Welcome back to
the Liberty Insider,
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before the break, Carmela,
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you've given a
wonderful vision statement
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from the point of
view of your magazine,
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but you know we're
not there yet, are we?
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We've got a big
challenge ahead of us,
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it's a big world and so much of
religious liberty and message,
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you know, it
has to by definition
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deal with close at
hand, but I'm impressed
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when I look at Message Magazine,
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how broader its scope is that
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when it was first
envisaged, wasn't it?
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Well, I believe...
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It dealt with I
think a particular need
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and a very
particular target audience
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but there's a
lot in message now.
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I...
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In fact, I should
give you a medal on this,
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so you might wear it as a medal,
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but I think in many ways Message
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has got more
utilitarian general coverage
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sometimes than
the signs or magazine
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that our church has
printed to reach out
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to the general
public for a long time.
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Wow! You're blowing me away.
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Well, it's real world stuff.
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Praise God,
because that is something
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that we want to make sure
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that we're dealing
with the real world.
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And for us, for many people
I think they take for granted,
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especially, in
people who grew up
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as a Seventh-day
Adventists as I did,
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things such as
health and vegetarianism,
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they take it for
granted, but as I'm looking now
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and I'm seeing
people incorporate a vegan
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or completely
plant-based lifestyle.
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And I've seen people do this,
these have real world effects,
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especially when
people, so many people
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do not have
access to health care,
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so many people
could not pay for,
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many people who are struggling
with others but, you know,
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you get the very
prevalent health conditions
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such as diabetes and obesity,
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these are the things
that can be addressed.
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The social
problems just compound,
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yeah, we think it.
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They can be addressed just
by what you're having to eat
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and your mind could be
clear and your children could
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do better in school,
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and you can have a
better night sleep,
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and so these are the things.
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Well, I've said it
before on this program...
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Yes.
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And, you know, the
Seventh-day Adventist church
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from many years in the
minds of a lot of people
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that know nothing
else about the church
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is that it's got
a health message.
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Right.
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And many Adventists I think
have forgotten why we had it,
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it wasn't to live longer,
it was for a spiritual reason.
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And Ellen White made the comment
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that to me is mind-blowing.
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She said that "The only way
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that heaven has of contacting us
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is through the nerve endings."
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There you go.
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And so that's an immediately
practical reason to be
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of healthy mind
and therefore body,
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I mean, body and therefore mind.
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Your spiritual
connections are at their peak.
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Right, and that goes
back to what we were talking
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about before, the
ability to read something
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and to make the
critical thoughts
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and analysis
behind what's going on,
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and to be able to meditate
on something and to think...
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That's what we're trying to do
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is make sure we
put this stuff out
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for one of these reasons.
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Let me put the real
hard question to you.
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Go ahead.
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You're an editor and
you've read different studies
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and all of the
surveys show that the average
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readability level of people
has dropped precipitously,
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some grade school
level at the moment.
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When you're dealing with
complex and important topics,
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how do we
communicate that to people
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whose
comprehension is dropping below
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or through certain threshold?
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Oh, I love that.
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You know, what I do is easy...
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easy way, but you
know, and that's the beauty
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of the technology at
the same time is that
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we can make sure that
we are not accommodating
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but we're making sure that
we are accessible to everyone
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whose strength is not reading
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and whose
attention span is short.
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You know, God didn't call us
to be impressive intellectually,
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He called us to reach people,
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and so that's
the way I look at it.
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Thank you.
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Well, you're actually
ahead of my next comment,
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but I'll still make it anyway,
what worries me sometimes
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an idea that's
not directly stated
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but implied to
understand salvation requires
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certain intellectual
ability and application.
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And if that's so,
a lot of this world
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is going to miss out.
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At root it has to
be a very simple idea,
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but I like to think with editing
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and promulgating materials,
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a very simple idea
still can require a systematic
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and never ending explanation
in its larger ramifications.
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Right.
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But the central idea
has to be very simple
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and easily
understood by almost anyone
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as long as it's
correctly and clearly stated.
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Yeah, and that's part
of our ongoing mission
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to make sure that we are more
and more accessible to people
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whose strength is not
reading and whose strength
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is not attention in long form.
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You know, reception
of that kind of thing
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so it's important...
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So back to what I
stated in the earlier program.
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You probably have ideas
on it too but, you know,
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even I belong to
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the Seventh-day
Adventist Church,
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I'm a fourth generation,
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so whole lot of
nuance then my close circle.
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I've lived most
of my life in the US,
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I came from Australia but
I know the US pretty well.
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And it seems to me
that both our church,
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by definition
many other churches
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and the country at large
is suffering from a rapid
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and recent decline in
people's comprehension
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of the basics that
make up both the church
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and democratic state.
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And I don't see how
either can really survive long
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with gross ignorance.
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No, and they cannot.
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The US once survived...
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Just even the Supreme Court
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continue to do
a pretty good job,
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they've made a few bloopers,
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but they give long and
considered legal evaluation
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but so what if the
people have forgotten,
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we are not to be paralleled
with Rome all the time,
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but it seems to me
that people of Rome
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got mixed up in
their entertainments.
