Debating a Liberal is as futile as putting talcum powder on a hog-But I sometimes still do it.
While I agree with the late Tom Anderson who said with a distinct Southern drawl: “Debating a liberal is as futile as putting talcum powder on a hog,” I occasionally do so. Not that I think that my reason and logic will change the mind of a liberal, but to others who may be reading or listening. I recently had such a debate on a Facebook friend’s page:
John’s original post:
If Maine is not the worst state in the United States, it is damn close to it!
Stephen (The “Liberal”)
You want cheaper taxes? You old fart? Go live in a republican state! You will have a couple extra dollars in your pocket! But don’t ask for healthcare, education! Free rides to and from medical appointments! or meals on wheels! You will have to call trump for that kind of emotional support!!
Hal Shurtleff
Stephen:
Free people don’t need “free rides” supplied by the government or inferior government healthcare or government schools that have become nothing more than far-left indoctrination centers.
Stephen
Hal Shurtleff: the irony is!! it appears to me? that you’re the one that has been indoctrinated by the right!!!! and I hope you have plenty of money because when you hit 70 something years old, you can barely walk. Maybe you’re using a cane or a walker your kids are grown. Don’t call you!! because you’re right Wingnut job. You’re really going to appreciate things like Meals on Wheels! Because that’ll be the only contact you have with people!! if you have no money and nobody that cares about you.
Hal Shurtleff
Stephen Thank you for your profound reply. Name calling always helps your case. You leftists are so brilliant.
Stephen
Hal Shurtleff: if your idea of indoctrination is schools teaching things like? racial diversity, inclusion protect the environment! those kinds of things? Those issues seem pretty important to me and we should start young with our children so that their world is a better place to live when they’re older.
Hal Shurtleff
Stephen: Racial Diversity: Hate whitey. Inclusion: All but conservative people of faith. Environment: We are all going to burn up unless we give total power to the government.
Stephen
Hal Shurtleff do people who have no vehicle? need rides?
Hal Shurtleff
Stephen: Do you expect me to pay for your rides?
Stephen:
Hal Shurtleff: if you make enough money? Yes!!
Hal Shurtleff
Stephen:
It works like this: Unscrupulous people promise to provide you free rides to the liquor store if you vote for them. They get elected and pass laws to buy an electric vehicle to take you and people like you to the liquor store. But in order to pay for the electric vehicle, maintain it, and hire people that will drive you and people like you, they need money. So, they pass laws forcing me and people like me whom you not only hate, but have been encouraging others to hate, to pay for all of this. The law is proposed and people who sell, build, and drive eclectic vehicles as well as those in the liquor industry lobby to pass the bill.
The bill has a clause that reads “failure to pay the tax that takes Stephen and others like him to the liquor store is not only a felony but a hate crime.” When the elected officials discover that I refuse to pay the tax, they send out people with guns to arrest me or shoot me. You and people like you, get your free rides, and the unscrupulous people you voted for not only get reelected but pass other onerous laws. In a free market, a ride to the liquor store could have been provided to you for a small amount of money but now costs hundreds of thousands of dollars. You call it social justice. I call it communism.
Hal Shurtleff
Stephen: Why is it right for people you hate to be forced to pay for your rides to the liquor store? And who determines if I make enough money? And how to you take this money from me?
Stephen:
Hal Shurtleff: who said the liquor store? I said doctors appointments. I never said liquor stores! And I never brought up Electric cars? You ok Hal? Little dementia kicking in?
Hal Shurtleff
Stephen: Lefties have no sense of humor unless it is put down humor.
Hal Shurtleff
Stephen: Good for you. More insults. That will show me. You can always ask Bernie Sanders for a ride. He is a multimillionaire. Or you can ask some local Maine socialists elected officials for a free ride. They know that they will be reelected. So, they don’t care about you, but you will still vote for them. They will be happy to voice solidarity with you, denounce the greedy doctors who must be MAGA, and Uber drivers and happily pass more restrictive laws to make practicing medicine and driving people more expensive. Or maybe you can ask some folks at the local church that have a ministry that takes people in need to their appointments. But don’t go to the churches with the Rainbow, Transgender and Black Lives Matter flags flying in front of them. Their members are far too busy lobbying governments to raise taxes, restrict free speech and do what their churches used to do before they went “woke.”
Another option is taking the free market approach. There is a need, and the free market can meet that need. Your doctor could reach out to other physicians and maybe start a service to get patients who don’t drive to their appointments. Or maybe organize a volunteer group to do it. But because you are a socialist at heart and hate people who don’t agree with your worldview, you choose to make nasty posts on Facebook.
Note: I did not make any corrections to Stephen’s typos.
Russian Puppetry From Wilson to Obama-Biden
In the wake of President Zelensky’s disastrous visit to the White House, fake news outlets, Democrats and their Republican Neo-Con allies have regurgitated their ridiculous claim that Trump and his supporters are Putin’s Puppets” This false narrative began before Trump was elected and was proven to be a complete and total lie stemming from the fake Steele Dossier that Hillary Clinton purchased. Obama used this discredited dossier to justify spying on the Trump campaign.
