Americanism vs. Communism

Written by Zack Strong

“The proudest boast of a citizen of ancient Rome was, “I am a Roman.” The proudest boast of any patriotic citizen of this free country of ours should be, “I am an American.” God grant this boast may ever be ours.” ~J. Reuben Clark, Jr. “Let Us Not Sell Our Children Into Slavery,” (Address to the Utah State Farm Bureau Federation, November 21, 1952)

America is being ripped apart by two diametrically opposed worldviews – Americanism and communism. These contending forces are locked in a savage death match. They are so incontrovertibly incompatible that they cannot peacefully coexist. At the end of the day, only one flag will wave over the United States. It’s our duty and mission as freemen to determine which side will prevail.

The American Founding Fathers gave the world a Freedom philosophy unique in human history. No other nation enjoys the heritage of Freedom we enjoy. No other country has the same institutions for securing the blessings of Liberty that we have. No other People centered their society upon the idea of protecting God-given rights like our forefathers here in America. Our Republic, with its unparalleled power, wealth, influence, success, and Freedom, was born with this immortal declaration from the pen of Thomas Jefferson:

“We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness. – That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, – That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it.”

These simple words declare our People’s commitment to God, to Liberty, and to our mutual Union. Out of their burning desire to secure their God-given rights, our Founding Fathers declared Independence, waged a war against British tyranny, and created the Constitution. However imperfectly we may have implemented these profoundly powerful principles, they have been our guiding light.

After touring the United States nearly a century ago, the famed philosopher G.K. Chesterton made a keen observation:

“The American Constitution . . . is founded on a creed. America is the only nation in the world that is founded on a creed. That creed is set forth with dogmatic and even theological lucidity in the Declaration of Independence; perhaps the only piece of practical politics that is also theoretical politics and also great literature. It enunciates that all men are equal in their claim to justice, that governments exist to give them that justice, and that their authority is for that reason just. It certainly does condemn anarchism, and it does also by inference condemn atheism, since it clearly names the Creator as the ultimate authority from whom these equal rights are derived” (G.K. Chesterton, What I Saw in America, 7).

Our American Republic is founded on a creed. To be sure, this creed is political, social, and cultural, but it is also highly religious in nature. Thomas Jefferson’s original draft of the Declaration of Independence in fact did not use the term “unalienable Rights.” Rather, it called our rights “sacred and undeniable.” Life, Liberty, property, individual stewardship, and all the things that make life worth living, are indeed sacred.

Significantly, Americans have traditionally viewed their rights as endowments from Almighty God – not as mere privileges granted by government. Alexander Hamilton, for instance, stated:

“The sacred rights of mankind are not to be rummaged for, among old parchments, or musty records. They are written, as with a sun beam, in the whole volume of human nature, by the hand of the divinity itself; and can never be erased or obscured by mortal power” (Alexander Hamilton, The Farmer Refuted, February 23, 1775).

Thomas Jefferson confirmed Hamilton’s position when he wrote:

“The God who gave us life gave us liberty at the same time; the hand of force may destroy, but cannot disjoin them” (Thomas Jefferson, A Summary View of the Rights of British America, 1774).

And John Adams expressed the idea this way:

“I say RIGHTS, for such [the People] have, undoubtedly, antecedent to all earthly government, — Rights, that cannot be repealed or restrained by human laws — Rights, derived from the great Legislator of the universe.” (John Adams, A Dissertation on the Canon and the Feudal Law, 1765).

This fervent belief that rights did not come from government, but from God, formed the basis of the American political and cultural system. Biblical principles, including prominent parts of the civil law revealed to Moses, are tightly interwoven into our federal, state, and local structures of law and justice. In his book The Ten Commandments & their Influence on American Law, William J. Federer detailed the ubiquitous blending of politics and religion during colonial times and throughout most of U.S. history. He noted:

“The belief in a monotheistic God is so basic to America that it is almost unnecessary to discuss. We have to look no further than our National Coinage, National Currency, National Motto, National Anthem, Pledge of Allegiance, Inaugural Addresses, State Constitutions, the wall above the chair of the Speaker of the House, National Monuments, National Day of Thanksgiving Proclamations, etc., to see examples” (William J. Federer, The Ten Commandments & their Influence on American Law: A Study in History, 43).

