JudgeRight

You Judging Me

2009-02-16T12:33:00.000-08:00

In our society, the tendency to approach intellectual conflict with prejudices and with strategic attack and defense mechanisms makes open dialogue dishonest at worst and closed minded at best while providing the incentive and venue for the destruction of moral ideals. It is a real struggle to put these 'tools' aside to find the kernels of truth in the oppositions' arguments. If you manage to do this, you are a rare commodity. What is required is a deep and thorough research into the topic and wading through all the discourse which has already occurred. Assuming your opposition is ignorant, bigoted, prejudiced, and hate filled whether they are or not, closes your opportunities to discern and glean the merits of their arguments. If there is ever to be any progress in understanding and agreement, it begins with an open mind and most importantly, a love for the truth.
Contempt prior to investigation is a bar against all information, which is proof against all arguments and which cannot fail to keep man in everlasting ignorance.. William Paley 1794
The higher goal must be to acknowledge facts and truth. This is a difficult point for our youth today due entirely to the fact that so many of our schools are promulgating another anti-wisdom mantra. This one is known as subjective truth. "What's true for you isn't necessarily true for me and what's true for me isn't necessarily true for you." In point of fact, there is only and can only be one truth. "Healthy grass is green" is not subjective. Either its a true statement or its a false one. Opinions are not truth. Opinions are built on false conclusions and limited knowledge more easily than truth can be discerned from the observable facts. However, that mantra encourages the holders of opinions built on preference rather than fact to feel as obligated to express their biased by preference opinions as readily as those who've actually dug through the evidence and thoroughly investigated the truth to gain authority on the topic. In the interest of wisdom and good judgment, we must put aside our preferences and allow our bias to be subjected to criticism on the merits of the evidence.
Finally, we have to acknowledge that no one person can grasp all the facts in macro-complexity, but the best minds establish which facts give the greatest indicators of trends we may observe on a consistent basis. This is where studies performed by professionals and scientist achieve their value. Researchers dig up the best available information while scientist do the work of testing and observation to refute or confirm our assumptions. On the micro scale of interpersonal relationships, we observe the behaviors of those we have relationships with and how they react to our behavior. We lean on traditions and laws to establish which behaviors are acceptable versus repugnant. These traditions and laws are malleable to some extent, but if we are applying micro sensibilities to macro issues, we begin to see a breakdown of traditions and laws that have proven their worth to the society as a whole. Similarly, if we apply the macro sensibilities to our micro relationships, we act in bigoted and damaging ways to those who are nearest to us. One wrecks society the other wrecks individuals. Neither is acceptable. We have to begin to train our young people in the difference between macro benefiting decisions with and micro benefiting decisions in our interpersonal relationships.
In this endeavor, I welcome the examining and challenging of my positions so we can ascertain what is right, good and true. Be forewarned however, I will simultaneously be evaluating your grasp of the truth. Due to the aforementioned tactics, each of us must guard against the immoral influence of personal preference held by our opposition as readily as we guard against our own preferences and temptations to influence others with strategic tactics when our preferential and comfortable positions are untenable. These tactical methods of argument are as natural to us as breathing. We are raised by people and people have been arguing since the beginning of time. So, our parents and our siblings and our neighbors are all teaching us how to 'win' an argument from the time we begin to speak. What they aren't able to do, even if they utilize proper methods of argument is to teach us the advanced disciplined methods of keeping an open mind while simultaneously guarding against the influential strategic tactics of argumentation. This takes discipline, this takes commitment, this takes a love of truth and places it above the justification of our preferences.
Christian influence has held sway in this country from its inception simply because this nation was founded on Christian principals. Our traditions and law are handed down from Christian societies and the founders envisioned a new type of government. One that has never been tried before. That is: The rule of law which holds authority over its government representatives equally as over the common people. There are three motivations for the myriad of forces seeking to undo that rule of law. Each is vying for greater influence than their one vote. They can accomplish this through being elected or selected to positions of authority then use their authority to advocate their preferences. Another is to fund politicians' campaigns to essentially buy advocacy for their cause. This is done by big business and groups who've joined together in a common cause in the form of lobbyists. Still another is through journalism. A journalist's responsibility to inform the public puts him in a position of framing our national discourse and selecting the issues to be discussed. His position is more powerful than the politicians' or their funders' or even the courts and judges'.
Three reasons people advocate rather than manage: Money, Sex, and Power.

Power? how much easier democracy would be, from their point of view, if the views of religious Americans could be safely ignored as ignorant and bigoted. Imagine if Christians could be pushed out of the political process altogether. The strongest voice of opposition to their political aims would be gone. Rev. Wildmon has seen this from the beginning. He knows through first hand experience the battle parents face today teaching their families traditional moral values. And he and his organization have fought tooth and nail to preserve the right of Christians through America to voice their beliefs and bring their opinions to the public square.

Money? The legal vice industry in this country, including not just Hollywood and the media, but huge Fortune 500 companies you would never suspect, makes hundreds of billions, even trillions a year. Christian voters and citizens are their biggest foes, and they want those foes silenced.

Sex? The leadership of the homosexual movement and their allies in the ACLU know that whoever controls the classroom controls the future. All over the country they are pushing programs in public schools that teach Christianity is bigotry, and homosexuality is to be embraced as normal, the equivalent of married love. -- Ann Coulter
Under these circumstances, there is no room for open dialogue and honest discourse. Vast sums of money are being spent on both sides of every political issue and it is used to spread propaganda and hire the best tactical debaters to win their cause advances. Christianity does not stand alone in their fight to preserve the standards which birthed our country but they are the vast majority in that cause. With motivations like those listed above and with the crumbling of our moral traditions generation after generation, the corrupting influence is gaining ground in great strides. Whatever your pet cause, when you look out across the field of intellectual battle, you see other battles for morality and agree with the Christians in their stance on that issue or this issue, but the collective effect of all those attacks on our traditions and standards are whittling away at those traditions and the Christian voice of authority on issues of morality until now, the Christian community is being opposed by state run institutions which have been taken over by advocates for pet causes. These include schools from kindergarten through college to teach humanism and communism. Science has long been used in the effort to devalue the Christian view and now is to the point the Christian scientist has to be silent about his faith or face grant block out and near universal black balling his reputation and career. These are the facts noted in several books and documentaries lately produced, among them "Expelled" by Ben Stein. Thomas Woods notes in his latest book "Meltdown" a similar attack on free market advocates. These aren't legitimate means for setting policy but they are largely successful. and in the fervor to win, many good people with serious credible arguments and factual evidence are being steamrolled by the populist opinion. Another documentary called "Speechless, Silencing the Christians" reports case after case of abuses of the Christians' right to free speech as our speech is being blocked and literally outlawed in the same venues other doctrines are openly supported by those state run institutions.
In the end, we will be facing the same fate as Europe. Hear this secularist Englishman explain the end result of closing off discourse. Here is a government now being faced with violent threats and capitulating to the pressures of forceful dissidence while factions of the political body are signing on to this illegitimate source of power. Think it can't happen here? It already is. Our own political body is fracturing with support for every imaginable opposition to our founding fathers' dream of a free and open society. From ideological talk by the heaviest power brokers in Washington of reinstating the fairness doctrine to shut out the conservative voice which finds its niche on national radio and on the internet, to legally requiring any institution which receives any government funding from allowing any religious activities including speech.

If we are to avoid the inevitable results of totalitarianism (read dictatorship) as demonstrated across the globe over the last century, we have to break totalitarianist tactics and purposely set out to hear every viewpoint and consider it's contribution to the debate on each and every issue as though that voice had no other agenda with which we disagree. Take the truth of the arguments and filter out the advocacy. We must break the trend toward the squelching of speech. We must shatter the glass ceiling of contempt before investigation. I welcome the speech of bigots, homosexuals, Islam.... everyone across the spectrum, but I should not be forced to accept their advocacy as legitimate because somebody got offended by the rejection of their arguments. I welcome criticism of my judgment and behavior because I believe my behavior and judgment stack up to anybody's. I should hope you would welcome mine.

Google Hates Me

2008-04-14T15:08:00.000-07:00

I have been a blogger for two years and a G-mail client much longer and a Google search engine user even longer. I have been a Google cheerleader for a very long time but today that comes to an end unless and until I hear a public apology from Google for their immoral and illegal bias against the Christian religion. This story was sent to me today in a newsletter from One News Now. I am peeved and I've written Google to let them know and to demand that apology. So this will be my last post and indeed, the last of my relationship with Google unless they act rapidly to repair it. Its been fun, but fun is no payoff if I'm hated for my faith by those who provide the fun. No Christian and no conservative should continue to do any business with Google because Google is actively working to disenfranchise you for your beliefs.

http://www.onenewsnow.com/Business/Default.aspx?id=75557

Google UK won't sell ads to religious sites that discuss abortion

Jeff Johnson - OneNewsNow - 4/14/2008 8:00:00 AM

The world's largest Internet search engine has denied a British Christian group's application to advertise because the group's website addresses abortion from a religious perspective.

The Christian Institute -- a United Kingdom-based charity that promotes biblical beliefs -- recently applied to place ads (referred to as "adverts" in Great Britain) on Google UK. But Christian Institute's Mike Judge says they were denied. "[W]e wanted to place [an ad] on the issue of abortion," explains Judge. "And we wanted to advertise some of the articles that are on our website regarding that issue.

The ad would have stated: "UK Abortion Law – Key views and news on abortion from the Christian Institute" – and included a link to the group's website. Currently searching the word "abortion" on Google UK returns paid ads for abortion clinics and pro-abortion lobbying groups, and that is why Google UK's response shocked Judge.

"Google banned the ad," he continues, "[b]ecause they don't allow religious sites to place adverts on the issue of abortion. But they're quite happy to accept abortion adverts from non-religious sites."

Judge believes Google UK's response is an infringement of free speech, which is unlawful under British law. He says even Google admits they rejected the ad based on religion.

But the British Equality Act of 2006 makes it illegal to discriminate on a number of grounds, including religion. The Christian Institutes' attorney has since sent a letter to Google UK demanding that they publish the ad within seven days, and that they pay attorney's fees.

"We have not heard anything back from Google, and it is very rapidly approaching the end of that deadline," says Judge.

If Google fails to respond, Judge says he will "rapidly" proceed with legal action. He adds that the Christian Institute is hopeful this dispute will establish the right of all Christian groups to advertise on Google worldwide, not just in the UK.

So Long you prejudiced bigots.

Answering Attacks on Christianity

2008-03-21T17:20:00.000-07:00

This is the blog of a friend of mine. She had such an attack from the homosexuals and supporters that she at first deleted the comments because of the vulgarity and the vitriol. Then she thought better of it and enabled comments on the article again. She then invited me to come over and help her answer their attacks. Everything remaining on the blog is here.

I spent all night answering their attacks and then their charges and then their questions. I've copied and posted here so that readers can see how I work, so that readers can learn how to answer evil and their charges against Christianity.

High School Offers Homosexual Porn - Required Reading

Humbled Infidel
Mar 13, 2008 at 10:22 AM
68 comments
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Update: 3.13.08 I was receiving quite a few comments that were completely unacceptable on this post. I even changed my settings for comments to where none would be posted without my approval. But I decided to switch it back. I thought everyone should read the comments like the ones I deleted that will be posted here. They claim there is no homosexual agenda being pushed on our children. I say they are flat out liars! They are justifying this book as good literature because it won some award. Hum, I wonder who voted for that. I bet we can all guess correctly on that. Would anyone care to share what the agenda was behind that?

Again the intolerant of the those who would protect our children are screaming "Judge Not". If only they would practice what they preach!
Humbled Infidel

Update: Here is another article about this by CampusReportOnline.net

School-Sponsored Smut
by: Bethany Stotts, March 10, 2008

A new genre has been added to the list of promoted high school literature: racist gay porn. Deerfield High School of Deerfield, Illinois decided to integrate the Pulitzer Award-winning play, Angels in America: a Gay Fantasia On National Themes into its curriculum. The play features pervasive swearing, graphic sexual content, bigoted remarks, and involves sexual experiences profaning both angels and the Mother Theresa. If high schools are sensitive about assigning Mark Twain’s great classic, Huckleberry Finn, due to its pejorative language, then why is Deerfield High promoting Angels in America?

The book was actually required reading at Deerfield High until recently, but the school demoted it to an “optional title” after parents filed a formal complaint. This means that students who are willing to read the book can still receive course credit for it.

The Illinois Family Institute, which has launched a campaign against the book, provides excerpts (warning: extremely explicit content) from the book and estimates that the book contains 221 vulgar words. “The school justifies this egregious choice because of its themes of hope. Evidently, all great literature with themes of hope have already been exhausted so teachers need to start offering pornography. We say—enough,” Executive Director of North Shore Student Advocacy, Lora Sue Hauser, told IFI.

The Tennessee Herald-Citizen has come out in favor of Angels in America, publishing both a favorable review and article about the play’s local performance this February. Andrew William Smith, an English instructor for Tennessee Technological University describes the play and its characters as “epic,” “complex and controversial,” “profound” and “dynamic.” “Confronting issues such as gays, Republicans and gay Republicans, the play hilariously combines fantasy and reality, politics and pop culture, spirituality and sexuality,” he writes.

Similarly, the Herald-Citizen’s February 11 article mainly quotes the actors involved and vaguely alludes to the controversy as between liberals and conservatives. They quote Mark Creter as saying “‘Angels’ is the kind of play that you’ll want to talk about after you leave. It celebrates what it is to be human, both good and bad…Yes, it’s edgy. Yes, it’s adult, but it’s a smart show...It completely fulfills my mission to embrace important works that, because of its controversial nature, are avoided by educational institutions.” Deerfield High is apparently not so hasty to avoid such “controversial” material.

Staff writer Elizabeth Ayres writes that the play, which features gay themes, has “also been the root of controversy between liberal theater-goers and their more conservative counterparts.” This marginalizes opposition to the play as homophobic, rather than grounded on family values. Or are they meant to be considered the same thing?

“It’s disgraceful for [the high school staff], who have been entrusted to help mold the minds of Deerfield’s impressionable youth, to have abused those youth by ostensibly violating the very laws intended to protect them...Deerfield parents should seriously consider every possible legal option to ensure that these people are held accountable,” said Concerned Women for America Policy Director Matt Barber in a recent press release. But those legal options may be slim. According the CWA, Hauser was told by the State Attorney’s office that both state and federal obscenity laws specifically exempt educators from prosecution.

Barber rejected the idea, offered by some, that this is a free speech issue. “My jaw hit the ground when I read what’s in this book. This isn’t a First Amendment issue; this is about school officials betraying the community trust,” he said.

Bethany Stotts is a Staff Writer at Accuracy in Academia.

High School Offers Homosexual Porn, Parents Complain
By Pete Winn
CNSNews.com Senior Staff Writer
March 10, 2008

(Editor's Note: This story contains references to graphic material about homosexuality and violence.)

(CNSNews.com) - Parents in Deerfield, Ill., are upset that a local high school is using books in advanced English classes this spring that they say are laced with graphic sexual content, pervasive expletives and mockery of religion.

Worse, the books - "Angels in America: A Gay Fantasia on National Themes (Parts 1 & 2)" - are required reading for advanced placement English students at Deerfield High School, but a parents' group wants them removed.

"Who would have ever thought that we would be handing out pornography in public schools?" asked Lora Sue Hauser, executive director of North Shore Student Advocacy, and a Deerfield parent.

"The fact that this was required is even more astonishing," she told Cybercast News Service.

Hauser cites numerous examples of offensive passages from the text, including the following:

Man: What do you want?
Louis: I want you to f*** me, hurt me, make me bleed.
Man: I want to.
Louis: Yeah?
Man: I want to hurt you.
Louis: F*** me.
Man: Yeah.
Louis: Hard?
Man: Yeah. You been a bad boy?

(They begin to f***.)

(Louis slips his hand down the front of Joe's pants. They embrace more tightly. Louis pulls his hand out, smells and tastes his fingers, and then holds them for Joe to smell ... they kiss again.)

Hauser said her group formally challenged the use of the books in school, and a school district committee reviewed their challenge.

"It was quite a lengthy process," Hauser told Cybercast News Service. "They spent five or six weeks deciding whether this book should be removed. Their final answer was it would be taken off the required reading list and put on an 'optional title' list.

Peter LaBarbera, with Americans for Truth About Homosexuality, a conservative group, said the two books are simply parts 1 and 2 of a 10-year-old play on the topic of AIDS - one that has been heralded as "one of the great American plays of the 20th century."

In fact, playwright Tony Kushner won the Pulitzer Prize, and "Angels in America" won two Tony Awards. An HBO adaptation for television was nominated for an Emmy.

"It is defended as a literary work that shows forgiveness, kindness and compassion," LaBarbera said. "Of course, the first question that comes to my mind is, how many classical works of literature are there that show these virtues without delving into graphic homosexual sodomy?"

Parents like Hauser said the work, which even mocks the Catholic nun Mother Teresa, is porn - not literature - and offers bad messages:

Man: I think it broke. The rubber. You want me to keep going? (Little pause) Pull out? Should I --
Louis: Keep going. Infect me. I don't care. I don't care.

"There's no other way to describe this," Hauser said. "It is so egregious and so vulgar. I've been doing advocacy in schools a long time - and this is the worst thing I've seen."

She added: "It's an example of what I call 'the competition of edginess.' High schools across the country have this 'thing' going, where they choose literature or they choose programming or curricula that pushes the envelope, and keeps pushing the envelope - and now after years and years of it, this is what we've ended up with - clearly pornographic materials."

While the books may be pornographic, they aren't legally prosecutable as obscenity, as the parents' group soon found out.

"The first route we went down was the criminal, because we saw this as distributing material that is harmful to minors," Hauser said. "But basically you can't prosecute schools and libraries, because all they have to do is say there is some educational purpose for these materials."

Pat Trueman, who ran the U.S. Justice Department's obscenity enforcement unit from 1988 through 1992, confirmed what the group found out is true.

"Federal obscenity law says that material can be prosecuted as obscene if it appeals to a prurient interest - that is, a shameful or morbid interest in sex - and if it is patently offensive, and if it doesn't have any literary, artistic, scientific or philosophical value. That's the situation you run into if it doesn't have pictures and is just the written word," Trueman told Cybercast News Service.

The fact that pornographic books can be protected from prosecution if they have "serious literary value" doesn't surprise parents, but it is disappointing.

"These laws need to be changed," Hauser said.

Hauser noted that this isn't the first time that Deerfield High School and the school district have come at cross-purposes to parents. The district ordered 14-year-old freshmen to take a seminar that amounted to homosexual indoctrination, she said, and had them sign a confidentiality agreement promising not to tell their parents.

Matt Barber, policy director for cultural issues at Concerned Women for America, a conservative group, is stunned by the actions.

"It's not enough that students at Deerfield High are being exposed to improper and offensive material relative to unhealthy and high-risk homosexual behavior, but they've essentially been told by teachers to lie to their parents about it," Barber said.

Calls to Deerfield school superintendent George Fornero and other administrators were referred to the district's communications director, who did not respond to interview requests prior to press time.

More links about this story.
http://libertyjustincase.com/2008/03/10/call-me-a-prude/

cnsnews.com/ViewCulture.asp [cnsnews.com]

kxmd.com/getArticle.asp [kxmd.com]

Make media inquiries or request an interview with Pete Winn.

Subscribe to the free CNSNews.com daily E-brief.

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Porn doesn't belong in any high school.

Humbled Infidel replied to Eudora’s comment:
Mar 11, 2008
Reply

I agree Eudora! Who do these people think they are to put this crud on our children?

I say everyone should pull their children out of the public education system. That would get their attention. This will continue unless we stop it.

Why are we surprised? The left wing liberals have been pushing the homosexual agenda for years, and conservatives have been passive about countering this sort of smut. It was only a matter of time before it came back to bite us. It is a result of sloth and lack of diligence on the part of mainstream Americans. (To choose not to act is action.) It is time to WAKE UP AMERICA!! Before we GIVE our country away without a fight! Pornography is the cancer of our society, and homosexual indoctrination is the most malignant kind. We have to purge our country of this sickness, and the cure isn't easy. I believe most Americans would vehemently disagree with this "literature" being "required" reading in the schools, but the libs have been running the schools for more than 20 years. That means this generation doesn't know anything else. And we are a morally "fat" society. Americans are overweight because it is too difficult or inconvenient to eat right and exercise. We are morally fat for the same reasons. It is too difficult or inconvenient to stand for what is right.

Humbled Infidel replied to Lexann’s comment:
Mar 11, 2008
Reply

[this is good]

Well said Lexann - that is the exact problem. People find themselves to busy to be bothered by "politics." I call that an excuse. It's a shame what people are allowing our children of the U.S. to be indoctrinated with this vile sinful, deadly lifestyle.

Can our country really claim to love the children of this country, when they won't do anything to protect them? I say no! Claiming and doing are opposites in this matter.

[this is good]

These Liberals are surely parents themselves.I can't help but wonder what goes on in their own homes. When I heard this on the news my stomach felt as if it were tying in knots.If we were found to be teaching our own kids such as this surely our children would be taken out of the home, as Well they should Be!

Now the "Liberals" are also trying to force out Home Schooling, and Very soon Private schools. I am blessed to live in a small town in Louisiana, with most of my grands and greats going to small rural schools, where everybody knows everybody, and for the Present,at least,this would not be tolerated. Also we have in this state an organization with branches covering every Parish, which meets together to Pray for our state and local government and officials.

Do you suppose that the people from smaller towns might somehow stick together to overcome these outlandish things which take root in the big cities??? ....just a thought but it couldn't hurt to try!!! :)

Thank you for posting this, and shining a spotlight on the absolute hypocrisy of it all.

Humbled Infidel replied to SallyTomato’s comment:
Mar 11, 2008
Reply

Your welcome. I was reading tonight about Anita Bryant. I had no idea why the orange juice lady was all of a sudden not seen much anymore. But tonight I now know it was because she spoke out about the gay agenda many years ago. She spoke of how far it wanted to go, and she was right.

She is a great role model! Even thought she knew she'd loose all she did, she still stood on principles. She didn't falter. This is a women who should be in our history books. The article is here.

Humbled Infidel replied to Ruth J Taylor’s comment:
Mar 11, 2008
Reply

Yes, I think your right. I also live in a small town. Everyone knows each other and everyone watches out for each others kids. There is big time praying here and also between all of the churches here in my community, they really attract
the kids. Church, youth groups and bible study make a big difference in a small town. I would think it would do the same in the communities in the larger cities. But larger cities are more busy.