It was Hillary, and her boss Obama, which enabled Putin. Hillary, as Secretary of State, facilitated the transfer of a percentage of our uranium to Putin. During a visit with Russian President Dmitry Medvedev, Obama was caught on a hot microphone saying that after the election he will have “more flexibility.” Medvedev. said that he will relay the message to Putin. Mitt Romney, who hates Trump more than most, said that Obama’s comments were “alarming and troubling.” It was the harshest thing he said against Obama during his weak presidential campaign. But he never called him “Putin’s Puppet.”
Long before Trump entered the political scene,100 years actually, forces in the United States including Wall Street financiers and both Republicans and Democrats have been involved in aiding and abetting the communists in Russia. Leon Trotsky was living in exile in New York City prior to the Bolshevik Revolution. In March of 1917, holding an American passport given to him by the Wilson Administration, and a large amount of money, Trotsky boarded a ship in New York Harbor to eventually join with Lenin. The Canadians detained Trosky and seized the ship after learning that Trotsky was going to get Rusia out of the war. This would have freed up thousands of German soldiers to fight on the Western Front where many Canadians were serving. When Wilson learned of Trotsky’s detainment, he demanded that the Canadians free Trotsky. The Canadians relented. After the Bolsheviks seized power, Wall St. bankers, using the Red Cross as a cover, went to Russia with large sums of money to help finance the revolution. The reign of terror under Lenin began.
After Lenin’s death, Stalin seized power and picked up where Lenin left off with a vengeance. The U.S. under Franklin Roosevelt established diplomatic relations with Stalin’s Russia. Roosevelt, despite overwhelming evidence of Stalin’s atrocities, had a political love affair with “Uncle Joe.” Pro-Communists reporters like Walter Duranty of “The New York Times” send stories to their papers praising Stalin to the hilt while overlooking the forced famine in Ukraine which resulted in the deaths of millions of men, women, and children, as well as other atrocities.
During World War II, we not only sent Stalin millions of dollars’ worth of weapons, and supplies, we gave them materials that made it possible for Russia to be a nuclear power. This treachery was made known to us by Major Racey Jordan who was in charge of this project. His book From Major Jordan’s Diary tried to warn the American people but it was smothered.
A link to a speech by Major Jordan: https://youtu.be/Z9eYS0mxtpQ?si=1iJdDiQekrkZWpwg
At the Yalta Agreement Roosevelt not only handed Stalin the nations of Eastern Europe but agreed to forcefully hand over millions of people who had fled from the advancing Red Army. This dark chapter in our history “Operation Keelhaul” is a little known event even to many World War II historians. I made reference to “Operation Keelhaul’ in a letter to the “Brockton Enterprise” in 1988, and a survivor of this event reached out to me and gave me a firsthand narrative of this tragedy.
During the Cold War. President Johnson approved of sending supplies to satellites of the Soviet Union some of which made its way to the North Vietnam and used to kill American soldiers. During the Nixon Administration, the U.S. sent technology to the Soviets making it possible for them to upgrade their nuclear missile system. The technology included miniature ball bearing from the Bryant Company in Springfield, VT. The company-the only one in the world at the time that made this ball bearing-initially refused to let the Soviets have them, but they relented due to the heavy hand of Henry Kissinger- who some believed was a Soviet Agent. This is from a Wikipedia article:
“ Bryant’s Soviet contracts continued to be controversial that same year. Bryant’s sale of 45 precision grinders enabled the USSR to improve missile accuracy and MIRV their ICBMs. Objections to the sale were quashed by Henry Kissinger.
We also send the material to build the world’s largest truck engine factory in the world at the time in Russia: The Kama River factory. Engines from these trucks came in handy when the Soviets invaded Afghanistan. This comes right from the CIA’s website:
This treachery was documented by the late Professor Anthony Sutton in a series of books which include Wall Street and the Bolshevik Revolution, National Suicide: Military Aid To The Soviet Union, The Best Enemy Money Can Buy, and the three-volume book Western Aid to the Soviet Union 1917-1965.
A link to a speech by Professor Sutton: https://youtu.be/9RNbM4tmKEY?si=jpz251XvRGGhUcsb
It always helps to make your case by finding those involved corroborating your research. Back in the early 2000s, I took a homeschool field trip to the New England Air Museum in Windsor Locks, CT with two of my children. In the museum’ lobby was a newsletter from United Technologies-the parent company of Sikorsky Aviation. It contained an article by Igor Sikorski Jr, the son of the aviation pioneer, and patriot. In the article, Igor bragged abut selling equipment to the Soviet bloc nations in the 1960s. I wrote to him and asked if he knew how many Americans died in Vietnam as a result of his equipment being send from Eastern Europe to North Vietnam. For some strange reason, he neve responded to my letter.
While doing research for the article, I pulled out a file of newspaper articles from the 1980s and early 1990s and found this this:
That’s right. Soviet generals being lectured by General Colin Powell, an anti-Trumper who supported Obama, Hillary Clinton, and Biden.
When Russia invaded Ukraine, Biden, or more likely his handlers, banned the sale of Russian fossil fuels to the U.S. but he did not break off diplomatic relations which we have had since the Franklin Roosevelt Administration. Practically every U.S. President from Wilson to Obama has done their utmost to cater to the Russian communists. The Democrats and their Republican Neo-Con allies like Liz Cheney, and Adam Kissinger have labeled Trump as a “Putin’s Puppet” for wanting an end to the war in Ukraine. While most have rejected their false and ugly accusation, there are a large number of people who want to believe it.
