How could anyone be so brave as our forebears, the Pilgrims who made the "Desperate Crossing" in the "Mayflower" to "our sea-washed, sunset gates" in 1620? Their faith carried them and sustained them. Our military of today are cut of the same cloth. We ourselves are a documented -- via Goomp's Aunt Helen Jameson's Daughters of the American Revolution records -- descendent of Priscilla Mullins of "The Courtship of Miles Standish" fame. Can we live up to her legacy? Squanto, the Patuxet translator who facilitated the Pilgrims' rapprochement with the locals could not have foreseen the irony of where friendship would lead down the road. "A lot of violent froth on the surface," as Baron Bodissey puts it. (Reproduction of the Mayflower at sea, above, from The History Channel's "Desperate Crossing: The Untold Story of the Mayflower")
"The daily news is like the wind-whipped whitecaps on the ocean, a lot of violent froth on the surface, dangerous to surfers and small craft, but having nothing to do with the larger movement of the sea," writes Baron Bodissey at Gates of Vienna, whose prose is poetry to this "tempest-tost" ear:
The deep swells are the movement of history; they are scarcely noticeable to a beleaguered swimmer treading water and gulping spray on the surface. But their slow-moving effects are much larger and more permanent . . .
Larger forces are in motion, ones which will take decades or centuries to resolve into historic clarity. None of us can see what’s really going on; we can blink away the salt foam, crane our necks up, and maybe see the beginning of another large swell heading our way. But the flow of the tide and the destination of the coming storm are not -- and cannot be -- known to us.
Yet we must take the current where it serves, or lose our ventures.
Take the current where it serves . . . What choice do we have? The Baron continues:
The Great Islamic Jihad is certain that Western Civilization is about to come to an end.
Islamic Fascism looks forward to the rule of the new Caliphate, in which the whole world will swear submission to Allah and bow five times a day towards Mecca. It aims to kill or enslave every person who will not accept its twisted vision of Islam. With the help of its allies among the world’s dictators and within our own media, it is confident that it will achieve its goal.
But even as this beast tears at our throats, a new defensive force is being born, a determination to preserve all that is good and right and true within the Western world. Even as we are abandoned by our leaders, by the sophists in our academies, and by the propagandists of our major media, ordinary people are connecting with one another, and are ready to stand up and defeat those who would destroy us.
Something slouching towards Bethlehem waiting to be born?
The emergence of Coalition to Preserve Civilization and the 910 Group is part of the deeper swell. The time has come for events like these, as many individuals wake up and realize that they are not alone in their determination to resist the twin juggernauts of Islamic Fascism and Multiculturalism.
Our sub rosa blogpals Miss Kelly and Sol of Solomonia, who lit a fire of late under the local media to go after some shady terrorist supporters in our midst here in the Greater Boston area are already in full slouching mode, and Papa Ratzi is taking the current wave. Richard Landes continues to hold a disingenuous media's feet to the fire in La Belle France. Having blogged our heart out for the last three years in the name of preserving this shining city upon a hill, we stand at the ready.
Update: The Baron responds in the comments:
You are uncanny! We at the 910 Groups were discussing possible logos for the CPC, and the "shining city on the hill" was what we figured we wanted to do.
The eyes of Ronald Regan are upon us. From his "We Will Be A City Upon A Hill" speech January 25, 1974:
You can call it mysticism if you want to, but I have always believed that there was some divine plan that placed this great continent between two oceans to be sought out by those who were possessed of an abiding love of freedom and a special kind of courage.
Standing on the tiny deck of the Arabella in 1630 off the Massachusetts coast, John Winthrop said, "We will be as a city upon a hill. The eyes of all people are upon us, so that if we deal falsely with our God in this work we have undertaken and so cause Him to withdraw His present help from us, we shall be made a story and a byword throughout the world."
"The last, best hope of man on earth."
Sissy,
You are uncanny! We at the 910 Groups were discussing possible logos for the CPC, and the "shining city on the hill" was what we figured we wanted to do.
Thanks for your kind words, and the reference to Miss Lazarus.
--B
Posted by: Baron Bodissey | December 01, 2006 at 11:06 PM
May the swell which you have brought to our attention grow to a huge reaffirmation of what created "The Shining City on a Hill". The efforts of you and your compatriot bloggers have begun to move the wave.
Posted by: goomp | December 02, 2006 at 06:22 AM
"The last, best hope of man on earth," and so we are. Continue your good work to alert the people.
Posted by: goomp | December 02, 2006 at 07:37 AM
Bravo.
Posted by: bird dog | December 02, 2006 at 01:11 PM
Beautiful post, Sissy.
Posted by: Tara | December 02, 2006 at 10:56 PM
Take one enormous Messianic complex, add multiple parts Red Dawn bravado, streak liberally with chickenhawk, fold in generous doses of Der Sturmer, shake and bake and what do you get? The contents of the "B" ark in Hitch Hikers Guide to the Galaxy. Please leave the telephone sanitizers on your way out.
Posted by: LanceThruster | December 03, 2006 at 11:54 PM
Well done, Sissy, and well said. Extraordinary insight and sensitivity and a welcome hearkening back to The Gipper who was so much more than the man his detractors scorned so viciously.
Posted by: Gayle Miller | December 04, 2006 at 09:28 AM