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 IN CONGRESS, JULY 4, 1776 our forefathers issued The Declaration of Independence. In so doing they declared their beliefs as self-evident “that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty, and the pursuit of Happiness ...”. After listing their complaints against the King of England they appealed to the supreme judge of the world and stated their reliance on the protection of divine Providence. They eventually drew up the Constitution of the United States of America which they would not acknowledge as affording equal protection for their black African slaves. They excluded their black African slaves in order to have the enthusiastic support of all the colonies as some of the colonies were dependent upon slaves for work on their plantations. The supreme judge of the world supported them or their efforts to establish their freedom would have failed. The consciences of grateful men eventually led them to call upon the nation to pay the debt they owed divine Providence by freeing the slaves; and pay they did as nearly 500,000 were killed and nearly the same number wounded.

Latter-Day Saints believe that God raised up men among our founding fathers for the purpose of establishing a free land where his church could be restored in order to bless humankind. Latter-Day Saints made the same mistake the founding fathers did, for after their prophet Joseph Smith set the example by ordaining a black man, they refused to allow further such ordinations.

When you presume to serve the Lord and become the Lord’s elect, there is a price to be paid for mistakes. The Latter-Day Saints failed to heed the warnings. In Jacob 4:14 we learn that the problems experienced by the Jews came upon them because they looked “beyond the mark” and “sought for things that they could not understand.” The Latter-Day Saints were warned again in D&C 88:64-65 when they were told, “Whatsoever ye ask the Father in my name it shall be given unto you, that is expedient for you; and if ye ask anything that is not expedient for you, it shall turn unto your condemnation.” In section D&C 63:31 the saints were warned that the price of failure to settle in Missouri was that they would be “scourged from city to city”. In D&C 84:55-59 we learn that we brought the whole church under condemnation because of our vanity and unbelief and we would remain under this condemnation until we “repent and remember the new covenant, even the Book of Mormon and the former commandments which I have given them,”.

In another Book of Mormon passage (3 Nephi 26:8-11), it says of those who receive the Book of Mormon which was a translation of 1/3 of the plates given Joseph Smith, “And these things have I written, which are a lesser part of the things which he [Jesus] taught the people; ...   And when they shall have received this [the Book of Mormon], which is expedient that they should have first, to try their faith, and if it shall so be that they shall believe these things then shall the greater thing be made manifest unto them. And if it so be that they will not believe these things, then shall the greater things be withheld from them, unto their condemnation.” The remaining 2/3 of the plates were never translated. Instead, the Latter-Day Saints were given the Pearl of Great Price which was received enthusiastically by racists in the church as it fit in so well with their preconceptions about African Blacks. They accepted it as justification for withholding the priesthood from blacks even though Joseph Smith ordained at least one black man.

Racist doctrine was promoted so boldly in the church that there was little chance for the Latter-Day Saints to learn that our prophet during the 1950s and 1960s didn’t believe that the priesthood should be withheld from blacks. David O. McKay’s biography finally came out in 2005. Now we know that he had been trying to obtain revelation allowing him to do away with the practice of withholding the priesthood from blacks and that one of his councilors had told him that the reason for his failure was that the Latter-Day Saints were not ready to share the priesthood with the blacks. Until very recently we were not encouraged to believe the change made church policy compatible with Book of Mormon passages about the gospel being for all nations. Has the time finally come that we can acknowledge that our unwillingness to ordain blacks of African descent was about our failure to understand the atonement Jesus made available for us?

The Latter-Day Saints were getting settled in the Utah territory in the late 1840s so they missed out on the Civil War, but paid dearly in being scourged from city to city. We tend to think that the plague of crickets which was stopped by seagulls in 1848 was the end of the Mormon settlers problems in getting established in Utah. On February 10, 1856 (JD Vol. 3, pp296-297) Orson Pratt told of the crop failure in the previous year because of drought and crickets. He told them that they had laid the foundation of a superstructure for what will become “one of the greatest ever constructed by the inhabitants of this earth. ... I believe that the Lord will whip us into it; I have no doubt of that.” Elder Pratt went on to say “I am as convinced that the Lord will whip us into this diligent course, as I am that I am standing before you. Why? Because this is the kingdom, this is the people and the Church of the living God, and just as surely as He is our God, will He purify this people by famine, by war, by sickness, by death, by various judgments, and by the flame of devouring fire. We cannot escape the course of purification. ... I would much rather be chastened than to heap up an abundance of this world’s goods, and neglect some of the most important duties of my religion. Hence, when I pray in relation to myself, my prayer is for the Lord to chasten me, and also in relation to this people my prayer is, O Lord, let thy chastening hand be upon this people, until they learn to obey...” We have paid dearly for the racism promoted by racists in the church.

Racism did not end with the freeing of the slaves and has spread to the mistreatment of other races. Perhaps as Americans some of us are overdue in acknowledging that the opposition to comprehensive immigration reform has a strong racist element to it. As economic considerations are also involved in the desire for cheap labor, immigration reform has opponents in both major parties. But, when you see a comprehensive immigration plan which involves penalties, going to the back of the line for citizenship, etc. and opponents are calling it amnesty, you know they are so filled with hate that they cannot see straight enough to read a dictionary in order to find the meaning of amnesty. Yes, the hardcore anti illegal immigration crowd is looking for a guarantee that illegal immigrants will never be allowed back in the United States. In view of all the efforts which have been made by our own citizens and government agencies to lure illegal aliens here and the huge benefit our own drug culture is to Mexican drug cartels it is difficult for me to sympathize with the desires of racists who want to prevent anyone who has ever come here illegally from ever returning.

