The Second Inaugural Address of President Jefferson Davis Hague
December 25, 2008
My fellow Americans under
God. I stand here before you on
the birthday of our Lord Jesus Christ, anticipating in all humility
the opportunity you have so graciously given me to continue to do His
bidding as your President. And I
can tell you that His bidding now is to continue to fight the good fight, for
the Lord, and for you the American people under God.
In fighting this fight, to the
best of my ability, blessed by both our Lord Jesus Christ and you, the American
people under God, I am both pleased and privileged to be able to announce today
the first step we of the Second Hague Administration have taken to do just
that. We have converted our
nation's leading political party, the Republican‑Christian Alliance, the
party of God‑fearing people that has put you in complete control of
the government here in Washington, into a brand‑new entity.
This is an historic decision,
comparable to the one that established the original Republican Party back
in the mid‑19th century.
For all of us, Christian and pagan American alike, it will usher in a
glorious new era of peace and harmony under the blessings of our Lord and his
only son whose birthday we celebrate today, Jesus Christ.
Reflecting the spirit of our times, and
the best of all American traditions, we have named our new party the
American Christian Nation Party.
For yes, in truth, declaring and carrying out Christian policies is
the only way that we will be able to continue to fight the good fight to
rescue our beloved country from the forces of sin, Godlessness, and liberalism
that continue to drag her down.
For inspiration, in this never‑ending
struggle I have turned often to the great Keith Fournier, who sat at the right
hand of our beloved Rev. Pat Robertson, as the Executive Director of the
American Center for Law and Justice.
As he said (1994):
"The challenge I have as a
Christian is to bring people to Jesus Christ, to a personal decision to accept
Him as Savior and Lord, to bring them to personal repentance and conversion. But for me that is only the
beginning. That salvation must be
sustained, nourished, and deepened.
It must also lead to personal transformation and holiness through implantation
into Christ's Body, the church.
The church is not an option, an extra we can accept or reject. It is the ark, the ship of God, and her
mission is to help rescue and restore the drowning. This has always been her
primary mission. The church exists
to evangelize and disciple toward personal and corporate
transformation, a mission entrusted to her by her Head, Master and Lord,
the evangel Himself, Jesus Christ."
To our friends
who are not Christians we say first, join us, for the Christian Way is the Godly Way. But for those Americans who choose
to continue to exercise their right as an American to freely practice
the religion of their choosing, a right we fiercely defend, we say ally
with us, to carry out the work of the Lord. And let me make it very clear that no one has anything
to fear from our new party or the new policies we will be carrying out, as
long as he is a loyal American, devoted to God.
But let me also make it very
clear that woe be to him who is Godless, or worships a false God, or does
not accept the Holy Bible as the innerant word of our Lord God and his only son
Jesus Christ. For upon him will
fall the wrath of God—and our wrath too. Let that be known.
For as the great R.J. Rushdooney has said (Sloan):
"Every social order institutes its
own program of separation or segregation. A particular faith and morality is given privileged status
and all else is separated for progressive elimination. . . . Every faith is an
exclusive way of life; none is more dangerous that that which maintains
the illusion of tolerance."
Let me now turn to sharing with
you the genesis of our brand new American Christian Nation Party. It sprang from the God‑inspired minds
of the forefathers of our movement.
And it is the thinking of some of them, both great and small, that I
would like to share with you now.
To set the stage as it were, I
will first turn to the writings of Thomas P. Monaghan, a Senior Counsel of the
American Center for Law and Justice (1994):
"In human existence there is only
one moral order. This is an order
that, through the grace of God, has been revealed to all human
beings. The Lord gives us reason
and faith so that at all times and in all places we are called to the good,
which is ultimately God Himself.
We all—Christians, pagans, and others—have this law
engraved on our hearts, . . . The
choice before us today is what it has always been: Christ or Caesar. Caesar can never give the human
heart that for which it hungers.
Christ can."
And how in our country, with our
valued Constitution, do we reconcile Caesar and Christ? The Rev. Pat himself told us (ACLU,
1992):
"The Constitution of the United
States is a marvelous document for self‑government by Christian people
[emphasis added]. But the minute you turn the document into the hands of non‑Christian
people and atheist people, they can use it to destroy the very
foundation of our society."
And the Rev. Pat told us how Christian
governmental control is to be achieved and maintained (Freedom Writer, 2/95):
"Christians founded this
nation, they built this nation, and for three hundred years they governed this
nation. We can govern again. That's why I founded the Christian Coalition.
. . . The mission of the Christian Coalition is simple: to mobilize
Christians one precinct at a time, until once again we are the head and
not the tail, and at the top rather than the bottom of our political
system."