I organized a youth group for a preacher of a church here in my community. (not my own church). He and their church asked me if I'd run it and they'd get me some helpers. I did and one thing I did differently was, even though they were young children, we did major bible studies. I was up front with them about all involved in the Bible studies.

After about a year some of the parents thought it might be too much for them since they were young. So I cut back on the Bible Studies. To all of our amazement, the kids wanted to know what happened to the 'real bible lessons'.
So I started them back up again.

We also drew in unchurched kids, and plus I wanted the parents to have a heads up on what we were teaching their children so I would also prepare an adult paper with all of the information plus more in the hopes the lessons would continue at home and what we learned would be lived in the home. Some parents liked it, some did not. Some said they were to busy, or other reasons. But they had the resources at their finger tips with scripture references handy if their children had any questions. I loved it, I hope it's made a difference in the childrens lives.

I do get big hugs from some of these kids when I see them. It's been awhile since I did the Youth group. Awhile back, one of the girls told me she was getting baptized and asked me if I'd come to her church so I could see her get baptized. She is precious!

Also we have had our share of outlandish behavior problems here with some kids, but by the whole town watching out for each others kids, we usually get it taken care of. Not usually in an authoritarian way, but by trying loving all the kids even the hard to love ones. I am in no way a person who allows bad behavior though. If a kids being naughty I call them on it. We do the entire 'why it's wrong, who it hurts and how God see the behavior. But it has to be in love or it instantly puts up walls and defeats the purpose. I also insist apologies to be made by their acknowledgment of their behavior, how it hurt the person or people and why they won't do it again. Sometimes it can take hours, but they are worth it.

Some parents do think I'm too strick, but I don't see a shortage of kids wanting to come to my house and hang out with us. Not in a bedroom, but with all of us together. I've also not had any complaints from kids, or rolling of the eyes either.

There is one big difference with me too! They can also hold me accountable and I respond to them in the same way I expect it from them. Yes, I sin, they see it and they lovingly are allowed to rebuke me when needed. And follow through with the apology. But they don't go overboard, they actually don't like disciplining anymore than I do. So it works out well.

Hillary was half right when she wrote the book, "It takes a village"
I think I need to expound on this principal in a new post on my blog. It does take a village to raise kids, but the village has to agree on the principals the village will instill in them. Your approach with the Bible studies kept everybody informed and left them the option of pulling them out or insisting they attend.
In the case of "Required Reading" in a public school where "Attendance is Required" under threat of state authority is not the right approach to education and information. The contrast is stark and Hillary's half truth is a whole lie.

Humbled Infidel replied to JudgeBob’s comment:
Mar 12, 2008
Reply

[this is good]

Your right. The principles have to match up. Don't get me wrong there are those in my village that does not agree with Biblical teachings, but they are not in my face about it.

As far as school - that is the topic here and I did get off topic. I look forward to reading your post, please let me know when you get it posted.

This book is more than exposing readers to other lifestyles, it is porn - which I thought shouldn't be provided to under 18 year old kids.

Humbled Infidel replied to Eudora’s comment:
Mar 13, 2008
Reply

Eudora I'm curious as to how this book would have any academical value. What kind of job would this train up someone for?

I never thought I'd seen the day when everyone in America would consider literature porn.

Ban To Kill a Mockingbird for the racial undertones. And while you're at it, move back to the deep south and reinstate slavery.

Since regression is obviously the best way to achieve progress.

Humbled Infidel replied to Marcus’ comment:
7 days ago
Reply

Definitions taken from The New Lexicon Webster's Dictionary of the English Language - Deluxe Encyclopedic Edition

Porn: n. short for pornography -
porn, porno, porny adj.

pornographer: n. a person who writes etc. pornography

pornographic: adj. of , relating to, or characterized by pornography

pornography: n. obscene literature, photographs, paintings etc., intended to
cause sexual excitement // the treating of obscene subjects in art, literature
etc. [fr. Gk pornographos, writings of harlots]

Man: What do you want?
Louis: I want you to f*** me, hurt me, make me bleed.
Man: I want to.
Louis: Yeah?
Man: I want to hurt you.
Louis: F*** me.
Man: Yeah.
Louis: Hard?
Man: Yeah. You been a bad boy?
(They begin to f***.)

(Louis slips his hand down the front of Joe's pants. They embrace more tightly. Louis pulls his hand out, smells and tastes his fingers, and then holds them for Joe to smell ... they kiss again.)

Yes this is porn. Any questions?

"To kill a Mockingbird -racial undertones"

I've not read the book, but if anyone that is not gay, would you share with me if this is a book of racial undertones.

"and while your at it, move back to the deep south and reinstate slavery"

I live in the south and we don't want slavery. Neither does anyone in the south want to be under slavery. That is one reason why we don't want illegal aliens here in our country. They are living under a form of slavery. But I bet you support open borders and illegal aliens coming in. So that would be you reinstating slavery.

"regression is obviously the best way to achieve progress."

Progress of healthy lifestyles and loving relationships as opposed to unnatural and unhealthy lifestyles.

If your interested here are some health issues that result from man on man sexual (homosexual) intercourse.

Many HIV-Positive Males Unaware their infected

New Staph Infection Spreads Among Gay Males

Medical Issues

S.F. gay community an epicenter for a new strain of virulent staph

As you will see homosexual intercourse is very dangerous. So would I teach my kids this is an alternative lifestyle? No, I'd teach them this is a choice of death.

Man you have to be dumb to refer to the Pulizer as "some prize."

Are you really calling these people gay?

Current Members of The Pulitzer Prize Board
(Updated 12/06/07)

Click on image to enlarge

front row: N. Lemann, S. Gissler, J. Byrd, P. Steiger, A.M. Lipinski, M. Pride, A. Bennett
back row: K. Carroll, D. Graham, G. Moore, T. Friedman, D. Kennedy, P. Tash, J. Harris, A. Gyllenhaal, D. Allen, R. Oppel, J. Amoss.

Lee C. Bollinger, President, Columbia University

Danielle Allen, UPS Foundation Professor, School of Social Science, Institute for Advanced Study

Jim Amoss, Editor, Times-Picayune, New Orleans, La.

Amanda Bennett, Executive Editor/Enterprise, Bloomberg News

Joann Byrd (co-chair), Former Editor of the Editorial Page, Seattle Post-Intelligencer

Kathleen Carroll, Executive Editor and Senior Vice President, Associated Press

Thomas L. Friedman., Columnist, The New York Times

Paul Gigot, Editorial Page Editor, The Wall Street Journal

Donald E. Graham, Chairman, The Washington Post

Anders Gyllenhaal, Executive Editor, The Miami Herald

Jay T. Harris, Wallis Annenberg Chair, Director, Center for the Study of Journalism and Democracy, Annenberg School of Communication, University of Southern California

David M. Kennedy, Donald J. McLachlan Professor of History, Stanford University

Nicholas Lemann, Dean, Graduate School of Journalism, Columbia University

Ann Marie Lipinski, Senior Vice President and Editor, Chicago Tribune

Gregory L. Moore, Editor, The Denver Post

Richard Oppel, Editor, Austin American-Statesman

Mike Pride (co-chair), Editor, Concord (N.H.) Monitor

Paul Tash, Editor, CEO, and Chairman, St. Petersburg Times

Sig Gissler, Administrator, Graduate School of Journalism

It's really sad that the writer of this blog has children.

I hope they grow up to be better people than she is.

What's really ironic is that this blog has the word "freedom" in the upper right hand corner, given that it's clearly a blog in support of Christian fascism.

This makes me almost ashamed to be an American.

I saw this play on Broadway, as well as its sequel. It was extremely difficult to watch, and disturbed me on many levels.

And I loved it. I loved that I was pushed to my mental and emotional limits. It forced me to think about what I view as right and wrong, good and evil. It made me realize just was the AIDS crisis was about, and how devastating it was to so many of the people I loved, and lost because of it.

I understand that the language unsettles you. If I had been assigned this in high school, my mother would have probably hit the roof. At first. But she would have read it herself, and talked to my teacher, and heard his point of view as to what academic value it had. And if she had been convinced, she would have changed her mind. If she hadn't changed her mind, she would have made sure we talked about the book, together, at length, while I was studying it.

It's a private matter between the teacher, his students, and their parents. It's really none of your business. If this was happening in YOUR school, to YOUR kid, then deal with it. But to incite others to snap judgments is ignorant.

Oh, but am I really naive enough to think I'll change YOUR mind? I can see by your blogroll that you've already inciting ignorance on a variety of subjects.

Get off your ass, go see the world, meet all these predatory gays and scary Muslims and creepy Mexicans you feel are around every corner. Look them in the eye, hear their stories, share their lives and their joys and disappointments and families and laughter, and then come back and tell me you still think you know all the answers.

Or, just all go and fill your kids' minds with your own prejudices and ignorance. It makes me wish there WERE a Rapture - we need a do-over.

Maybe this woman's kids are gay. If so that's probably a good thing, given that it means that her genes won't reproduce.

What is troubling about this crap, I don't care if the Pulitzer claim it is anything else, is that it is troubling for Miss C and still she thinks its appropriate for children. What's worse is that it is controversial. This means that many parents are concerned about the moral implications. Parents have the right and the responsibility to instill morals in their children. The state does not have the right and it should not have the responsibility to choose the morals we want instilled. That's what's wrong. Not that this is or is not literature. It may be classic, I don't approve, but it may be a provoker of thought. It is a provoker precisely because of the lack of morals it portrays. That does not belong in a community education system required for our kids to attend.
What does belong in our educational system is what we all agree needs to be taught. This is especially true when American children are graduating among the worst achievement levels in the world. We want the education system to concentrate on doing a better job, not on doing our job.

JudgeBob, the main reason why America has the lowest achievement levels in the world is because of people like this blogger. Most of Europe and the Far East, which have higher achievement levels allow their children to be exposed to great literature like this. Those countries also teach evolution and not Intelligent Design.

As soon as Christians stop trying to impose their values on school boards, America's achievement standards will improve.

JudgeBob,

You're 100% right; it's not safe for children. Of course not. However, it IS safe for 17 and 18 year olds who are on a college track taking AP English classes.
You say, "It is a provoker precisely because of the lack of morals it portrays. That does not belong in a community education system required for our kids to attend." First of all, no one is required to take AP English. Secondly, surely you must be joking. How are we to know what we're for, or against, or what's wrong or righteous in this world if we are not met with all the possible alternatives? Do you really not trust people in their late teens from good homes to be able to form their own opinions? Do you not think that maybe it's the parents' job to instill a strong sense of right and wrong in their children, so when faced with things that are in this world, they can tell right from wrong, moral from immoral? And moreover, do you honestly think that a group of parents would be able to agree on a curriculum for their children? Have you ever been to a PTA meeting?!

We need to raise educated thinkers, not sheltered sheep. No civilization ever got by by blindly believing in one point of view.

Humbled Infidel replied to JudgeBob’s comment:
7 days ago
Reply

Judge I'm not responding to these people. I'm allowing their comments to stay because their own words are exposing their intolerance of Christian values in their hope of disgracing them. I'm also for exposing their demand and justifications to shove this disgusting crap down people's throats disguised as education.

I refuse to argue with these people, they're not here for any reason except to force their immoral standards and porn on us. They have no desire to deliberate and look for what is best for our children.

They don't like their sins to be challenged or to be labeled sinful!

Humbled Infidel, have you even read the play?

supermatt41 replied to Humbled Infidel’s comment:
7 days ago
Reply

Ugh. Please. As a gay man, I have no intention of forcing any standard on you, your family or your community.
If you really want to know what the gay agenda is, perhaps you should sign up for our newsletter, which is delivered in a handbag full of rainbows by a flying unicorn. Then you can judge us all you wish, as well as copy down the recipe for grilled salmon burgers, which is featured this month.

supermatt41 replied to supermatt41’s comment:
7 days ago
Reply

Also, why did you delete the rest of this post? I find that fascinating.

Humbled Infidel replied to supermatt41’s comment:
7 days ago
Reply

supermatt41 I didn't delete any of your post. You'll have to repost it. There has been a problem with that occasionally on Vox. It's not just on my blog but several others that I know of have had the same problem.

Also I couldn't delete only part of any comment. It would be all or nothing.

I've decided to not remove any comments from this post. They speak for themselves. Hey by the way, thanks for being civil. That's very much appreciated and noticed.

I disagree that it is safe for 17 and 18 year old children. They are still children, otherwise they'd be voters, drinkers, and spouses. They're not ready for critical thinking unless their parents are actively instilling morals in them early. That's why home schoolers are getting the results they are. (tops-actively recruited by those colleges because they are prepared) whereas publicly educated are required to take preparatory classes before they are ready. and they were required to read this smut, but the outrage of their parents made the school change it to optional. That's not even good enough in my mind. Again, they should focus on teaching what we all agree should be taught and stop trying to do the parents' job of mandating their version of morals.

I am not joking, kids are not naturally good people. We have to fight our natures, and kids have to be taught how to fight our natures and what ideals to work toward. That's why the smut is not good. Most kids never get training in good judgment. And the schools are enforcing non-judgmentalism to the point there is no room for any judgment. Read through my blogs and you'll get a lot deeper understanding of what I mean. My blog focuses not on outrages, but on using good judgment.

JudgeBob, I'm not sure why you think teaching Angels in America is teaching the "morals" of the characters in the play.

More likely than not the point is to teach good writing by example.

Most literature has examples of characters who make good choices and other characters who make bad choices. No one is expected to associate themselves with every character in a story.

Are there flawed human beings who make bad choices in Angels in America? Sure there are. But, the play also shows other characters who make good choices.

A reasonably qualified teacher would discuss with the students how they feel about the way the characters interact and the consequences of their choices, both good and bad.

Then, the teacher would spend the majority of the time talking about how the text was written and how the structure of the writing elevates it above other written works of the same era.

On this post people are making a big deal about the scene where one of the gay characters behaves very, very irresponsibly - but the play itself makes it clear that he's not a role model and he does face consequences for his choices.

I would guess that in almost any text of this size written after 1950 or so you could take a couple paragraphs out of context and make it seem horrible. Heck, there are moments in Catcher In The Rye that out of context would seem pornographic.

What really matters, and what any reasonable teacher will stress, is the way Kushner phrases things and how he manipulates language so that almost ever scene could have multiple meanings.

I agree with you that this play would not be appropriate if taught in a high school philosophy class, because then you would be talking about the moral elements of the characters.

But in English class you are talking about the use of language and this play uses language in a way that is not only interesting, but if taught properly will prepare students for college level writing work.

I'm a straight guy and I'll admit there are elements in the play that are disturbing - but it's a play about a disturbing part of American history. In the same way that a play about Nazi Germany would be disturbing - because that part of world history is in and of itself disturbing. But that doesn't mean it shouldn't be talked about.

At 18, people are eligible to vote, marry, and in some states and certainly in most developed countries, where they trust their children, drink.

"Most kids never get training in good judgment." Aha. This is where we come to the crux of our argument. I was raised to have an excellent understanding of right and wrong. Sometimes I did not exercise it, but I did so always knowingly, and with full knowledge of the consequences of my actions. That, I find, is good judgment - even though I messed with it sometimes.

Kids push boundaries. It's what they do. It's what helps them to be better adults. But, I digress.

If parents exercised and taught good judgment at home, then works of art like Angels in America could be extremely useful things in schools. But parents don't teach their children objectively; they teach them their own prejudices, and their own narrow view of the world from a previous generation. Parents need to teach their children to see the world the way it is, and appreciate their place in it, and to know right from wrong. And you want to get all Christian on this tip? Then teach the true word of the Jesus - forgiveness WITHOUT JUDGMENT, love thy neighbor, turn the other cheek. LOVE ALL MANKIND. All mankind, by the way, includes Mexicans, Muslims and gay men.

Humbled Infidel replied to Miss C.’s comment:
7 days ago
Reply

Miss C this was for freshmen in highschool. What age is that?

Taking scripture and twisting it to fit your twisted view is not helpful. But I'll leave that to JudgeBob, for he can explain it much better than I can.

And your justifying kids bad behavior as "it's what they do"...Bad form of thinking! It's not what they do, it's what their enabled to do by adults justifying bad behavior as it's what they do. You may live you life like that, I say thank God you don't have a imput on my children!

You're an absolute idiot.

I don't care about the educational application you might be able to draw from this play. It presents morality issues that I don't approve of, period. It is not for the school to display this smut to my kid, period. The school teachers and administrators might approve or they might not. It is not for them to decide, period. This is why conservatives and Christians feel like it is being pushed on us. It is for the parent to instill morals, it is for the schools to teach people to read, write, and otherwise know how to obtain information. There are much less controversial works, interesting and relevant works that don't present foul language, indecent acts, and glorification of evil behavior. If it weren't controversial, I would want the kid to glean something from the skill it was created with, but the amoral society of today does not see the harm it can do to present this behavior to our youth.

Look, you don't want your 7 year old exposed to cage fights because the 7 year old emulates the aggression. In the same way I don't want my 17-18 year old exposed to indecency, and especially by a school who apparently believes they are not accountable to the parents. Its hard enough to teach our kids to fight their natures to grow into healthy adults. Yes we shield them from this kind of crap, for as long as we possibly can. There are plenty of examples in their lives without this, that we parents have to help them understand and fight within themselves. This school is in effect promoting the behavior depicted within the play by not addressing the morals, or not addressing them in the same direction the majority of parents would. Its not even their job.

The key fact here is that it is controversial. Controversy seems to be the aim of the schools these days. Its not fair to the parents, and its not fair to the kids. I don't even want this crap in a college course I would be taking, why on earth would I want my kid to have to deal with it. It might exist, but it is extreme, and certainly isn't healthy behavior.

There is no excuse for pinpointing this work when there are so many good works to pick from. Works that edify good morals.

"Then teach the true word of the Jesus - forgiveness WITHOUT JUDGMENT, love thy neighbor, turn the other cheek. LOVE ALL MANKIND. All mankind, by the way, includes Mexicans, Muslims and gay men." Oh no you didn't!!! You want to preach my religion to me you hypocrite? Fine, give me the verses' addresses. What book do you find them in, what chapter? Have you even read them for yourself? Did you read them in context of the thought they framed? I demand an apology from you leftist hypocrites or anybody who's ever condemned a Christian for judging. I and my entire faith have been labeled hypocrites for exercising our God given responsibility to use good judgment. You have managed to convince nearly all of pop culture to judge and condemn us for judging. By mis-using our scriptures, you take one verse out of context and reduce thousands of years of wisdom to a three word bumper sticker slogan, "Don't Judge People" or "You Shouldn't Judge" effectively hijacking the lesson it was meant to teach and twisting it to fit your self centered agenda to continue in whatever sin you feel judged for. I'd be shocked if any of you could name the verse you so glibly quote to justify this charge against us. Even if you could, you wouldn't be able to quote the next verse or any other verse that supports it, yet you have the nerve to quote our Holy Book to us without any understanding of its proper application.
I will rip your self righteous prejudiced condemnation of us to shreds and expose your hypocrisy before God and everybody if you try doing that to my face. If you ever do decide to read a scripture, try this verse; [John 7:24 "Do not judge according to appearance, but judge with righteous judgment."] Oh my God, open these hearts to the truth and make them face their shame for shaming the righteous. Don't snort! We know we are not perfect, neither are we wrong about this. Righteousness is one of those buzz words you hypocrites, who don't like being judged but, enjoy judging us for. If you had any idea what righteousness we speak of, you'd know your judgment of us is unfounded and just plain wrong.
I suppose you'll try to judge and condemn me for being angry next. When I am wronged, and especially when my entire faith is condemned on the basis of a prejudice, I have, not only a right, but a responsibility to be angry. Its called righteous anger and the Bible reference for that is Eph 4:25-27. [25 Therefore, putting away lying, each one speak truth with his neighbor, for we are members of one another. 26 Be angry, and do not sin" do not let the sun go down on your wrath, 27 nor give place to the devil.] It means I have to speak the truth, it means I have to say it in the face of those indulging in self delusion. It means I shouldn't bottle it up because that would give place to the devil using it in me to create my own prejudice. So if you don't like being judged with righteous proper judgment, tough, that doesn't give you license to judge us with prejudice and unrighteous improper judgment.

Humbled Infidel - Freshman in high school? Yeah, that's a bit young. I'd wait until senior year at least, if not college. I would be uncomfortable with my freshman son or daughter reading this; there's simply too much that has to be brought up to put it all in context, and I am not sure if when I was 13 or 14 I would have been able to comprehend all of it. But, let the parents of that school decide for themselves, and stop making it sound like we're all going to Hell in a handbasket because one teacher has a really messed up sense of age-appropriate behavior. For every one of him there are a dozen teachers who are good people just trying to get kids to understand the world and prepare them for being decent grown-ups. Give the education system a break.

Judge Bob - Watch out, you're judging me! LOL

Gee, it looks like we're finally talking about literature! Excellent. And we're choosing one of the most controversial books today - arguably the one up for the most interpretation, and so easily picked apart for one's own purposes.

The quotes you choose are so typical - as mine are, below. You can find a Bible quote that justifies anyone's reasoning. But, I'll play along. I knew one day that my 14 years of Catholic school and intense Bible study would be of use eventually!

I'm not partial to John's version of judgment, myself, as the whole misdefined "righteous" thing doesn't sit well with me. I like more of the one-two punch from Matthew and Romans in reply:

Matthew 7:2-5 esp. "You hypocrite, first take the plank out of your own eye, and then you will see clearly to remove the speck from your brother's eye." and Romans 10:3 "Since they did not know the righteousness that comes from God and sought to establish their own, they did not submit to God's righteousness."

It's that last one I love the best, because I find it so apt for those who think they know EXACTLY what God's thinking ALL THE TIME ON EVERY SUBJECT. The mysteries of God are great and unknowable; we can only hope to discover an unfathomably small percentage of His ways. I certainly don't claim to know. Apparently, you do. So be it.

I don't like someone telling their small child that Jesus doesn't want them to have a candy bar before dinner and then turn around to me and say I take the Bible out of context. (Yes, that really happened to me, so I'm not hyperbolizing - and it wasn't the only time something ridiculous was attributed to Jesus in my presence.)

