Last weekend, the President of the United States was bestowed with an honorary degree from the University of Notre Dame as he spoke at the school's commencement exercises.  In a related story, former presidential candidate Dr. Alan Keyes spent the evening in a South Bend jail for prayerfully protesting the university's invitation to the most pro-abortion president the country has ever elected.

Let me get this straight.  The country's premier Catholic institution - one that proudly touts itself as a friend and advocate of biblical truth and moral principle - jails a man for standing against the slaughter of innocent children in the womb as it simultaneously honors and exalts a man whose policy preferences facilitate such slaughter?  There's no denying it: it's a world turned upside down.

Only in an upside down world could a man with such a flagrant anti-human rights record attain the highest office in a country founded upon the protection of those rights. 

Only in an upside down world could a man be elected to preserve, protect, and defend a people's most basic entitlements after having acknowledged during the campaign that he believes determining who should have them and who shouldn't is, "above [his] pay grade." 

Only in an upside down world could "hope" be embodied in a man who votes to allow half-delivered babies to be murdered, while one who believes every human being is worthy of protection is termed a "radical."

Obama's defenders, including the president of Notre Dame, have suggested this invitation shows the great commitment the university has to open debate, differing viewpoints, and the free exchange of ideas.  Oh brother.  Having done my undergraduate studies at a private Christian university, I find such a proposition insulting. 

Open discussion, arguments, and the free exchange of ideas happen in the classroom; and if Notre Dame had invited President Obama or a like minded pro-abortionist into an ethics class for a rousing debate, that would be a legitimate position.  Indeed, my favorite college course was one entitled "Western-American Intellectual and Social History," where we were presented with an eclectic array of viewpoints, belief systems, and thought streams that dominate our world.  I am a firm believer that it is enlightening, challenging, and useful to expand our understanding of viewpoints with which we disagree.  But that's not what happened in South Bend.

The University of Notre Dame invited President Obama to deliver the commencement address to its graduates, presenting him as a model to emulate, a man deserving of the students' admiration.  To further ingrain this point in their minds, the graduates watched the institution award Mr. Obama with the prestige of an honorary degree.  Some have asked, "Who better for these students to hold in high esteem and seek to imitate than the President of the United States of America?"  I have a simple answer: anyone with a respect for human rights, whether that's a grocery store clerk, a missionary, a stay-at-home mom, a gas station attendant, or even a man sitting in jail for speaking out against evil.  Take the lowliest person among us by earthly standards who believes in the unalienable right to life - that the protection of the law should extend to more than just those who are convenient - and you'll have someone more honorable than the President of the United States.

Since taking office, the one issue that President Obama has appeared to be least concerned with is human rights.  He is seemingly disinterested in the mass starvation of North Koreans, the violent oppression in Zimbabwe, the suppression of freedom by Russia, the horrendous practices of forced abortion and political subjugation in China, and the savage treatment of the innocent Burmese.  He has exchanged polite messages with the madman of Iran, shook hands, shared laughs, and officially recognized the corrupt and fraudulent radical Hugo Chavez of Venezuela, and has hinted at easing sanctions on perhaps the worst human rights abusing regime of them all in Sudan.

As this evidence amasses, it is becoming painfully clear that the question of when a human being gets human rights is not at all above Obama's pay grade.  That pathetic response simply sought to cover the alarming reality that to our new president, human rights are determined by political winds and are pliable to partisan convenience.

Simply put, Barack Obama is not a man to be honored.  He is a man to be pitied. 

The fabled Notre Dame Victory March sung at every football game calls to "shake down the thunder from the sky."  Those words take on all new meaning when considering what a just and holy God must think of Notre Dame's decision to honor a man whose policies encourage the slaughter of His innocent creations.

It never ceases to amaze me how intellectually condescending evolutionary naturalists can be.  Keep in mind, these are folks who believe that a indescribably tiny wad of nothingness exploded into a fully functional, structured, and ordered universe of orbiting planets and complex creatures without any supernatural agency involved.  They are the ones who cling to a theory known as spontaneous generation - the notion that dead matter can just suddenly pop to life.  They are the ones who champion a man (Charles Darwin) who suggested that Africans were more closely related to gorillas than Caucasians.  They are the ones who believe that a wolf-like animal with hooves took to the water, lost its legs, and morphed into a whale (Cetaceans).  If anyone should go easy on the intellectual condescension, it's these people.  But they don't. 

