“I told him I couldn’t be prouder. You know, one of the extraordinary measures of progress that we’ve seen in this country has been the recognition that the LGBT community deserves full equality, not just partial equality, not just tolerance but a recognition that they’re wholly a part of the American family,” the president told reporters at the White House Tuesday.

“Given the importance of sports in our society for an individual who’s excelled at the highest levels in one of the major sports to go ahead and say, ‘This is who I am. I’m proud of it. I’m still a great competitor. I’m still seven-foot tall and can bang with Shaq. And, you know, deliver a hard foul.

“I think a lot of young people out there who are gay or lesbian who are struggling with these issues to see a role model like that, who’s unafraid, I think it’s a great thing. And I think America should be proud that this is just one more step in this ongoing recognition that we treat everybody fairly. And everybody’s part of a family. And we judge people on the basis of their character and their performance, and not their sexual orientation. So I’m very proud of him.”

via “I couldn’t be prouder” of Jason Collins, Obama says – CBS News.

There is no libertarian contract in a pluralistic society in this President’s mind. Reading the president’s words on homosexuality makes me understand now why he is so willing to jail marijuana users and ignore state laws to the contrary. Barack Obama clearly has no capacity to imagine something wrong, harmful. or immoral being legal. If it is legal, it must be good and must be promoted and accepted by everyone. If it is not good and should not be promoted and accepted by everyone, then it deserves SWAT raids and prison time.

There is no tolerance of other people making good or bad choices that are theirs to make and suffer or benefit from. There is only one American “family” and we all have to obey one daddy–so he can say that he is proud of us.

awnurmarc » Reading Romans, Part 01.

CP: There are some libertarian atheists who follow the philosophy of Ayn Rand. From your chapter on the political views of atheists, I take it you didn’t find many of them.

Yancey: We didn’t ask specifically about that, so I can’t say for sure we didn’t interview any libertarian atheists, but nearly all the atheists we interviewed, when we talked about politics it wasn’t merely on the cultural issues, they were progressive when it came to issues of the environment, government, taxes, that sort of stuff.

I have no doubt that those libertarian atheists are out there, maybe our sample design didn’t allow us to capture them. Maybe they aren’t connected to the organizations I was working with.

My suspicion is, because atheism is a reaction to the Christian Right, they’re going to be smaller in numbers. There are times in history when Christianity was quite progressive when it came to economic issues – the whole notion of social justice and things of this nature. It seems to me that you would have more libertarian atheists at times like that.

via Modern American Atheism Is Reaction to Christian Right, Sociologists Argue.

If there was a problem in sample selection, then the above observations are meaningless. (“Maybe they aren’t connected to the organizations I was working with.” Though, if libertarians are not represented in prominent atheist organizations, that might be significant.)

But if the sample was valid, then this confirms my suspicion that Christian conservatives and libertarians are the main audience and support for Libertarian Atheists.

This has a further implication. It means that Christian attacks on Ayn Rand are not very useful. Other than weak-minded souls who can be intimidated from their opinion by guilt-by-association claims, such critiques aren’t going to affect many Christians. Rather, if one wants to counter libertarianism or free-marked views among Christians one needs to learn how their understanding of Christ’s lordship leads them to their political convictions and directly refute those arguments.

Ortlund made several points but only #2 and #3 are obvious Biblical argument to the point of contention. However, in mentioning the Reformed tradition in #1, he also implicitly argues from Genesis 17, so I’ll deal with that as well.

1) First of all, it may be worth noting that the idea that an Israelite’s parents had to believe in order for that Israelite to be eligible for circumcision is not the historic reformed view. Calvin, for example, in his commentary on Genesis 17, was emphatic that while the outward rite signified in the inward reality, it was not conditional on how the inward reality had been received: the sign of circumcision was for all the offspring of Abraham, irrespective of inward appropriation. The reason Calvin maintained this view is because he was a good exegete of Genesis 17:9-15, which specifies the intended recipients of circumcision to be the seed of Abraham, not the seed of Abraham whose parents also believe. It was an intergenerational and national covenant, and its initiatory sign was for all males throughout the nation and throughout its generations.