I'm not condemning anyone's faith. I'm not going to tell my Hindu friends or my Jewish friends or my Muslim friends that they're WRONG for not believing in Jesus, and I don't like Jesus' name thrown around for the purpose of promoting one's own agenda. NO one's right, and NO one's wrong. The people who use the Koran to justify blowing themselves up are no worse than the people who use the Bible to justify shooting doctors. The tenets of EVERY faith preach love and understanding; it's the crazies who pick the most incendiary parts to rationalize their hatred, bigotry and fear.

More of my favorite quotes from the Bible, which give me great comfort in my belief that God is good and probably wants everyone to just shut up now - Psalms 103:

(2) Praise the Lord, I tell myself, and never forget the good things he does for me. (8)The Lord is merciful and gracious; he is slow to get angry and full of unfailing love.

My favorite, though, is from Psalms 104:24 - O Lord, what a variety of things you have made! In wisdom you have made them all. The earth is full of your creatures.

We're ALL God's creatures. Me. You. The Pulitzer committee. Gay men. The Dalai Lama. Palestinian teenagers. Kim Jong Il. If He made us all, then He loves us all; and if He loves us all, and I want to be more like Him, then so will I love us all. People mess up; do we need to get so hysterical and Chicken Little about it?

I find myself unable to be swayed from this opinion, just as I am sure you're unable to be swayed from yours.

Oh, alright, a parting potshot from Matthew 21:31, the oh, snap! moment to a rollicking good story I'm sure you know and that's mighty apt here:

"I assure you, corrupt tax collectors and prostitutes will get into the Kingdom of God before you do."

Miss C. replied to supermatt41’s comment:
6 days ago
Reply

SuperMatt! You are so full of win.

bart replied to Humbled Infidel’s comment:
6 days ago
Reply

You have to be a high school senior to take AP English.

["Gee, it looks like we're finally talking about literature! Excellent. And we're choosing one of the most controversial books today - arguably the one up for the most interpretation, and so easily picked apart for one's own purposes."]

Yes, its controversial, that's why it is not being taught in schools today! though the vast majority prefer it was. Instead my 7th grade nephew is taught the Qu'ran and told to wear Muslim dress and recite a Muslim prayer. HMM. no hypocrisy there?

["You can find a Bible quote that justifies anyone's reasoning."
"I'm not partial to John's version of judgment"]

You took the first quote, and took it out of context. Until then I wasn't using any scripture. I was arguing from a secular standpoint. Now you accuse me of taking it out of context to justify my stance. The opposite is true, I have been putting into context to correct your out of context. You admit you are cherry picking your verses. You seemed to like John in the first application of scripture, now you don't?
Taking Bible quotes out of context is the whole point of my response to you telling me what Jesus said. What does the whole verse and more importantly the whole thought entail? hmm. Not to judge unrighteously, NOT just do not judge. For by the same measure in which you or I judge is the measure by which we will be judged. So there you were judging me for judging with the measure by which I want to be judged. (Righteous judgment) I haven't condemned anybody, but I have followed the direction all the scriptures give me. To tell the truth, to present the path of life to others. That's the love I am instructed to have for my neighbor, not to ignore their sin and allow them to trot merrily off to Hell. I don't pass judgment, it is not the same as using good judgment to 1 recognize sin 2 to call sin sin 3 not to allow that influence to get into my kids. So far #3 is the only application I've used here until I got preached to about using my judgment. That's when I got mad, and that's when I pronounced a judgment on you. Even that was not a condemnation of you, but a naming of an obvious truth to correct your judgment of me.

By the way the next scripture you quote is very applicable. You just need to reverse the application. I have pulled the plank out of my eye. (Salvation) Its taking years to heal, but I see a lot clearer these days. I am submitting to God's righteousness. In that verse He was referring to non-believers, not believers.

["It's that last one I love the best, because I find it so apt for those who think they know EXACTLY what God's thinking ALL THE TIME ON EVERY SUBJECT. The mysteries of God are great and unknowable; we can only hope to discover an unfathomably small percentage of His ways. I certainly don't claim to know. Apparently, you do. So be it."]

I don't claim to know all His ways, does that mean I shouldn't claim to know any of His ways? He makes the homosexual thing awfully clear. He also makes the 'protecting your kids' from evil influences' pretty clear.

["NO one's right, and NO one's wrong."] There you go with that, 'no judgment' thing again. of course there is a right and a wrong, that's why He tells us to judge with righteous judgment. How can you pick a religion without judgment? And no, they don't all preach kindness and light. They might call what they teach light, but I can do a little research and show you verses in the Qu'ran that instruct the Muslims to lie to the infidel, to subjugate them, place a special tax on them, kill anyone who leaves their religion, kill all the Jews, kill the homosexuals. I don't find that stuff in the New Testament. One is right, one is wrong. Christians may have done some bad things in the name of religion, but the foundation of the religion didn't support them. The Muslims extremism is found in the Qu'ran. And no, I don't put all Muslims on the judgment seat for the works of the few, they do that themselves by complaining about being labeled Islamo-Fascist. They identify themselves with the extremists. Whites aren't up in arms about the label being placed on white Supremists. We recognize the White Supremists as evil. Blacks don't get up in arms about the Black Panthers name, they know the Black Panthers are evil. Its only Muslims who do this.

["The tenets of EVERY faith preach love and understanding"] NO, they don't. You grew up in a Western culture where these things are normal, but they are not taught the same way in the East. They are taught to be nice to each other and to subjugate everyone else. Everyone, from the president to the Main Stream Media are not giving you the information you need to understand what's going on. In Iran and the Palestenian Authority they teach grade school kids to kill anyone not of their faith until they submit to Islam. There are schools right here in America that are teaching the same things without the firearms drills and the marching. I have an old article on my other blog at http://judgeright.blogspot.com called "In Their Own Words" showing videos of this as well as their most popular leaders speaking to thousands in attendance about subjugating the whole world, and they aren't quoting the Qu'ran out of context.

["God is good and probably wants everyone to just shut up now"] Jesus said spread the good news to the four corners of the Earth, That's hardly instruction to 'shut up!'

["he is slow to get angry and full of unfailing love"]
yes, that is what it says, but again, you are cherry picking to get what you want out of it. Slow doesn't mean never, someday we are going to sit on that judgment box, and nations and ideologies tend to get judged here and now to turn people back to God.

["We're ALL God's creatures. Me. You. The Pulitzer committee. Gay men. The Dalai Lama. Palestinian teenagers. Kim Jong Il. If He made us all, then He loves us all; and if He loves us all, and I want to be more like Him, then so will I love us all. People mess up; do we need to get so hysterical and Chicken Little about it? "]

God did not make Pulitzer committees or Gay men or Palestinian jihadi's, He made babies and they grew up to choose what they would become. Its on those choices that He makes His judgments. In the meantime, He is calling us to follow Him, to submit to His will.

["I find myself unable to be swayed from this opinion, just as I am sure you're unable to be swayed from yours."]

As you've demonstrated all the way through this conversation, no amount of reason matters to you, you want to believe what you want to believe. I have reasoned out my positions, give me reasons to change instead of bumper sticker theology and I might be swayed.

["I assure you, corrupt tax collectors and prostitutes will get into the Kingdom of God before you do."]

Yes, corrupt tax collectors and prostitutes who'd repented and changed their ways. Not people actively pursuing their own ways. Submission to God's will is key to getting into the kingdom. Anything else is licentiousness.

Miss C. replied to Humbled Infidel’s comment:
6 days ago
Reply

Re your links to articles about gay men infected with HIV to prove that gay sex - death:

Did you know that the highest rate of new HIV infections worldwide is among heterosexuals? Just curious.

http://www.silencingchristians.com/video4.aspx
Watch a little of this movie and see if you can understand Christians' concerns about school.

JudgeBob, I think my basic objection to the premise of this post is catergorizing the play as "porn."

My understanding is that pornography is meant to get people sexually excited. The sex scene in Angels in America is designed not to be sexually exciting. It's presented as the man's attempt at suicide. Both before and after that scene the play presents scenes of people dying horrible painful deaths because they engaged in similar acts of risky sexual behavior.

In fact one of the main points of the play is that homosexual sex in the 1980s very often led to slow painful deaths. That's hardly pornography.

What the play does do is attack hypocrisy - by showing people like Roy Cohn, who made a career out of judging others finally dying of AIDS because of his secret gay sex life.

In a lot of ways that's why for mature 17 or 18 year olds this play could be extremely constructive. One of it's messages is that sex is safer, saner an healthier in the context of long term monogamous relationships.

A good teacher could certainly use the death scenes in the play to hammer that message home.

Another theme of the play is that before judging others you first need to judge yourself, which is another lesson a smart teacher could bring out.

The irony over arguing about this play with Christian rhetoric is that it's a play the celebrates and embraces Christian values. In fact, it might be the most religious text that those students are exposed to in their entire high school career.

It shows that today's world is full of dangerous temptations and that a single lapse in moral judgment can not only hurt yourself, by also the people who love you.

Isn't that the type of message we want children to be exposed to? Isn't that the same advice that a pastor would provide a child who asked about the temptations of Western Society.

In fact, I'd be less surprised if liberals were not angrier than conservatives over the teaching of Angels in America, since the play is very much a religious allegory that teaches exactly the values that are discussed in church on a weekly basis.

You know, given your description, you might be right about using the play the way you suggest, but in today's political climate, I have very little trust for the teachers especially given the performance levels of the kids graduating from those schools. I might take my 17 year old to see it so I could discuss the morals of the play with him, but I would not want that option left to the teachers. That's my main point. Its not their job, and they are wresting that job from the parents and doing a lousy job of what they are supposed to be doing. When they master the 3 R's we can get back to the moral dilemma of who's supposed to instill which morals.

As to the content of the play, it is far too graphic and far too profane not to be controversial and as I mentioned earlier, the Bible isn't taught because it is controversial and the vast majority of parents want the Bible taught. If that rule applies to Christian literature, it should certainly apply to secular literature presenting sexual scenes and profanity.

Judge Bob,

When I see the Christian Right actually emulating Jesus, I'll change my hypocritical, heathen ways. But for now, I'm going to continue to be good to those around me and try not to get hysterical about people who have different opinions or beliefs than mine.

I agree with you on one thing - the portrayal of religious extremists in the media. Just as watching videos like "In Their Own Words" has caused you to make sweeping statements about the entirety of Islam, so too am I guilty of sweeping generalizations about Christianity after watching "Jesus Camp."

In every society, every religion - heck, every coffee shop in the world, you're going to get people who essentially believe the same thing, but to different extents and with wildly different ways of expressing those beliefs.

The thing is, I believe in God - but I'm not pompous enough to think that I'm 100% percent correct in doing so. There is absolutely no way of knowing whether Christians, Buddhists, Muslims, Hindus or Jews are "right" in their interpretation and faith in a higher power - or for that matter, atheists. There is no way of knowing! They believe they're right just as strongly as we do - so be it.

I'll go ahead and keep believing that Jesus is cool with me as long as I continue to try to do my best on this Earth. You keep vigilant and await your time in the Judgment Box. Muslims will fantasize about their 40 virgins and not eat pork. Jews will also not eat pork, and wait for a "real" savior. Hindus will not eat cows, and worship elephant goddesses with eight arms. Buddhists will leave oranges for and chant to their higher power.

I think my ire comes down to this: I choose to believe in God the way I do, because I cannot fathom a God that hates the people in my life who have shown me the true meaning of friendship, forgiveness, compassion and generosity. It pains me to know that you'd meet the people in my life, these people who mean so much to me, and that after meeting them you'd still believe they are damned by God. It hurts me, and that hurt turns to anger and makes me lash out at those who think anyone on this earth is lesser than they.

Now that's cherry picking statistics. Here in the U.S. the highest rate of new infections is in the gay community and the world wide epidemic is due to heavy promiscuity. That is an unfair comparison considering that many in the gay community consider HIV infection a badge of honor.

You have some well thought out points.

My concern is that perhaps one of the reasons students these days come out of high school so poorly prepared for college is that the books that are taught in English classes are not particularly good examples of writing.

I worry that because school boards are worried about upsetting parents they tend to select books that are designed not to offend. The problem is that dating back to the time of Michaelangelo almost all great art is offensive at some level to some people.

Therefore when you teach only the "safe" books you short change students, by not exposing them to the most well written works possible.

Both liberals and conservatives are equally guilty in this respect. For example there are liberal groups that have pressured high schools to remove "Huckleberry Finn" from school libraries because of the politically incorrect way Huck talks about black people. That this classic work of American literature is being taken away is a tragedy.

As to the Bible, I agree that there are elements of it that could be of great value to students. It is, after all, the primary work of Western Literature and the entire way we evaluate a book's theme, structure and metaphor comes from early interpretations of the Bible. Plus, we teach Greek and Roman myths, which are certainly not secular.

I guess I simply don't see it as an either/or or moral dilemma. I

f I had children in high school I would want them exposed to the best writing possible, and that would include The Bible as an example of classical literature, Milton's Paradise Lost (which is also controversial) and modern morality tales like Angels In America (if not Angels In America, then "Bright Lights Big City" which is also a very well written metaphor about the dangers of the world's temptations.)

["I think my ire comes down to this: I choose to believe in God the way I do, because I cannot fathom a God that hates the people in my life who have shown me the true meaning of friendship, forgiveness, compassion and generosity. It pains me to know that you'd meet the people in my life, these people who mean so much to me, and that after meeting them you'd still believe they are damned by God. It hurts me, and that hurt turns to anger and makes me lash out at those who think anyone on this earth is lesser than they."]

God does not hate people unless they choose to hurt the defenseless, neither does He change. He is calling people to Him because of His love. But some people we would condemn He will forgive, and some people we would forgive, He will condemn based on that submission thing. He is sovereign and we are His voluntary subjects. If we don't voluntarily submit then He will not have us in His kingdom. Heaven wouldn't be heaven unless everybody is submitted to the One Authority. He isn't condemning them, they are condemning themselves by not fighting their natures. My job according to the scriptures is to point out the truth, not to hate, the problem is that the hearer interprets my pointing to the truth as hate. I really believe it is hate to allow people to self destruct with giving them the option of knowing the Healer, the Counselor, and the eternal Hope of that loving God.

Judge Bob, you say, "the Bible isn't taught because it is controversial..."

The Bible is controversial because of HOW people want it taught in schools - as, well, the God's honest truth, for lack of a better phrase. I'd love to learn ABOUT the Bible - its history, why King James decided to get involved, what other versions there are, why we follow some of its teachings and not others (and, unless you own slaves and are burning bulls on an altar, you're not following all of its teachings), comparing and contrasting it to the great books of other religions.

We're a diverse society, and one religion should not be shoved down the throats of people who do not share those beliefs. Just as you cannot imagine your child being told all day in school that the Torah is God's only true word, so too should a Jewish parent not have to worry about their child being fed Christian dogma all day.

People are going to continue pushing the envelope for as long as the Christian Right keeps sealing it shut. That's what I meant by God wanting everyone to shut up now. Do you really think you're going to win me over to Jesus by telling me my gay friends are damned for all eternity, and my Muslim friends hate freedom? If we all calmed down and live and let live, and kept a clear separation of church and state (I think BOTH sides have gone too far), we'd be better off.

You can spread the word of Jesus to the four corners of the world. But I'm sorry, thinking that the Bible should be taught in school as a religious tool is disrespectful to other people's beliefs.

I will grant that the students are being a little short changed in the equation, but the loss is small compared to the risks involved with sexual indoctrination. Let those things be approached in college. Even then, I would choose a college like Hillsdale who do not accept government grants and so are not compelled by the state's requirements, but are more concerned with who pays the bills. I have more confidence in a conservative college to interpret those morals the way I would. Public schools really do need to focus on competing with the rest of the world and leave liberal arts to the colleges.

Morals are taught at home and have nothing to do with the 3 R's you mentioned earlier. I'm just as terrified as you are about the state of our schools - but EVERYTHING should be kept out of schools except for the essentials (which include art, music and physical fitness). That's the only way we'll get back in the game.

Again, the Bible is a controversial subject in public schools, that is why it isn't used in public schools. That is ok until they start teaching my nephew Muslim prayers and habits. I'm not saying it should be taught, I'm saying there is a tremendous double standard against Christians of any stripe. It was Christians who made the Bible a controversial subject in the public schools. But if we're going to ban one religion, we have to ban them all, even secularism or atheism. They are faiths as surely as Buddhism is a faith.

I would win you over to faith based on reason, not emotion. There is a standard of truth, there is no standard of emotion. emotion is one of those things in our natures that we have to battle.

I went to a Quaker school for first grade, and I remember that we celebrated every holiday that came up, the whole school year, for every religion. And because we were in first grade, it was made "fun" - we learned different prayers, ate different foods, played dressup in different clothes. It was pretty cool.

I think we agree on something? LOL That regarding religion in schools, it's gotta be all or nothing. I vote for nothing - because there's no WAY anyone's going to get the "all" right. Someone's always going to be offended.

Well, I can see that we are now coming to some common ground. I agree with everything in this paragraph with the caveat that art is not all inclusive as it is now portrayed. Here in California, we spend the most of all the states per student and we are getting near the lowest results. Last week a 3 judge panel ruled that home schooling parents could not teach their own kids unless they became accredited teachers for the grades they were teaching. This in the face of the fact that a government study shows 4th and 8th grade home schooled kids performing better than any other venue. And the colleges are actively recruiting home schooled kids because they are better prepared for college. The public schools are spending the moneys they take from us in taxes on brand new administration buildings and hordes of administrative staff. Very little of it is making it to the class rooms. Class sizes often top 60 kids. The unions are strangling the education budget and the state can't fight them based on tenure rules. Its not the teachers' fault, its their own unions and yet they keep voting them back to their seats of power. It would take a major power to clean house and nobody in the state has the communication skills to rally the voters to clean house. Its a daunting task and their seems to be no end in sight.

I posted a link to a movie called 'Silencing Christians' a little while ago, have a look, it will be very educational.

I believe that home schooled kids are better prepared, as well - but that scene from Jesus Camp still scares me, in which a mom pretty much writes off evolution in a single sentence, and the kid eats it up. That made me physically uneasy. If the 3 Rs are to be taught, science needs to be included in there, too - 3 Rs and an S? - as objectively as possible. You can't pick and choose what you want to teach your kids, you know? I mean that in terms of overall subjects, not individual tasks.

I also wish that there was some way that home schooled kids could be exposed to more of the world, somehow. Well, heck - I wish ALL American kids were more exposed to the world. The European kids I know (about 20 from a total of 6 countries) are amazingly intelligent socially; they're more comfortable around adults, around people different than they, and much, much more tolerant at very young ages than most college kids I know!

I agree with you on teacher unions, class sizes - 60 kids in a room is a crime. And I agree it would be ludicrous to ask parents to become accredited using the same process as regular teachers.

But, how do we monitor what's actually being taught? The Christian Right thinks it's fine to dismiss evolution; what about a white pridesters omitting the existence of Africa? What about overeager feminists teaching literature using only books written by women? What about holocaust apologists dismissing WWII? What about black separatist who teaches American history from the point of view of white oppression? And who knows what crazy liberal hypocrites would teach their children?? ;)

Where do we draw the line?

Oh JudgeBob, how I do love your screen name. It implies superiority and authority in one fell swoop. Perhaps I should change my screen name to JudgedMatt, just to keep things consistent.

Speaking as the chosen representative of the entire worldwide community of gay men and women, I have to tell you what an outrage it is for you to say that some gay people consider their HIV+ status as a badge of honor. It's utter nonsense and you know it and shame on you. No one with any illness needs your smug scorn, and it's utterly clear how much pleasure you derived from that made-up "fact." You're an embarassment.

No salmon burger recipe for you.

Humbled Infidel replied to bart’s comment:
6 days ago
Reply

"You have to be a high school senior to take AP English".

Then you should call that school in topic here and fill them in on that rule.

Humbled Infidel replied to supermatt41’s comment:
6 days ago
Reply

You obviously have no defense for your sin so you verbally attack someone for knowing their facts and presenting them.

Everyone this is the exact language I wanted you all to see. The Ultimate judgment upon anyone who shows why this lifestyle is not healthy or natural.

THE INTOLERANT OF THE TOLERANT! "SUPERMATT41 THE INTOLERANT"

ANY QUESTIONS?

bart replied to Humbled Infidel’s comment:
6 days ago
Reply

That's a federal law.

AP English classes by definition are federally funded classes that allow high school seniors to earn college credit during their senior year of high school. Hence, why they might be assigned books that are more challenging and controversial than would be used in a traditional high school class.

Also, most students can't get into AP English, they have to apply to the class - and this is by federal law - with an application signed by their parent or local guardian.

That parent or guardian can obvious ask to see the syllabus before granting permission for the application, so obivously no one is being required to read this text.

That said, it is perhaps the most Christian text I've ever heard of being assigned to high school students, so I'm shocked that you object to it.

The entire point of this text is to resist the temptations of the world, live a good life, to not be promiscuous and to be honest. And the text says that if you abandon these values you will die a horrible death and live in hell on earth.

So, I can't imagine why Christians would object to it. I could see liberals objecting to it - because it implies that a homosexual lifestyle and/or sexual promiscuity leads to disease and death.

But I can't honestly see a single reason why a Christian would object to a text that tells people to be faithful to their spouse and that suggests that sin is a form of suicide.

JudgeBob,

I just want to say that I really appreciate the level of respect you have given to our arguments. While I may disagree with you on some issues, i think we have a level of agreement on others.

If nothing else I get the sense that you took me seriously - and I want you to know that I take your arguments seriously as well.

I wish that more people were like you - and I wish that the woman who posted this post in the first place had your sense of decency and willingness to listen.

I don't ask anyone to agree with me. Heck I'm a catholic heterosexual writer who found myself today talking about a homosexual themed play - a role I never thought I'd find mysel fin.

What I do ask - and what you have provided - is a healthy debate so that we can find what we have in common as reasonable adults.

I do with the original writer of this post was as thoughtful and insightful as you are.

You made me think today.

I hope that you or I can make humbled infidel think tomorrow.

Humbled Infidel replied to bart’s comment:
6 days ago
Reply

Hi Bart - This reading was required of a freshman high-school class. There is where the trouble started. If you read both articles above you'll see the actions taken and the results, not favorable results, but none the less the results.

Bart this book may be teaching the morals you say, the whole problem Christians have with this teaching in public schools is..."I don't want an school system that is not allowed to speak of Jesus and the Bible to teach any morals to my children.

If a teacher cannot share with a highschool kid where good morals come from, I'm speaking of Jesus and the bible, then they have no business teaching morals. They can't give a complete teaching, because they are silenced on biblical conversation or teachings.

