Last night, the Senate voted overwhelmingly to pass the $700 billion bailout bill. After reading the 400+ pages that were crammed with enough pork to make Jimmy Dean look like a vegetarian, they decided to go ahead and sell American freedom to such important interests as Wool Research (Section 325), Auto Race Tracks (Section 317), TV and Film Production (Section 502), and Wooden Arrows Designed for Use by Children (Section 503). Tonight, the House of Representatives will vote on the pork-laiden bill.

The stock market is showing us how it feels about the bill: before Monday’s Senate vote, the Dow Jones Industrial Average was down 100 points in the first hour, and 300 points by 1:30, ending the day around 700 points down from the previous close. The House killed the bill, and the next day the markets started to recover. After the Senate approved the bill last night, Wall Street reacted by shedding another 300+ points as of this writing. Wall Street is voting with their wallets: they are afraid of the economic impact of the bill, and the stock prices show it. Hardest hit are luxury goods manufacturers like Apple (-8%), gas & oil exploration companies like EOG Resources (-12%), and raw goods companies like BHP Billiton (metal mining, -10%) and Nucor (steel recycling, -11%). The message from Wall Street is that as the economy slows, people won’t be buying iPods, the demand for gasoline will go down as people lose their jobs or just drive less to save money, and since people are consuming less, the need for metals to make new goods goes down as well.

Rather than allow the bad companies to fail and allow the market to correct itself, Washington has decided to get involved under the pretense of “saving the economy.” As has become typical in Washington, they are doing it by spending money. Taxpayer money. Our money. And, like every other form of government “assistance” — welfare, Medicare, Medicaid, Social Security — it has only served to make those problems worse, rather than better.

The passage of this bailout bill will pave the way toward centralization of the banks and industry. This is one of the key tenants of Marxism: Karl Marx’s Proposal Number Five argued for the “centralization of credit in the banks of the state, by means of a national bank with state capital and an exclusive monopoly.” After this bailout, what’s next? Bailing out troubled farms? Automakers? Seizure of the energy industry?

All of these bailouts serve not to help the cause of the people, but instead to strip liberties away from us.

What you can do:

1. Use The Mailbox to find out the name and contact information of your Representative in the House. Call and tell them to vote “NO”. If the line is busy, you can also fax them. (Be sure to include your name, address, and phone number on the fax.)
2. Check the list of Senators who voted “NO” on the bailout bill. Then call your Senator. Thank them if they did vote no. Tell them how you feel about them selling our liberties in exchange for pork if they voted yes.
3. All indicators point toward a massive recession or full-blown depression. Take necessary steps with your 401k, IRA, and savings accounts. If possible, move your savings to a credit union rather than a bank. Most people qualify to belong to at least one credit union. The easiest way to find one is to do a Google search for “credit union near 12345″ where you replace 12345 with your zip code. Credit unions are much safer than banks, and typically offer better interest rates.
4. As we learned in Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy, don’t panic. If you need money, by all means take it out of the bank. But if you have money in savings or a Certificate of Deposit, leave the money where it’s at. Without bogging you down with the details, just trust us that this is essential for the future health of the economy. The Great Depression was started by a run on the banks: everyone went to the banks and took their money out, and stuffed it under their mattresses. As a result, banks closed and neither businesses nor people could borrow money, and the economy imploded.
5. Put together a series of plans. Sit down with your family and go over the “what if” scenarios. Know in advance what you’re going to do if you lose your job, your spouse loses theirs, or if you both lose your jobs. Decide things such as what unnecessary things get cut (i.e. cable TV, cell phones) and what takes priority. Having plans means less panic if the unthinkable happens.
6. Get your financial house in order. Pay down debt, put off unnecessary purchases, and close revolving credit card accounts.
7. Stock up. Once your financial house is in order, buy things you know you’ll need — clothes and food — but don’t need right now. This is especially important if you have children who will outgrow their existing clothes.
8. Prepare The Fifth Box. Uncertain times are ahead, and it’s better to have it and not need it, than need it and not have it.

Have you forgotten the significance of today?

Have you forgotten where you were? What you were wearing? What your reaction was when you heard the news? What you felt in your stomach when you saw the fireball? When you saw the towers fall?

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Have you forgotten hearing about another plane crashing into the Pentagon? And another in a field in Pennsylvania? And wondering silently “How many more planes will be hijacked today? How many more people will die? Who is doing this? Why? Am I in danger? Is my family safe?”

Have you forgotten?

For a moment we all stood in shocked silence. For a moment, we all felt the same outrage and horror that we as a nation felt when the Japanese attacked Pearl Harbor. For a moment, our nation was united.

Then just a few days later when the shock had worn off, people started asking the inevitable question of “why”. And that is when that national unity began to fall apart.

The Ward Churchills and Michael Moores and Keith Olbermanns and Reverend Wrights saw the situation as an opportunity. Whatever they opposed — Jews, Republicans, America itself — they were able to point to New York and Washington D.C. and that field in Pennsylvania and say “See? People around the world hate the Jews!” or: “See? This happened because of failed Republican leadership!” or: “See? This happened because of failed American foreign policy! People hate us!” Whatever their axe to grind, 9/11 became their whetstone.

Over time, their hatred spilled over onto television screens. It spilled off the pages of magazines and newspapers. It spilled off websites on the internet and out of email inboxes. Hatred of this group or that group. Hatred of this policy or that decision or something that happened ten, twenty, or two hundred years ago that are irrelevant now.