I didn’t have Calvin in mind when I responded in the interview. But I did remember (but forgot to mention) that Richard Hooker took Theodore Beza to task for claiming that the child of non-christian parents should be baptized regardless, because of his Christian grandparents. I think he actually said it was because the covenant was “to a thousand generations.” I don’t think I ever confirmed Hooker’s claims that Beza actually taught such a thing, but if he did teach such a thing, then I sided entirely with Hooker. Such a child is not qualified to be baptized.

On the other hand, when a Christian orphanage has guardianship of children who were born to pagans, then of course they should be baptized. The American Presbyterian General Assembly in 1843 answered correctly that children who were not yet old enough to be unbelievers should be baptized. This is exactly right and consonant with the Great Commission. Here is the text from Charles Hodge.

BAPTISM OF ORPHANS

A memorial was presented from the Presbytery of Lodiana, respecting the baptism of the orphan children of heathen parents, to which the Assembly returned the following answer:

Dear Brethren–You have submitted to us questions respecting a subject, which, we have no doubt, is one of very great importance, in regard to the progress of religion among the heathen. We have seriously considered it, and give you here the result of our deliberations.

You present to us three questions, to which we reply, in the order in which the same are presented.

1. “Are all orphan children of heathen parents committed to the care of our mission, entitled to the benefit of the ordinance of baptism, without respect to their ages?”

We reply–certainly they are not. You must make the same distinction that you would make, if their parents were alive and members of the Christian church and desiring to have them baptized–the same distinction which is made in Christian countries. We add–let those children only be baptized, in every case, who are so committed to the mission, or other Christian tuition, as to secure effectually their entire religious education. On this point, great caution is necessary.

2. You ask, (on the presumption that the preceding question is answered in the negative,) “Are those only to be baptized who have not attained to years of discretion.”

This question we answer in the affirmative.

3. Your third question is, in substance, as follows–”If those only who have not attained to years of discretion are to be baptized, at what age shall the federal right be supposed to cease, and personal responsibility to commence?”

Although it is not difficult to answer this question in accordance with the standards and the practice of the Presbyterian Church, yet the rule may frequently be found difficult of application.

Our answer to the question, however, is;–the officers of the Church must judge in each particular case, whether the proposed subject of baptism has arrived at years of discretion or not. We can adopt no other rule in our own practice, and we can recommend no other to you. We refer you to chap. ix. sec. 2, of our Directory for Worship.

If the person proposed to be baptized has acquired that maturity of mind, which renders him capable of making an intelligent profession of religion himself, he ought not to be baptized on the faith of another. Our Confession of Faith recognises the right to baptism of the infant children only of such parents as are members of the church. We do not doubt that in heathen countries, children of heathen parents ordinarily arrive at, what are called years of discretion, later than those who enjoy the advantages of Christian instruction in early life; but in a country where the religion of all consists in forms and ceremonies, great care should be taken that the Christian religion does not even appear to partake of the formality and emptiness of Mohammedanism and Paganism.

So what about Genesis 17? It was a national and inter-generational covenant, but it was only for believers. As we see in the very next chapter, this nation was to be discipled from generation to generation.

17 The Lord said, “Shall I hide from Abraham what I am about to do, 18 seeing that Abraham shall surely become a great and mighty nation, and all the nations of the earth shall be blessed in him? 19 For I have chosen him, that he may command his children and his household after him to keep the way of the Lord by doing righteousness and justice, so that the Lord may bring to Abraham what he has promised him.”

The descendents of Abraham had a covenant that demanded discipleship. This is no different than the great commission. Nothing in Genesis 17 contradicts such a position.

On to Ortlund’s next Scriptural argument.

