This is probably not the best forum to expand on this subject, so I'll try to be brief, if that's possible, though I may not do the subject justice in doing so...

I believe God is like the Universe, and has existed concurrently with it, and is in fact dependent upon it. Binging infinite, like the Universe, I believe God has revealed Himself, either deliberately or accidentally, to mankind in infinite ways over time. (Please excuse the masculine reference. It is used out of habit due to my Catholic upbringing, and for lack of a better pronoun to to describe a being that has no gender, or otherwise describable form. I believe calling God "It" just isn't right either.) For the purpose of answering your question, and for the sake of brevity, I will concentrate on one aspect of God that best serves this task.

It says in the book of Genesis in the Old Testament of the Bible that man was created "in God's image." Now I believe that this is accurate, but rather than being an actual description of God, as is common in Judeo\Christian tradition, I believe it is a metaphor. To explain this, I must now turn to a brief description of the human body.

The human body is an incredible machine to be sure, and it would take a doctor of medicine to do the subject justice, but I do not need to go into that level of detail to explain my understanding of the subject at hand.

Suffice to say that the human body is a machine with an engine, the body, and a computer that runs it, the brain. Now modern medicine has taught us that the body itself can be kept alive absent the brain. However, I will submit that in such a state, the body has lost its purpose. It needs the brain to have purpose for existence, otherwise it is just a collection of tissue, meat on a platter so to speak.

Thus is my understanding of God. God gives the Universe purpose.

I hope this explains things to some degree, though I must admit that this subject deserves its own thread, and likely a different web site altogether.

Oh, of you think you can fix stupid, God speed. I've gone Galt but I'm not hiding. I'm here in plain sight LMAO as I watch people whine while they work and pay for their own destruction. I'm brimming with confidence. I have gone Galt but I still know how to "make money". I love my work and because I love it, I will very likely never do it again.

Yes, thank you for this exposition, and never give up. Sometimes ideas catch on virally practically overnight. Look at cellphone use. How did they catch on so fast? When things get bad enough, or good enough, people will make a change. Old ideas die hard. As I see it, we must inform and persuade that the use of force is not an acceptable means for resolving anything. The world is so rabidly conditioned for war as the only resort that people get drawn along, emotionally and opportunistically, to support aggression, torture, and hate. We are told whom we should hate, and like herds we follow. We rationalize why it's right to do wrong. We need to remember to check the premises, and if we have done wrong, to right them. Not by piling up more dead bodies but by thinking our way into realizing that there are no conflicts of interest among rational men. We need to act on that premise. Stop actions that create more enemies. Don't give up. Just don't support bad ideas. That's the area where we can shrug.

As a deist, could you please define what your deity is or does, what function it has in the running of the Universe? I sincerely would like to hear your thoughts on this. And how would you differentiate "faith" from well-founded belief, such as in scientific principles like gravity.

And your argument to them about that would go how exactly??

Sorry for the length, but you can probably tell from my name, this is close to what makes me tick...

Well, I have been active in the Greater Boston Tea Party for the last 3.5 years. It is a way to get people activated. It started off as protests, and evolved into a political education movement.

The ignorance of the US Constitution, US history and the ideals of liberty is rampant in our society. The biggest part of the fight is education, both on what government should/should not be, and we also educate people on getting INVOLVED. We have classes on the Constitution, lectures from organizations like American Majority and The Leadership Institute on political activism, and have speakers from local media, political groups and think tanks.

The biggest problem of "the right" is the lack of unity on the central core issue - our government is out of control in the power it has amassed and wields, and the national government is all-powerful. Government has to shrink incredibly, regulations slashed / eliminated, and power and money needs to stay as local as possible, i.e. not go to Washington.

There is no central Tea Party organization, although there are several large nationwide organizations - e.g. TeaParty.NET, Tea Party Patriots, Tea Party Express (the latter - mostly a PAC). MOST Tea Parties focus on fiscal / constitutional issues, and stay away from the social ones. We can't get Libertarian types and Social Conservatives to agree about abortion - but we can get both to agree to DEFUND Planned Parenthood!!

There are "socially conservative" Tea Parties out there. If you are thinking about joining a Tea Party, review their principles, mission statement and what activities and speakers they have. That will tell you a lot about the organization and allow you to see if it matches your interests. There is in-fighting, just like there is between various factions of the Republican Party.


Our (GBTP) mission statement:
We are a group of citizens who are concerned with the increasingly burdensome reach of government. Our mission is to educate and advocate for the restoration and defense of public policy that promotes limited government, free markets, free speech, individual liberty and personal responsibility, all tenets of the Constitution of the United States of America and the Bill of Rights.

We advocate citizen engagement through civil discourse, community involvement and online activities that promote peaceful and productive social change.


The Tea Party movement (again - not anything "more" than 100's or 1000's of individual organizations) will not become a party - third parties will loose in the current structure.

They typically are very amenable (if not exceptionally supportive) of Ayn Rand and her ideas and her works. The Greater Boston Tea Party has hosted Yaron Brook as a speaker several times, and we enthusiastically supported and participated when Andrew Bernstein was a speaker at a Worcester Tea Party event.

The lesson from recent decades: those who have some value to get from the government (the looters and moochers) have actively lobbied and become part of the government. Those who work for a living also have to participate and work to STOP the looting and mooching!

We encourage our members to become involved in campaigns, at the local, state and maybe even national level (e.g. US House & Senate). We encourage members to "Adopt a Candidate" - whether by donating time and/or money. And if there is not anyone you can get behind locally - find someone from neighboring towns & cities or states! WE freedom-loving and get-the-government-the-hell-out-of-my-life types have to be part of the process.

Many Tea Parties do not endorse candidates. Our assumption is that people are smart - we help to educate them on the issues and candidates, hold candidate forums and debates, and encourage our members to make an informed choice. There are many times when disagreements will occur on candidates, and people "hold out" for the "perfect candidate". Being from Massachusetts, "perfect candidates" are almost non-existent!! I was not a huge fan of Brown, but all I had to do was to replay Liz Warren's "You didn't build that" speech in my head, and I was motivated to work against her! In 2010 we doubled the number of Republicans in our State House seats. We survived 2012 by only loosing a few. When I say "we" - there are 30-40-50 Tea Parties in MA.

The Tea Party focuses on the need for political activism - it educates and stresses the need for people to become active. It took us decades to get us into this hole - it will not be fixed in 2-4-6 years. The Tea Party is a "gateway" to activism - it is not need an end in itself.

We need to inform, educate and activate!

P.S. is there hope, or is it best to give up and "Go Galt". I fight now. There are good people left. Also, our country had our "Nat Taggerts" (Founding Fathers) that left us a legacy and it seems a betrayal to let it die. What's the final straw?

I'm done a LOT of GOTV work in California with the Tea Party. Truth be told, in CA the TP is doing the vast majority (IMO, 90%+) of the GOTV work.

Country Club Repubs hate us, but we're doing all the work. You would not believe the dogfights in the Central Committees. The old line GOPs folks think you open a "Victory Center" for a few months, lose the election, close the Center, then do it again in 2 yrs.

Yeah, sure.

Absolutely! I feel it has no business in political discourse. You're correct about the change in momentum. It was palpable!

I think the Tea Party started as a wonderful thing. However, it got hijacked by the Religious Right, abetted by the media, to the point that now when I say I'm a Tea Party sympathizer, people also assume I'm a young-earther and anti-abortion.

Agreed. I'm a firm believer that any political party is best served leaving social issues alone. I could sense a change in momentum for the Republicans as soon as social issues reared their ugly head during the campaign. Social issues polarize, and turn off people who might otherwise be agreeable to the fiscal restraint message that the Tea Party otherwise espouses.

The TEA party is fine so long as they confine themselves to fiscal issues. It is too bad they didn’t have more influence in the last election. Perhaps they can organize into massive demonstrations in the coming years and stick to issues which will unite and change more minds.
O.A.

Great exchange... I have great difficulty with this. It is completely contrary to my nature to give up! I have come to the conclusion after witnessing much history, and studying much more, that it will take something quite devastating to change the minds of enough people to reverse the trend. It will be a monumental event of some kind, economic depression, riots, huge demonstrations, or unfortunately something more violent. Something monumental… Let us hope for a passive civil means. As long as the govt. continues to make it look like they can control things, print money and continue to pacify the ignorant with “bread and circuses” it will not change.
Regards,
O.A.

Unfortunately, our founding fathers are rolling in their graves over the absolute bastardization of our Constitution. The general populace has no clue what it means, only that they hope to wring from it everything they can get away with. The fundamental ideas behind the Tea Party movement intrigue me, just leave out the religious aspect of it. Separation of church and state, and all that......

Well... yeah.

So, we've been working to re-educate the looters / convince them of their error in thinking for, what, going on sixty years now?

Have we made any progress in that regard?

At what point do we realize that we've lost that battle, and move on?

I for one believe that we passed that point some sixteen years ago.

Not any more. China has been selling their T-bills...

I would say that I am very involved in the Tea Party groups in my area and can report that they are an educational type of grass roots movement. The goal of the Tea Party is to keep government small and simple and to re-learn what the Constitution is all about. The idea is that once people understand what they should have already known, they will be able to vote properly. The reason progressives are so scared of the Tea Party is because they require stupidity to function, and the Tea Party is all about education. And they love Ayn Rand even with the hang up on religion.

It seems you have no confidence that anyone can educate those who are in error? Have you no confidence in your ability to convince someone the error of his\her ways?

So is your answer to do as they did in the AS book, to drop out, hide away, and let the ones who are in error destroy all around them until they die off from starvation and\or brutality? Aren't you thus having "faith" that their struggle and demise will nevertheless leave a habitable planet on which to begin over again?

I believe this was the major error\paradox of the Atlas Shrugged book. Of course AR wrote it before the advent of MAD, and the rise of militant Islam.

Inasmuch as I am a deist, then yes, in AS jargon, I am a mystic. However, I do not believe that God directly intervenes in our daily lives. I "do" believe in my power over my own life, and do have confidence in my ability to reach other people, though must admit I am not always successful.

The U.S.A. has nothing left to give. The money that psys for the goodies is borrowed from China.

You have "faith" in mankind? Yep, you are a mystic. If you think you can do something to re-educate idiots or raise the now dead U.S.A. from the grave, then as a Tea Party member may say; “God speed, OH, God speed.”

In my view the Tea Party, which as I understand it is divided into two separate organizations having informal chapters and separate websites, is never likely to become a party, but is a valuable movement of mostly mature adults who deplore what is happening to our country under the Democrats. They will continue to influence election outcomes toward fiscal conservatism, but not much else. In that aspect we should cherish them.

Agreed, unless we can convince them that it is in "their own personal best interest" not to.

Seems a bit fatalistic.

Don't get me wrong, if there were a hidden valley with a shield powered by an engine that runs on thin air to render it invisible, where I could disappear too, at this point, after the last election, I might just go there.

However, I believe that this country wasn't always as it is today, and that a great deal of effort and money has been spent over generations by the left in this country to bring it to its current state. Its likely to take as long, or longer, to straighten it back out, if that's possible.

I guess it depends on what faith you put in the intelligence of mankind, and whether or not you believe it is possible to re-educate those who have been brain washed, or those who have simply been too lazy to date to realize that you can't redistribute wealth by the force of arms, and expect those who create it to keep on creating it.

Too many people in this country believe that their government 'creates' wealth simply by re-distributing it. We who believe otherwise need to be vocal and convincing in correcting this error in understanding.

The Atlas Shrugged movies are a step int he right direction. However, as I stated, it took generations to get where we are today, and likely will take longer to get us back to rights. Since I don't think there is anyplace to go on this planet to hide from the looters, I believe our only choice is to re-educate them: convince them or their error in thinking.

Sadly, the Takers will keep voting in politicians who will continue “giving” to them until there is nothing left to give.

Thanks. I'm a Republican, but my membership has lapsed, the fact of which the party spares no expense in reminding me.

I stopped participating in party events and fund drives when the Republican controlled congress ,and President, passed and signed into law the Campaign Finance Reform bill. And then when the seemingly Republican leaning Supreme Court stated that it was constitutional, I lost all faith in the GOP. I guess I'm looking for a new home where political parties are concerned.