I know many good teachers that are Christians and I don't want them teaching any highschool kids morality, because they are censored. They are not allowed to use biblical teachings.

That's it! I would have no problem with some of these teachers I know to teach my kids on some moral issues in their homes. In their homes they are not censored!

Censored Christianity in public education is what the uproar is about. Miss C talked about evolution and said Christians want that to have no part of education. Really? Is that true? I know Christians who homeschool their children and they learn about evolution. They learn Creationism. They don't hide their children from world issues, their children learn of all, not just a select few.

The real intolerant here is not allowing Christianity to have a part in public education. Therefore kids don't get as good an education as homeschooled kids do.

This is the problem. Have I explained to where you understand where Christians come from on these issues? I hope so.

Humbled Infidel replied to bart’s comment:
6 days ago
Reply

I just read your comment to Judge Bob, interesting comment! Maybe I should have read this before I replied to your comment to me.

I do want you to know, I appreciate your thoughtful conversation with Judge Bob. He is a very good man and I too value his insight. I'm thankful for your respectful manner in which you speak with him.

["3 Rs and an S? - as objectively as possible. You can't pick and choose what you want to teach your kids, you know? I mean that in terms of overall subjects, not individual tasks."]

The science class has been another area of indoctrination you have obviously bought into. This video of a science teacher displays how secularists and atheists have spread their own doctrine by mandate into the science classes. Proven lies are being taught as fact. Where's the science in that? All people of faith in any version of God want the the theory named a theory and presented with an alternate theory that attributes the known universe's existence to a designer.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aLJDAupZlsc
look, if you're going to object to my faith, at least look at my blog so you'll be informed of what it is that I am saying. I'm pulling these links right off of my blog.

["I also wish that there was some way that home schooled kids could be exposed to more of the world, somehow. Well, heck - I wish ALL American kids were more exposed to the world. The European kids I know (about 20 from a total of 6 countries) are amazingly intelligent socially; they're more comfortable around adults, around people different than they, and much, much more tolerant at very young ages than most college kids I know!"]

most home schoolers are being exposed to the world, far more than most publicly educated kids. Home school parents are hosting foreign students too, they take vacations too, and they have access to public venues too. In fact most home schoolers go to church. Guess what, most churches send out missionaries to other countries. they have guest speakers from other countries. Your are expressing a bias against conservatism, we get out, we actually participate in aid efforts to other countries. Ever heard of Youth With A Mission, how about Shake the Nations? These take school kids to other countries to either work on a project like building a church or to reach the youth of that nation for God. As I've demonstrated throughout our conversation, we are not haters, we love people of all stripes. We want to see them blessed with good information. These kids are led by people like me to do what I'm doing here. Speak the truth, whether its received or not. Again, its the hearer's interpretation of the truth we speak as hate speech, not our intention to be hateful.

["But, how do we monitor what's actually being taught? The Christian Right thinks it's fine to dismiss evolution; what about a white pridesters omitting the existence of Africa? What about overeager feminists teaching literature using only books written by women? What about holocaust apologists dismissing WWII? What about black separatist who teaches American history from the point of view of white oppression? And who knows what crazy liberal hypocrites would teach their children?? ;)"]

Do you think these things aren't going on in public schools? and there, they affect hundreds or thousands of students over time. We don't need no thought control. is a line from an old rock song by a leftist rock group. You may have heard of them, Pink Floyd and the album its on is called The Wall. What you are suggesting is a form of thought police. Again check out the article on my blog about indoctrination called Clinton's Indoctrination Agenda.

The line has already been drawn. Law is a reactive program of deterrence. You can't arrest somebody until they do something unethical, that is described in the penal code. Laws are on the books about seeing to the welfare of your own children. Some kids lose out, I'm sorry about that. But how much worse is it to force everybody under one dictator's moral agenda. That's what it comes down to.

JudgeBob replied to supermatt41’s comment:
6 days ago
Reply

["Oh JudgeBob, how I do love your screen name. It implies superiority and authority in one fell swoop. Perhaps I should change my screen name to JudgedMatt, just to keep things consistent."]

Wie thankye son. Super Matt doesn't imply any superiority though? Seriously, I encourage everybody to use their judgment. It's required for a successful life.

["Speaking as the chosen representative of the entire worldwide community of gay men and women, I have to tell you what an outrage it is for you to say that some gay people consider their HIV+ status as a badge of honor. It's utter nonsense and you know it and shame on you. No one with any illness needs your smug scorn, and it's utterly clear how much pleasure you derived from that made-up "fact." You're an embarassment."]

You don't need to speak for the world wide community of gay people, I talk to them myself thank you very much. I have been in a recovery group with gay people, now don't tell me there aren't gay men out there purposefully contracting aids. I've talked to them myself. Denying the truth makes you blind to the realities. I referred to this fact in defense of the comparison to the world wide majority of new contracted cases being hetero. It was an unfair comparison.

["So, I can't imagine why Christians would object to it. I could see liberals objecting to it - because it implies that a homosexual lifestyle and/or sexual promiscuity leads to disease and death.

But I can't honestly see a single reason why a Christian would object to a text that tells people to be faithful to their spouse and that suggests that sin is a form of suicide."]
Bart, be honest. We covered this last night. I think I was pretty clear, even after your description, why it is not appropriate from the Christian perspective.
I appreciate the level of discourse we've enjoyed as well. If I didn't think you were taking me seriously, I wouldn't have made the effort. As always, when the conversation remains on topic or relevant to the original topic, and everyone is providing serious thought to their responses, I find that I am not only fighting for the truth, but having fun doing it.

As far as Humbled Infidel is concerned, she is my friend and biggest cheerleader because I am able to articulate the Christian perspective where she becomes flustered and frustrated. I know the feeling. Its taken me years of study to find answers to all, I mean ALL the Numerous charges leveled at Christianity first and now conservatism in general.

I've been neglecting my blog while we have this conversation. I'm going to head over there and get some work done. So, I will speak to you again some time tomorrow.

"Ever heard of Youth With A Mission, how about Shake the Nations? These take school kids to other countries to either work on a project like building a church or to reach the youth of that nation for God."

Sorry, Judge Bob, this is where our conversation ends. I wish you all the best.

I've enjoyed it. Thanks for dropping in. Keep an eye on my blog, today's post is a demonstration of local communism.
http://judgeright.vox.com
http://judgeright.blogspot.com

Applied Communism

2008-03-16T13:38:00.001-07:00

Listening to talk radio a couple of days ago, I heard a guest give an account of a teacher who truly taught his students about Marxism. He gave them two final grades on their hard work. One was the grade they'd actually earned but would not count, the other was the scaled grade for the average of the whole class. He nearly had a riot on his hands. The kids who'd earned great grades were angry at kids who'd done poorly, accusing them of laziness and idiocy. I wish I'd been able to catch the speaker's name, but work was demanding at that point and I couldn't find it online afterward.

Most people don't know that socialism has already been tried in this country, indeed at its earliest beginnings. The first settlement tried the communal lifestyle, where everybody's crops were stored in one common storehouse and the whole community would pull from that storehouse as food was needed. The leaders couldn't get everybody to work their fields because they knew they could count on somebody else's hard work to make it through the harsh winters. It wasn't until they assigned everybody a plot of land and let them keep their crops for themselves that the community began to thrive. Socialized benefits mean socialized effort. Capitalized benefits mean capitalized effort. Which one is evil in your eyes?

Philanthropy works in similar ways. If you want to save the world, do you vote for the programs and politicians who support them to do the work, or do you volunteer through a local outreach group and send money to successful aid organizations? Expecting government to fix all the ills is like voting for a communal storehouse for your potatoes. Donating to a successful privately run program is like putting your potatoes in your own storehouse. If the program is failing, you stop giving to that one and find one that does work. But the state won't let you stop giving them your tax dollars whether the programs they are used to support are successful or not. Legislating gifts is dangerous to the very people you want to help. If you see a need and think, "What can I do? What difference can one person make?" start doing something and find out how much one person can do!

China is a communist country, but decades after the revolution, their leaders recognized the communist regulated industry was a failure and implemented capitalist programs. Capitalism in China is making China an industrial success. Not so the communist social, legislative, and law enforcement programs. Constant revelations about their moral atrocities are leaking out into the international media. All Muslim nations are bottomless pits of moral piety resulting in torturous death sentences and mutilations for millions. A few of them are economically successful based solely on the oil revenues. The king and princes of Arabia are funding the spread of Islam throughout the world with these revenues. So the world is struggling to break the oil addiction and break the funding of this stone age ideology. There is no room for success in the absence of freedom.

During my research for this article, I came across a reference to California Law that prohibits the advocacy of communism in schools. Here is that state law:

51530. No teacher giving instruction in any school, or on any property belonging to any agencies included in the public school system, shall advocate or teach communism with the intent to indoctrinate or to inculcate in the mind of any pupil a preference for communism.
In prohibiting the advocacy or teaching of communism with the intent of indoctrinating or inculcating a preference in the mind of any pupil for such doctrine, the Legislature does not intend to prevent the teaching of the facts about communism. Rather, the Legislature intends to prevent the advocacy of, or inculcation and indoctrination into, communism as is hereinafter defined, for the purpose of undermining patriotism for, and the belief in, the government of the United States and of this state.
For the purposes of this section, communism is a political theory that the presently existing form of government of the United States or of this state should be changed, by force, violence, or other unconstitutional means, to a totalitarian dictatorship which is based on the principles of communism as expounded by Marx, Lenin, and Stalin.

Any teacher sporting a poster of Che Guevara, Mao, Stalin, Lenin, Kim Jong Il, Putin, Castro, or any other socialist advocate, and found promoting communism should be fired and charged with a crime against children. Any teacher discovered participating in communist or registered with communist organizations should be fired.

When this ideology comes home to roost, when its applied to your work, your rewards, it isn't nearly as attractive as when its applied to others, to the 'rich and the powerful.' Smart people either learn how to use communism to their benefit or they look for ways to escape it. Capitalism isn't perfect but its, at least motivating. That motivation is what this great country was built on. Do you think the kids who had worked hard would have worked just as hard the next year knowing that their grades would only be balanced against the lazy and dull? It isn't that the quick and sharp kids are evil, it is that the whole class benefits by the success of the achievers. In the same way, it isn't that rich and powerful people are necessarily evil, it is that their success keeps the rest of us employed and civil. Their is no social Robin Hood in social programs. For there to be a Robin Hood, there has to be criminal injustice in the authority charged with collecting taxes. Now we'd all agree there have been transgressions in American tax collecting and spending, but 'We The People' do still have the power to vote them out or otherwise hold them accountable without legislating taxes to even out the distribution. It isn't just about being fair, it is about keeping the motivation the founding fathers built in to the bedrock of our society.

Clinton Indoctrination Agenda

2008-03-13T01:08:00.001-07:00

http://www.amazon.com/Takes-Village-Hillary-Rodham-Clinton/dp/0684825457

Hillary Clinton wrote a book a decade ago called, "It Takes a Village." The premise is that parents cannot be held solely responsible for the upbringing of their children. This much is true and I agree wholeheartedly that teenagers especially, but children in general must be held accountable for their behavior by whoever catches them in their unacceptable behavior on the spot. I take this very seriously and act personally on this principal. Funny enough, I saw an example in a Hollywood movie called 'Second Hand Lions' that cemented this principal in me.

A few weeks ago I was driving through a nice neighborhood on a very quiet street in the middle of the day when something thumped against my vehicle. I quickly checked my rearview mirror and saw a nerf football bouncing around on the pavement. Looking around, there wasn't a soul in sight. I still hadn't come to a complete stop so I immediately decided to keep going. Before I'd traveled 6 houses along the street I thought better of it and decided to pull over where the street curved and watch what happened where the ball rested. It didn't take but a minute or two and there they were, about five pre-teen boys creeping out into the street to retrieve their ball. They didn't hang around to continue their play but slipped back behind the backyard fences to wait for another car to come along. Sure enough, the next car had the ball bouncing off the side of it as it passed the house.

I turned around and headed back down to the house and they saw me and broke in three different directions. When I got there and stepped out they were well out of sight. Rather than call the police and make a much bigger deal of it than it had to be, I called out to them that I wanted to talk to them.... no answer. I waited a few seconds them said, "You can talk to me or you can talk to the police!" That did it. Three of them came out to face my wrath rather than have names recorded, addresses noted for trouble makers and parents ire lit to the heavens. At first they tried to deny they'd done anything, then tried to claim it was an accident, but I wasn't having any excuses. I described who and what I saw in as clear detail as I could muster then proceeded to chew them up one side and down the other about endangering drivers, about common courtesy, and about their use of time. If I were involved in any sort of youth activities, I would have talked to their parents about involving them in my program. As it was, I let the scare of my anger and the 'could have been' consequences ride their reasoning abilities. The worse they can imagine and the less you explain what those consequences might be, the better. I didn't have to press charges, I didn't have to hit anybody, and I didn't have to press their parents to "do something." All I had to do was express my intolerance of their abusive behavior, but it has to be done on the spot, when it happens. This is love, not ignoring them, and not pressing the advantage because you're in the right.

Another time, some teens had taken somebody else's wheeled trash can and drug it along the street beside their speeding vehicle to slam it into my garbage cans. These kids were videoing their handy work to post it on the web. They were finding glory in their mis-behavior. (following the influence of the movie 'Jackass' no doubt.) This is far worse behavior for society and is the same mindset that has lone gunmen walking into schools to shoot kids and faculty en masse so their story will be plastered all over national and international news. This is where you call the police and prosecute to the fullest extent of the law. Judges and defenders are wrong to write this off as 'just kids' stuff' when they are glorifying it on YouTube. This too, is love. Measuring your response based on what is best for all of society, those who would harm it, what would correct it. Not assuming they will get their due, not allowing glory to Jackass copycats, and not chasing them down with a baseball bat to damage their property, (car) in retaliation for damaging your property.

Back to Hillary's book, she doesn't want to just uphold the common decency standards we can all agree on. She is talking about state run programs expanding educational and Child Protective Services' authority and using it to enforce her standards on our children and their parents. If you don't find that scary, consider the results of every government run social program to come out of Washington. What has welfare done to the biggest recipient group, inner city blacks? What has Social Security, whose funds were stolen by the welfare program, done to retirement planning and the social responsibility we must have for our own futures? What has federally funded education and it's requirements done for our kids' ranking in the world? What has price regulation done for fuel supply? (repealed within one year due to shortages in the 1970's) I could go on, but I'd only be repeating myself from earlier articles on this blog. Imagine if you will, the parenting police ensuring you are teaching your children according to state proclaimed standards or worse, keeping your kids in various after school programs to give you less access to them. That was Hillary's vision in the book, but stated in softer tones and covered over with examples of the inevitable atrocities committed by so few parents against their own children in relation to the norm.

Add to this authority the propensity of groups like the Lesbian/Gay/Trans-sexual Lobby foisting their agendas upon parents under the threat of removing the children from your home and incarcerating you if you refuse. Last week, a three judge panel in the Los Angeles area gave a ruling effectively dissolving all California parents' option of home schooling unless they can become accredited teachers. This in the face of the fact that home schooled kids consistently rank at the top of 4th and 8th grades according to a government sponsored study and are preferred recruits for college. Hillary's agenda is dangerous and there are plenty of co-conspirators within our courts, within our Federal and Local Government, and among the lobbyists.

Accounts of current indoctrination:

This is an article in World Net Daily about Anita Bryant. Anita's story is about the sacrifice necessary to combat lies like these. http://www.worldnetdaily.com/index.php?pageId=58600

Is the Whole World Blind?

2008-03-12T00:00:00.001-07:00

One of the most famous quotes of all time is Mahatma Gandhi's statement that "An eye for an eye makes the whole world blind." It is so popular among the cultural left in this country that you can see it on bumper stickers from sea to shining sea. Goes right along with the footprint of the American chicken. I suggest that tolerance of remorseless evil also makes the whole world blind. The secularists tolerate by equating the evil with the good, the violent forcing a foreign will on the innocent with those who violently resist such forces. Now the peace movement has moved into their own intolerance of the defenders of free will. The liberal Berkeley city council story for example or the more recent bombing of the NY recruiting office. The secularists are statist in that they use the force of big government to take from the successful workforce under threat of incarceration to give to the unsuccessful and the lazy. They're called taxes and they're raising them so they can give them away in the form of unemployment insurance, welfare, scholarships, grants, or they're spent on earmarks like diversity training/tolerance indoctrination and the now infamous bridge to nowhere, not to mention what the politicians keep for themselves. This is not love even though it gives them warm fuzzy feelings that they are doing something for the unemployed, the alcoholics, the drug addicts, the fatherless gang members, etc., On the right, the Christian conservatives prefer to have the choice of giving to which organization is successful at meeting those needs in the best possible way.

Balancing judgment and mercy is no tight rope walk. There are miles between the two extremes and righteousness is found in the right mixture of the two to turn a self destructive man from his ways. The only requirement for righteous judgment is love for your fellow man. Love is not always sweetness and warm fuzzy feelings. Sometimes love is hard and rigid. When I was mean to my little brother as a kid, my dad spanked me and taught me to equate his suffering with my own, to empathize the pain I'd caused him. That was love for both me and my little brother. The secularists want a spankless world where people are treated (doctored) out of their 'harmful to others' and prejudiced a.k.a. 'intolerant' ways.

If I am caught breaking a law, even if it is a law of moral values and not written into any penal code, it is loving for a fellow man to confront me on the basis of my own beliefs. To allow me to continue in my self destructive behavior is not tolerant, rather it is hateful. It is damaging to the general community to tolerate people following any desire. This is why Christians say the secularists have turned truth upside down. Secularists claim intolerance is hateful. "If people want to do drugs, make sure they do it in a safe environment. If they want to live a homosexual lifestyle and call it marriage, let them get married." Until we knew that drugs were addictive when used recreationally, the secularists were all on board with legalizing recreational drug use. Many users still are but the rest recognized the damage to society after the 1970's. Crime rates skyrocketed and the users wind up screwing up their entire families' lives as well as every relationship they ever had and themselves dying if allowed to continue.

Now with gay marriage, the secularists can't see past the nose on their face, what damage this will do to society. They can't even admit that this behavior is dangerous to the participants. The human body's organs and valves and so on, have specific functions. The anus is a one way valve. Bodily fluids exchanged in sexual encounters entails some risk of transmitting diseases, risks made much greater when done in ways we aren't designed to do. Actual physical harm is often done in these practices as well. Let's just say it doesn't wear well when used in impractical ways. Don't believe me, check this out. Lot's of other disorders associated with 'the lifestyle.' The only reason they are blind to these issues is because they are covering their own eyes.

When it comes to spanking a nation or an ideology, it takes wars. Sanctions are like timeouts, or losing a privilege. International corporal punishment comes in the form of military action. That's what happened in Afghanistan and Iraq. That's not hatred. Hatred was the Clinton administration ignoring the growing problems in Iraq and Afghanistan, ignoring the looming threats against us, ignoring the plight of their people.

To Be or Not to Be

2008-03-10T03:39:00.001-07:00

I was talking to my neighbor tonight about politics and the value of human life. She posited in so many words, that life is not worth suffering. In her mind, war is so evil it would be better for humanity to stop having children, to discontinue the species.

How can humanity be served by obliterating humanity? The kid in this video illustrates my point. Success and happiness in life is all about the attitude we approach it with and has very little to do with how much we suffer. Happy people are found in all walks of life the same as unhappy people. Many who suffer terrible setbacks are well adjusted, contributing members of society. Others in the very same circumstances would rather not have been born and some few would go so far as to end their lives because of their suffering disabilities.

I would find my neighbor's opinion about the value of human life appalling if it weren't for the fact that literally half of our culture believes in some variant the same as she does. That "Since we mercy kill animals that are suffering, why won't we offer the same 'service' to our loved ones?" There are elements of this mindset who believe wholeheartedly that this kid should have been killed when he lost his sight at the age of two to prevent his 'suffering' through life sightless. Granted, there are people suffering from terminal illnesses, in pain, and have no known chance of any recovery. So why not just let them die as they want to? I don't have all the answers to these terrible choices, but I do have huge concerns about 1. moving the line of decency. and 2. cutting short any opportunity to find that miracle cure for that person, or at least stabilizing their condition so that they don't continue to decline. The first concern is the biggest because it is detrimental to all of society. This week or this month or this decade, most of our culture would agree that a terminal illness is the point where we should draw that line. I don't happen to agree but the majority would.

Taking the evidence of abortion. For the sake of convenience, and personal choice, babies are being killed every day and this practice is sponsored by the state. Fifty years ago any mother and her 'doctor' would have been jailed by the state for the very same thing. So, fifty years into the future, will the state sanction killing two year olds because their mother didn't want them to suffer through blindness, or for themselves to have to raise a blind child? Will it be a viable choice for the parents of a mentally handicapped teenager? What about retirees without pensions who can't pay for their health care? What about homeless people? When we take upon ourselves the authority of God and start moving the line of decency, there is no authority left to correct, to say this far and no farther. No reason is required for abortions any longer because that line was moved by man. It went from 'only in the first trimester,' to 'in the first and second trimester,' and now at birth, the babies' brains are being sucked out while in the birth canal, and some are arguing that the option should remain open into the first year of life. If we move the line on other issues (mercy killing) in the future, no reason will be required for someone to decide who lives and who dies. Only that it falls within the parameters of what is best for.... who? the chooser?, the state? (gay marriage) will we be marrying two men and a chicken? two men and a six year old child? two brothers and their sister? a mother and her two sons? We scoff at the idea now, but we were scoffing at the idea of infanticide in the 1950's and 60's.

This isn't new, neither is abortion new to humanity. It was practiced as part of pagan religions during Biblical times and so was child sacrifice. One of their gods was a bronze statue with his arms held out in front of him. The statue was heated to glowing red and the mother or father would take their infant and set him or her in the arms of this glowing red statue and watch while their own child fried to death. Hitler and his Nazi's took the mentally challenged and had them gassed or shot. Other cultures killed the homeless. Without God, the line, the standard of conduct is as malleable as air. You can find some way to justify anything you want to do. We've already justified the murder of unborn children in our 'sophisticated' culture.

Back to my neighbor's mindset on life and suffering. All of life entails some measure of suffering. Birth is probably one of the most traumatic experiences of life. We struggle to learn to walk, falling often, and often experiencing pain in the process. Since it is painful to start life, to achieve the most basic of abilities, should we all stop trying, suicide because suffering is involved. Suffering is not pleasant, but it is one of the means by which we grow personally. Death and failure is much worse than suffering.