Out of our ancestors’ reverence for their God-given rights grew a movement to codify Liberty in written documents and to restrain the hand of tyranny by a strict and limited national Constitution. The American People knew that they held all political power and that government is their servant. The Declaration of Independence had made that abundantly clear. Moreover, they knew that they were accountable to God, not to the state, and therefore endeavored to remove government from their lives to the fullest extent possible while still maintaining a civil society with enough strength to secure their collective Freedom.

To fulfill these hopes, the finest American minds came together in Philadelphia in 1787. Carefully, they crafted an instrument capable of preventing usurpation by despots, delegating limited power for specific purposes to government, and retaining to the People and the states the lion’s share of social duties and daily governmental functions. The Constitution which they produced contained a short list of powers that would be delegated by the People to the federal government for particular purposes, such as to repel invasion, put down insurrection, maintain state militias, build postal roads, and to coin money. Beyond this, the government could not go.

The Bill of Rights was later added to safeguard specific fundamental rights, such as the rights of self-defense, peaceable assembly, speech, discrimination, privacy, habeas corpus, due process, and religion. The Bill of Rights serves as a list of “thou shalt nots” to government. The right to keep and bear arms for self-defense against criminals and tyrants, for instance, “shall not” be infringed. Our patriot forefathers loved their Liberty too much to leave anything to chance.

The purpose of the Constitution, as stated in the Preamble, is to “secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity.” It is the Constitution which activated our forefathers’ hopes and dreams. It is this wise document, so beautifully constructed with checks and balances, a brilliant division of powers, and an almost perfectly limited scope of operations when correctly followed, that truly launched the Republic to greatness. James Madison in fact referred to the Constitution as “the cement of the Union” (James Madison, First Inaugural Address, March 4, 1809).

Former British Prime Minister William Gladstone famously called the Constitution “the most wonderful work ever struck off at a given time by the brain and purpose of man” (Thomas W. Hanford, ed., William Ewart Gladstone: Life and Public Services, 323). It was such a brilliant feat because it was created by honorable men who understood that their rights came from their Creator, that government’s duty was to secure those rights, and that the People justly held all political power and were capable of governing themselves.

These were also men who knew that “Freedom hath been hunted around the globe” and that America was to be Liberty’s final “asylum” (Thomas Paine, Common Sense, February 14, 1776). Not only did early Americans see God as their national Benefactor, but they viewed themselves as chosen instruments in His hands to set the ball of Freedom rolling. For instance, President George Washington remarked:

“[T]he preservation of the sacred fire of liberty, and the destiny of the Republican model of Government, are justly considered as deeply, perhaps as finally staked, on the experiment entrusted to the hands of the American people” (George Washington, First Inaugural Address, April 30, 1789).

In harmony with their convictions, the patriots of 1776 fought zealously for their rights as if on a holy crusade. They revered George Washington and his fellow Founders nearly as highly as prophets. And the Declaration of Independence and Constitution held a place of sanctity akin to scripture in the American mind. Taken altogether, this Freedom philosophy and the sense of prophetic national destiny that emerged in early America has sometimes been termed the “American Gospel.”

When we speak of “Americanism,” therefore, it is this constitutionally-guaranteed Freedom philosophy, undergirded by formal belief in God and a sense of our People’s special destiny, to which we refer. The “American Gospel” is our true heritage. It is our mission as a People to carry forward the sacred fire of Liberty and protect it from the tumultuous torrents of tyranny.

