The Martyr Who Immolated Himself

The dark pages of history have recorded the selfless sacrifice of millions of faceless and often nameless heroes buried in native and foreign lands, quickly forgotten by the collective memory of their brethren whom they protected and saved so that they can have a better life, a brighter tomorrow, a happier future.

Occasionally the hero has a name; he/she commits such a solitary act of bravery and courage that it defies description. But the ultimate self-sacrifice sometimes is quickly forgotten or even scorned.

In 1969 Czechoslovakia, Jan Palack, a 21 year-old student set himself on fire on the steps of the National Museum in Prague in order to protest the USSR military intervention in his country.

Jerzy Popieluszko, a Catholic priest who sympathized with the labor group “Solidarnosti,” was assassinated in October 1984 by the Polish police.

Chris Gueffroy of the German Democratic Republic, a communist satellite state of the Soviet Union, was killed while trying to climb the Berlin Wall in order to flee from communism. Nobody ever tries to flee from capitalism. He was literally the last straw in the west’s desire and campaign to demolish the Wall of Shame built by East German communists in 1961.

The future president of Czechoslovakia, the writer Vaclav Havel, was sentenced to nine months in prison in February 1989, a victim of his anti-communist thoughts, ideas, and writings.

Author Mircea Brenciu dedicated his book, “The Martyr,” to a hero who may have changed the course of history with his act of defiance and bravery.  His self-sacrifice on March 2, 1989 in Poiana Brasov, Romania, helped initiate the end of 24 years of Ceausescu’s brutal communist dictatorship. Yet he is largely unknown today to his own people and to the West.

Mircea Brenciu asked rhetorically in his book dedicated to the most incredible brave man, Liviu Corneliu Babeş, “Why don’t Romanians love their authentic heroes?”

It is understandable why that was the case prior to the “fall” of communism. “Securitatea [security police] had ears everywhere, even when you were quiet, you were a suspect.” Unfortunately, “many of the torturers of yesterday and their replacements can be found today in key political, social, cultural and especially financial positions,” added Brenciu. It is clear why there is so little mention of the most tragic Romanian martyr.

Christianity in general considers suicide unholy and many priests refuse to bury such deceased in holy ground.  Only God can give the right to life and only God can take it away.

The Orthodox Church considers suicide an act of cowardice, not of heroism.  According to the young priest I spoke to on my trip to Poiana Brasov in 2015 to pay my respects to a Romanian hero, Babeş is an apostate and not worthy of praise.

A small monument is located a few feet from a small wooden church in the meadow where Babeş sacrificed himself to bring attention to the rest of the world to the plight of the desperate Romanian citizens living under the boot of communism.

There is a street that bears his name in Brasov, there is a metal cross on the bottom of the ski slope where the end of the tragedy unfolded, the type reserved for road accidents, and a modest monument in Poiana Brasov with the bronze effigy of the martyr created by the artist George Jipa.

Liviu Corneliu Babeş (1942-1989) made the ultimate sacrifice on March 2, 1989, several months before the December revolution that toppled the brutal communist dictatorship of Nicolae Ceausescu and his wife Elena. On a very crowded ski slope in Poiana Brasov where skiers from the West were vacationing, Babeş chose to set himself on fire, protesting the atrocities committed by the Ceausescu regime.

Brenciu wrote how, in a cathedral stillness, the crowd witnessed in shock and horror the unimaginable act of a skier on fire, gaining speed, not making a sound, as the smell of burnt flesh filled the air. At the bottom of the slope, Babeş fell, his body licked by the flames fed by oxygen and the clothes soaked with gasoline.  From underneath his smoldering clothes, he pulled out a sign that read, “STOP MURDER! AUSCHWITZ=BRASOV.”

Brenciu described how two tourists from Scotland, who happened to be very close to where the skier collapsed, covered his smoldering body with coats, in an attempt to put out the flames. Douglas Wallace was subsequently interviewed by the Sunday Times on March 12, 1989. (Burnt Alive: the Suicide that Shamed Romania)

When the ambulance arrived, Babeş was still alive, the barely audible labored and pained breaths the only witness to his intense pain and suffering.  According to Brenciu, the stretcher carriers, dressed in white but with police uniforms underneath, and with menacing looks, shooed the crowd away.  They were not there to help the immense suffering of the dying Babeş; they were there to cover up the incident. They announced loudly to the crowd that this man was mentally ill and there was nothing to see. Perhaps the crowd would have believed him, had it not been for the yellowed paper sign Babes carried with him that spoke clearly why he immolated himself.  “One of the residents of the concentration camp called Romania broke the silence, but the price was his personal sacrifice,” said Brenciu.

Nobody knows the last indignities this dying hero had to suffer while in custody of the so-called “saviors.” The Romanian word for ambulance is “salvare,” [salvation]. Their mission was quite different, to get to the bottom of his sacrificial act that dared to destroy the harmony of Poiana Brasov, of the fake reality created for foreign tourists that aimed to give them the false impression that Romanians lived in excellent conditions in Ceausescu’s “most humane and wise political regime possible.”

Mircea Sevaciuc explained that Liviu Cornel Babeş “was buried by communists and Securitate.”  After the revolt in November 15, 1987, Liviu was never left alone. He had sent a letter to Free Europe, asking for a better life for all Romanians. Since that time, a friend said, “He was afraid to walk in the streets. One day he told me at work – they want to get me but they won’t succeed because I am going to set myself on fire.”

 

Babeş’s widow, Etelka, and their daughter, were not left in peace to mourn the loss of their beloved husband and father.  Her apartment, located in one of the drab concrete apartment high-rises, was constantly watched by the Security Police. They came and searched everything and confiscated any notes and sketches he may have left behind. An amateur painter and sculptor, he had a small collection.

One day a friend accompanied Etelka to the cemetery where Babeş was buried.  They were followed by a Security Police officer who did not bother to disguise his obvious spying. Even in death, the communist police state did not leave her Cornel alone because he had the courage to sacrifice his life in such a public way in order to expose communism and its paid torturers and informers who robbed the masses of their humanity and freedom under the false pretense of “social justice” and equality.