2) The attempt to make the Abrahamic covenant conditional upon each individual family professing faith does not line up with what we read throughout the Old Testament. Are we to envision, for example, all the moms and/or dads in Israel being lined up at Gilgal in Joshua 5:2-8 to be examined by Joshua concerning the credibility of their profession of faith, in order to determine whether their children were eligible for circumcision? No, the entire nation was circumcised, according to Joshua 5:8, because — as specified by Genesis 17 — circumcision was for the entire nation, not just for believers and their children within the nation. In fact, so much did the sacrament continue apart from inward appropriation of its meaning that at her worse moments, God could lament that the entire nation had not appropriated the sacrament inwardly (Jeremiah 9:26)! If Drew were right, and Israel operated as paedobaptist churches operate, then I suppose in Jeremiah’s day just about the entire nation would have to be excommunicated!

Whatever examination for a credible profession of faith means to Ortlund, it is too complex to have taken place at Gilgal. In that case, the most obvious retort is that such an examination for a credible profession of faith is about as unimaginable as claiming that such an examination for credible profession of faith took place on the day of Pentecost, or any of the other times that the apostles preached to thousands and then baptized those who responded. Confessing that Jesus is Lord on the basis of the belief in the message of the Gospel that Jesus raised him from the dead was the credible profession of faith (and is exactly what Paul states in Romans 10).

Furthermore, one can look at the moral requirements for church leadership in First Timothy 3 and Titus 1 and deduce that Paul expected quite a bit of moral and sanctification-level diversity within the congregation. Like Moses in Exodus 19, the involved examinations are reserved for officers. But that does not mean that Israelites were permitted to be unbelievers or that unbelievers were permitted to continue in the covenant transferring it to their children.

Ortlund says that Israel ought to have stopped circumcizing in Jeremiah’s day, but that is like saying that a liberal Church that no longer preaches the true God or the Bible should stop baptizing them. Obviously, if a church goes liberal and keeps baptizing they probably won’t listen to your biblical arguments to stop. Jeremiah had no governing authority to stop the Israelites from circumcising, so they kept doing it. And since God wanted the nation as a whole to repent and return to the covenant, Jeremiah reminded them to respond to the call to circumcise. A paedobaptist preacher would do exactly the same in a liberal church, he would state that the people are in violation of their covenant vows made in baptism and should repent, trust in the Lord, and believe the Gospel. But that sermon would not obligate him to support the baptism of “Christian grandchildren” being raised by unbelieving parents.

Interestingly, however, the entire reason Israel underwent mass circumcision at Gilgal was because Israel had committed high-handed sin against the Lord. This was the one time in Israel that Godly government remained in control during a general apostasy. According to Ortlund, the covenant sign is purely with the nation. So whey then was circumcision discontinued for a generation? Instead, exactly as Ortlund suggests should have happened in Jeremiah’s day, an entire generation was “excommunicated” after a fashion.

3) There is no hint in the Old Testament that Israelites were excommunicated from the covenant, either by death or expulsion, simply because they had failed to profess faith in God. Rather, according to the texts Drew cites, excommunication occurred as a response to high-handed acts of rebellion like witchcraft and idolatry (Deuteronomy 17:5 speaks of the kind of idolatry in view here as an “abomination”). Drew seems to acknowledge this when he speaks of excommunication as occurring in cases of “outright rebellion or apostasy” and among “those who overtly and unrepentantly rejected God.” This is a far cry from contemporary paedobaptist practice! In other words, the mere fact of excommunication in the Old Testament does not establish anything until we ask some careful questions about the conditions of excommunication, and how they compare to the practice of contemporary paedobaptist churches. “Stone the sorcerer among you” is not equal to “examine the credibility of their profession.” In other words, the threat of excommunication for specific offenses, introduced in the Law, did not redefine the Abrahamic covenant to make it tantamount to “those who believe and their children.” Rather, God’s people remained a fundamentally national and inter-generational body, as dictated by Genesis 17:9-15; and this was the entity from which one was excommunicated, or into which one was grafted.

Here, Ortlund tries to make a distinction between lacking a credible profession of faith and active rebellion against the Lord. That is simply not Biblical. The Bible never uses the terms “examine the credibility of their profession,” so Ortlund has no basis for claiming that these words must be used.