I realize that simply exposing the misguided people who have bought into the “Putin’s Puppet” narrative to the above will not likely change their positions. However, it will help give folks who oppose the war in Ukraine some needed historical background. Readers who would like PDF versions of Wall Street and the Bolshevik Revolution and The Best Enemy Money Can Buy, please E-mail me at campconstitution1@gmail.com
Mine, Baby, Mine – right here in the USA!
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Maine State Rep Laurel Libby takes a stand against the Cultural Marxists and gets censored, but she will not be silenced
The Camp Constitution Report plays the speech that Maine State Representative Laurel Libby gave outside the House Chambers after being censored for standing up to girls and women’s sports in Maine.
When……………………….You Said Nothing
A friend sent this to me this morning. Author unknown.
When millions of illegals were ushered in through the southern border, you said nothing!
When they abandoned billions of dollars’ worth of military equipment in Afghanistan, you said nothing!
When they flaunted a two-tier justice system, one for them and one for everyone else, you said nothing!
When they covered up the Hunter Biden laptop, you said nothing!
When they passed a trillion-dollar infrastructure bill that failed miserably, you said nothing!
When they forced Americans to take an untested vaccine, you said nothing!
When inflation crushed the middle class, you said nothing!
When they sent billions to Ukraine, you said nothing!
When chemicals polluted the water in East Palestine, Ohio and they ignored it, you said nothing!
When Americans were raped, robbed and murdered by illegals, you said nothing!
When they implanted Kamala as the presidential nominee without getting a single vote, you said nothing!
When billionaire and anti-American George Soros funded dozens of AG elections, you said nothing!
When they turned our classrooms into liberal indoctrination camps, you said nothing!
When they spent our tax dollars on inmates’ transition surgeries, you said nothing!
When they gave the citizens of Hawaii $700 after losing their entire city, you said nothing!
When they gave free money, food and 5-star hotel lodging to illegals, you said nothing!
When they came for our free speech, you said nothing!
When DEI weakened the military and put our national security at risk, you said nothing!
When they colluded with the media to push false reports, you said nothing!
When it was open season on law enforcement and criminals reigned, you said nothing!
When they weaponized the justice system to take down their political opponents, you said nothing!
When the bureaucrats took over the White House and ran the government, you said nothing!
When they covered up Biden’s rapidly declining mental state, you said nothing!
When they groomed our kids in school and hid it from the parents, you said nothing!
When the drug epidemic exploded and 1000s died annually, you said nothing!
When they accosted the Jews on their campuses, you said nothing!
When they weaponized the intelligence agencies against Americans, you said nothing!
When they spent $45 million dollars on “Diversity and Inclusion” scholarships in Burma, you said nothing!
When they let men play women’s sports, you said nothing!
When they chanted “Death to America” and burned our flag, you said nothing!
When they shut down our energy production, and emboldened Russia, you said nothing!
When the crime rates in American cities increased, you said nothing!
While thousands of veterans were left to sleep out on the streets, you said nothing!
When 300,000 migrant children went missing and no one had a clue, you said nothing!
When Joe Biden pardoned his friends and family, you said nothing!
When they sent billions to Iran and inadvertently funded Hamas, you said nothing!
When men were celebrated for pretending to be women, you said nothing!
When they let a Chinese Spy Ballon sail across America, you said nothing!
When 50 intelligence agents all lied to bury the Hunter Biden laptop as Russian disinformation, you said nothing!
When American citizens were taken hostage and held for a year in Gaza, you said nothing!
When Facebook admitted, they conspired with the Biden administration to censor the truth, you said nothing!
When they cleaned the streets of San Francisco for the communist Chinese President Xi Jinping, you said nothing!
When Fauci and the WHO peddled covid 19 virus lies and covered up the origins, you said nothing!
When they sealed the January 6th commission files or “lost them”, you said nothing!
You saw the corruption, the lies, the bad policy, the anti American agenda and said nothing, so please spare us your crocodile tears
and all your fake hysteria now. For 4 years you watched this country get run into the ground on all fronts and you said nothing!
Executive Orders History – American Minute with Bill Federer
Executive Orders are not specifically mentioned in the Constitution, but Article 2, Section 3, does say the President is to “take care that the laws be faithfully executed.”
Executive Orders are Presidential directives to his staff, or government officials and agencies, having the force of law. Initially, they were not distinguished from Presidential Proclamations, Memorandums, and Letters.
Executive Orders were not numbered until 1907, when they were then retroactively assigned back to 1862. There are over 1,500 unnumbered Executive Orders.
In 1936, the Federal Register Act required that Executive Orders be documented and made public.
George Washington issued 8 Executive Orders.
His first was when war between England and France was beginning, and he issued an Executive Order for American citizens to stay neutral.
Since there was not a clear way of enforcing it, when Congress came back in session, it supported Washington by passing the Neutrality Act of 1794.
Lincoln issued 48 Executive Orders, saying
“to the extent of my ability I shall take care, as the Constitution itself expressly enjoins upon me, that the laws of the Union be faithfully executed in all the States.”
His first Executive Order was at the outset of the Civil War. Democrat John Merryman organized riots in Maryland which attacked Union troops and destroyed telegraph lines. Local Democrat law enforcement refused to arrest him.
Lincoln considered him a public threat and issued an Executive Order to arrest him.
There was a problem, though, as his arrest violated Merryman’s right of habeas corpus, which required law enforcement to first bring the accused before a judge with evidence before locking him in jail.