This is just as true culturally, should we not resist evil people who want to kill us? That would stop the war, that would stop our suffering, but it wouldn't stop the killing and the suffering of Muslims. They stone people to death, they kill each other in tribal and feudal wars.

'End all suffering' is the most foolish idea to come down the pike and it has saturated our culture. Of course there is suffering in life, and of course there is war. There will be war until God comes to take us out of here. Its in our nature. We have to fight our nature to achieve civilization, to have a community, to even have a family. It is in our nature to force our will on others. It is only by the understanding of every individual in a community, that we fight our natures to compete against other communities for survival. Through this achievement we have come to understand that cooperation is far more beneficial to everyone in a community than allowing our natures to rule us. We've learned when communities cooperate with each other to withstand bigger communities wills, cooperating communities benefit. The more people you have cooperating, the better the benefit. Finally, there are still communities in the world that still operate from the mentality of the stone age and would rather kill us or force us into their failing community structure via their religion.

We've come to regard this mindset as evil. Evil is as evil does. Killing and terrorizing to force your will on others is evil and that is exactly what the Islamo-Nazis are doing. Western culture did not first enter the Middle East with the idea that we are going to militarily change their culture and force our ways on them. We went over there as private citizens to do business in there culture. We were so successful at business that their culture began to change by virtue of their own success in that business environment. Some of them saw their own culture's change with successful trade as evil and violently opposed it. Threatening their own into submission, threatening the business people until they abandoned their trade markets, killing all business within their culture, they forced their will on their countrymen. Then, seeing all the other cultures growing and succeeding they decided all their failures were the fault of the West. Now, the ignorant people of the West are siding with the stone age people, believing every lie they tell. Our own media is an active party in the enemy's agenda to rule the world with this evil religion. Their holy book instructs them to lie to the infidel if that will empower them. I'm going to repost my article, "In Their Own Words" so you have easy access to the video of their most popular leaders speaking the truth about their intentions toward Western culture. They literally want to rule the world with their stone age power structure based on this evil, murdering religion.

If that's offensive to your politically correct indoctrination, consider this. In seven years and two wars, how many times have you heard moderate Muslims confess that global jihad is wrong? How many people of that faith stood behind the one making the confession? What percentage of the Muslim faith has spoken out against global jihad? I can tell you, because I've been listening and watching. If ten percent are actively involved with global jihad, not even 1/10 of one percent are saying a word against global jihad. Most speakers for Islam are excusing the jihadi actions or at best calling them mis-guided and acting against Western influence because it is corrupting their culture. I happen to agree that porn peddlers and homosexual activists are corrupting Muslims, they're corrupting Christians too. But Muslims aren't attacking porn peddlers or homosexuals. They name the corrupting influence as Christian Crusaders, harkening back 700 years to a period of retaliation for Muslim invasion into Europe. So the very things Christians are fighting in our own culture are the reasons this nation is being attacked by Muslims, not because of what Christians do or did. The abortions, the gay agenda, the porn peddling and on, and on So why does the Christian Right get the bad rap in this country? Because the liberal left doesn't want to admit their own responsibility for the mess we're in. They'd rather blame the military industrial complex, the oil industry, the stupid president who pulled off the biggest conspiracy ever by blowing up the World Trade Center, or Goldie Locks. I'm not sure how Goldie fits in the grand scheme of things but somehow, she is just as legitimate a target for blame as George Bush and the Christian Coalition.

The left no longer desire to obtain reason. The wisdom they seek is self serving. If knowledge requires that they accept blame, then knowledge is wrong. (revisionist history) If knowledge requires suffering and sacrifice to face threats, it isn't worth doing. If it is offensive, it is evil. And if knowledge of decency limits their desires, they aren't wrong, the limits are wrong.

Agents of Intolerant Tolerance

2008-03-08T07:42:00.000-08:00

quote, "I recognize and celebrate that our country is founded upon Judeo- Christian values, and I have pledged my life to defend America and all her values, the values that have made us the noblest experiment in history. But public -- but political intolerance by any political party is neither a Judeo-Christian nor an American value. The political... (APPLAUSE)

The political tactics of division and slander are not our values, they are...

(APPLAUSE)

They are corrupting influences on religion and politics, and those who practice them in the name of religion or in the name of the Republican Party or in the name of America shame our faith, our party and our country.

(APPLAUSE)

Neither party should be defined by pandering to the outer reaches of American politics and the agents of intolerance, whether they be Louis Farrakhan or Al Sharpton on the left, or Pat Robertson or Jerry Falwell on the right."

John McCain presidential campaign speech 2000

I am an agent of intolerance according to many including Presidential hopeful, John McCain. It used to be that I didn't think of myself that way. Now that I am taking bolder and broader stands for conservative values based on evidence of results, I get charged with being an agent of intolerance often. The most striking thing about this is that it requires a large measure of intolerance to make the charge in the first place. Nothing new here. In the same way judgments are made against me for judging, intolerance is expressed toward my intolerance in the name of tolerance. The first time I heard it, I was a little taken aback. But a two second reflection upon whatever issue I was debating and the words I'd chosen, and the way I'd presented them..... Yep, intolerant.

So what? Everybody is intolerant by necessity. Tolerance and intolerance requires judgment. Judgment is meaningless without intolerance. We don't tolerate stealing, cruelty, endangering others, slander,,,, you name an area of life and I'll demonstrate intolerance. These are called laws. More personally, we have intolerance for relatively minor things called infringements. A sociologically healthy person sets up boundaries and require others to respect them. This too, is a form of intolerance. For instance, I don't allow anybody I'm not intimate with to stand within a foot of me unless circumstances null my personal space. Something like riding a crowded bus or commuter train. If I observe someone acting aggressively or threateningly my personal space is extended until I feel I can react in a timely manner to counteract any threatening move made by that individual. In effect, I grow more intolerant the more insecure I feel.

I'm an individualist, I'm self reliant, I've finally grown up enough to take responsibility for my decisions, and stick to my commitments,,, and I expect others to do the same. I've come to understand that even though I am an individualist and self reliant, I don't live in a vacuum. What I do affects those around me and what others do, affects me. Since this is the case I have, and expect others to have, some common courtesy, some guidelines for behavior both public and private that benefit the whole society. These are healthy boundaries. I'm intolerant of gays getting equivalent benefits and legitimacy as a 'family' and of illegal immigrants getting equivalent benefits as citizens because, even though they may be nice people, their equivalence negates the sacrifices of those who live by the set boundaries of healthy societies. I'm intolerant of many social programs that hurt the very people they are intended to help. I'm intolerant of mob mentality which often undermines social structure. I'm intolerant of repeating failed attempts to fix self destructive people with big government programs that only support the self destructive behaviors we want fixed. I'm intolerant of government sponsored fixes for nonexistent threats like global warming while so many advocate ignoring real threats like global jihad. I'm intolerant of abusing language to the point that set definitions and expressions are muddled to near complete obfuscation. (Fascist)

Now that I've owned my intolerance and I believe most all conservatives would own their intolerance with me, let's see if any of the agents of intolerant tolerance (liberals and Democrats) will own their intolerance by recognizing their hypocrisy in labeling the rest of us intolerant. After all, how tolerant is it to attack conservatives for supporting established principals that are time proven while they insist on pouring ever increasing tax dollars into proven failure programs. More likely they will continue to obfuscate the term the same as they have fascism, xenophobe and a host of other labels used to dismiss any opponents' input not inline with their own.

Promotion of Islam in our Schools

2008-03-03T18:35:00.001-08:00

This was sent to me in the form of a newsletter from the Middle East Forum

http://www.meforum.org/

by Cinnamon Stillwell
FrontPageMagazine.com
February 5, 2008
http://www.meforum.org/article/1848

Public school children in grades K-12 are being assigned textbooks that misrepresent and, in some cases, glorify Islamic beliefs and history – often at the expense of other religions and cultures. The apologetics and indoctrination common in university Middle East studies programs is being carried into public schools by contentious, unhistorical, and inaccurate textbooks written by those same Middle East studies professors.

History Alive! The Medieval World and Beyond, a textbook published by the Teachers' Curriculum Institute, was removed from the Scottsdale, Arizona school district in 2005 for this very reason. The textbook is now causing controversy in California and at the center of the storm is Cal State University-Sacramento sociology professor Ayad Al-Qazzaz.

An Iraqi native who specializes in Middle East studies, Al-Qazzaz, is both a contributor to History Alive and one of the gatekeepers who approved it for use in California's public middle schools. And, according to an American Textbook Council review cited by World Net Daily (WND):

Al-Qazzaz is a Muslim apologist, a frequent speaker in Northern California school districts promoting Islam and Arab causes…[He] also co-wrote AWAIR's 'Arab World Notebook.' AWAIR stands for Arab World and Islamic Resources, an opaque, proselytizing 'non-profit organization' that conducts teacher workshops and sells supplementary materials to schools.

A parent and former student in one of Al-Qazzaz's Middle East studies courses wrote to WND expressing her own reservations:

That was a big flag for me…after seeing Al-Qazzaz as one of the main contributors I began to put two and two together … about the extra book coming home only in this class and I questioned where this book's money source came from – I still do not know.

Al-Qazzaz's contributions to History Alive on the subject of jihad are flagrantly biased, as he consistently presents jihad as merely a personal struggle rather than a holy war.

Hence, as noted by WND, the text presents jihad as "an effort by Muslims to convince 'others to take up worthy causes, such as funding medical research'" and that "even at its most violent, 'jihad' is simply Muslims fighting 'to protect themselves from those who would do them harm.'"

In a 2003 KXTV, Sacramento, story on "Islamic War Ethics," he elaborated:

Al-Qazzaz says there are two levels of jihad. The greater jihad is every Muslim's quest to live out their faith in their daily lives, to improve themselves and to become a better Muslim. The lesser jihad means to protect one's people and fight against enemies, he says. So the greater jihad prompts devout Muslims to remember their religious guidelines while fighting, which would cause them to treat war prisoners well.

One suspects the victims of beheadings and torture would beg to differ. Moreover, that Islamists (otherwise known as jihadists) worldwide repeatedly cite jihad as a motivating factor belies Al-Qazzaz's contention that war is the "lesser jihad."

In a 2002 interview with Peace Magazine, Al-Qazzaz rejected the association of "jihad" with "fundamentalism" and advocated what's come to be known as the "root causes" approach to combating Islamic terrorism:

You are not going to get rid of suicide bombers by killing them. You have to know the causes. It is like a disease. You can treat the symptoms but if you don't know the causes, the symptoms keep coming up.

Yet, when the interview turned to the study of Islam and its connection to terrorism, Al-Qazzaz skirted the issue by blaming others. After first accusing Islam scholar Bernard Lewis of "becoming progressively anti-Islam and Zionist," he continued:

There are two schools of thought about Islam in the US. One school is headed by Bernard Lewis and Daniel Pipes, who equate Islam to terrorism. The other school, headed by John Esposito, argues that there are bad apples everywhere. You have terrorists in Islam, terrorists in Judaism, terrorists in Hindu-ism. But the majority of the people, though they may be backward, do not have a terrorist attitude.

Al-Qazzaz's characterization of both Bernard Lewis and Daniel Pipes is demonstrably false. Neither equates Islam with terrorism, but, rather, seeks to examine the undeniable connection between the two. John Esposito, who heads the Saudi-funded Prince Alwaleed bin Talal Center for Muslim-Christian Understanding at Georgetown, is a leading Wahhabi apologist who consistently seeks to muddle what is in fact an Islam-specific issue.

Considering Al-Qazzaz's troubling viewpoints on these matters, his involvement with History Alive and other Middle East studies textbooks is cause for alarm. Not only do California education officials need to undertake a rigorous and unbiased reexamination of such textbooks, but also the gatekeepers approving their use. Otherwise, it's simply a case of the fox guarding the hen house.

Cinnamon Stillwell is the Northern California Representative for Campus Watch. She can be reached at stillwell@meforum.org.

Socialist Programs and Consequences

2008-02-27T01:18:00.001-08:00

Ethanol; the answer to the smog caused by the enormous American appetite for fossil fuels, right? The answer to the oil addiction which feeds money into the hands that want to kill us, right? Apparently not. Ethanol is made from corn, primarily. A lot of corn. Two acres of corn per average tank full. So the price of corn has been climbing steadily since the ethanol program began. What other markets are affected by the rise in corn markets? Well, there's the livestock and meat industry. That's rather obvious because we feed all that livestock a lot of corn. Higher corn prices mean higher meat prices. Where is all this corn coming from? Since corn is more profitable, farmers are turning under other crops like wheat, barley, soybean, etc., to plant more corn. Now we're experiencing a shortage of wheat. Last week, wheat prices shot up 200% taking a 50lb. bag of wheat flour from $15.00 to $45.00 almost overnight.

Where might these price hikes end? Will we have to go all the way to true food shortages before our government subsidies of ethanol programs are canceled? There is only one tried and true source of energy apart from fossil fuels but the environmentalists hate it more than the oil companies। One environmentalist (the man known as the father of environmentalism) has been ejected from their society for believing in it. What is this energy source? Nuclear power. Isn't it funny that the American environmentalists reject what is proven in 'so called' leftist controlled nations like France. The American left are far more extreme on economic policies than their contemporaries in Europe.

http://www.ecolo.org/media/articles/articles.in.english/love-indep-24-05-04.htm

James Lovelock

The reason the socialist agenda succeeds in America is because the voters aren't aware of the consequences of all past socialist programs. A few examples include;

1 price control; Jimmy Carter's price control of gasoline prices created gas shortages, California's price control of electricity created rolling blackouts across the state. What lesson can we learn from price control? Markets have to control prices, anything else sends vendors to where the market is free or investors bailing out and sending their money where it gets a return.

2. health insurance; everywhere its been tried, England, Canada, etc., the governments that implemented national health care programs had to ration out the various types of care, ie. health care shortages. In Canada last year, a patient needed an operation that would save her life. The waiting list for that operation was 3 YEARS long. She would die before her turn to get the operation would arrive, while at the same time they scheduled a sex change operation for another patient. This case is not unique, but is a common story of critical care being denied because it isn't available. The doctors are leaving those countries to go where they can get fair market value for their work. Here in the U.S. the government required companies over a certain size to provide health care insurance which resulted in the current mess of health care being priced outside of the financial feasibility for a blue collar worker to pay for it out of pocket. Instead, we have to cancel retirement accounts and sell our houses to continue living unless we're insured.

Caption: In America you wait in line to see a movie. / In government run health care systems, you wait to see a doctor.

3. social security; we developed a program to guarantee every citizen a retirement fund at the beginning of the baby boom. What looked like an overwhelming success in the first 40 years was squandered in other programs like welfare that rewarded divorce and out of wedlock childbirth. Now the boomers are retiring and there aren't enough depositors to pay the dues to the recipients and the out of wedlock childbirth and divorce rates have skyrocketed and nearly destroyed the moral integrity of the favored recipient race and heavily damaged the strength and social benefit of the institution of marriage.

Chart compares substance abuse (dark) to non-substance abuse (light) in areas of education, psychiatric, domestic violence, housing, health, legal, low job skills. Welfare provides endless time and 0 direction so that the vast majority of recipients never get off of welfare.

All these programs seemed like good ideas, they made us feel good about our intentions to heal all the ills in the world. The results show that they do much more harm to society than they do good. Now lets look at programs that work.

1. Strategic Defense Initiative; under Ronald Reagan America built up its defenses and initiated technological advancement in military programs to create a system that would defeat missiles launched at the continental United States before they entered our air space. At the same time we supported countries trying to break free of communist rule. The result was the bloodless fall of the U.S.S.R.

2. philanthropy; with all of the government programs to fight homelessness, dropout rates, hunger, drug and alcohol addiction, and a plethora of others, turns out the only successful programs dealing with all of these were faith based. When the gifts are locally regulated, follow up and accountability are much more closely worked because the givers see the results of the work and ensure they work or take their giving where it does.

Faith based prison program provide support to change lives from a destiny of hardened career criminals to contributing members of society.

3. education; rather than throwing more money at a continually growing problem, we can look around at what is already working and support those organizations. When nearly all private educators, including home schooling, are consistently performing far above public schools, its time to abandon the failing program and invest in those that succeed. School vouchers are working in other nations. Oddly, one of them is communist China, another is India.

This is the first school voucher in India. Another word for voucher is Scholarship.

http://www.schoolchoices.org/roo/whatsnew.htm

What have we learned today?

Socialism bad, Conservatism good!!!

Jonah Goldberg, in his book, Liberal Fascism, reminds us that Hitler's Nazism, Mussolini's Fascism, Chairman Mao's Communism, North Viet Nam, North Korea...... (well, you get the idea) was born out of socialism. In fact, all forms of fascism is born out of socialism. You can't have both freedom and utopia in a world where everybody doesn't agree what utopia is. Scratch that, you can't have utopia without God centering every life.

The Hammer Fight

2008-02-25T22:50:00.001-08:00

Sitting across the aisle, I'm mildly entertained by the fact that the Democrats are right for once. Half of them believe Barack is an empty suit or a cowboy that's all hat and no cattle.

The other half think the Clinton's are power mongers and all dirty politics and Hillary in particular is shrill and just plain scary. This week a picture surfaced of Barack in a turbin raising the suspicions already floating around that he is Muslim. I heard what I still consider to be a rumor on Rush's program today that this picture was released by the Clinton machine.

Here are a couple of examples why this photo release will help the Obama camp.

Well, its no surprise to the Republicans that the Clintons play dirty politics, the right have felt the sting of such timed releases quite a number of times over the last 16 years. Its kind of good to see the hammers landing on the other side for a while. But the Clintons only resort to this when they are desperate. And why are they desperate? After they came out of the early primary races with a commanding lead, Obama has gained steadily and with increasing velocity no matter what trick they pull out of their bag. They've come to realize, its not about the play book. This is a new religion. The empty suit is standing only because its filled with a spirit of faith.

No matter what hammer they throw at him, the voters boo them for the attempt. Meanwhile, Obama stands up and says bumper slogan speeches that never touch on what will change or how it will be made to change. This allows any voter to fill in the blanks with their own agendas. Call after call on the talk shows today were Obama supporters being challenged to give one platform issue that he would tackle and how that challenge would be accomplished. They either recited the bumper sticker slogans from his many gloriously empty speeches or filled one of those blanks with their own agenda's passionate desires. They could not quote him because he hasn't said anything.

So, it's going to be Obama for the nomination because you just can't fight faith with a political bag of tricks. Hillary doesn't wear a teflon suit like Bill did, but it looks like our lord, the great and mighty Obama might.

No Low, Too Low

2008-02-23T23:21:00.001-08:00

Here we are again, seeing the new evidence of how low they will go to inflict their evil on the rest of us. This video explains how the terrorists are using prosthetics to disguise their suicide bombers as pregnant women. It goes on to reveal that they are recruiting people who look and sound like westerners and have the legitimate documentation to travel freely, to carry out their attacks on innocent civilians.

Original site can be found at:

http://www.liveleak.com/view?i=9a4_1202868059

Profiling won't be an issue anymore, but accidental shootings of pregnant women within our airports and sports arenas may be. Lest we forget, they have already arranged it so that its now possible to mistakenly kill the mentally challenged and children by using them to carry out terrorist bombings.

We westerners have to understand that their's is a culture that values religious pride and identity above life, even the lives of their own children as evidenced not only by these unwitting suicide bombers, but also by their honor killings of daughters who refuse to wear the hijab or who've been raped or for just dating.

America does not target innocent civilians but the enemy uses the innocent as shields and as couriers to carry their bomb belts into our midst. The enemy is evil, real, and cunning. Their is no comparison between honorable men and women of our culture and those who consider it an honor to target our innocent and hide behind their innocent civilians. Cowardly tactics from cowardly ideologues.

About those who compare ours to theirs; you consider it bravery to attack honorable institutions and those who man them on the confidence that you will not be answered violence for violence. Beware; this is an open threat. If I catch any of you attacking one of these honorable people who cannot return blow for blow under threat of biased prosecutor and judges and this politically correct climate, I will step up to do so in their stead. Your right to freedom of speech does not include destruction of property public or private, and it certainly does not include any personal attacks to people in uniform.

त्सेस फॉर थे record

2008-02-22T22:16:00.000-08:00

Jesus Said, "Judge Not" Misquote

2008-02-22T13:15:00.001-08:00

Charles Barkley, Madonna, and innumerous other pop culture icons are purposefully and in some cases ignorantly misquoting Jesus to Christians. Its not exactly a misquote, but it is definitely taking his instruction out of context. This verse makes it clearer.

John 7:24 "Do not judge according to appearance , but judge with righteous judgment ."

Here is a video of a pastor saying it much better than I can. Here's to defeating this ignorance.

Christophobia and Islamophobia

2008-02-18T22:37:00.001-08:00

Yesterday, I heard Charles Barkley slamming Christianity for judging people, calling it hypocrisy. He (Barkley) judged all of Christendom hypocrites for judging others. The lack of depth, the vacuousness of his thought processes are not unique. This is fast becoming the populist position within the very culture that is derived from Christianity. What has Western culture become?

If Christians are hypocrites for judging others, what does that make those who judge Christians and condemn them for judging? I do not condemn anyone for judging me, in fact I encourage it. However, I must condemn anyone who judges me on the basis of prejudice. Prejudice is a pre-judgment and in this case, a pre-judgment (prejudice) based on my faith, an irrational fear of Christians and it is called Christophobia.

Judgment based on understanding, facts, behavior, values, and morals is absolutely necessary to our survival. You cannot succeed in any relationship without using your judgment. Everybody uses judgment to choose their friends, their spouses, their advisors, their suppliers, their customers, business partners.......everyone is judged daily. What's more, since no one is perfect, we have to use our judgment within each relationship with every contact, every exchange of information must be evaluated for relevance and accuracy. Even my pastor, whom I respect and adore and lean on for guidance has weaknesses and holes in his knowledge and is therefore capable of steering me wrong, not because of evil intent necessarily, though he struggles with certain temptations just like I do, but lack of knowledge. So I evaluate what my mentor has to say maybe even more carefully than what my doctor has to say. Most assuredly, I evaluate what my doctor has to say since my life may literally depend on it.