Instead, why don’t we ask what instructions we get from Paul about excommunication. And the most obvious text is 1 Corinthians 5. And, lo and behold!, right there Paul appeals to the Deuteronomy passages:

Deuteronomy 13: But that prophet or that dreamer of dreams shall be put to death, because he has taught rebellion against the Lord your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt and redeemed you out of the house of slavery, to make you leave the way in which the Lord your God commanded you to walk. So you shall purge the evil from your midst.

Deuteronomy 17: The hand of the witnesses shall be first against him to put him to death, and afterward the hand of all the people. So you shall purge the evil from your midst.

So, according to Ortlund, these passages–which I think are self-evidently similar to the ones Ortlund quotes–cannot be used for excommunication. Paul says they can and should be. In the meantime, we once again see wide moral diversity in the Corinthian church, including immorality and even false teaching. And yet Paul writes to the Corinthians as

those sanctified in Christ Jesus, called to be saints together with all those who in every place call upon the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, both their Lord and ours.

Further, as we see in First Corinthians 12, he assures them that their baptismal covenant counts:

For just as the body is one and has many members, and all the members of the body, though many, are one body, so it is with Christ. For in one Spirit we were all baptized into one body—Jews or Greeks, slaves or free—and all were made to drink of one Spirit… For the body does not consist of one member but of many…. Now you are the body of Christ and individually members of it.

So, again, where is the Greek Scriptural practice that is at odds with the covenant of circumcision and excommunication we see in the Hebrew Scriptures?

As far as I can tell, Ortlund is taking for granted an overly rigorous interpretation of “credible profession of faith” and then assuming the Greek Scriptures support such a practice and the Hebrew Scriptures don’t. I think the Hebrew Scriptures do require a profession of faith, but one no different than what is required in the Greek Scriptures for the Christian Church.

This is a great post from 2009 by Mike Hyatt. I think we not only get distracted by what we cannot control, but sometimes we want to be distracted by what we can’t control so we don’t have to face our responsibilities.

Proverbs addresses this often.

Whoever is slow to anger is better than the mighty,
and he who rules his spirit than he who takes a city (Proverbs 16.32).

A man without self-control
is like a city broken into and left without walls (Proverbs 25.28).

Even if you somehow succeed in “changing the world” while leaving yourself enslaved to your passions or vices or fears, the Bible will tell you that you made a bad trade. The world you are supposed to change is your self. Focusing on a huge goal can be an excuse to go AWOL.

The definition of a very vague legal term is at the center of oral arguments being heard today in a federal appeals court in Cincinnati, Ohio. That term is “particular social group.”

In US law, that is one of five named groups of people eligible for asylum — and the most ill-defined. The other categories are race, religion, nationality, and political opinions. If someone can demonstrate they are being persecuted or that they fear being persecuted on those grounds, they can be granted refugee status in America. People also have the right to asylum if they’re being persecuted because they belong to a “particular social group,” but what that means, who that applies to, is a matter of a legal dispute. In the case in court today, the question is whether or not homeschoolers count as a “particular social group” and should be granted asylum if they come to the US from a country where homeschooling isn’t legal, such as Germany.

The political agitation coming out of this court case bears only the slightest relation to the legal issue, though.

The activists who care about this case, Romeike vs. Holder, don’t appear to be at all interested in the legal issue at the heart of the case. They are, though, very interested in the way public perception of the case allows them to agitate against the Obama administration and for homeschooling.

The Romeike family has become a cause célèbre on the American right.

via Daniel Silliman: Hitler wins: the disjunction of law & politics in Romeike v. Holder.

The post by Silliman is longer, and I invite you to read it all. If the facts he mentioned are correct, I suspect the Romeike’s as more or less a toxic family. People who don’t belong to any church and simply read the Bible are far from any Biblical ideal. But the children will grow up, leave home, and have their own families. The German nation state (like every other nation state) never lets anyone grow up.

It is a fundamental societal fact that parents raise their children. They did it before Germany existed. European parents did it in North America before the United States existed. And parents will still raise their children after the glorious day(s?) when those nation states come to an end.

