Our Threatened Freedom

R.J. Rushdoony

Transcript:

R.J. Rushdoony: 00:01 Is there a return to religion? This is R.J. Brushwood with a report on our threatened freedom. In the past year, many magazines and commentators have written about a return to religion. Is this true? Is there evidence of a change in the United States? First of all, we have had in the past half century more than one return to religion, which meant a little or nothing. A return to faith involves more than joining a church or buying more religious books.

R.J. Rushdoony: 00:33 Second, a return to religion can be a product of social stress rather than a believing heart. I can recall in the 1940s hearing a returning soldier say that under fire in a foxhole, he prayed. When he came back, he headed for a bar and a prostitute, and he laughed about his foxhole religion. Because of the economic problems today, more than a few people are ready to act religious who with prosperity tomorrow will forget the faith.

R.J. Rushdoony: 01:06 On the other hand, some of the statistics are quite interesting. The Evangelical churches have gained members in the years from 1972 to 1982, and the modernistic churches have lost them. During those years, the Southern Baptists gained by 20%, the Assemblies of God were up 62%, and the seventh day Adventists, 36%. The United Methodist Church lost 10%, the Episcopal Church 15%, and the United Presbyterian Church went down 21%. In other words, the stronger the faith, the stronger the growth. Clearly, there is a return to and a growth of a more Biblical and Evangelical faith. This means that it is more than a church growth because many churches lost, but it represents instead a faith growth. Even this, however, is not enough to ensure a lasting return to faith. Together with a faith growth, there is also an obedience growth.

R.J. Rushdoony: 02:14 One telling evidence of this is the great increase every year in the growth of Christian schools. This indicates that parents take seriously their responsibilities under God. Another indication is the growth of various agencies to deal with problems of delinquency, drugs, family stress, and more from a Biblical perspective. Another evidence is the development of agencies to minister to poverty, unemployment, and crime from a Christian viewpoint. We can also add that major groups have been formed to call attention to the problems on the political scene in the realm of economics and more.

R.J. Rushdoony: 02:58 All this is promising. A valid and enduring return to the faith means that all of life is viewed in biblical terms and in terms of a mandate from God. Such a renewal, if it continues, offers hope of a new birth of freedom and self-government. This has been R.J. Brushwood with a report on our threatened freedom.

Learn more about R.J. Rushdoony by visiting: https://chalcedon.edu/founder

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Our Threatened Freedom

R.J. Rushdoony

Transcript:

R.J. Rushdoony: 00:01 Is our federal bureaucracy out of control? This is R.J. Rushdoony with a report on our threatened freedom. Recently U.S. News & World Report carried an article entitled, “Washington’s Red Tape Just Keeps Rolling Out.” The article called attention to several important facts. First, the federal government often loses our records, papers and tax returns. We are not forgiven any delay in filing papers and tax returns, but the federal government can delay indefinitely in providing us with data we need or our tax refund without any penalty whatsoever. This is a one-sided relationship which leads to arrogance and corruption.

R.J. Rushdoony: 00:47 Second, federal regulations, tax forms and instructions are written in an unintelligible gobbledygook. We have in the US today 30 million illiterates and almost 30 million more who are functionally illiterate. If PhDs have trouble understanding many of the federal regulations, laws and instructions, how can the rest of the people understand them?

R.J. Rushdoony: 01:17 Third, the paperwork is continually increased. I received a form from one department which asked for voluntary compliance with new penalties for failing to return it. As an agreeable man, I filled it out and returned it. As a result, I was sent a second and longer form with a letter telling me of the penalties for failing to comply. One way to get clobbered by Washington, it seems, is to be an agreeable and willing citizen.

R.J. Rushdoony: 01:47 Fourth, we can add that much, if not most of this paperwork is useless. It does nothing except to spend the taxpayer’s money on useless projects. Useless information is not information but disinformation. It has a negative and a harmful role. As long as the bureaucracy is not trimmed, the people are. We pay the high price of misgovernment and overregulation. As a result, inefficiency and corruption are increasing because a federal bureaucracy is too big to control, except by some dramatic and ruthless cutting.