And finally the Rev. Pat, in 1993
speaking at his Regent University law school, predicted that what we
have now achieved would indeed be achieved by us (Clarkson): "One day, if
we read the Bible correctly, we will rule and reign along with our
sovereign, Jesus Christ."
But let me refer to other of our
forefathers besides the good Reverend Pat. Being just plain forthright about it, the 1990s Republican
Governor Kirk Fordice of Mississippi put it thusly (Berke, 1992):
"The United States of America is a Christian nation. . . the less we
emphasize the Christian religion the further we fall into the abyss of
poor character and chaos. . . "
And our revered Randall Terry,
the founder of Operation Rescue, the prototype of those many organizations
which now militantly protect and defend God's Way, said back in August, 1993
(Foxman): "Our goal is a
Christian nation. We have a
biblical duty, we are called by God, to conquer this country. We don't want equal time. We don't want pluralism."
And he said further
(Porteous):
"You better believe that I
want to build a Christian nation, because the only option is a pagan
nation. . . . A Christian nation would be defined as 'We acknowledge God
in our body politic, in our communities, that the God of the Bible is our
God, and we acknowledge that His law is supreme.'"
The great Rev. Jerry Falwell, writing
in 1993 under the headline "America is a Christian Nation!":
"Our pledge of allegiance declares
we are 'one nation under God.'
Our currency states 'In God We Trust'. The Declaration of Independence says we have
a God‑given right to 'life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness'.
"Yet today, we find our religious
heritage under attack. Ungodly forces in society seem intent on removing God
from every area of public life. . . . But despite what the Supreme
Court and radical liberal activists may say, AMERICA IS A CHRISTIAN
NATION!"
Mr. Robert Flood of that God‑serving
organization "Focus on the Family" said in 1992 (Freedom Watch): "The
Constitution was designed to perpetuate a Christian order."
Mrs. Cheryl Gillaspie, a right‑thinking
Councilwoman from that font of Right‑Thinking, Colorado Springs, CO, said
in a November, 1994 speech to the local chapter of the Christian Coalition
(Freedom Watch): "There is no validity to the doctrine of separation of
Church and State . . . America was established as a Christian nation
by believing Christians."
Mr. Robert Simonds, president of
Citizens for Excellence in Education tells us (Freedom Watch):
"Government and true
Christianity are inseparable!
There can be no morality (right or wrong) without the Bible—man's
only reliable book on right and wrong.
Christians can properly apply Bible principles to government,
because they are the ones who read the Bible."
And finally, my friends, in an
early version of Focus on the Family's Community Impact Curriculum, we are told
(Freedom Watch): "[T]his was really a Christian nation and, as far as its
founders were concerned, to try separating Christianity from government
is virtually impossible and would result in unthinkable damage to the
nation and its people."
It is this thinking and these thinkers
and their successors that have provided the foundation of our new Party. But I want to tell you that our Party
has not been formed with Christian leadership alone. The ACNP provides nothing if it does
not provide a "Big Tent" to accommodate many differing
views on how we can best move our nation forward.
Thus I am pleased to announce
that we have been joined by and welcome as integral parts of our new
Party, among others The Order, the Ku Klux Klan, the Leadership Coalitions
for America, the Skinheads Factions, the Militias, Jews for Christ and
Tradition, the Aryan Nations, the Men of Liberty, the Posse
Comitatus, the Armed Survivalists, and Christian Identity.
The Republican‑Christian Alliance
has been strong, and it has brought us a long way. But we have yet a long way to go, and it is the American
Christian Nation Party that will get us there. In closing, my friends and fellow Christian Americans,
let us join together in pledging allegiance to our new Christian flag:
"I pledge allegiance to the
Christian flag, and to the Saviour, for whose Kingdom it stands, one Saviour,
crucified, risen, and coming again, with life and liberty for all who
believe."
Thank you my friends, God bless the God‑fearing,
and good night.
A Connie Conroy Note (December 27, 2008)
We did it again! Maybe not as sintilating (sic) as the
first time around, but we did it.
We produced a great speech, at the last minute, again. Boy it's great to have those quotes to
go to. I hope there are some left
we can use next time. This time it
was a brilliant stroke too to recognize that we were using that old stuff
by name. No more charges of
plajarism (sic) from those sticklers among us.
And I like the way we slipped in
those old Far Right groups at the end.
Boy, some of them are really crazy! But we need them.
Things are starting to get a bit rough out there. Sometimes we've
just got to have some un‑official "off the shelf" muscle to get
things done we just can't ask the cops or the FBI or the Federal marshalls to
do. Those other guys can do it and
sometimes do do it for us. Better
to have them inside than out.
