Super Hip Grandma

Witnessing at Her Own Funeral

2006-08-15T07:57:00.000-07:00

By John Jessup

CWNews.com – NORTHERN VIRGINIA - It was a crime that shocked and saddened residents living around the nation's capitol: two police officers gunned down and killed in an ambush at a police station in suburban Washington, D.C.

But as tragic and painful an ordeal as it was, it's apparently sparked a religious awakening for hundreds in the area.

It was a day that started like any other. Forty-year-old Vicky Armel went to work, as usual, at her police station. What would happen hours later, no one ever expected.

"Vicky, the aggressive detective, was the one who said to our boss, 'Hey, there's been a couple of carjackings. Are we going to go out and look for it?' I'm (Mike) 15 seconds behind her," recalled Detective Mike Motafches of the Fairfax County Virginia Police Department.

As they headed out to do their jobs, Detective Armel and Master Officer Michael Garbarino were fatally shot in the parking lot of the police station, ambushed by an 18-year-old gunman armed with an AK-47 assault rifle, five handguns, and a hunting rifle.

Armel was the first officer to be killed in the line of duty in the department's nearly 70-year history. The news shocked many around the region and drew the community's show of support in a makeshift memorial at the police station—and even more at her funeral.

Police estimate that anywhere between 7,000 to 10,000 people paid their final respects at Detective Armel's funeral, many of them law enforcement officers from around the country, in town for National Law Enforcement Memorial Week.

Grieving friends and family came to mourn the woman they describe as well-liked and respected, kind, creative, and often candid about what she was thinking. They thought they would never hear from her again.

But they were wrong.

Imagine the emotions when they heard these words: "My name is Vicky Armel, and if you told me last year that I'd be standing in front of hundreds of people talking about Jesus Christ, I’d say you're crazy."
During the service, the packed auditorium listened to a recorded speech that Vicky gave last year, recounting how she came to make one of the biggest decisions of her life: to become a Christian.
Vicky's faith journey started two years before, with her friend and partner Mike Motafches.
"We knew it was going to be a long day on our investigation out in Maryland, Mike said, and she said, ‘You have the whole day to convince me that this Christianity stuff is true or God exists. I'm your audience for the next five hours.’

This article was excerpted from cbn.com. Click on title for the rest of the story

When Anti-semtism Is

2006-08-07T19:48:00.000-07:00

By Jeff Jacoby
Monday, August 7, 2006, Townhall.com

Two anti-Semitic incidents occurred on July 28. Both took place on the West Coast; both involved an American venting his hostility to Jews. But only one of them became in the days that followed a big national story about anti-Semitism. The other was treated as a serious but local matter, and drew only modest coverage around the country.

Incident A involved nothing more dangerous than a guy spewing crude anti-Semitic slurs when he was arrested for drunk driving; once sober, he publicly and profusely apologized. Incident B involved a Muslim gunman’s premeditated assault on a prominent Jewish institution; his attack left one woman dead and sent five to the hospital, three of them in critical condition.

Which would you say was the bigger story?

Unless you've spent the past week submersed in the Mariana Trench, you know that the intoxicated driver in Incident A was Hollywood’s Mel Gibson, who railed at the Los Angeles County police officer who pulled him over about the “(bleeping) Jews” and how “the Jews are responsible for all the wars in the world.” Details of Gibson's tirade leaked quickly and the story was soon everywhere. In the first six days after his arrest, the media database Nexis logged 888 stories mentioning “Mel Gibson” and “Jews.” And that didn’t include the countless websites, talk shows, and smaller publications where the story also played.

By any rational calculus, Incident B was far more significant.

According to police and eyewitness reports, the killer, a 30-year-old named Naveed Haq, forced his way into the offices of the Jewish Federation of Greater Seattle by holding a gun to the head of a 13-year-old girl. Once inside, Haq announced, “I am a Muslim American, angry at Israel,” and opened fire with two semi-automatic pistols. Pam Waechter, 58, died on the spot. Five other women, one of them 20 weeks pregnant, were shot in the abdomen, knee, or arm. When one of the wounded women managed to call 911, Haq took the phone and told the dispatcher: “These are Jews and I’m tired of getting pushed around and our people getting pushed around by the situation in the Middle East.”

This was no spur-of-the-moment meltdown. The police say Haq, who holds an engineering degree from Washington State University, had purchased the two guns and waited 10 days before picking them up on July 27. He selected his target by searching online for Jewish sites. And as his declarations make clear, he was impelled to kill by his antipathy toward Jews and his convictions as a Muslim.

At a time when jihadist murder is a global threat, and when some of the most malevolent figures in the Islamic world -- Iranian president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and Hezbollah chieftain Hassan Nasrallah, to name just two -- openly incite violence against Americans and Jews, the attack in Seattle should have been a huge story everywhere. Yet after six days, a Nexis search turned up only 236 stories mentioning Haq -- about one-fourth the number devoted to Gibson’s drunken outburst. Why the disparity?

This is an excerpt taken from Townhall.com. Click on title for rest of article.

Letter To The Editor

2006-08-05T08:10:00.000-07:00

From: "David LaBonte"

My w ife, Rosemary, wrote a wonderful letter to the editor of the OC Register which, of course, was not printed. So, I decided to "print" it myself by sending it out on the Internet. Pass it along if you feel so inclined.

Dave LaBonte (signed)
Written in response to a series of letters to the editor in the Orange County Register:

Dear Editor:

So many letter writers have based their arguments on how this land is made up of immigrants. Ernie Lujan for one, suggests we should tear down the Statute of Liberty because the people now in question aren't being treated the same as those who passed through Ellis Island and other ports of entry.

Maybe we should turn to our history books and point out to people like Mr. Lujan why today's American is not willing to accept this new kind of immigrant any longer.

Back in 1900 when there was a rush from all areas of Europe to come to the United States, people had to get off a ship and stand in a long line in New York and be documented. Some would even get down on their hands and knees and kiss the ground. They made a pledge to uphold the laws and support their new country in good and bad times. They made learning English a primary rule in their new American households and some even changed their names to blend in with their new home.

They had waved good bye to their birth place to give their children a new life and did everything in their power to help their children assimilate into one culture. Nothing was handed to them. No free lunches, no welfare, no labor laws to protect them. All they had were the skills and craftsmanship they had brought with them to trade for a future of prosperity.

Most of their children came of age when World War II broke out. My father fought along side men whose parents had come straight over from Germany, Italy, France and Japan. None of these 1st generation Americans ever gave any thought about what country their parents had come from. They were Americans fighting Hitler, Mussolini and the Emperor of Japan.

They were defending the United States of America as one people. When we liberated France, no one in those villages were looking for the French-American or the German American or the Irish American. The people of France saw only Americans. And we carried one flag that represented one country. Not one of those immigrant sons would have thought about picking up another country's flag and waving it to represent who they were. It would have been a disgrace to their parents who had sacrificed so much to be here.

These immigrants truly knew what it meant to be an American. They stirred the melting pot into one red, white and blue bowl.

And here we are in 2006 with a new kind of immigrant who wants the same rights and privileges. Only they want to achieve it by playing with a different set of rules, one that includes the entitlement card and a guarantee of being faithful to their mother country. I'm sorry, that's not what being an American is all about.

I believe that the immigrants who landed on Ellis Island in the early 1900's deserve better than that for all the toil, hard work and sacrifice in raising future generations to create a land that has become a beacon for those legally searching for a better life. I think they
would be appalled that they are being used as an example by those waving foreign country flags.

And for that suggestion about taking down the Statute of Liberty, it happens to mean a lot to the citizens who are voting on the immigration bill. I wouldn't start talking about dismantling the United States just yet.

(signed)
Rosemary LaBonte

A Hero At Geno's

2006-06-16T09:38:00.000-07:00

A hero at Geno's
Jun 16, 2006
by Mike Gallagher,Townhall.com

Email to a friend Print this page Text size: A A Joey Vento, a feisty and proud Italian guy from Philadelphia, has become an American hero.
The 66 year old Vento is the hands-on owner of a Philadelphia treasure, Geno’s Steaks, a legendary cheese steak joint in the middle of gritty, working-class South Philly. Day after day, month after month, year after year, for 40 years now, Joey and his crew have been serving up a delicious sandwich that is unique to the City of Brotherly Love. What pizza is to New York City, cheese steaks are to Philadelphia. And even though there’s competition and plenty of debate about who makes the best one, many people emphatically declare that Geno’s is the best place to get a Philly cheese steak in America.

Geno’s Steaks stands out on the corner of 9th and Passyunk like a brightly lit shrine to gastronomic delights, it’s bright orange exterior and illuminated signs paying tribute to Philly sports teams seemingly visible for miles. Joey likes to say, “If they turned the lights out at Geno’s, Philadelphia would go dark.”

Turning the lights out at Geno’s is a circumstance that some people at City Hall seem to think is a proper punishment for something that Joey has done. The only trouble is that most Americans think the guy deserves a ticker tape parade for what he’s done.

Joey Vento is a flag-waving, freedom-loving businessman. He works seven days a week putting in long, tough hours cutting the loaves of bread for the sandwiches, supervising his employees, and glad-handing the many customers who make a stop at Geno’s a part of their routine. Meeting Joey for the first time will make you feel like you’ve known him forever, the proverbial guy who never met a stranger.

But Joey has a simple request of his customers who line up outside Geno’s to await their turn: when ordering, please speak English. It’s a polite request that has landed him in a lot of hot water with the governmental bureaucrats who feel it’s their duty to patrol the politically correct waters of Philly.

Nearly a year ago, Joey put a little sticker on the window above the counter where people order their food. The sticker simply reflects his wish that people not hold up his line and make life difficult for the men and women who take the orders. It contains this message: “This is America. When ordering, please speak English.”

This was excerpted from article on Townhall.com. Click on title for rest of the story

Million Dollar Bills

2006-06-14T06:48:00.000-07:00

Quadriplegic Harassed by Secret Service For Passing Out $1 Million Dollar Tract
June 13, 2006
© ChristianWorldviewNetwork.com

On Friday, June 2nd the Secret Service seized 8,300 of Ray Comfort’s Million Dollar Bill gospel tracts from his sister ministry “The Great News Network” in Texas. They Secret Service told them that someone in North Carolina tried to deposit one in their bank, and that if they didn't give up their supply, they would arrest them for violation of counterfeit laws. Then they said they are going to seize Ray Comfort’s supply in California. The Million Dollar Bill tract was produced in 2002 by best-selling author and co-host (with Kirk Cameron) Ray Comfort of the award-winning “The Way of the Master” TV program, now airing in 70 countries and on 20 networks.

After Ray Comfort alerted Brannon Howse, President of Worldview Weekend and Christian Worldview Network of the Secret Service action, Brannon urged Comfort to call their mutual friend, Tim Wildmon, President of the American Family Association and The AFA Center for Law and Policy. After Howse and Comfort contacted Wildmon, AFA’s lead trial attorney took the case.

By June of 2006, Ray & Kirk’s ministry had sold an incredible 5,300,000 in the last four years. Other groups were buying the $1 million bill and were buying them and making them available to their customers because people love them. The reason they produced them was because they knew that they weren’t violating counterfeit laws because there’s not such thing as a real million dollar bill. The Monday after the seizure there was panic buying from customers who loved using the tract. A total of 500,000 were sold in one day.

Two days later the story hit the Washington Post, then it was picked up by the Associated Press and became national news. A further one and a million and a half were then ordered and a special print of 100,000 of the bill that had the words “Secret Service Version” printed in the seal. This was in compliance with Federal guidelines. Even though it wasn’t real money, it was made 1 ½ times the size of a genuine bill.

Excerpted from The Christian Worldview Network. Click on title for rest of article.