R.J. Rushdoony: 02:31 At present, there is no such cutting or axing in sight. In fact, bureaucracy is our major growth industry. Every administration for decades has promised a cutback while increasing the power and scope of the bureaucracy. We are less and less governed by our elected officials and more and more by bureaucracies. We are increasingly getting a kind of government which cannot be called either a republic or a democracy, but only a bureaucratic oligarchy. As this new regime develops, freedom wanes.

R.J. Rushdoony: 03:11 This has been R.J. Rushdoony with a report on our threatened freedom.

Learn more about R.J. Rushdoony by visiting: https://chalcedon.edu/founder

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Our Threatened Freedom

R.J. Rushdoony

Transcript:

R.J. Rushdoony: 00:01 Should universities get Pentagon funds for research? This is R.J. Rushdoony with a report on our threatened freedom. Each year the defense department awards contracts to industry for research and for new technology. Such grants are necessary and proper as long as they are honestly granted to the bitters who can deliver the best weaponry at the lowest prices. A lesser grant was to colleges and universities. The new contracts rose to $852 million dollars for the fiscal year essentially for research.

R.J. Rushdoony: 00:39 During the Vietnam War era, such grants were a major concern to the student protesters, and more than a few riots and incidents resulted. Spring 1983 began with a student protest at Ann Arbor, Michigan against the University of Michigan’s defense contracts. Before the matter goes further, it would be wise to examine the issue carefully.

R.J. Rushdoony: 01:05 It is fitting and right for industry to get such contracts, and industrial research and development departments are the major sources of our modern technology in every field. Few people appreciate the extent to which industrial research produces the inventions, technologies, and advances of our era. Without industrial research we would have very little technology and scientific advance.

R.J. Rushdoony: 01:34 In the development of technology, the role of the university is a very minor one. The university or scientist concerned is more involved in teaching than in anything else. Moreover its scientific concerns tend to be theoretical not practical. As a result, the involvement of the universities and defense department grants or contracts is actually a minor matter.

R.J. Rushdoony: 02:01 The 1982 contracts to industry totaled $116.7 billion dollars whereas those to colleges and universities came to $852 million dollars. In other words, it is much less than 1% of the total. Obviously, the Pentagon does not see university research as important. It is possible that such university grants are made partially towards funding those schools whose alumni are important in congress and the bureaucracy.

R.J. Rushdoony: 02:38 It is questionable whether the grants to universities are very productive. What good the universities do could probably be better done elsewhere. Education will be better served if the contracts go elsewhere. This is not because defense work is demeaning to science but because the essential purpose of a college and university is and should be education. Whenever any kind of fat research contract is dangled before professors teaching suffers and the professors profit.

R.J. Rushdoony: 03:17 With some schools the rationale is that a few students gain opportunities for more research but the reality is that there are better options in industry and teaching suffers when the university is involved in defense contracts. We have too many universities greedy for such contracts and education suffers as a consequence. To harm or depreciate teaching is not practical. This has been R.J. Rushdoony with a report on our threatened freedom.

Learn more about R.J. Rushdoony by visiting: https://chalcedon.edu/founder

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Our Threatened Freedom

R.J. Rushdoony

Transcript:

R.J. Rushdoony: 00:01 What are the facts about Soviet slave camps? This is R.J. Rushdoony with a report on our threatened freedom.

R.J. Rushdoony: 00:09 We have recently had some very contradictory figures released concerning Sylvia slave labor camps. According to Under Secretary of State Lawrence Eagleburger, there are four million prisoners, of whom 40,000 only are political, working out of 1,100 camps. Refugees from the slave labor camps give up very different accounts.

R.J. Rushdoony: 00:37 Michael Makarenko, a Russian who served eight years in slave camps, testified recently before the Senate Banking Committee in International Finance. According to Makarenko, there are 2000 camps and up to 17 million men, women and children engaged in forced labor or political reason.