We now have a far more dangerous enemy to our culture than racists. Radical atheists have made great inroads with their hatred of Christians and Jews and they are looking at the Moslems promoting Sharia and jihad as friends via the theory that “the enemy of my enemy is my friend”. The leadership of the Democratic Party has taken on radical atheist priorities as their own as has most of the mainstream American press, and the social science departments of our public colleges and universities. Their poison reaches into every political party, our public schools and some of our churches. Even some businesses are throwing their weight around in order to promote radical atheist causes. We are facing an enemy who loves to hate people who respect unborn human life. They hate those who believe in the innocence of children. They hate those who believe in being responsible for their reproductive choices. They hate those who cannot be tempted to sell their personal integrity.

The Book of Mormon in Helaman 7:5 tells of a time when the obtaining of  political offices was popular so they might “more easily commit adultery and steal...”. Today the same goes for some kinds of sales jobs and journalism careers. High level administrators in large companies and large government agencies can fall prey to the same temptations as they attend out-of-town seminars. Fortunately, even some atheists, journalists, politicians, and capitalists in today’s society have high standards of personal behavior while far too many Christians give in to temptation.

From the time when I wrote my first book, my files are full of reports on the corruption in politics during the Bill Clinton era. Corruption has become a distraction to prevent us from seeing what is happening. For many people, life is about helping their heroes get control of us. Examine the changes in our society and you will see that we are being trained to want casual sex and a wet nurse nanny to tell us what we should eat and what size portions, someone to cheer us on and tell us that we are winners, even if we are not, someone who will tell us it’s okay to hate people who hurt our feelings by disagreeing with us or telling us something we don’t believe. All that in addition to equal portions of housing, food,  transportation and health care. Traditional health care has been so corrupted by big pharmaceuticals with the help of the Federal Drug Administration, and the AMA that getting rid of Obama care will hardly be a good start.

Taking a good look at the victims of radical atheist cultural warfare is way overdue. Families living in the inner city are the most vulnerable. Patriotism, a sense of personal responsibility, pride in our American heritage, and gratitude for the opportunities available in America are no longer part of the curriculum in public schools. The Left gave teen age girls in unhappy circumstances an easy way out. Hook up with a tough gang member, get pregnant, then let welfare provide the necessities of life for the single parent family she has settled on. Then she stays in the inner city to raise her fatherless children whose heads will be filled with things only they can understand; For how can white folks understand what it is like to be black?

But, I can understand that when the news media plays a sound bite from an angry black man saying that his son is not going to bow down to the cops, he is asking blacks to be uncooperative with the police and try to intimidate them. Then when a police officer tells someone to “show me your hands”, doing anything else is asking for trouble from a cop with a very nervous trigger finger. Why does the news media want to help encourage blacks to make the police nervous when they are checking out suspected trouble makers. Then President Obama in talking about the gunman who killed five Dallas police officers says that we don’t understand his motivations for the shooting even though the shooter made it clear that he wanted to kill white cops. After all the anger from blacks which was broadcast a day or two previous I think we can believe he meant what he said when he told them he wanted to kill white cops. Have you noticed that the leaders of al Qaeda and other terrorist organizations don’t send their own wives and children out to be suicide bombers? They simply spread enough hatred and anger around, along with the promise of cash for the family of a suicide bomber, in order to obtain the desired results. Will we ever see a family member of Al Sharpton’s or Louis Farrakhan’s in a shoot out with the police? I wonder if the families of angry blacks who get themselves killed by the police are compensated by someone. If not does that mean that Islamic terrorists who teach hate are nicer guys than blacks who spread hate?

About twenty five years ago Rodney King led police on a dangerous vehicular chase in the Los Angeles area. When the chase finally ended he resisted arrest and was severely beaten in the process of subduing him. As he was a large powerful man and drugged up, subduing him took a great effort. The news media showed a partial film clip of the episode which stirred up a considerable amount of anger at the police. Of the several officers involved only one of them was convicted. The jury had the advantage of seeing a fuller account of the video clip than had been shown the public. Based on the partial film clip shown the public there were high expectations of convictions for all the officers involved. When the verdict came in it took little time for the violence to start. I was on temporary assignment performing maintenance on a propane terminal in the northeastern L.A. basin. My supervisor called me that evening and told me to return home the next day. In the morning I entered a westbound freeway headed for the southern end of the grapevine on my way back to Sacramento. Being used to L.A. freeway traffic I was amazed at the scene that awaited me for no one was riding anyone’s bumper or dodging in and out of traffic. Everyone was keeping their distance and driving slightly under the speed limit. Apparently, no one wanted to be stranded in L.A. by the Highway Patrol or an accident. Dozens of people were murdered by rioters and thousands of rioters were arrested. The amount of property damage from fires and looting was astronomical. Some years later when I was interviewing a member of the National Guard who had been involved in arresting looters, he told me that forty percent of those arrested were illegal aliens.

There is no doubt that stirring up controversy increases profits for news organizations and builds careers for reporters and journalists, but among the news media there is also the problem of personal bias and convictions being on the side of radical atheist’s cultural warfare. It is difficult to avoid the conclusion that radical atheists and some angry folks would like to see a multitude of Rodney King sized riots across the country. It would certainly take attention away from Hillary Clinton’s problems.