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And the Senate became riven
with strife and self interests,
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and pretty soon they
had emperors, and dictators,
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and madmen ruling them.
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And the church the
same, pretty soon you can have
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mad prophets leading you,
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or worst
bureaucratic functionaries.
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Right, and all because
either we didn't maintain
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that knowledge or we
just didn't dig hard enough
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to know what
those principles were.
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Well, you remind me of
a situation I had once,
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I was teaching a law
class, a law criminal procedure
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kind of class once, and I
had in my class of people...
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It was not a law school
class but in college level
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and I had one of the
campus security people
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that were there,
and we're talking about
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when is it
right to stop someone,
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when is it right to confront
someone with deadly force.
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And I remember one of
the test papers came back
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from the security guard
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that it is okay to
shoot a shoplifter.
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You know, it's
okay to shoot, you know,
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and I mean
somebody that you think
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of doing it is okay to do it.
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And I think at a basic
level there used to be a time
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when everybody had a sense
of what our freedoms required
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and what they
gave and you had a,
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you knew who you were
and what you could say,
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these are my rights,
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and this is that you
can't go beyond this.
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But when we let go of those,
there is just grose ignorance
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and grose
miscarriages of justice.
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You know, it works
on many, many levels
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and you're getting
really putting up one.
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Yeah.
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I mean the police are guilty
of that even without malice,
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they're losing a proportion,
now they're on apprehending.
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Well, that's
just an example, yes.
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But where I heard
something that may be about
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blood running cold
and it's gotten worse
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during the election of 2000.
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I heard over and over again,
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if the majority
wants something it goes.
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Right.
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When the whole
basis of religious liberty
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is protecting the
minority against the majority
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and we are not a
majoritarian system.
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In fact in the narrowest
sense, the United States
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is not a democracy,
it's a democratic system,
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it's a representative republic.
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Republic means that the
path derives from the people,
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but the structure
is representative.
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People choose
someone to represent them
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in the governing
system, but, you know,
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if the 300 million
people want something
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and if it's
against the principles
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that the constitution and
the country is founded on,
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it's still not going to happen.
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Right, right.
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And I think that...
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People have lost sight of that.
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And to me that's
the straight and narrow.
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Well, not narrow the straight
and wide road to despotism.
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Oh, absolutely, and I think
that's the beauty on which we,
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this country was
founded, call it what you like,
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there was a carve out,
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there was a
carve out for people,
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the religious minorities,
the people who were strangers
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on the shores,
there's a carve out
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so that there was not
the tyranny of the majority.
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There was an
ability to make sure
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that you don't
just get out voted
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or marginalized or pushed aside,
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you know, very well everyone.
00:09:38.41\00:09:39.74
I know, very well said.
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And you know I try to say
too that religious liberty
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does not mean that
I like your religion
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or your moral viewpoint,
but I should be willing
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to defend your right
to hold that to the death.
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Absolutely.
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If you hold that,
religious liberty is safe.
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Absolutely, and I think
that's one of those things
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where we all have to
learn how to blend what it is,
00:09:57.16\00:10:02.90
my interest,
against your interest,
00:10:02.93\00:10:05.70
how do we continue to
live and strive together
00:10:05.73\00:10:08.67
without me
overcoming or overpowering you
00:10:08.70\00:10:12.11
and not being or
succumbing to your views.
00:10:12.14\00:10:16.75
And today unfortunately,
this is something that person
00:10:16.78\00:10:19.71
with the biggest mouth
or the best social media
00:10:19.75\00:10:22.95
gets to rule the day.
00:10:22.98\00:10:24.52
That's not the way
it's supposed to be.
00:10:24.55\00:10:25.95
Giving a message,
years ago when my father died
00:10:29.62\00:10:33.36
and while he was
suffering in hospital,
00:10:33.40\00:10:36.67
he said that he had a dream
and in the middle of the night
00:10:36.70\00:10:39.57
he got up, got out of his bed
00:10:39.60\00:10:41.04
and went to a
nearby Indian church
00:10:41.07\00:10:43.71
and he said to
them, "I'm gravely ill,
00:10:43.74\00:10:46.31
I cannot stay but I have
a message to give to you."
00:10:46.34\00:10:49.31
He says, "It's four
words, trust in the Lord."
00:10:49.34\00:10:54.88
Message Magazine I
think is as succinct as that.
00:10:54.92\00:10:58.22
It began with a
message of trust and compassion
00:10:58.25\00:11:02.52
for a certain subgroup
of the American experience
00:11:02.56\00:11:06.70
and it still
caters to minorities,
00:11:06.73\00:11:09.26
but I think its
message as the general messages
00:11:09.30\00:11:12.43
of salvation is
broadened to accomplish
00:11:12.47\00:11:16.00
or to encompass a great
many of the daily challenges
00:11:16.04\00:11:20.81
that we all face,
and that challenge,
00:11:20.84\00:11:23.51
that particular
challenge must include
00:11:23.55\00:11:26.05
a challenge of
religious liberty.
00:11:26.08\00:11:29.82
For Liberty Insider,
this is Lincoln Steed.
00:11:29.85\00:11:33.05