PG Rating For Baptist-Backed Film

2006-06-09T06:50:00.000-07:00

TERRY MATTINGLY
Scripps Howard News Service
07-JUN-06

The Motion Picture Association of America is crystal clear when it describes why its "PG" rating exists _ it's a warning flag.

"The theme of a PG-rated film may itself call for parental guidance," states the online explanation of the rating system. "There may be some profanity in these films. There may be some violence or brief nudity. ... The PG rating, suggesting parental guidance, is thus an alert for examination of a film by parents before deciding on its viewing by their children. Obviously such a line is difficult to draw."

Disagreements are a given. The Christian moviemakers behind a low-budget film called "Facing the Giants" were stunned when the MPAA pinned a PG rating on their gentle movie about a burned-out, depressed football coach whose life _ on and off the field _ takes a miraculous turn for the better.

"What the MPAA said is that the movie contained strong 'thematic elements' that might disturb some parents," said Kris Fuhr, vice president for marketing at Provident Films, which is owned by Sony Pictures. Provident plans to open the film next fall in 380 theaters nationwide with the help of Samuel Goldwyn Films, which has worked with indie movies like "The Squid and the Whale."

Which "thematic elements" earned this squeaky-clean movie its PG?

"Facing the Giants" is too evangelistic.

The MPAA, noted Fuhr, tends to offer cryptic explanations for its ratings. In this case, she was told that it "decided that the movie was heavily laden with messages from one religion and that this might offend people from other religions. It's important that they used the word 'proselytizing' when they talked about giving this movie a PG. ...

"It is kind of interesting that faith has joined that list of deadly sins that the MPAA board wants to warn parents to worry about."

Excerpted from Scripps Howard News Service. Click on title for rest of the article.

The Media War on Traditional Values

2006-06-05T13:09:00.000-07:00

by Cliff Kincaid

June 05, 2006 09:30 AM EST

The sewer-mouth by the name of Howard Stern once denounced Jack Thompson as a "lunatic lawyer" for getting him kicked off radio stations. Considering the source, this is why this statement is featured as a badge of honor on the cover of Thompson's book, Out of Harm's Way, about the dangers posed by what passes for "entertainment" on television, radio and video games. The book not only describes how Thompson has waged a valiant legal war on those who pollute our culture, it offers evidence of direct harm caused by what children see, read and hear.

Thompson is a father who cares about his family and country.

Another fighter is Rebecca Hagelin of the Heritage Foundation, who wrote Home Invasion: Protecting Your Family in a Culture That's Gone Stark Raving Mad. You can read her excellent speech to Hillsdale College on the Hillsdale website. A mother, she understands the dangers. We need more mothers like her speaking out.

She's right that the culture has gone mad. To the disgrace of American society, Stern, who has since fled to satellite radio, has become something of a cultural icon. It's like he's become the new Hugh Hefner, the modern version of the dirty old man. Stern has even appeared several times on Fox News, supposedly the "conservative" cable channel. Thompson's book would be well worth it if he only dealt with the damage caused by this so-called "King of All Media." Thompson's chapter on "Stern Stuff" examines the disgusting nature of what this creature spews forth. To cite just one example, Stern told his audience shortly after 9/11 that prostitutes should be sent to the rescue workers on their breaks. Much of what Stern says can't even be described without being offensive. What he represents is a sickness and blight on our society.

Excerpted from article on theconservativevoice.com. Click on title for rest of article

Having A Gay Time In School

2006-05-30T08:47:00.000-07:00

By: Bill O'Reilly for BillOReilly.com
Thursday, May 25, 2006

Here is some sobering information: According to a National Election Study, 25% of Americans aged 18 to 24 could not identify Dick Cheney as Vice President of the United States, and 63% of them could not find Iraq on a map of the Middle East. That might be because 80% of the younger set in America do not own a world map and therefore 90% of them could not find Afghanistan either.

In the face of that depressing situation, the state of California is taking action. Earlier this month, the state senate voted 22-15 to prohibit textbooks or instructional materials that "contain any matter that reflects adversely" on persons because of their ethnicity, gender, disability, nationality, sexual orientation, and religion.

In addition, the proposed law would mandate textbooks include the study of "people who are lesbian, gay, bisexual, or transgender, (and who have contributed) to the economic, political, and social development of California and the United States of America ..."

In other words, California kids might soon be studying Gay 101.

Even liberal newspapers like the LA Times and the Sacramento Bee think this legislation is dopey. The Times is lamenting that books would recount history, in part, through a gay and lesbian "prism."

The educational madness in California is part of a secular strategy to de-emphasize academic discipline in the classroom and replace it with an imposed worldview of tolerance and diversity. No longer are facts the primary focus in many public school lesson plans. Now, it's not what you know, it's how tolerant you are.

Excerpted from article on Bill O'Reilly's website. Click on title for rest of the article.

A Confederate Soldier's Prayer

2006-05-28T14:16:00.000-07:00

I know this has circulated around the Internet, but I just now saw it. I would like to share it and hope that everyone is blessed by it.

"A Confederate Soldier's Prayer"
O God,
I asked for strength that I might achieve;
I was made weak that I might learn humbly to obey.
I asked for help that I might do greater things;
I was given infirmity that I might do better things.
I asked for riches that I might be happy;
I was given poverty that I might be wise.
I asked for power that I might have the praise of men;
I was given weakness that I might feel the need of God.
I asked for all things that I might enjoy life;
I was given life that I might enjoy all things.
I got nothing that I asked for but everything I hoped for.
Almost despite myself, my unspoken prayers were answered.
I am among all men most richly blessed

Researcher Gives Google a Thumbs Down on Impartiality

2006-05-26T07:07:00.000-07:00

By Chad Groening
May 25, 2006(AgapePress) -

A public-policy think tank is calling search engine giant Google to task for removing news organizations from "Google News" that have been critical of radical Islam. An official with the organization suggests the popular Internet website is practicing censorship and exercising a double-standard.Google has removed sites like New Media Journal and the Jawa Report from its Google News service for what it calls "hate speech" against Islam. Sonia Arrison, director of technology at the Pacific Research Institute, points out the move was made at the same time Google was urging Congress to pass Internet neutrality legislation.

It is somewhat ironic that Google is trying to censor some things from its search engine at the same time as it's making this very public plea for something called net neutrality, where it's trying to use Congress and legislation to regulate the Internet so that censorship doesn't happen," Arrison notes. "So the question is, what's really going on here with Google and net neutrality and censorship?"

Excerpted from article in Agape Press. Click on title for rest of article

No More Time Magazine For Me

2006-05-08T15:50:00.000-07:00

Excerpt from Religious Communities Hardly Score with TIME

By Matt Friedeman
May 5, 2006

(AgapePress) - "Here's our list of the 100 men and women whose power, talent or moral example is transforming our world," says the latest issue of TIME Magazine.

As Joel Belz of World Mag Blog suggests, only three on the TIME list could be deemed religious leaders -- the Pope, Muqtada al-Sadr of Iraq, and Archbishop Peter Akinola of Nigeria Indeed, notes Belz, "TIME lists 27 'artists and entertainers,' 16 'scientists and thinkers,' 22 'leaders and revolutionaries,' 21 'heroes and pioneers,' and 23 'builders and titans.'" And yes, for the counters among us, that is 109. So in other words, TIME, lurching around for a list of movers and shakers on this planet and given 109 chances, couldn't drum up a healthy list of people known for their relationship to God and the leadership of faith communities?

Ahead of, say, evangelists Billy and Franklin Graham or megachurch pastor and Purpose Driven church leader Rick Warren were listed such forces of influence as the Dixie Chicks, George Clooney, Ellen DeGeneres, Arianna Huffington, Howard Stern, Hugo Chavez, Hillary Clinton, Michelle Wie, Katie Couric, Al Gore, Paul Simon, and Steve Wynn.

Two things could be said of the TIME list: it demonstrates both a definite penchant for popular culture and an impoverished understanding of what is really and fundamentally most important concerning the nations of the world.

Maybe what the most powerful forces in Christianity lack, to their credit, is an overabundance of media machines that make heroes out of people who are just busy doing the work of the Kingdom. There are exceptions, of course; but the best of God's work is done not on the front pages of the publications or television screens of the media elite but in the trenches where life is most difficult, within what Edmund Burke once described as "little platoons" of community. They gather meager resources, join with a small band, and make a mark where mercy and compassion is needed most.

Click on title for rest of the article

Proliferation of Public Profanity

2006-04-07T13:34:00.000-07:00

A Cultural -- and Spiritual -- Problem

By Tim Wildmon
April 6, 2006

(AgapePress) - Perhaps you saw the same survey I saw the other day about Americans and public profanity. It said that we the people are cursing more frequently and using words that were once considered taboo in public. I was probably 12 years old when I first heard the "f" word used by a neighborhood kid. I even asked my parents what it meant because I had no idea. Talk about an awkward moment for a parent. Today, however, you frequently hear words such as this out in the open.

A few weeks back I was on an airplane and the 25-year-old male a few seats over was yaking on his cell phone, letting everyone in on his business that none of us cared about. About every 60 seconds he felt the need to use the "f" word. I don't know if that made him feel more adult or what. Later in the airport waiting on a connecting flight, there was a lady, about 50, talking loudly on her cell phone. I heard her twice use the "f" word in what sounded like a casual conversation. Then while I walked at a local park earlier this week some teenage boys were playing basketball. One of them called another one a "mf" just as casual as you please. They were not in a fight, they were just talking to one another.

Raw profanity has become an acceptable part of popular culture today.

Rap music -- the most popular music among young people today -- is filled with gutter language. They play it loudly in their cars. Movies and television programs use hard profanity on a regular basis. In a way, we have become desensitized to it. This has been the goal of Hollywood for many years. There was a time before the mid-60s when foul language was not used on television, in movies or popular music.

But today many people mock you if you complain about public profanity. They say it's just the way people talk today and the language one uses doesn't matter. My question then is, why use words like "f" and "mf" and "gd" in public if language doesn't matter? Why didn't the teenage boy on the basketball court just say, "Give me the ball, John," instead of "Give me the ball 'mf'?" Why did certain words come out of the young man's mouth and not others? I contend most people who use foul language intentionally do so because they understand the words themselves represent rebellion against societal norms -- or what used to be societal norms. Otherwise, why use that kind of language? It's an attention grabber. Then, after using profanity for a long period of time, it does become second nature -- just the way people talk.

This article was excerpted from Agape Press. Click on the title for the rest of the article.

The Land "Down Under" Rises to the Top

2006-03-17T08:44:00.000-08:00

Excerpted from piece by Jan Markell at olivetreeviews.org. Click on title for rest of the piece
March 17 - The Land "Down Under" Rises to the Top

Muslims who want to live under Islamic Law (Sharia Law) were told this week to leave Australia as the government targeted radicals in a bid to head off potential terror attacks. A day after a group of mainstream Muslim leaders met with Prime Minister Howard, he made it clear that extremists would face a crackdown.

Australia basically said that if Australian values do not suit their Muslim residents, would you kindly find the nearest exit door and hightail it out of the "land down under." Move to a country that accepts Islamic Law. Prime Minister Howard said that Australian spies would also be monitoring Australian mosques.

This is leadership with courage, that doesn't call Islam a "noble religion," and is just plain no nonsense. It doesn't welcome them to attend to their ports, rise to high political office, and likely doesn't bow to an American-based organization, the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR). Perhaps they have no such deceitful organization in Australia and if so, pay them little attention rather than placating them. If Saudi Wahabbi theology is preached in Australian mosques, it will likely be shut down.

Beyond Its Bounds

2006-03-14T12:48:00.000-08:00

The Census Has Grown Beyond Its Bounds
by Phyllis Schlafly
Excerpted from Human Events On Line. Please click on title for rest of the article
Posted Mar 13, 2006

While the Patriot Act and National Security Agency wiretapping have received enormous attention and criticism from the mainstream media, another federal agency has been quietly gathering far more personal information about U.S. residents than those laws ever can. And this unreported project affects thousands more people.