I have heard more often than most Christians prejudices like Barkley's because I have tried to reach young people with some good old fashioned common sense. When I have been on Yahoo's Answers and in chat rooms and when I speak to the youth in person, I am often condemned for judging others for giving common sense advice. These young people have been taught this prejudice in our educational institutions. From grade school through college this anti-Christian attitude is rampant among the staff and the kids pick it up directly or indirectly, through lessons or by observing their teachers. Now with the legal requirements to remove God from schools, these prejudices are being reinforced by our courts and by the highest authority in the land. This schizophrenia fracturing the character of our nation and its culture is what is weakening our resolve to define and fight evil within our own culture as well as the external threats to our very existence.

Some examples of what I've been condemned for include, choosing what kind of person to date, what kind of person to be, what kind of person to follow, what kind of person to do business with. Anytime we Christians are attacked (verbally) on the basis of this prejudice, Christians should respond with a counter attack (verbally) on their prejudice and hypocrisy. Stand for what you believe in and stand for your reputation loudly and immediately. Expose the ignorance of your attacker so that all who hear will know their prejudice and shallowness of thought. Let it be a shame to them. Do not allow an unreasonable fear based on prejudice to condemn you for following the Scriptures. Certainly, do not allow a non-believer to mis-quote Jesus or to take His word out of context to condemn you.

The bigger problem is when the non-believer equates Christianity with Islam. Every week we hear of another act of terror perpetrated on Christians and Jews. In Chad and the Sudan the Islamic government and those it supports are ethnically cleansing the entire country. They are killing everyone who does not believe in their particular branch of Islam, so Christians, Jews, and Muslims are dyeing by their torturous methods. In Saudi Arabia and Iran and numerous other countries dominated by Islam, people are literally executed for leaving Islam. Where in the Christian dominated governments around the world can you claim anybody is executed for leaving Christianity? There are none. Yet, pop culture here in this nation, give Christianity, Islam, and all religions the same level of credence. We Christians make statements against lewd behavior, debauchery and defend values that have stood the test of thousands of years, but in Arabia and Persia they don't just speak out against this behavior, they take deadly steps to stop it. If you are a non-Muslim there and are caught in a sexual encounter with a Muslim woman, you will be executed. If you are caught in a homosexual act whether you are Muslim or not, you will be executed. If you try to teach a Muslim about your faith, any faith other than Islam, you will be executed.

Ok, so maybe most people are unaware of these distinctions. What about the way they conduct war? We see on the nightly news that Muslims target their own innocent civilians in order to disrupt the economy in Iraq to keep the region from trusting the stability the American forces are bringing to them. Muslims use their youth to blow themselves up in crowded shops in Israel. They target innocent civilians in other countries. They keep children around their leaders so that if they are located and attacked the children will be killed in the process, then our media play their story in our homes so that the enemy is aided by our media to make us look as bad as they are because their children were killed. Their moderates do not speak out against their extremists' obvious evil ways to protect the reputation of their own faith. Their is no comparison, but they are given equal status with the vastly more honorable by our own colleges, media, courts, and to some degree, even our president. (Religion of peace) In fact many of the Muslims who fully support these extremists have been employed as professors in our colleges. The peaceniks and the blame America types have no excuse for equating murderers and terrorists with those of us who try and occasionally fail to hold the standard, who try to convey that standard to others, who do not force our faith on others, but offer information to be evaluated for its truthfulness and who fight to make freedom available to all people. We do have real reason to fear the advancement of Islam for the things I've listed above and much more.

Charles Barkley is ignorant. No surprise, this. What is surprising is that we hear the same rhetoric coming from our youth, our media, and our courts. That is why we need to be ready to answer prejudicial attacks. That is why we need to judge right.

Christians in Chad; Get Out or Die!

2008-02-03T19:34:00.001-08:00

By now, most of us are familiar with what's going on in Darfur. The Muslim controlled government is slaughtering everyone not subscribing their particular brand of Islam. Well, this weekend the Chadian rebels who are supported by this same government have battled their way into the capitol of Chad. Chad's population; under 10M. Geographical location; central Africa. The overthrow of the current government is immanent. The rebels have pulled back from the capitol to give foreigners the opportunity to leave before they make their final attack.

Chad is a country of close to 50% Muslim and 40% Christian of one denomination or another and various other religions filling out the rest. The infant mortality rate in the region is close to 10%. Everybody is conscripted into the military, men for three years minimum and women for one year minimum at age twenty-one. You can learn all about the country at the link below.

https://www.cia.gov/library/publications/the-world-factbook/geos/cd.html#People

Time to flee: The French Army helped evacuate foreigners Sunday as fighting gripped N'Djamena, Chad.
French Ministry of Defense/AP

The Chadian rebels have been in cohorts with the Darfur government. It is the Darfur government that has been running the ethnic cleansing in Darfur. The government of Chad had been returning the favor to Darfur by supporting their rebels. With this overthrow, the region will become far less stable than it has been for 17 or 18 years when Chad drafted a democratic constitution. Pray for the people of Sudan, Darfur, and Chad to know Christ and to know prosperity and peace. Pray for the Christians to be protected for their faith and identity among the hostile Muslim majority.

Holding My Nose Like Mama Said

2008-02-03T10:16:00.001-08:00

The media had a good time talking to John McCain's mom a few weeks ago. "The conservatives will just have to hold their noses and vote for John." She was answering a question put to her about the conservative base not liking her son. We have our reasons, from Embryonic stem cell research to free speech to immigration policies to tax cuts to defining torture to bringing the prisoners of war under the leftist courts' authority by closing Guantanamo and other prison camps. The guy may have a lifetime voting record of 83% conservative but over the last year he has demonstrated a propensity for sticking his thumb in the conservative bases' collective eye. Anytime the issue was a partisan controversy he didn't just vote left, he pushed and stumped for the left.

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/02/01/us/01conservatives.html?_r=2&hp&oref=slogin&oref=slogin

My vote in the Primaries will be for Mitt Romney because he has the right message and the right position on most everything I've seen. The only place I differ on his positions thus far is the pandering he did in Michigan when he stated that he would work toward a bailout for the auto industry. He had been saying he was for free market or market self control. Where does bailout fit with market self control?

Huckabee is siphoning off the moral conservative vote from the majority conservative vote leaving McCain to win overall in the primaries. What is happening in the late primaries is a 3 way split of the vote. The religious right are split between Huckabee and Romney while the fiscal vote is going to McCain. The conservative coalition consists of basically, 4 groups; fiscally conservative, moral values conservative, free market conservative and finally the national security conservative. McCain gets the nod in only one of these groups, the fiscal conservatives while Huckabee gets the religious moral conservatives but the Republicans who are concerned with the economy and are thinking of the war and foreign affairs are leaning toward Mitt Romney. So, unless Huckabee drops out before Tuesday, we will be deciding whether to vote for McCain or sit out the vote in the General election and watch the Dems end the war pre-maturely. McCain loses the Values conservative because of his previous stump and vote on embryonic stem cell research which turns out to be unnecessary. He loses the free market conservative because of his stumping for caps on trade and global warming which many believe to be a sham, and he loses some on the security conservatism because of his stumping to close Guantanamo and defining scare tactics as torture. He has been a media sweetheart and he has a good record of voting against every spending bill, but he also voted against tax cuts.

I get peeved with Nancy Pelosi for bringing the national defense policies to public debate. This should have been a closed doors debate for the sake of national security. Now the enemy knows he does not have anything to fear if he is caught and he may well have the right to sue our soldiers and the guards at the prison camps in our court system giving him many of the rights his ideology is working to destroy, basic rights he and his cohorts deny their own people, rights our soldiers can't even hope to rely on if captured by their people. I get peeved with John for jumping in with this kind of debate and calling a scare tactic a form of torture. More than anything, I am peeved because my defenders, my faith, my identity as an American gets a double standard from those of our enemies within our own media, legal, political, and teaching institutions. I am fed up with members of my own party joining the blame America first crowd for any reason, much less for political gain. The enemy has no system of accountability for their terrorist acts and in fact are cheering every death they inflict on the West. We are accountable to courts and judges and condemn law breakers to jail. They have no freedom of speech to question their leadership. We have every opportunity to say anything at any time and not suffer legal consequences. What? We know the bad guys are bad so we shouldn't condemn them, but we have small faults by comparison so we should condemn us? Is there logic in this somewhere that I am just failing to see? No. This is the work of cowards and zealots who would rather attempt utopia on earth which always has resulted in the greatest evil this world knows; Nazism, Communism, Fascism, and the like.

So, why on earth would I vote for Senator John McCain to be President of these United States? Because I view the conflict with the 1/5 of 1.3 billion Muslims world wide who support the radical versions of Islam as the defining issue of our time. This is equivalent to the entire population of the U.S. supporting murderous, suicidal, evil people who are willing to hide behind babies and innocents while committing these atrocities. This week some of them sent mentally handicapped girls to blow themselves up in a crowd. If we pull out anywhere too soon, the radicals everywhere will be encouraged and we will have to go back within two years to start all over again, and at that time it will be a far worse mess than it is now because no would-be ally will trust our commitment to the work of defeating radical ideologues. Contrary to popular beliefs that these are people with few resources, we have seen in the U.K. doctors blowing up the tubes and a bus and the airport terminal and in the U.S. business men going suicidal jihad, and in Spain college students blowing up trains. I'm holding my nose because John McCain's politics stink, but he will fight the evil Jihad. If there had not been a war to fight that the Democrats have promised to pull out of, I would have encouraged Republicans to sit this election out so that the Conservative coalition would not be saddled with a reputation of electing a leftist conservative with a leftist view, leftist policies, and a leftist agenda.

Without the war in the picture, I would have considered Ron Paul much more seriously. His stand on governmental spending and taxation is most inline with my thinking. Cut government programs that do more harm than good, cut unnecessary programs that accomplish nothing at all for the people, (leave philanthropy to the private organizations) cut all foreign aid, end taxation and the IRS all together. 1500 pages of tax code so that nobody can understand it, not even the professionals or the IRS. Take your tax forms to one IRS agent or office and you'll get an entirely different sum at another tax office under another tax agent. They often vary as much as 30-40%. Too bad Paul sounds like such a nut when it comes to foreign affairs.

Apology to Brian Williams

2008-01-28T17:16:00.001-08:00

http://hughhewitt.townhall.com/blog/g/766ea7e7-409f-43bd-ab9a-52b3b6c87d10

Ok, so I followed Hugh Hewitt into a bad charge and I apologize to Mr. Williams with Hugh. This does not negate my larger point but Brian did not make up the facts made in his question to Mitt Romney.

Vote Responsibly

2008-01-27T13:19:00.001-08:00

Please go to YouTube.com and watch all 7 segments of this presentation to be informed about the threat against freedom, peace, and life. You can find all of them at http://www.youtube.com/user/Media4Truth

I was listening to Hugh Hewitt this afternoon when he had Michelle Malkin on. See her blog here. She had confirmed a story about John McCain's Hispanic outreach guru, Dr. Juan Hernandez. While she was there, Hugh asked her to comment on Brian Williams questions during the latest Republican debate. It seems Brian asked Mitt Romney a question and referred to a poll that would be released the next day and lied about what that survey reported. The lie was so leading and so blatantly false that it appears he is going down the same track Dan Rather took. Remember Dan reporting about President Bush's past 'Absent Without Leave' charge and the falsified documentation? Brian's statement within the question 'informs us' that a Mormon cannot win the general election. In fact, the word 'Mormon' never appears in the polling question. There isn't even any reference to religion of any type much less specific to Romney's. You can view the incident at this link and view a transcript here.

The entire problem I have with the media is not that they are biased. I am biased. The problem is that they claim not to be biased. The slogan 'Fair and balanced' has been a lie since its inception. If it were not for Talk Radio and the blogs they would get away with this hyperbole because they have a stranglehold on the mainstream media market. Fox news (who also use the slogan Fair and balanced) is the only outlet that swings somewhat to the right and they are cable only access unlike CBS, NBC, ABC, and the rest of the alphabet who are all over air TV or the Publicly funded (taxpayer funded) Public Broadcasting System which is extreme left. Even the movie industry is dominated by 'Progressive' writers, directors, producers, and actors. This means, "if you aren't looking around for better sources of news and information, you don't get news unless it has been skewed by the leftist ideologue filter."

Elections are too important, especially during wartime, to allow yourself to be led or herded by scaremongers and skewed news. Its bad enough that the rest of the world's press paint us, our military, our working churches and people, our leaders, and our successful business entrepreneurs as the evil world bully, but our own press corps. can't find enough bad news to blemish our reputation and efforts to secure a peaceful relationship with hostile entities. Look around and see if what they are saying is at all represented in the events of our times. You don't have to be online but it helps. Order a conservative paper like the OC Register or the Washington Post. There are some, but not anywhere near as many liberal papers. If you can think of other sources offline then please post them in a comment.

If a Democrat takes the White House, they have stated already that their agenda is to get our troops out of Iraq and Afghanistan as soon as possible. The enemies of life and peace will be encouraged that Osama was right when he stated that Americans do not have the stomach for a fight. Worse, our allies would be foolish to trust us again with their lives and the lives of their children. Everything we have sacrificed for the successes we have won over the last eight years will have been for nothing and the end result would be, we will be in a worse position to take up the fight again than when we were attacked on 11 November 2001. Be informed, learn the facts, especially the history of U.S.-Islamic relations....... in fact, the history of all interrelations with Islam. Look up Spain and Europe's history with Islam and North Africa's and Lebanon's and India's......... Should I go on? Fourty-four nations around the world are currently involved in wars with Islam and where is the moderate Muslim voice? America is the only country on the planet where moderates are free to speak out against extremist activities. Yet they can't put together 50 people to march in protest of their religion being hijacked by murderers and thugs who focus many of their attacks on children in the name of Allah.

This video shows what level of intelligence and depth of thought is found in the Democratic camps. No depth of thought among the demographic displayed here. Lots of platitudes, but no real thought of the consequences of some of our options.

Books you should read, get the audio version and listen to them while you work or jog. Do whatever it takes to get the real story. Seek out the documentary movie, "Obsession"

America Alone by Mark Steyn or visit the author's web site http://www.Steynonline.com

http://www.amazon.com/America-Alone-End-World-Know/dp/0895260786/ref=pd_bbs_3?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1201326292&sr=1-3

While Europe Slept: How Radical Islam is Destroying the West From Within by Bruce Bawer

http://www.amazon.com/While-Europe-Slept-Radical-Destroying/dp/0767920058/ref=pd_sim_b_img_2

Londonistan by Melanie Phillips

http://www.amazon.com/Londonistan-Melanie-Phillips/dp/1594031975/ref=pd_sim_b_img_1

Islamic Imperialism by Ephraim Karsh

http://www.amazon.com/Islamic-Imperialism-History-Efraim-Karsh/dp/0300122632/ref=pd_sim_b_img_5

Predictions

2008-01-22T01:12:00.001-08:00

http://bibleresources.bible.com/passagesearchresults.php?passage1=1+Thessalonians+5&version1=49

1 Thessalonians 5

The Day of the Lord

¹Now as to the times and the epochs, brethren, you have no need of anything to be written to you. ²For you yourselves know full well that the day of the Lord will come just like a thief in the night. ³While they are saying, "Peace and safety!" then destruction will come upon them suddenly like labor pains upon a woman with child, and they will not escape. ⁴But you, brethren, are not in darkness, that the day would overtake you like a thief; ⁵for you are all sons of light and sons of day We are not of night nor of darkness; ⁶so then let us not sleep as others do, but let us be alert and sober. ⁷For those who sleep do their sleeping at night, and those who get drunk get drunk at night. ⁸But since we are of the day, let us be sober, having put on the breastplate of faith and love, and as a helmet, the hope of salvation. ⁹For God has not destined us for wrath, but for obtaining salvation through our Lord Jesus Christ, ¹⁰who died for us, so that whether we are awake or asleep, we will live together with Him. ¹¹Therefore encourage one another and build up one another, just as you also are doing.

Well, this is it. The time has arrived. Half of the world is willing to lay down their arms for the sake of peace even though it only takes less than 20 determined people to pull off an attack like 11 Sep 2001 when nearly 3000 people died. Given the current political climate, the next few years will be following the prophecy scriptures like regular clockwork.

(Gog and Magog) Putin has acquired a new dictator role in Russia. (Children of Essau) The enemies of the free world who operate under the banner of Islam are losing the war where we fight, but we aren't fighting everywhere they are. The free world's eyes (the main stream press) are closed to the extent of the dangers we are facing and the good we do around the world either as a nation or as a religion. The classic denial of truth is a faith (peace by peaceful means) being taught in our institutions of higher learning, and is the basis of rule for our own courts as well as the United Nations. World leaders and our own press are judging the righteous deeds of nations as evil and the evil as equivalent to the righteous. (Schools, courts, government) The Bible is being shunted out of every institution that was born on its precepts, even some churches. These same institutions see the faith of Christendom as something between comical and dangerous and equate it with that of the terrorists.'

When you marvel at the blindness of seemingly intelligent people, you have to believe it is the work of a supernatural hand.

Ephesians 4:18being darkened in their understanding, excluded from the life of God because of the ignorance that is in them, because of the hardness of their heart;

There is no stupid, like the stupid of someone who does not want to know. I remember my own walk in that state of blindness. I remember, as if it were yesterday, the revelation when I accepted that I was the one covering my eyes. It requires several things going on at once for someone like this to begin to see.

1. They have to want to know.

2. They have to seek God.

3. They have to hear the Word of God.

4. They have to attribute the truth to its Source.

If any one of these things is not in place, they will not believe there is a God of the Bible or that anyone of the faith is enlightened or that the God of the Bible expects us to be proactive for national defense. For all the evidence, all the miracles, all the good that is accomplished because of the faith, they still will not receive the truth.

The princes of Arabia have poured finances into every educational institution that will accept them for the support of teaching students their extremist version of Islam. In that version the same things being taught to Palestinian, Iranian, Syrian, and Arabian public school students is being pushed into Western culture. The Iranians and the Syrians have sent real support (soldiers, money, cell phones, bomb belts, explosives, military arms etc.,) to the terrorists in Lebanon, Afghanistan, Israel, and Iraq.

I have linked videos of these schools in action. I have linked videos of their most popular leaders preaching hate and murder. I have linked websites of eye witness testimonies of their cultures at work in jihad. I have been kicked off of popular forums and chats for hate speech for linking these videos and websites to other participants. I have tried educating people concerning these real and present dangers and I am called the hate monger for my efforts. I have not cursed or condemned anyone, I have simply informed but to these folks, the truth is hate speech.

I have tried to educate by comparing the histories of Islam and Christianity. I have tried to educate about the history of Islam in relation to other belief systems. If education were the key to peace or at least acknowledgement of the facts, I could believe there might be a chance that education could induce peace. Even with people of my own culture I can't gain respect for at least evaluating the facts. So I cannot believe that another culture will suddenly give up their lifetime of training to hate in honor of a little education. Government efforts in this vein are too late and too little and entirely in vain.

Worst case scenario

John McCain will be the Republican nominee. Hillary Clinton will be the Democratic nominee. Hillary will have the support of the black vote, the Ron Paul Republicans, the environmentalists, the youth on the power of universal health care, and the rest of the anti-war groups. McCain will be supported by the die-hard Republicans, the moderates, and the elder voters, but the Libertarians and evangelicals will sit out the vote. The next president of the United States will be Mrs. Hillary Rodham-Clinton. Before she takes office, the war will get much worse very suddenly because the Islamo-fascists see her as a sign of America's weakness. She will weaken the war effort. She will weaken the U.S. military machine through non-support, military industrial complex reduction. Russia and the U.S. will enter into territorial/influential disputes leading to all out war. China, having held back until military reserves are exhausted in the U.S. and Russia will easily step into world economic/military domination. Islamic aggression will spread over the European Union until 3 nations fall to one charismatic Islamic leader. That leader will strike a peace treaty with Israel for 7 years and for 3 1/2 years there will seem to be peace until that same leader begins to claim deity status or allow claims of his deity status. Israel will rebuild the temple and begin making sacrifices to God. When the charismatic leader of the European Union takes a seat in the tent of meeting on the temple mount in Israel, he will claim to be God. He will shortly thereafter be killed by a mortal wound from an assassin and then will rise from the dead.

Best case scenario

Mitt Romney gets the nod, and Barack Obama has to face off with him. Romney wins on economy and security with Juliani as VP. The war effort is increased, the military industrial machine is maximized. China is faced with trade equivalency agreement. The war with Russia is hard but nuclear arms threat is averted. China facing economy struggles keeps to itself. The Islamic action in the European Union is averted through U.S. assistance for a while longer. Sorry Israel, the peace agreement is still a long way off. No temple yet.

Peace Niks and Ron Paulites

2008-01-21T03:54:00.001-08:00

The reason I'm writing this is because under the peace movement, you are attempting to move me and our community to your ideals, and ultimately to sacrifice with you. You'll understand my concern since I don't believe you comprehend at all, the sacrifice your ideal requires. So, for the record, you should know why I object to your movement.

First, appeasement is not equal to peace and the results of appeasement is the same whether you are dealing with an abusive father, mother, sibling, spouse, boss, friend, workmate, neighbor, school bully, evil dictator, or world terrorist. The more you attempt to please them the more displeasure they show. They are pleased only by your subservience.

Second, peace is not the absence of war or conflict. If I'm doing everything I can to avoid violence, violent individuals pursue me. This I know from personal experience. This refers to social peace specifically. Peace is achieved through reasoned agreement between all parties of interest. If even one party remains or becomes unreasonable, peace is lost. Until reason is restored to that party or that party's interest is removed or neutralized, peace cannot be restored. We don't necessarily have to meet and negotiate an agreement to establish peace with each and every individual but a peaceful agreement is assumed in a law abiding society. In the area of specific interests a meeting might be required to establish peaceful agreements. It is in this vein that I am presently attempting to gain peace with you.

In a case where the abuser is unwilling or unable to reason or compromise only one course of action remains for the abused to obtain peace. Confront with overwhelming force and establish appropriate boundaries. The abuser will test the boundaries, which means it usually takes two or more serious confrontations before resolution can be sought again, then, and only then can peace ensue. Us country fellers call 'at a attitude adjustment.

