Just finished reading: "Preparing the Elders of Israel to Save the Constitution" by Steve M. Thomas

An interesting read from the LDS perspective of prophecy fulfillment involving the deterioration of freedom within the United States and the eventual rising of the "Elders of Israel" who save the Constitution. Thomas goes into the abuses of the Constitution that currently exist as well as lightly touching upon governmental philosophy. He backs up some of his statements with quotes from Ezra Taft Benson, but many of his claims are unfounded except as an appeal to oneself. His arguments weakend by his recurring us of the phrase "seem obvious", "obvious to any person", "you obviously have", and the like. Anyone that has studied philosophy or creating rational arguments knows this is a big no-no. By claiming something is 'obvious' you are simply saying, "I have no proof of this, but believe it anyways". This book (more of a pamphlet really) is a mere 103 pages. To properly cover the subject (as my AP History teacher would say) would have required at least five times that I think. Thomas skims over way too much just making statements that the reader is expected to accept at face value. Alot of his points are valid, and alot of his points could be backed up quite strongly, but he fails to do so, and it weakens the whole claim. I found myself agreeing with about 50% of what he was saying, but from the tone he takes writing it, that's only because I won't accept the truth of it. He comes across as very condescending, which also takes away from the rationality of the arguments being posed. He would argue that Federal Government should be so minimal that we hardly even notice its existence, and it hardly notices ours. While this sounds great, he then goes on to say that there should be no such thing as Federal Regulations in any industry, ok still pretty good. But lets think about the state of things before any Federal Regulation. Shall we read "The Jungle" by Upton Sinclair? Meat packing plants were disgusting before this book was published, forcing the creation of the Pure Food and Drug Act of 1906. I'd say that's a pretty good use of Federal Regulation. Ok, we don't know what might have happened if that Act hadn't been created, maybe people would have stopped buying meat until companies cleaned up their act, but more likely is nothing would have happened. In my personal opinion the majority of people are completely apathetic. They'll get riled up for a month or two, and then they'll forget it ever happened. Anyways, it was an interesting read, even though I refuse to agree with much of it, I do agree with alot of it, and believe that he could have written another 200 pages (on top of the additional 400 I suggested) to cover the Secret Combinations that exist outside the governement, but control the government nonetheless. I refer here to the RIAA, the MPAA, the Telecom giants, and many other organizations.

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