Our inquisitive federal government has been demanding that selected U.S. residents answer 73 nosy questions. They are threatened with a fine of $5,000 for failure to respond.

When I first heard about this from a reader in Lake Geneva, Wis., I thought it might be a joke or an anomaly. But when another in Ishpeming on Michigan's Upper Peninsula received the same questionnaire, I realized something is going on nationwide.

These nosy questionnaires come under the friendly name "American Community Survey." But this is not a Gallup or a Harris poll; the interrogator is the U.S. government and has the power to compel and computerize your responses.

The U.S. Constitution authorizes the government to take an "enumeration" every 10th year in order to reapportion the seats in the U.S. House of Representatives to accord with the "respective numbers" of each state's population. The Constitution thus authorizes a count of people; it doesn't authorize the government to find out with whom you share your bed and board.

Beginning in 1960, the 10-year census-taking significantly changed. The government began sending a long form with many questions to a limited number of people, randomly selected, and a short form with only six questions to all remaining U.S. residents.

The government is jumping the gun on the 2010 census, and without public announcement is already sending out an extremely long form, starting with a few thousand mailings each month to a handful of residents in widely scattered small towns that don't generate national media. Recipients can't find neighbors who received the same mailing, so it's difficult to avoid the impression that the project was planned to avoid publicity and citizen opposition

The Gospel According to Hollywood

2006-03-10T15:35:00.000-08:00

Guest Commentary
By Denny Burk
March 9, 2006(Baptist Press / AgapePress)
Excerpt from Agape Press. Please click on title for rest of article.

Christians aren't the only ones who preach. Hollywood does it too, and with great effect. This was no where more clearly seen than in two men who won Oscars at the Academy Awards March 5. George Clooney and Ang Lee both made a point of saying that movies can and should advocate for causes that the rest of the country may not support.

In the acceptance speech after winning the Oscar for best actor, Clooney celebrated the disconnect between his own liberal views and the views of mainstream America.

"We are a little bit out of touch in Hollywood every once in a while," he said. "I think it's probably a good thing. We're the ones who talk about AIDS when it was just being whispered, and we talked about civil rights when it wasn't really popular. And we, you know, we bring up subjects. This Academy, this group of people gave Hattie McDaniel an Oscar in 1939 when blacks were still sitting in the backs of theaters. I'm proud to be a part of this Academy. Proud to be part of this community, and proud to be out of touch. And I thank you so much for this."

We can all agree with AIDS awareness and the promotion of civil rights. But Clooney implies that current left-wing causes (like the normalization of homosexuality) are morally equivalent to the advent of civil rights for African Americans. Such a position is in fact "out of touch" with the vast majority of Americans (and contrary to Scripture), but I don't think it's anything to be proud of. Clooney is proud to be "out of touch" with mainstream America because he believes Hollywood's values are superior to those of the "fly-over" states.

The Academy Award Speech We Should Have Heard

2006-03-09T10:53:00.000-08:00

Mar 7, 2006
by Dennis Prager
Excerpted from article on Townhall.com. Please click on title for rest of the article.
Here's a speech we would like to hear from an Academy Award winner:

I thank you for this wonderful award. Receiving an Academy Award gives the recipient an almost unique opportunity to speak to hundreds of millions people around the world, so I would like take this once-in-a-lifetime moment to say this:

First, I want to thank my country, the United States of America. Every one of us here has this country to thank for enabling us to live lives of unprecedented freedom and unimaginable affluence. Too many of us forget that no other country in history has offered such opportunities to people in our profession or in any other profession, for that matter.

Second, I want to thank the men and women of the armed forces of the United States. While we bask in freedom and spend a good part of our lives going from party to party and award show to award show, tens of thousands of my fellow Americans are confronting a menace to our world as great as that fought by previous generations fighting Nazism and communism.

At the same time, I also want to apologize to these troops for my profession not having made even one motion picture about any of the heroic American fighters in Afghanistan and Iraq. This country is fighting a war, Hollywood. You may think this war is unwise, waged under mistaken, or even false, pretenses. And as an actor in Hollywood, you are overwhelmingly likely to hate this commander in chief. But even the men and women of Hollywood must recognize that America is fighting the worst people of our time, people who hurt every group Hollywood claims to care about -- minorities, women, gays -- people who engage in the sins Hollywood most professes to oppose -- intolerance and violence -- far more than anyone else on the planet.

Why Didn’t the Children Say Something Sooner?

2006-03-08T08:07:00.000-08:00

By J. Michael Sharman
Posted: 03/05/2006
Excerpted article taken from Christian Worldview Network. Please click on title for rest of article.

Melvin Alexander Moore was doing his clothes at a Laundromat when a fifteen year-old girl came in, saw him, and became so upset that she left the building crying.

The girl testified later that the last time she had seen Melvin Alexander Moore was when she was six years old and he had molested her.

Moore’s defense was a pretty simple one – the girl wasn’t telling the truth. If he had really molested her, why had it taken nine years for her to press charges against him?

The testimony at his trial was that Moore had been the mother’s boyfriend back when the girl was six, and that the girl had, in fact, told her babysitter and her mother that Moore had molested her.

At the time, the mother didn’t report it or take her to a doctor. The child’s therapist testified that, “Often adults who are charged with caretaking of young children feel so much shame and guilt and denial that a child has been violated while in their care that it is very difficult for them to accept.” When a child confides in an adult that someone has molested them, 24% of the adults don’t pass on the information to anyone else.[1]

The jury heard the girl, heard the therapist, listened to Moore, and then convicted him of rape.[2]

Judicious Double Standards

2006-03-08T07:42:00.000-08:00

By Richard Cohen
Tuesday, March 7, 2006; Page A17
Excerpt taken from The Washington Post. Please click on title for complete article.

Back behind my high school one day, we all assembled to watch a fistfight. To my immense pleasure, a bully was being bested by his victim. Then the bully's friend stepped in and ended matters with a swift kick to the other guy's midsection. It was an unfair ending to what was supposed to be a fair fight, but it taught me a valuable lesson: You treat your friends differently than you do your enemies.

This elemental principle of life, love and other matters seems utterly lost on so many critics of George Bush's agreement to provide India with civilian nuclear technology. In doing so, we are told, he has done something truly awful -- established a double standard. Well, duh -- yes. India is our friend and Iran, just to pick an example, is not.

The cry of "double standard" is a bit silly. It asks us not to recognize certain realities -- the difference between friends and enemies, for instance, or good and bad democracies, to give another example. In the case of the nuclear agreement, we are somehow supposed to believe that by favoring India, Bush has made it much harder to put pressure on Iran to abandon its apparent weapons program and become a "good guy" nation. This overlooks the fact that Iran is governed by a zealot who has pledged to eradicate Israel and who firmly believes in the inherent evil of the United States of America. As Bush once said about himself, the Iranians do not do nuance

Are We Awake Yet?

2006-02-28T07:58:00.000-08:00

By ZARAR KHAN, Associated Press Writer
Tue Feb 28, 6:56 AM ET

KARACHI, Pakistan - About 5,000 children chanting "Hang those who insulted the prophet" rallied in Pakistan's largest city on Tuesday in the latest protest in the Islamic nation against the publication of cartoons of the Prophet Muhammad.

The children, ages 8 to 12, burned a coffin draped in U.S., Israeli and Danish flags at a traffic intersection in the port city of Karachi as police in riot gear looked on.

The rally was organized by Jamaat-e-Islami, Pakistan's largest Islamic group. The children, some wearing school uniforms and headbands emblazoned with "God is great," were released from schools to take part.

Jamaat-e-Islami is part of a radical coalition of six Islamic parties that has rallied Muslims throughout Pakistan in recent weeks against the cartoons despite bans on protests in some cities.

Opposition lawmaker Liaqat Baluch, deputy secretary-general of the coalition, on Tuesday welcomed the European Union's first statement on the controversy.

EU foreign ministers said Monday they regretted the cartoons were "considered offensive" by Muslims around the world after first appearing in a Danish newspaper in September.

But Baluch demanded an apology from Denmark, saying it "has not so far acknowledged its mistake."

Baluch also said a "line should be drawn" between freedom of expression — the justification newspapers gave for reproducing the drawings, which Muslims consider blasphemous — and actions that offend cultural sensitivities.

"A freedom of expression that destroys world peace is against basic human rights," he said.

The religious coalition has been leading protests against the cartoons, drawing thousands of people to the streets of the conservative Islamic nation. At least five people died in two Pakistani cities when recent protests turned violent.

Baluch said the EU must take steps to ensure that another controversy such as the cartoon dispute doesn't occur in the future.

"This is a good step forward, but it is incomplete," Baluch said of the EU statement.

Islamic tradition bans representations of Muhammad.

Associated Press writer Sadaqat Jan in Islamabad contributed to this report

America Idolized

2006-02-23T09:00:00.000-08:00

Cal Thomas 2/23/06

Would you care to guess who said this: "To the courageous men and women of the 3rd Armored Cavalry Regiment, who have changed the city of Tall Afar (Iraq) from a ghost town, in which terrorists spread death and destruction, to a secure city flourishing with life"?

Is this an excerpt from a Pentagon or presidential citation? Nope.

"To the lion-hearts who liberated our city from the grasp of terrorists who were beheading men, women and children in the streets for many months." Was that on a plaque from the local Kiwanis Club? Wrong again

To those who spread smiles on the faces of our children and gave us restored hope, through their personal sacrifice and brave fighting, and gave new life to the city after hopelessness darkened our days and stole our confidence in our ability to reestablish our city."

Give up? That is a letter from the mayor of Tall Afar in the Iraqi province of Nineveh. Mayor Najim Abdullah Abid Al-Jubouri wrote it to express his gratitude to American soldiers. Chances are you have not read this letter. I have only found it in a few small-circulation U.S. newspapers. It certainly conveys an impression opposite what much of the mainstream media and some politicians have been telling us.

Tall Afar was the main base of operations for the terrorist Abu Musab al-Zarqawi. The mayor says his city was held hostage by al-Zarqawi. "Our schools, governmental services, businesses and offices were closed. Our streets were silent, and no one dared to walk them. Our people were barricaded in their homes out of fear; death awaited them around every corner. Terrorists occupied and controlled the only hospital in the city. Their savagery reached such a level that they stuffed the corpses of children with explosives and tossed them into the streets in order to kill grieving parents attempting to retrieve the bodies of their young."

The 3rd Armored Cavalry Regiment (ACR) arrived in Iraq in 2003 and began attacking insurgents in Fallujah. Last year, they went back for a second tour, this time in Tall Afar. The mayor's letter sums up the result: "This was the situation of our city until God prepared and delivered ... the courageous soldiers of the 3rd Armored Cavalry Regiment, who liberated this city, ridding it of al-Zarqawi's followers after harsh fighting, killing many terrorists and forcing the remaining butchers to flee the city like rats to the surrounding areas, where the bravery of other 3rd ACR soldiers in Sinjar, Rabiah, Zumar and Avgani finally destroyed them."

One of the returning soldiers from this regiment is Chief Warrant Officer Roger Wood of Fort Carson, Colo. Wood, a helicopter pilot, arrived home last weekend. He tells me, "There's a lot of good going on in Iraq," adding that "negative stories" he's seen on the news "are discouraging." Wood says he's noticed a "big difference" since his first tour in 2003 in the way Iraqi soldiers and police operate. He says they are increasingly confident and able to operate independent of American forces. "Iraq will come around," Wood predicts. "Baghdad will take a little longer, but as people see change and acquire hope, we'll see a new Iraq."