Interesting. Some people have already noticed
that the Prez specifically didn't mention the American Nazi
Party, which has been growing by leaps and bounds over the last few years. Well, for the record, that's for our
Jews. I'm not sure what the final
answer is going to be on the Jew Question. But for now anti‑Semitism is officially out, no
matter what the bastards do.
The Prez sez that "our
Jews" have been too important to us and our growth to chuck them out
now. He says that's why we won't
have anything to do with the Nazis or with the swastika. Not only the Nazis but several of
the groups in our new coalition use it as their symbol. Well, our Jew allies understandably
don't like it. Also, and not too
many people know this, the Nazi swastika is simply the reverse of an old
American Indian symbol that meant good luck. Well, we certainly wouldn't want to be associated in any way
with a symbol used by one of the inferior races.
Anyway, the Prez sez we are
officially not anti‑Semitic.
Naturally, from time to time we do have some flareups of that stuff
on the street. But they almost
always involve liberal nigger-lover Renegade Jews, not Real Jews. So nothing to worry about there. Our Jews stay with us, and with a wink
and a nod we let the boys have their fun.
The Prez does acknowledge, privately
and publicly, that many outstanding Jewish thinkers made very important
contributions to the political doctrines underlying our system of
government. He likes especially to
hark back to a Right‑Wing Jew organization called "Toward Tradition"
(1994), formed during the election of '94 that created the famous
"Freshman Class" of which he is so proud.
Anyway, big win, great speech, if I do
say so myself. Onwards and upwards!
Author's Commentary
And thus on a fateful Thursday, President Jefferson Davis Hague delivered
his Second Inaugural Address from the National Cathedral in Washington,
DC. Although it would indelibly
set the future course of the nation under his leadership (which would last
until the final overthrow of the NAR), one wouldn't have known that fact
from the speech. Departing from a
Presidential tradition, Hague did not address the major problems faced by
the country at that time, even to the limited extent he had in his
first Inaugural.
That critical problem list included:
•A standard of living that still continued to
fall for most Americans, and a gap in both income and wealth between the very
rich and everyone else that still continued to widen. Both patterns, as noted on several
previous occasions, had been established during the Transition Era
(Bradsher; Thurow; and see Chapter one).
They were firmly entrenched by R‑CA Federal tax, fiscal,
and regulatory policies of the early Fascist Period, policies that echoed
that of the infamous 1994 Republican "Contract on America"
(HRC).
•The continuing decline
of manufacturing in America, caused by continuing
"globalization," a cosmetic term that really meant the export of
capital and the jobs that accompanied it.
The massive economic and social impact of
the decline in manufacturing was left untouched by what had
been touted to replace it: the old Tofflerian "Third Wave/Information
Age." That was a notion
that somehow the processing of an intangible, "information," could replace the production of tangible goods and
services as the regular, reliable, adequate source of income for any
significant number of people.
Further, the now long‑discredited notion
held that somehow the processing of information could meet real, tangible
needs of everyday life of the people for goods and services. For everything from survival to the
full enjoyment of life, people need food, clothing, shelter, transportation,
health care and education, entertainment, cultural activities,
athletics, and so on, not information about them. In the real
world, where needs for tangibles are tangible, the "Third Wave"
notion simply didn't work. But it
had made for good political theater.
•The virtual
disappearance of governmental investment in "infrastructure:"
roads, bridges, tunnels, railways, and airports; public health care facilities,
schools, colleges, universities, and research institutions; water supply
and sewage disposal systems; flood control, irrigation networks, and other
waterway maintenance projects; the air traffic control system, national
parks and forests and wilderness areas (soon to disappear entirely);
seashore maintenance and coastal navigation systems; and the like.
What remained for the most part was only
that which had been "privatized" and then survived. The result was a very spotty system. To be sure, the rich and others living
in the growing number of walled communities guarded by private armed
forces did well (Egan). And, as
noted in Chapter eight, the prison system flourished, continuing a
pattern established in California in 1995‑96 when for the first time
spending on the state prison system had exceeded that on the state's two
university systems (Butterfield).
The prison system had been "privatized" to a significant
degree, and provided huge profits for those connected to the new
Prison/Industrial Complex (see also Chapter three).
•The continuing growth of
interpersonal violence accompanying the repeal of any limits on gun ownership
that had occurred early in the Pine Presidency.
•The public and political
prominence of public and personal racism, homophobia, misogyny, and xenophobia,
and their continued exploitation by the forces of Right‑Wing
Reaction.
