Posted on 12/10/2007 8:09:56 AM PST by JRochelle
Government may have dropped the ball in modern American society, but religion dropped it first, Gov. Mike Huckabee told Southern Baptist pastors Sunday night. "The reason we have so much government is because we have so much broken humanity," he said. "And the reason we have so much broken humanity is because sin reigns in the hearts and lives of human beings instead of the Savior." Huckabee, an ordained Southern Baptist minister, addressed his contemporaries at the two-day Pastors' Conference, which continues today. The three-day Southern Baptist Convention begins Tuesday here in the heartland of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints and the city in which the Mormons have their world headquarters. Huckabee told the pastors gathered in the Salt Palace Convention Center that while the March 1, 1997, tornadoes which struck Arkansas were tragic, at least the devastation could be clearly seen from a helicopter. In contrast, he said, the catalysts for the nation's recent school shootings -- including the one March 24 near Jonesboro that left four students and a teacher dead and 10 others wounded -- were harder to see but were driven by "the winds of spiritual change in a nation that has forgotten its God."
(Excerpt) Read more at ardemgaz.com ...
Don’t you think welfare replaced Christian charity?
Ping to read later
This seems to make the idea that we have forgotten God dubious in my view.
The man speaks the truth, and I say this as a God-fearing, Christian.
Remember Kinky Friedman and his run for Governor of Texas? At one point he was polling about 25-30% in a four-way race, and I began to wonder if he could pull a Jesse Ventura. He then started dropping a bunch of N-words, and his numbers cratered. I'll always have the suspicion he got scared he might win and so engineered his own "Macaca" moment.
My thoughts; American has left the foundational Word of God. When that happens we tend to depend on man’s wants, desires and needs. Included in that package comes sin and in sin is death. America has willingly (to a degree) become a fallen, immoral society, we have lost our moral values. We’ve become a me-me-me society, my needs first and if you don’t agree you’re wrong. If you’re old enough take a moment and reflect back on how things in America were and how they are now. I tend not to agree with all that politicians say but what Huck. is saying rings true. America is dealing with an enemy more dangerous than any we have ever seen. I get a little sick when people start using their belief in the soverignty of God as an excuse for their own sin sin. The gopsel of Jesus Christ is under attack politically, socially, legislatively,from the outside and apostates from the inside, In short this nation is falling apart as we watch, bicker and complain while those chosen leaders get puffed up and tell us how important they are.
Not exactly, according to Huckabee. Welfare from big government and high taxes filled the gap because people were not generous enough:
"I'm often asked why taxes are so high and government is so big. It's because the faith we have in local churches has become so small. If we'd been doing what we should have -- giving a dime from every dollar to help the widows, the orphans and the poor -- we now wouldn't be giving nearly 50 cents of every dollar to a government that's doing ... what we should have been doing all along."
People were just too selfish with their own money, or so says Huckananny.
Their economic views are prettymuch identical.
Why parole a monster like Green (2004)
Garrick Feldman
The Arkansas Leader
07-21-04
Gov. Huckabee probably never read the confession of a demented killer named Glen Green before he made the monster eligible for parole.
Green's confession is so depraved, its sadistic details so scary that no sane, responsible adult would consider him for parole.
If the governor didn't read the confession, he is guilty of dereliction of duty.
But if he read the confession and still considers Green deserving of parole, he's certainly unfit to hold office. Who would free a madman who beat an 18-year-old woman with Chinese martial-arts sticks, raped her as she barely clung to life, ran over her with his car, then dumped her in the bayou, her hand reaching up, as if begging for mercy?
We're publishing the gruesome picture of Green's victim on the front page because we believe her hand is reaching up to demand justice.
In usual fashion, Huckabee's office didn't even contact the victim's family about the clemency.
Although he's required to by the Constitution, the governor, as is his custom, won't say why he granted clemency to this crazed killer (over the unanimous objections of the Post-Prison Transfer Board).
Huckabee apparently listened to Green's minister (and a friend of the governor), who thinks the murder was an accident and Green was forced to confess.
The Jacksonville police, who arrested Green in 1974 after a witness linked him to the crime, think the minister and Huckabee are both delusional, which is the mildest epitaph we can print.
This old police reporter knows a genuine confession when he sees one, and Green's depravity has the ring of truth.
Green, a 22-year-old sergeant, kidnapped Helen Lynette Spencer on Little Rock Air Force Base, where he beat and kicked her as he tried to rape her in a secluded area. She broke loose and ran toward the barracks' parking lot, where he caught up with her and beat her with a pair of nunchucks.
He then stuffed her into the trunk of his car and left her there while he cleaned up. Several hours later, he drove down Graham Road, past Loop Road and stopped near a bridge in Lonoke County. Green told investigators he put her body in the front seat and raped her because her body was still warm.