The mayor of Tall Afar concludes his letter: "God bless this brave Regiment; God bless the families who dedicated these brave men and women. From the bottom of our hearts we thank the families. They have given us something we will never forget. To the families of those who have given their holy blood for our land, we all bow to you in reverence and to the souls of your loved ones. This sacrifice was not in vain. They are not dead, but alive, and their souls hovering around us every second of every minute. They will never be forgotten for giving their precious lives. ... Let America, their families and the world be proud of their sacrifice for humanity and life."

The U.S. Conference of the World Council of Churches recently condemned U.S policy in Iraq for "raining down terror" on helpless Iraqis. They should talk to the mayor of Tall Afar and tell him to his face they think al-Zarqawi's "reign of terror" should not have been ended.

Lobbying Reform Should Be Done Carefully

2006-02-08T08:36:00.000-08:00

Feb 8, 2006
by Tim Chapman,Townhall.com

Your tax dollars, hard at work

On Tuesday, Chairman of the Senate Subcommittee on Federal Financial Management Tom Coburn (R-OK) held a hearing that exposed wasteful federal spending at the agency level. Coburn sent a letter to every federal agency requesting details as to how much money those agencies spent on conferences.

The results were shocking.

In his opening statement, Coburn revealed that since 2000, federal agencies have spent more than $1.4 billion underwriting and sending federal employees to conferences (many of which are located in lavish tropical destinations). Even more shocking, noted Coburn, was that “this increase occurred during a challenging time for out country.” It is also ironic that these costs are increasing at the same time that telecommunication technologies are getting more and more reliable reducing the need for travel.

Testifying before Coburn’s subcommittee was a former Department of Health and Human Services staffer Scott Evertz, who bravely played the role of whistle blower. Evertz told the subcommittee that during his tenure at HHS, he had “witnessed an attitude of entitlement concerning international travel by many bureaucrats and downright arrogance when senior officials attempted to curtail – or even question – the travel of some individuals.”

Evertz relayed the story of a 2004 Bangkok International AIDS conference, which when all was said and done was derided by experts in the field as “irrelevant.” That “irrelevant” conference cost nearly $17 million. But the ancillary cost for those whose life mission is helping people with AIDS was much higher, noted Evertz, “For the cost of this single conference, up to 1,500 individuals living with HIV with access to no life saving treatment could have been treated for an entire year.”

Coburn says his purpose in holding the hearings is to hold agencies accountable and to prevent future wasteful spending. Without accountability, “We deprive Americans of the checks and balances to which they are entitled,” said the doctor from Oklahoma.

By the looks of it, accountability is certainly needed, and at this rate, Americans may not be able to afford to wait.

Click on title for complete article as this is just an excerpt on lobbying reform.

Why I Won't See Brokeback Mountain

2006-02-07T15:23:00.000-08:00

By Tim Wilkins
February 7, 2006,

(AgapePress) - With eight Oscar nominations, more than any other movie this year, Brokeback Mountain continues to gain momentum. And with the momentum comes increasing interest by evangelicals to see it.

I will avoid the movie like a slug avoids an overturned saltshaker -- and for the life of me, I cannot understand why any evangelical would see it -- though there appear to be many. But what is more disturbing to me is that many men and women I know with unwanted homosexual attractions are seeing the movie.

A reporter from The Christian Post asked my thoughts about the movie and I obliged. My comments as a former homosexual were made from the reviews I had read -- comments which generated numerous emails to me from individuals arguing that I could not make an intelligent comment on a movie I had not seen.

They suggested that my viewing the movie would be beneficial in responding to the reporter's questions. I told them and the reporter that my going to see Brokeback Mountain would be similar to asking a former alcoholic to go to a liquor store to buy his neighbor a toddy for the body.

Opponents of ex-gay ministries will immediately shout "Aha! So you are still tempted with same-sex attractions!" I do not deny it! Martin Luther said it this way, "if your head is made of butter, stay away from the fire."

These opponents will also argue that ex-gay ministries "only teach avoidance techniques." Indeed, avoiding anything which may cause temptation is appropriate and biblical.

"Do not set foot on the path of the wicked or walk in the way of evil men. Avoid it, do not travel on it; turn from it and go on your way." (Proverbs 4:14-15)
"You are to abstain ... from sexual immorality. You will do well to avoid these things." (Acts 15:29)
"Avoid every kind of evil." (1Thessalonians 5:22)
"Flee from sexual immorality." (1 Cor 6:18)
"It is God's will that you should be sanctified: that you should avoid sexual immorality." (1Thes 4:3)
I am aware that an ultra-literalist might argue that viewing the movie does not constitute sexual immorality, but let's remember that sexual immorality can be a thought as much as it can be an act.

On a more simplistic level, I urge people who are allergic to bee stings to avoid bees -- fair skinned women to void the sun -- lactose-intolerant men to avoid dairy products -- asthmatics to avoid perfumes -- and hay fever suffers to avoid pollen.

When Dr. R. Albert Mohler, president of Southern Baptist Theological Seminary, appeared as a recent guest on Larry King Live, he said: "I'm going to say something that is about as counter-cultural as I can imagine, and that is I'm actually convinced that as a Christian, there are certain things I don't need to see. And that's the reason why, as a matter of principle, I have not gone to see the movie. I wouldn't encourage anyone to go see the movie. I'm unembarrassed to say that."

A self-avowed unhappy homosexual man emailed me to say he saw the movie and "cried for three days after seeing it." Why am I not surprised?

Another wrote: "As a man who has struggled with homosexuality all my life, I decided I would face it head on when I first saw the previews." (Those previews did their work, didn't they?) Indeed, another wrote: "I would rather face challenges than run from them." These reasons may sound heroic, and one can imagine a man charging into the theater refusing to avoid this issue which has caused him so much hurt.

But let me ask -- is it possible the homosexuals' continued pain results in part from continued time investment in things homosexual? When Potiphar's wife was attempting to seduce the godly Joseph, he faced his challenge by running for the exit sign. (Genesis 39:12)

Lest I sound uncaring to homosexuals, let me say to you (and you evangelicals need to hear this also) that I am aware of the unfathomable suffering which is part of same-sex attractions -- despair, depression and darkness blacker than the bottom of the Mariana Trench.

One of the reasons that evangelicals have not made much progress in reaching homosexuals with the gospel is their failure to empathize with the excruciating pain homosexuals experience.

But back to my main point -- to view the movie will most likely reduce one's defenses from future immorality.

A large man had won accolades from his co-workers by dieting. However, the man walked into the office one day with a half empty box of donuts under his arm. His colleagues, genuinely concerned as to why he had slipped-up, asked why. He told them that in his race to work he took a detour by the local donut shop and a blinking "HOT DONUTS NOW" neon sign caught his attention.

But there was a problem; the parking lot was full! He told his co-workers, "At that moment I told God that if He wanted me to stop and buy some donuts, He would have to open up a parking space right in front of the shop -- and sure enough, the seventh time around the block, there it was!"

In October 2005, Associated Press ran an article titled "Study Backs Out of Sight Out of Mind Theory." The study, led by Brian Wansink, involved placing candy jars of Hershey's Kisses in close proximity to a select group of secretaries. Some of the containers were clear while other containers were opaque. Additionally, some of the containers were placed on the secretaries' desks while other containers were placed six feet from their desk.

Ready for the results? "Secretaries ate an average of 7.7 kisses each day when the candies were in clear containers on their desk; 4.6 when in opaque jar on the desk; 5.6 when in clear jars 6 feet away; and 3.1 when in an opaque jar 6 feet away."

The study went further. "Secretaries rated candy as more than twice as hard to resist when they could see and reach it than when they could not. They were twice as likely to say that they often thought of the chocolates or that the treats kept grabbing their attention if they visible and nearby. By contrast secretaries were twice as likely to say they forget the candy was around if it was hidden and distant."

I will not see the two hour and fourteen minute movie; rather, I will devote an additional two hours and fourteen minutes to my time with God who, when I am tempted, will also provide a way out so that I can stand up under it. (1 Cor 10:13)

Pay Attention To Muslims Gone Wild

2006-02-06T09:37:00.000-08:00

by Steve Muscatello
2/06/06 Townhall.com

An irrational fear of evangelical Christians deprives secular America of a true understanding of the dangers posed by radical Islam. But those who fret over an imagined American “theocracy” run by Christian zealots should take note that it’s not Bobby from Birmingham or Wally from Wichita that’s burning down embassies, raiding buildings, threatening executions and otherwise behaving like animals on the streets of (to name a few) Damascus, Gaza City, Jakarta and Baghdad.

By now you know the story. Last October, a Danish newspaper printed twelve cartoons depicting the Muslim prophet Muhammad in various postures: walking through a field; in front of a classroom chalkboard; and even with a bomb tucked in his turban.

The initial reaction was tepid. But then an Austrian newspaper reprinted the cartoons in January, followed by French, German, Italian and Spanish newspapers this month. The reprints set off a firestorm (Islamic law forbids depictions of Muhammad to prevent idol worship). Violent protests have raged since, reaching a head Saturday as Syrian mobs burned down much of the Danish and Norwegian embassies in Damascus.

If the outbursts were small, isolated incidents in two or three countries it would be easier to write them off—just the work of a vocal—and exceptionally radical—minority, we’d say. But the demonstrations have been large and widespread. Indeed, if airborne disease spread through the Muslim world as fast as outrage, a simple case of the flu might afflict millions in minutes. Things get contagious.

If only Muslims had a better public relations strategist they might have avoided this brouhaha. Instead of letting the little-noticed drawings drift into oblivion, Muslim protests lit the fires of Western curiosity. What do these cartoons look like? Then the media swarm came and suddenly newspapers on the other side of the world were printing editorials titled “The freedom to blaspheme” and galvanizing armies of free speech advocates.

Nevertheless, there are two reasons why it’s better for the West (but not the Danish and Norwegian embassies) that it happened this way.

First, the timing is perfect. The latest issue of Rolling Stone depicts rapper Kanye West as a Christ-like figure in a crown of thorns with the title: “The Passion of Kanye West.” The cover shot is a disgusting affront to Christians, and certainly as blasphemous as the cartoons were to Muslims.

As a result, no one was surprised when Christians firebombed Rolling Stone headquarters in New York.

Oh wait, didn’t happen.

Okay, well no one was surprised when Christians threatened to firebomb the building.

Nope, didn’t happen either.

Rarely does history provide such a perfect point of comparison, and the contrasting responses could hardly be more telling: When faced with a nearly identical situation, one faith resorted to violence, threats and rage like unruly savages; the other was civil, responding (if at all) with letters to the editor, calls for a boycott and many public denunciations.

Second, the rage of the Muslim world again lays bare radicalism for all the world to see. A similar fervor was set off in 2005 in response to purported Koran desecration at Guantanamo Bay. People died then, many of them Muslims. But it didn’t matter. The rage is as overwhelming as it is contagious.

Victor Davis Hanson has called this the “lunacy principle,” that is, “these people are capable of doing anything at anytime."

That’s what makes Iran so scary. When President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad denies the Holocaust and says “Israel must be wiped off the map” he really means it. And if his nuclear program continues unabated, he might just wake-up one morning and do it.

And that’s the thing, for all their shrewd and secret plots, most radical Muslims are remarkably forthcoming: they seek the destruction of Western civilization, beginning with Israel, in order to establish a world-wide caliphate.

That blueprint should scare secular America more than, say, a well-organized group of pro-life activists. But in many cases, it doesn’t. Trace it to comfort or laziness: it’s easier to create a paper tiger out of the “Religious Right” and to rail against their “bigoted” and “intolerant” policies than to acknowledge the true threats posed by radical Islam.

