A letter from the President

Dear Friends and Allies of SCP,
December 7, 2007

Merry Christmas from all of us at SCP. May God's grace shine upon you this Christmas and beyond, that you might overcome the slew of assaults that try the faith of every one of us, as well as those broader assaults on this nation as a whole, a nation once known for its bounty, noble virtues, courage, Christian spirit and wide-ranging freedoms.

No matter what the multiculturalists say in their attempts at historical revisionism, it was not Zoroastrians or atheists coming over from England to colonize the new world. It was not Muslims, Jews, Hindus, or Buddhists who came on those ships to found colonies along the Atlantic coast, but Christians looking for freedom to worship and live out their lives away from government tyranny. Our early history bears this out in its prayer books, literature and early charters. The pilgrims and early colonists in their day would have gladly anticipated the Constitution, Bill of Rights and Declaration of Independence, which unashamedly placed God at the center of the Republic's mandate.

As most 5th-graders should know, the Constitutional limitations on governmental power, by implication, are a warning against the rapacious state becoming a tyranny. These limitations also anticipate the erosion of freedoms and liberties through clever arguments and sudden crises used by the State to weaken the resistance of the people. Constitutional limitations were created so that the government would remain the servant of the people, and prevent the people from ever becoming servants of the State. Citizens are to be vigilant against surrendering their freedoms in exchange for government offers of protection, welfare or any other so-called benefit. Benjamin Franklin warned that if they did, they'd be worthy of neither.

SCPs burden is that we, and organizations like us, must have the freedom to write as we see things, a freedom Americans have taken for granted for two hundred years. When SCP is no longer able to write freely--but is required to dance around ever narrowing guidelines enforced by the State--we will be effectually shut down. This is a key reason we are concerned about the issue of free speech and related freedoms, such as individual right to privacy in light of state surveillance. Anti-hate laws present a terrible trap. Seeming to be high minded and benign, they will shut the door for any views at odds with the State. This is a terrible threat.

If today's lawmakers, compromised, corrupted or indifferent to Constitutional protections, pass draconian anti-hate laws, SCP would be unable to make any meaningful moral judgments or critique new religions, Neopaganism, Eastern thought, channeling, Spiritualism, human potential, emerging cults or their various founders, leaders and gurus.

This upcoming election may well become a referendum on public distrust of the deceit, corruption and dangerous blundering of the government. For America to survive, I believe we need a noble statesman of deep and genuine (not pretended) Christian conviction, broad vision, intelligence, integrity and uncompromising character, who would champion the nation's historic faith, its liberties and freedoms, indeed, its people--an individual free of the influences of tainted advisors with secret agendas, special interest groups and powerful political lobbies. It may be that such a one has appeared, a man who is not a slick, charismatic orator but someone plain spoken and honest, a champion of the people. He may be our window of hope. But if our government is again ruled by another whose ultimate loyalty is to a foreign power or shrouded special interests, America may never recover.

And surely America is in trouble with mounting debt, over thirty million illegal aliens who have flooded across open borders (as the government polices the rest of the world and subjects American citizens to humiliating searches), the dollar in free-fall, growing international contempt for America's hubris and preemptive wars, the sub-prime lending crisis, banks and mortgage firms being bailed out as homes are foreclosed, the trillion dollar cost of invading Iraq, and now a "no fly list" in which the government can dictate to citizens whether or not they are permitted to fly. Perhaps most discouraging is the utter indifference of a public distracted by "bread and circuses," entertainment junkies a far cry from those early patriots who fought for our freedoms.

One of America's premier writers of a century back predicted:

"When fascism comes to America, it will be wrapped in the flag and carrying a cross." -- Sinclair Lewis (1885-1951)

This is exactly what comes to mind when you recall American flags and calls to patriotism being invoked to justify our preemptive wars in the Middle East, the Patriot Act and emergency legislation creating an imperial presidency that is above the law--all of it managed like a Hollywood extravaganza as the people stare on numbly, barely comprehending what is going on.

In this vein, Judge Napolitano writes in his latest book, A Nation of Sheep (p. xi), that after 9/11 "the neocons who dominate the Republican Party" commenced three separate wars: one in Afghanistan, another in Iraq, and "the third against the civil liberties of the American people." He states:

[T]he [present Administration] has systematically attacked and diminished virtually every freedom and right guaranteed by the Constitution: freedom of speech, freedom of the press, freedom of religion, freedom of association, the right to privacy, the right not to self incriminate, the right to counsel, the right to speedy trials, the right to fair trials, the right to avoid cruel and unusual punishment, even the right to be set free after acquittal! . . . . the President has broken laws he swore to uphold, and declined to enforce laws that he has himself signed into existence . . .

We may well face the very nightmare that the founders of this Republic tried to prevent from happening--a tyranny worse than anything they had seen under King George III. Because, unlike then, the technology of today can bring virtually any individual to his knees: from implantable GPS monitoring chips, ID cards, to cameras and tracking devices on every street corner, iris scans, to the power of Government to perform unlimited wire taps and email espionage on its citizens, to the present day reality of super-computers with vast databases of information about each and every one of us. When privacy goes, so does freedom.

So we hope you follow your conscience in standing up for freedom as the hour approaches. SCP will continue to write as though freedom of speech still exists. This is the line in the sand for us.

Meanwhile, let me give you the encouraging news that SCP is healthy, in the black with no debt of any kind, and all of us remain in good spirits as we watch the ripple effect of our work in the constant emails and phone calls we get here and abroad.

Your faithfulness has fended off any temptation for us to make any appeals--which we make a policy not to do anyway. This has ministered to us and, we hope, given you the needed latitude to follow your conscience. God forbid that we ever send you one of those expensive, glossy, professionally designed survey appeals geared to pressure donors into giving! That's not for us.

Thank you for your feedback, faithfulness, support and encouragement. God has used you in our lives. We thank you for hanging in there with us as we try to reach the broader public arena on critical issues.

Merry Christmas and Godspeed

Tal Brooke, President/Chairman, SCP, Inc