All of this hatred combined to try and make us feel guilty for being who we are, for whatever reason. And all of this hatred took focus off the most important fact of 9/11: we were attacked. We were attacked by radical Islam, and it is not the first attack in their war against us, just the bloodiest.

From attacking our shipping in the Mediterranean during Thomas Jefferson’s watch, to the Iranian hostage Crisis during President Carter, the Beirut Embassy Bombing during President Reagan, and the 1993 WTC bombing, Khobar Towers bombing, and USS Cole bombings during President Clinton our country has been under attack by radical Islamists who are attacking us simply because we’re not like them.

September 11th should be seen as our wake-up call: these people will not stop until we capitulate. Or are dead. This is not a political issue. This is not a political party issue. This is an issue of national security and national survival.

So take this day to remember the promises you made to yourself on September 12, 2001. Take this day to pick up a copy of United 93 and re-live the terror of that day. Take this day to read The Falling Man. Take this day to remember the fear, the terror, the sadness, the horror and the outrage. Take this day to remind yourself that we’re still at war and that it can happen again.

May we never forget.

For the past 54 years, the IRS tax code has prevented churches from involving themselves in political affairs. But is this an infringement of the churches’ First Amendment rights to free speech? Does permitting churches to speak on political issues interfere with the so-called “separation of church and state”? And why has it only been the past 54 years that there has been this prohibition?

President Lyndon Johnson… we have so many things to thank him for: The failure of “the war on poverty,” the war in Vietnam, tax-gluttons Medicare & Medicaid, and getting the federal government deeply financially involved in the education system. A New Deal Democrat, his plan for the Great Society is costing us countless billions in wasted tax revenue every year.

But one thing about his political career rarely gets mentioned…

When running for his Senate seat, he was strongly opposed by a non-profit organization (that wasn’t a church.) Not known as one to forget a grudge, Johnson decided to get even. So in 1954, he proposed an amendment to the IRS tax code that would silence non profits’ influence upon public policy. Johnson sugar-coated his poison pill through deception: add churches to the list of organizations that can get 501(c)(3) tax-exempt status. Who wouldn’t want that? What politician would want to be seen as the guy who wants to tax churches? The amendment passed without debate. But in so doing, Johnson shackled churches to one of the qualifications of 501(c)(3) status:

Currently, the law prohibits political campaign activity by charities and churches by defining a 501(c)(3) organization as one “which does not participate in, or intervene in (including the publishing or distributing of statements), any political campaign on behalf of (or in opposition to) any candidate for public office.”
— Source: IRS website 

As a result, churches who file for 501(3)(c) status are giving up their right to free political speech. Contrary to popular belief, churches are not required to file, but most do, because of ignorance of the tax laws or recommendations by an accountant. Churches have never been taxable, and are expressly and automatically exempted from being taxable, according to IRS Code § 508(c)(1)(A). Further, they are not required to file IRS Form 1023 (to apply fro tax-exempt status,) according to IRS Publication 557. Finally, according to IRS Publication 526, donations to churches are automatically qualified as deductible contributions.

Further, forcing churches to restrict their speech means that churches fall under the jurisdiction of United States law, which is founded in Constitutional law. If churches fall under United States law, then prohibiting their speech violates the First Amendment which clearly states that “Congress shall make no law [...] abridging the freedom of speech [...]“. The passage of the tax code laws are clearly unconstitutional.

It is our position that it is not only is it legal for churches to influence the congregation, it is essential that they do so. Part of the purpose of religious leaders is to interpret scripture and apply it to every day life, including the selection of political leaders who make and enforce laws that may run counter to the beliefs of the church. It is for that reason, that we at FiveBoxes find it essential that churches be afforded the free political speech guaranteed to everyone by the First Amendment.

Some argue that this will lead to corruption in churches. Others argue that they go to church to learn the teachings of their faith and not to listen to political rhetoric. The thing to keep in mind is that churches and their leaders should have the freedom to decide if they want to discuss political issues, just as the congregation is free to change churches that engages in — or abstains from — political discourse. The point is that churches and parishioners should be free to choose if they want to hear religious-based endorsement or opposition of political candidates of every level.

In addition, it is essential for the continued survival of this great nation for our leaders to be moral people. George Washington in his farewell address stated:

Of all the dispositions and habits which lead to political prosperity, religion and morality are indispensable supports. In vain would that man claim the tribute of patriotism, who should labor to subvert these great pillars of human happiness, these firmest props of the duties of men and citizens. The mere politician, equally with the pious man, ought to respect and to cherish them. A volume could not trace all their connections with private and public felicity. Let it simply be asked: Where is the security for property, for reputation, for life, if the sense of religious obligation desert the oaths which are the instruments of investigation in courts of justice? And let us with caution indulge the supposition that morality can be maintained without religion. Whatever may be conceded to the influence of refined education on minds of peculiar structure, reason and experience both forbid us to expect that national morality can prevail in exclusion of religious principle.

It is substantially true that virtue or morality is a necessary spring of popular government. The rule, indeed, extends with more or less force to every species of free government. Who that is a sincere friend to it can look with indifference upon attempts to shake the foundation of the fabric?

Promote then, as an object of primary importance, institutions for the general diffusion of knowledge. In proportion as the structure of a government gives force to public opinion, it is essential that public opinion should be enlightened.

Encourage your religious leaders to investigate this issue on their own. If they find as we do, they should join the growing number of churches who — supported by the Alliance Defense Fund — are protesting the IRS tax law by speaking out to their congregations on September 28th. The future of our country depends upon moral leadership at all levels of government.