R.J. Rushdoony: 01:03 The State Department said that 11,000 Vietnamese are working on the gas pipeline. A former member of the Vietcong estimated that Vietnamese slaves are between 24,000 and 60,000 and that half a million Vietnamese would be used according to plans. Makarenko called attention to the fact that even official Soviet publications reveal the slave camp deaths are now seven to eight times higher than during the Stalin terror period.

R.J. Rushdoony: 01:40 Other refugees have stated plainly that without the slave labor, the Soviet economy would collapse. The workers in Soviet factories have a declining productivity. The real production is slave production. Thus, we have a monstrous slave states, the Soviet Union, history’s major slave power together with Red China, receiving more foreign aid from us than any other country in the world. American taxpayers are helping to keep a slave state alive with their tax funds. Our State Department admits that slave camps exist, but it understates the number of camps and slaves and it continues to deal with an evil power as though it were a community of honorable gentleman.

R.J. Rushdoony: 02:32 The Soviet Union was behind the murder attempt on Pope John Paul the second, but our State Department seems unconcerned about the matter. Something is wrong with this picture.

R.J. Rushdoony: 02:46 The United States should be the champion of the free world, not the main stay of the slave states. We should offer hope to the oppressed, not aid to their oppressors. Are we doing this because ourselves are no opposed to freedom? No nation can export freedom if it does not practice it at home and treasure it.

R.J. Rushdoony: 03:13 This has been R.J. Rushdoony with a report on our threatened freedom.

Learn more about R.J. Rushdoony by visiting: https://chalcedon.edu/founder

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Our Threatened Freedom

R.J. Rushdoony

Transcript:

R.J. Rushdoony: 00:00 Can a hole in the ground to be productive? This is R.J. Rushdoony, with a report on Our Threatened Freedom.

R.J. Rushdoony: 00:08 Throughout American history, we have had an element in the population, very much opposed the puritan work ethic. Instead of holding to useful work as the key to productivity and prosperity, many have had a variety of gimmicks to suggest as an easy way to national wealth. More than a few have insisted that printing more money would create more wealth. Instead, of course, it creates more inflation.

R.J. Rushdoony: 00:35 Others have believed that prosperity would come and poverty disappear, by means of the passing of laws. If this works, why not pass laws to abolish sin and death? In 1874, Richard Shell, a Wall Street stock speculator, became a member of Congress. Shell had a solution for the economic problems of his day. He wanted the federal government to dig a canal from New York to San Francisco.

R.J. Rushdoony: 01:05 This would have been quite a task, considering that in 1874 only horse drawn earth moving equipment existed to tunnel through the Rockies. Shell wanted greenbacks to be printed to finance the project. More recently, in 1936, in the general theory of employment, interest and money, Keynes wrote, and I quote, “To dig holes in the ground, paid for out of savings will increase not only our employment, but the real national dividend of useful goods and services.”

R.J. Rushdoony: 01:45 Remember, since at least 1932. Keynes theories have governed the Western world and the United States, and also other nations as well. As a result, we have had all kinds of nonproductive federal spending. The idea being that any such spending will automatically bring about prosperity no matter how useless the cause. Because Keynes’ idea of prosperity through useless holes in the ground projects, we have hundreds of federal agencies, which exists merely to spend money. If Keynes was right, then our farmers are foolish, wasting time and money, planting crops which bad weather can destroy.

R.J. Rushdoony: 02:37 Instead, it would be much safer, simply to plow the ground and ask for a subsidy to do so. As a matter of fact, under the influence of Keynes, this is exactly what the federal government began to do some years ago. Farmers were paid for not planting anything. Remember, Keynes believed that digging useless holes in the ground would in his own words, “Increase, not only employment, but the real national dividend of useful goods and services.” Our politicians believed him. No wonder we are in trouble. This has been RJ Rushdoony with a report on Our Threatened Freedom.