It’s early yet, but the cartoon protests may go a long way in changing this mentality, in expanding horizons beyond the water’s edge. President John Quincy Adams once said that America should not go “abroad in search of monsters to destroy.” Well, he might have added that America should not create monsters at home over relatively tame ideological differences. After all, these days we don't have to search very far for monsters. They're already in the streets, calling our name.

Vermont Justice

2006-01-23T08:30:00.000-08:00

Vermont Justice--Bill O'Reilly--1/23/06
Ralph Page is a problem. The 35-year-old Vermont man has twice been convicted of drunk driving, and now faces charges of theft and assaulting his girlfriend. He's a typical low-level offender who shuffles around causing trouble and clogging up the justice system.

On Jan. 17, Page ambled into Judge Patricia Zimmerman's courtroom to answer charges that he punched a woman in the face. Apparently, Page did not like hearing the charges against him and screamed out, "this is f—-ing bull——." That annoyed Judge Zimmerman, who promptly found Page in contempt of court and sentenced him to 60 days in a Vermont jail.

Nothing wrong with that, but listen to this: That 60-day sentence is the same amount of jail time another Vermont judge, Edward Cashman, awarded 34-year-old Mark Hulett. But it is here where the Vermont justice system collapses. Incredibly, Hulett pled guilty to a variety of felony sexual assault charges against a 6-year-old girl. Over a period of four years, Hulett, a friend of the girl's mother, confessed to raping the child in her own home. It was a methodical and brutal series of actions on Hulett's part, and it has devastated an innocent little girl.

But when it came time to sentence Hulett, Judge Cashman suspended all but 60 days of a potential life prison stretch, because Cashman wanted Hulett to get "treatment." At sentencing the judge said: "I keep telling prosecutors, and they won't hear me, that punishment is not enough."

So here's justice in the state of Vermont: Cursing at a judge merits the same prison time as repeatedly raping a 6-year-old girl.

If Hulett had committed the same crime in Florida, he would now be serving 25-to-life in the penitentiary because that state has passed mandatory minimum sentences for felony battery on children. But Vermont has no such minimums. So Mark Hulett, child rapist, is set to walk free on March 4.

The philosophy of our nation is "equal justice under the law." Obviously, the abused little girl and her family did not get justice by any measure. Clear-thinking people understand that true justice requires that the punishment fit the crime.

But Judge Cashman does not understand that. His sympathies are with the rapist, and he did not even attempt to hide that fact. Because of Cashman's outrageous sentence, you would think Vermonters would be calling for his gavel and robe.

You would think. But you'd be wrong.

Most of the state's liberal newspapers are supporting Cashman. The far-left Brattleboro Reformer editorialized: "Lengthy jail terms, without rehabilitation will not accomplish anything."

Really? How about keeping child rapists away from children? Doesn't a lengthy prison term accomplish that?

Vermont's shameful story is being played out in other places as well. But it is in this tiny state, the second least populated behind Wyoming, that a horrendous violation of human rights is taking place.

Yet we have heard nothing from former Vermont Governor Howard Dean, or Sens. Leahy and Jeffords, or social activist Ben Cohen of Ben and Jerry's Ice Cream, which is based in the Green Mountain State.

Also, the ACLU is silent as well.

Meantime, an abused little girl will likely live out her life in anguish and confusion, her low-income family is devastated, and the crazy left media believes Judge Cashman is the victim of unreasonable "demagogues."

They say the skiing is great this winter in Vermont. But I'm not going. There's something in the air there that I cannot abide.

When Kennedys Attack

2006-01-13T10:28:00.000-08:00

Taken from Investors.com
Posted 1/12/2006

Supreme Court: There's something ironic about Sen. Ted Kennedy, who is campaigning to re-elect a former Grand Kleagle of the Klu Klux Klan while complaining that Judge Samuel Alito is a racist.

Unable to touch Alito on his knowledge of the law or the depth of his experience, Kennedy and his liberal brethren on the Senate Judiciary Committee have resorted to a McCarthy-era tactic — guilt by association.

The depth of his desperation was seen in an altercation Wednesday between Kennedy and committee chairman Arlen Specter in which liberalism's grand pooh-bah demanded a vote on a motion Specter never made and a subpoena of records that were publicly available.

At issue were the records of William A. Rusher, former publisher of National Review, and early board member of a group called the Concerned Alumni of Princeton (CAP). Kennedy believes documents prove that Alito, who was a member of the group, is anti-black and anti-female.

Doing his best Emily Litella imitation, Kennedy huffed and puffed and hinted at some vast right-wing conspiracy to keep Alito's checkered past secret. Except that these records are available at the Library of Congress and have been pawed over by The New York Times. Never mind.

According to David Kirkpatrick, who wrote about them in November in the Times, "Those records and others at Mudd Library at Princeton give no indication that Judge Alito, who sits on the United States Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit, was among the group's major donors."

Kirkpatrick went on to note: "He was not an active leader of the group, and two of his classmates were involved and Mr. Rusher and they did not remember his playing a role." Neither did Alito, who said he didn't even remember joining the group and probably did so in protest of Princeton's policy toward the ROTC.

Kennedy's performance was not exactly Captain Queeg, but he continued his pursuit of Alito's allegedly missing strawberries. During Monday's hearings, Kennedy read from a 1983 essay printed in Prospect, a magazine published by the now-defunct CAP.

Alito didn't write it, didn't read it and graduated from Princeton 11 years before it was published. Yet there was Kennedy asking Alito if he agreed with statements such as: "Everywhere one turns, blacks and Hispanics are demanding jobs simply because they are black and Hispanic."

Joe McCarthy would have been proud at the tactics employed by Kennedy, who is supporting the re-election of Sen. Robert Byrd, the only senator to have voted against the only two black justices confirmed to the Supreme Court, Thurgood Marshall and Clarence Thomas.

This heated rhetoric sounds eerily similar to the invective directed by Sen. Kennedy towards another strict constructionist legal scholar, Robert Bork, in 1987. Kennedy's claim then was that if Bork were confirmed, he'd return America to a time when "blacks would sit at segregated lunch counters."

In this week's hearings, Kennedy waved a study at Alito that allegedly showed that Alito has ruled against individual rights 84% of the time. Kennedy forgot to mention that he himself had commissioned the study by liberal University of Chicago professor Cass Sunstein.

Nor did he say that Professor Sunstein had qualified his work by saying in many of the cases it was difficult to determine which side represented individual rights, and that his work was "crude" and done "under considerable time pressure."

Ironically, Sunstein wound up disagreeing with Kennedy, saying that "the law, fairly interpreted, could be taken to support" Alito's views and that "Judge Alito's opinions are carefully reasoned, well-done, attentive to law, lawyerly and unfailingly respectful to his colleague . . ."

Which is more than you can say about Sen. Kennedy.

Another Award-Winning Year

2006-01-01T08:59:00.000-08:00

Jan 1, 2006
by Paul Jacob

Okay, so it's 2006. Is this really news? Did we think that 2007 might somehow slip in first?

For most, it's "another day, another holiday"; for columnists, it's an excuse for year-end reviews. Such reviews can be work. And I don't particularly like work. (Was I supposed to be taking notes?)

Appropriate, then, for me to begin with (let the dots stand for a drum roll) . . .

The 'We Just Make It Up' Award! This celebrates the most bald-faced denial of reality, law, or basic common sense during calendar year 2005. The competition was fierce.

The most obvious contender was the unbelievable but all-too-real U.S. Supreme Court decision in Kelo v. New London, the case about the city government that is taking homes through eminent domain only to hand the land over to a private developer who will build a complex producing more tax dollars for the politicians. This may be the most unpopular High Court decision in history.

But that's too easy.

Also in the running was the U.S. Supreme Court decision in Gonzales v. Raich, where a majority of the court, including Justice Scalia, ruled that "interstate commerce" can include commerce that doesn't cross state lines and, thus, isn't "interstate" at all, and, in fact, can include activity that isn't commerce, either.

But 2005's winning departure from reality (or honesty) is far less well known. Back in spring, the Ray C. Bliss Institute for Applied Politics at the University of Akron released a poll of Ohioans' opinions on term limits. The Bliss Institute news release about the poll stated, "Ohioans may support lengthening terms from the current eight years to 12."

Turns out that the poll respondents were asked specifically, "Would a term limit of twelve years be acceptable to you?" And, by a better than two to one margin, Ohioans said, "No." Weakening term limits was unacceptable. But this established educational and policy group ignored the actual answers voters gave to their poll's questions and just made up their own spin. Award-winning!

The 'Who Cares About the People?' Award goes to those public officials who in their hubris and arrogance show the most disdain for the people who pay their salaries. This year, the Florida Legislature gets an honorable mention for going against the wishes of three-fourths of their constituents by placing an amendment on the 2006 ballot that if passed would weaken their term limits from eight to 12 years. Countless other examples abound . . .

But the hands-down winner is the St. Louis County Council. When polls showed citizens by a four-to-one margin opposed public subsidy of a baseball stadium, the council decided to subsidize a new stadium anyway. When voters gathered signatures to place a measure on the ballot to forbid public financing, the county council rushed to give the ball club the money before the election, issuing $45 million in bonds.

Click on title for rest of the story.

New Bone To Pick With Evolutionists

2005-12-24T11:52:00.000-08:00

By Allie Martin
December 21, 2005
(Originally published on April 6, 2005)

(AgapePress) - The president of Answers in Genesis says the recent discovery of a dinosaur bone in Montana supports the biblical creationist theory of a young Earth.

According to an article published in last month's Science magazine, in 2003 scientists found a Tyrannosaurus Rex thigh bone during an archaeological dig. The research team had to break the bone in pieces in order to fit it into a helicopter, and when they did so, they discovered the fossil contained well-preserved soft tissues, including blood vessels.

Ken Ham, president of the creationist group Answers in Genesis (AiG), says this important find supports the biblical view of the Earth's timeline. "The reason this is such startling news is because you just wouldn't expect soft tissue and cells like this in a bone supposedly 70 million years old," he says.

The general consensus among scientists prior to the find was that such soft tissue could not survive for tens of millions of years. Now, the dinosaur remains have many evolutionists scrambling to accommodate their evolutionist ideas about origins.

But what AiG scientists would say about the find, Ham observes, "is that it's totally consistent with the fact that these bones aren't that old and probably date back to the time of the flood just a few thousand years ago." However, he doubts evolutionists will give consideration to the possibility that the T-Rex bones are only thousands rather than millions of years old.

"Nothing has been found, nothing in observational science, that contradicts what the Bible says," the AIG spokesman contends, "but over and over, it does contradict the ideas of evolutionists."

Still, because evolutionists' beliefs about the past are so entrenched, he predicts they will just look for ways to explain away the contradictory evidence.

"Instead of questioning their beliefs they just come up with secondary and tertiary explanations," Ham says. "'Well, given enough time ...' or 'Well, we think there is a process somewhere' or 'Well, even though we don't know why' -- In other words they'll do anything but question their beliefs."

Ham is convinced proponents of the theory of evolution will not allow the Montana find to change their minds. Even though, he contends, the recent discovery supports the young Earth theory of origins, he believes evolutionists will say anything rather than admit that the biblical account of creation is true.

The Good News

2005-12-23T08:24:00.000-08:00

"And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, and we beheld His glory, the glory as of the only begotten of the Father, full of grace and truth." —John 1:14

"Now there were in the same country shepherds living out in the fields, keeping watch over their flock by night. And behold, an angel of the Lord stood before them, and the glory of the Lord shone around them, and they were greatly afraid. Then the angel said to them, 'Do not be afraid, for behold, I bring you good tidings of great joy which will be to all people. For there is born to you this day in the city of David a Savior, who is Christ the Lord. And this will be the sign to you: You will find a Babe wrapped in swaddling cloths, lying in a manger.' And suddenly there was with the angel a multitude of the heavenly host praising God and saying: 'Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace, goodwill toward men!"' —Luke 2:8-14

The Story Of The Dogwood

2005-12-22T21:11:00.000-08:00

There is a lovely little legend,
If you look, then you will see,
Hidden within the dogwood-
The blossom and the tree.

