On March 9th, my Term III 2013 at Troy ended and Matthew Perdie arrived for a brainstorming visit. After helping us set up our new green screen and lights…

Abigail masters the Director’s Viewfinder.

…Matthew and I got to work planning our first web series…

Such a creative day at Fair Hills Farm!

We’re not telling much about the plot yet, but you can catch a few hints here and there in this video…

After that, Matthew headed off to CPAC while I did some writing for ViralRead, worked on screenwriting, helped clear land by hand, and enjoyed cooking new recipes.

Clearing land the old fashioned way…

Also, here’s a snapshot of my sister Rachel and me dressed up for a very insightful Ratio Christi JSU event – “Sincerely: An Honest Response to Honest Questions.” I will reference it in future posts, I’m sure!

I’m now down to my final term and final class in college, and I have lots to write about!

Never let a childhood endeavor go to waste!

I think we were influenced by Diana Waring, whose history tapes we would routinely listen to at bedtime. We wanted to tell history in the same entertaining way she did!

American President Abraham Lincoln and British naturalist Charles Darwin would have both turned 204 today. As of late, I’ve seen more Americans obsessing over Darwin. Some Democrats in Congress wanted to officially designate February 12th, 2013 as “Darwin Day” to recognize “the importance of science in the betterment of humanity.” (Hmmm, as long as science has a moral check and balance, if they had the nerve to specify…)

Since I never want my academic work to go to waste, I’ve recycled some papers that readers might enjoy.

DARWIN: DEFINING THE ORIGINS DEBATE

Written for an English literature class in 2010, this essay of mine dissects the rhetorical strategies of Darwin.

FIT TO SURVIVE: DARWIN’S ACADEMIC LEGACY

Written last year for a history class on Victorian England, this term paper of mine investigates the factors behind the acceptance of Darwinism.

MY VERY OWN CHICKEN GENETICS EXPERIMENT!

“Together with Marx’s materialistic theory of history and society and Freud’s attribution of human behavior to influences over which we have little control, Darwin’s theory of evolution was a crucial plank in the platform of mechanism and materialism – of much of science, in short – that has been the stage of most Western thought.”
- Douglas Futuyma

DARWINOCRACY: THE EVOLUTION QUESTION IN AMERICAN POLITICS

Does Darwin rule the electorate? Why does a stigma surround those who are skeptical of Darwinism, and how should candidates respond?

Jan Ingenhousz, Dutch physician (1730-1799)

“We might conceive a little more of the deep designs of the Supreme Wisdom in the different arrangement of sublunary beings. The stubborn atheist would, perhaps, find reason to humiliate himself before that Almighty Being, whose existence he denies because his limited senses represent to him nothing but a confused chaos of miseries and disorders in this world.” - Jan Ingenhousz, in a piece of writing I discovered in the antique book, The Beginnings of Modern Science: Scientific Writings of the 16th, 17th, and 18th Centuries.

My lovely Southern Belle Grandmomma gave me this belt from Anthropologie for my birthday this year. On my birthday I wore it while mix-matching a white blouse, black sweater, and pink skirt with my cowgirl-inspired boots. Grandmomma also gave me the garnet necklace for my previous birthday and the gold bracelet for Christmas. She knows how to look glamorous…

I got my haircut recently (I refer to it as my “economical haircut” because if I get it cut barely shoulder length, I think I’ll only have to get it cut maybe twice a year) and really like the look and feel of styling it in a few soft curls.

What a fun way to ring in my twenty-third year! (All the photography is by Abigail.)

My birthday is January 23rd, the same as John Hancock’s, if you’d like to read about somebody more interesting.

Alright, I’m off to get tons of studying done and prepare for my next writing ventures. Godspeed!

Our languishing culture is made up of individuals, not a collective mass audience. Most of them are blasé, complacent individuals. To simply confront them with holier-than-thou accusations or rah-rah chants is fruitless. Moral outrage doesn’t make sense to them anymore, and misplaced skepticism is profuse. How do you cure a patient who refuses to believe they are ill?

This is an age-old problem with an age-old solution. Do not merely inform them. Show them.

Imagine the thoughts that must have gone through the prophet’s mind as he walked to the residence of the King of Israel. Nathan was approaching David, the legendary musician and warrior who was – as God Himself said – a man after God’s own heart.

But David had just committed adultery with Bathsheba, and after learning she was pregnant by him he deliberately had her husband put on the front line of the fiercest battle so that he would be killed. After Bathsheba mourned her husband’s death, David took her as his wife. David had disgraced himself in front of YAHWEH, but he had grown so full of himself that he hadn’t even realized it.

How did the prophet break the news to the complacent king? With a parable.

Despite its subtlety, the story was powerful enough that David empathized with the story’s protagonist who was done wrong. He was so outraged by its heartless antagonist, in fact, that he said, “As the LORD lives, surely the man who has done this deserves to die” (II Samuel 12:5).

Then Nathan exclaimed, “YOU are the man!”

The realization brought David to his knees. He felt conviction because he had witnessed his own actions analogized in a story he had never heard before – a story from which he was otherwise personally detached. He was thus caught vulnerable, with no witty excuse prepared in order to plead his innocence. David was truly guilty.