Learn more about R.J. Rushdoony by visiting: https://chalcedon.edu/founder

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Our Threatened Freedom

R.J. Rushdoony

Transcript:

R.J. Rushdoony: 00:00 Who are the debtors in America. This is R.J. Rushdoony with a report on our threatened freedom.

R.J. Rushdoony: 00:07 Quite frequently newsmen politicians and people generally talk about the huge burden of debt carried by the poor people of America. I’ve even heard a few speak for some kind of moratorium on the payments of debts. Thus far such talk is not too commonplace, but before the situation gets any worse it is important to get the facts straight.

R.J. Rushdoony: 00:34 While it is true that debtors include all classes of people, it is not true that all classes of people are equally in debt. One of the most basic facts for us to grasp in this matter is that the poor have the fewest debts of all. A really poor man can rarely get a loan. He is generally considered a bad risk and few lending agencies are ready to consider his application. The poor are poor. They’re commonly hard up for money. But they are not often in debt. And if they are then only for minor things.

R.J. Rushdoony: 01:16 The middle class will tend to have more debts than the lower class. But even here the debts are limited. They are primarily loans against houses and farms and also small businesses. Since the middle class tends also to be the savers their debt picture on the average is not really a bleak one, although many do have serious problems.

R.J. Rushdoony: 01:42 When we come to the rich we find a much higher ratio of debts. To illustrate, a couple owning a lovely home in a superior neighborhood had it on sale for over two years. None of the perspective buyers could get a bank loan until a much richer man who could have paid cash for it bought it with a bank loan. For a variety of reasons, including the tax break for interest payments, plus the advantage of keeping a large amount of cash free for investment purposes, the buyer sought a loan and the bank readily granted it. A sizeable percentage of debtors are rich to begin with. They are the ones who can borrow money most easily. This is not all.

R.J. Rushdoony: 02:35 A vast amount of the public’s debt has been contracted by corporations. These are the main debtors in America. Plant expansion, new branches, the purchase of subsidiary firms and much, much more, make corporations the major debtors in the non-statist sector. I am not calling attention to this fact to make any conclusions. I am doing so because we cannot have a realistic awareness of the nature of our debt structure apart from nostalage. At the same time we need to remember the much more ominous debts of our cities, counties, states and the federal government. If debt is a form of slavery as Solomon said, we are in trouble.

R.J. Rushdoony: 03:26 This has been R.J. Rushdoony with a report on our threatened freedom.

Learn more about R.J. Rushdoony by visiting: https://chalcedon.edu/founder

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Our Threatened Freedom

R.J. Rushdoony

Transcript:

R.J. Rushdoony: 00:01 Are we misjudging our prison convicts? This is R.J. Rushdoony with a report on our threatened freedom. Recently, a murder took place inside the Men’s Central Jail in Los Angeles, California. A young man of 24, in prison for six months, for petty theft and battery was murdered because he refused to pay $5 a week to live. A prison gang was extorting money from other prisoners and beating all who refused into submission. This young man, having refused to pay, at all, was beaten and kicked to death less than a month before his release date. 15 street gang members were arrested for the murder. Two were 18 years-old, one was 24, and the other 13 gang members, in prison, were between 19 and 23 years of age. All were in prison on charges ranging from parole violation to murder.

R.J. Rushdoony: 01:03 This extortion racket was not unknown to the jailers. According to Deputy District Attorney Peter Berman, and I quote, “Any non-gang was to be charged $5 a week to live on the row, and if he didn’t like it, he would be beaten up. The jailers would have to remove him and bring in another guy to be extorted.” The 15 gang members were arrested, but we can probably be sure that nothing will be done to the jailers, who are, in a sense, accessories to such extortion. This crime, of course, was only a brief glimpse into the cesspool life of prisons. Homosexual rape is routine in jails. Prison life is a monstrous evil and, yet, prisons were originally started as reform institutions.

