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Co-founder of GraniteGrok, my concern is around Individual Liberty and Freedom and how the Government is taking that away. As an evangelical Christian and Conservative with small "L" libertarian leanings, my fight is with Progressives forcing a collectivized, secular humanistic future upon us. As a TEA Party activist, citizen journalist, and pundit!, my goal is to use the New Media to advance the radical notions of America's Founders back into our culture.

Why should Christians be involved in government and politics?

Last night, I was at an event at the Word of Life Christian Fellowship Church (Senor Pastor Thomas Peetz, Rev. Ed carnahan, Associate Minister) where we may have seen the rebirth of the Black Robed Regiment.  This was the name given to the clergy at the time of the Revolutionary War that provided much of the intellectual, motivational, and spiritual leadership during the struggle for this new country.  From the shackles of tyranny to the Freedom, it has often been said that without them, we’d still be speaking the King’s English.

The Patriot Pastor – Garrett Lear, a most imposing gentleman (to the left, above) – gave the opening invocation and a sermon.  It struck me so that I found him after the event and asked if I could post what he had read.  It is listed below: 

Why should Christians be involved in government and politics?

Evil men don’t understand the importance of justice, but those who follow the Lord are much concerned about it – Proverbs 28:5.

A wicked ruler is as dangerous to the poor as a lion or bear attacking them – Proverbs 28:15
With good men in authority people rejoice, but with the wicked in power, they groan – Proverbs 29:2
When rulers are wicked their people are too, but good men will live to see the tyrants downfall – Proverbs 29:16

Where there is ignorance of God, the people run wild, but what a wonderful thing it is for a nation to know and keep His laws – Proverbs 29:18

If the moral, righteous people of our country do not take their responsibility in government, then we leave the doors open for our nation to be governed by the wicked and immoral.

America has a unique form of government that can only work well if…

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First Prayer of the Continental Congress, 1774

The First Prayer In CongressDuring his address to the Candidates and crowd at the Word of Life Christian Fellowship Church, The Patriot Paster, Garrett Lear, read the first prayer that opened up the Continental Congress.  With his permission, that material is presented below:

 
The Congress opened in prayer led by the Reverend Jacob Duché, a local minister from nearby Episcopalian Christ Church. Many of the Founding Fathers worshipped there and seven signers of the Declaration of Independence are buried in Christ’s Church cemetery. Reverend Jacob Duché (1737-98) was born in Pennsylvania, a descendant of Huguenots who immigrated to America with William Penn
 
 
"The First Prayer in Congress" by T.H. Matteson 1848
The Congress opened in prayer led by the Reverend Jacob Duché, a local minister from nearby Episcopalian Christ Church. Many of the Founding Fathers worshipped there and seven signers of the Declaration of Independence are buried in Christ’s Church cemetery. Reverend Jacob Duché (1737-98) was born in Pennsylvania, a descendant of Huguenots who immigrated to America with William Penn
 
Reverend Jacob Duché
Rector of Christ Church of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania opened the second session at Carpenter’s Hall September 7, 1774, 9 o’clock a.m. [2]
 
It was not a perfunctory prayer, but one that was a time of profound prayer. Opening the session he read the 35th Psalm, and then broke into extemporaneous prayer.

O Lord our Heavenly Father, high and mighty King of kings, and Lord of lords, who dost from thy throne behold all the dwellers on earth and reignest with power supreme and uncontrolled over all the Kingdoms, Empires and Governments; look down in mercy, we beseech Thee, on these our American States, who have fled to Thee from the rod of the oppressor and thrown themselves on Thy gracious protection, desiring to be henceforth dependent only on Thee. To Thee have they appealed for the righteousness of their cause; to Thee do they now look up for that countenance and support, which Thou alone canst give. Take them, therefore, Heavenly Father, under Thy nurturing care; give them wisdom in Council and valor in the field; defeat the malicious designs of our cruel adversaries; convince them of the unrighteousness of their Cause and if they persist in their sanguinary purposes, of own unerring justice, sounding in their hearts, constrain them to drop the weapons of war from their unnerved hands in the day of battle!

Be Thou present, O God of wisdom, and direct the councils of this honorable assembly;

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“Social justice”: Not the moral philosophy on which the Constitution was fashioned

A response to Kip Allen’s Letter to the Editor in the Daily Sun:

To the Editor,

Kip Allen in his Letter to the Editor (Daily Sun, P7) wrote: "Social justice and moral obligation are not just words but ideas that a great nation was upon"

Methinks you forgot about a couple of words – but even after adding them back in, it still would be wrong.

The operative phrases in our country’s founding was NOT "social justice" (a more nebulous term has never been created in the annals of social engineering and political tax raising) – but "equality under the law".  Neither was it "moral obligation"; rather, the phrase "the freedom ability to decide for oneself and one’s family unhindered by Government" would be a far better fit.

This country was built on the singular (and still radical today) notions of individual freedom and personal sovereignty. What Kip Allen wishes to place upon us all is an overarching mechanism to force behavior according to the Progressive ideal of "social justice".  The problem is when you ask for specific definitions of that term and compare that to those of "individual freedom and choice", one can tell their political acknowledge the role of freedom, and then the word "but" appears as in usage that screams out "but that it should be subservient or limited in the cause of ‘the common good’ in one fashion or another".  While I agree we do have responsibilities to others, one has the innate freedom to decide for themselves whether to help or not – a voluntary and free choice of will.  However, every time I see his two phrases used together, I also see their implication of "and I will make you adhere to such by force of law".  And laws are not voluntary.

I am not so naive that all human behavior is such that we need no laws – unfortunately, there are those that believe that what belongs to others should be taken from them – we call those people "criminals".  