The American people need to be told stories about themselves that they haven’t heard before – stories that suddenly reveal that the sort of character we despised is what we ourselves have become.

That’s why Matthew Perdie and I (likely to be joined by my siblings and some friends) are planning a venture into narrative film. He’s doing all the groundwork in New York City while I’m doing the screenwriting out here in Ohatchee, Alabama. I experimented with screenwriting a few years ago, and as I have just three classes left before graduating from college, I look forward to trying my hand at it again. Historical drama and epic are my passion, but modern themes will likely be explored first.

Our goal will be to use narrative film to awaken people’s consciences to seek the truth.

Here’s a glimpse of the festivities (I’ll add more photos and maybe some videos as they come about):

Rachel snapped this photo of Matthew, Ms. Lindy, and me hanging out in the schoolroom.

Playing "Catch Phrase" in the sunroom.

The menfolk setting up the bonfire.

Little David fires the Roman Candle while Adam and Andrew prepare fireworks and Matthew films (see camera lens on the right edge of the photo. I held the film light to illuminate these shots).

Andrew sets up a firework while Rex prepares to attack it (he loved snarling at those things!).

What a beauty!

Adamson and David play chess on the chessboard Rachel gave Adamson for Christmas, while Andrew plays "Risk" on his mother's pink iPad.

Abigail experimented with one of Matthew's camera lenses for this shot of Joseph and me.

Matthew held his film light while Adam and David reenacted some shadowy creepers that Rachel and Jessica thought they saw on the trail.

These lovely ladies (mothers, Mrs. Lindy Abbott and Mrs. Chris Read) are working on publishing a magazine with me. To give you a hint . . . it's a magazine for thinking women!

Abigail snapped this photograph of me reading aloud "Ben-Hur: A Tale of the Christ" to family (that's a copy from 1887 that I'm holding!).

“In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.

He was in the beginning with God.

All things came into being through Him, and apart from Him nothing came into being that has come into being.

In Him was life, and the life was the Light of men.

The Light shines in the darkness, and the darkness did not comprehend it.

There came a man sent from God, whose name was John.

He came as a witness, to testify about the Light, so that all might believe through him.

He was not the Light, but he came to testify about the Light.

There was the true Light which, coming into the world, enlightens every man.

He was in the world, and the world was made through Him, and the world did not know Him.

He came to His own, and those who were His own did not receive Him.

He was in the world, and the world did not know Him.

But as many as received Him, to them He gave the right to become children of God, even to those who believe in His name, who were born, not of blood nor of the will of the flesh nor of the will of man, but of God.

And the Word became flesh, and dwelt among us, and we saw His glory, as of the only begotten from the Father, full of grace and truth.”

~ John 1:1-14.

“So preoccupied is the mind with myths and systems; so much do false deities crowd every place–earth, air, sky; so have they become of everything a part, that return to the first religion can only be along bloody paths, through fields of persecution; that is to say, the converts must be willing to die rather than recant. And who in this age can carry the faith of men to such a point but God himself? To redeem the race–I do not mean to destroy it–to REDEEM the race, he must make himself once more manifest; HE MUST COME IN PERSON.”

~ The Magi in General Lew Wallace’s Ben-Hur: A Tale of the Christ.

 

The keeping room at night, after the multitudes have dispersed...

Merry Christmas, and have a Blessed New Year ahead!

Are you heading for a train wreck? (Abigail took this photo of us playing with the wooden train at the Janney Furnace Park playground)

“All experience hath shewn that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed.” ~Thomas Jefferson, Declaration of Independence (1776)

Fun with family and friends in our swimming pool this summer.

The beautiful people I hang out with during breaks from school and column writing (Elizabeth, age 8, and Rebecca, age 2)

This past summer I attended the Intercollegiate Studies Institute and Alabama Policy Institute’s summer seminar on America’s First Principles of Freedom. Brilliant Canadian student Amanda Achtman (who appeared along with me in Alexander Thompson’s “Young and Conservative” documentary) did a great write-up on the event: http://amandaaction.com/2012/07/26/what-do-we-seek-to-conserve/

Preparing to take notes during Dr. Scott Beaulier's lecture on F.A. Hayek's "The Road to Serfdom".

“When a people are corrupted, the press may be made an engine to complete their ruin.” ~John Adams (1775)

The Economists (I snapped this photo of Stephen Moore chatting with Scott Beaulier).

A picture I took of Jeb Blackwood with Alabama Attorney General Luther Strange.

We wore green because Steve Moore was talking about money.

The lovely Rachel Wilson was my roommate. Check out her blog at http://dixielanddreamin.blogspot.com/.

View more pictures from the ISI event in my Facebook album here.

Lindy Abbott, me, and my brother Joseph on Election Night. I knitted that scarf four years ago (photo by Abigail Read).

So much is changing so fast, and new strategies are in order. It appears that the near future holds a variety of projects I was not expecting. Perhaps some ideas that I thought would not be applicable until later on have now become infused with a new sense of urgency. We are a country of polarized worldviews that many citizens thereof do not even understand.