•The constantly spreading
personal alienation and destruction of the basic interpersonal fabric of
society resulting from the incessant promotion by Right‑Wing
Reaction of the philosophy of "every‑man‑ for‑himself‑and‑the‑devil‑take‑the‑hindmost,"
otherwise known as "self‑responsibility" (see Chapter seven for
an excellent Transition Era summary of this philosophy by the Right‑Wing
philosopher Michael Levin).
•The failure of any of
the measures adopted through the Constitutional Amendment process since
the ratification of the 28th (the first Balanced Budget Amendment) to
materially affect in a positive way way any of the underlying economic or
social problems faced by the old United States.
Because they in no way addressed those
underlying economic or social problems, to summarize, primary among them being
capital disinvestment, the disaccumulation of labor from capital
(Judis) as a result of technological change (Wright), and
institutionalized racism, the "solutions" could not have
been expected to work. Nor were
they intended to.
In fact, as often noted, they were often
intended to do nothing more than distract the American people from what the
real problems of the society were.
In that, this consciously planned and carefully executed strategy had
from the beginning of the Transition Era been very successful for Right‑Wing
Reaction, in both increasing the wealth of the wealthy and maintaining its own
political power.
The primary tangible outcome of the "solutions"
for the most part was either to cause problems in the first place or seriously
aggravate them, that is if the negative outcomes were not ones actually
desired by Right‑Wing Reaction.
(For more on this subject, see the Alex Poughton letter at the end of
this chapter.)
In his address, Hague did not outline his plans for the conduct of his
Second Term (most likely because at that time, as events would show, it was in
Hague's best interests to keep them secret). In any case, like his political forebears, such as his
original patron former House of Representatives Republican Speaker Newton
Gingrich and former Senate Republican Minority then Majority Leader
Bob Dole, Hague's strengths were in politics and power, not policy. Thus it is understandable that
Hague devoted the bulk of his speech to announcing the conversion of the
Republican‑Christian Alliance into the American Christian Nation
Party, and giving his rationale for so doing.
Hague and the "Christian Nation" Concept
In analyzing and understanding the Hague approach to that issue, it
is important to note that neither in this speech nor elsewhere did he ever officially declare or decree the
U.S. to be a "Christian Nation." Note too that as noted above the quotes from "The 15%
Solution's" Godfather Pat Robertson that Hague chose to include,
themselves never referred directly to the concept but only alluded to
it. In fact, Robertson was
usually quite careful not to use the words directly, even though most of
his followers and most of his allies had the "Christianizing of
America" right at the top of their agenda, and just "knew" that
Pat did too. But not using the phrase gave the Reverend Reaganesque
"deniability."
Following this pattern, Ralph Reed, Jr., the
first Executive Director of Robertson's Christian Coalition, during the
Transition Era periodically had tried to obscure its true
agenda. For example, addressing a
group of national Jewish leaders in 1995, he said "that it was a 'blatant
wrong' for some on the religious right to talk of the United States as a
'Christian Nation'" (Niebuhr).
Reed "also said his group was committed to the separation of
church and state" (Time).
One wonders how Reed would have reconciled
that claim with the statements his boss, Robertson, had previously made, quoted
by Hague in his Second Inaugural.
Contemporary observers raised the question (Rich). But there is no record of Reed ever
having been able to achieve such a reconciliation. Nor is there any evidence that Reed ever disavowed statements
like one the activist Mrs. Gillaspie made to a Christian Coalition
chapter, quoted by Hague. In
reality Reed was just "blowing smoke," as they used to say back
then. But the smoke helped to keep
the Right‑Wing Reactionary Jews on board. As Conroy noted, in 2009 that was still a vital interest of
the Hagueites.
Following this pattern of obscurantism, even
the New American Republics would not be officially designated a
"Christian Nation." In
practice, of course, both the NAR and the old U.S. under Hague and the
Republican‑Christian Alliance were "Christian Nations" as the
term was understood by those who had promoted the notion during the Transition
Era, and their ideological successors.
But by never saying so in so many words, and never making
"Christian Nationhood" official policy, Hague was always able to
deny that that was indeed the case, a politically useful maneuver.
The same "mis‑direction
play" was later used to deal with the question of whether or not the
New American Republics was a fascist state. Certainly the NAR was by definition a fascist state (see
Appendix II). Nevertheless, the
ACNP which founded it and became its only legal political party officially
continued to deny that it was.
This "being‑but‑denying" approach followed the
pattern established by the old Republican Party during the Transition Era,
discussed by Dino Louis in Appendix II, p. 372. As Louis so eloquently said: "If it looks like a duck,
walks like a duck, and quacks like a duck, it's a duck."
