By Richard Larsen
Published – Idaho State Journal, 05/27/07

Sergeant Blake Stephens brought home to Pocatello the profound significance of Memorial Day this year. A young man with a bright future ahead of him and a loving and supportive family behind him, voluntarily and willingly signed up, as millions have done before him, to put his life on the line in defense of liberty and the security of America. While he may not have known at the time he enlisted that he would indeed pay for that privilege with his life, he obviously knew at the time the potential consequences of his commitment. And for that, we owe him and the millions who have preceded him the grateful acknowledgement of an appreciative nation for his sacrifice.

I have been blessed to know many veterans throughout my life; some who simply had the wrong number and were conscripted, but many who willingly and voluntarily joined the military not just for a quality education and decent benefits, but more out of a sense of duty, and a love for everything good that America stands for.

Blake was part of a growing number of recruits in these latter years that were educated, bright, and full of life; who were filled with optimism about their future and the future of America. He was part of a growing number of young and not so young people who had everything going for them before joining the military, and yet felt the compelling yearning to make a difference in a fight against radicals who target our very way of life. To some among us, the fallen represent lives wasted, while to most of us, the fallen represent the high cost of liberty, especially in conflicts critical to our national security and way of life as this one is.

Some of us may never totally understand the mentality and the sense of loyalty and respect that drives people like Sergeant Stephens to be willing to pay for our liberties with their lives. Whether we all understand it or not, gratitude and our mutual respect should be compulsory. I will never understand those who hold our military personnel in contempt; those who choose to focus on the few aberrations on the battlefield or the prison camps, rather than the millions of acts of mercy, sensitivity, and sacrifice which typify those gallant men and women in uniform. This generation who joins willingly knows full well their possible destiny, yet they are willing to make that investment for our current and future liberty.

I will be eternally grateful for goodly parents who inculcated in me from my earliest days an appreciation for this great country and an unwavering awe for those who have and continue to sacrifice their all for us to enjoy the freedoms that are ours. Senator Craig very properly reminded us in his guest column a week ago of our responsibility within the confines of our homes to nurture our children with the appropriate respect for those who serve, and love of country for the incomparable ideals upon which America is founded. Trent and Kathy Stephens obviously instilled in their son Blake such a love of country, and a commitment to the American ideal.

For some inexplicable reason, there are some among us who think it’s chic to trivialize and minimize the greatness of America; who think patriotism and loyalty to America are characteristics of oversimplified minds living in a state of denial of our flaws. Quite the contrary, the overwhelming majority of Americans recognize in America an unprecedented historical and ideological uniqueness; a singularity that magnifies exponentially the willingness of those in uniform to sacrifice even their very lives in defense of our ideals

Dr. Benjamin Rush, one of our founding fathers, said “Patriotism is as much a virtue as justice, and is as necessary for the support of societies as natural affection is for the support of families.” As a nation convinced of the imperative to love and nurture our children, we should hold as tenaciously the commitment to patriotism for our country, which is simply a love of, and a loyalty to, our country, and a professed willingness to defend her against enemies or detractors.

For those of us who love this country, when we sing the poignant anthem, “Oh Beautiful for Spacious Skies,” a natural lump grows in our throats. We fight back the tears of gratitude and respect for those who have granted us the liberties and freedoms we enjoy even when we sing the line, “God mend thine every flaw.” Certainly this great country has its share of challenges and inequities to mend, but amenable and equitable solutions rarely are arrived at through verbal conflagration and demeaning epithets. There is nothing in that beautiful hymn to the greatness of America that makes reference to political parties, policy differences, or political candidates. It is, however, replete with gratitude and appreciation for our roots of liberty, and recognition of the uniqueness of the principles upon which this country was founded. These are sentiments that should be universally shared by all Americans.

President Ronald Reagan declared, “Let us make a vow to our dead. Let us show them by our actions that we understand what they died for. Let our actions say to them... ‘I will not fail thee nor forsake thee.’ Strengthened by their courage, heartened by their valor, and borne by their memory, let us continue to stand for the ideals for which they lived and died.” To which I can only add, “Amen.”

By Richard Larsen
Published – Idaho State Journal, 05/20/07

I have many friends who have much nicer homes than I do. Sometimes I wonder what it would be like to live in such a nice home as my friend Steve has. I just can’t afford to buy a house like that, but I really do want to improve my life, and that of my family, and living in a house like Steve’s could be just the ticket.

