Participants: Lincoln Steed (Host), Allen Reinach
Series Code: LI
Program Code: LI000233A
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00:23 Welcome to the Liberty Insider.
00:25 This is the program bringing you news, 00:27 views, discussion, analysis 00:29 and up-to-date information on religious liberty events 00:32 in the United States and around the world. 00:34 My name is Lincoln Steed, editor of Liberty Magazine. 00:38 And my guest on the program is Attorney Allen Reinach, 00:40 Executive Director of the-- 00:44 -Church State Council. -Church State Council. 00:45 I was hesitating, but-- 00:46 Celebrating our 50th anniversary next year. 00:49 I do remember the anniversary discussions. 00:51 So as with Liberty Magazine, Liberty which I edit 00:54 it's been published continuously now since 1906. 00:58 Okay. 00:59 A lot older than I am and you. 01:04 On one level continuity and history is great, 01:06 but the sad fact is that we are living in such rapid change 01:11 that something that existed a decade or so ago is passe 01:15 and something we have today may have any viewers, 9/11, 01:19 the world has changed since 9/11. 01:20 I remember reading in-- 01:23 well, I read a quote from LaMonte magazine, 01:26 the French news magazine, 01:31 I remember reading right after 9/11, 01:33 this statement: it said we have reached the point, it said, 01:37 where the very idea of freedom relatively new 01:42 is in the process of disappearing 01:44 and being replaced by its polar opposite, 01:47 that of a global terror of security. 01:51 -A terror of security. -Yeah. 01:53 Well, in my view we lost the war on terrorism 01:58 the minute we responded to 9/11 02:01 and called it a war on terrorism because 02:04 the whole point of the attack was not simply a destruction 02:08 of physical property or even a destruction of lives, 02:12 it was to alter the structure of society which we have done. 02:17 We have caved in. 02:19 We no longer put freedom as the first priority. 02:23 Security, the national security state now trumps freedom. 02:29 Yeah. I mean, in many ways and it's very unfortunate. 02:32 One example that I've often given talking to groups 02:35 about this is from World War II. 02:38 I wasn't born then, but I've read much about it 02:41 and seen many videos of-- 02:42 Your kids don't think you were born then? 02:45 My kids are quite convinced that I was a contemporary of Moses. 02:49 Dinosaur, yeah. 02:50 We are dinosaurs in the eyes of a 12-year-old or thereabouts. 02:55 A teenager. 02:56 Yeah. But, you know, 02:57 there's plenty of visual evidence 02:59 still with us from World War II 03:02 and Germany-- not Germany, 03:04 but Britain under the German blitz, 03:07 you know, for several, 03:09 I think it was nearly 2 months, 03:10 but suddenly weeks on end the entire German air force, 03:14 bombers, fighters and the lot came over, 03:17 a little Channel, 26 miles I think, the English Channel. 03:19 They came across the Channel and they bombed 03:21 the heck out of London. 03:24 It was massive destruction. 03:25 Then Hitler sent the vengeance weapons, 03:28 the buzz bomb, 03:31 a post jet powered guided missile 03:33 and then the V-2s that Iraq still uses. 03:36 You know, the scant is a V-2. 03:38 They were relatively modern weapons raining down on London. 03:42 I've never read anywhere, never heard anything, 03:45 there is nothing in the records that says England's 03:47 or even London's viability was ever threatened. 03:51 And here two buildings, three, 03:52 let's give the benefit of the third one 03:54 that was taken down, world trade center three. 03:58 Three buildings go down in one of our many cities 04:01 and it's like our existence is on the line. 04:05 Not to denigrate, you know, 04:07 the tens of thousands of people that died. 04:10 I'm sorry, that's not even tens, 3,000 people. 04:11 Three thousand people. 04:13 But as far as threatening our way of life 04:15 as the President said, it didn't even come close. 04:17 The politicians know that 04:20 the most power weapon in their arsenal is fear. 04:25 The politics of fear 04:27 is one of the most destructive elements 04:30 in our nation today. 04:34 The thing, if anybody cares about freedom, 04:37 the first thing that they should do is 04:39 resist the politics of fear, 04:42 call it out for what it is and oppose it because 04:46 it's fear that has completely destroyed, 04:49 almost completely destroyed our freedom. 04:51 It's true. 04:53 And then President Bush is as culpable as any, 04:58 but ironically, at the same time 05:00 he said some things that support what you say. 05:02 Go back about your shopping, do business as usual. 05:05 We should have clung to normality. 05:07 And legally to the protections that have seen the United States 05:11 through centuries of relative security 05:16 and protection of the rights of individuals. 