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Tony Perkins of the Family Research Council issued the letter below yesterday inviting conservatives to sign the Mount Vernon Statement, a proclamation in which the conservative movement reaffirms itself to America’s founding principles (see FRCBlog). A host of conservative leaders signed it in a ceremony yesterday (see FRC news release). Many are saying conservatives have tied themselves too closely with the Republican Party. Which may be true, but was that statement possible before the Tea Party movement? Now, there are options. Conservative movement stalwart Richard Viguerie offers his thoughts on his Conservative HQ Blog (here) while OneNewsNow covers the story here.

More than 100 conservative leaders joined together today to celebrate the release of the Mount Vernon Statement — a document in which the conservative movement has reaffirmed its commitment to Constitutional Conservatism and the principles of the Declaration of Independence: life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. This is a significant moment as social, fiscal, and national security conservatives joined together to declare the importance of working in partnership to defend our nation’s founding principles.

You can become part of history as well by signing the Mount Vernon Statement today.

Sign the Mount Vernon Statement today to stand with us on the historic principles of Constitutional Conservatism

Sincerely,

Tony Perkins

President

In conjunction with this Saturday’s Inaugural activities in Richmond, The Family Foundation has commissioned a private reenactment of Patrick Henry’s “Liberty or Give Me Death” speech after the swearing-in ceremonies. The performance, by professional actors, who do a weekly performance to packed houses during the summer, will take place at historic Saint John’s Church, where Henry made the revolutionary oration. Saint John’s is located at 2401 East Broad Street, less than a mile from Capitol Square. The reenactment begins at 3:30 p.m.

The actors, complete in 1770s attire, portray several prominent delegates at the March 23, 1775, Second Virginia Convention, including Richard Henry Lee, Benjamin Harrison, Thomas Nelson, Thomas Jefferson and George Washington, in addition to the participation of audience members who are encouraged to participate as delegates themselves. The reenactment of the Second Virginia Convention is a historically accurate representation of the event. It portrays the democratic process through passions of the revolutionary era and the animated debates that culminated in Henry’s clarion call for the breaking of the chains which bound Virginia to Great Britain (see short video). This production is a Virginia treasure, one that puts visitors back in time, and overwhelms them in a unique patriotic experience difficult replicate anywhere else.

This reenactment, exclusively for supporters and friends of The Family Foundation, has limited seating and a RSVP is required by this Friday. To reserve a seat, please call Marie Edwards at (804) 343-0010 or e-mail her at marie@familyfoundation.org.

For the convenience of individuals attending the swearing-in ceremony and other inaugural events, a bus will provide transportation to and from Saint John’s Church. It will leave the northwest corner of 9th and East Main Streets, in front of the One Capitol Square Building in which TFF’s offices are located, 2:45 p.m. The bus will return to the same location at the conclusion of the reenactment, at approximately 4:30 p.m.

Those who want to drive directly to Saint John’s Church should arrive by 3:20 p.m. and enter the property by the main gate on East Broad Street. An elevator is available for handicapped individuals on the 24th Street entrance.

For information about attending the swearing-in ceremony, which is free and open to the public, complete details are available at mcdonnellinaugural.com.

You are there! Patriot reenactors Washington, Jefferson and Henry.

Remember all of the publicity Jamestown and Virginia received two years ago for the 400th anniversary of the establishment of the first permanent English settlement in North America? Why, even the mother country’s own Queen Elizabeth visited us to great international aplomb!

Not only was all the attention — and the millions of taxpayer dollars that paid for its — going to draw tourists to the Old Dominion, but it would be a great way to educate America about its founding history. We were even charged an extra buck a year on our car tag renewals for a while to help fund the state’s spending on promoting Jamestown’s year long party (and some pols wanted to keep the charge even after the celebration was over).