The "Rightward Imperative"
The "Rightward Imperative" I mentioned in an "Author's
Note" to the Hague Address (see p. 131) described a pattern of a constant
rightward policy shift that could be observed in the old Republican Party
during the Transition Era, and then in the R‑CA/ACNP during the pre‑NAR
Fascist Period. First on economic
issues, then on social ones, so‑called "moderates" were read or
ridden out of the Republican Party, unless they radically moved their positions
to the Right on both economic and social issues. For example, the Republican Senate Majority Leader
Robert Dole of Kansas did that in the run‑up to the 1996 Presidential
election (Kramer) (see below).
It became de
rigeur in the 1980s to recite the mantra of "tax
cuts/balanced budget amendment/free market" that would have horrified old‑line
"moderate" Republicans like Nelson Rockefeller, former Governor
of New York and Jacob Javits, former Senator from New York. Even former President Richard
Nixon and George Bush, before he became Ronald Reagan's Vice‑President,
had problems with certain sections of that agenda.
Then came the '90s mantra of "ban abortion/prayer
in the schools/no civil rights for homosexuals." This was designed specifically to
appeal to the growing Religious Right and the Rev. Pat's Christian
Coalition. They formed the core
vote of an ever‑rightward moving Republican Party, they were the
constituency which made "The 15% Solution" possible. They had to be kept in tow.
During the Transition Era the Rightward Imperative
was perhaps best personified by Senator Dole (mentioned above). He had been a Nixon Republican, tough
on rhetoric in practice but relatively progressive on domestic issues
(Berke, 1995). He had, for
example, introduced the Nixon health care reform plan in the Senate in
1973, a plan that had much in common with the (Pres. Bill) Clinton Health Plan
that Dole played a major role in defeating, primarily for political reasons, in
1994.
For most of his career, Dole had downplayed
the Right‑Wing Reactionary "social issues" such as banning
freedom of choice in the outcome of pregnancy, requiring voluntary prayer
in the schools, and introducing censorship into the entertainment
industry. In 1995-6, running for
President in a Republican Party already well under the spell of the Christian
Coalition, he quite suddenly became a supporter of their position on these
matters and related ones. He was
being realistic. As he said
(Berke, 1995): "Any survey research you or I have seen shows that these are
the issues that [Republican] primary voters [Author's
Note: read "Far Right Republicans"] care about or
are motivated by."
The Stirring of Political Violence
Once "The 15% Solution" had succeeded, during the pre‑NAR
Fascist Period Right‑Wing Reaction found that its policies did not
indeed solve problems, as noted above.
It also found that there was, therefore, an increasing
amount of labor and racial unrest.
Too, there was potential political trouble, as various groups tried
to reinvigorate the still Democratic Leadership Council‑lead
Democratic Party or set up some left alternative to it. Political violence, unofficial to
be sure, increasingly became the order of the day. The Rightward Imperative continued to
operate.
Political violence was to be intensified by
the formal establishment in 2009 of the force known as the Helmsmen. This was part of the campaign to
promote and enforce the Proclamation of Right (see the next chapter). An important prototype for the Helmsmen
was the German Nazi dictator Adolf Hitler's Sturmabteilung (SA), the Storm
Troopers. The SA was a private
army of thugs used primarily to terrorize the center and left
opposition before Hitler's official takeover of the German government
in 1933.
Preparing the way for the formation of the
Helmsmen, a number of the groups that Hague welcomed into the official
American Christian Nation Party at the time of its founding had armed
wings. While uncoordinated to
be sure, for the R‑CA in its later stages and the ACNP in its early one
they generally served the purpose that the SA had for Hitler in pre‑Nazi
Germany. Faced with increasing
although unfocussed resistance, the Hagueites needed armed support for
repressive purposes. By officially
recognizing and indeed embracing them, the successors of the old Republican
Party were just continuing at a different level the Rightward Imperative it had
experienced for the previous three decades.
The Exclusion of Anti‑Semitism
As discussed by Conroy, the exclusion of anti‑Semitism at least
from the public ideology of the ACNP if not at the street level, was regarded
as essential by the leadership.
(It is interesting to note, however, the perhaps unconscious anti‑Semitism
that slipped into Conroy's prose.)
But Right Wing forces had changed their positions on various religions a
number of times throughout U.S. history.
For example, during the 20 years prior to
the First Civil War, there had existed a far‑Right Wing party popularly
known as the "Know‑Nothings." Officially (and ironically in light of the ethnic group to
which the name came to be applied in the latter half of the 20th century),
the party was called the Native American Party. Its colloquial name came into use because its members
refused to publicly answer questions about what they stood for. This party was violently xenophobic,
focusing especially on Irish‑Catholic immigrants fleeing the Irish Potato
Famine of the 1840s.