 

 

 

Confessions of Being a Young Conservative among a Sea of Liberals by Mimi Johnson

As I sit here attempting to write about my experiences as a young conservative, I reflect back on the choices and situations that led me to this exact moment.  I look at the world and issues today, the constant onslaught of “he said/she said” everywhere,  the constant blame games and lack of responsibility to oneself, commitment to striving for personal excellence, love for one’s country, respect for others and their opinions, and most importantly self-reliance. 

The Liberal/Conservative debate is nothing new throughout political history, but I find myself wondering why can it be seen in every facet of life beyond politics?  What has driven the young generation to such hatred and animosity? 

Facebook used to be a social medium for college students to connect on a friendship level, to incite silly games and to get a break from the monotony of studying and being stressed out.  When did it become a political forum for everyone in America?  The bigger question is where was this fervor and voice when it actually counted to stand up for what you claimed you believe in so vehemently?  Where were they when it came time to vote on issues that were destroying our country? 

Growing up in Mississippi, where Conservatives are plentiful, was very interesting to say the least.  I was raised more on European ideals rather than Southern ideals.  I was exposed to things many children either were not interested in or parents had no interest in learning themselves.  To say the least, I was well versed in the world and the way it operated. 

I remember my mother telling me stories of how Communists oppressed and tortured citizens in her county, how the government kept everyone in a constant state of poverty to promote the wealth of the elite, orphanages full of sick children, horrible socialized medicine; the list could go on.  At the time, being a teenager, I never fully understood the ramifications of these stories and rarely took them seriously - I thought them to be just rants of an adult.  Since I was raised in a predominantly conservative area, I never once had to deal with any of those issues or ever remotely thought this would happen in our prosperous country. If I only knew then what I have witnessed and know now! 

In college and Graduate School, I majored in the most Liberal subjects:  Music and Education.  I’m absolutely in love with music and couldn’t imagine a world in existence without it.  It is difficult to juxtapose having conservative values and also being a musician - usually these two do not go hand in hand. 

The educational system cultures you that conservatives are bad and want to take away funding from our programs and freedoms.  It’s just hogwash and the furthest thing from the truth, yet so many buy into this dogma. 

For over a decade, I kept my mouth shut, never uttering my opinions on political matters, because I was afraid of being ostracized amongst my friends.  When I was in graduate school at Northwestern, I definitely would avoid political conversations as I was not in the right company.  I wish now that I had spoken up and voiced my opinions.  Fear drove me to silence. That is what political correctness does.  I wish I had known that I could support my friends and still be Conservative.  I felt bullied and forced to be silent. 

It’s no secret that the Republican Party lacks support in the 18-40 year old demographic.  I constantly ask myself why this is the case? Most of the liberal youth are in college and can rationally see what is happening in the world today.  Why aren’t there more conservatives in this age bracket?  Where are we as conservatives going wrong in adequately gaining this support?  How can we shake the stigma of being a “stuffy Bible beating party full of white men?”  How do we educate a population to stop giving handouts of other people’s hard-earned money and seeing the fallacy in doing so?  How do we stop seeing Republicans and Conservatives as greedy mongers with no one’s interest at heart but the so-called 1 %?

People constantly ask me, “how can you be conservative and be a woman?” or even better, “how can you be conservative and still have gay friends? First off I answer them by saying that Abortion is not a choice, regardless of whether you believe life happens at conception or not.  You advocate not killing animals, yet wouldn’t bat an eyelash at aborting a human even after it is viable outside the womb.  No rights are being infringed upon except those of the unwanted fetus.  Where is the fairness in this?  Who protects their interest? This explanation normally will get someone’s attention. 

Defining what a “right” is in this country is also important and I think we as conservatives fail to convey this definition appropriately.  Ultimately people don’t understand the true definition of being Conservative.  The media does an awful yet successful job at pitting people against one another and of course we, as citizens buy into it. 

We love drama and the media gives it to us just like a Tele-novella! They’ve definitely done a tremendous job at demonizing anyone that stands for what this county was founded on and reads the Constitution as if it wasn’t intended to be taken ad litteram. 

Liberals are right in one regard, the Bible is definitely NOT the Constitution.  There aren’t any differing denominations of the Constitutional interpretations like there are interpretations of the Bible. The Constitution is a binding document that is meant as is, no reading between the lines and making things up as we go to fit someone’s agenda.  People will constantly change, and so will society, but we must abide by a set of rules. 

We can’t continually keep changing them to appease everyone.  When amendments were made, they were because those cases were ACTUALLY devaluing human life.  Abortion devalues human life yet many take no issue with it.  It seems hypocritical to me.  No one views women as being inferior anymore, but it’s still difficult to assert ourselves in certain situations. I see it as more of a challenge and not a hindrance.

Many of the so called “injustices” are manufactured by the media and by the most important element: the bottom line.  Conservatives aren’t attempting to control anyone or stifle anyone’s freedoms; they simply want “Liberty and Justice for all.”  In actuality, they’re attempting to PROTECT ALL FREEDOMS from Tyrannical leaders who want to weasel their way in, (or in our case, already have) promising free healthcare, free money, and a perennial nanny state. 

I am sure your parents taught you the adage that if something is too good to be true, it usually is. We are so skeptical of anyone/everything else in our lives except when it comes to the most important institution governing our lives.  Why is this so?  Why would you, as a proud American, accept handouts over an education and a good paying job?  Our system is flawed to a degree that I’m afraid is beyond fixing. 

It is our job as responsible Americans to educate and influence the younger generations as much as possible before things progress to such a point of uncertainty and no return, that we’ve completely lost our way.  I truly believe that all will come to fruition soon enough, unfortunately it will be too late for most, but hopefully when the upheaval does occur, it will put society on the right path for the sanctity of our glorious country! 

               

                 

 

A 1979 Time Magazine Article about Islam

“We Muslims are one family even though we live under different governments and in various regions.” – Ayatullah Ruhollah Khomeini, leader of Iran’s revolution



http://content.time.com/time/covers/0,16641,19790416,00.html

Thirty-seven years ago, Time magazine dedicated its cover to “Islam, The Militant Revival,” and published a lengthy article, “The World of Islam,” in which John A. Meyer wrote, “We want to examine Islam’s resurgence, not simply as another faith but as a political force and potent third ideology competing with Marxism and Western culture in the world today.” It was April 16, 1979.  

The editor, Marguerite Johnson, penned the cover story because “the Iranian revolution has made it especially important for Westerners to understand the driving energy and devotion Islam commands from so many.”