Nation states in the West face a problem. In order to foster the delusion that they are “from” and “for” the people, they have to make people believe they have a choice. They do this by controlling options. “Because we are an ‘open society’ we allow refugees to live here,” says the State. Buried from polite conversation (including the odious sloganeering about Obama and “illegal aliens”) is the insane tyranny that no one is any longer permitted to travel freely in the world. Inertia, nostalgia, resources, relationships, and expense encourage all people to stay where they originate. But for millennia people have moved and traveled elsewhere when it was expedient to do so according to their own judgments of their own situations and prospects.

We can all be thankful Abraham didn’t get raided by Canaan’s INS and deported back to Ur. Or that Joseph, Mary, and infant Jesus didn’t get stopped at Egypt’s border check point. Perhaps Joseph spent a year applying for Egypt’s refugee status, and the Gospel narrative just omits that adventure in anti-social bureaucracy.

So now that nation states have thrown up borders around the globe and made the fundamental natural fact that parents raise their own children a matter of permission rather than right, they offer a few avenues to us, the prisoners, by which the warden might consider allowing us to do what we think is right. Basically, we are given a playbook that we are told, if we follow, we will get a just hearing.

Assuming everything written in the post about the legal case is correct, it would still be a crime for HSLDA to be content to only play be those rules. No one should allow themselves to be gamed in that way. Propaganda (a neutral term in my vocabulary) is an essential part of the fight (just as it is an essential tool in the State’s toolbox).

So I find this critique of the HSLDA campaign to be, more or less, a call for surrender and disarmament to a ravenous enemy. What I find most problematic is the following:

They certainly were religious, but the law they were accused of violating had no religious component to it, and didn’t qualify, legally, as amounting to religious persecution.

An entity claims the right to raise your children among a billion other life and death matters they also rule by divine right. It is an transparent evasion that we don’t call such entities “gods” anymore. That is obviously what they are. (Recall that both Jew and Gentile alike referred to their rulers as “gods” and Paul spoke of “gods” and “lords” together, not discriminating between mythical beings and humans claiming their authority.) How can such a dictate fail to be religious? The word, “religion” itself is a nation-state contrivance, not a societal reality apart from the service of political needs. The state thinks it’s a god and the Romeikes disagree. It is from first to last a religious issue.

I certainly tire of the Hitler comparisons, but I notice that the refutations reveal the real moral level of these debates. The nation-state is righteous as long as it can claim to not really be as bad as Hitler.

The common claim is to say that money is “government created.” Supposedly, this leads to the conclusion that the money must not be really worth anything. But that is not the only way the argument could work. Many people hear that money is created by the state and then see how well it works for buying things and conclude that the state must be pretty competent in creating currency (I’d say, “making money,” but that would be confusing).

Claiming that the state has created our money, gives the state too much credit. Even if a monetary crisis is in our future, the fact remains that “Federal Reserve Notes” have worked well for decades. Nor do “legal tender” laws have much to do with anything. People use money because they find it valuable to do so. “Legal tender” laws are a marginal hedge that barely does anything. The day there really is a monetary crisis, no legal tender laws in the world will be draconian enough to make people use the money. Those laws are not why money is valuable now.

Why is money valuable? Money is valuable because everyone else wants it. Because everyone else wants it, everyone knows they can trade people for stuff in exchange for that money. And because they know they can trade with it; they want it too. It is a deep circular custom that has nothing to do with state power or “authority” or trustworthiness.

Money arises from trade. It is true that in some areas trade only arises when governments prevent theft and enforce contracts. But there has, throughout world history, been plenty of trade between people in different jurisdictions or without civil jurisdictions (just as there have been and are plenty of governments that interfere in trade and destroy contractual agreements). When people trade items, the exchange requires a “double coincidence” of wants. I have to want what you have more than what I have. And you have to want what I have more than what you have. When we trade, we both are happier for it.