Before the Supreme Court had a chance to determine if Lincoln had over-stepped his authority, Congress supported Lincoln by passing the Habeas Corpus Act of 1863.
Lincoln issued the Emancipation Proclamation, which was an Executive Order to free the slaves. Congress considered this an overreach of his authority.
Lincoln responded by pushing Congress to ratify the 13th Amendment.
Theodore Roosevelt greatly expanded the use of Executive Orders, issuing 1,081 of them.
His attitude was, instead of seeing if the Constitution authorized him, he would issue Executive Orders unless the Constitution specifically prohibited him.
He wrote in his autobiography:
“My view was that every executive officer … was a steward of the people bound … to do all he could for the people … anything that the needs of the Nation demanded unless such action was forbidden by the Constitution ….
Under this interpretation of executive power I did … many things not previously done by the President … I did not usurp power, but I did greatly broaden the use of executive power.”
What one President does, however, is often outdone by subsequent Presidents.
Thus President Woodrow Wilson issued 1,803 Executive Orders, claiming the emergency of World War I justified it.
During the Great Depression and World War II, Franklin Roosevelt issued a record 3,721 Executive Orders.
By an Executive Order, Roosevelt confiscated all gold held by private citizens.
He closed all banks in the country for four days.
He created agencies, like the Works Progress Administration – WPA, and the Office of Censorship.
He seized private businesses, including mines and factories, such as the North American Aviation plant in California.
Congress supported Roosevelt’s orders by passing the War Labor Disputes Act of 1943.
Franklin Roosevelt issued Executive Order 9066 which rounded up 122,000 Japanese-Americans and confined in internment camps in the desert.
The Supreme Court backed up Roosevelt in the 1944 case of Korematsu v. U.S.
Roosevelt issued Executive Order 8807 to establish the Manhattan Project which created the atomic bomb. Truman did not learn about it until a day after Roosevelt died.
President Truman issued 908 Executive Orders, with a notable one being desegregating the military.
During the Korean War, Truman tried doing what Roosevelt and Wilson did, but this time, Congress and the Courts pushed back.
When union steel workers went on strike in 1951, Truman issued an Executive Order seizing control of all the steel manufacturing plants in the nation.
The Supreme Court limited Truman in the 1952 Youngstown case, saying:
“Presidential powers are not fixed but fluctuate depending upon their disjunction or conjunction with those of Congress … When the President acts pursuant to … authorization of Congress, his authority is at its maximum.”
Eisenhower issued 484 Executive Orders, one of which deployed troops to desegregate Arkansas schools.
John F. Kennedy issued 214 Executive Orders, one of which, EO 10924, created the Peace Corp and another, EO 10973, created USAID.
Lyndon Johnson issued 325 Executive Orders. One was to demand affirmative action be pushed on all federal contractors.
This was eventually struck down by the Supreme Court in 2023.
Another, EO 11130, created the Warren Commission to investigate the Kennedy assassination, which many now suspect was to cover up evidence of his involvement.
Gerald Ford issued 169 Executive Orders, one of which pardoned Richard Nixon.
Jimmy Carter issued 320 Executive Orders, one of which, EO 12127, created FEMA.
Another promoted wage and price controls, including setting the price of oil with Executive Order 12153.
When the Iran crisis took place, Carter issued an Executive Order freezing all Iranian assets in the U.S.
Ronald Reagan issued 381 Executive Orders, many of which peeled back layers of government regulation that hampered economic growth.
Bill Clinton issued 364 Executive Orders, saying: “Stroke of the pen, law of the land. Kind of cool.”
One of his Executive Orders prohibited replacements for striking union workers, which the courts reversed.
George W. Bush issued 291 Executive Orders. One limited the public from seeing presidential documents.
After 911, by Executive Order 13228, Bush created the Department of Homeland Security.
He then instituted government surveillance of American citizens without a warrant, even authorizing the NSA National Security Agency to eavesdrop on citizens’ phone calls.
Obama issued 276 Executive Orders, saying: “We are not just going to be waiting for legislation … I’ve got a pen, and I’ve got a phone.”
Obama issued Executive Order 13707 titled “Using Behavioral Science Insights to Better Serve the American People,” which authorized the Federal government to secretly use media to carry out psychological operations on the American public.
President Donald Trump issued 220 Executive Orders in his first term.
Biden issued 162 Executive orders, many of which revered Trumps Executive Orders.
When Roe v. Wade was overturned, Biden issued Executive Order 14079, to continue ending of the lives of unborn children.
In the first month of Trump’s second term, by Executive Proclamation, he freed J6 prisoners.
He issued more than 70 Executive Orders, including:
recognizing only two sexes (EO 14168);
keeping men out of women’s sports (EO 14201);
protecting children from chemical and surgical mutilation (EO 14187);
ending radical indoctrination in K-12 schooling (EO 13985);
ending DEI (EO 14151);
establishing the Department of Government Efficiency (EO 14158);
securing the borders (EO 14165);
withdrawing the U.S. from the World Health Organization (EO 14155);
withdrawing from Paris climate agreement (EO 14162);
designating drug cartels as terrorist organizations (EO 14157);
protecting Second Amendment rights (14206);
freeing up land for oil drilling (14154);
declassifying records of the assassinations of President John F. Kennedy, Senator Robert F. Kennedy, and the Reverend Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. (EO 14176);
renaming national monuments, including renaming the Gulf of America (EO 14172); and
eradicating anti-Christian bias (EO 14202), stating:
“The United States Constitution enshrines the fundamental right to religious liberty in the First Amendment …
Yet the previous Administration engaged in an egregious pattern of targeting peaceful Christians … bringing Federal criminal charges and … multi-year prison sentences against nearly two dozen peaceful pro-life Christians for praying … outside abortion facilities.