Senior editor John Elson indicated that “Islam has been frequently misunderstood, partly because so many people have tried to apply terms from Christianity and Judaism to it.” In writing this article, the editors have attempted to draw a picture of Islam for what it really is, “a way of ordering society.”

According to Time magazine, there were 750 million Muslims and 985 million Christians in 1979, a large group ready to assert the “political power of the Islamic way of life.” The people of Iran apparently voted overwhelmingly to create an Islamic republic, the nation’s first “government of God,” as Ayatullah Khomeini declared.

This theocratic and freedom-stifling government replaced, after one year of revolution, “a dynastic autocrat who dreamed of turning his country into a Western-style industrial and secular state.” Changing a westernized society into a government by religious mullahs was described as “a new dawn for the Islamic people.”

Time magazine quoted the Cairo’s magazine Al Da’wah (The Call): “The Muslims are coming, despite Jewish cunning, Christian hatred, and the Communist storm.”

And it came to pass - the Muslims are really coming, by the millions, invading Europe and America, welcomed with open arms by a senescent and suicidal Europe ruled by technocrat elitists who are only interested in failed multi-culturalism, their power, control of the emerging tower of Babel, and their bank accounts.

Time magazine described the revival of Islam in the 70 countries around the world, reflected in the hajj, the pilgrimage to Mecca, unchanged for 14 centuries; this alleged revival took place among the young who desired sharia law, burkas, hijab and other forms of enslaving women to their half-person status, genital mutilation, and harsh punishments in cases of rape, divorce, adultery, and abortion.

Time magazine assumed that this alleged revival had taken place for decades because “Islam is no Friday-go-to-mosque kind of religion. It is a code of honor, a system of law and an all-encompassing way of life.”

This resurgence was inspired and fueled by a “quest for stability and roots,” a deep-seated hatred for Western values, and “the population explosion in those Islamic nations where birth control is little practiced.”

Marvin Zonis is quoted that “Islam is being used as a vehicle for striking back at the West, in the sense of people trying to reclaim a very greatly damaged sense of self-esteem. They feel that for the past 150 years the West has totally overpowered them culturally, and in the process their own institutions and way of life have become second rate.”

“Islam is a political faith with a yearning for expansion,” said Marguerite Johnson. And the history of its expansionist desires is quite telling, an expansionism that necessitated the Christian Crusades in order to regain territories occupied by Islam.

Arabs raided and conquered many lands and their traders carried Islam with them; the Persian Empire, the Byzantine Empire, North Africa into Spain, the Middle East, Malaysia, Indonesia, Singapore, the Philippines, the black tribes in Africa south of the Sahara Desert, were all forced into submission and conversion to Islam. Time magazine added that, “On the Indian subcontinent, in Southeast Asia, in Africa and the Pacific, millions of Muslims were under colonial rule.”

Time magazine remarked that “Islam is frequently stereotyped as unmitigatedly harsh in its code of law, intolerant of other religions, repressive toward women and incompatible with progress.” No mention is made of the Koranic quotes which advise their faithful to kill the infidels.

Salem Azzam, then Saudi secretary-general of the Islamic Council of Europe, was quoted as saying that seeing this Islamic resurgence in a negative light is nothing but a “return to colonialism – indirect but of a more profound type.”

Other Muslims and their defenders claimed that “Islam is not monolithic, that it is compatible with various social and economic systems, and that far from being a return to the Dark Ages, it is wholly consonant with progress.” The reality is that the Taliban had oppressed and regressed a thriving Afghan society.

The “war refugees” from Syria, who have invaded welfare-generous European countries and are raping and pillaging the host societies, have gravely affected the very tolerant and multi-cultural nations who foolishly invited them in with open arms.

Devout Muslims are described in this article as opposed to the “materialism of the West and the atheism of Communism.” But they welcome “individual initiative, respect private property, and tolerate profits.” But moderation and “communal responsibility” are most important. Usury is forbidden but interest is allowed if used for the “common good.” Community and the common good are communist tenets.  A zakat of 2.5%, levied against individual assets, was allowed for the benefit of the community.

A devout Muslim objects to the evils associated with modern life but enjoys everything free that the west must provide, such as welfare, housing, TVs, cell phones, cable, cars, electricity, A/C, etc. The Time article stated that Islam objects to “liquor factories,” to the “breakdown of the family structure, the lowering of moral standards, [and] the appeal of easygoing secular life-styles.” But Muslims “are demanding the best of the West: schools, hospitals, technology, agricultural and water development techniques.”

Devout Muslims, no matter where they live, are required to abide by Sharia Law, “the path to follow.” The consensus of Islamic scholars in charge and the deeds and sayings of Muhammad become an “all embracing code of ethics, morality and religious duties.” It is thus a complete control of one’s life.

Once entrenched in the western civilization, Muslims start chiseling at its foundation in an effort to turn it into Sharia-compliance; everything that made western schools, hospitals, agriculture, military, and technology great in the first place, will be replaced with what is approved by the Islamic theocracy.

No matter how the media spins Islam then and now, Sharia Law and our U.S. Constitution are not compatible. Moral relativism and tolerance to the point of ignorance will result in national suicide.

Stalin's Meditations Through the Writing of Dr. Watson

Struggling to survive on $3.10 minimum wage of 1978 America, I never envied or blamed anyone for my state in life. I understood the work ethic and the fact that everybody had to start at the bottom and climb the ladder of success if they worked hard.

I came here for the opportunities America offered. I wished to study and earn my Ph.D., raise a family, and be free under capitalism. I did not want my whole life to be watched by the dreaded communist police state and to stand in line for hours every day for our food. I was tired of poverty, fear, misery, and exploitation.

I never really talked about my former life publicly because I had a healthy dose of fear of all the communist agents that had infiltrated the west. I knew they were everywhere, hiding in plain sight in American society. Every knock on the door threw me into a panic – I was reliving the dreaded 2 a.m. knock on our apartment door in Romania.

On the days when the drudgery of being a low-paid secretary was discouraging, I imagined the innocent and happy eyes of my future children who would grow up to experience freedom, parental love, no hunger, a nice home of their own, toys, books, abundant water and electricity, and plenty of clothes to keep them warm.