Perhaps what I’ll do is simply break into Steve’s house and stake a claim. After breaking in I’ll clean the house, mow the lawns, and do the dishes and the laundry. You know, all the jobs he doesn’t like to do. When he comes home, he may be upset to find me in his home, but I’ll simply point out all the good honest work I’ve done before he discovered me there, and tell him all I want to do is work and stay in his place until I want to leave. I do honest labor, and the fact that I’ve illegally entered his house should have no relevance to the discussion. Now Steve may actually speak a different language than I do, so I may need an interpreter to translate all this for me.

By this time I’m kind of on a roll. I need to get a little more assertive in my position of advantage here. Not only am I going to insist that he has to let me stay in his house, but he needs to add me and my family to his insurance plan. He needs to educate my children, and he has to cater to my language of preference. I have no intention of learning his language, so he needs to make signs around his house in my language, and make sure that the telephone and the computer are geared to my language as well.

Steve may not like this proposal that much, but I think I know how I can convince him that it’s right. If he tries to kick me out or call the police to have me removed, I’ll just tell him that I’m going to have all my friends bring protest signs and create a massive demonstration declaring to the world how evil he is for trying to keep me out of his house and how I have a right to be there. They’ll declare to the neighborhood and the world that I deserve to be there, because I’m an honest worker (except for that little part about breaking into his house), and all I want to do is to improve my station in life.

I’ll also prey on his emotions, and convince him that he’s a bigot or a racist if he doesn’t accept me with all my conditions.

Oh, and there is another little thing. Since I’m illegally in his house, when he puts me on his payroll I can’t make any contributions toward the cost of me staying there and mooching off his insurance plan and healthcare plan. But I must insist that in spite of that, I have to be given benefits for when I want to retire and stay in his house until I die. After all, he has a big house, virtually unlimited financial resources, (or so it seems), and I am going to be doing all those jobs he doesn’t like or want to do.

It shouldn’t bother Steve at all that when I broke in I stole his identity and that of his family. I needed one of those legal nine-digit numbers so I could get a drivers license and get a job, and a credit card, and his number seemed to be as good as any. Especially with that nice big house, his number will probably give me a good credit rating, too.

There is one other little thing that he may not like. I did notice when I broke into Steve’s home that some other rather nefarious looking characters from other foreign countries broke in at the same time. They were talking crazy about things like “jihad,” and were yelling “Allah Akbar” all the time. They didn’t seem to be the honest (other than the breaking in part) hard workers that I obviously am. But I’m sure they’ll be just fine. They certainly won’t cause any trouble, even though they broke in just like I did.

As ludicrous as this hypothetical scenario may appear, the allegory should be readily apparent. This is the situation of the illegal aliens in our country. They come here illegally, and we are to provide them health care, education, Social Security benefits, and cater to their language preferences. I hope the parable puts it into more comprehensible terms for you.

The most disturbing aspect of this scenario is the fact that Congress and the President have agreed tentatively on the terms of an immigration reform bill that will grant virtual amnesty to millions of illegals in our country. Not only is their proposed amnesty ludicrous, but it’s dangerous, inasmuch as many thousands of those illegals are Islamic extremists who pose legitimate security threats to shopping centers, college campuses, amusement parks, and ball games.

Some of our national legislators will undoubtedly claim that the proposed legislation is not “amnesty” to give temporary legal status to illegal aliens. Yet amnesty is explicitly “a general pardon of offenses against a government.” By this definition, any way you analyze it, legal status for illegals is a pardon of offenses even if a fine has to be paid for that pardon. The proposed legislation goes far beyond pardon to actually reward the offense. The violator is allowed to keep reaping the benefits of living in the United States while requiring minimal accountability for breaking the law in getting here. Rewarding bad behavior simply encourages more of it. Amnesty is no panacea, but creates a virtual Pandora’s Box of national employment problems, entitlements, health care, education caveats, and a perpetuation of linguistic challenges.

Congress’ proposed amnesty creates many more problems for the nation than it resolves. If this bill is passed and signed into law, it will perhaps be the most flagitious act by a sitting Congress in U.S. history.

By Richard Larsen
Published – Idaho State Journal, 05/13/07

Earlier this week six Islamic radicals from Kosovo were arrested for planning to attack Ford Dix, New Jersey, to kill as many people there as possible. Three of the six are illegal aliens, possessing no legal documentation for their presence in the United States, two had green cards for temporary labor in the States, and one was a U.S. citizen. Apparently they had made videos of their training, shooting semi-automatic weapons and yelling “Allah Akbar” (God is great) in the hills of Northeastern Pennsylvania. Authorities were tipped off by a clerk at the local Circuit City that had been requested to copy the training tapes for the terrorists.

This event provides us an opportunity to look back at our war on terror, how we conduct it, and how various elements within the government and our populace have dealt with certain aspects of it.