Remember this guy?

“The cause of truth is never hurt by unjust attacks and its citadel never reached by the devious ways of unworthy foes, but it is sometimes weakened by the unguided enthusiasms of its defenders.” ~Harvey Wiley

He was the subject of my first screenplay. There will be more to come.

A screen capture from film production.

IndiRes.com

@IndiResolve on Twitter

To empower individual efforts for the purpose of abolishing statism by means of connecting patriots who share the same resolve.

The hours are ticking down to the moment when Americans decide which candidate to hire as chief executive of the U.S. government for the next four years. Take a few minutes to watch some scenes that will further inform you of the issues behind the big choice in the 2012 election. (The above video is an ad that I participated in with members of Resist 44.)

THE DETERMINATORS

Obamacare: The controversial legislation that Obama plans to enforce and Romney vows to repeal. What does it actually do?

Available for free viewing on YouTube is a documentary on Obamacare produced by the Tea Party Patriots. The movie examines the intersection of medicine and politics from the days of Hippocrates and Plato to the present before investigating the Affordable Care Act piece by piece.

Featured throughout the film is Grace-Marie Turner of The Galen Institute, who has explained the crucial differences between “Romneycare” and “Obamacare” (I recommend her articles “What Really Happened With Romneycare” and “Romney’s Best Defense: The Truth About Romneycare).

KEY SCENES: 37:20 – What’s up with the rationing talk? “If the federal government is paying medical costs for us…the incentive of the federal government now is to reduce our life expectancy once we’re not taxpayers anymore.”

What does the Independent Payment Advisory Board (IPAB) decide?  The legislation says “Any other areas that the Board determines affect overall spending and quality of care in the private sector.” (Representative Paul Broun explains that “overall spending and quality of care in the private sector” could easily apply to things like guns, food, eating habits, and cars.)

40:10 – THE FEDERAL RESERVE OF HEALTHCARE – Representative Paul Broun says, “I think people can make a strong comparison of the Fed from a monetary policy perspective and IPAB from a healthcare perspective. IPAB can utilize healthcare to control every aspect of our lives just like the Fed controls the monetary side.”

43:21: “We’re leaving the age of the independent physician, where the physician is now an employee, and that fundamentally changes the loyalty of that physician, because now they have to either respond to the demands of government or an employer, not necessarily to the needs of the patient.”

Bottom line: Obamacare does not increase healthcare, but increases government.

BENGHAZI TIMELINE AND REVELATIONS

Fox News’ Bret Baier takes us through the history of the Benghazi attack (available on YouTube).

2016: OBAMA’S AMERICA

I haven’t found 2016 available for purchase through online download, so you have to get the DVD for this one. Dinesh D’Souza’s respectfully done biopic of Barack Obama offers a plausible theory of Obama’s political philosophy based on Obama’s own words, life experiences, and influences. Obama’s worldview favors the redistribution of wealth worldwide, indicating that a weaker United States of America is actually a good thing in our incumbent president’s opinion.

KEY SCENES: Obama’s relationship with Frank Marshall Davis, whom he referred to only as “Frank” in his writings to avoid controversy.

Interestingly enough, Obama’s half-brother, George Hussein Obama – who lives in poverty in Kenya – does not share the U.S. president’s anti-colonialist sentiments.

Also, notice the anti-colonialist opposition to Israel. Anti-colonialists call Israel “a Trojan Horse” in the Middle East. Furthermore, there is a daunting speculation of America’s potential increased national debt in 2016.

PERDIE ACROSS AMERICA

Matthew Perdie (a film editor of the aforementioned movie, The Determinators and the “Our President Shouldn’t Be…” ad) toured America entirely on foot during the early days of the Obama administration and the dawning of the Tea Party – and captured it on camera. Perdie’s mission was to “provoke questioning of the dangers of massive government expansion, while acknowledging the principles and virtuous behavior that are necessary for the survival of a free Constitutional Republic.”

During the 2012 election season, Perdie released all four episodes of his first DVD online.

KEY SCENES: Episode 3: Tyrannical Expansion, 8:40 – “If our children remain indolent and lazy, we can basically kiss our country goodbye. The lack of productivity that would result from the absence of a strong work ethic would lead to economic collapse, giving the proponents of big government all the perceived justification in the public eye that they need to take over the economy – and in many ways, our lives.”

17:16 - “Madison and other founders did the very best they could to write a constitution that would actually make the government only strong enough to keep the country unified. But over 200 years later, their hopes were crushed by a tyrannical government in a form that few of them expected. Excessive and abusive taxation, spending, regulations, and illegal use of their own powers, granted to them by the apathetic consent of the governed.

With the establishment of the colonies, and the birth of the United States, came the opportunity to experiment with the idea of a free market system. Over the next 200 years, this experiment resulted in a tremendous economic boost never seen before in world history. By 1945, the United States economy by itself produced 50% of the world’s wealth as a result of this free market system. Over time, our government began to spend more and more…[unsustainably]…now our country currently produces 25% of the world’s economy…”