Posted on 02/09/2009 12:20:24 PM PST by EternalVigilance
When I ran for the U.S. Senate against Barack Obama I did my best to speak the truth. I knew when I accepted the invitation of the Illinois Republicans that I stood little or no chance of victory. With few exceptions, everyone I consulted advised against it. Most thought it political suicide. But the facts convinced me that Obama is a dangerous left-wing extremist. When confronted with the proven depravity of his moral views, my faith and conscience convicted me as well. After years of telling audiences that we had to stand for right and truth no matter what the cost, I felt that the Lord would hold me accountable if I refused to walk the talk. Sometimes we are not called to victory, but to witness for truth, as Jesus did, even unto death.
So when I campaigned in Illinois I let no false ambition; no kind of blandishment or intimidation; and no whispers of political gain or loss distract me from speaking the truth. I talked about Obama's extremist support for abortion (including his unconscionable willingness to tolerate infanticide in Illinois hospitals); I described him as a hard line socialist, pointing out his uncompromising commitment to central government control of health care and education; I pointed to the contradiction between his professed support for traditional marriage and his consistent promotion of the homosexual agenda. I remember talking to people, including Republican leaders, and others who have built little empires and big reputations as leaders of the so-called "Christian right", (what I call more appropriately the moral conservatives). Time and again I heard in response feckless mumblings about how moderate he seemed in his speech at the Democratic convention. Time and again I felt the implication that I was somehow exaggerating, imprudently "demonizing the opposition." They did little or nothing. And when the pro-abortion elements of the Illinois Republican Party openly went on the offensive against my refusal to back down from my stand for moral principle and real conservatism, in silence and inaction these leaders complied with their politically ruthless intention.
Meanwhile I and my family encountered from the Obama forces the ugliest indignities I have ever experienced in politics: Parades in which Obama's marshaled minions shouted curses and epithets almost every step of the way; and forums in which they rudely launched expletives with gestures just short of physical violence. At one such forum the environment they created was so ugly that my wife was visibly shaken, and my daughter in tears. Even on Election Day, when we went to the polling place to vote, a man there created a disturbance. He shouted insults. He acted in a physically threatening way. Nothing was done to stop him, and the pandering Illinois media breathed hardly a word about it in their so-called news coverage.
In all of this there was a hard edged disdain for decent civility that reminded me of the murderous invective Lenin launched against those who opposed the communist agenda. But it all took place behind a media fabricated façade of false hope and moderateness, like the propaganda screen behind which the totalitarians of the twentieth century hid their perpetration of atrocity.
Having felt the cutting edge of this reality, on election night I refused to engage in the nice ritual usually associated with the resolution of our political contests in America. Obama's people treated politics as war. But in war only gutless servility congratulates a ruthless opponent on the victory he has gained without civility. Mine was to be sure, a silent protest but loud enough to have some so-called leaders, supposedly on my side, losing no opportunity to "apologize" for my behavior.
Since 2004 I have walked in the political wilderness. This walk is not without its burdens, but I am heartened when I remember whose footsteps I find there: those of people like Reagan and Winston Churchill who in their dedication to right refused to let ambition triumph over truth. Assaulted, ridiculed, caricatured, ignored, at times reduced to a small and almost covert band of like-minded adherents, they kept their faith. They witnessed the rising power of the evils they warned against. They witnessed the policies of appeasement, retreat and surrender practiced by unprincipled leaders in the face of those evils. They witnessed the day when hard experience finally forced those who had all but forgotten their existence to turn and make a stand against wickedness triumphant over freedom.
I have an ominous feeling about the years ahead. With Obama, we have crossed the line that separates civil politics from civil war disguised as politics. Occupying the White House is a man known for his support and association with people (like leftist Kenyan politician Raila Amollo Odinga) for whom that line appears never to have existed. I predict that American politics as we have known it is gone. And unless we Americans wake up, more than civil politics will end up dead. For there are other footsteps in this wilderness, left by leaders who opposed the Communists when they took over Eastern European countries in the late 1940s, or Asian countries in the fifties, or African countries in the sixties, or South American and South African countries in the eighties, and so on. Mostly we do not know their names, nor can we mark the spot where their lives were overtaken because their compatriots did not wake up in time. But, with the Psalmist, I will fear no evil, for here, as everywhere, I see the footprints of the one who conquered death itself. Wherever they lead, there is life renewed.
Read more from Alan Keyes at www.LoyaltoLiberty.com...
Sobering.
Alan Keyes and his inner circle make their living by flitting from one cause to the next, staying just long enough to cash the checks, but never long enough to be held accountable for their utter, complete lack of accomplishments.