I can still see in my mind’s eyes the twinkle of happiness when my Dad would bring home something special, grapes in winter, a pear, a banana, or an orange. I wanted to be able to do that for my children every day, without having to stand in endless lines and then come home empty-handed.

Marx, Engels, Lenin, Stalin, Ceausescu, and all those who forced communism and its police state upon millions, were truly evil and Machiavellian tyrants thirsty for absolute power and control.

Dr. Emile E. Watson wrote in 1952, on the occasion of Joseph Stalin’s 72^nd birthday, “Meditations of Joseph Vissarionovich Djugashvili, alias Joseph Stalin,” with the idea to let “the aging Stalin, in his own words,” explain his world communism because the “ignorance of Communism has been a costly luxury for the American people.” (Meditations of Joseph Stalin, The American Coalition, Southern Building, Washington 5, D.C., 1952)

At that time, Dr. Watson’s book was recommended reading for high school students by The National Americanism Commission of The American Legion. http://www.legion.org/commissions/americanism

Millions of Stalin’s communist agents were spread around the globe, his “undercover army” mounting ideological attacks on the “social, political, cultural, and religious edifices of civilized society.” Dr. Watson criticized our foreign policy which he believed was based on “stupidity and the appeasement of Communism.”

In writing this book, necessitated by the fact that there were “several hundred thousand American Communists and fellow travelers in the United States,” Dr. Emile E. Watson consulted with “nine men in the United States and Canada” who were authorities on the subject of communism and of Stalin.

Stalin grew up in a blue collar family – his father was a shoe cobbler and alcoholic who beat his only child, and his mother was a laundress; they lived in squalor and poverty. He trained for five years at the Tiflis Theological Seminary. His life in such an austere and monastically simple environment may have contributed to his sullen and despondent disposition, while his atheism flourished. 

Stalin’s insubordination resulted in his expulsion from the seminary, perhaps guiding him into a future of street activism, crime, and revolution. Having been beaten repeatedly by his father, Stalin became brutal himself and a master at “evasion, trickery, and deception” while pretending to champion the cause of the poor and downtrodden.

After meeting Lenin in 1905 at a revolutionary party meeting in Tammerfors, Finland, Joseph V. Djugashvili was accepted into the ruling elites of the Party. His prior activities of payroll and bank robberies which funded the Bolsheviks, opened up new opportunities for the constantly unemployed and unskilled Joseph, nicknamed by Lenin, Stalin (Man of Steel).  But Lenin found him so capricious that he left instructions in his January 4, 1923 last will and testament that Stalin be removed from the position of General Secretary.

Sentenced to various jail terms and exile in Siberia between 1902 and 1917, the criminally-inclined Joseph changed his name 20 times and found ways to run subversive activities from various czarist prisons and even from Siberia. His experience there taught him how to build later an escape-proof labor camp with the “largest prison and exile population in the world.”

The Bolsheviks, who seized control in 1917, did not want a constitution that would interfere with what they wanted to do. After the Bolshevik dictatorship was entrenched, a Stalin constitution was adopted in 1929 which solidified a government based on “force, violence, recognizing no legal restraints, subject to no laws whatsoever.” 

Stalin’s totalitarianism was validated when the United States gave the Soviet Union diplomatic recognition in 1933. And, on August 17-24, 1943, at the first Quebec conference, a “death sentence was passed on freedom for Eastern Germany, Eastern Europe, North Korea, Manchuria and China.”

Dr. Watson explained that Roosevelt, “like most of the people of the United States, did not comprehend what Communism really is, how it works, and what it intends to do to the rest of the world.” The world did not understand how truly evil Stalin was. Contemporary Americans still have no idea how oppressive communism is and turn a deaf ear to survivor stories and to historical accounts.

The Soviet participation in the United Nations was not geared towards “world peace,” whatever that means, but to create “enmity and division among the non-Communist countries to the detriment of the United States.”

Stalin turned North Korea into a mini-Soviet Union and “trained and equipped a native army” which resulted in a conflict that the United Nations called, in liberal euphemistic fashion, a “police action,” while Stalin described the Communist Chinese fighters in Korea as “volunteers;” and millions of Chinese were subjugated to the will of Kremlin’s communist apparatus.

Stalin took absolute economic control by nationalizing light and heavy industries, commerce, arable land, subsoil, minerals, and water resources. Nothing was left to chance. Private mom and pop enterprises were forced to deliver any surplus to the Bolsheviks at very low and fixed prices, making it highly unprofitable to produce anything except subsistence crops and goods.

Lenin tried in 1921 to reverse the economic disaster and the depopulation of cities caused by the lack of food and succeeded in bringing in surpluses.  “By 1927 there was plenty of food in Moscow and in other cities.” The free enterprise system worked beautifully.

Stalin stepped in and, in 1928 private enterprise took a dive again when he forced collectivization which caused massive starvation in Russia in 1932. “From 1932 on, the Bolshevik regime went through one crisis after another, each worse than the other.”

The Bolshevik collectivism confiscated the peasants’ homes, livestock, tools, and placed them in the ownership of the new collective farm. Farmers were forced to work for their own subsistence, giving the lion’s share to the communists. Growers who resisted this massive confiscation became “enemies of the state” and were loaded onto cattle trains and sent into labor camps in Siberia where they succumbed to cold, hunger, and the backbreaking work.

Many farmers burned their barns, granaries, and killed their animals rather than turn them over to the Soviets – “50 percent of their horses, 45 percent of their cattle, and two-thirds of their sheep and goats.” Fifteen million died of starvation in the famine that ensued. And news of the disaster, like any other purge, was never allowed to travel outside of the Soviet Union.

To completely root out capitalist ideas and to fundamentally transform society, the ruthless communists formed the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (1922-1991) which forced people speaking 150 languages and dialects into a huge social engineering project.

“Whole populations, especially in the area of Western Europe, were uprooted. Hundreds of thousands of Jews, Poles, Ukrainians, Lithuanians, Letts, Estonians, Germans and others were torn from their families and lands and shipped to remote regions.” All the groundwork was led by the “Communist Fifth Column directed from Moscow.”

Stalin wanted to make sure that the Communist Party survived long after he was gone, controlling the future of all human beings. Bolsheviks, he admitted, should have never been invited as part of the United Nations because they are “permanently at war, war against their own people and against the world.”