But how often is the guy with a surplus of shoes likely to want a chicken at just the time when I need a new pair of shoes and have a surplus of chickens? As barter continues, people start making intermediary trades. That means they trade for things that they don’t want but which they predict that other people are likely to want so that they can trade again for the things they really want. Where precious metals are available, societies have naturally developed in a way that leads everyone to expect to use them as the best intermediary good. Not only does everyone tend to be attracted to gold and wish they could own some, but it can be divided up with each part having a proportionate fraction of the value. That would not be the case if someone were trying to “make change” with a fish during an exchange. Also, metals last (again, unlike fish and many other goods).

Of course, gold and silver are still heavy and somewhat bulky. Eventually societies learn to store their precious metals in safe places and carry warehouse receipts. This is the first paper money. At this point, legal shenanigans come into play. The state can start claiming that an inability to redeem the gold coins is not theft or fraud, but merely an inability to pay a debt. A promise to redeem paper bills in precious metal can allow the banks and/or states to create more money. They only need to redeem the bills of the minority in the population who demand the metal. Most people, being accustomed to trading paper and not wanting the hassle of storage, will not bother and trust the state.  Eventually, the state can say that only foreigners may redeem currency for metal. And then they can, later, stop redeeming currency for metal at all.

In all of this, the state is not creating value. The state is not the reason for the value of the money. The value has been established long before through social tradition. The state is insinuating itself in the process. This will have consequences for the value of money, but the state is never the origin of it. The state may say calming words like, “backed by the full faith and credit of the United States.” But the reason people trust the words is because they already find the money trustworthy. They don’t trust the money because they trust the words.

To recap: money is a social tradition. It is simply what happens as a result of trade. It is a natural development of barter. The state takes this working social institution and damages it while taking credit for it. But the damage does not make the money worthless, and we shouldn’t give the state credit for the value of money. The fact that the state can conceivably damage money to the point of destroying its value, does not change the fact that fiat currency has value until that point.

Finally, we shouldn’t be surprised that money is as stable as it is despite state action. We all need each other. Exchange is how societies become more than the mere individuals within them. It should not surprise us that attempting to not use money or use a substitute usually does not end well. It is tantamount to trying to withdraw from the market network of social cooperation.

Cross-posted at The Kuyperian Commentary

1 Then what advantage has the Jew? Or what is the value of circumcision? 2 Much in every way. To begin with, the Jews were entrusted with the oracles of God.

A lot of people speculate here about what kind of advantage Paul is talking about, or what kind of value he sees in circumcision. Basically, most people read this passage as saying that the Jews had the opportunity to be saved, if they would believe those oracles or put their faith in God and not their own flesh, as circumcision called them to do.

It would be great if I thought that was Paul’s intention because then I could preach for all of you to do the same with your baptisms. Jews would stand here merely for members of the visible Church before Christ. We could all easily apply this to ourselves.

But it’s not so easy. Paul speaks of these oracles of God earlier and he speaks of circumcision later. Let’s look at what Paul singles out in those other passages and then see whether that helps us here.

When Paul later talks about circumcision as the covenant God made with Abraham, he singles out that it is a covenant that calls and promises Abraham that he will be the father of many nations.

Now, it would be helpful if I preached on all of Romans 4 to bring out how it all works together. I’m going to make do with 4.16-18 to substantiate my point, which is that Paul is not only concerned with the fact that Abraham believed, but he is concerned especially with the content of what Abraham believed. It isn’t just that Abraham believed God in general, or even for personal salvation. The point Paul emphasizes is that Abraham believed God for a worldwide people that encompassed many nations.

Read the rest: Trinity House » What Advantage the Jew?.

Posted by The Brooks on April 19, 2013. Anabaptist, Church(es), Reformed, Sacraments, Theology – No Comments

A couple of weeks ago, Mark Horne was kind enough to subject himself to our first video blog, an interview on the question of infant baptism. Horne is a brilliant author, and we highly commend his blog, which you can find here. He’s the author of a biography of JRR Tolkien, a commentary on Mark, and most important for our purposes, a primer on baptism.

Please enjoy! We hope this will be a helpful resource for those in the church who are looking to explore infant baptism or are looking to defend it. It’s a long video, but is definitely worth your time. We’ve included a comprehensive list of the questions we asked Mark below. For those of you who don’t have time to watch the whole interview, we’ve included a timestamp beside each question so you can skip ahead and listen to it. Please leave any feedback that you have in the comments section. Enjoy!