Actually, it should make us ponder John Edwards’ assertion that there is no “global war on terror.” Even the Congressional Budget Committee is attempting to eliminate the term “global war on terror” from the 2008 budget probably because President Bush coined the phrase. So it would appear that the Fort Dix Six are not terrorists. According to Edwards, terrorists are simply caught in a “political frame” and we generalize in calling them terrorists as part of our “political rhetoric.” Seriously, the more we hear from the left on dealing with terrorism and terrorists the more we should all realize they have no grasp of reality, and should be kept as far away from the seats of government as possible.

Balkan terrorism expert Darko Trifunovic says that the arrests show “white Al-Qaeda at work.” He also referenced the February attack in Salt Lake City when a Bosnian Muslim youth, Sulejman Talovic went on a shooting rampage at Station Square as evidence of white Al-Qaeda terrorism. Trifunovic claims Al-Qaeda has adopted new tactics of using white European youths for terrorist attacks, “because of their non-Arabic appearance.” “The strategy is to indoctrinate or poison the hearts and minds of youngsters to psyche them up for future terror operations,” Trifunovic said.

Now, as we reflect back on the left’s arguments against our efforts in the “war on terror”, let’s see how they would have to view the Fort Dix Six scenario in order to be consistent.

First of all, it’s America’s fault that the six are terrorists. They weren’t terrorists before, and if we didn’t invade their lands, Kosovo and Yugoslavia, and if we weren’t so supportive of Israel, they would not seek to kill us.

Even though they may have more information about other plans for terrorist attacks and the role the other four suspects played in their plan, we certainly can’t detain them at Guantanimo because they may be “tortured” to get information from them in order to protect Americans they may be plotting to kill. Any efforts to extract additional information from them would have to be illegal.

Just because they don’t qualify for protection under the Geneva Convention, we’d better grant them those rights, otherwise the rest of the murderous terrorists of the world will think less of us, and may do worse things than cut off the heads of Americans when captured.

The ACLU needs to be brought in to protect the rights of the accused, because it’s not their fault, it’s ours, that they want to eliminate us and cause us damage. Also, the ACLU has to protect them because their rights were undoubtedly violated by utilization of Patriot Act provisions or NSA wiretaps and we all know that those government programs encroach on our liberties.

The Circuit City clerk who tipped off local authorities must be prosecuted for violating the civil rights of the six, along with the law enforcement personnel who apprehended them because they undoubtedly used some sort of profiling which we all know is politically incorrect, plus contemporary rap and hip-hop artists admonish us not to “snitch.” It’s obvious that the copy clerk “profiled” just because the six were shooting lots of guns and yelling “Allah Akbar” in the mountains.

And of course, it shouldn’t make any difference that they were illegal aliens; they should still be given all the rights and privileges of American citizens, because it is, after all, our fault that they’re here illegally because they simply want a better life.

There, I think that captures the sentiment of the anti-war-on-terror crowd pretty well, and hopefully it sounds as ludicrous and detached from reality to you as it does me.

Among the many lessons from the Fort Dix Six, two stand out notably. First, that many among us, even of our leaders, have no comprehension of the risks facing us in Islamo-fascism and seem more interested in protecting the rights of perpetrators than protecting Americans. Secondarily, it should be obvious that some form of amnesty for illegals is not viable in resolving our illegal immigration conundrum. The current lack of enforcement of our existing immigration laws is a national security risk. America must fix the problems of illegal aliens pouring into the country before one of these plots becomes the next tragedy.

As Dan Stein, president of Federation for American Immigration Reform said this week, “Today we found out once again that our failure to control illegal immigration and our inability to manage the current caseload of people applying for immigration benefits poses a lethal risk to the nation. After years of denying the obvious – that terrorists can and will take advantage of the same unenforced immigration policies that have flooded this country with illegal immigrants -- we now have irrefutable proof that the terrorists understand where we are vulnerable. We can be certain that there are many more terrorists who entered the country illegally or overstayed visas, and we may not be as lucky next time.”

Congress needs to do more to protect our borders, which is their primary responsibility in executing their duties under the Constitution. They need to do away with any plans for “amnesty” or a “pathway to citizenship” until they can gain and retain control of our borders. As Stein put it, “Luck was on our side this time, but luck is not a substitute for due diligence and an immigration enforcement policy that protects the nation and its people.”