Unfortunately, we have lost touch with our Founding Fathers’ vision for this great Republic. Their vision of an “Empire of liberty” (Thomas Jefferson to George Rogers Clark, December 25, 1780) has not been taught in schools, heralded by the media, celebrated in the movies, or uttered in the halls of government for generations. Parents have failed to convey a proper love of our Republic to their children. And churches, once the guardians of the sacred flame of Freedom, have become mere mouthpieces for the mantra “obey government.”

As a People, we have let the Constitution collect dust while allowing our public servants to glorify themselves at our expense. We’ve sat silently as our political power has been usurped and our precious rights have been trampled. We’ve allowed the memory of our national heroes – men such as George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, Andrew Jackson, and Robert E. Lee – to be denigrated and twisted into something horrid and repulsive while anti-American agitators are held up as icons worthy of emulation. We’ve let a rabid minority of activists foist perversions upon us and our children in the form of the LGBT movement, feminism, and so forth.

Our society has been so thoroughly indoctrinated that it recoils at the terms “American exceptionalism” and “Manifest Destiny.” We become offended by those things which make us characteristically American and which made America great. Our language has been hijacked and the free speech of those who defend traditional values is viciously attacked. Our noble history has been transformed into something “oppressive” and “shameful.” Our culture has become corrupted inside and out. Political correctness taints everything.

Who is responsible for this campaign of mass brainwashing and societal transformation – transformation that causes us to turn inward and condemn our history, belittle our ancestors, hate our institutions, and, ultimately, devour ourselves in tribalistic hostility? The origin of the term “brainwashing” points us in the right direction. In his book Brain-Washing in Red China, Edward Hunter explained:

“The plain people of China have coined several revealing colloquialisms for the whole indoctrination process. With their natural facility for succinct, graphic expressions, they have referred to it as “brain washing” and “brain-changing.”

“Brain-washing became the principal activity on the Chinese mainland when the Communists took over. Unrevealed tens of thousands of men, women, and children had their brains washed. They ranged from students to instructors and professors, from army officers and municipal officials to reporters and printers, and from criminals to church deacons. There were no exceptions as to profession or creed. Before anyone could be considered trustworthy, he was subjected to brain washing in order to qualify for a job in the “new democracy.” Only then did the authorities consider that he could be depended upon, as the official expression is worded, to “lean to one side” (Soviet Russia’s) in all matters, and that he would react with instinctive obedience to every call made upon him by the Communist Party through whatever twists, turns, or leaps policy might take, no matter what the sacrifice. He must fight by all possible means and be ready, too, with the right answer for every contradiction and evasion in Party statements. . . .

“. . . Man has learned not only some of the theoretical processes that go on in a man’s head but also how to direct his thoughts, and to do this in a “democratic group discussion,” in a “self-criticism meeting,” on the operating table, or in the hypnotist’s chamber. The whole field of psychology has broadened to embrace everything that influences thought and attitude, from the first crude publicity put out for a movie actress to Ivy Lee and psychological warfare, and the whole wide range of activities that lies within – in effect, our entire field of modem communications media, from public opinion surveys to aptitude testing. . . .

“The politicians of the world have been quick to seize upon these discoveries in the realm of the brain in order to advance their own objectives. Initially, they worked primitively in the field of propaganda. Then the vast possibilities of psychological warfare, what we call a cold war, dawned upon them. Cold war as a term is unfortunate in one respect. It sets up a line between cold and hot war that exists only on the writing table, not on the field of battle. What actually is meant by cold war is warfare with unorthodox weapons, with silent weapons such as a leaflet, a hypnotist’s lulling instructions, or a self-criticism meeting in Red China” (Edward Hunter, Brain-Washing in Red China, 4, 11-12).

Modern brainwashing is communist in origin. While variations of their tactics have been used throughout time, it was the communists who perfected the art, combined it with modern technology, science, and medicine, and employed it on a global scale. In particular, the unholy alliance between Marxism, psychiatry, and the drug industry threatens to upend our civilization and reduce us to bedlam.

