Our lesson today comes from the songwriter Frank Loesser:In the book "America Alone," Mark Steyn
"Praise The Lord And Pass The Ammunition."
...note[s] a global survey on optimism: 61 percent of Americans were optimistic about the future, 29 percent of the French, 15 percent of Germans. Take it from a foreigner: In my experience, Americans are the least "bitter" people in the developed world. Secular, gun-free big-government Europe doesn't seem to have done anything for people's happiness.I sometimes hear politicians - even ones I generally agree with - talking about restoring Americans' trust in the government. I think it is part of American DNA to distrust the government. The further removed it is from me and my control, the less I want it involved in my life. On the other hand...
Europeans did "vote for their own best interests" – i.e., cradle-to-grave welfare, 35-hour workweeks, six weeks of paid vacation, etc. – and as a result they now face a perfect storm of unsustainable entitlements, economic stagnation and declining human capital that's left them so demographically beholden to unassimilable levels of immigration that they're being remorselessly Islamized with every passing day.Europeans voted away their personal responsibility in favor of security and leisure and in the process have given away their very identity. We are a generation away from the Germans and the French being minorities in their own countries.
In stark contrast to Europe
...large numbers of Americans tote guns because they're assertive, self-reliant citizens, not docile subjects of a permanent governing class. The Second Amendment is philosophically consistent with the First Amendment...The Second Amendment provides the citizenry with the means to protect themselves from government infringement of the rights in the First Amendment.
1 comment:
America also has 200+ years of experience with things Europe as a whole only recently has begun. The uniqueness of the USA lies in its founding.
I believe those men were inspired by God in creating the Declaration of Independence and Constitution. Instead of localized, insular communities in the US, the Constitution has tied us together as uniquely American.
This was the first place that religious freedom was guaranteed. There have been hickups along the way, but the glorious standard of the Constitution is still the envy of the world.
I disagree with your statemtnt that "faith.. and carrying weapons delay..recognition of the forthcoming crisis." I am acutely aware of the threats that face this world. And the biggest is not islamofascism. The biggest threat is the breakdown of the family.
Modern prophets have been trying to shore up the family for 100 years, long anticipating the current crisis. All the evils that governments worry about become greater threats in a society without intact families.
Consumerism and egotism are merely symptoms. They cannot be addressed directly. The word of God must be spread:
"And now, as the preaching of the word had a great tendency to lead the people to do that which was just—yea, it had had more powerful effect upon the minds of the people than the sword, or anything else, which had happened unto them—therefore Alma thought it was expedient that they should try the virtue of the word of God" Alma 31:5. (see http://scriptures.lds.org/en/alma/31/5)
I believe that an armed populace is vital to preserving freedom, but it is freedom that creates the atmosphere wherein people can make the choices that will change society.
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