R.J. Rushdoony: 01:56 Our problem with prisons is that we begin, and end, with a false doctrine of man. Humanism holds that men are either, naturally good or, at worst, morally neutral. The solution to criminal behavior, then, become rehabilitation, trying to change the prisoner’s outlook and lifestyle. I believe it is time for us to view criminals, again, as sinners, as men with an evil bent. To be under any illusions about the nature of criminals is to be more, and more defenseless in dealing with them. When parents of young hoodlums, and murderers, tell us that their sons are really good boys at heart, we need to challenge that assumption.

R.J. Rushdoony: 02:42 I am weary of reading about model boys suddenly going wrong, only to find out, too often, that they were manifesting their evil character long before, only to have their parents cover up for them. When such people cover up their son’s evil, they only encourage him, thereby, to feel free to indulge his criminality all the more. If we regard our criminals as unfortunate men and boys, we are misjudging them. If we treat criminals as people who are really good at heart, we are fools and suckers. The more respect and freedom we give to evil men, and to criminals, the less freedom there will be for us to enjoy.

R.J. Rushdoony: 03:27 This has been R.J. Rushdoony with a report on our threat to freedom.

Learn more about R.J. Rushdoony by visiting: https://chalcedon.edu/founder

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Our Threatened Freedom

R.J. Rushdoony

Transcript:

R.J. Rushdoony: 00:01 Are we in a banking crisis? This is R.J. Rushdoony with a report on our threatened freedom. Recently, Congressman Rand Paul of Texas reported on the international banking crisis. He called attention to the fact that the world debt is expanding steadily and rapidly. Third world and communist states owe Western nations and banks nearly $1 trillion.

R.J. Rushdoony: 00:28 According to Congressman Paul, and I quote, “This debt must be liquidated, and this can only be done in two ways: by countries defaulting or by the debt being paid off with inflated dollars. The former approach requires the bankers to suffer the consequences of their actions. The latter method forces the American people to bear the cost for bailing out the banks and debtor countries. It would involve a massive intervention by the Federal Reserve and the destruction of our money through the continued depreciation of the U.S. dollar. The mechanism is already in place for a further expansion of money and credit in order to sustain the system for a while longer. This means that long term inflation will persist and get much worse.”

R.J. Rushdoony: 01:25 This is not all. Other debts bring the worldwide debt total to an estimate of over $10 trillion, and the annual interest on that debt comes to over $1 trillion at the rate of an average 10% interest. This means that the world economy as well as the world tax structures have a major problem simply meeting interest payments apart from any payment on principal. More and more nations are increasingly unable to pay their debts. If you have a savings account, the money loaned out to debt-deep nations may be your money and their failure to pay could endanger your bank and your deposits.

R.J. Rushdoony: 02:14 The evidence is clear that we do have a world banking crisis. Behind that crisis stands the ugly fact of debt. Since World War II, men and nations have gone into long term and heavy debt as though tomorrow would never come. Now as the economy falters, the burden of debt grows heavier and more pressing. The economic and banking crisis will not be solved by economic measures alone. We definitely do need a return to the gold standard and to sound banking practices. Both however presuppose a mentality opposed to long term and ready debt. A debt ridden people are not a self reliant and free people. Debt is a form of slavery and worst of all, of self imposed slavery. Are we ready to be a free and responsible people? Being debt free is an important aspect of freedom.

R.J. Rushdoony: 03:22 This has been R.J. Rushdoony with a report on our threatened freedom.

Learn more about R.J. Rushdoony by visiting: https://chalcedon.edu/founder

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Our Threatened Freedom

R.J. Rushdoony

Transcript:

R.J. Rushdoony: 00:00 Are we afraid of words? This is R.J. Rushdoony with a report on our threatened freedom. One of our growing problems is our fear of words, of name calling. All too many minority groups do outrageous things, and, if criticized, cry racism.