Long ago, the dogwood tree
Grew very straight and tall;
The wood was used for crosses,
Since it was the strongest wood of all.

But after Christ was crucified,
The tree grew crooked and curled.
So no more crosses could be made
From the dogwood that was burled.

To commemorate His death,
The tree beared these special flowers,
As symbols of our Saviour,
And the love he brings to ours.

Four petals has this posy,
Just as a cross appears,
With a notch at every tip,
As made by Roman spears.

The center of the blossom
Is like the crown of thorns,
That Jesus wore upon his head,
And so the flower it adorns.

This, this simple little shrub
With its flowers of pink or white
Will stand here to remind us
Of Christ, and all His plight.

Fritzi Frey

If I Ruled America

2005-12-19T08:48:00.000-08:00

I would like to introduce you to Rebecca Brown, editor and publisher of Rebecca Reads. I am sorry I have not done this before as it is such an interesting site. She has a lot more to offer than just book reviews. It is especially a pleasure to read her editorials. So try Rebecca's Reads for a good read.

If -- Rudyard Kipling wrote a powerful poem about that two letter word -- if I were ever to rule America this is what I'd make happen:

Politics: election campaigns would start only 6 months before Election Day.
All tv campaign ads on all channels would be free, once every half hour, to be rotated equally among candidates. Their ads would be about their platforms, not their opponents' anything. All ads would start only 3 months before Election Day.

Debates would really be debates. Candidates would be required to answer questions with the words “yes” & “no” & then explain in 30 words or less.
Questions would be 10 words (or less) from anyone attending the debates or from reporters. No two-part questions allowed.
Candidates' spouses would be required to keep their mouths shut.
Ditto for candidates' families, friends & partisans.

All absentee ballots would come with a SASE, for wherever they were mailed.
Voting from home should be explored & as secure as shopping from home.
Exit Polls would be abolished.
Ditto TV newscast projections.
All high school classes would watch all major news channels, at the same time, on Election Day, with times out for debating & studying the election process.
TV anchors would be fined for showing their biases.

Philanthropy:
All domestic charities like food banks, women's shelters, etc., would get free tv ads - made & aired by the channels - reminding folks to donate, especially from October through March.
All supermarkets would donate their “past pretty” produce & out-dated meats & dairy stuffs to their local food banks.
Realtors would encourage donations of homes to communities to house the homeless & for safe houses for domestic violence prevention programs.
Charities that run retail outlets would price their second-hand goods at reasonable prices - none should charge more than half a dollar for a used jigsaw puzzle!

Prisons:
I'd make every person in jail earn their keep with a living wage.
If they want to eat they work for it, just like every working stiff on the outside.
If they damage the buildings, they pay for repairs.
Ditto for entertainment, they pay for it.
If they want a better life, they study & learn a trade so when they do get out they can be gainfully employed. Ditto!
If they get ill, they pay for the medicines & care. They can earn income by being testers for new drugs.
Then our taxes would only pay for their guards.
& no, prisoners don't get flu shots before outsiders.

Faith:
So much of how we live our lives evolves from the practice of our belief systems.
There's much from every faith that is interesting & worthy. None has a monopoly on righteousness nor oppression.
A comparative study course in high school should be an elective.

Education:
For our national education system, we will return to the 3 Rs, which is a misnomer anyway, only one starts with an r.
Reading -- Writing -- Arithmetic = every single student graduates knowing how to understand what they read, how to hand write & type, & how to figure the basic maths they'll use as an adult.
Those students who have an appetite for reading, go on into the heady realms of literature.
Those with a bent for writing, add that to their career possibilities.
Those who are blessed with a feel for numbers, continue into the more esoteric mathematics.

Music & The Arts:
There are about as many students who enjoy playing & performing music, acting, painting, sculpting & potting as there are those who love sports. Ergo, there should be as much emphasis & money assigned to this aspect of our education. Each class would start & end with 5 minutes of singing

Click on the title for the rest of the story.

The Plant Of Peace

2005-12-18T20:14:00.000-08:00

For most of us the mention of mistletoe probably brings kissing to mind. But that practice wasn't the first involving mistletoe.

Two thousand years before Christ, the ancient Celtic people living in Gaul considered mistletoe to be sacred and medicinal. Druids, the priests of the Celtic tribes, used it in religious ceremonies held in tree groves where mistletoe was found.

In ancient Scandinavia, enemies, who met by chance beneath mistletoe, laid down their weapons and held a truce until the next day. This practice eventually led to the tradition of kissing under the mistletoe, the "plant of peace."

The use of mistletoe has continued throughout the centuries during the Christmas season as a decoration and as a symbol of fun and joy. But its early religious roots and peacemaking qualities are even more significant.

It Is The Soldier

2005-12-16T13:12:00.000-08:00

Federalist Patriot 12/16/05
This piece gave me God bumps.

Amid the political rancor about justifications for Operations Enduring Freedom and Iraqi Freedom, it is worth remembering the words of Admiral Jeremiah Denton: "It is the soldier, not the reporter, who has given us freedom of the press. It is the soldier, not the poet, who has given us freedom of speech. It is the soldier, not the campus organizer, who has given us the freedom to demonstrate. It is the soldier, who salutes the flag, who serves beneath the flag and whose coffin is draped by the flag, who allows the protester to burn the flag."

Hundreds of thousands of young Patriots in uniform, sworn to uphold our Constitution, serve in very inhospitable places that we may enjoy the peace and tranquility so many take for granted. Not only have they successfully held the warfront on Jihadi turf, but they are winning stability in the midst of chaos in the Middle East—stability that is well within the critical national-security interests of the United States. Contrast the joyful faces of millions of Iraqis citizens (no longer Saddam's slaves) voting for their Parliament yesterday with those of American politicos protesting our policy in the region

The Big Lie

2005-12-16T13:08:00.000-08:00

The BIG lie...Federalist Patriot 12/16/05
Readers of Monday's New York Times were greeted by a full-page advertisement on page entitled, "The World Can't Wait; Drive Out the Bush Regime!"

In the spirit of the season, we'll let this one speak for itself...

"YOUR GOVERNMENT, on the basis of outrageous lies, is waging a murderous and utterly illegitimate war in Iraq, with other countries in their [sic] sights.

"YOUR GOVERNMENT is openly torturing people, and justifying it.

"YOUR GOVERNMENT is moving each day closer to a theocracy, where a narrow and hateful brand of Christian fundamentalism will rule.

"The Bush regime is setting out to radically remake society...in a fascist way, and for generations to come. We must act now... There is not going to be some magical 'pendulum swing.' People who steal elections and believe they're on a 'mission from God' will not go without a fight. There is not going to be some savior from the Democratic [sic] Party. This whole idea of putting our hopes and energies into 'leaders' who tell us to seek common ground with fascists and religious fanatics is proving every day to be a disaster, and actually serves to demobilize people."

The ad calls for massive nationwide demonstrations in January "to create a political situation where the Bush regime's program is repudiated... Bush is driven from office... and the direction of society is reversed."

Signers included the Revolutionary Communist Party, Queers for Economic Justice and Hollywood has-beens like Martin Sheen, Margot Kidder, Casey Kasem, Edward Asner, Ed Begley and, of course, Hanoi Jane Fonda

When In Doubt Blame The Victim

2005-12-15T08:38:00.000-08:00

Cam Edwards - 12/14/05 Townhall.com

William Burden’s just an unlucky guy. It was bad luck that he was caught by an armed citizen when he was trying to rob a home in Upper Deerfield, New Jersey. It was bad luck that police have been able to tie him to a string of other crimes in southern New Jersey in 2002 and 2003. And it’s just his bad luck that’s led to a sentence of 20 to 30 years for those crimes.

Clearly, the crimes William Burden committed are not his fault. At least, that’s what William Burden believes. He recently told a court that the people to blame are his victims, saying “I wish they had answered the door. Had they done that, me and my boy would have gone on our way."

The “they” in this case are Robert and Wanda DuBois, who made the mistake of not answering their door to two strangers on July 4th, 2003. Because they didn’t answer the door, Burden and his accomplish had no choice but to break down the front door of the DuBois residence. Had the DuBois family simply have opened that door, William Burden’s life would be different.

"Maybe it wouldn't have brought down all these other burglaries and stuff I didn't commit on me," says Burden. "Not to minimize what I did, but I'm going through a terrible situation because of all these charges I'm facing."

Click on the title for the rest of the story.

The Yuck Factor

2005-12-12T16:24:00.000-08:00

Mice Created With Human Brain Cells By PAUL ELIAS, AP Biotechnology Writer

SAN FRANCISCO - Add another creation to the strange scientific menagerie where animal species are being mixed together in ever more exotic combinations.

Scientists announced Monday that they had created mice with small amounts of human brain cells in an effort to make realistic models of neurological disorders such as Parkinson's disease.

Led by Fred Gage of the Salk Institute in San Diego, the researchers created the mice by injecting about 100,000 human embryonic stem cells per mouse into the brains of 14-day-old rodent embryos.

Those mice were each born with about 0.1 percent of human cells in each of their heads, a trace amount that doesn't remotely come close to "humanizing" the rodents.

"This illustrate that injecting human stem cells into mouse brains doesn't restructure the brain," Gage said.

Still, the work adds to the growing ethical concerns of mixing human and animal cells when it comes to stem cell and cloning research. After all, mice are 97.5 percent genetically identical to humans.

"The worry is if you humanize them too much you cross certain boundaries," said David Magnus, director of the Stanford Medical Center for Biomedical Ethics. "But I don't think this research comes even close to that."

Researchers are nevertheless beginning to bump up against what bioethicists call the "yuck factor."

Three top cloning researchers, for instance, have applied for a patent that contemplates fusing a complete set of human DNA into animal eggs in order to manufacturer human embryonic stem cells.

Click on title for the rest of the article

Why Do We Keep Shooting Ourselves In The Foot

2005-12-12T16:12:00.000-08:00

Agape Press 12/12/05

...The senior minister at central Kentucky's largest church is defending his church's decision to close rather than hold worship services on Christmas Sunday. Last week Associated Press reported that some of America's largest churches will be closed on Christmas Day, which this year falls on a Sunday. The report said those churches are planning Christmas Eve services on Saturday, but are canceling their usual Sunday worship schedule. Officials at those churches say the schedule change is meant to be "family friendly." But closing the doors of the church on the Lord's Day, said critics, is unthinkable. Critics include Fuller Theological Seminary professor Robert Johnson, who objects to redefining Christmas as a family celebration rather than as Christians celebrating the birth of the Savior. Among the megachurches AP reports will be closed on Christmas are the Chicago-area's Willow Creek Community Church (senior pastor Bill Hybels); Mars Hill Bible Church in Grandville, Michigan (founding pastor Rob Bell); North Point Community Church (founding pastor Andy Stanley) in Alpharetta, Georgia; and Fellowship Church near Dallas (pastor Ed Young). Rev. Jon Weese of Southland Christian Church in Lexington, Kentucky -- also among those closing on Christmas Day -- says it is a matter of putting families first. Responding to Christians nationwide who have protested the cancellation of services by Southland and other megachurches on a Sunday, Weese noted that Jesus also was criticized by people who "emphasized religion over relationship." But Rev. D. James Kennedy of Coral Ridge Ministries told the Miami Herald, "We need to think carefully before we abandon our services on that day, especially when many churches are rightly blaming retailers and businesses for ignoring Christmas." [AP]

The Roots Of Holly

2005-12-09T17:22:00.000-08:00

Like many Christmas traditions and symbols, the use of holly began long before the time of Christ. Thought to be a sacred plant and a good omen, holly was used by the ancient Romans to honor Saturn, their god of the harvests. The festival Saturnalia, was held annually on December 17. Wreaths and other gifts were exchanged and homes were decorated with holly. During the early years of Christianity, many Roman Christians continued to decorate their homes with holly to avoid detection and persecution. When Christianity became the dominant religion of the Romans, holly continued to be used.