05:18 Well, now through the revelations of Edward Snowden 05:22 and the media that have picked up some of our documents 05:27 that he has on unearthed-- 05:30 We don't need to make a judgment about 05:33 whether he personally did the right thing. About him. 05:34 It's not about him. 05:35 But the information that came out is very real. 05:37 Well, but this is stuff that we have long suspected. 05:41 And, you know, I was trying look at 05:44 what's really the bottom line of all of this. 05:46 The bottom line is 05:48 you are only free as long as you don't matter, 05:51 because as soon as you matter to somebody, 05:54 everything you do and say is being scrutinized. 05:58 And there is no hiding from the cameras that are everywhere. 06:03 You know, they can listen, 06:04 you have a cell phone in your pocket, 06:05 it doesn't matter if it's on or off, 06:07 they can listen to your conversation. 06:09 Your car has an inbuilt GPS. 06:11 Not the GPS on the dash. 06:13 But it's in there, your cell phone. 06:16 The satellites overhead can scan you. 06:18 And I spoke to a government computer expert recently 06:23 and he pointed out that there is 06:24 a type of side reading radar 06:26 that can actually see inside of your house. 06:28 I mean, there literally is no escape. 06:30 Now these things are not in themselves, 06:32 I keep maintaining pernicious 06:34 technology is providing these tools, 06:36 but for any government or any system to readily 06:40 then sort of put these into use is quite startling. 06:44 Look, in prophetic terms we talk about the United States 06:49 being founded as a republic, as a Protestant 06:52 and Republican nation and eventually repudiating 06:56 every principle of our constitution. 06:59 And sovereignty in this nation, 07:02 at least in theory, drives from the people, not the state, 07:08 but we have turned this whole thing inside out. 07:10 As soon as we have a national security state, 07:13 a national security apparatus 07:15 and we have our huge sector of our foreign policy 07:21 and our public policy being decided in secret, 07:25 we no longer have a republic, 07:27 we no longer have a government 07:29 where the people have any semblance of control 07:32 over the way our nation conducts itself. 07:35 I know. You and I read many articles, 07:39 you know, analyzing this 07:40 and they point out very correctly 07:43 that often military operations, 07:45 often relationship between countries are hampered 07:48 when things are all out in the open. 07:49 There's a necessity of, 07:51 you know, a country to keep these secrets. 07:53 Well, that might be true in that realm, 07:55 but as you just pointed out, for a free and open society 07:58 to survive it has to truly be open. 08:01 Once you allow the secrecy 08:04 and what comes with it is non accountability. 08:07 Exactly. 08:08 And so, you know, one article 08:11 we've been reading has to do with the billions, 08:14 hundreds of billions of dollars we've been spending 08:16 on the national security apparatus 08:18 and how much of it's been wasted. 08:20 There is no accountability and contractors are buying, 08:24 you know, influence and making contracts 08:27 worth millions and millions of dollars 08:29 and whether they're delivering anything for their money-- 08:33 Well, this is in one regard we hope it's being wasted. 08:38 But we're all being watched and, 08:40 you know, I saw something recently where, 08:45 you know, an ex-security employee was being interviewed 08:48 and the interviewer made the comment. 08:50 They said, why should I have to worry 08:52 if I'm doing nothing wrong? 08:53 And he said something that resonated with me. 08:56 I suddenly saw it. 08:57 He says, "just remember you are not the one 09:00 that gets to define what is right and wrong." 09:04 So it's all-- we saw this-- 09:06 I'm not making any connection between 09:08 the West or United States in particular and communism, 09:11 but under the communist system 09:13 where there was ongoing surveillance, and I went to, 09:16 I remember in Bulgaria in particular, seeing, 09:19 they were actually uniform, 09:20 but they were called security services. 09:22 They were going on with little black briefcases 09:26 into every home, every business, 09:28 checking every document, updating the records. 09:32 You know, they had that, where you had that, 09:35 they were collecting innocuous information 09:37 but if suddenly the authorities thought that 09:39 person is up to no good, 09:41 almost everything they were doing 09:42 then fits within their matrix of suspicion, 09:46 like taking Patriot Act. 09:49 The Initial Patriot Act 09:50 means they can survey what you take out of a library. 