Anyone who dares question where the money went, or why Keyes has never won an election or influenced policy in any way whatsoever is accused (by Keyes’ paid staff) of being pro-Obama, and all criticism is met with nasty self-righteousness and a martyr complex. (see the OP and the rest of the thread for good examples)
Alan Keyes and his inner circle lied directly and repeatedly to the faces of Republican donors during the 2004 campaign, and within weeks of the election he and his cronies had packed up their carpetbags and gone on to the next scam.
I didn't think that the Illinois GOP could sink much lower, but Alan Keyes proved my wrong with his scorched-earth failure of a campaign that amounted to nothing more than an extended fundraising endeavor for Keyes and his inner circle. They took a party in disarray and picked the bones, setting it back several years in the process.
It’s unAmerican. And unpresidential for him to be yelling like that, trying to instigate class warfare and racial resentment. It’s like he’s trying to wage a cultural revolution in a Third World country.
Pure fiction.
Two very good reasons. Another is that a body like the US senate was made for Dr. Keyes. The major complaint about politicians who allegedly represent our interests is that they are a bunch of inarticulate, namby-pamby, gutless wonders without any clear allegiances. Well, here's someone who could easily out debate any whole commitee in that house, on any topic. And he's on our side, to boot.
..we still have 'supposed' Freepers demonizing Keyes rather than Obama.
Alan Keyes said he would stay in Illinois while he was soliciting donations and left the state only a few weeks after the November election. You can rationalize *why* he lied all you like, but the fact that he (and his staff) lied cannot be disputed.
Again, your posts are nothing but a fictionalization of actual events.
I’d respond to your crass comments re Keyes but others have already done so. Find the videos of Keyes vs Obama debate and you will see 1 man against the many OBots time and again. Would you be as brave? The other R cowards did nothing to support Keyes in the lion’s den.
Simply waving your hands doesn’t make the facts go away, Mr. Chairman.
Keyes and his minions lied. You can rationalize those lies all you like, but the facts remain.
I believe it, and expected it when I posted this wonderful piece here. But, what they don’t realize is that for honest-minded readers these attackers are doing little but illustrating the truth Alan speaks about what he’s gone through.
They have no interest in doing what Alan Keyes does, which is get down to the brass tacks about what is ailing this republic and taking action to address it. Politics to them is only about power and personalities.
The folks in Illinois had little interest in putting aside the interests of their own little fiefs to accomplish something. I spent a couple of months trying to overcome that resistance. At some point you quit trying to beat down locked doors and go somewhere where you’re wanted.
Your spin against Alan is weak and ignorant.
If Keyes and his minions weren't up to the task, they shouldn't have lied to the people writing them the checks. He and his organization lied to people up to and including election day. You can rationalize why they lied, but you can't change the fact that they lied.
I spent a couple of months trying to overcome that resistance.
I know. You lied to people while taking their money, too.
At some point you quit trying to beat down locked doors and go somewhere where you’re wanted.
What a coincidence that the effort to reform the Illinois GOP only lasted as long as the campaign checks were coming in!
Believe me, I have no love for the GOP establishment in Illinois. They wrecked the party, then opened the door for vultures like Keyes and his minions to come in to pick the bones.
Keyes and his cronies knew they were coming in to a situation where the state party was in disarray, and they used that situation to drum up donations that would purportedly be used to put the Illinois GOP back in the hands of grassroots conservatives. Quite simply, they lied, took the money, and ran.
Fact is, you could care less about the money. It’s just an excuse. You’d criticize Alan Keyes whether he was swimming in an ocean of money or whether he took a vow of poverty and walked around in a diaper like Mahatma Gandhi.
Again, that’s not the way it happened at all.
If RINOs were as critical of their party’s leadership as they are of Alan Keyes, the GOP would once again be worth more than a bucket of warm spit.
It sounds like you have quite a bone to pick here. How 'bout explaining it in a little more detail. Your comments here come perilously close to plain slander, and we don't play that game here. At least I don't. A link or something will do.
This is so typical of you, Mr. Chairman—you accuse others of lying when they cricize Keyes’ actions in Illinois, you never address the clear facts that demonstrate those lies, and when you’re backed into a corner you just say that those lies don’t actually matter.
I’ll tell you one thing, Mr. Chairman—money does matter to people who, unlike Keyes, have to work for their living. Keyes and his minions lied to the faces of those Illinois Republicans, many of whom didn’t have a lot of money to spare, and your efforts to dismiss those lies and rewrite history is disgusting.
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