REASONS WE SHOULD FIGHT

your movement is counter productive to this process and is ,in my view, socially irresponsible. I would even go so far as to call it, "self destructive behavior." Again, my concern is that your movement is attempting to involve me personally as well as my family, our community, our nation, and yes, our world and even if we weren't involved personally we are affected by the consequences. Early aggression and healthy confrontation can resolve disputes far faster and with much less collateral damage than giving the aggressor whatever they want. Giving the aggressor what he wants is rewarding his unwanted behavior. There is no example in history that I know of which would indicate this is a wise strategy. Ghandi, Jesus, Buddha all stood against the political machine with non-violence but none faced an ideology that could not be shamed for their bloodletting of innocents and all were martyred anyway.

Applying this wisdom to today's international disputes we observe, we are late to the chore of confronting unreasonable and powerful entities fed by oil money. It can be argued that we should never have offered support to such men as Osama, and Saddam and I see that you make some good points there, however, this cannot be laid at the feet of George Walker Bush. The fact is, confrontation was put off until it could not be ignored any longer. I believe we can no longer afford to wait until an issue won't be ignored. The threat is too large and too imminent, and we are too vulnerable so that very few resources do massive amounts of damage and cost thousands of innocent lives. It seems to me to be necessary to make decisions and to take actions that establish healthy boundaries for other leaders displaying erratic and threatening behavior patterns before they bring their aggressive nature to bear on U.S. interests and especially our homeland. Our diplomats have been and are now attempting to resolve disputes using negotiations and compromises. Obviously, they aren't always successful, but in a world where hundreds of nations are empowered to great ability to do harm to its neighbors and are vying for largely mutual interests, conflicts are bound to pop up.

MORE REASONS WE SHOULD FIGHT

The two embassies that were bombed, the Marine barracks, the first World Trade Center attack, the USS Cole, and the German disco where American military spent their off time were all bombed on Clinton's watch. These are evidence of the nature I have been describing of avoiding violence only to be pursued by violent people. Those nations named as the 'axis of evil' escalated their erratic behavior and threatening postures until action was taken. One was taken down and the other two huffed up. However, neighboring nations with similar stances toward nuclear arms and terrorist ties began to take notice. Moammar Khadafi turned his nuclear weapons program out to pasture. Other leaders toned down their rhetoric considerably.

MORE REASONS WE SHOULD FIGHT

Moreover, the evil that occurs under these dictators should be cause enough, under your own claims to civil rights progress, for international action against them. The goals you seek are in direct opposition to appeasing or pleasing evil men for the sake of peace and will not achieve it. Sacrifices are necessary, but the sacrifice of millions of innocent lives by ignoring their plight for our own safety is shameful at best and self destructive at worst. We are all familiar with the reports of rape rooms, murder, dismemberment, control of free speech, beheadings, electrification, and on, and on,.... under Saddam Hussein and Kim Jong Il. Actual evil, not the smear tactics used for political clout against George Bush. Men who thwart education for their own people, then use their ignorance and violence to subjugate them. Men who redirect limited funds from feeding and health care of their people who are literally dying of starvation and easily curable diseases and then use those funds to achieve a greater threat against their neighbors and to reward and support threats or create their own threats against the U.S. I am appalled at your refusal to acknowledge the necessity of action against men who display their willingness to perpetrate great evil on their own people and especially after they display willingness to perpetrate great evil upon our people.

ON PASSION AND SACRIFICE

I know from personal experience that "peace at all costs" as an ideal, is far more expensive than we want to think. Jesus had this attitude and paid the ultimate price. The difference is, He did it with foreknowledge. He changed the world with His sacrifice, but you must realize He spent three years preparing the world to receive the truth of His sacrifice. Yet, even He used force to drive out the money changers and dealers from the temple. He restored appropriate boundaries and shamed the priests for allowing terrible things to go on there with their blessing.

While you might be admired for your passion to protest and perhaps even experience real sacrifice, in comparison, your sacrifice isn't valued by your enemies or your brothers as was His for He literally was perfect and did not deserve the punishment He took. The only reason He took it was because God directed Him to so that it would count as what all of humanity deserved. Now if you want to argue that Jesus Christ taught us to love our enemies, I've a few questions for you. 1. Are you ready to give up your life as a witness of Christ? Because that was what He was saying, "In My Name" 2. Where did Jesus teach the nation of Israel not to defend itself? His teachings and speeches were never toward disarming a nation, but of personal responsibility to belief in God and to act in accordance with love toward family, friends and neighbors. He taught foreigners to follow these same doctrines but He never demanded foreigners lay down there arms either. 3. Did He ever admonish His disciples for carrying weapons? He didn't and in fact instructed them to carry weapons.

A WORLD UNDER ISLAM WOULD MEAN PERPETUAL WAR

Your apparent ignorance on the dangers we face as a nation allows you to take a position that would ultimately lead to the destruction of this nation and indeed the free nations all around the world. The extremists want to take us all back to the stone age. In the world they envision, we would all be subject to their particular brand of Islam. Namely, the Wahabist and the Shia and the Sunni, which would choke down the world economy by preventing all women from education, from even traveling without a male escort, from literally even showing their faces in public. They would sink us into an eternal war between this and that brand of Islam. They would demand all non-Muslims would have to pay a special tax, that all non-Muslims would have to give the right of way to Muslims. That all non-Muslims would not be allowed to freely worship via their own faith or to even congregate together. They would begin another holocaust on the Jews and don't think it would stop there. If the moderate Muslims aren't prepared to stand up to these extremists, to reclaim or maintain control of their heritage, then it must be non-Muslims who hold the line of decency.

BUSINESS AND ECONOMICS PULLED SOME OUT OF THE STONE AGE

The Muslims here live better lives within their faith than do those who live in 90% of Muslim territories. They are typically free to choose which faith they will follow and to what degree they will follow it. They are vastly better off economically. Yet, in the American Muslim culture, we see honor killings where self proclaimed 'Moderate Muslims' kill their own children for shaming the family by not wearing the head covering or taking boyfriends. There is no Islamic country that we can point to and marvel at their industrial success. Islamo-fascism is not a nation with borders defending their land, and a trained and uniform militia. These are ideologues spouting hatred and murder and hatching plots against all non-Muslims from all over the globe including right here within our own borders. They send their children to suicide attack other Muslims for non-compliance to their extremist views. So, you say, "Bring our troops home!" and "Stop interfering in other countries affairs!" If you would bother to look at the history all western nations have with, not nations, but Islamic leaders, you'd know that these are not honorable people. They had nothing to compete with other economies until members of our business world went over there to help them discover and use their own natural resources. Yes for profit, profit is the motivation for most of the world economy's advancement. Then the Muslims steal the technology and the equipment that blessed their economy from those who would do business with them. Why would any investor want to do business with people like that? If they were willing to work with the rest of the world with integrity, they would be competitive in the global economy. Currently, the only way they have been able to influence their own economy is by the oil technology they stole back in the forty's. With all their oil money they haven't progressed anywhere unless western companies are brought in to provide their services. They have skills and abilities just like the rest of us, but they have concentrated their efforts toward wars. Wars with one another, wars with the West, and top most among their efforts, war with Israel. In every deal made with Israel that fell through, it was the Muslims who broke faith. In every conflict within Israel, the first blood shed to break the agreement was Jewish and usually happened at a civilian market or on a public bus. There is no comparison between the culture of Islam and the cultures of Democracy.

THE PURSUIT OF UTOPIA CREATES HELL ON EARTH

I'm not suggesting that all Muslims are crooks or immoral, but I am saying that there is no comparison between those who target innocent civilians and those who protect the civilians of their enemies or even those who will not stand and fight their extremist brothers to prevent these atrocities in the name of Islam. I often hear your type comparing our military actions to that of Hitler or Stalin but I've got news for you. Your politics are more closely aligned with fascism than are the militant west. The idea that humans can create some sort of utopia is where Nazism, Fascism, and Communism was born. Completely separate from your stance on the war, this philosophy is frightening to me. Meanwhile, our military and Israel's military are answerable to civilian leadership who are elected by the people and that leadership has term limits to prevent attempts to create their own versions of utopia.

This is a Muslim leader in England refusing to condemn the bombings there last year. He, in fact, states that he must stand with them in support. He is an English citizen encouraging English citizens to make devastating attacks on England. We have them here as well, the difference is they are lauded on our college campus' and among elite circles. They have schools all over this country where they are reciting the same extreme fanatic doctrines taught in Iranian public schools.

Just a few resources to look at to see for yourselves what they are teaching in grade schools. GRADE SCHOOLS!!!

http://vids.myspace.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=vids.individual&VideoID=4474402

http://www.iht.com/articles/2004/08/18/edweiss_ed3_.php

http://www.grokyourworld.com/louisxiv/2005/06/me_ii_political.html

http://www.mtholyoke.edu/acad/intrel/jc.htm

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2006/08/31/wpino31.xml

Right MovIe Right Now

2008-01-13T14:19:00.001-08:00

The Orange County Prager meetup 10 JAN 08 was quite inspiring. A couple of guests were invited and had exciting projects to tell us about. Paul Croshaw is writer and director of a quality documentary which is autobiographic called Baseball, Dennis, and the French. The reason he was at a Dennis Prager meetup to promote his project is because Dennis had him on his show to talk about how Dennis influenced his life toward conservatism and religion. You can view a short, a test run of his project at his website http://BaseballDennisandtheFrench.com and get further information relevant to the project. He is looking for investors and donations to help finance the project.

The purpose of the project is to get a concise, entertaining, quality documentary presentation of conservative/religious values in the marketplace to explain how we conservatives come to be. With the flood of leftist views in the media market, including news, movies, sitcoms, educational institutions, etc., it is essential that we support the development of new venues to express our rationale. Paul's project is doing just that. You can support him by going to his website and donating and by spreading the word to generate interest in viewing the completed work.

The other guest, Larry Dudock is a Prager Group organizer and leader and had also done a short film which can be viewed here.

This film was born out of the 168 hour Presbyterian film project. The details of that organization can be found at http://www.168project.com

The discussion after these two gentlemen presented and discussed their projects ran from the start of the groups and their apparent success to the topic of race in the political debates and electoral race. We have such a good time at these group meetings that we tend to stay until the staff run us out.

While looking for Paul's work on the web I was thrilled to discover Alan Miller's lyrics for Dennis' Happy Hour theme song posted on YouTube. Here they are

Happiness to everybody out there. Listen to Dennis' Happy Hour at http://krla870.townhall.com/ just click on the listen now link in the upper left corner. The Happiness Hour is scheduled every Friday 10-11 AM or if you are in the Los Angeles area tune your AM radio to 870. Another way to hear them is via podcast at http://krla870.townhall.com/talkradio/Show.aspx?RadioShowID=3&ContentGuid=20cdaed8-5621-4392-9db9-ea41f27a1604

Dennis literally wrote the book on happiness called "Happiness is a Serious Problem" a human nature repair manual. I have read it and can attest that this is an important read for those who want to achieve happiness. The book can be ordered from Amazon at http://www.amazon.com/gp/search/ref=sr_adv_b/?search-alias=stripbooks&unfiltered=1&field-keywords=&field-author=Dennis+Prager&field-title=Happiness+is+a+Serious+Problem&field-isbn=&field-publisher=&node=&url=&field-binding=&field-subject=&field-language=&field-dateop=&field-dateyear=&sort=relevancerank&Adv-Srch-Books-Submit.x=18&Adv-Srch-Books-Submit.y=12

FAITH

2008-01-06T21:41:00.001-08:00

Funk & Wagnalls Standard Dictionary defines faith as; 1. Confidence in or dependence on a person or thing trustworthy. 2. Belief without need of certain proof. 3. Belief in God or religious writings. 4. A system of religious belief. 5. Allegiance. Contrast --bad faith Deceit; dishonesty. –in faith, Indeed; truly. –in good faith with honorable intentions. –to break faith 1. To betray one’s principals or beliefs. 2. To break a promise. –to keep faith 1. To adhere to one’s principals or beliefs. 2. To keep a promise. –interj. Indeed. [< L fidere to trust]

The New American Standard Exhaustive Concordance says

#4102. pistis; from #3982; faith, faithfulness: ---faith (238), faithfulness (3), pledge (m)(1), proof (1).

#3982 peitho is described as a primary word, verb; to persuade, to have confidence:-assure(1), confident(3), convinced(7), followed(m)(2), have confidence(2), having confidence(2), listen(m)(1), obey(3), obeying(1), put confidence in(2), put trust in(1), relied(1), seeking favor(1), sure(2), took advice(1), trust in(2), trusted in(1), trusting in(1), trusts in(1), urging(1), win over(1), won over(2).

Faithful 1. True or trustworthy in the performance of duty, the fulfillment of promises, etc.; loyal. 2. True in detail or accurate in description: a faithful copy.

--the faithful 1. The followers of a religious faith. 2. The loyal members of any group. –faithfully, ---faithfulness.

Faith, according to its use in the English language in one form, could be described as a very practical application of trust. So faith is getting information, evaluating the information and deeming it true, then applying that information and acting in belief as though a proven fact. The less proof we require to believe, the more we are said to act on faith. The term, “blind faith” is used of absolute trust in unproven, untested information. A second form is supernatural faith. It is this faith that is employed by anyone who comes to a saving knowledge of Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior. I’ll describe this form as trust in information that has been divinely revealed. The more we know of the Bible, the more we know it to be trustworthy as the faithful word of God and this demonstrates the practical aspect of faith. Much of it is proven faithful as we read and daily see the practical aspect of God’s instruction. Even so, veteran theologians and pastors are often heard saying, “I don’t know how many times I’ve read that verse, but until now I’d never seen it in that light.” That scripture has been revealed. That individual’s spiritual eyes were opened to a spiritual truth and they gained spiritual understanding.

In the Greek, believe “pisteuo” 4100 (a contraction of noun and verb) is used to convey, “firmly persuaded upon hearing, a firm conviction producing a full acknowledgement of God’s revelation or truth. 2 Thess 2:11-12” So at salvation we hear and are persuaded so completely as to commit the rest of our lives to Jesus. Obviously, this is only possible through the divine intervention of an all-powerful God because previous to this event we literally cannot perceive either our need for salvation or God’s willingness or ability to accept and save us. 2 Corinthians 4:2-5

Luke 22:32, “but I have prayed for you, that your faith may not fail;” Acts 6:7b “and a great many of the priests were becoming obedient to the faith.” 16:5 “So the churches were being strengthened in the faith, and were increasing in number daily.”

Romans 1:5 “through Whom we have received grace and apostleship to bring about the obedience of faith among all the Gentiles, for His name’s sake,” 4:20 “Yet, with respect to the promise of God, he did not waiver in unbelief, but grew strong in faith, giving glory to God,” 12:3 “For through the grace given to me I say to every man among you not to think more highly of himself than he ought to think; but to think so as to have sound judgement, as God has allotted to each a measure of faith.” Vs. 6 “And since we have gifts that differ according to the grace given to us, let each exercise them accordingly; if prophecy, according to the proportion of his faith;” 14:1 “Now accept the one who is weak in faith, but not for the purpose of passing judgment on his opinions.”

1Corinthians 12:9 Supernatural faith is spoken of as a Spiritual gift.

While “pistis” is translated into “faith” 238 times in the New American Standard Bible, it is interesting to note that it was translated once as “pledge,” once as “proof,” and 3 times as “faithfulness.” Lets look at where these occur and how. We’ll take them in the order they came.

At 1 Timothy 5:11-12, Paul is speaking to a young pastor of honoring a widow who is, what Paul calls “a widow indeed.” He says, “But refuse to put younger widows on the list, (list of widows indeed) for when they feel sensual desires in disregard of Christ, they want to get married, thus incurring condemnation, because they have set aside their previous pledge (pistis).” Sounds as though they were pledging themselves to Christ as some kind of Nuns. Paul was concerned that these young widows would disregard faith, that is to say their commitment to Christ.

James 2:19 demonstrates the need to do more than believe, but to commit. We work (study and meditate) to be grounded in the Word and as we stand firm in the conviction of our belief in the resurrected Christ, our faith is made solid. Galatians 5:1-6, Philippians 2:12. The works of faith are perfected by our simply believing and acting in that belief. These works are known as fruit. Fruit of the Spirit are a result of living a Spirit filled life. Works that are not as a joy unto the LORD or which are designed to impress people are not fruit of the Spirit. To abide in Christ and have Him abide in me is to be empowered and to be faithful to live by His will (direction). John 15:5-8

“Pistis” the same word, is used to communicate the idea of the gift of God as spoken in Ephesians 2:8,9 by the same speaker, Paul. It becomes clear then, responsibility on the part of the Christian is required to walk (live or act according) by faith or commitment to Christ. This is a two-way relationship just like dating and marriage. He has committed Himself to us and expects us to commit ourselves to Him. Note: He is perfect and commits Himself perfectly. We are of a fallen, imperfect nature and our commitment is flawed with our nature. He has provided for this in 1John 1:9. But your faith is linked together with a joy as evidenced with Christ in Hebrews 12:2. He suffered, looking past the torture to the joy of the kingdom completed with all the saints. This is what we look to also. Philippians 1:25 Paul links them together again for us, being concerned for their, “progress and joy in the faith.”

Luke uses the same word describing the provision of God to empower us to victory and this is the reason for every Christian’s accountability to God for faith. Acts 17:30-31, “Therefore having overlooked the times of ignorance, God is now declaring to men that all people everywhere should repent, because He has fixed a day in which He will judge the world in righteousness through a Man who He has appointed, having furnished proof “pistis” to all men by raising Him from the dead.”

We are also called to prove, (be proof) witness through our testimony the worthiness of God for our trust. Revelation 12:10,11 “Now the salvation, and the power, and the kingdom of our God and the authority of His Christ have come, for the accuser of our brethren has been thrown down, who accuses them before our God day and night. And they (the saints) overcame him (Satan) because of the blood of the Lamb and because of the word of their testimony, and they did not love their life even to death.” This all the proof we can be.

All the proof we’ll ever have or need is given to us at the point of salvation when we accept that Christ was crucified and died for our sins and believe He rose from the dead. This is the reason God will not increase our faith. If you have faith enough for salvation, you have faith enough to raise someone from the dead, to move mountains, curse a fig tree, command a mulberry tree to be uprooted and to plant itself in the sea, or to cast out demons.

An example of this is found with Jesus teaching something especially difficult to abide by and the apostles respond with, Luke 17:5, “And the Apostles said, ‘Lord increase our faith.’” In the very next verse, Luke 17:6 Jesus answered them, “If you have faith the size of a mustard seed, (one of the smallest of seeds) you can say to this mulberry tree ‘Be uprooted and be planted in the sea.’ and it would obey you.” Let me say it again! The reason God will not increase faith is because all the proof is in the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead! Hebrews 6:4-6 Faith is given by this proof.

One block to the flow of power is in lack of forgiveness. Jesus ties these together in Mark 11:22-26. All lack of forgiveness must to be eradicated. The person we are most likely to hold unforgiveness for is ourselves. 1John 3:21 “If our heart does not condemn us, we have confidence before God.” Without assurance, confidence we have no power to stand firm in our faith. Remember Paul’s concern for the Philippians, “progress and joy in the faith.” 2Thessalonians 1:11 “To this end also we pray for you always that our God may count you worthy of your calling and fulfill every desire for goodness and the work of faith with power;” To what end? It was to glorify God.

Free will is still at work. Everywhere through the gospels, Jesus chides the apostles for the smallness of their faith. I have to take this as smallness of faithfulness or commitment more than belief and trust. The word “pistis” is translated both ways.

Galations 5:22,23 But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness (pistis), gentleness, self-control; against such things there is no law. This is the third way that Greek word translated. And it refers to keeping our word and commitment to its completion and not just once, but as general practice. This verse is speaking of the nature of our character.

Matthew 23:23 “Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you tithe mint and dill and cummin, and have neglected the weightier provisions of the law: justice and mercy and faithfulness, (pistis); but these are the things you should have done without neglecting the others.”

Romans 3:3 If some did not believe, their unbelief did not nullify the faithfulness (pistis)of God, did it?” God does not need to trust or believe us, He has known from the foundation of time. Yet, the same word is used here in order to convey His commitment to us.

The only place in the New American Standard Bible New Testament I could find faith being increased, was not through prayer or directly by God. 2 Thessalonians 1:3 “We ought always to give thanks to God for you, brethren, as is only fitting, because your faith is greatly enlarged, and the love of each one of you toward one another grows ever greater; therefore, we ourselves speak proudly of you among the churches of God for your perseverance and faith (dedication to following Christ) in the midst of all your persecutions and afflictions which you endure.” Faith (their commitment) had increased, or perhaps better translated, “firmed up” with personal experience of God’s faithfulness.

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. Faith is a gift of God but it is important to keep in mind that it is described partly as commitment and always implies action based on belief and commitment.

.There is physical evidence for the resurrection in the events recorded in history, but the enemy has blinded men everywhere to these. Men deny Jesus because of their love of sin. Jesus was seen by more than 500 men at one time after He rose from the dead. So dramatic and effective were these appearances that time itself is measured on His existence by those who know Him. The effect He has on those who know Him is so dramatic that their testimonies affect unbelievers and make them believers as the Father draws them. Revelation 12:11 When they believe, He enters their hearts and they experience the personal relationship with Him and change. 2 Corinthians 3:18 And so the family of Christians grows.

In John17:17,18 Jesus is praying for all the disciples throughout all generations, “Sanctify them in the truth; Your word is truth. As You sent Me into the world, I also have sent them into the world.” In order for us to know the truth, we have to read (hear) the truth from the Source, His love letter to us. A.K.A. the Bible. The truth is then applied to our lives. This is shown at 2Timothy 3:16. “All scripture is inspired by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, for training in righteousness.” We must have the Spirit of God for discernment of spirits and discernment of the Word. 1 John 2:27 “And as for you, the anointing which you received from Him abides in you, and you have no need for anyone to teach you; but as His anointing teaches you about all things, and is true and is not a lie, and just as it has taught you, you abide in Him.” In 1 Samuel 14:6-23 The king’s young son and his younger armor bearer moved into the enemy camp and within about a hundred feet, slaughtered twenty soldiers of the garrison. The Jews looked and saw the multitude of Philistines moving around and running from something in the camp. While this is going on, the Jews have time enough to take a census of their ranks to find out who was missing. When they find out its Jonathon, the king takes time to talk with the priest before joining the battle in the Philistines’ camp. The words Jonathon uses to start all this were, “Come and let us cross over to the garrison of these uncircumcised; perhaps the LORD will work for us, for the LORD is not restrained to save by many or by few.”