Not that we shouldn’t have done all that celebratin’ mind you. But it doesn’t sound like the education thing was much of a grand payoff. Glenn Beck today, on his radio show, cited a poll of Americans’ acumen on U.S. history. The results were embarrassing, with many not knowing basic, simple American civics questions — and they were multiple choice. One question was:

Which event happend prior to American independence?

The Civil War

The Emancipation Proclamation

The War of 1812

The Jamestown Settlement

While 49 percent of respondents got answer correct, a combined 51 percent chose one of the three (obviously) incorrect answers. So much for all the education. So much for all that publicly spent money.

As the year and decade draw to a close, we leave you with quotes from Virginia patriot and Revolutionary hero Patrick Henry. As with all great, legendary orators and thinkers, his words were/still are prescient. Among them are two lesser known rhetorical flourishes during his famous ”Give me liberty or give me death” speech at the Second Virginia Convention on March 23, 1775, at Saint John’s Church in Richmond. In one, he asked:

Shall we acquire the means of effectual resistance, by lying supinely on our backs, and hugging the delusive phantom of hope, until our enemies shall have bound us hand and foot?

No, we shouldn’t. We shouldn’t lay down with the expectation that vague and demagogic cries of “hope” will lead us to prosperity and liberty, while those espousing the hope, in fact, deviously take us down a path of oppressive limits on our freedom, rather than the freedom afforded by limited government, for which Henry fought.

Nor should we lay down in expectation that this fad, too, will run its course. It can be fought and won, despite the current wisdom, because as Henry also foretold:

Sir, we are not weak, if we make a proper use of the means which the God of nature hath placed in our power . . . millions of people, armed in the holy cause of liberty, and in such a country as that which we possess, are invincible by any force which our enemy can send against us. Besides, sir, we shall not fight our battles alone. There is a just God who presides over the destinies of nations. …

The battle, sir, is not to the strong alone; it is to the vigilant, the active, the brave.

From all of us at The Family Foundation of Virginia to all of you: Our best wishes for a happy, safe, healthy and prosperous New Year, one in which we all will need to be vigilant and redouble our efforts in the political battles ahead.

If only we could. … Bringing in the New Year with Patrick Henry would be a blast!

Thanks to the alert by our friend Tea Party Jim, we now know the winner of the Public Option Please propaganda, graffiti, Obama adoration, uhh, “art” contest. As Jim writes us:

The sickness of this kind of thinking is what is destroying this country. The thought that Washington, D.C., is the lifeblood of the nation is simply idiotic, but not surprising.

And apart from the misattribution of the quote, the doublespeak of the supposed Jefferson quote is nearly hilarious. “Without Liberty no happiness can be enjoyed by society” as the money quote to sell government rationed health care is simply Orwellian.

I can’t add much more to that. Well stated, Jim. Gabriel Malor has something to say, too, at Ace of Spades HQ.

The winners are (although we thought liberalism doesn’t have winners and losers, and that it makes everyone equal and happy):

First place and People’s Choice winner, to an Amy Martin, with the perfectly understandable idea that our country is great because of Washington, D.C.:

Second Place, to Tatyana Fazlalizadeh (there’s always a Tatyana involved in socialism, isn’t there?), but lacking nothing in staged propaganda heart strings, and a bone to underappreciated photographers out there:

Finally, a disappointing, I’m sure, third place to the POTUS, represented by a Michael Cuffe, but it’s my personal favorite, as well, and takes second to nothing in human adoration, if that’s any consolation to him. After all, the bronze here is better than what he got at got at on his Olympics bid:

We’ve been looking for an American conservative politician who would stand up and speak to the truth in the face of what the left has portrayed as its inevitable transformation of America into a European-style socialist state, as well as its permanent stay in power. Notice “American” in the first line, because earlier this year British European Parliament member Daniel Hannan emerged on the world stage with his profile in courage when he publicly dressed down British Prime Minister Gordon Brown in front of the European Parliament. Later, Hannan exposed the  liberty shackling European anti-discrimination laws as most Americans were asleep while our own version — “hate crimes” — was sailing through Congress.