In a recent article for Live Science magazine that attempts to prove Darwin by using the swine flu of all things, author Robert Roy Britt sneers, "Anyone who thinks evolution is for the birds should not be afraid of swine flu.if there's no such thing as evolution, then there's no such thing as a new strain of swine flu infecting people."  His supposedly witty remarks were meant to mock creationists, castigating their "junk science."

But the intellectual dishonesty inherent in Britt's statement is almost as obvious as his failed attempt at humor.  Britt is using a common ploy of Darwinists: confuse people into believing that their utterly unsubstantiated speculation of species-to-species macro-evolution is synonymous with the universally accepted scientific fact of adaptation and development within a species (sometimes called micro-evolution).

The word "evolve" simply means to change, alter, or develop in some way.  Everyone recognizes that changes in gene frequencies happen and are expressed in a population over time.  Unfortunately for the Darwinists, that is not anywhere close to the "molecules to man" postulation Charles Darwin made (also known as "goo to you by way of the zoo").  The contention between Darwinists and those of us who believe in a Creator then is about what kind of evolution is possible and observable.

Britt concludes that since swine flu is a mutated form of the influenza virus, it proves that viruses evolve to survive, thus confirming Darwin's theory.  The only real problem with Britt's conclusion is that it is utterly absurd.  For Darwin to be affirmed, the swine flu would have to demonstrate some new genetic information that hadn't been present in the original influenza strain.  It doesn't.  No new genetic information is present - just mutated forms of pre-existing material.

Observational science also demonstrates that various strains of flu viruses will blend together their genetic codes, creating a new form that evades our defenses.  But again, what we're left with is merely a conglomeration of pre-existing genetic information - nothing new.

Interestingly, when pressed, Britt and other adherents to the Darwinian faith would be forced to admit that they cannot produce a single example of mutations creating new genetic information.  But how can this be?  In order for a frog to morph into a lizard, it is going to need its genes to do some pretty wild and crazy productive mutations.  And when you consider the entire premise of Darwinian macro-evolution states that all creatures (not just frogs) are constantly experiencing these positive mutations, the weight of the evidence crushes evolutionary naturalists.  If Darwin was right, we should be able to observe and replicate gene mutations that yield new information nearly everywhere we look.  We simply cannot.

Meanwhile, what we can find are innumerable cases of destructive gene mutations, where we end up with less genetic information than what was originally present.  Take the recent discovery of perfectly preserved octopus remains.  The discovery revealed that these ancient octopi actually had more genetic information than do modern octopi.  Call it "Darwin in reverse."  Both horizontal and destructive mutations support the creationist model.both devastate Darwin's.

The truth is that the swine flu evolving does nothing to prove Darwin's ridiculous "molecules to man" evolutionary model.  That his modern day prophets are so willing to distort and manipulate a flu virus in order to substantiate his wild theory only proves how they are far more rigid in their commitment to their Darwinian faith than the most rabid fundamentalist preacher is to the Bible.

Perhaps in Mr. Britt's next piece, he could lay off the condescension towards creationists and instead enlighten us all as to why he defends a theory whose author proclaimed that blacks were genetically inferior to whites.  To me, I think that's the very definition of junk science.

Peter W. Heck

Alexander Hamilton, perhaps the brightest of all the Founding Fathers, once spoke of the role of the judiciary in this way: "It may truly be said to have neither force nor will, but merely judgment."  In other words, judges do not determine the law, nor enforce it.  They merely gauge whether actions brought to them in various cases fall within the parameters of legality established by the political branches, and then rule accordingly with no regard for the persons involved. 

This responsibility is precisely why the Founders isolated judges from the political winds, giving them life tenures.  Judges should not be forced to consider popular opinion or cultural fads in the course of determining what the law says.  Indeed, it may be necessary for the courts to defy those very trends in order to uphold the law as written by the people through the elected branches of government.  If the people wish to change their law, they do so through the ballot box, not the courtroom.

To illustrate what Hamilton meant, it is helpful to consider the role of an umpire whose responsibility is to call balls and strikes based on a predetermined strike zone.  The umpire does not change the strike zone throughout the course of the game.  Nor does he consider the socioeconomic, athletic, or racial background of the individual batter.  He doesn't determine for himself whether it is "fair" that one team's pitcher seems to be more skilled than the other, and then seek to "even the playing field."  He is a neutral party with neither force nor will, merely judgment.

