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The Omega Letter Intelligence Digest
Vol: 43 Issue: 16 - Saturday, April 16, 2005
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------Special Report: Spirit of Antichrist
I looked up the adjective, 'cynical', in a thesaurus once.
Suggested synonyms for 'cynical' included; contemptuous, derisive, doubtful, ironic, misanthropic, misanthropical, mocking, pessimistic, sarcastic, sardonic, scoffing, scornful, skeptical, sneering, suspicious, unbelieving, and wry.
Antonyms for 'cynical' included; believing, hopeful, optimistic, positive, and trusting.
Writing of the Church Age as it comes to its conclusion, the Apostle Paul wrote;
"This know also, that in the last days perilous times shall come. For men shall be lovers of their own selves, covetous, boasters, proud, blasphemers, disobedient to parents, unthankful, unholy, Without natural affection, trucebreakers, false accusers, incontinent, fierce, despisers of those that are good, Traitors, heady, highminded, lovers of pleasures more than lovers of God; Having a form of godliness, but denying the power thereof: from such turn away." (2nd Timothy 3:1-5)
Before going on, let me try and smooth partisan hackles that I am relatively sure are rising somewhere. My intention isn't to slam a political party or advance another political party, but rather to make a spiritual observation.
So stay with me and keep an open mind as we go on.
We live in a cynical age, and it helps to be somewhat cynical if one is to be successful in politics. And politicians are, after all, representatives of their various constituencies.
For every successful politician, there are a sufficient number of like-minded individuals to put him in office, or he wouldn't be there.
For example, Teddy Kennedy and John Kerry, by definition, represent the majority of Massachusetts voters who put them in office. And John Kerry received the greatest number of national votes ever cast for a losing candidate.
The Democratic Party represents almost half of American voters, and its platform is therefore the shared platform of virtually every other American.
And the chairman of the Democratic National Committee is the choice of the majority to prioritize and advance the goals that platform represents.
The chairman of the Democratic National Party is former Vermont governor and failed Democratic presidential candidate, Dr. Howard Dean, M.D.
The platform of the Democratic Party represents the core values of its constituency, and the chairman is that platform's visible representative and the voice of the party.
(I know I am repeating myself, but that is a point I want you to keep going back to in your mind as we continue.)
Dr. Howard Dean, DNC chairman, attended a gay-rights breakfast in West Hollywood, reports the Los Angeles Times, under the headline, "Dean Says Democrats Will Make Schiavo Case an Election Issue".
Actually, the Times cleaned up what Dean actually told his audience, which was; "We're going to use Terri Schiavo later on."
As I noted, it takes a healthy note of cynicism to be successful in politics. But when the legal counsel to Florida Republican Senator Mel Martinez wrote a memo calling the Terri Schiavo case 'a great Republican issue', he was immediately forced to resign.
Not Dr. Dean. Dean told his audience that he planned to 'use' Terri Schiavo as a club with which to beat up on Republican Majority leader Tom DeLay for spearheading a Senate effort to save Terri Schiavo from court-ordered starvation.
"This is going to be an issue in 2006, and it's going to be an issue in 2008," Dean told about 200 people at a gay rights group's breakfast in West Hollywood, "because we're going to have an ad with a picture of Tom DeLay saying, 'Do you want this guy to decide whether you die or not? Or is that going to be up to your loved ones?' "
Hmmmm. Terri Schiavo was put to death at the request of her husband, who remembered her desire to die only years later. And after he won a $1.2 million malpractice suit and entered into a ten-year common-law marriage with another woman with whom he has two children.
The decision to put her to death came after a ten-year court battle against Terri's parents (also presumably her 'loved ones') and was upheld by a judiciary who totally ignored a law that passed unopposed by the Senate requiring the federal court to conduct a complete reassessment of the case.
Instead of re-hearing the case (which would have necessitated reconnecting Terri's feeding tube) the courts merely reviewed the state court's rulings, and not the evidence itself, which was what the law required.
The decision to put Terri Schiavo to death was NOT made by her 'loved ones'. It was made by what would certainly have been Terri's EX-husband, had she ever awakened. It was carried out under judicial decree, with law enforcement officers present to ensure Terri starved to death as ordered.
When the Senate intervened, Dr. Dean tried to seize the high moral ground by calling it a 'case of Republican political grandstanding' -- but now that Terri is dead, he openly admits he intends to 'use her' for political advantage.
Dr. Dean's question is a stunning example of cynicism in practice. The question Dean posed is, "Who do you want to decide whether you die or not?"
Think that through. One could make the same point by asking, "Who do YOU want to decide if you LIVE or not?" -- but evidently, that option didn't occur to the good doctor.
It gives one pause. Can such rhetoric actually ATTRACT voters? And, if it DOES attract new voters, what does that say about them spiritually?
In his breakfast speech, sponsored by "Access Now for Gay and Lesbian Equality", (or, "ANGLE") Dean also took issue with fellow Democrats who had voted for proposed constitutional amendments to ban same-sex marriage.
"What I really object to is Democrats who support the constitutional ban, because I think putting in constitutional discrimination in either the United States Constitution or individual state constitutions is wrong," said Dean.
What is the official platform of the party of Dr. Howard Dean?