As we begin to move in the ministry of faith, our commitment becomes more solid with every new experience of God’s faithfulness. Practice what you know to be God’s will for righteousness in God’s will. Learn all you can of the will of God, and commit yourself to doing what you know is God’s will and watch God move in power at your request. This is not a righteousness for salvation. That was accomplished at the cross. But for power to glorify God as He moves with miracles, righteousness is a necessity. James 5:16 “The effective prayer of a righteous man can accomplish much.” Galations 3:11b “THE RIGHTEOUS MAN LIVES BY FAITH.” Romans 14:23b “Whatever is not from faith is sin.” Sin is defined as “missing the mark.” And the mark, in this case, is the will of God.

The men who followed Jesus on earth received faith from God to believe in Jesus as the Christ long before they received power from Him to do the great works that we know them for today. Stephan, the first martyr and Peter speaking boldly before thousands. Paul and Sylas rejoicing because they were counted worthy to suffer for the Name. All of them laying hands on and seeing miracles occur and going everywhere witnessing of the love and saving grace of God to birth new churches.

While Jesus was with them they were beginning to move in the works of faith, yet imperfectly. Mathew 17:16 “And I brought him to Your disciples, and they could not cure him.” In verse 20 He chides them yet again. “Because of the littleness of your faith; for truly I say to you, if you have faith as a mustard seed, you shall say to this mountain, ‘Move from here to there,’ and it shall move; and nothing shall be impossible to you.” Then He adds, “But this kind of demon does not go out except by prayer and fasting.”

A man of faith is a faithful and loyal man. I like the example in the definition of faithful, “a faithful copy.” A faithful copy of Christ in love and commitment, knowing that what is set before us, in this life as well as the next, is truer than this physical existence. The belief, the conviction of this grows more assured as I commit my life to His purposes and experience His faithfulness to do exactly what He said He’d do. Romans 12:1 “I urge you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, to present your bodies a living and holy sacrifice, acceptable to God, which is your spiritual service of worship.”

I must risk rejection for His sake. He who testifies of Me before men, I will testify of to My Father, and he who denies me before men, I will deny before the Father.****** To be a man of faith means I speak the truth He tells me to speak to whom He tells me to speak at the time He tells me to speak. I stand up for righteousness even if no other man stands with me. I willingly look a fool to obey His command to lay hands on and pray for healing and release or to publicly worship Him. If I am to be a man of faith, I must willingly pour my life out for Him as He did for me. This is what it means to “Take up your cross and follow Me.” Matthew 10:38 ------------------------He said we could expect to be rejected and hated because we represent Him and He was rejected and hated.**** Paul and Sylas rejoiced at the fact they were counted worthy to suffer for Him***** In all works of faith and every thought we are to filter our hearts through the love (agapeo) of Christ and men. Our motivation must be for the good pleasure of God for power from on high.

1 Corinthians 13 demonstrates the uselessness of faith without love. We can be in total agreement with God and see the great miracles by our own hand and still not have salvation for ourselves. God will accomplish His will through willing servants, but let us watch the motivation of our hearts for the full reward to come at His returning. If I seek any reward for these works in the present life I forsake the reward in heaven. Even if all I seek is to be noticed by men. Matthew 6:1

Some of the strongest warnings in the Bible are in regard to our faith! It concerns me deeply for the American church overall, when I read verses like, Hebrews 3:12-19, 5:9-6:12. Especially verses 6:4-6 “For in the case of those who have once been enlightened, (the unveiling of spiritual eyes 2Cor3:14) and have tasted of the heavenly gift (experienced salvation) and have been made partakers of the Holy Spirit, (The Baptism in the Spirit) and have tasted the good Word of God (recognize its validity) and the powers of the age to come, (the working of miracles) and then have fallen away, (rejected the truth) it is impossible to renew them again to repentance, since they again crucify to themselves the Son of God, and put Him to open shame.”

We may be unable to determine what’s in a person’s heart, but the evidence of attendance is obvious. It has been estimated that 70% of church members simply dropout of attendance in America. Whether they are falling away from the faith is between God and them, but we are each responsible to encourage one another in the faith. Dropping out of attendance is a definite sign of a struggle in their faith.

Do they lose their trust in God because some immature Christian hurt them or the pastor failed to recognize their works? More likely they lose their devotion to Christ long before such incidents. Indeed, in some cases their may never have been the devotion to Christ. This is the work of ministry that is least desired and most needed within church today. The faithful man is to correct and challenge, in the care and knowledge of Agapeo love, every wayward sheep. Search out the will of God through prayer and study before approaching them, but do not fail to go after them. Galations 6:1 “Brethren, even if a man is caught in any trespass, you who are spiritual, restore such a one in a spirit of gentleness, each one looking to yourself, lest you too be tempted.” This is one of the finest examples of spiritual faithfulness going. James 5:19,20 My brethren, if any among you strays from the truth, and one turns him back, let him know that he who turns a sinner from the error of his way will save his soul from death, and will cover a multitude of sins.”

2Timothy 2:13 “If we are faithless, He remains faithful, for He cannot deny Himself.” When we fail to do what we know we should, we are able to confess that as sin, repent and try again. 1John 1:9 “If we confess our sins, He is faithful and righteous to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.” Concerning confession, I recommend confessing to a brother in Christ as it says in James 5:16 “Therefore, confess your sins to one another, and pray for one another that you may be healed. The effective prayer of a righteous man can accomplish much.”

My personal definition of faith is now boiled down and rendered into the old, old nine-word adage:

“God said it, I believe it, that settles it.”

Except that I would add, “so I’ll walk it.”

***Let us see if God is willing.*** Does God want me to get married? Does God want me to reach these bikers with the gospel? Does God want me to work in the prison? Does God want me to speak against homosexuality publicly? Does God want me to reach the men’s group with my testimony? Does God want me on the mission field? Does God want me to offer to pray for healing for this quadriplegic? Does God want me to speak to this pastor about his Christian walk?

.This rebellion is passive aggressive. It would be like saying to yourself, “I don’t want to do that job, I’ll just act like I didn’t know it needed to be done and busy myself with this ‘more important job’ and let someone else do it.”

. To apply teaching without contemplation or meditation can get you very spiritually damaged. I might read where God had Abraham sacrifice his son and decide to do what God called Abraham to and would very quickly find myself condemned by God and society, and rightly so.

. Gal 5:22 “But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control; against such things there is no law.”

. . We can even place faith without any information at all. We can also replace our faith, “Whereas I once thought I could get to heaven by cleaning up my act and convincing God I am good enough for His kingdom, I now believe I can’t. I now rely on the provision of God in the finished work of Jesus Christ to get me into the kingdom of heaven.” I have removed my faith in my ability to save me and placed it in the ability of Jesus to save me. Just as I have placed my faith in Christ, I can change my mind and remove my faith in Christ and go back to trusting my own ability. This would mean I am a fool, but I could do it. This is what is meant when the Bible says some fell away from the faith. It can also mean I no longer concern myself with the kingdom of God. Let me make it very clear here, you cannot be taken out of God’s covering or redemption, but free will is still yours. You are free to choose any other way, right or wrong. As a Christian, I am convinced there is no other right way. One question still remains, “Can I fall away and get resaved or am I doomed after turning away from the faith?” My personal experience stares me in the face, else I would believe once fallen, lost forever. We all have doubts, we all get discouraged but I walked away from the faith for 20 years and acted grotesquely. Yet the Lord never gave up calling me and drawing me back into fellowship with Him. I could have been doomed eternally according to the scriptures, but here I am. I’m now baptized in the Holy Spirit and more grateful than ever for His mercy and grace. I wasn’t re-reborn but I was certainly resaved because I had gone back to my self destructive nature leading to death.

Hebrews 12:2 “fixing our eyes on Jesus, the Author and Perfecter of our faith, Who for the joy set before Him endured the cross, despising the shame, and has sat down at the right hand of the throne of God.”

. So, you say, “All I can do is ask God for more faith. If I read the Bible and listen to the pastor teach, I’ve done all I can to get more faith, the rest is all on God. If He chooses to give me more, great. If not, there’s nothing I can do about it.” Yes, we should read the Bible but, just reading or hearing the pastor and not practicing what I receive or even meditating over it (evaluating how to apply it to my life) is not profitable for faith. ^^^^^^ In fact, these might serve only to inoculate us against faith!

. James tells us to anoint with oil, pray and see what God does. James 5:13-15

. When we are saved, we pray, “Jesus, I believe You died for me on the cross and that You rose from the dead. John 3:16 I agree with You that I am a sinner. Romans 3:23 Forgive my sin, come into my heart and make me the kind of person You want me to be. 1John 1:9 I renounce sin and commit myself to following You.” Romans 6:17

. We can place faith in worthy information and individuals or in unworthy information or individuals. I’d always understood faith to be, “able to depend on or trust in God.” While this much is true, it really is an incomplete picture of the provision of power God has given every Christian. I see now that I’ve done myself a great disservice by not looking into it more fully and much sooner.

. I’ve been a believer for about fifteen years and only about 5 years ago looked into the depths of what it means to have faith and to be a man of faith. As a young Christian I wanted greater faith, more faith, better faith and sought faith through prayer and reading the Word. I understood faith to be an essential part of Christianity. I had asked older believers what faith is and how to get it and was quoted <TOPIC:Hebrews 11:1 “Now faith is the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen.”

Ephesians 2:8,9 “For your salvation is from Jesus Christ through faith, and that not of yourselves that you may not boast.”

Romans 10:17 “So faith comes by hearing and hearing by the Word of Christ.”

These are accurate quotes, but don’t they leave you with an ethereal sense of other worldliness? Kind of like grasping smoke or eating cotton candy. No matter how big a chunk you pull from the cone you can’t fill your mouth. As soon as it touches your tongue it just melts away. So it was with my confidence. I could sit in church and worship and pray with knowledge and get the holy goose bumps and all my confidence would melt at the door on the way out into the world.

You mean, God You want me to witness?” You want me to be ready to lay hands on anyone willing at any time? Like that unsaved woman’s injured puppy and pray for healing so she could know You as a loving God. But, w-ww-What if it doesn’t work? What if I pray and it doesn’t happen? I’d look like a fool, a religious fanatic and God, You’d look like a powerless, or even nonexistent God.”

You know how we have to protect God, right?

What I didn’t understand, was that faith like love is not a feeling. With love we make a choice to care, then feelings follow. Similarly, faith is a choice, but confidence type feelings come only with experience. Every time I come to circumstances greater than my experiences, my feelings are fear and nervousness. Even so, I have the option to act according to the Word of God or what my understanding and reason indicate, or what my flesh is screaming. “RU-U-U-UN”

. I’ll caution you here to check your motives. As a young believer, my desire for faith really was and more often than I’d like to admit, still is about having the respect and acceptance among people. Possibly, in my immaturity and sinful nature, I value their approval even more than the approval of God. My faith is enough for salvation but I limit God, by being such a spiritual toddler, a danger to myself and others. Faith won’t be complete without complete obedience. This doesn’t mean He can’t or won’t use me or you to do great things, otherwise He’d be doing everything without using anyone. Hey, if He can use an ass, then He can use me. Numbers 22:28 Even so, He won’t set me up to fail. In fact He is working all things together for the good of those who love ********Him.

If He’d used me as an instrument to work great miracles then, my pride might easily have poisoned my heart against Him the next time an opportunity to see a miracle arose and God chose in His sovereignty not to use me at that time. Or, if the miracle occurred and I allowed the glory to fall on me, I may have insisted it is for any believer to move in miracles at anytime. I could stumble another young believer. Suffice it to say, “everyone who is not God has room for improvement.” There is no greater faith than to believe Christ is the Son of God, paid for our sins on Calvary and rose from the dead. However, our faith commitment will always need work.

Dennis Prager Meetup

2007-12-20T00:20:00.001-08:00

Ok, if I haven’t said it enough, I thoroughly enjoy listening to Dennis Prager, a conservative talk show host based at the LA radio station KRLA. On 9:00 AM to 12:00 Monday through Friday.

I discovered Dennis when my work moved me away from a rural town in central California up to Sacramento where Dennis was played over the air by tape delay. Out of all the excitable voices on the air, this voice sounded reasonable and generally calm and yet, even when exasperated, he is able to bring clarity to the topic, be it a current event or a news article or an authors politically correct book. Dennis invites the politicians, news authors and editors, the book authors, whoever he would criticize on the air to defend their work or their stance on his show. Often, the invitation is rejected because they see what he has done with previous interviews in his most respectful and humble way. Simply by asking pointed questions, he forces them to either admit they are wrong or that they have not given the issue its due examination, or that they simply don’t agree with Dennis (when it is down to a matter of opinion.) He doesn’t let them get away with calling a difference on the facts a difference of opinion.

The thing that sets Dennis apart from other talk show hosts is found in his motto: I prefer clarity to agreement. Clarity of thought and the ability to communicate thought out, concise ideas and to challenge guests and callers to do the same have earned him a listenership and followers who desire to emulate him in their personal thought life. There are now groups around the country and in varied places around the world who meet for the express purpose of discussing the topics and writings Dennis has covered.

I had the good fortune to meet one of these groups here in Orange County, California last week. I sought them out because Dennis was advertising his meetup groups and because, having attended a Town Hall meeting in Glendale, featuring Laura Ingrahm, Michael Medved, and Dennis Prager, I met some great people. So, I expected to meet good people, but I was pleasantly surprised to find 5 people who were not only nice and like minded, but also engaged in current events. Everybody had something to contribute worth listening to, and everybody appreciated others’ input. I tip my hat to the Orange County Dennis Prager Meetup group. I had a fantastic time with you and look forward to the next meeting.

I came away with an idea that truth alone will not curb the onslaught of the politically correct torrent against Judeo-Christian values and common sense. It has to be a love of truth above self interest. The vast majority of the politically motivated on the left are motivated by self interest, but with limited insight/foresight. Whether its Social Security benefits, Welfare benefits, universal health care benefits, advancing the legalization of recreational drug use, limiting the governments use of laws to instill accountability for criminal behavior, having the government not only keep legal, but to pay for abortions with tax dollars, keep themselves or their children from having to serve in the military during a shooting war, whatever it is for each individual.

Like Dennis does, let me include a qualifier; not every individual on the left is selfish, of course not, but in general, this is who makes up the liberal agenda. There are some few true believers, (like Jimmy Carter) some politicians who sell the agenda for power, (the Clintons) some are hold overs from the 1950’s era Democratic party, (Zell Miller) some who vote the way their family always has with no real thought on history and consequence, but most vote for their personal self interest.

Until the real world invades our little universe, our little self involved microcosm, real world threats and real values issues are not going to have the weight our self interest does at the ballot box. I pray God does something, something only He can imagine or do to call us out of our slumber, our daydream that we have nothing more threatening than our own government and Christians and Jews to fear.

Ever the case the messenger with bad news is killed before the bad news is dealt with? It is the church who has cried out against the destruction of our culture from within, it is the Jews who cried out against the threat of Islamo-fascists, and now the government is facing the very real threat of world domination by the radical extremist factions of Islam. These are the three worst enemies of the liberals, progressives, or Democrats. Not the destruction of our culture, not the Islamo-fascists, not the threat of domination by a foreign power, much less a violent religion, but the Christians, Jews, and our own governmental role in world politics.

The case being made against the Christians by the left is that they are morally equivalent to any other religion, including Islamo-Nazis. The case made against the Jews is that they are morally equivalent to the Islamo-Nazis. The case against the government is that they are morally equivalent to the enemies they are preventing from world domination, Islamo-Nazis.

The church has to be morally equivalent because they are just another religion like any other religion with a bloody history and plenty of bad leaders who take advantage of their congregates. Never mind that the church does not condone violence in the name of God anywhere today but because of a thousand year old event we are no different than the Islamo-Nazis who literally roam around their lands like Nazi Brown Shirts enforcing Sharia law by beheading, caning, and raping. What church leader sanctions anything remotely comparable?

The tiny little country of Israel has to be morally equivalent because they stole the land from the poor Palestinian dirt farmers. If anybody on the left would bother to look past the convenience of blaming the Jews for every evil since the dawn of time, they’d learn the land was purchased, that the Palestinians were never Palestinians until the tiny country of Israel was invaded by all its comparatively giant neighbors simultaneously and survived by miracle after miracle and that the non-Jewish residents picked up and moved out of the way so they could move back in after the attack and claim the land of the defeated Jews. Only it didn’t work out that way. The refugees were rejected by their attacking neighbors and forced into refugee camps. They were obviously aligned with the enemies of Israel so they could not be re-assimilated back into Jewish culture, only then did they take the name Palestine for the purpose of sending a message to the Jews that they were taking on the role of their greatest enemies, the Philistines.

The U.S. government must be morally equivalent because after all we have invaded their homeland and we use torture methods and we don’t hold to the Geneva Convention. Never mind that the Geneva convention only holds for countries that have signed it and that our enemy has not signed it and certainly don’t hold to any of its standards. When they capture one of our soldiers, they have no qualms about castrating, beheading, and dragging through the streets the dead bodies, going so far as to video tape these events and posting them on the web for all the world to see. But hey, if we hood a guy and make him pose in his underwear with a girl soldier, (for which convictions were handed out and resignations were signed) or if we scare a guy into giving up information that will save the lives of many of our troops or innocent civilians of his own country, then we must be becoming the same as they are.

With the theme being so single pointed, you’d expect the Islamic coalition to be the root of the Democratic party, but it isn’t. The Islamic coalition would like to be, I’m sure. The truth is, it’s a conspiracy of self interested parties. If there is no more common sense on the left side of politics than this, then there has to be ulterior motives for their agenda. While it is not criminal to advance a political agenda for self interests, it certainly is amoral. I cannot believe that the vast majority of the American left are that ignorant, that unreachable by teaching the facts of history and the consequences of former political activism. It has to be self concern on the micro level sacrificing the good of the macro level political arena.

Eventually, this will either kill the society we know and love and give control over to the tyrants of the next generation or it will kill the party that feeds on it. For now, its even money whether the Looney left will further this agenda down the road to self destruction or the right gains full control of the House and the Senate and the Presidency to re-establish the importance and the role of traditional Judeo-Christian values in our society and the teetering balance America maintains in the jostling field of macro self interests known as world politics.

The Democratic party has chosen, for its monogram, the outline of a jackass which is relevant to this day. Is this just a quirk, or is it really the attitude they want to continue to identify the party by? The party who identifies with being an irritating, insulting jackass? When I was a Democrat, I didn’t like the idea. The Republican party chose the elephant because it represented a long memory, also relevant to this day. We pride ourselves on remembering the consequences of past choices and on trying to make better choices for the future. Will a relevant party please step up to the plate and put common sense back on the debate table?

Guns!!!!! Good? or EVIL? Why?

2007-12-10T17:56:00.000-08:00

NBC's Channel 9 News covered the recent shootings in Colorado Springs pretty extensively.

Naturally, we want to prevent these killings, these murders, these shootings. So the simple answer is to prevent these nuts from getting their hands on guns. Right?

Maybe not. No, really!!!!

The places that are attacked by these lone nuts are places that disallow guns. No teachers, no security personnel, only a police officer on call can bring a weapon on to a school or college campus, the malls have signs posted "GUN FREE ZONE" They may as well post "No Defense Allowed" for a lone attacker. The nut who attacked this church and the Youth With A Mission camp assumed the same was true of Christians. Thank God for the common sense of the church leaders to provide enhanced security after the YWAM shootings. Note: Yes people still died at the church, but guess what? Without the enhanced security, the dead and injured very well could have numbered into the hundreds and certainly would have numbered over 20 except that someone present and responsible was armed and qualified to use their weapon. More guns, more gun education equals greater safety.

There is a movement to rid our society of hand guns. A major step toward this goal is known as the Brady Bill named after James Brady who was shot during the attack on President Reagon. Brady suffered severe brain damage and is used to lobby the body politic to outlaw hand guns and assault weapons. Initially the effort was to instill a waiting period for weapons purchasers to be investigated for their legal status. The movement has, hrrrrmmmph, PROGRESSED to an all out ban on hand guns and assault rifles.

Just an aside, the liberals/progressives are good at poster childing those who don't have the ability to stand on their own cognitive merits. ie. brain damaged, children, mentally challenged, and just plain ignorant.

Anyway, with the advent of terror tactics making their way onto the nightly news, uh, nightly, it is no surprise that the same terror tactics are finding their way into our own society. So naturally, any nut with a bend for Hell is likely to employ this newly popularized method of protest. Its becoming the norm to -"take as many with me as I can when I go."- among suicide cases. This way they will have made the statement the suicides of old wanted to make only to their loved ones. "You don't deserve me! Yada, yada" but they now are not only selfish beyond reason, to the point of literal self destruction, they're narcissistic and elitist to boot! (Narcism)

Another aside, news agencies provide interesting stories. If it isn't interesting, it isn't reported, or at least, not for very long. They are a (stay with me here) big business. Just like many other big businesses, they use their power to influence the market to their own advantage. Lately, though, many of these agencies have joined the faith based church of liberalism, er excuse me, progression to advent for the Politically Correct agenda of the day, "Anti-gun" "Anti-tobacco" "Anti-junk food" "Global Warming." (I still remember the global cooling scare of the 1970's, so this latest nonsense is just bothersome!!!)

Ok, time to get to my point here. Look carefully at what it takes to stop a nutcase. IT USUALLY REQUIRES A BULLET and therefore, a gun. It doesn't matter what he is using to bring terror, be it a knife, a gun, a bomb, a victim held over a ledge, a speeding car or truck, whatever. They get what they want just by being on the news. They make a name for themselves, THEY ARE HEARD!!! The bumper sticker you've read on the pickup trucks and jeeps "Outlaw guns and only outlaws will have guns" is kind of proven in that church. A security volunteer licensed and qualified to carry a concealed carry weapon, shot the killer, the murderer, the nutcase dead before he could do any further damage. He managed to injure four before then, but what if she flinched, what if she ran the other way or just hid? How many would he have killed before he turned the gun on himself?

Its an old argument, but its making more sense than ever now that suicidal terrorists are shooting up our schools, our malls, our churches, our McDonalds, etc., The police do a lot and I appreciate them to no end, but they can't be everywhere, and they can't do it all. However, if every shooter nutcase had a sense that he will not make the news tonight and will likely go down in the ground without any more whimper by society than the understandable pain of his own family, then this method of 'to quote a former friend of one of the nuts' "going out in style" will lose its appeal before the trend can gain any more speed.

Otherwise, put armed guards at the doors to every church, mall, and McDonalds in the land.