R.J. Rushdoony: 00:19 The same is true of many non-minority groups. They perpetrate all kinds of non-sense and evil, and when caught at it, charge with critics with being against the people. For example, in 1971, 60 radicals demanded certain things of the federal government in the name of Indian Rights. They received 643 acres of federal lands, with buildings, to set up a supposed university. The school established, DQU, has never met any of the necessary elementary educations requirements. It has received at least seven million dollars in federal grants. It’s chancellor has been Dennis Banks of the ultra leftist American Rights Movement. And DQU has been allied with Marxist groups.

R.J. Rushdoony: 01:18 Federal requirements, which were a part of the original grant of land and funds, have never been met. Accreditation was required and has not been attained, nor a minimum student enrollment. The original 1971 agreement required a return of the property if the terms were not met. Not only has DQU failed to meet the terms, it has failed to maintain the property, and it has leased out the land illegally.

R.J. Rushdoony: 01:51 In spite of all this, the people of DQU are making all kinds of charges against the federal government and are accusing it of attacking an American Indian and Chicano project. To make matters worse, DQU is suing the federal government with the aid of the Native American Rights Fund. A national support center of the federally funded legal services corporation. As research director Michelle M. Rossi noted in Eye on Bureaucracy, and I quote, “The U.S. Government is essentially financing a lawsuit against itself, in that NARF, the Native American Rights Fund, received approximately $205,000 in 1982.” In other words, we finance this nonsense, and now we are financing both the attempts to dissolve it and to preserve it. Everyone gets consideration except the taxpayer.

R.J. Rushdoony: 03:01 Moreover, all such groups need to do, to gain major media coverage, is to charge bigotry and racism. It is time to stop fearing names and words, before freedom is destroyed by our timidity and negligence.

R.J. Rushdoony: 03:21 This has been R.J. Rushdoony with a report on our threatened freedom.

Learn more about R.J. Rushdoony by visiting: https://chalcedon.edu/founder

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Our Threatened Freedom

R.J. Rushdoony

Transcript:

R.J. Rushdoony: 00:00 Are you a patron of the arts? This is R.J. Rushdoony with a report on our threatened freedom. Very few of us have the money to finance artworks, and if we did have it, we would prefer to pay for what we believe is good art. All of us, however, through our tax dollars, are very definitely patrons of the arts. The annual appropriation for the national endowment of the arts budget is being pushed closer and closer to the $150 million mark.

R.J. Rushdoony: 00:34 These millions go to many things most of us would consider bad art, and to much we would not at all call art. In recent years, such funds have been used to produce a film on making a blue cornmeal bread or producing a gay Sunshine journal, to publish a feminist publication, to acquaint ex-criminals and ex-drug users with art, and much more.

R.J. Rushdoony: 01:03 Some of the funds go to strange causes. The National Conference of State Legislatures is a lobbying group, but it has received arts funding. The same is true of The National Council on Aging, also a lobbying group. In Washington, D.C., one sponsor of an erotic art show received funding, and so on and on.

R.J. Rushdoony: 01:26 Of course, some in Congress will argue that $150 million is not much. It may not be much to Congress, but it is a great deal to the rest of us. Moreover, we have our growing deficit because grants of $150 million to many thousands of like causes add up to billions of wasted dollars and an economic crisis.

R.J. Rushdoony: 01:57 We are regularly told by State and Federal officials that their budgets cannot be cut. What we are not told is of the thousands of foolish grants which are regularly made, and need to be eliminated totally. Our national deficit is becoming the national disaster. Taxes are increasing, and so, too, is the tax revolt, a dangerous fact, in that it represents a growing vote of dissent and no confidence in our form of civil government.

R.J. Rushdoony: 02:33 If Congress continues to spend money as usual, it will not only bankrupt the country, but also destroy all confidence in our Constitutional order. The end result of fiscal irresponsibility and inflation has all too often been a totalitarian regime.

R.J. Rushdoony: 02:55 Those who want subsidies to the arts should remember that such subsidies, which are always followed by controls, are the hallmark of every totalitarian state.

R.J. Rushdoony: 03:11 This has been R.J. Rushdoony with a report on our threatened freedom.

Learn more about R.J. Rushdoony by visiting: https://chalcedon.edu/founder

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