It is tough to imagine someone with a more contradictory philosophy to our Founders' vision of the judiciary than the man who currently stands poised to make his first appointment to the Supreme Court.  When liberal justice David Souter announced his retirement, Obama pledged to appoint as his replacement a justice who combines "empathy and understanding."  While this fits perfectly with his campaign pledge of seeking judges who are "sympathetic enough to those who are on the outside, those who are vulnerable, those who are powerless," it is also an indication of contempt for the proper role of the judiciary and an affront to men like Hamilton who helped frame it.

Though a self-proclaimed "constitutional scholar," Obama's statements depict a stunning betrayal of constitutional jurisprudence.  Sympathy for outsiders, the powerless and vulnerable are noble qualities to desire in legislators - those making the law.  That Obama demands them of potential judges, however, shows his allegiance to the anti-constitutional practice of judicial activism.

Consider what happened in Iowa just a few weeks ago.  In 1998, the people of Iowa overwhelmingly passed through their elected branches of government a law stipulating that marriage was an institution between one man and one woman only.  But seven black robed lawyers just issued a decree binding on the entire state that marriage would be opened up to alternative definitions.

In their 69 page decree from Mount Olympus, the seven wizards of the Iowa Supreme Court audaciously stated the following: "[E]qual protection can only be defined by the standards of each generation."  In other words, when the people of Iowa first wrote their constitution, they weren't as enlightened as they are today.  Ignoring the obvious fact that this generation of Iowans already stated their definition of "equal protection" in 1998 when they said marriage is between opposite sexes, the judges threw it out and wrote their own law. 

This is the exact type of judicial malfeasance that Barack Obama wishes to facilitate at the U.S. Supreme Court level.  Regardless of where we stand in the social divide that separates the left and right in American politics, this abandonment of the separation of powers as defined by the U.S. Constitution should be a grave concern for all Americans.

Allowing umpires to redefine the strike zone whenever they see fit may seem like a good idea when they favor your team.  But what happens when they don't?  This is the problem the Founders sought to avoid, and we will too if we know what is good for us.

Our 3^rd president, Thomas Jefferson, warned that such practice would make, "The Constitution.a mere thing of wax in the hands of the judiciary, which they may twist and shape into any form they please."  Yet that seems to be exactly what our 44^th president desires.

Coming off a terrifically mismanaged presidential campaign, Steve Schmidt, former top adviser to John McCain, made his first public appearance at a gathering of the Log Cabin Republicans.  Speaking to this group of homosexual activists, Schmidt demonstrated the very lack of conservative grounding that plagued his candidate - an illness that the antidote of conservative darling Sarah Palin couldn't even cure.

In his speech, Schmidt addressed the Republican Party in general and warned them to lighten up on their opposition to homosexual unions and marriage.  "If you put public policy issues to a religious test, you risk becoming a religious party," he said. "And in a free country a political party cannot be viable in the long-term if it is seen as a sectarian party."

This type of intellectual sophistry should be rejected by anyone who holds public debate in high regard and is serious about policy discussions.  Consider what Schmidt is actually proposing when he condemns putting issues to a religious test.  He is arguing to remove moral discernment from any public policy.  That, of course, is as ignorant as it is impossible.  The purpose of any law is to declare certain acts right and others wrong.  Pretending that moral discernment should not be a primary factor in this process is absurd.

George Washington stated that "the foundation of our national policy should be laid in private morality."  In other words, lawmakers' first and foremost concern in crafting law should be to consider whether the act in question is consistent with moral truth. 

What's more, Schmidt himself is guilty of the very act he supposedly condemns.  The reason Schmidt endorses homosexual marriage is because he has determined that it is unequal, discriminatory, and wrong to not grant homosexuals the right to wed each other.  To do that, he utilized his own concept of moral discernment, rooted not in divine revelation but in his own intellect, to make his public policy decision.  The difference then is not whether policy decisions will be put to a religious test, but rather which religious test.

Christians believe that God has revealed His truth to man in the Bible, and therefore it provides a firm basis upon which to build a morally upright society.  This is done not by enforcing a strict religious code that all citizens are forced to obey (this is forbidden by both the Constitution and the Bible), but by providing immutable, unchanging moral absolutes as a guide.  And, though typically found on the left, that is what humanists like Schmidt oppose. 