Those convicted included a Catholic priest and 75-year-old grandmother, as well as an 87-year-old woman and a father of 11 children who were arrested 18 months after praying and singing hymns outside an abortion facility … part of a politically motivated prosecution campaign by the Biden Administration … a Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) memorandum asserted that “radical-traditionalist” Catholics were domestic-terrorism threats …
The Biden Equal Employment Opportunity Commission sought to force Christians to affirm radical transgender ideology against their faith …
The Biden Administration declared March 31, 2024 — Easter Sunday — as ‘Transgender Day of Visibility’ …
Catholic churches and institutions have been aggressively targeted with hundreds of acts of hostility, violence, and vandalism …
My Administration will not tolerate anti-Christian weaponization of government or unlawful conduct targeting Christians.”
Since these Executive Orders can be reversed by any future President, it is up to Congress to pass laws supporting the President’s directives.
The Liberator, February 21, 2025, published Mat Staver’s article “Codifying Executive Orders into Law to Secure a Legacy”:
“Executive Orders should be seen as a launching pad for legislation that Congress needs to set in stone.
The federal government was given a clear mandate from the American people in 2024 — Congress must ensure this mandate is not one presidential action away from erasure.“
—
The Weekly Sam: Why the Federal Government Should Get Out of Education By Samuel L. Blumenfeld
The real issue is Limited Government versus Unlimited Government Most Americans want less government, smaller government and lower taxes. The only way to accomplish this is by abolishing federal departments and bureaucracies. As far back as the Reagan administration, Republicans promised to abolish the Department of Education. They couldn’t do it then because they lacked a majority in Congress. But whatever happened to the plan to abolish the Department of Education when Republicans became the majority? Not only did they forget their promise, but in September 1996 they passed the single largest increase in federal education funding: $3.5 billion. Who were the Republicans trying to impress? The National Education Association? The basic question is: Can good education be provided in the U.S. without the help or intrusion of the federal government? The answer is clearly yes. In fact, there is ample evidence indicating that the present decline in educational quality is a direct result of federal funding which has been used by the educators to fund more and more expensive educational malpractice.
A little historical background will help us understand why the federal role in education in America is more of an aberration than a natural development. There is no mention of education in the U.S. Constitution. However, in 1785 and 1787, while the United States were still under the Articles of Confederation, the Continental Congress passed the Northwest Ordinance Acts which provided for the orderly settlement of the Northwest Territory and encouraged the establishment of schools in the territory by stating: “Religion, morality and knowledge being necessary to good government and the happiness of mankind, schools and the means of education shall be encouraged.” The new states were required to set aside the 16th section of each township to be used for educational purposes.
But there was no requirement that the schools be government owned and operated. Seventy-five years later, in 1862, Congress passed and President Lincoln signed the Morrill Land Grant Act providing each loyal state with 30,000 acres of land for each Senator and Representative, the land to be used for agricultural and mechanical schools under a measure proposed by Senator Justin S. Morrill of Vermont. Five years later, in 1867, a federal Office of Education was established. Its purpose was:
“To collect such statistics and facts as shall show the condition and progress of education in the several States and Territories, and to diffuse such information respecting the organization and management of schools and school systems, and methods of teaching as shall aid the People of the United States in the establishment and maintenance of efficient school systems, and otherwise promote the cause of education throughout the country.”
It should be noted that the National Education Association had been founded ten years earlier in 1857 and that its members called for the establishment of a federal department of education at the founding convention. And it is obvious that in that statement of purpose was an expansionist view of the government’s future role in education. After World War I, the NEA began a long range campaign to get federal aid for public education. From 1867 to 1940–a period of 73 years–the Congress passed about 11 minor pieces of legislation related to education. The fear of federal control of schools kept most legislators from voting for federal aid to public education. But resistance was gradually broken down by such acts as the National School Lunch Act of 1946, the School Milk Program Act of 1954. But it was the Elementary and Secondary Education Act of 1965 passed during the Johnson administration which opened the floodgates of the U.S. Treasury for the benefit of the education establishment.
From 1965 to 1983–18 years–there were 43 education acts passed by the Congress, including the establishment in 1979 of a U.S. Department of Education with cabinet status. In the year 1994 alone, there were about 180 educational restructuring bills before Congress! The three most important bills enacted were the Goals 2000 Act, the School-to-Work Opportunities Act, and the Improving America’s Schools Act, a reauthorization of the ESEA of 1965. All of this legislation was passed with much Republican help. In short, the Congress launched an avalanche of bills which virtually amounted to a cultural revolution. It seemed as if all restraints had been removed on government expansion and intrusion into education, and the Republican Congress did nothing to reverse the trend.
