November 19, 2015

Dear Members and Coworkers,

We are officially in the Twilight Zone. Our president says that bringing thousands, maybe hundreds of thousands of supposed refugees to be ensconced among the American population is good for our national security. The heads of numerous government agencies say there’s no way they can verify who’s who or determine the history of any of these individuals, the president says it would be inconsistent with our values to “slam the door” in their faces.

We’re still watching reactions from all official parties everywhere to the cold-blooded massacre of innocent civilians in Paris, France. The French President Hollande uncharacteristically declared that France would now “wage pitiless war” against the terrorists. But even people who witnessed and survived the hideous ordeal in Paris were quick to tell interviewers that they don’t blame Muslims or their religion. “We’ve gotten past all that,” one Parisian declared. We’ll see what comes of it, but chances are the “pitiless war” was just rhetoric spoken in the emotional wake of the mounting body count in Paris.

Hollande’s early response was to say that France would not cower in the face of terror, but will continue to enjoy the lifestyle of liberty ingrained in it’s culture. Then they shut everything down. A whole week after the vicious attack, the streets are still empty. Public transportation has come to a virtual halt and everything – public landmarks, shops, and business – is closed. People are staying home afraid to go out in public.

Only nine hours prior to the report of machine gun fire and bombs going off at locations around Paris, Obama was on Good Morning America with George Stephanopolis (a political hack for Bill and Hillary Clinton who was welcomed into an anchor chair for ABC as a fair and unbiased arbiter of current events). He told George and the world at large that ISIS was contained, and that his strategy was playing out successfully.

After the Paris attack, Obama took to the podium in Turkey to declare, “What I’m not interested in, is… pursuing some concept of…ah… ‘America leading’ or ‘America winning’.” No, that would be completely counterproductive, according to the president. He’s already pursuing the right strategy, he insists, one of containing ISIS, and working together more closely with our allies. Then came the most important part of his reaction. That’s when he took to lecturing all of us from his podium in Turkey, that it would be wrong, even dangerous to conflate the incident in Paris with the religion of Islam. Why would it be dangerous? Because all the Muslims in the Middle East might leap to the conclusion that we in the west are critical of their beliefs and practices, critical of them as human beings, and then the lid would really blow off!

Something became crystal clear in the aftermath of the carnage in Paris, with the criticisms of the president, and the discussion of whether the religion of Islam has anything to do with terrorist attacks all over the world. You and I are incredibly ignorant and bigoted if we don’t understand that all GOOD Muslims, you know, 99.999 percent of ALL Muslims, reject out of hand the clear instructions of the prophet Mohammad. All truly enlightened and civilized people are well aware that GOOD Muslims would never support this tiny handful of jihadists that believe that they must either convert or kill infidels, Jews or Christians or anybody else who hesitates to become one of them. If you don’t believe that, and understand it as self-evident truth, then you’re xenophobic, bigoted and beyond redemption.

Only BAD Muslims would carry out, or privately support these vile acts of wanton murder. Only BAD Muslims would actually act out Mohammad’s clear instructions. Oh, but these terrorists really aren’t Islamic at all. According to the president, they have nothing to do with Islam!

Think about this, it’s incredible. GOOD Muslims would NEVER actually get on board with what they regard as holy Scripture in the Koran and the collections of Mohammad’s sayings and quotes known as the Hadith. There have been all kinds of historical disputes over which accounts of Mohammad’s sayings are accurate and which are “weak” or lacking in credibility. Those disputes are responsible for the many divided sects, the most notable being the Sunni and the Shiite. While they may disagree on details, one thing is clear. They all agree that Islam is destined to conquer the world, and that infidels, particularly Jews and Christians must be conquered, subjugated under Islamic law, or killed. It is a religious imperative under the Koran and various versions of the Hadith that all Muslims contribute to that end. Sunnis and Shiites, regardless of their internal disputes, agree on these points and have their high holy men, their “clerics,” preaching this doctrine on a continuing basis.

But GOOD Muslims would never, EVER condone outright slaughter of unsuspecting civilians like the attack just carried out in Paris. No, we’d be ignorant to believe that any GOOD Muslims actually believe and support the clear narrative of their holy books. That would be ridiculous. When pressed on the issue while Paris was still cleaning up riddled and blown-up bodies, Hillary Clinton actually refused to equate the attack as having anything to do with the religion of Islam. No, that would be “painting with too broad a brush,” she said.

So there you have it! Only BAD Muslims actually live the words of the Koran, and follow the example of their prophet. And there is only a relative handful of those. All GOOD Muslims hate what those BAD Muslims have done, and believe that they have besmirched the great religion of peace by following its dictates to the letter.

And if we don’t understand that pretty much all Muslims are GOOD, and would never act upon the instructions of their holy scriptures, then we’re ignorant bigots. The enlightened Obama, having been raised and taught Islamic precepts from a tender age, knows this emphatically, and will rule accordingly on our behalf.

So what if one of the attackers came into Europe with the hundreds of thousands of supposed “refugees.” He must have been the only one! These people, these massive hordes of young swarthy men, need our help. To quote the enlightened one, “To slam the door in their face would… ah… be… ah… inconsistent with American values.” Nearly half the governors of the United States have publicly rejected the idea that the “refugees” should be transported and settled in their states. But never mind that. Obama knows best, and besides, the States have no legal right to reject what the federal government under Obama has decreed. So, here they come. There’s no stopping it. We have nothing to say. Our representatives in Washington have nothing to say. The Governor of our State can say what he wants, too bad. Obama will send the refugees anyway. He obviously “cares for” everybody but God-fearing Americans.

Here we are at Thanksgiving time. It seems like all our patriotic holidays shape up like a celebration of “The Way We Were,” the values we used to follow, but not any more – at least not as a nation. God has been painted out of the picture. We’re all “bitter clingers” if we don’t approve of national suicide over and behalf of Muslims, global warming, queer matrimony, social justice. Our president is intent on the destruction of America. But we still have God, the Almighty. And we still have each other. We’ve been blessed to live in relative freedom and abundance, and we should not hesitate to give thanks to God for all that we’ve had and still have, even as we see how easily it can be lost. Write or call for your copy of Thankfulness on CD, by Garner Ted Armstrong. It’s a perspective we can use right now.

Sincerely,

MarksSignature

Mark Armstrong