US Downfall Traced to Defeat of Christianity.
from:-
"America
is great because America is good, and if America ever ceases to be good,
America will cease to be great." - Alexis de Toqueville
by
Richard Evans (henrymakow.com)
"Is
America using immoral tactics to fight unjust wars? I found part of the answer
in a remarkable interview with a former US drone operator, Brandon Bryant, on
BBC's HARDtalk (above.)
I thought
it would be the usual 'gung ho' pep talk about America's great weapons, but the
young man impressed me with his honesty, courage and conviction. Brandon
says drone warfare represented the most cowardly warfare ever devised. Although
he took part in over 1600 kills, he felt sick about it because he could not be
sure whether some were even enemy combatants.
He
condemned the Presidential order to assassinate US citizen Anwar al-Awlaki who
was killed by drone in 2011with another American who was purportedly editor of
al-Qaeda's English-language web magazine, Inspire. Bryant felt
these assassinations constituted a blatant violation of the US Constitution -
which says that US citizens must have a fair trial by their peers even when the
charge is treason. Obama simply ordered al-Awiaki and sidekick murdered
by drone ten thousands miles away.
Bryant
argued, "We're supposed to be the greatest nation in the world, and we do
not live up to our own standards".
HOW DID
AMERICA LOSE ITS MORAL GROUNDING?
To answer
this question, we have to travel back to the 19th century when Alexis de
Tocqueville, (1805-1859) the French social philosopher visited America to
discover the reasons for our incredible success. He published his observations
in his classic two-volume work, Democracy in America (1838). He was
especially impressed by America's religious character. Here are some startling
excerpts from Tocqueville's great work:
Upon my
arrival in the United States the religious aspect of the country was the first
thing that struck my attention; and the longer I stayed there, the more I
perceived the great political consequences resulting from this new state of
things.
In
France, I had almost always seen the spirit of religion and the spirit of
freedom marching in opposite directions. But in America I found they were intimately
united and that they reigned in common over the same country.
Religion
in America...must be regarded as the foremost of the political institutions of
that country; for if it does not impart a taste for freedom, it facilitates the
use of it. Indeed, it is in this same point of view that the inhabitants of the
United States themselves look upon religious belief.
I do not
know whether all Americans have a sincere faith in their religion -- for who
can search the human heart? But I am certain that they hold it to be
indispensable to the maintenance of republican institutions. This opinion is
not peculiar to a class of citizens or a party, but it belongs to the whole
nation and to every rank of society.
In the
United States, the sovereign authority is religious...there is no country in
the world where the Christian religion retains a greater influence over the
souls of men than in America, and there can be no greater proof of its utility
and of its conformity to human nature than that its influence is powerfully
felt over the most enlightened and free nation of the earth.
In the
United States, the influence of religion is not confined to the manners, but it
extends to the intelligence of the people...
Christianity,
therefore, reigns without obstacle, by universal consent...
I sought
for the key to the greatness and genius of America in her harbors...; in her
fertile fields and boundless forests; in her rich mines and vast world
commerce; in her public school system and institutions of learning. I sought
for it in her democratic Congress and in her matchless Constitution.
Not until
I went into the churches of America and heard her pulpits flame with
righteousness did I understand the secret of her genius and power.
America
is great because America is good, and if America ever ceases to be good,
America will cease to be great.
The
safeguard of morality is religion, and morality is the best security of law as
well as the surest pledge of freedom.
The
Americans combine the notions of Christianity and of liberty so intimately in
their minds, that it is impossible to make them conceive the one without the
other
Christianity
is the companion of liberty in all its conflicts -- the cradle of its infancy,
and the divine source of its claims.
Tocqueville
gives this account of a court case in New York:
While I
was in America, a witness, [in a court case], declared that he did not believe
in the existence of God or in the immortality of the soul. The judge refused to
admit his evidence, on the ground that the witness had destroyed beforehand all
confidence of the court in what he was about to say. The newspapers related the
fact without any further comment. The New York Spectator of August 23rd, 1831,
relates the fact in the following terms: