There has been a lot of discussion recently regarding Enhanced Interrogation Techniques. While we want to make it clear that Freedom's Defenders agrees with the use of some of these techniques (for example: Waterboarding), we do have questions about some of them. 

The fact that we may disagree with the use of some of these tactics does not destroy our faith in our country as other authors have stated that it should. Instead we merely use this to again recognize that our Country is made up of fallible humans. A species with a great propensity for mistakes and illogical actions. In fact our if you follow Freedom's Defenders at all you will realize that while we celebrate America, and claim she is the greatest country in history of mankind, we believe that abortion is a terrible mistake on the part of this nation.

One thing sets America apart from the nations around the world. The United States has a set of values we pursue, something no other nation has. As G.K. Chesterton once wrote, "America is the only nation in the world that is founded on a creed." He goes on, "It [is] that all men are equal in their claim to justice that governments exist to give them that justice and that their authority is for that reason just." These principles drive the US to pursue something higher than material goods. The United States pursues the triumph of good over evil. Throughout history the United States has been on the right side and still is today.


There is just one problem: the United States is run by finite, fallible, fallen and sometimes illogical human beings; not angels, thus It is easy to get carried away and forget that the battle between good and evil is on two levels, the Physical and the Spiritual. When we see the absolute evil that caused the destruction of the Twin Towers, that caused 3000 fellow Americans to be burned to death, when we see the tear stained faces of the children who will never see their mother or father again because of some senseless act of violence against a civilian population, it is easy to stoop to a level to try and overcome the physical aspect of the struggle, while forgetting the spiritual aspect and forgetting what sets us apart. 


If forget what sets us apart it is easy to stoop to the level of those we are fighting. Although we may conquer in the Physical arena, we have failed to live up to our standards and have lost the battle in the Spiritual arena - The more important of the two. In other words we may have won the battle but in stooping toward their tactics (although not quite so low as theirs) we have lost the war.


As one former CIA operative stated, "Once we resort to using the inhuman tactics of our enemies, we have granted them their greatest victory." If we stoop to their level we lose the distinction between us and them. We become what we are fighting to eradicate. Our enemies fight us because we are good, if we cease to be so they have won.

“America is great because she is good. If America ceases to be good, America will cease to be great.” ― Alexis de Tocqueville

Thus let us cling to our principles and remember that even the worst of terrorists are still created equal, regardless of the evil, pain, and suffering they have purposefully cause. America must always be a city on a hill. America must always pursue the triumph of good over evil. We must never succumb to the temptation to stoop to our opponents level -whoever they may be. America has a standard to live up to, and that standard is what makes us the greatest nation in the world.

As a reminder Freedom's Defenders does not oppose all of the Enhanced Interrogation Techniques. Freedom's Defenders does agree that terrorists should be interrogated and tried in a military setting. Freedom's Defenders fully supports the war against terrorism and the use of Waterboarding to obtain information from high profile terrorists.

In recent years the proponents of assisted suicide has become increasingly vocal. They argue that those with terminal illnesses ought to have the ability to take their own life in order to "die with dignity." This argument sounds substantial, after all who wants to live with debilitating pain that in the end will only kill them? Who wants their mental faculties ripped from them? This though, is not the question. The true question is, what is death with dignity?

Dignity: "the state or quality of being worthy of honor or respect." Is someone who ends their own life because they do not wish to face what is ahead dignified? Why is someone who commits suicide to avoid life with disease any more dignified than someone who ends their life to avoid life with debt? In both cases neither had the courage to face the road ahead. In both cases neither acknowledge that there was anything that was worth living for. 


Christian Philosopher G.K. Chesterton puts it this way; "Not only is suicide a sin, it is the sin. It is the ultimate and absolute evil, the refusal to take an interest in existence; the refusal to take the oath of loyalty to life. The man who kills a man, kills a man. The man who kills himself, kills all men; as far as he is concerned he wipes out the world....The thief is satisfied with diamonds, but the suicide is not, that is his crime. He cannot be bribed even by the blazing stones of the Celestial City. The thief compliments the things he steals, if not the owner of them. But the suicide insults everything on earth by not stealing it. He defiles every flower by refusing to live for its sake. There is not a tiny creature in the cosmos at whom his death is not a sneer. When a man hangs himself on a tree the leaves might fall off in anger and the birds fly away in fury for each has received a personal affront.
Of course there may be pathetic emotional excuses for the act. There often are for rape and there almost always are for dynamite. But if it comes to clear ideas and the intelligent meaning of things, then there is much more rational and philosophic truth in the burial at the cross roads and the stake driven through the body...There is a meaning in burying the suicide apart. The man's crime 
is different from other crimes - for it makes even crimes impossible." 



The argument applies to those who wish to commit suicide because of terminal illness just as well as it does to those who wish to kill themselves because of depression or any other reason. Suicide is the irrevocable declaration that there is nothing in the universe worth living for. Suicide declares that only when things are going well is life worth fighting for. 

One may argue that Assisted Suicide allows people to cease being a burden on their family. That it cuts down the hospital bills and the other burdens that come naturally in caring for someone with a terminal illness. This argument claims that people money and the relieved stress of not having someone around is more valuable than the person themselves. If this is the case than humans are only valuable if they are contributing to society. The entire framework of the Declaration of Independence, which declares that all people are inherently valuable, is washed away if this is true.  Once humans become a burden they are expendable. Thus we ought to legalize the murder of children by their parents - after all children are both a financial and emotional burden. 

Today the House of Representatives passed Rep. Ted Yoho's HR 5759, the Executive Amnesty Prevention Act of 2014, in an effort to block President Obama's unconstitutional executive order granting amnesty to those who have come into America illegally.  The bill passed 219-197, with seven Republicans voting nay and three Democrats voting yea.  While this bill is unlikely to pass in the Senate before the session expires -- outgoing Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid said he will not bring it up for a vote in the Senate -- it's a step in the right direction.  Republicans in Congress must continue to fight the lawlessness from the Obama administration on this crucial national security issue.