During one of its periodic resurgences, in
the 1920s, the traditionally anti‑black racist Ku Klux Klan was also
virulently anti‑Catholic. It
focused especially on relatively recent Catholic arrivals from Italy as well as
on Catholic Americans of Irish descent.
By the 21st century, however, the ultimate political achievement of
Right‑Wing Reaction, the American Christian Nation Party, would itself be
lead by an American Catholic of Irish descent.
On the other side of the coin, in one of the
more striking ironies of American history, what some historians consider the
best speech ever on the issue of the separation of church and state, the one I
quoted from at length at the end of the last chapter, was given by a great
American of Irish descent, the first and only Catholic President of pre‑fascist
times, John Fitzgerald Kennedy.
An Alex Poughton
letter
December 31, 2008
Dear Karl,
You may recall that I wrote to
you just four years ago this date, commenting on Hague's First
Inaugural. I don't know which address,
the first or the second, will be considered more depressing by future historians. But I am depressed enough thinking
that this poor benighted country has another four years of this guy to endure.
[Author's Note: Poughton had no way of
knowing that the country would have coming many more than four more years of
Hague.]
The formation of this new
"American Christian Nation Party" comes as something of a shock, although I suppose using the
retrospectroscope you could have seen it coming. The good news?
Hague straddled on the "Christian Nation" issue itself. The
bad news? The official welcoming
into the party of the goon elements that have been unofficially been providing
Hague and his men with street‑muscle for a few years now.
The worst news, I suppose, is that
Hague had to form the party at all.
He wouldn't have done it if things had been going well here. Noticeable by its absence in
his speech is any consideration of the myriad current problems this country
faces. Noticeable also by its
absence is any presentation, even in the most general terms, of policies he intends
to follow to try to deal with them.
And he's got to have something in mind, because everything major
they've tried so far, each of course supposed to "solve the problem"
and "set the country on the right track" hasn't worked. (He could have talked about that too,
but somehow I don't think he would have.)
And so, going back with these
guys to the 90s, the first Balanced Budget Amendment was supposed to do
it; then Term Limits; then the "Real War on Drugs" (the subject
of my very first letter to you); then ending that "burdensome
immigration" with the Preserve America Amendment; then getting that
"meddlesome" Supreme Court out of the way with Anderson v. Board of Education; then putting into the Constitution the definition of "when
life begins," what can and cannot be taught to kids about sex, a full
legal sanction for homophobia, and outlawing freedom of choice in the
outcome of pregnancy; then ending any form of "welfare;" then
repealing the income tax, having another go at trying to get to a balanced
budget by amending the Constitution, making any tax increases virtually
impossible, and ensconcing the line‑item veto; then giving the President
decree powers (which he has yet to use) and ending the Constitutional
prohibition on unreasonable search and seizure (that one, I hear, is
being widely used—but even there, to deal with the apparently rising
unrest, they have been rumored to be making use of these unofficial
"militias"); then making the "Law of God" supreme, and
finally Constitutionally putting God "back in the schools" (although
he, or she, has firmly been there since Anderson v. Board of
Education).
And of course, nothing "did
it" because none of these policies addressed any of the underlying
problems of this country, that I wrote to you about earlier this year during
the election campaign. (And ah
yes, the election campaign. The
Democrats still didn't get it.
They still haven't learned that "me too" doesn't work. And the real left? "Oy," as my Jewish friends
are wont to say.)
So anyway, Hague needed some new
distraction, and the formation of the ACNP is it. We'll see what comes next, but I cannot
imagine it will be anything good.
At the rate he's going, it could be a full‑blown police
state.
Well, enough
gloom and doom for now.
Your friend, Alex
A Parthenon Pomeroy Diary Entry (January 1, 2009)
We did it, we did it. We're finally going to get on the right
track in this country. We've
finally got the Party we need. And
we're going to have a party. We've
got some muscle, if you know what I mean.
Now we're going to really be able to deal with the niggers, and the
spics, and the faggots, and the yids (I don't care what the President says
about them, a Jew is a yid and a yid is a yid). We've always known God is on our side. And now we've told Him so. This is going to fix things up all
right. This is what we need to get
America to where it ought to be, to what it can be, to what it always was and
always will be. Thanks, God, and
thanks Pat, too.
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
References:
ACLU: American Civil
Liberties Union fundraising letter, quoting Rev. Pat
Robertson, 1992.
