious views, Congress should start holding those responsible for the scheming accountable. Without congressional action, though, Americans can expect even more attacks on middle America in the coming months as Obama's “fundamental transformation” reaches its climax.  


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