This insidious program of mental and moral transformation – our version of Mao’s Cultural Revolution – is not native to our fertile American soil. Rather, it was imported to the United States by Soviet agents, covertly engrafted upon us, and cunningly cultivated. They first brought political correctness, of which the Encyclopaedia Britannica has noted:

“The term [political correctness] first appeared in Marxist-Leninist vocabulary following the Russian Revolution of 1917. At that time it was used to describe adherence to the policies and principles of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union (that is, the party line).”

Brainwashing techniques arrived on our shores soon after political correctness. The purpose of these twin tactics of subversion was and is to convince people to toe the communist line and embrace socialism. Of course, they didn’t refer to it as “the Communist Party line” – they used other terms to disguise their true motives. They preached about “democracy” and “equality,” heaped praise on “diversity,” force fed us the vice of “tolerance” (i.e. toleration of criminality, corruption, and communism), deceptively referred to themselves as “Progressives,” “liberals,” and “social democrats,” and did everything they could to project the failures and abuses that they were guilty of onto America, her People, and her constitutional system, thus inverting reality and confusing our citizenry.

In order to push political correctness and wash Americans’ brains, the social engineers went about convincing us that our history was “shameful,” that our heroes were “villains,” that our principles were “hateful,” that our institutions were “oppressive,” and that our Republic was founded by “bigots.” The current rash of monument-destroying and the ghastly effusion of self-hated and “white guilt” is the long-cultivated fruit of the communist effort to demoralize and indoctrinate our People.

Let’s make something very clear: Communism is not American. It is a hostile, alien ideology that seeks to destroy and then supplant our Amercanist Freedom philosophy. The great statesman J. Reuben Clark, Jr. observed:

“This influence is in leadership largely alien, – in birth, or in tradition, or in training and experience, or possessing alien concepts and alien philosophies. With them are some American-born rebel conspirators. These all form a vast army . . . all ready, able, and willing to take over if their opportunity shall come, or be made” (J. Reuben Clark, Jr., October, 7, 1943).

This alien conspiracy is wholly anti-American. It is a parasitical force sapping the lifeblood of our nation. Its values are the opposite of those codified in the Declaration of Independence and U.S. Constitution. Its principles were forcefully rejected by our ancestors. Its aim is to convert the United States of America into the United States of Soviet America. All their study, planning, and work is aimed at transforming us from Freedom to high-tech feudalism.

In a 1951 article, David O. McKay warned of the attempt to use sophisticated, long-range methods to subvert our country. He wrote:

“More destructive to the spreading of Christian principles in the minds, particularly of the youth, than battleships, submarines, or even bombs, is the sowing of false ideals by the enemy. . . .

“Misrepresentation, false propaganda, innuendos soon sprout into poisonous weeds, and before long the people find themselves victims of a pollution that has robbed them of their individual liberty and enslaved them to a group of political gangsters” (David O. McKay, Salt Lake Telegram, April 26, 1951).

For a very long time, our People have been asleep. We were lulled into a hypnotic trance. We’ve been so beguiled that we didn’t listen when Charles Lindbergh, Henry Ford, Huey Long, Senator Joseph McCarthy, J. Edgar Hoover, W. Cleon Skousen, Fred Schwarz, Antony C. Sutton, Robert W. Welch, Jr., Bella Dodd, Whittaker Chambers, Louis Budenz, Yuri Bezmenov, and hosts of others in and out of government, attempted to alert us to the creeping dangers of socialism here in America. We failed to pay attention when the FBI, the U.S. House Un-American Activities Committee, and the Reece and Cox Committees, churned out material exposing the communist conspiracy and its backers on Wall Street, in banking, in academia, in Hollywood, in the news media, and in Washington, D.C.

Perhaps some did listen to the warnings, but never acted on them either out of fear or out of being labeled a “conspiracy theorist” or “intolerant” or one of the other smears the communists love to use. The esteemed Ezra Taft Benson made this relevant observation. He said:

“The communists bring to the nations they infiltrate a message and a philosophy that affects human life in its entirety . . . Communists are willing to be revolutionary; to take a stand for this and against that. They challenge what they do not believe in – customs – practices – ideas – traditions. They believe heatedly in their philosophy.