“We are war makers and will continue so until we have conquered the world,” Dr. Watson wrote in his book.

What kept millions and millions of Iron Curtain citizens compliant? They had been disarmed, unable to defend themselves, and were frightened by the 2 o’clock a.m. knock on the door when the political police might whisk them away, never to be seen again. This reign of “mute terror” kept them under control. The large contingent of family and neighbors turned police informers on each block were also a force to be feared.

How were so many people lured into accepting communism in the first place? It was plain discontent with one’s miserable status in life and unfettered envy of those who were successful. Communism was presented as the “drowning man’s last hope.” The false and deceptive slogan “forward” did not include personal responsibility for one’s choices in life, it was always someone else fault and nanny communism was there to fix it.

“Victims of poverty, disease, illiteracy and insecurity complexes, frustration, over-emotionalism, racial, religious and political intolerance, an urge of recognition of power are the motivating forces causing discontent among the peoples of the earth.”

Labor leaders in America had become pro-communist, undermining the very capitalist system which provided them with good wages and a standard of living far superior to any communist country.

It is incomprehensible how so many Americans can undermine their own capitalist way of life even today. That is because few understand how the kudzu seed of communism was sown into labor unions, government, and other institutions. Communism was presented as a magical cure for all diseases that “plague” the “socially unjust” capitalism.

The three steps that Stalin used to take over his communist satellite countries were:

1.      Sending in agents for propaganda, agitation, and street organization.

2.      Organize a Fifth Column (overt of covert operatives) and direct it.

3.      Take over the government.

In the Soviet Union Stalin controlled the Communist Party, its Central Committee, and the ultimate power broker, the Politburo. He controlled the state, the Communist Party, and the international communist movement.

He kept two million policemen to control the 300 million Sovietized Russians; additionally, he had the military and the infamous slave labor camps.

The M.V.D., the political police of two million, included agents who were assigned to watch the secret police. And then there was an inner group of thousands of specially-chosen men who answered only to Stalin.

The M.V.D., similar to Hitler’s Gestapo, was organized around regiments, divisions, an air force, tanks, infantry, and artillery. The inner army suppressed rebellions, controlled the railroads, borders, factories, power plants – “the obedience-compelling arm.”

“Every factory, every railroad and every government enterprise were controlled and held in check by these fractions and the M.V.D.”

The masses were also controlled by forcing them to join organizations such as labor syndicates, the young communist league, mandatory professional organizations, or the elementary school “pioneers” with their red scarves and revolutionary berets emblazoned with communist symbols.

Stalin’s Secretariat appointed representatives to all government agencies and to the Communist Party. These hand-picked representatives reported only to the Secretariat and “were authorized to appoint, remove, or command the personnel of any committee or agency.”

Doctors were his medical henchmen. Those who were suspected of harboring divergent opinions were murdered through slow-acting poisons. Lenin’s death is alleged to have been hastened this way.

Stalin was the ultimate dictator and ruler. He arrested, removed, and disposed of members of the Central Committee and Politburo, disappearing them overnight, even removing them from previously published photographs. Stalin was the final decision-maker who imprisoned 12 million Russians in forced labor camps, lording over his slave labor state.

A master in the art of indoctrination, Stalin took over the schools and dictated the curriculum, emphasizing Marx’s, Engels’, and Lenin’s Socialism and vilifying capitalism, molding the youth, controlling the press, radio, and movies. His cult of personality included adulation ceremonies, May 1 parades, military parades, large statues of himself and portraits placed in every institution, factory, and classroom. Journalists and artists were censored.

Bolshevism used propaganda to “create a breakdown between the more backward and undeveloped nations and the West, or as Lenin said, ‘to separate the metropolis from the hinterland,’ … a grand design of economic and political warfare.”

To disrupt the capitalist world economically, Stalin used communist-controlled or communist-influenced labor unions and the diplomatic campaign of “peace” while he thought of nothing else but “to sharpen my knife to cut their throats.”

The long-range Soviet plans to destabilize and destroy other governments also included “undermining their governments and institutions, organize their workers, and steal their secrets, including the atom bomb.”

During Stalin’s reign, Dr. Watson wrote, there were “half-million Communists and fellow travelers in the United States, plus hundreds of communist-front organizations and their subversive publications, with little opposition. Daily these are undermining the moral fiber of the people, and especially the youth.”

Stalin boasted, Dr. Watson wrote, that “My agents and fellow travelers are so deeply infiltrated into the fabric of the United States that they have become a powerful influence in government, industry, labor, education, and religion.”

His agents infiltrated public schools and colleges in the U.S. in the name of “progressive education” which was interpreted to suit their purposes. Dr. Watson wrote that the infiltration was facilitated by the “pirate method.” It was so much easier to enter a port and assault it by taking down the pirate flag and raising the flag of the country to be raided.

Stalin used psychological warfare to capture the empty minds of the young who were craving for direction.  Planting an idea is inexpensive and long-lasting, Dr. Watson wrote. Feeding the empty stomachs like the Americans do, he said, is lost overnight.

Dr. Watson wrote, “Hollywood is a powerful outlet for undermining the Capitalist system by creating doubts in the minds of the adults and, above all, the youth of the United States and other nations to which American films are exported.”

Stalin admitted that communists are dangerous like him because they have no ethics, no integrity, and recognize no moral law. They keep no promises or pledges, except those that are to their advantage. They place no value on human life and suffer no “disturbance of conscience.”

Dr. Watson wrote that our “nation will never fall if the majority of its leaders and people cling to the hand of God, creating a rebirth of religion and morality.”

 

 

The Show Must Go On

Injured BMX acrobat Photo: Ileana Johnson

My love affair with the circus started as a child in Romania when a caravan coming all the way from Czechoslovakia, Yugoslavia, or Hungary would set up the big tent in an open field not far from the concrete grey cluster of high-rise communist era apartments we lived in.

We were so dazzled by the lights, the bright and happy colors, the clowns, the caged tigers and the lumbering giant elephants, the glittering costumes, the trapeze artists, and the magical sights and sounds of the circus, that we were hooked for life.

