LONE STAR AMERICA
I'm in a small town called St. Francisville in an obscure part of Louisiana. Visitors who come here stop briefly to gaze at the nicely preserved 19th century homes on its main street before hurrying off to the area's principal attractions nearby - magnificent ante-bellum plantation mansions like Rosewood, the Myrtles, or Oakley where Audubon stayed and painted many of his birds. Almost no tourists pay any attention to a flag that flies in front of the courthouse along with the stars and stripes and the state flag, nor have any idea what it symbolizes: 
It's the Bonnie Blue flag of the Republic of West Florida, the capital of which was here. In 1810, St. Francisville was the capital of an independent country. How it got to be, and what it may mean for America's future, is a story that goes from Spanish explorers to American rebels, from Napoleon to the Alamo, from the "Halls of Montezuma" of the Marine Hymn to the invasion of America by illegal aliens from Mexico. So curl up and get cozy in your favorite chair during a winter weekend evening, and let me tell you the story. It starts with a man named Hernando de Soto.
THE GIFT OF TO THE POINT
We've just made it really easy to give a friend the enlightening gift of a subscription to To The Point. There's a new option on our subscription page: a one month only non-recurring gift subscription for $9.99. Now what could you give a friend that could more open his or her eyes to the world and give them more insight upon it than this - and for less than ten bucks? It's also the way to bring a currently non-member friend to the To The Point Rendezvous in Las Vegas next month (see Rendezvous at Mandalay). Here's how it works.
ADIOS AHMADINEJAD
The first step toward understanding the Iranian "elections" last Monday (12/18) is that they weren't. Elections, that is, at least in our common understanding of the term, namely the people vote and the counters count those votes and so we find out what the people want. That's not what happens in Iran, where both the candidates and the results are determined well in advance of the casting of ballots. Yes, people get mobilized and go to the polls and mark their ballots and put them in the ballot box. But then Groucho Marx comes into play: "I've got ballots. And if you don't like them, I've got other ballots." So, as usual, candidates (featuring, as usual, the unfortunate Mehdi Karubi, the eternal loser who nonetheless remains at the top of the mullah's power mountain) complain that ballot boxes disappeared, and new ones magically appeared, and numbers change, and counters are replaced. It's all part of the ritual. Which is not to say they weren't significant. They certainly were. They mean that Mr. Ahmadinejad usefulness to Iran's real rulers may have run its course.
PRESIDENT BUSH AND CAPTAIN PATRIQUIN
Sir Thomas Gresham noted that: "bad money drives out good." A kind of Gresham's Law applies in politics and journalism. Bad advice drives out good. The recommendations of the Iraq Study Group (composed of 10 famous people who know next to nothing about either the military or the Middle East) received enormous attention from the news media. But the report last week from people who actually know what they're talking about received little. Aside from the surreal recommendation that we ask our enemies, Iran and Syria, for help in quelling the violence they are largely responsible for fomenting, the ISG recommended, essentially, that we do more of what hasn't worked very well. President Bush has been asking a lot of people what he should do next in Iraq. But he should have consulted with Travis Patriquin.
A CHRISTMAS LETTER TO ANTI-CHRISTIANS: 2006
A version of this was first written for Christmas 2004. It is addressed to members of the ACLU and other Anti-Christian Liberals. It is obviously not addressed to TTP members! But feel free to send this to any ACLU member should you happen to know one. Merry Christmas. If that offends you, why should I care? It's your problem, not mine. Let me explain your problem a little more fully. America is a Christian country. It's your job to deal with that, because you're not going to change this fact. America has always been a Christian country, and - open wide now, because you're going to have to swallow this - it will continue to be. It will continue to be because most Americans aren't Euroweenies. They haven't lost the moral courage to be proud of their country and their civilization. Notice the "most" - which you are not a part of. You are anti-Christian because you are anti-American. You are anti-American because you are anti-Western Civilization. You are anti-Western Civilization because you are afraid of and intimidated by the envy of the world's impotent. Fear of being envied defines your liberal soul.
HOW CONSERVATIVES ARE GOING TO GET IN BED WITH NANCY PELOSI
How many times have you heard that old adage, "politics makes for strange bedfellows"? But no matter how many times that's been, you're not going to believe how many conservative Republican Members of Congress are about to jump in bed with Speaker Pelosi. One of the things that most drives these folks around the bend is the sell-out of their party's principles to Country Club Corporate America. They can't stand Big Business's addiction to cheap labor. It's an addiction that blocks effective attempts to stem the flood of illegal alien immigration from Mexico, or to stem the flood of trade deficit dollars to China. The list of issues that conservatives in the House will oppose Pelosi on seems endless, and amnesty for illegals plus refusing to fence them out is certainly one of them. But there is one issue not on that list, an issue of the gravest national security on which they are sure cooperation with her is possible. That issue is...
OPENING THE DOORS OF ISLAM
It has become a commonplace observation that Islam today requires a Reformation with an Islamic Martin Luther. This is the absolute last thing Islam needs now, the triumph of faith over reason with resultant bloodshed and sectarian slaughter lasting over a century (ca. 1520-1648) and costing the lives of millions. That horror was the Reformation. What Islam needs instead is an Enlightenment. It turns out there is a term in Arabic for enlightenment, for analysis and interpretation through reason, that has an honorable tradition in Islamic jurisprudence and thought. Get to know the word, for it is the salvation of Islam: Ijtihad.
For every verse in the Koran the moderates can cite, the Islamofascists can refute them with a dozen. There is no possibility of women’s rights in Islam or an end to Islamic terrorism, for example, until verses like Sura 4:34 that condone wife-beating, or those that condone slavery and killing infidels and spreading Islam with violence, on and on, are challenged as not being the true words of Allah.
That they are being challenged by a growing number of Moslem scholars, that there is an emerging Ijtihad Movement stirring within Islam, is the best hope for an Islamic Enlightenment.
PHILISTINES AND PALESTINIANS
Responding to Moses in Mecca, TTP member "Marco" has asked about the historical lineage of the ancient Philistines and their connection to modern-day Palestinians after whom they are named. OK, Marco, here goes. The origins of the Philistines are unclear. Genesis 10:14 lists the Pelishtim as among the sons of Ham, shorthand for the Hebrews' traditional enemies which also included Egyptians and Canaanites, while Amos 9:7 claims they come from "Caphtor." At least two things about them are clear. They are not aboriginal to the Levant (east coast of the Mediterranean) and they are not Semitic.
MOSES IN MECCA
Have you ever wondered why Arab Palestinians think Jerusalem is so important to them? Why they say there will never be Arab-Israeli peace until they control it? They say it's because of the "sacredness" of the Al Aqsa Mosque. So here's a thought experiment: What if it were discovered that Moses, of whom the Bible says, "no man knoweth of his grave site," was buried in Mecca? What would be the response of the Islamic world if millions of Jews began claiming that Mecca was sacred to them now just as it is sacred to the Moslems, and demanded that they had the right to build a Dome of Moses next to the Kaaba as a pilgrimage shrine honoring the Founding Patriarch of the Jewish People?
THE ANTI-ASSIMILATION MOVEMENT
Assimilation - defined as the act of becoming part of or more like something greater - is being opposed by increasing violence these days, from calls for a return of the American Southwest to Mexico by the Reconquista movement to the encroachment of radical Islam on the streets of Paris Members of immigrating minority groups are increasingly refusing to assimilate into the cultures of their resident countries. The lack of assimilation by immigrants to the United States - both legal and illegal - is culminating in an American identity crisis and poses a serious problem for the future of our country. This movement toward anti-assimilation stands in stark contrast to the very concept of our nation