“But our civilization and our people here in America are seemingly afraid to be revolutionary. We are too “broadminded” to challenge what we do not believe in. We are afraid of being thought intolerant – uncouth – ungentlemanly. We have become lukewarm in our beliefs. . . .

“This is a sad commentary on a civilization which has given to mankind the greatest achievements and progress ever known. But it is even a sadder commentary on those of us who call ourselves Christians, who thus betray the ideals given to us by the Son of God Himself. I ask, are we going to permit atheistic communist masters, fellow travelers and dupes to deceive us any longer?” (Ezra Taft Benson, The Red Carpet: Socialism – the Royal Road to Communism, 53-54)

Though written decades ago, Benson’s question is one we must ask today. We must decide how much longer will we allow ourselves to be deceived, lied to, and abused before we stand up, speak out, and take back our country. Can we afford not to be “revolutionary” in the cause of our Freedom? Is it wrong to be radical for Liberty when the alternative is socialist slavery? Was it wrong when the Sons of Liberty became extremists against British tyranny in 1776?

Americans have generally believed that the threats we face are those hiding in the shimmering sands of Arabia or the sweltering jungles of the Pacific. We don’t like to think that the enemy is here, in our neighborhoods, in our schools, in court houses, in our Congress. Yet, that’s precisely where he is! Over a long period of time, as we’ve sat apathetic and distracted by TV, hedonism, political correctness, party politics, and pride, a ruthless cadre of criminals has helped one another rise to fill key positions in our government, media, justice system, military, medicine, universities, and so forth.

This group of gangsters may be called many names, from the “deep state” to the “swamp” to the “globalists.” I simply call them communists, however, because the thing they share in common, regardless of where you find them, whatever outward differences they may have, and whatever sinister organizations they belong to, is their communist ideology. They are committed to internationalism, one-world government, legalized plunder, centralization and collectivization, economic monopolies, humanism, loose morals, political correctness, and so on. In short, the adherents of this global cabal all support the core planks of The Communist Manifesto.

Some try to draw distinctions between the various isms. In particular, they endeavor to separate socialism and communism. Ezra Taft Benson explained the fallacy in their attempts:

“It is high time that we recognize creeping socialism for what it really is – a Red Carpet providing a royal road to communism. . . .

“This is a most important lesson for all of us to learn, namely, that the communists use the socialists to pave the way for them wherever possible. This is why communists and socialists are often found supporting each other, collaborating together and fighting for the same goals.

“The paramount issue today is freedom against creeping socialism. . . .

“. . . the worst thing that can happen to a socialist is to have himself openly identified with the work of the communists who are generally feared and despised. . . .

“We must ever keep in mind that collectivized socialism is part of the communist strategy. Communism is fundamentally socialism. We will never win our fight against communism by making concessions to socialism. Communism and socialism, closely related, must be defeated on principle” (Ezra Taft Benson, The Red Carpet: Socialism – the Royal Road to Communism, 65, 69, 75).

The blunt reality is that socialism is communism with a smiley face. Karl Marx was instrumental in launching the First International, forerunner of today’s world-wide Socialist International (SI). George Bernard Shaw and the others who created Fabian Socialism, which has utterly devastated our nation, were ardent followers of Marx. Red China openly promotes socialism. Russia, after the fake “fall” of the USSR, proclaimed it was instituting more socialism and getting back to its Leninist roots. And so it goes, with communists invariably supporting socialism, and socialism invariably leading to communism.

When you compare the principles and inevitable outcomes of socialism, communism, social democracy, democratic socialism, Maoism, Marxism-Leninism, or the more vague “statism,” “globalism,” and “collectivism,” you realize that there’s not a dime’s worth of difference between them. They all lead to the destruction of Faith, Families, and Freedom and to the establishment of state domination over human beings. Socialism and communism must be seen as two wings of the same ravenous bird of prey and defeated by any means necessary.