We wanted to run away with the circus not because of the Bohemian , thrilling, and fascinating travel life in cramped trailers, but because we wanted to see the world like them, beyond the heavily guarded and barb-wired borders where we could get shot even daring to approach it. We imagined beautiful and indescribable freedom beyond the frowning and heavily armed soldiers who were told to shoot on sight and ask questions later.

As soon as the big tent went up, all the kids in the neighborhood started hanging around the circus site, leaving home early each day and returning late at night. Then one morning, we would wake up and the circus would be gone – a few holes left in the ground were the only markers that they were ever there. A sense of sadness and loss overcame the kids in the neighborhood and nobody came out to play for a while. It was as if we were mourning the lost opportunity for freedom. It was a fascinating ephemeral world that now lived just in our memories. The joy could have lasted longer on celluloid but nobody had cameras or the means to develop photos.

One beautiful blond girl from our building ran away with the circus several times but she never made it very far. The police would find her, take her into custody, lock her up for a few hours to scare her, and return her later to parents who were fined for being so “bad and neglectful,” and did not follow the parental rules and dictates of the communist regime. To this day, I marvel that they never took her away from her parents to send her to a juvenile reform school. She probably would have found a way to escape; she was a dreamy Bohemian who liked to stretch the limits.

My fascination with the circus never died because it gave me so much joy and wonder as a child. I took my young children to see a Three Ring performance here in the United States and visited recently and wrote about the Ringling Brothers Barnum and Bailey winter quarters and museum in Sarasota, Florida. http://canadafreepress.com/article/a-visit-to-cadzan-and-to-the-ringling-brothers-museum

Last night my husband surprised me with tickets to the Extreme Ringling Brothers Barnum and Bailey show in Fairfax, Virginia. We went early and mingled with some of the performers, the acrobats, the clowns, the BMX bike acrobats, and the most docile elephant in the menagerie, Mabel.

We learned that the circus has teamed up with a doctor in Utah who does research on pediatric cancer. The announcer said that elephants very seldom get cancer and doctors are studying their herd to find out why and perhaps find a cure.

We were dazzled by the acts, the strobe lights, the sixteen tigers, the six camels, the Arabian horse, the trapeze acts, the five elephants, the lady who was shot from a cannon, defying extra G-force on her body, the wire acts, the jugglers, and by all the modern pizazz augmenting an old art.

Near the end, the BMX performance was sadly cut short when one of the seasoned bikers flew in the air and, upon landing, his tire blew out, bringing him to a sudden stop that threw him airborne, and, continuing the momentum, landed him at the bottom, on his neck, face down. He did not move again. To my horror, the show continued for a few more minutes. It was finally stopped but nobody left the arena, everyone was concerned for his safety and wanted to make sure he was alive. I was so close that I could see he was still breathing but unresponsive. Shocked spectators, who were so happy moments earlier, started to file out of the arena, silently and in tears.

The show must go on but the glitz, glamor, and fantastic skill of the performers were shadowed by the severe injury of this young man. The reality of human frailty in the face of such daring acts of impossible athleticism sunk in hard. We hope and pray that he makes a full recovery.

 

Rick Monday in one of the greatest plays in baseball history, 1976

One of the greatest plays in baseball history by Rick Monday.
http://agencypages.net/AgencyPages/11-52/

A Warning in 1960 by Gen. Carlos P. Romulo

Wiki photo

Readers Digest published an article in November 1960 by the Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Gen. Carlos P. Romulo (1899-1985), a diplomat, statesman, Philippine Ambassador to the U.S., and President of the United Nations General Assembly (1949). He served in WWII with Gen. Douglas McArthur.

“America, Wake up!” was a critique of the United States of America and of its citizens whom he perceived and described as “strangely unmoved” and “meek” in the face of the “menace and humiliation” of the overt communist aggression and infiltration around the world during the Cold War era.

Even though Americans believe that all men are “equally entitled to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness,” Gen. Romulo warned that the “Red despotism of the universal Communist police state could come into being in our own lifetime.”

He understood that Russia was determined to dominate the world and he cautioned, “America, wake up! Shake off the course of inaction that is giving the forces of evil the right of way in this world! Face up to the blunt fact that you are now engaged in a real war and that it must be fought and won. This is the only alternative to defeat by default!”

He saw clearly that dictatorships were not interested in “peaceful coexistence,” they wanted control at all costs. Gen. Romulo witnessed vicious communists who kept entire nations captive and poor, even banning the word “liberation.” We don’t have to look very far to see that population confinement, misery, and abject poverty caused by communism still exists today in Cuba.

Communists were so focused on “winning the war to the finish,” whether it was cold or hot, that they employed any weapon necessary, “from propaganda leaflets to military force, from sabotage and murder to smiles and handshakes.  And they are always on the offensive,” Romulo wrote.  

During the Cold War era, Americans and the world were subjected to one manufactured crisis after another and each was “Made in Soviet Russia,” bent on “the creation of a one Communist world.” Very patient, communist activists around the world knew that they were engaged in a long, protracted war, spanning decades.

At the time, phony negotiations dealt with euphemistic scenarios such as “relieving tensions,” stabilizing situations,” “keeping the boat from rocking,” “containing communism,” instead of, in Romulo’s opinion, “eliminating the scourge.”

Well, the communist “scourge” has survived the fall of the Soviet Union, of the Berlin Wall, and of the Iron Curtain in 1989, and is coming back with a vengeance, including in the 2016 United States, where it is fashionable to be communist, to vote communist, and to desire and protest violently in support of a communist utopia.

Gen. Romulo explained how the “United States twice renewed the moratorium on nuclear testing, thus giving the Kremlin exactly what it wanted – a test ban without inspection.” It sounds eerily similar to the nuclear concessions made recently to Iran. At the time, Romulo said, the truth was that “the free-world leaders are dealing with a sinister global conspiracy by international gangsters as if it were an old-style dispute between civilized nations which respect the diplomatic niceties and the sanctity of treaties.”

Gen.  Romulo described how Russian communists had been schooled in the fine art of indoctrinating and pressuring racial minorities like himself to turn against the West.  He had been approached on numerous occasions by East German and Russian apparatchiks assigned to brainwash him. He believed the West was too passive when faced with such endless propaganda which made the “Western ‘colonialism’ the whipping boy in world opinion.” Nothing has changed 56 years later.