He dragged Spencer out of his vehicle and put her in front of the car and ran over her several times, going back and forth. He then collected himself long enough to dump her body in Twin Prairie Bayou.
This is what the Rev. Johnny Jackson, interim pastor at Bethel Baptist Church in Jacksonville, calls an accident, and apparently Huckabee believes him.
"There is no doubt in my mind that he could kill again," warns Pulaski County Prosecutor Larry Jegley.
The crime started out in his jurisdiction and ended in Lonoke County, where Prosecutor Lona McCastlain has also spoken out against the clemency.
"Life means life," she said, referring to Green's sentence after he plead guilty to Spencer's kidnapping, rape and murder.
As he grants clemency to scores of violent criminals, Huckabee's motives are the subject of speculation: Why, people are asking, is he doing it? After studying the record for several weeks, all one can say is that his actions perhaps reflect a combination of arrogance and avarice and ignorance.
While his fellow governors keep electing him to top positions in their little club, he has alienated Arkansans of both parties. They're shocked at not only the amazing number of clemencies but also at the way he ignores the suffering of the victims' families, who are always the last to know when their loved one's killer is up for parole.
Bilenda Harris-Ritter, an attorney who now lives in California, is one of those people who worry all the time that Huckabee might free the man who killed their relatives. Harris-Ritter's parents were murdered in north Arkansas, and she has had to deal with heartless state bureaucrats as she fights to keep the killer locked up.
Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger recently named Harris-Ritter chairman of the Public Employees Board, which oversees collective-bargaining agreements among 7,000 employers and 2 million employees.
She is upset that our governor has not been more forthright about his clemencies.
"Huckabee is required by law to make certain notifications. When he does not, the pardon should be voidable," she told us.
She continued, "The people of the good state of Arkansas (and I really mean that) need to think seriously about impeachment."
When told that many people consider Huckabee our worst governor in recent memory, Harris-Ritter replied, "No argument from me, and I am a Republican!"
Arkansas clemencies outpace other states (August 2004)
Garrick Feldman
The Arkansas Leader
08-11-04
(Excerpted, click here to read the rest)
If you're wondering how Gov. Huckabee's hundreds of clemencies compare with neighboring states, get ready for a shocker.
Huckabee leads the pack.
He has issued more commutations and pardons than all of the six neighboring states combined.
Governors seldom reduce sentences in other states – and almost never for murderers serving life without parole or for rapists or for habitual drunk drivers, while in Arkansas it's a regular habit with Huckabee.
Other governors use their clemency power only rarely, while Huckabee has made it routine. As we've told you before, he has issued more than 700 pardons and commutations during his eight years in office – more than 137 this year alone – and more than his three predecessors combined.
Here are the figures for neighboring states since 1996, when Huckabee took office (and keep in mind the population of these states is nearly 20 times ours):
-Louisiana – 213.
-Mississippi – 24.
-Missouri – 79.
-Oklahoma – 178.
-Tennessee – 32.
-Texas – 98 (in-cludes 36 inmates released because they were convicted on drug charges with planted evidence).
Total: 624 vs. Huckabee's 703.
Governors in neighboring states almost never grant killers clemency, while Huckabee has commuted the sentences of a dozen murderers.
(snip)
Governors in the states we studied grant clemencies only on special occasions, such as when they leave office. Last January, after Mississippi Gov. Ronnie Musgrove, a Democrat, lost his re-election bid, he issued 16 clemencies, and there was a huge outcry. That's how many Huckabee averages per month.
By contrast, Haley Barbour, Mississippi's new Republican governor, has issued no clemencies all year, nor has Kathleen Babineaux Blanco, Louisiana's new governor, a Democrat.
In Tennessee, Gov. Phil Bredesen, a Democrat, has issued no clemencies since he took office in January 2003.
(snip)
He reminds me of Edwin Edwards. A former preacher turned populist politician whose current residence is the Federal Pen.
As a Baptist, I would NEVER vote for a Baptist minister turned politician!!!
LLS
Ditto that.
He uses his faith to justify his liberal ways.
Examples,
Letting all kinds of criminals out because he bought their ‘I found Jesus in jail!” line.
Raising taxes to help the poor.
Its the christian thing to do to let illegals have in-state tuition.
On and on it goes.
Have you got room to add LBJ and Michael Dukakis? :)
JR:
So, if one drew a trendline on the degree of Americans’ receptivity to Christ and our willingness to publicly acknowledge Him and live accordingly and not rebel against Him — and this line started in, say, 1880 and continued to this day — you actually think it would be level?
So Huck, instead of serving as a Senator and running for President, why aren't you serving as a pastor or missionary?
Where did I say it would be?
What does that have to do with Huckabee?
I have a problem with electing a “Preacher-in-Chief” to lead this nation...I have the Pope to follow on matters of faith, thank you very much.
Post #8, well said.
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