That is why the federal government has become a government of unlimited power. We must return to the principle of limited government if we wish to reduce the cost of government and its unwarranted intrusion in the education of our children. A limited federal government does only those things that cannot be done by the states or the private sector. The purpose of taxes is to pay for government, not change society. There is no doubt that the federal intrusion in education has harmed education and produced the dumbing down effect. Test scores attest to this bizarre phenomenon. Since 1962, SAT verbal scores have declined despite billions of federal dollars pumped into public education. In September 1993, the U.S. Department of Education revealed that some 90 million adult Americans have grossly inadequate reading and writing skills, despite compulsory school attendance.
The more federal money Congress pumps into education the worse it gets. Why? Because educational malpractice is very expensive, and without federal funding we’d have much less of it. The simple truth is that federal education programs cost the taxpayers billions of dollars, yet not one of these programs has actually improved education. Claims have been made that HeadStart is a successful program. But research indicates that whatever gains children make in HeadStart are lost by the third grade. Federal education grants subsidize a liberal academic elite with its secular humanist, socialist agenda, thus violating the Constitutional prohibition against establishing a state religion: Humanism.
The Data Collection System of the National Center for Education Statistics threatens family privacy and freedom. Children are not a “national resource” to be monitored and controlled for use by the state or industry. They are individuals whose lives belong to themselves, not to “the economy.” The federal government has institutionalized educational malpractice by supporting unsound educational theories and practices which have found their way into the public schools via the federally funded National Diffusion Network. Federal aid to public education simply reinforces a socialist, government owned and operated education system which distorts market values and encourages monopoly union practices.
Meanwhile, the education establishment continues to grow and prosper. In 1982, the average public school teacher’s salary was $19,274. In 1995 it was up to $37,643., and in 2008 it us up to $47,602. In 1982, per pupil expenditure was $2,726. In 1995-96 the national average was up to $6,213, and in 2009 it was up to $9,963. In 1984, total expenditure for public education was $134.5 billion. In 2002 it had risen to $420 billion. In short, never has public education been more generously supported by the taxpayer and never have our schools seen more violence, academic disarray, and parental dissatisfaction than the present.
What is even more shocking is that over four million students must be drugged daily with Ritalin in order to be able to attend class. Today, well-connected change agents like Mark Tucker are busy imposing on America the new Human Resources Development System, exuberantly described by Tucker in an 18-page letter to Hillary Clinton when her husband was elected President. Tucker described his system as “a seamless web of opportunities to develop one’s skills that literally extends from cradle to grave and is the same system for everyone–young and old, poor and rich, worker and full-time student.”
And so, in place of academic excellence, we have Outcome Based Education, Whole Language, Multiculturalism, Skinnerian Mastery Learning, National Teaching Standards and Certification, School-Based Clinics, Attitude Assessments, Global Citizenship, and Socialized Medicine for every student. What is actually taking place is a cultural revolution engineered by behavioral psychologists, humanist educators, and socialist change agents using a whole galaxy of education programs to implement their agenda, financed by the federal government. And much of this has taken place when Republicans were in control of Congress. And that accounts for the extreme frustration of conservatives who vote Republican but get liberal results.
When will this change? The takeover of the White House and the federal government by radical leftists has finally awakened the American people to what has happened to this country since we started allowing the federal government to exceed all limits placed on it by the Constitution. But in order to succeed in restoring the principles of government held by our founding fathers, we must return to limited government. This can only be done if the American people realize the potential for tyranny inherent in a government education system. The most important institution in a socialist state is a government owned and controlled school system wherein children can be indoctrinated to accept a socialist way of life. And the best way to prevent this from occurring is to return to the concept of educational freedom in which the federal government has no role in education.
Local public schools can easily become private institutions governed by local trustees and supported by tuition fees. This would greatly reduce the tax burden on home owners and provide more than enough resources to pay for the tuitions of poor families. The costs of education would decrease dramatically since education would once more become reality based wherein the fundamental academic subjects would be taught without the added costs of educational malpractice. Individual intelligence would be enhanced, while collectivist group-think would be discarded.
Can this be done? Only if America’s conservative leaders demand that it should be done. The home-school movement has already proven that parents can actually teach better than our high-priced professionals, that children progress better academically when taught at home, and that the cost of educating a child at home is less than $1,000 a year. If Americans want to once more experience what it means to be free, they must burst out of the high-priced straitjacket imposed on them by the socialist education tyrants. If they want better education at lower cost, then the prescription for success is simple: get the government out of education.
(The above timeless article is from the Sam Blumenfeld Archive http://blumenfeld.campconstitution.net/main.htm
Announcing the Guest Speaker for Camp Constitution’s Ladies Spring Fling May 2-4 at the Alton Bay Christian Conference Center Alton, NH
We are pleased to announce that author Michelle Gallagher will be the speakers at our 5th annual Ladies “Spring Friday May 2 to Sunday May 4 at the Alton Bay Christian Conference Center https://altonbay.org/
Michelle Gallagher:
Michelle is an author, designer, and book publisher. Her first book, the “Forefathers Monument Guidebook,” uses a colorful tour of this iconic national monument in Plymouth, Massachusetts, to present the Pilgrim story in a fresh way to a modern generation. Released in 2021 to strong sales, the Forefathers Monument Guidebook has received glowing endorsements and is now in its third printing as a hardcover book. Her second project, “Monumental Prayers: 14 Days of Prayer Inspired by the Faith of the Pilgrims,” was released in May 2023 in partnership with Intercessors for America (IFA). Both projects were published through Proclamation House, Inc., an independent publishing company she co-founded with her husband in 2019 to create quality books and teaching materials that herald faith and freedom to the generations. (www.ProclamationHouse.org) In 2023, they published their first outside project for IFA entitled “Inspired Stories” to a national audience.