Often times, there are also others that delight in forcing behaviors upon others that they would not ordinarily perform – we call those people "bullies".

And then there are people who do both – forcibly take from some to give to others and then also demand that we act in ways that are pleasing to them and not what we would chose ourselves – we call them "Progressive Politicians".

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Notable Quote – Ann Althouse “Bite Me!”

On Vice-President Jo Biden calling a shop manager a "smartass" for simply asking for lower taxes: Bite me. When the powerful seek to work their will upon us and demand that we be nice about it, that’s the right response: Bite me.  Even if he were the one being nice about it, we shouldn’t have … Read more

Things might look goofy around here – especially during weekends

Well, with Steve, Tom, and Tim arriving on scene, I’m going to be doing a bit less blogging and a bit more tinkering with the site for a while – which means things may go screwy around here from time to time (‘gosh durn it, what did I do THIS time???  THAT wasn’t supposed to … Read more

Ovide Lamontagne house event – Q & A session

As I said here, one of the staples of the campaign trail for any candidate is doing house events – talking to small groups of people and getting the message out.  This is quintessential NH retail politics; some there for a first meeting and a few there for the Nth time in their attempt to … Read more

TEA Party – racist? Misogynist?

From Powerline, a poller who worked with Nikki Haley, Tim Scott, and Mike Lee has a report: In my primary polling, I have taken to asking this question: "Do you consider yourself to be more closely aligned with the traditional Republican Party, or with the Tea Party movement that has arisen in the past year?" … Read more

Notable Quote – Woody

A reason for the "wealth or income gap": Smart people keep on doing things that are smart and make them money while stupid people keep on doing things that are stupid and keep them from achieving. People who get an education, stay off of drugs, apply themselves, and save and wisely invest their earnings do … Read more

Candidate Forum tomorrow night!

An event that the ‘Grok will be attending:   Please also note: in the upper right hand corner, we now have the ‘Grok Calender!  Click on it and see the different events that we think that you should be aware of OR that someone from the ‘Grok (Tim, Tom, Steve, or I) will be attending. … Read more

GraniteGrok on the Radio

I will be on WGIR 610 AM (Manchester, NH) with Jeff Chidester for a quick discussion of Hot Topics for a single segment starting around 6:10am and lasting until 6:20am (or thereabouts). Scheduled (tentatively) for tomorrow and Wednesday of this week, and Monday through Wednesday of next week!

“You Betcha!”

In response to a Letter to the Editor from Tim Sullivan in the local paper,  Daily Sun (P6):

To the Editor,

Tim Sullivan, in his Letter of 6/25/10 wrote the following: "Hopefully the selectmen and Budget Committee members of Gilford are not so busy…that they don’t have time to actually read the newspapers and either watch or listen to the news on a regular basis. Their decision making should be based on the outlook for the situation in their community and not their own personal situations and affinity for pet projects."

I have two words for you: "You betcha!".

Speaking for myself: These are hard economic times; I believe they aren’t getting better anytime soon. For the past two years, even though Gilford budgets have been pretty much flat, I have been critical and questioning of any expenditure for new programs or purchases (e.g., "can we put off the new phone system or that new truck until the economy gets better?") in an attempt to move property taxes even lower; during these times, we can and should spend less. And yes, if that means cutting back on lesser priorities, those "less than absolutely essential services", so be it.

Even town government, should only do what would ordinarily be difficult for even groups of individuals to do; it should not be doing things simply because we have grown lazy, outsourced our individual responsibilities to others, or that it “feels right and good". Sadly, we seem all too willing to shuck off those responsibilities with a response of "someone will do it", "there ought to be a law", or "government should/will take care of it".

However, there are those that absolutely believe that Government has to spend more to take care of its citizens and should always do more; they have it exactly wrong. American style of governance as envisioned by our Founders, was built solely to protect our Rights, be a limited government that relied more on people taking care of themselves, and not be in the business of taking care of our every need (real or perceived). They never speak of the harm they do to others by raising taxes to pay for higher spending, for that would spoil the narrative.

Tim is right – this is not a time to spend.

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Hey, Mr. Pindell – if I singled out the Swett campaign, why should I ignore you?

Over at NHPolitical Report (warning: $400 / year subscription required – pretty much all of it Google-able, btw, from other sources if you wait a tad), Jim Pindell has a weekly feature called Political Standing. This week, I see that he "used" information from GraniteGrok without attribution: Frank Emiro: When you are a Republican running … Read more

NH Politics with John Burt – Gubernatorial Debate on July 1st in Manchester

And the ‘Grok will be there!  Tweeting and live streaming (as possible) as always!     Contact: John A. Burt                                                                                                   FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASETel. 603-624-5084Email: … Read more

Ovide Lamontagne house event – the talk

As I said here, house events are an absolute necessary activity if you wish to gain political office here in NH – the old saw hangs true: "whatdoya think about so-and-so?  Dunno, only met’im twice". I also mentioned that Blip.TV was having a hissy fit – let’s see if it will play the video of … Read more

Speaking of this morning’s Closeup show

If I’m going to correct a Republican, you KNOW I would be a hypocrite not to do the same to the Democrat on same said show.  Ann McLane Kuster, running to be the Democrat nominee in NH’s Second Congressional District, was also on- albeit, a different segment.  While Sean merely slipped up (but yes, an … Read more

Why differentiation matters…”

And no, I don’t mean differentials in terms of either calculus or or drive trains.  In politics, the differences between candidates can count (those between Parties do as well but are generally more easily seen).  Often candidates make the decision to move Right or move Left to simply and merely appeal to more voters with … Read more

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