Its sharp, pointy-edged leaves are thought to represent Jesus' crown of thorns, while the red berries represent the blood he shed on the cross. This seems to make holly a suitable decoration for Easter as well as for Christmas.

Xmas?

2005-12-09T17:13:00.000-08:00

Every year during Advent, we generally see a sign reading "Merry Xmas!" Some Christians have been offended by the word Xmas. They say the letter X should not be substituted for Christ as though it were a modern insult to our Lord.

However, it really isn't. Xmas has ancient origins. The letter X in Greek--the original language of the New Testament--is the first letter of the word Xristos, which translated into English is the word Christ.

So Xmas is simply an abbreviation for the word Christ. And the letters mas are an abbreviation of the word mass. Therefore, Xmas really means Christ mass or Christ worship.

Are We In Trouble Or What?

2005-12-09T09:38:00.000-08:00

Emerging Elitist Theory Threatens to Redefine Personhood

By Mary Rettig
December 8, 2005

(AgapePress) - A senior fellow at the Discovery Institute says the changing definition of personhood in contemporary society will have a profound effect on everything from abortion and euthanasia to assisted reproductive technology and embryonic stem-cell research.

The Discovery Institute's Wesley Smith maintains that the United States of America was founded on the premise of the great value of human life and that all human life, regardless of mental or physical capacity, is important. But increasingly, he says, opinions on this subject are changing, especially in bioethics and some higher education circles, and an idea known as the "personhood theory" is taking hold.

Under this theory, Smith explains, "being human is irrelevant to moral worth. What matters is whether you have sufficient cognitive capacity to be deemed worthy of things such as life and bodily integrity; and if you do, for example, by being self aware over time, you are called a person." So, while the words "person" and "human" were at one time considered synonyms, he observes, "increasingly in the universities and among the elite, that is no longer true."

Putting criteria on what it means to be a person devalues all life by putting a quantitative value on it, the Discovery Institute fellow contends. Also, he believes once such definitions are established, they would likely change with whoever is in power at any given time, putting the weak and the marginalized in society in a perpetually vulnerable state.

"I think defeating personhood theory in the marketplace of ideas may be the most urgent matter facing this society," Smith adds, "because if being a human being is not what gives moral value, but instead we decide it is personhood theory or some other measurement, then value rights depend on who has the power to decide."

That would turn the value of a person into a matter of politics, Smith says. And whenever that happens, he observes, the value of all life gets demoted and the weak and voiceless in society are left particularly at risk.

Anti-Christianism

2005-12-06T14:50:00.000-08:00

...As liberal Jewish leaders meet in New York City this week to respond to what they see as the Religious Right's effort to Christianize America, another Jewish group is speaking out against increasingly prevalent intolerance toward the Christian faith. The Anti-Defamation League and Union for Reform Judaism are heading up the New York meeting; but, meanwhile, Rabbi Daniel Lapin of Toward Tradition -- a nonprofit group promoting Judeo-Christian values -- is voicing concern about the growing hatred and intolerance against Christians across society. "If you think anti-Semitism is an evil in this world," he says, "then fairness requires that we also admit that there is another parallel evil in this world, and that's called anti-Christianism." Rabbi Lapin is part of a group known as Jews Against Anti-Christian Defamation, which believes Jews should stand by and support Christians who have been their allies since the Second World War. Lapin agrees with a man he calls "one of the great rabbinic leaders of the 20th century, Rabbi Weinberg," that society is "entering an era where anti-Christianism will be a bigger threat to Jews than anti-Semitism." [Bill Fancher]Agape Press-12/06/05

An Inescapable Date

2005-12-06T08:29:00.000-08:00

This post is for Cindy Lee who did a great post on the law.

An Inescapable Date was written by Dr. Walter Wilson--Medical Doctor, Pastor, Bible Teacher, Christian author.

We celebrate Christ's birth by referring to it in the date placed on all our coins, civil records and vital documents. It is inscribed upon metal and written on parchment and engraved on the cornerstones of great buildings. It is on every newspaper, ever check, every deed, and it is universally acknowledged at the beginning of a new life.

Every transaction is related to the birth of Christ. It cannot be avoided or evaded. God has seen to it that this event is more widely advertised than anything on earth that is or that ever has been.

Christmas Prayer

2005-12-05T16:52:00.000-08:00

Christmas Prayer by Robert Louis Stevenson

Loving Father, help us to remember the birth of Jesus, that we may share in the song of the angels, the gladness of the shepherds, and the worship of the wise men.

Close the door of hate and open the door of love all over the world. Let kindness come with every gift, and good desires with every greeting. Deliver us from evil by the blessing which Christ brings, and teach us to be merry with clear hearts.

May the Christmas morning make us happy to be thy children, and the Christmas evening bring us to our beds with grateful thoughts, forgiving and forgiven, for Jesus'sake. Amen!

Crime And Punishment

2005-12-02T19:07:00.000-08:00

Taken from Federalist Patriot 12/02/05

A convicted murderer, 57-year-old Kenneth Lee Boyd, was executed Friday morning. Boyd's was the 1,000th execution since capital punishment was reinstated in 1976. "I'd hate to be remembered as that," Boyd said in a prison interview Wednesday. "I don't like the idea of being picked as a number."

Apparently, he would rather be remembered just as the guy who, on 4 March 1988, entered the home of his estranged wife's father, where his wife and children had taken up refuge, and, in the presence of his young children, murdered both his wife and her father.

Opponents claim that execution is not a deterrent, but they have yet to produce a single executed murderer who has killed again!

Naturally, this "landmark execution" has reopened the debate about capital punishment—in some circles. Unfortunately, the fate of more than 500,000 murder victims since 1976, is not part of that debate. Death penalty opponents claim that execution is not a deterrent, but they have yet to produce a single executed murderer who has killed again!

Senator John Glenn

2005-12-02T17:48:00.000-08:00

JOHN GLENN (ON THE SENATE FLOOR)
Mon, 26 Jan 2004 11:13

Some people still don't understand why military personnel
do what they do for a living. This exchange between
Senators John Glenn and Senator Howard Metzenbaum
is worth reading. Not only is it a pretty impressive
impromptu speech, but it's also a good example of one
man's explanation of why men and women in the armed
services do what they do for a living

This IS a typical, though sad, example of what
some who have never served think of the military.

Senator Metzenbaum (speaking to Senator Glenn):
"How can you run for Senate
when you've never held a real job?"

Senator Glenn (D-Ohio):
"I served 23 years in the United States Marine Corps.
I served through two wars. I flew 149 missions
My plane was hit by anti-aircraft fire on 12 different
occasions. I was in the space program. It wasn't my
checkbook, Howard; it was my life on the line. It was
not a nine-to-five job, where I took time off to take the
daily cash receipts to the bank."

"I ask you to go with me ... as I went the other day...
to a veteran's hospital and look those men ...
with their mangled bodies in the eye, and tell THEM
they didn't hold a job!
You go with me to the Space Program at NASA
and go, as I have gone, to the widows and Orphans
of Ed White, Gus Grissom and Roger Chaffee...
and you look those kids in the eye and tell them
that their DADS didn't hold a job.
You go with me on Memorial Day and you stand in
Arlington National Cemetery, where I have more friends
buried than I'd like to remember, and you watch
those waving flags
You stand there, and you think about this nation,
and you tell ME that those people didn't have a job?

What about you?"

For those who don't remember .
During WW.II, Howard Metzenbaum was an attorney
representing the Communist Party in the USA.
Now he's a Senator!

If you can read this, thank a teacher.
If you are reading it in English thank a Veteran.

The Ultimate Question About Comparative Exposure

2005-12-02T08:07:00.000-08:00

This excerpt was taken from article on Townhall.com 12/1/05 by Ross Mackenzie

NBC'S Brian Williams said of Congressman Murtha: "When one Congressman out of 435 members of Congress speaks out against the war in Iraq, it normally wouldn't be news. But it was today, because of who he is." Neither Williams nor many others in the mainline media have noted that two years ago "hawk" Murtha urged the firing of Pentagon leaders who misled him into voting for the Iraq enterprise.

Here are the abbreviated comments of "one Congressman out of 435" - Sam Johnson of Texas - on the floor of the House two weeks ago:

I spent 29 years in the Air Force - served in Korea and Vietnam and spent seven years as a POW in Vietnam, more than half of that time in solitary confinement.

When I was a POW, I was scared to death when our Congress talked about pulling the plug that I would be left there forever. I know what it does to morale. I know what it does to the mission. And so help me God, I will never, ever, let our nation make those mistakes again. Never.

Our men and women in uniform need our full support.

They need to have full faith that a few naysayers in Washington won't cut and run - and leave them high and dry. They need to know these things because that's mandatory for mission success and troop morale.

Mr. Speaker, we're making great progress in Iraq. And our work is paying off.

It's going to take time, but our guys on the ground are working with other nations to make inroads to create leadership and inspire democracy in a country that has known only hate, fear and death from a ruler.

However sadly, some here want to embolden the enemy by saying we just cut and run. That's just irresponsible and unconscionable.

In case people have forgotten, this is the same thing that happened in Vietnam. Peaceniks and people in Congress - and America - started saying bad things about what was going on over there. Let me tell you what it did for troop morale. It's a real downer.

Withdrawal is not an option!
Click on title for the complete article

Paul Harvey And Prayer

2005-12-01T20:55:00.000-08:00

This was e-mailed by a friend, and I would like to share it with you.

Paul Harvey says:

I don't believe in Santa Claus, but I'm not going to sue somebody for singing a Ho-Ho-Ho song in December. I don't agree with Darwin, but I didn't go out and hire a lawyer when my high school teacher taught his theory of evolution.

Life, liberty or your pursuit of happiness will not be endangered because someone says a 30-second prayer before a football game.

So what's the big deal? It's not like somebody is up there reading the entire book of Acts. They're just talking to a God they believe in and asking him to grant safety to the players on the field and the fans going home from the game.

"But it's a Christian prayer," some will argue.

Yes, and this is the United States of America, a country founded on Christian principles. According to our very own phone book, Christian churches outnumber all others better than 200-to-1. So what would you expect-somebody chanting Hare Krishna?

If I went to a football game in Jerusalem, I would expect to hear a Jewish prayer.

If I went to a soccer game in Baghdad, I would expect to hear a Muslim prayer.

If I went to a ping pong match in China, I would expect to hear someone pray to Buddha.

And I wouldn't be offended.
It wouldn't bother me one bit.
When in Rome ..

"But what about the atheists?" is another argument.

What about them?
Nobody is asking them to be baptized. We're not going to pass the collection plate. Just humor us for 30 seconds. If that's asking too much, bring a Walkman or a pair of ear plugs. Go to the bathroom. Visit the concession stand. Call your lawyer!

Unfortunately, one or two will make that call. One or two will tell thousands what they can and cannot do. I don't think a short prayer at a football game is going to shake the world's foundations.

Christians are just sick and tired of turning the other cheek while our courts strip us of all our rights. Our parents and grandparents taught us to pray before eating; to pray before we go to sleep.

Our Bible tells us to pray without ceasing. Now a handful of people and their lawyers are telling us to cease praying.

God, help us.
And if that last sentence offends you, well ... just sue me.