Fair enough.  But we should demand that they are honest about the alternative they offer.  Far from removing a religious test, they prefer substituting a religion of humanity - using the wisdom, reason, and ever-changing philosophies of man as the basis for civil society.  Both foundations are equally religious.

This recognition may undermine the false choice Schmidt attempts to engineer, but it is critical if we wish to have a serious discussion.  And we should. 

With 200 years of American prosperity and happiness demonstrating the outcome of a society based in Christian principle, this is a debate that I and any Christian conservative should be eager to engage.  And lest anyone attempt to contradict the reality of a Biblical foundation for the United States, take it up with John Quincy Adams who confirmed, "the highest glory of the American Revolution was this: it connected in one indissoluble bond the principles of civil government with the principles of Christianity."

The historical legacy of countries founded upon secular humanist values is not quite so appealing.  In fact, the subjective whims and baseless principles that characterize humanistic thought have left a wake of death and destruction in every society they have come to dominate.  There is a reason that humanists have found it safer to live in this country - one that grounds the basic rights of humanity in a constant, unchanging, moral authority - than in those that embrace humanism.

If Mr. Schmidt or others want to make the case why the Republican Party should follow the lead of the Democrats, abandon Christian morality, and begin using the religion of secular humanism as the basis for their platform, they are more than free to do so.  But they should at least have the decency to be honest about what they're seeking.

This is a debate about whether we will cling to our Judeo-Christian underpinnings or toss them aside.  Now that we're clear, let's have at it.

As I was sitting in church waiting for the start of the service, my grandpa came walking towards me pointing his finger.  No matter how old I get, and no matter how long he's been out of the U.S. Navy, that's still an intimidating sight.  As he approached me, his voice quivered as he said, "We saved that continent twice...how dare my president apologize for this country's arrogance."  My grandpa is right.  Americans need not apologize to the world for their arrogance; rather, Americans should apologize to their forefathers for the arrogance of their president.

Barack Obama's first foreign trip as President of the United States has confirmed the naiveté so many of us feared during the election cycle.  But worse than that, it has also demonstrated that our president suffers from either a complete misunderstanding of our heritage and history, or an utter contempt for it.  Neither is excusable. 

Garnering cheers from the French of all people, President Obama declared, "In America, there is a failure to appreciate Europe's leading role in the world. Instead of celebrating your dynamic union and seeking to partner with you to meet common challenges, there have been times where America has shown arrogance and been dismissive, even derisive."  Consider that Obama spoke these words just 500 miles from the beaches of Normandy, where the sand is still stained with 65 year old blood of "arrogant Americans."

Indeed, columnist Mark Whittington observes, "One should remind Mr. Obama and the Europeans how America has 'shown arrogance' by saving Europe from itself innumerable times in the 20th Century. World War I, World War II, the Cold War, and the wars in the Balkans were largely resolved by American blood, treasure, and leadership."  But all that appears lost on the president's seemingly insatiable quest to mend fences he imagines have been tarnished by the bullish George W. Bush. 

If Obama wishes to continue trampling the presidential tradition of showing class to former office holders and publicly trash Bush for his own personal gain, so be it.  But all Americans should make clear that no man - even if he is the president - will tarnish the legacy of those Americans who have gone before us.  Ours is not a history of arrogance.  It is a history of courage, self-sacrifice, and honor.

When abusive monarchs repressed the masses, Americans resisted and overthrew them.  When misguided policies led to the unjust oppression of fellow citizens, Americans rebelled and overturned them.  When millions of impoverished and destitute wretches sought a new beginning, Americans threw open the door and welcomed them.  When imperial dictators were on the march, Americans surrendered their lives to stop them.  When communist thugs threatened world peace, Americans bled to defeat them.  When an entire continent was overwhelmed with famine and hunger, Americans gave of themselves to sustain it.  When terrorist madmen killed the innocent and subjugated millions, Americans led the fight to topple them.

This is the legacy that generations of Americans have left.  If President Obama seeks stronger relations with the world community, perhaps he should begin by reminding them of these very truths, rather than condemning his own countrymen on foreign shores.

This "obsessive need to put down his own country," has caused blogger James Lewis to call President Obama a "stunningly ignorant man" who has evidently never spoken to a concentration camp survivor, a Cuban refugee, a boat person from Vietnam, a Soviet dissident, or a survivor of Mao's purges.