1. How did you arrive at becoming a paedobaptist? Were you always a convicted paedobaptist, or is this a position that you changed to? If so, how did it happen? (1:00)

2. Let’s assume that someone is listening who has never encountered any arguments for paedobaptism. Their only experience is with believer’s baptism. How would you go about explaining infant baptism to them? (4:00)

3. So, a couple of weeks ago I just became a dad. This has obviously made the whole paedobaptism question really pressing for my wife and I! What I was really intrigued by was your suggestion in “Why Baptize Babies?” that Christian parents are given very specific promises by God for their children. You list three:

Read the rest: Mark Horne Infant Baptism Video Interview – City of God.

David Koresh’s Revenge: Waco and 20 Years of State Terror

by Anthony Gregory

There is something about April. From Columbine to Virginia Tech, from Oklahoma City to Boston, mid-to-late April occasions some of the most infamous massacres on U.S. soil. At least, these are the ones we are told to focus on. The killers are called terrorists. Unless they wear uniforms, as they did on April 19, 1993, just outside Waco, Texas. That time, as we are urged to believe, the terrorists were the ones who died. In all these massacres, regardless of specifics, the government portrays itself as all that keeps chaos at bay.

The state claims to stand against terrorism, but killing people is its stock in trade. Slaughters come in various forms, almost all of which feed the health of the state. The state conducts much killing outright. The state officially poses against other killing, while nevertheless encouraging it through its own violence. Even the killing that the state has no hand in serves as a pretext for the state to grow.

In Boston this Monday, someone left bombs that murdered three people, including an eight-year-old boy, and injured 176 others. President Obama called the crime an “act of terrorism.” The establishment definition of “terrorism” was always flawed, in that it categorically absolved the government, but at least it specified the targeting of civilians for political goals. Yet these days, even before the motive is known, such as at Boston, or when the targets are not civilians, such as American soldiers abroad, the U.S. government calls any dramatic acts of violence of which it disapproves “terrorism.”

This February, they called ex-cop Chris Dorner a terrorist. Then the police surrounded him in a cabin to burn him alive, asking the media to cover its eyes like at Waco. Everyone who knew how the state operates had no reason to expect he would get due process. They were going to hunt him down and kill him no matter what. The media dropped the formality of calling him an “alleged” murderer. The LAPD tried and convicted and executed him all on the same day and no one batted an eye. Meanwhile, liberals say all talk of American tyranny is irresponsible and conservatives continue to worship law enforcement.

Today, violent resistance to the state is called terrorism. Many of the “terrorists” rounded up and imprisoned at Guantánamo Bay were at most guilty of defending their country against an invading army. Some of these people continue to languish in that dungeon, seeing their desperate hunger strike in protest of declining conditions go unanswered, except by an administration willing to cut off their water.

From February 28 to April 19, 1993, the Branch Davidians resisted. On the morning of February 28, about one hundred ATF agents, concealed in livestock trailers, descended upon their property. The agents had planned and trained for eight months, having practiced their histrionic assault on model buildings. There was no reason for all this other than publicity. The agents could have easily arrested Koresh, whom they had befriended. The agents had conducted an investigation of weapons violations and found nothing. Koresh had cooperated with them. 60 Minutes had recently focused on an ATF sexual harassment scandal, and the agency was accused of racial discrimination during a House subcommittee meeting. The bureau wanted to improve its public image. Officials reached out to the press to make sure reporters could witness their heroics on the last February morning of 1993.

Unlike the vast majority of the hundreds of daily domestic militarized raids in America, the ATF’s surprise raid “Operation Showtime” faced resistance. When the agents ran out of ammo, the Davidians ceased fire. There were casualties on both sides, although one anonymous agent told the Dallas Morning News that he suspected some agents had fallen from friendly fire. Once the raid became a clear disaster, the ATF forced the press away.

Read the rest: David Koresh’s Revenge: Waco and 20 Years of State Terror by Anthony Gregory.