09:53 Well, if they think you are a terrorist, 09:55 they look in the library that you took out 09:56 as many people did after 9/11, 09:59 took out a book on Islam, 10:00 they got a developing interest in radical Islam. 10:03 So the bad construction is put on. 10:06 Freedom is not served by this, nor is security ironically. 10:10 There is an improper assumption, a false assumption 10:17 that we have to trade freedom for security. 10:21 We need to debunk that myth. 10:24 If we don't have freedom then 10:27 what difference does it make about security? 10:30 Security for what? To be conformist, 10:34 you know, clones doing our part in the global economy, 10:38 good little consumers who keep their mouth shut, 10:41 who consume mindless entertainment 10:44 and don't have a thought or a life, 10:46 thought worth thinking or life worth living. 10:49 You know, as soon as you have a thought 10:53 that descends from the global order, 10:56 you are under suspicion. 10:58 It is George Orwell come home to roost. 11:01 Yeah, I think at some point 11:02 I'm gonna have a program on George Orwell. 11:05 Read 1984, read it often, 11:07 read Huxley, read Brave New World. 11:09 We are in a brave new world. 11:11 By the way, I discovered something. 11:13 It's logical, but I never heard of it before, 11:15 but in a number of countries, 11:16 I think Iran in particular, they have banned Animal Farm. 11:22 -But you know why? -Why? 11:23 Because the main characters of pigs. 11:28 Totally missing the real message there. 11:30 Yes, of course. 11:31 Although I don't really remember the pigs 11:32 as being heroic figures of any degree. 11:35 So they're condemned. 11:37 But that's probably the one that the average person 11:40 would be as well off to read Animal Farm 11:42 is often given to the children, 11:43 but it's telling a very much a morality tale 11:49 to warn people of totalitarianism 11:50 and how it comes often under the guise of-- 11:54 well, it says all animals are equal 11:57 but at the end, some animals more equal. 12:00 So some freedoms-- all freedoms are important, 12:03 but perhaps, in the interest of security 12:07 we shuffle that a little bit. 12:08 So I think, you know, in the substance of this 12:11 what Americans are just beginning to realize 12:15 is that the government is gathering 12:17 all of the data on who you are calling, 12:21 what you are saying, all of your emails are being stored up. 12:26 If anybody wants to look at your life, 12:29 they can read your emails, 12:31 they can review your phone records, 12:33 who you've associated with, your comings and goings, 12:37 your shopping history if you don't pay cash, 12:40 anything that you do with credit, 12:43 it's all an open book. 12:45 And again, it doesn't have to be 12:47 anything wrong with what you're doing, 12:49 but that's an intrusion, 12:50 that's a violation of the compact of a free society, 12:55 as long as they have been free societies, right. 12:57 Well, the whole point is to squelch dissent. 13:01 I don't know if it's the point, 13:03 but that becomes the necessary end. 13:06 Look, there's some very good analysis done. 13:12 You know, we've had two, sort of, protest movements 13:15 since the economy took a hit, back in 2008. 13:18 On the conservative side you had the Tea Party movement, 13:21 on the liberal side you had the Occupy Wall Street movement. 13:25 The Occupy Wall Street movement was completely shut down 13:29 by the political establishment 13:32 and that's been very well documented. 13:34 It was closed down at one point, 13:37 and it was closed down by the federal government. 13:40 There was an FBI conference call with literally 13:44 something like 45 city mayors to coordinate 13:50 the shutdown of the Occupy movement. 13:53 Now the point is not whether you agree or disagree with, 13:56 you know, any message that was coming out, 13:59 the point is that we live in a society 14:02 where dissent is supposed to be permitted, 14:05 we're supposed to protect free speech, 14:07 where the government is not supposed 14:09 to be acting to stifle dissent. 14:12 And I've mentioned in this program before 14:14 because it gagged me, 14:16 I just gagged when I heard of this. 14:19 About 10 years ago now, 14:22 it's a great tradition in the United States of free speech 14:25 that when any public official comes along 14:28 you could demonstrate, stick a placard up 14:31 or even if you are so inclined, call it out. 14:34 Different people find it offensive 14:35 and I might find it offensive 14:37 if I was the President coming by, 14:38 but it's a free society. 14:40 But starting about 10 years ago 14:44 free speech zones were established, 14:48 that were walled off areas 14:49 and they were sometimes miles from the location. 14:51 We'll be back after a break to discuss this serious topic 14:56 and then get onto some 14:57 implications for religious freedom. |
Revised 2014-12-17