Berke, R.L., "Religion
Issue Stirs Noise in G.O.P. Governors' 'Tent," The New York
Times,
Nov. 18, 1992.
Berke, R.L., "Dole
Works on Expansion Of a Conservative Resume," New York
Times,
April 12, 1995.
Blumenthal, S.,
"Christian Soldiers," The New
Yorker, July 18, 1994, p. 31.
Bradsher, K., "Gap in
Wealth In U.S. Called Widest in West,"
New York Times,
April 17, 1995.
Butterfield, F., "New
Prisons Cast Shadow Over Higher Education," New York
Times,
April 17, 1995.
Clarkson, F., "Neither
a Juggernaut Nor a Joke," Freedom
Writer,
October/November, 1993.
Egan, T., "Many Seek
Security in Private Communities," New York
Times, Sept. 3,
1995, p. 1.
Falwell, J., "America
is a Christian Nation!," Drawing
Closer, Vol. 1, No. 7, 1993.
Foxman, A.H., Fund‑raising
letter, New York: Anti‑Defamation League, Jan., 1994.
Freedom
Watch, "Exploring the Myth and Reality of 'Christian
America'," Vol. 4,
No. 3, March, 1995.
Freedom
Writer, "Reed Masks Coalition's True Agenda," Feb.
1995, p. 3.
HRC, House Republican Conference, Contract With America, Washington, DC:
September 27, 1994.
Fournier, K.A., A House United?, Colorado Springs, CO:
Navpress, 1994, p. 33.
Judis, J.B., "The
Jobless recovery," The New Republic,
March 15, 1995, p. 20.
Kramer, M., "Will the
Real Bob Dole Please Stand Up?" Time,
November 30, 1995, p. 59.
Monaghan, T.P.,
"Nosophobia," Law and Justice
(American Center for Law and Justice) Vol. 3, No. 1, 1994.
Niebuhr, G., "Gramm,
on Stump, Invokes the Second Coming of Christ,"New York
Times, September
20, 1995.
Porteous, S., "OR
founder calls for a 'Christian nation,'"
Freedom Writer, Sept.,
1995, p. 1.
Rich, F., "Bait and
Switch, II," New York Times,
April 6, 1995.
Sloan, J., "A hidden
agenda?" Freedom Writer,
April, 1995, p. 1.
Thurow, L. C.,
"Companies Merge; Families Break Up," New York Times,
September 3, 1995.
Time,
"Chronicles: An Olive Branch," April 17, 1995, p. 16.
Toward Tradition,
"Should Jews Fear the 'Christian Right'?" (an advertisement),
New York Times,
August 2, 1994.
Wright, R., "Who's
Really to Blame?" Time,
November 6, 1995, p. 33.
Notes:
Note:
There is no indication or evidence that the Christian Coalition, Keith
Fournier, R.J. Rushdooney, Thomas P. Monaghan, the Rev. Pat Robertson, Kirk Fordyce,
Randall Terry, the Rev. Jerry Falwell, Mr. Robert Flood, Mrs. Cheryl Gillaspie,
Mr. Robert Simonds, Focus on the Family, or any other organization, or any of
the other historical personages mentioned in the "Hague Second Inaugural,"
elsewhere in this chapter or elsewhere in this book in a similar manner,
would have supported or approved of any of the thoughts, positions, or
actions taken by Jefferson Davis Hague or any member, employee, or associate of
his government, either of the U.S. or the NAR, or of any of the events that
occurred in the United States or the New American Republics subsequent to the
delivery of the Hague Second Inaugural Address and the implementation of
the policies carried out pursuant to it.
2 Author's Note:
"Liberalism," however one wanted to define it, had long‑since
lost whatever force it once had to influence the direction the country was
taking. Nevertheless, it and
its supporters, the "liberalniggerlovers" as Curley Oakwood liked to
call them, were still blamed by the Right‑Wing Reactionaries for
virtually all of the ills of the time they cared to identify. As noted previously, during the Transition
Era Right‑Wing Reaction had used something they called "The Counter‑Culture"
in much the same way.
Right‑Wing
Reaction's common political strategy, described previously, was to first
demonize and then blame "the other" for whatever troubles they wished
to focus the public's attention on. At the same time, as we have noted
previously, they neither defined precisely what they were
talking about as "the enemy" nor proved in any way that whatever
the identified enemy was in fact caused the harms Right‑Wing Reaction
identified with it.
Whatever the "Counter‑Culture"
really was or had been, by the time of the Reagan Presidency it had lost
whatever national influence it had had. However, absent people and absent
movements both find it difficult to either defend or promote themselves. That was the case for both the
"Counter‑Culture" and the "liberals" during the times
they were, respectively, the leading targets for Right‑Wing
Reaction. But my, what convenient
targets they did provide.