According to Gen. Romulo, communist propaganda was “allowed to undermine public morale and sow confusion in the United States itself.” He mentioned former President Herbert Hoover who spoke about a “multitude of citizens who have sunk to the posture of perpetual apology and seeming shame for ourselves.” It appears that apologists never went away, they have mushroomed during the frequent apology tours of the last seven years of this “transformational” administration.

Gen. Romulo believed that American honesty and puritanical background produced individuals with an “inordinate guilt complex. Somehow, it has become the fashion to belittle major American accomplishments, while all Soviet claims, including dubious boasts of future accomplishments, are played up in a groveling spirit.” It seems that this academia-manufactured guilt has grown over the last 56 years to the point where American exceptionalism is squashed constantly while mediocrity and primitiveness of other backward nations are praised and exalted.

Gen. Romulo wondered if America could project an “accurate image of its own society and a truthful image of the Communist slave world?” It seems that this faulty image of American society has become larger than life thanks to the work of American academia and liberals who constantly belittle and berate American exceptionalism, promote mediocrity, and revise history to reflect their socialist/communist views of the world.

Gen. Romulo had proposed a global public education campaign on such a grand scale as to exceed the Communist propaganda efforts on all continents. Unfortunately, the global education campaigns promoted by non-governmental organizations (NGOs), the so-called non-profits, such as global citizenship, international baccalaureate, and Common Core are actually supporting and advancing global communism and Islam, not freedom, not Christianity, nor American exceptionalism.

The agit-prop machine, agitation and propaganda, said Romulo, had spent billions of dollars on hundreds of special schools which produced “armies of experts in brainwashing and subversion” which had been deployed throughout the world.

These agit-prop graduates trained “Asians, Africans, Latin Americans, West Europeans and even citizens of the United States in all revolutionary techniques, from propaganda and sabotage to street rioting and guerilla fighting.” Generations later we see the results of these schools in today’s organized rioting by Occupy Wall Street, Black Lives Matter and other communist organizations in the U.S. funded by progressive billionaires and elites who support global communism.

Romulo suggested that Americans have to fight these communists with their own “tricks and stratagems,” because it is the “only way to win the struggle for survival.” Appeasement is futile in any kind of war, cold or hot, he concluded.

 

Do Energy Conservation Programs Save Money?

"If you can't explain it to a six-year-old, you don't understand it yourself."     -  Albert Einstein

As the climate change industry continues to spend trillions of dollars over the idea that humans are somehow responsible for our climate changing over the millennia, presenting skewed data that favors their hypothesis, we continue to be forced to pay taxes for carbon credits and to subsidize with taxpayer dollars the solar and wind energy around the globe, receiving in return inadequate amounts of expensive energy that does nothing to address the energy needs of the planet and causes a multitude of other problems that affect the environment, humans, and animals.

The Fraser Institute, an independent Canadian think-tank, released on April 5, 2016, a study, “Demand-Side Mismanagement: How Conservation Became Waste,” which examined “energy conservation programs in Ontario such as smart metering, home retrofit rebates for insulation, caulking, etc., and subsidies for consumers who purchase energy-efficient appliances.”

Our own government had proposed on March 2, 2010, a Home Star Energy Efficiency Retrofit Program which was to deliver rebates directly to consumers if they made certain energy-saving investments into their homes. This program was not unlike the Cash for Clunkers Program, which was a disaster in terms of destroying perfectly good and usable second-hand vehicles which Americans, who did not want brand new cars, could have purchased.  

“A broad array of vendors, from small independent building material dealers, large national home improvement chains, energy efficiency installation professionals and utility energy efficiency programs (including rural utilities) would market the rebates, provide them directly to consumers and then be reimbursed by the federal government.“

The rebates included:

      -          $1,000-$1,500 Silver Star if consumers made upgrades in insulation, duct sealing, water  heaters, HVAC units, windows, roofing and doors

-          $3,000 Gold Star if consumers made more comprehensive energy retrofits so that they would achieve 20% energy savings in their homes

This program was supposed to “create tens of thousands of jobs while achieving substantial reductions in energy use, anticipating to save consumers $200-$500 per year in energy costs, while improving the comfort and the value of their homes.” https://www.whitehouse.gov/the-press-office/fact-sheet-homestar-energy-efficiency-retrofit-program

The Fraser Institute study asked two very important questions, do conservation programs “really save consumers money, and do they conserve energy?”

Citing a 2015 Berkeley University Study, Fraser Institute said that the “U.S. Weatherization Assistance Program – a home retrofit program – predicted 2.5 times more energy savings than were actually realized. Moreover, the cost of the program per household was about twice the value of the energy savings.” The engineering model was wrong because for every dollar saved in energy, more than two dollars were spent on weatherization assistance subsidies, even when taking into account “the value of the reduced air pollution.” http://e2e.haas.berkeley.edu/featured-eeinvestments.html

The Fraser Institute study explained that “Ontario taxpayers and ratepayers have doled out billions of dollar in energy conservation subsidies over the decades with no verifiable evidence that conservation programs actually save consumers money.”

The Fraser study talks about “negawatts,” a term coined 25 years ago as a justification for not building new generating capacity because “it was more expensive than subsidizing conservation of energy.” Politicians subscribed to this explanation. Economists, however, did not like the implication that “consumers systematically pay more for their electricity than they consider it to be worth.” The “dumb” consumer must rely on government to tell them how to stop making “bad” choices of electricity consumption and purchase.

The authors also stated that “utilities often claim success for their conservation programs, but these numbers need to be carefully scrutinized.” They cite a 1992 study in which “utility program costs were understated and benefits were overstated.” Program costs such as implementation, monitoring, and evaluation were either ignored or computed only for those consumers who were part of the conservation programs. In addition, “utilities systematically overestimated the amount of electricity saved.”

Ross McKitrick, study co-author and professor of economics at the University of Guelph, said that “Queen’s Park is betting heavily that conservation programs will effectively and cheaply manage power needs in the coming decades, yet the plans for these programs rely on unsubstantiated and overly optimistic claims.”

McKitrick cites the Ontario Power Authority (OPA) that has spent in 2013 “almost $400 million on conservation, in addition to federal, provincial and municipal programs such as the City of Toronto’s Home Energy Loan Program.” http://windfallcentre.ca/energy/incentives/toronto-help-program/

The authors added that $3.1 billion “has been earmarked for these OPA programs (now transferred to the Independent Electricity System Operator) over the period 2015 to 2020.”