America is long overdue for another great awakening. Thankfully, the blatant attacks on our rights using the Coronavirus sham as a pretext, as well as the violent rioting in our cities with its bestial destruction of our national monuments, has awakened many to the awful situation we find ourselves in. Many more need to awaken, however, if we are to tip the scales back in favor of Freedom.

In order to accomplish this great awakening, one thing we can do is to point the finger of blame in the right direction. No longer should we point to Jihadists in Afghanistan or to vaguely-defined “terrorists” as our primary enemy. Rather, the finger of blame must be pointed inward. And not merely to the Democrats, but to people of any party or persuasion who fail to uphold the Constitution, who excuse and justify the violence on our streets, who promote cultural corrosion, who advocate greater government centralization, who denounce the godly principles America was founded upon, or who promote any form of socialism.

Dr. John Coleman encouraged us to cut out the cancer within our society above and beyond all else. He wrote:

“The greatest danger arises from the mass of traitors in our midst. Our Constitution warns us to be watchful of the enemy within our gates . . . The UNITED STATES is where we MUST begin our fight to turn back the tide threatening to engulf us, and where we must meet, and defeat these internal conspirators” (John Coleman, Conspirators’ Hierarchy: The Story of the Committee of 300, 30).

From Black Lives Matter agitators to Antifa thugs to turncoats on the Supreme Court to LGBT activists to oath-breakers at all levels of government, it’s time to fight the enemy within. We can’t long endure a situation where 97 members of congress belong to the openly Marxist Congressional Progressive Caucus – the largest single faction in the government. We can’t long endure a situation where governors allow communist revolutionaries to take over city buildings, police precincts, and residential areas, declaring them autonomous zones where U.S. law doesn’t apply. We can’t survive if we allow thugs to vandalize and destroy memorials to our fallen soldiers and monuments to our past heroes with impunity. We can’t last when we empty our prisons of hardened criminals while arresting mothers playing in the park with their children or people who rightly refuse to wear a face mask. We can’t endure in an atmosphere where anything you say that doesn’t agree with the communist agenda is labeled “racist” and “hateful” by the media. None of this is sustainable if our goal is to be free.

Until we wake up and realize the stakes of this war we’re engaged in, we don’t have a prayer of winning. Until we point the finger of blame in the right direction and square off against the traitors among us, we will forever lose ground. We would do well to recall words written during the height of the Cold War:

“Let’s get one thing straight at the very beginning. International communism is the self-avowed enemy of every loyal American. It has declared war against us and fully intends to win. The war in which we are engaged is total. Although its main battlefields are psychological, political and economic, it also encompasses revolution, violence, terror and limited military skirmishes. If we should lose this war, the conquering enemy’s wrath against our people and our institutions will result in one of the greatest blood-baths in all history. Call it a “cold war” if it makes you feel better, but our freedom and our very lives are the stakes of this contest” (Ezra Taft Benson, An Enemy Hath Done This, 165).

As precarious as our situation is, we haven’t lost yet. We have a choice. We can choose Americanism with its Freedom philosophy and reliance on God or we can side with communism and its unparalleled system of Satanic oppression. We can uphold the Constitution or we can sustain The Communist Manifesto. We can throw our lot in with George Washington and Thomas Jefferson or we can fly to the standard of Marx and Lenin. There’s no middle ground; neutrality is not an option.

With all her flaws and internal spasms, America is still the greatest nation on earth. We are still the hope of the world. We are the only thing holding back the full tsunami of communistic tyranny from sweeping over the globe. We have the potential to yet realize our forefathers’ vision of America as a shining city on a hill – an asylum for Liberty. I hope and pray that we will do the right thing, utterly purge communism from our society, and reclaim our heritage as Americans.

This article was originally published at NewsWithViews.com.