3 Author's Note: At
the time Fournier wrote this passage, the "church" he was referring
to was the Catholic
Church, a fact omitted from the quoted passage. But by the time Hague was quoting the text, the dominant
Christian Church in the old U.S., supported by most members of the old
Religious Right, Catholic, Protestant, or Jewish, was that of the homogeneous,
but definitely Far Right, New American Religion.
4 Author's
Note: As a past chairman of the House American Morality
Committee (see Chapter six), Hague would speak with special feeling on
this point.
5 Author's Note: Hague was referring here not to the
traditional "forefathers" from the time of the founding of the
nation, but rather to prominent Transition Era figures representing Right‑Wing
Reaction, especially of the religious variety.
6 Author's Note: Some extensive
sleuthing found Robertson originally making this statement on a 1990
Christian Coalition recruiting video called "America at the Crossroads." The nascent campaign Robertson was
describing lead directly to the development of "The 15%
Solution." The creation of
the ACNP can be seen as the eventual, logical, outcome of the whole
process.
7 Author's
Note: Neither the Pledge nor the currency said precisely
which or whose God was being referred to.
The Declaration doesn't mention God, but rather "our
Creator," a rather different concept, popular with the Deists who wrote
and signed the document. But that
didn't stop Falwell from making a leap of faith from "Creator" to
"God" to a "Christian God" to a "Christian God with
the characteristics I, Jerry Falwell, attribute to Him." And it was a "him," you can
be sure.
8 Author's Note: Colorado Springs was
a central focus of Right‑Wing Reactionary activity in the old
U.S. For example, it was the home
of the organization that in 1992 put together the famous homophobic
"Amendment 2" that became the prototype for much of the homophobic
legislation that spread nationally over the following two decades (see the
next chapter.) Colorado Springs
was also home to the courageous early Constitutionalist organization, the
"Citizens' Project."
9 Author's Note:
During the Transition Era, some members of the old Republican Party
had developed the "Big Tent" concept in an attempt to keep both
pro‑ and anti‑freedom‑of‑choice‑in‑the‑outcome‑of‑pregnancy
but otherwise reactionary elements in the party. That attempt ultimately proved to be in vain, as the
"Rightward Imperative" (see below) took effect. This second Big Tent strategy of
Hague's was much more successful.
10 Authors'
Note: The "Christian flag" at this time was the old
U.S. flag with a Christian cross emblazoned on the field of red and white
stripes. At a January, 1994
training conference for Religious Right activists called "Reclaiming America,"
looking at such a flag, a former Vice‑President of the old U.S., J.
Danforth Quayle, lead the crowd in reciting the Pledge with which Hague
concluded his speech (Blumenthal).
11 Author's
Note: The apocalyptic concept of the "Second Coming"
of Jesus Christ, based on the Book of Revelation and part of the theology of
many an evangelical preacher like Jerry Falwell and Pat Robertson, had begun to
make its appearance in the rhetoric of Republican political candidates
late in the the Transition Era.
For example, Senator Phil Gramm, a Far Right candidate for the 1996
Republican Presidential nomination, said in a 1995 fund‑raising
letter (Niebuhr): "I ask you to fight tirelessly and when you are too
tired to go on, remember that there is only one person who has ever lived
whose values we would be willing to see imposed on America. And when He comes back, He's not going
to need government's help to get the job done."
12 Author's Note: "Off the
shelf" is a term the arch Right‑Wing Reactionary William Casey,
President Ronald Reagan's first Director of the Central Intelligence Agency,
used to describe an extra‑legal right‑wing foreign insurgency instigation
and support group he had put together during his tenure at the CIA.
13 Author's Note: The
swastika or hackenkreutz
("crooked cross" in German) was the symbol of the German Nazi Party
between 1933 and 1945.
14 Author's Note: The
Hagueites commonly referred to that tiny, but very visible, vocal, and
influential minority of the American Jewish community that supported Right‑Wing
Reaction as "Real Jews."
Their leading organization by this time, "Jews for Christ and Tradition,"
was officially welcomed into the ACNP coalition by Hague in his speech. The traditionally Constitutionalist
Jewish community, representing a majority of American Jews, was
referred to as "the Renegade Jews."
15 The phrase "a wink and a nod"
came from the practice President Reagan had used to give his approval for
"unofficial" governmental activities of questionable legality
without committing anything to paper, and oftentimes not saying anything
directly at all to those on the operational level, even privately.
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The original trade paperback edition
(1996, new) of The 15% Solution has been available for purchase from
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