Tom Adams, co-author of the Fraser study, said that “based on the experiences of other jurisdictions, electricity conservation programs in Ontario are likely a waste of resources.”

McKitrick said, “In light of the billions of taxpayer dollars being spent on these programs, and the government’s poor track record of estimating cost and energy savings, there’s a serious need for comprehensive and objective information about the costs and benefits of energy conservation programs in Ontario.” https://www.fraserinstitute.org/studies/demand-side-mismanagement-how-conservation-became-waste

 

 

Economic Miseducation

I have taught basic principles of economics for thirty years to groups after groups of college students who were often cross-eyed, bored, running late, playing with their phones, angry that I gave them too many notes, “hard tests,” and too many assignments which interfered with their busy social lives.  

Many students were there just to get a grade and to complete their useless social studies degrees on the way to an advisor’s assurance of a six-figure salary job on day one, an offer that would never materialize on their limited horizons. They did not care that their parents went in debt to pay for this college miseducation they received or that hard-working taxpayers funded their federal grants for four years. Most of them had no clue how the economy ran nor did they care.

It is painfully obvious that today students and college graduates are just as woefully incompetent and uninformed. They are voting in droves for their Marxist/communist of their choice, falling for empty promises of free education in their communist utopia of free birth control pills and free legalized drugs.

None of them paid attention in Economics classes that in communism abortion is not a choice, birth control pills are not available or expensive, and drug use is punishable with hard time in jail.  Education is free technically but there is no room to educate everybody in the halls of higher learning, so only a select few are chosen, usually the elite’s children are picked first, regardless of grades. If there are places left, then those with the highest scores are admitted.

Someone who spends a lot of his time running computer models to predict economic downturns, upturns, bubbles, crashes, and collapse, attempted to educate the audience on Facebook. Most of his advice fell on deaf ears because people are tired of listening to anybody, they know it all already, and have already made up their minds to go full speed ahead off the cliff, they want to try things for themselves, why listen to reason and rational thought. Repeating failed history in hopes of a different result seems enticing to most people.

In his analysis, in an economic environment of “120 percent debt to GDP ratio, we have less than five years before economic implosion.” He defined “Point Zero” as the point where the national debt becomes 120 percent of GDP, an unsustainable scenario that would cause an unrecoverable spiraling downturn of the economy. A black swan event would make things much worse.

In order to make sure the economy becomes sustainable again in the face of a 19 trillion national debt, “entitlements” must be reformed, spending and waste must be cut, some regulatory burdens on corporations must be reduced or eliminated, and taxes must be raised.

And this does not even begin to address unfunded liabilities such as Social Security and Medicare. Entitlements comprise 70 percent of the budget and debt servicing is 10 percent. This leaves just 20 percent of the budget that can be cut. Is that sufficient to even begin reducing the huge national debt?

Cutting the corporate credit card will force Congress to balance the budget. They cannot spend more than they take in from Treasury auctions and taxpayers. How many Congressmen will risk their careers in order to do what is right? Congress does not seem willing to address any of the above because they do not want to compromise their political careers and thus destroy the power they yield in Washington.  

Even though both spending cuts and tax increases are necessary, Congressmen fight and politically posture on both sides of the isle while nobody’s pet project or state funding gets cut. Why are Congressmen unwilling to cut pet projects? When they do, they know their constituents will vote them out of office.

We keep giving money to the U.N., we fight unwinnable wars with strange rules of engagement, and we waste more money on our political friends and foes overseas at a time when we can ill-afford it.

To make matters worse, inflation is looming on the horizon because of the three quantitative easings (QEs), printing money without the backing of goods and services in order to purchase our own debt.

The corporate mandate of the Affordable Care Act (ACA) has not even taken full effect yet. We are not sure if Congress will repeal Obamacare without a replacement. The preexisting conditions’ feature of ACA is a good idea.  In spite of dishonest political rhetoric, nobody will die in the streets without medical care.

But there is rationing occurring already due to the burgeoning and very expensive bureaucracy. We cannot offer care to more people and illegal aliens without substantial costs to the nation which so far seem to be far greater than if we would have given free premiums to the millions of uninsured who, before ACA, could not secure nor afford medical insurance. Some of them were already recipients of Medicaid.

We are sitting on a social unrest powder keg as evidenced by Ferguson, Baltimore, the Black Lives Matter, the collegiate race-baiting violence, and ISIS coming to our shores via unprotected borders. The social cohesion is breaking down faster than you can say All Lives Matter.

Even though our national debt to GDP ratio is quite high (104.7%), our economic situation is slightly different than Greece’s because we can print our own dollars. http://www.tradingeconomics.com/united-states/government-debt-to-gdp

Our fiscal policy is in a mess. Taxation burdens the middle class and favors crony capitalism while spending is out of control.  Almost 50 percent of the country does not pay any taxes and crony corporations move their headquarters to other countries to avoid paying proper share of taxes. Because corporate tax in the U.S. is one of the highest in the world, Congress enabled corporations to move overseas via Congressional bills.

The burden of taxation falls on the middle class yet again. TPP is going to move most of the remaining manufacturing sector overseas, transforming U.S. into a service economy and destroying many blue collar and white collar jobs in the process.

Congress originates the spending bills and approves them. The President can express what he wants and signs or vetoes bills, but the ultimate spending power and control rests with Congress. Congressmen are few and far between who have strength of character or the will to do what is unpopular. Nobody wants to be perceived as hurting parents trying to feed their kids, put a roof over their heads, or as “throwing grandmas over a cliff.” So the out-of-control spending continues to balloon.

American citizens themselves do not want to give up their instant gratification and suffer without their Starbucks coffee and the pain or indignity of a less than 75-inch TV or other electronic gadgets that are creating the blue screen hunchback nation. Why bear responsibility for yourself when Uncle Sam can do it for you?

Presidential hopefuls make promises to the electorate that will not reduce debt substantially in the absence of a robust and sustained economic growth that would bring in additional revenues. Some talk about “entitlement” reform by increasing the retirement age. Proposals to create economic growth are not very encouraging. There is no magical pot of gold at the end of the rainbow, nor another bubble that would bring in enough revenue to offset the very large budget and reduce the unpayable national debt.