By Richard Larsen
Published – Idaho State Journal, 05/06/07

Two weeks ago the Supreme Court upheld the constitutionality of Congress’ 2003 ban of Partial Birth Abortions. This was a very small step in the right direction to reestablish our national recognition of the value of life. Our Declaration of Independence explicitly states that “life” is a God-given, inalienable right that we hold sacrosanct. We have many laws in our legal code that protect life of adults and children, but for some reason we have abandoned our constitutional requirement when it comes to the protection of innocent, unborn life.

Partial birth abortions are absolute grisly procedures that should make even the most hardened producer of horror movies cringe. Justice Anthony Kennedy, traditionally a pro-abortion jurist, included the following description of the process in his majority decision. “The abortionist (his assistant reported) delivered the baby's body and arms -- everything but the head. At that point, the baby's little fingers were clasping and unclasping, and his little feet were kicking. Then the doctor stuck the scissors in the back of his head, and the baby's arms jerked out. ... The doctor opened up the scissors, stuck a high-powered suction tube into the opening, and sucked the baby's brains out.” The law prohibits this particularly brutal kind of abortion when the abortionist’s rationale is clearly to deliver the infant partially with the intent to make sure the child will not be alive when fully delivered.

Anyone with even a semblance of moral normalcy should be absolutely repulsed by the fact that this could be done legally in our country. I find it nearly as abhorrent that four Supreme Court Justices would not concur with the majority at the reprehensibility of such a procedure.

This same procedure if performed with the child completely outside of the birth canal would be murder, and the perpetrator would be charged with a capital crime. What difference is there between the two scenarios? Only someone who is completely amoral could possibly contend that it makes any difference if a portion of the baby’s body is still inside the mother.

What’s even more shameful is the fact that not all partial birth abortions are averted by the 2003 law. Congress only voted to forbid the intact D&E (Dilation and Evacuation) procedure as described above. If the abortionist does not deliver a certain minimum extent of the baby’s body before killing it, the ban does not even apply. For anyone with a sense of propriety, the law did not go far enough to restrict this ghastly practice.

Many in our society are perfectly fine committing murder on innocent, partially born infants as described above. Yet surprisingly, many of those same infanticide advocates have a problem with a murderer paying his life as the price for taking the life of another human being. Not only is there no viable logic in such a position, but it is devoid of any semblance of morality. A wise man once said, “Woe unto them that call evil good, and good evil.” That’s exactly what such abortion advocates and capital punishment deniers do. It should be truly alarming to our collective consciences that much of the country seems to think it’s acceptable to kill innocent life, yet spare the guilty life of a capital crime perpetrator.

Justice Kennedy in his majority position further stated, “Where it has a rational basis to act, and it does not impose an undue burden, the State may use its regulatory power to bar certain procedures and substitute others, all in furtherance of its legitimate interests in regulating the medical profession in order to promote respect for life, including life of the unborn.” The respect for life should be such a core issue for us and it is encouraging to finally see some logic verbalized from the Supreme Court relating to the valuation of life. When respect for life is reduced, the value of life itself can’t help but be curtailed.

As the time when a “tissue mass” can be classified as a “viable tissue mass” moves closer and closer to the point of conception, the pro-abortionists are going to have a more difficult time defending the practice. When a baby is born, it is more like a change of address, than it is a change of status as a viable human being subject to the same protection of law as an infant outside of the womb.

On the constitutionality issue, does anyone else find it disturbing that the same people who think it’s their constitutional right to kill unborn infants think its okay to extirpate gun rights? Granted, I’ve a simple mind, but as many times as I’ve read the Constitution, I still can’t find anything in there about the right to commit infanticide based on some other notion, conspicuously absent from the Constitution, of a right to choose elimination of the unborn. Compared to the explicit right of Americans to own guns, which is right there in black and white in the 2^nd Amendment, the abortion “right” is downright hallucinatory.

There is one other positive element to this decision that deserves reference. The ink on the ruling had hardly dried when the leading Democrat Presidential Candidates all denounced it. Hillary Clinton, Barack Obama, and John Edwards were all critical of the ruling. That should provide some moral clarity for those in quest of a Presidential candidate to support.

This may be, and it should be, the precursor to the reversal of Roe vs. Wade. That was a characteristic mistake of the Warren Court. For those who argue for precedent in upholding Roe vs. Wade and the infallibility of the Supreme Court, consider where we would be if Dred Scott vs. Sanford hadn’t been overturned by the 13^th and 14^th Amendments.

The protection of life is fundamental to our republic. The innocent, who have no voice in their protection, deserve the complete safeguarding of unborn infants as is afforded born infants. Neither have voices, mandating that we adults provide that protection. At the very least, Roe vs. Wade should be overturned and the issue referred to the states to handle at that level. Hopefully this is one small incremental step toward that end.