Our recent interview with Michelle:
In addition to Michelle, the weekend event includes arts and crafts. Classes on gardening, Bible studies, optional marksmanship training, and an evening campfire.
The cost for the weekend which includes two nights of lodging, five meals and materials will be $200. per person. For an application, please response to this E-,mail Payments can be made via our PayPal account accessed from our website’s homepage https://www.campconstitution.net or by check payable to Camp Constitution and mailed C/O Hal Shurtleff146 Powder Mill Rd. Alton, NH 03809. An application and a bring list is attached to this E-mail.
Gloucester Man Alex Destino puts left-wing clergy in their place
The following is a statement released by a group of “clergy” in the Gloucester, MA area-Cape Ann and an excellent rebuttal from Alex Destino-a life-time resident of the Gloucester:
MIDWEEK MUSINGS: By The Associated Clergy of Cape Ann
On Jan. 21, in the traditional prayer service at the Washington National Cathedral, the Episcopal bishop, the Rt. Reverend Mariann Edgar Budde, asked President Donald Trump to “have mercy upon the people in our country who are scared now.” Many people were angered by her words, insisting that such language had no place within a service of worship.
The Associated Clergy of Cape Ann is writing to share our support for Bishop Budde and to thank her for her prophetic witness. Clergy of any religious tradition understand that our call to ministry is, when necessary, to speak truth to power.
Throughout human history, prophets have emerged during turbulent times to raise their voices and to speak their truth. When we think of prophets we most often think of the ancient voices in the Hebrew Bible: Amos, or Jeremiah, or Isaiah. Here is the Prophet Amos: “I hate, I despise your festivals … but let justice flow down like waters, and righteousness like an ever-flowing stream.” (Amos 5:21,24).
Of course, throughout Jesus’ public ministry he spoke prophetically to the crowds who gathered, words that are familiar to us today. We remember well Jesus’ response to the question of what commandment in the law is the greatest: “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind … and a second is like it: ‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself.’” (Matthew 22:37-39)
The words of warning and admonition spoken to the powerful often make people uncomfortable. No one wants to hear that they are missing the mark, acting out of covenant with God. It’s the role of prophets to tell us, and hope that we will have ears to hear.
Often a prophet is scorned. We see in the Gospel of Luke how Jesus was rejected for his preaching: an enraged crowd in Nazareth “got up, drove him out of the town, and led him to the brow of the hill on which their town was built, so that they might hurl him off the cliff.” (Luke 4:29-31)
We tend to celebrate prophets from earlier times, not those of the present. The Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., one of the most prophetic voices of the 20th century, was often deeply unpopular among ordinary citizens and those in the corridors of government. He was only silenced by assassination, at the age of 39. Today, he is honored. Time has made his words feel safer to us.
Clergy learn of all these powerful examples as they take up their calling. But in fact, reading the words of others is just the beginning. We are also called to serve, and to act on behalf of the vulnerable and the oppressed, to do all we can to bend the arc of the universe toward justice. We take this call seriously.
And we ask that others join us in lifting their voices, in finding ways to serve, in showing mercy and compassion, and helping those in need. It is all of our work together: we are all needed, and we all have a role to play. There are many different ways to serve, many opportunities to offer mercy and care. We do not have to agree on everything in order to each put our shoulders to the wheel and to foster more kindness in an often harsh world. But prophets of any age would tell us that we are not ever let off the hook; that we are not allowed to do nothing. Regardless of our political and religious beliefs, the work to foster justice and mercy remains the same.
Perhaps an outspoken clergy member, or even attendance at religious observances has made you uncomfortable. Do you ask yourself why that is? Is it easier to blame the person uttering the words for your discomfort than it is to search your heart?
In the concluding paragraphs of her 2023 book, “How We Learn to be Brave,” Bishop Budde wrote, “As a person of faith, I dare to trust that God is at work amid the most challenging realities of our lives, and that by grace and acceptance, we join God in the holy work of transforming the world.” (p. 183)
It’s a tall order, to transform the world. No one can do it alone. Working together, we can accomplish a great deal. We hope you will join us.
Members of the Associated Clergy of Cape Ann,
The Rev. Janet Parsons, minister, Gloucester Unitarian Universalist Church.
Rev. Valerie M. Roberts-Toler, interim pastor, St. Paul Lutheran Church, Gloucester
Rev. Printice M. Roberts-Toler, United Methodist pastor, (retired)
Rev. Susan Moran, minister, Unitarian Universalist Society of Rockport
Rev. Tess Baumberger, minister, First Universalist Church of Essex
The Rev. Alice W. Erickson, United Church of Christ,
The Rev. Judith Brain,
Rev. Sue Koehler-Arsenault, pastor, Annisquam Village Church
Rev. Rona Tyndall, pastor, West Gloucester Trinitarian Congregational Church, United Church of Christ
Elsa Marshall, C.M.C.E.Y.M.,
The Rev. Dr. Norma Brettell, pastor, Trinity Congregational Church, United Church of Christ
The Rev. Jim Achadinha, pastor, The Catholic Community of Gloucester & Rockport
Brother Patrick Garvey, Diocesan hermit, The Catholic Community of Gloucester & Rockport
The Rev. Derek van Gulden, First Congressional Church of Rockport, United Church of Christ
The Rev. Wendy Fitting, Unitarian Universalist minister (retired),
The Rev. Marya DeCarlen, St. John’s Episcopal Church, Gloucester.