But now, perhaps, America’s Hannan has emerged: Retired Army Lt. Colonel Allen West, a candidate for Congress in Florida (see author Mark Whittington at AssociatedContent.com), made a speech that has generated a million-plus views on YouTube, aired on national television, and which has galvanized conservatives across the country. Watch it for yourself and let us know what you think.

Retired U.S. Army Lt. Colonel Allen West as ignited what some conservatives are calling a second American Revolution. His references to the patriotism of the first one reinforce that imagery.

Delegate Chris Peace (R-97, Hanover) today sent out this very well stated and  contemplative Thanksgiving thought and prayer. We couldn’t have said it better ourselves:

While President George Washington declared a National Day of Thanksgiving in 1789, Thanksgiving has been an American tradition officially celebrated on the 4th Thursday of November annually since 1863. Our federal holiday was not formalized until 1941. As Virginians we can take great pride in the fact that our ancestors arrived on the banks of the James River at what is now Berkeley Plantation in 1619 and gave the first thanks to God for His provisions.

Thanksgiving Day Prayer For Your Family:

Almighty and gracious Father, we give you thanks for the fruits of the earth in their season and for the labors of those who harvest them. Make us, we beseech thee, faithful stewards of thy great bounty, for the provision of our necessities and the relief of all who are in need, to the glory of thy Name; through Jesus Christ our Lord, who liveth and reigneth with thee and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and for ever. Amen. (Book of Common Prayer)

From the entire family at The Family Foundation of Virginia — Board, volunteers and staff — extend to you and your loved ones the very best wishes for a happy and safe Thanksgiving.

This is a must see video. It’s an entertaining cartoon, but don’t let the kitsch of it underwhelm you. It’s powerful. Created in 1948 to dispel the notion that socialism (communism) was the emerging modernity’s panacea to prosperity and equality, it has uncanny relevance today. They shame of it all is that the contemporary comparison is not to a foreign power or movement, but to our own government! (Or at least those currently running it.) Read The Daily Capitalist blog for a bit more on it.

 Leave it to a cartoon to break it down for us, and well before “I’m just a bill” was made.

Remember when House Speaker Nancy Pelosi called attendees who opposed nationalized health care at this summer’s Congressional town hall meetings, ”Nazis”? Ironic, since “Nazi” was a word formed from an acronym that stood for “National Socialist,” but apparently it’s the speaker who’s all in for totalitarianism. Here, she makes it clear that she thinks it’s “fair” for people who don’t get health insurance to go to jail, as is in a provision of the recently passed “Saturday Night House bill.” But that’s only a small part of it. Among many other loss-of-freedom provisions, the bill includes fines as well as forcing self-employed people out of the insurance they purchase, like it or not, into the government-run plan. Freedom in Amerika be damned.

Government knows best, don’t ya know? Speaker Pelosi: No freedom for you. If you don’t like it, go directly to jail and stay there until you change your mind!

There isn’t much government does well. It wants to take over the entire health care industry and it can’t even deliver Swine Flu vaccine. The one thing government does well, because it is constitutionally charged with doing so, is protecting us with a well-armed military. But even the military has its shortcomings when venturing out of its core function.

Take the example of investigator Gary Zaetz and Arizona adventurer, Clayton Kuhles. Mr. Kuhles spends months of his own time and thousands of his own dollars each year searching for the remains of missing American service men. He hires Zaetz to do much of the detail work. Recently, Zaetz found the plane and remains of a World War II plane and crew missing for 66 years, despite the U.S. Army’s inability to do so through that entire period (see Steve Friess of AOL’s The Sphere).

This is not a slap at the military’s recovery operations. It does the best it can with thousands of missing over decades of time spanning the entire world. (This plane was found in India.) But, it cannot be ignored that a single (and very patriotic and caring) man, who carries out his own searches, has had great successes. If someone like this can replicate what government is good at, why, then, shouldn’t private entities be allowed to do yet more where government monopolies continue to fail its citizens?