Unfortunately, I can no longer bring myself to give Mr. Obama that benefit of the doubt.  Not after looking at the pain in my grandpa's eyes...a man who still carries shrapnel in his body from his service to this country.

As a student and teacher of history, I recognize that America has made mistakes...plenty of them, in fact.  But one of the great things about our people has been their courage and humility in admitting and correcting those mistakes.  God willing they will prove that willingness again in four years and correct the mistake that is the presidency of Barack Obama.

Demonstrating the commitment the far left has to elevating the level of civil discourse in our society, belligerent homosexual Congressman Barney Frank recently resorted to name-calling in an interview with the website 365gay.com.  Answering a question about the Supreme Court potentially overturning the Defense of Marriage Act, Frank dismissed that possibility saying, "I wouldn't want it to go to the United States Supreme Court now because that homophobe Antonin Scalia has too many votes on this current court."  How classy.

In Frank's warped worldview, anyone who opposes the spread of homosexuality in our culture is a homophobe.  This offensive misuse of the term is more than irresponsible.  It is ignorant and slanderous.

Homophobia is defined as a fear or hatred of homosexuals.  To pejoratively label anyone who has moral objections to the practice of homosexuality a homophobe is such a blatant overreach that it effectively strips the term of any real meaning.  There are homophobes in America today.  But who they are just might surprise you.

To illustrate this, let me first begin by asking a question.  When someone you care about picks up a loaded revolver to play a game of Russian Roulette, what is the loving response?  To pat them on the back and say, "Well, this wouldn't be my cup of tea, but go for it.it's who you are!"?  Or would it be to rip the gun out of their hand and tell them how dangerous, irresponsible, and deadly their behavior is?  If you're struggling to answer this question, please stop reading and seek counseling.

Physically, the consequences of homosexuality are devastatingly apparent.  According to the Omega Journal of Death and Dying, the median age of death for homosexual men is between 40 and 43.  The median age of death for heterosexuals is between 74 and 80.  In 2003, the Center for Disease Control noted that homosexuals accounted for nearly 65% of all new HIV cases (keeping in mind that they make up only 2-3% of the entire population), and that cases of Syphilis, Gonorrhea, Hepatitis A and B, Lymphogranuloma Venereum, and virtually every other sexually transmitted disease disproportionately affected the homosexual community.

Psychologically, the effects of homosexuality on an individual are just as deplorable.  According to the well respected Archives of General Psychiatry in 1999, "homosexual people are at substantially higher risk for some forms of emotional problems, including suicid(e), major depression, anxiety disorder, conduct disorder, and nicotine dependence."  Further, Dr. N.E. Whitehead from the National Association for Research and Therapy of Homosexuals stated, "Studies show homosexuals have a substantially greater risk of suffering from psychiatric problems than do heterosexuals.  We see higher rates of suicide, depression, bulimia, antisocial personality disorder, and substance abuse."  And contrary to the misconceptions advanced by the homosexual lobby, these psychological problems are rarely associated with a stigma they endure from society.

Spiritually, an unrepentant practicing homosexual is engaging in an activity that is explicitly and unquestionably condemned by both the Old and New Testaments, and is completely irreconcilable with any Biblical understanding of Godly living.

In light of these realities, could someone explain to me how knowing these crippling physical, psychological, and spiritual consequences of the homosexual lifestyle and then encouraging a person to embrace it is loving?  Urging another human being to engage in a risky behavior that will leave them dead at nearly half the age of the general population is an odd definition of love in my book.

The truth is that the people who love homosexuals are the ones who have the courage to face the bigotry and slander from hate-peddlers like Barney Frank and stand up for moral truth.  They are the ones that face the mockery and derision of fools in an effort to take the Russian Roulette pistol from the hand of the homosexual.

So who is the homophobe, Barney?  The gay rights lobby in this country works unceasingly to advertise and glamorize a deadly lifestyle.  They celebrate behavior that tears families apart, wrecks homes, and sentences people to lifetimes of loneliness, confusion, disease, and heartache.  And politicians like Barney Frank use their positions to make it easier for them to ensnare and attract hurting, confused people in need of love and help.  Quite frankly, I can't think of anything more homophobic than that.

Peter W. Heck