The Rev. Sean Bendigo, senior pastor, First Church in Wenham
And Mr. Destino’s rebuttal:
My Response to The Associated Clergy of Cape Ann—Midweek Musings
The Associated Clergy of Cape Ann, entrusted with guiding their congregations in faith and doctrine, present themselves as biblical leaders. However, some of their recent statements raise concerns about their alignment with Scripture.
In their letter, they endorsed Bishop Mariann Edgar Budde’s call for “mercy” on transgender children and illegal immigrants at the National Prayer Service before President Trump, Vice President J.D. Vance, and their families. While mercy and compassion are core Christian values, our faith leaders must also remain firmly rooted in biblical truth.
Bishop Budde—the first woman and openly lesbian individual to serve as Bishop of the Episcopal Diocese of Washington—represents a departure from God’s design for church leadership.
Scripture is clear on this matter: God has established distinct roles for men and women within the church (1 Timothy 2:12; 1 Corinthians 14:34-35). This is not about inequality—Scripture affirms that men and women are equally valued but called to serve in different capacities. When these distinctions are disregarded, the church risks following cultural trends rather than God’s Word.
The Bible is also unambiguous regarding sexual morality (Romans 1:26-27; 1 Corinthians 6:9-10). By fully embracing Bishop Budde’s leadership without acknowledging these teachings, the clergy of Cape Ann appear to be prioritizing societal pressures over Scripture.
At the same time, these clergy seem to be promoting gender ideology rather than biblical truth. While we are called to love and support all individuals, true compassion does not affirm confusion, but leads people toward clarity and truth. God created humanity male and female (Genesis 1:27), and our identity is divinely appointed before birth (Psalm 139:13-16; Jeremiah 1:5). Shouldn’t clergy, above all, uphold this truth?
Additionally, these clergy are actively protesting President Trump for enforcing immigration laws while remaining silent on the greatest crisis facing our nation: Under the Biden administration’s open-border policies, more than 365,000 children have gone missing—many tragically trafficked and exploited (Department of Homeland Security, 2024). Where is their outcry and compassion for these vulnerable children?
Beyond theology, there are financial concerns regarding the funding of faith-based organizations.
The Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) has revealed that faith-based NGOs—including the Episcopal Church and Catholic Charities—have received tens of millions in taxpayer dollars, in part, to fund LGBTQ+ and immigration programs.
This raises a serious question: Whose interests are these clergy truly serving? Are they answering to the government agencies that fund them or to their parishioners, who seek God’s unfiltered truth? Consider Matthew 6:24, Zechariah 11:13, and Matthew 26:14-16.
To the Associated Clergy of Cape Ann, I offer these questions with sincerity:
Where were you when Christians were arrested for praying on sidewalks and reciting the Rosary outside abortion clinics?
Where was your support and protests for Christian parents arrested at school board meetings for opposing gender policies?
Where were you when our religious freedoms were being infringed upon during COVID? You closed your churches while liquor stores and big-box retailers remained open. Did any of you stand up for religious freedom?
And why were you silent when the FBI spied on traditional Catholics while attending Mass, labeling them “potential domestic threats”?
To the faithful Christian and Catholic community of Cape Ann: Please join me in prayer for our region’s clergy. My hope is that they will return to their sacred duty of upholding God’s Word without compromise.
The church’s calling is not to conform to culture but to stand unwavering in God’s truth (Romans 12:2). Our community needs shepherds who will lead with wisdom, conviction and faithfulness to God’s Word.
Alex Destino
Gloucester
Friend of Camp Constitution Ed Martin Nominated by President Trump for D.C. Attorney
Long-time friend of Camp Constitution, head of the Phyllis Schlafly Eagles, and host of The Pro America Report radio show was chosen by President Trump to be the U.S. Attorney of Washington, D.C. While his appointment didn’t sit well with the left-wing media, we are delighted to hear the news. Ed is currently serving as the acting D.C. Attorney and needs Senate confirmation. Our prayers are with him and his family.
Donald J. Trump
@realDonaldTrump
It is my honor to nominate highly respected Edward R. Martin, Jr., for the full and permanent term of United States Attorney for the District of Columbia.
Ed has led a distinguished career of service, including as Human Rights Office Director for the Catholic Archdiocese of St. Louis, where he supervised legal clinics for low-income residents. He later worked as judicial clerk to Judge Pasco M. Bowman, II, of the Eight Circuit Court of Appeals, and launched his own successful Law practice. He has also invested his expertise in other roles, but always with the same goal, of serving his community, and creating a brighter future for all.
Since Inauguration Day, Ed has been doing a great job as Interim U.S. Attorney, fighting tirelessly to restore Law and Order, and make our Nation’s Capital Safe and Beautiful Again. He will get the job done.
Camp Constitution Director Hal Shurtleff was a guest on Ed’s Show on a number of occasions.
And in September 2017, Hal interviewed Ed about his book that he co-authored with Phyllis Schlafly:
https://www.podomatic.com/podcasts/shurtleffhal/episodes/2017-09-11T06_13_01-07_00