I went to the DNC's official website for answers. The planks were conveniently arranged in alphabetical order.
The DNC's platform on abortion isn't merely abortion on demand up to the last second before the baby emerges from the womb -- it includes the right to FREE abortion on demand, paid for with taxpayer money.
Among the planks in the DNC civil rights platform are a ban on racial or religious 'profiling' to detect terrorists in our midst and rescinding a federal ban on gay marriage.
It favors expanding the global 'free trade zone', imposing punitive taxes on upper income earners, granting more power to the United Nations, and closing gun control loopholes on the theory that guns cause murder.
In addition, the DNC official platform calls for "putting science ahead of 'ideology' in research and policymaking" - that's a direct quote.
It was 'science' that determined life begins at birth, paving the way for unrestricted abortion. Those who oppose abortion as 'murder' are, in this worldview, 'ideologues'. . . CHRISTIAN ideologues, by unspoken political definition.
In the DNC's official worldview, respect for life is based in an 'ideology' that not shared by the DNC. As respect for life decreases, so does respect for the process that creates and perpetuates it.
"Marriage" is the human equivalent of 'mating'. The scientific explanation for 'mating' is the procreation (and preservation) of a species. Remove the 'procreation' aspect from 'mating' and the word 'mating' becomes meaningless in any scientific sense.
Interestingly, under the category, 'family' on the DNC's platform list, is the sole entry, "Family is the center of American life."
Assessment:
As I noted at the outset, the purpose is to discuss matters of the spirit, in light of Bible prophecy for the last days. The politics of the DNC is part and parcel of that end-times picture for two reasons.
The first is what those politics are, and how perfectly they mirror the Apostle Paul's description of the social mores of the Church Age in the last days.
The second is that those social mores are shared by almost half of US voters, including many Christians, if the email I receive from angry self-professed Democrats is to believed.
The DNC favor free abortion on demand at taxpayer expense, euthanasia, gay marriage, confiscatory taxation; oppose nationalism, abstinence education, put science ahead of ideological concepts of right and wrong, and oppose any mention of Christianity in either public education or public life, while defending the practice of teaching such things as 'alternative religions'.
The only religions that are illegal to study in American public schools are those based in the Bible.
The stated moral values of the DNC are, statistically, shared by almost half of American voters.
According to the CIA World Factbook, America's religious culture is broken down as follows: Protestant: 52%, Roman Catholic: 24%, Mormon: 2%, Jewish: 1%, Muslim: 1%, other: 10%, none: 10%.
In total then, America is 78% nominally Christian, 14% non-Christian and 10% atheist. By any reasonable standard of measure, America is a predominantly 'Christian' nation.
We return to the adjective, 'cynicism' and some of its synonyms . . scoffing, scornful, skeptical, sneering, suspicious, unbelieving, and wry.
Compare them to both the public statements of prominent Democrats and the official platform of the Democratic Party.
This isn't about politics, it is about a moral worldview that permeates our society.
A worldview in which supporting the 'right to die' by euthanasia is as important as upholding the right to kill the unborn by abortion.
A worldview that can condemn an effort to save someone from starvation as 'ideological' and then openly exploit the death of a helpless human being for political gain.
And a society so cynical that such an approach is feasible as a method to attract new voters.
It is a worldview 'without natural affection'. The Kerry campaign was a litany of 'false accusations', and characterized Christianity as 'right wing politics' (despisers of those that are good).
The Kerry campaign proposed giving the UN veto power over US foreign policy, (traitors) and opposed making social policy on gay rights or abortion or cloning or stem cell research based on ' right-wing ideology' (lovers of pleasures more than lovers of God.)
(And, it got more votes than any losing campaign in US history).
Howard Dean recently issued a 'talking points' memo advising Democrats to pepper their speeches with Bible quotes and references to God and Christianity, in order to recapture lost voters from the South's 'Bible Belt'.
"Having a form of godliness, but denying the power thereof. . .'
Many theologians and teachers have tried to find some evidence of America, the world's most powerful and most Christian country, mentioned in Bible prophecy for the end times.
They've pored over Daniel, Ezekiel, Jeremiah, and Isaiah, and systematically dissected the Book of the Revelation.
They are looking in the wrong place. America plays no role in the Tribulation Period, but one can see America's spiritual fingerprints are all over the Scripture's account of the final days of the Church Age.
The Apostle Paul called it a 'perilous time' to be a Christian, before outlining a mirror-image description of the political platform and expressed worldview of 'Christian' America's second-most powerful political party.
"And every spirit that confesseth not that Jesus Christ is come in the flesh is not of God: and this is that spirit of antichrist, whereof ye have heard that it should come; and even now already is it in the world." (1st John 1:43)
I am not saying that Howard Dean is the antichrist. Nor am I making the case that Republicans are good.
One just finds fewer deniers of Christ among Republicans -- regardless of whether its due to political savvy or genuine conviction. Those who get elected reflect the worldview of their electors.
The point isn't about politics, its about the worldview of the society that puts politicians in power -- and what that worldview says about the spiritual condition of that society.
Comparing Dean's public statements to his party's official platform makes a point about America's spiritual condition relative to Bible prophecy for the last days.
"For where your treasure is, there will your heart be also." (Luke 12:34)
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