The silent majority has been silent too long. It's time we let that one or two who scream loud enough to be heard .... that the vast majority don't care what they want. It is time the majority rules! It's time we tell them, you don't have to pray; you don't have to say the pledge of allegiance; you don't have to believe in God or attend services that honor Him. That is your right, and we will honor your right. But by golly, you are no longer going to take our rights away. We are fighting back .
and we WILL WIN!

God bless us one and all . especially those who denounce Him. God bless America, despite all her faults. She is still the greatest nation of all.

God bless our service men who are fighting to protect our right to pray and worship God.

May 2005 be the year the silent majority is heard and we put God back as the foundation of our families and institutions.

Keep looking up

More Quotes

2005-11-30T20:13:00.000-08:00

"The greatest good we can do our country is to heal its party divisions and make them one people." —Thomas Jefferson

"Do not measure compassion by government. Measure it by what you are willing to do for the least of your brothers." —House Budget Committee Chairman, Jim Nussle

"Congress can no more repeal the law of supply and demand than physicists can repeal the law of gravity. If you restrict the profits you can make for something, you'll get less of that something. If you restrict prices, you'll get less conservation." —Jerry Taylor

"Terrorists are also winning the psychological warfare, partly because the jihadists are unified behind a goal and we often are not. They want territory and they want to kill 'infidels.' American leftists want 'peace,' without realizing that peace is a byproduct of defeating evil. The left also wants to use the war for partisan political gain and will seek to deprive President Bush of any credit for victory because it could benefit him politically. How sick is that?" —Cal Thomas

Quotes For The Day

2005-11-28T19:47:00.000-08:00

"We are either a United people, or we are not. If the former, let us, in all maters of general concern act as a nation, which have national objects to promote, and a national character to support. If we are not, let us no longer act a farce by pretending to it." —George Washington

"We do not need more intellectual power, we need more moral power. We do not need more knowledge, we need more character. We do not need more government, we need more culture. We do not need more law, we need more religion. We do not need more of the things that are seen, we need more of the things that are unseen. If the foundation be firm, the foundation will stand." —Calvin Coolidge

"The Middle East is a complicated place—well not really a place, it's more a state of mind. A disordered mind." —Ronald Reagan

France always thought it had one last resort, one ready strategy for fending off the rage of its Arab street: beyond avoidance lay appeasement. No country in the West has done more to cultivate world Arab opinion, to appease Arab terrorists, to ostentatiously oppose American Middle East policy (Iraq above all), to champion the signal Arab cause of Palestine. It was no accident that Yasser Arafat chose Paris as his place to die—Paris, after Jerusalem, his second holiest city. Paris burns anyway. As the French seem to learn every 70 years, appeasement does not work. It merely whets the appetite." —Charles Krauthammer

The Burgeoning Alliance Between Leftists and Islamists

2005-11-26T08:52:00.000-08:00

Chris Adamo 11/24/05

In the wake of the information explosion of recent years, Americans can now find any “version” of the news that they like. Press accounts of the same international events are often unrecognizably altered from each other, with no apparent connection to reality. Thus, alarming occurrences are often distorted in order to prevent their significance from becoming apparent to the public at large.

Yet the resulting false sense of security in which some may then choose to bask can suddenly come crashing down before them, as did the World Trade Center towers on September 11, 2001.

Still, not long after the attacks, replays of the towers as they collapsed on thousands of terrified occupants were summarily removed from nightly news broadcasts. And any subsequent terrorist atrocities, such as the videotape of the protracted and gruesome beheading of Nick Berg, have been thoroughly censored and essentially banned from broadcast by the liberal media.

Clearly, little has changed among the American left since it ascended to prominence during the Vietnam era. Back then, brutality was not personified by the genocide of the Soviets, the Communist Khmer Rouge and their Killing Fields, nor the wanton slaughter of Vietnamese by the millions in the wake of the U.S. departure from that nation. Rather, it was singularly characterized by Lieutenant William Calley and the My Lai massacre.

Now, to hear it from liberals, 9-11 was little more than a historical fluke to which the best response may well be indifference. Furthermore, the ensuing terror war has been a singular violation of human rights, defined not by the toppling of indescribable tyrants, but by a few terrorist inmates who were forced to play “dog pile” at the hands of some admittedly perverted U.S. prison guards.

Chris Matthews of the MSNBC “news” program “Hardball,” went so far as to claim that the Islamist monsters of al Qaeda are “not evil,” but merely see things from a “different perspective.” And Matthews is not alone. Among the nation’s major networks and liberal news organizations, such inflammatory concepts as “evil” are reserved for President Bush, Vice-President Dick Cheney, and of course Donald Rumsfeld and Karl Rove

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State And Federal Tax "Profit"

2005-11-26T08:35:00.000-08:00

State and Federal Treasuries "Profit" More from Gasoline Sales than U.S. Oil Industry

by Jonathan Williams and Scott A. Hodge

High gas prices and strong oil company earnings have generated a rash of new tax proposals in recent months. Some lawmakers have called for new “windfall profits” taxes—similar to the one signed into federal law in 1980 by President Jimmy Carter—that would tax the profits of major oil companies at a rate of 50 percent. Meanwhile, many commentators have voiced support for the idea of increasing gas taxes to keep the price of gasoline at post-Katrina highs, thereby reducing gas consumption.

However, often ignored in this debate is the fact that oil industry profits are highly cyclical, making them just as prone to “busts” as to “booms.” Additionally, tax collections on the production and import of gasoline by state and federal governments are already near historic highs. In fact, in recent decades governments have collected far more revenue from gasoline taxes than the largest U.S. oil companies have collectively earned in domestic profits. (Click here for previous analysis of state, local and federal gas taxes

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D.C. Government Playing with 'Corked Bat'

2005-11-25T18:54:00.000-08:00

City to condemn private property to make way for baseball stadium
Written By: Steve Stanek

Washington, DC officials have begun condemnation proceedings to seize privately owned property to make way for a new $535 million ballpark for the Washington Nationals Major League Baseball team. The Nationals now play at RFK Memorial Stadium.

Steve Green, director of development in the office of the deputy mayor for planning and economic development, told the Washington Times for an October 6 article, "We think there are some [property owners] that we'll have good-faith negotiations with."

Nearly half of the 23 landowners whose property is targeted for the new stadium site had not responded to city officials. Most others had rejected the city's offers. City officials told landowners at the 21-acre site along the Anacostia River if they did not strike a deal with the city by October 21, their property would be condemned.

Land Values Climbing

"Most landowners have been offered about three times the amount at which properties were assessed, but many have resisted selling because the rise in land values around the ballpark site [has] outpaced the city's offers," reported the Washington Times in an October 21 article.

Patricia Ghiglino, who owns a yellow-brick art studio on the proposed stadium site, has vowed to take the matter to court. Retired Army officer Kenneth Wyban also plans to go to court. His pre-Civil War home, which he has worked for years to restore and had hoped to turn into a bed-and-breakfast, is targeted for acquisition.

"I was born in Peru, and I never, ever imagined something like this could happen here," Ghiglino said. "I think what is really upsetting is that they are stretching the concept of eminent domain for economic development. ... They are opening the door to corruption."

Ghiglino doesn't know where she'll move, only that it likely won't be DC because real estate prices are too high and she doesn't want to "get burned a second time."

Interpretation Is 'Twisted'

"The Fifth Amendment of the U.S. Constitution stipulates land can be taken for 'public use,' not public good or private benefit," said Peyton Knight, director of environmental and regulatory affairs for the National Center for Public Policy Research in Washington, DC. "As Justice Sandra Day O'Connor noted in her dissent to the Kelo decision [issued June 23, 2005], no one's home is safe. This twisted interpretation of the law has potentially put every home and small business in America in the crosshairs of politically connected developers and their unscrupulous government allies. Eminent domain reform is needed soon."

Knight added, "Typically, 'good-faith negotiations' do not portray the buyer holding a gun to the seller's head. These negotiations have been tinged with bad faith since April, when the city told property owners they had to be out of their homes by New Year's Eve. Mr. Green can pretend he's dealing in good faith, but he's really playing with a corked bat."

City Still Seeking Financing

The city is waiting for approval for an upfront payment of $246 million from Deutsche Bank in exchange for a lease payment and future stadium revenues. The rest of the ballpark would be publicly financed by selling municipal bonds, but bond houses refuse to issue an investment-grade rating on the bonds until the city fixes certain problems with the plan. Without an investment-grade rating, the interest rate charged on the borrowed money will be higher, raising the total financing costs.

The bonds would be repaid from revenue from a gross receipts tax on large businesses and a utilities tax on businesses and federal offices.

Mayor Anthony Williams has been promoting the new stadium as a key element of a redevelopment plan for the Anacostia River area. Construction could start in March and is expected to take two years.

More information on the Washington Nationals baseball stadium is available from the Cato Institute at http://www.cato.org/pub_display.php?pub_id=2479 and from the National Center for Public Policy Research at http://www.nationalcenter.org.

Bubba Steps Over The Line

2005-11-25T13:33:00.000-08:00

Dick Morris 11/25/05

By traveling to Dubai, just a few hundred miles from the combat zone, to denounce the American in volvement in Iraq as a "big mistake," Bill Clinton has made a big mistake of his own.

Normally, a top leader of the Democratic Party and the spouse of a presidential candidate can and should feel free to say anything he chooses. But a former president of the United States should be more careful before he tells hundreds of thousands of young men and women, many of whom served under him, that they are risking their lives for a mistake.

To do it in the Arab world compounds the error. His denunciation of our war effort so close to the spots where our troops are fighting summons memories of Jane Fonda.

Yes, Clinton's attacks were highly specific. He praised getting rid of Saddam, but criticized President Bush for being overly optimistic about how easy it would be to leave Iraq afterward. He also attacked the administration for not leaving the "fundamental military and social and police structure intact." Really? That infrastructure killed, tortured, maimed and mutilated hundreds of thousands of people. Should President Harry Truman have left the Gestapo in place?

Moreover, Clinton knew that the sound bite that would emerge was "big mistake" — a remark far outside the normal bounds of criticism of a president by one of his predecessors.

But there's another, all too familiar, concern here — Bill Clinton, blurring his roles as political advantage dictates.

Is he the husband of the 2008 White House frontrunner, predicting that his wife would be a better president than he was? Sometimes. Is he the former president rising above party to join former President George H. W. Bush in appealing for aid for victims of tsunamis and hurricanes? Often. Is he the partisan critic, the nation's chief Democrat, slashing away at administration policy and rallying the faithful on the left? Increasingly

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Schadenfreude or Thanksgiving

2005-11-25T10:35:00.000-08:00

By Rabbi Mitchell Wohlberg

A warped perspective on life is on the rise and spreading fast

Question number one: What do Terrill Owens, France and the Palestinians have in common? Answer: They provide an opportunity for schadenfreude. Question number two: What is schadenfreude? It is spelled s-c-h-a-d-e-n-f-r-e-u-d-e. It's a German word that us Brooklyn guys don't throw around lightly. You rarely hear this word being used but recently it was featured in two editorial pieces across the country, one in the Wall Street Journal and the other in the Los Angeles Jewish Observer.

The German word "schadenfreude" takes seven English words to define it. It means: "malicious satisfaction in the misfortune of others." In recent weeks it has become popular amongst Jews because of an article written by Si Frumkin, a journalist and Jewish activist in Los Angeles. He wrote about the sense of schadenfreude he know feels when looking at the situation in Gaza. At least 6 people emailed me a copy of the article! Internet surfers have surfed it, bloggers have blogged it … and us non-geeks have just read it.

Frumkin starts off by citing a famous historian, Peter Gaye, a Jew in Germany during the Nazi era, who experienced schadenfreude when he watched the Germans lose gold medals in 1936. Watching the German lose, Gaye wrote, "can be one of the great joys of life."

Frumkin goes on to tell about the schadenfreude he felt when Israel was disengaging from Gaza and there was a disagreement over what should be done with the "hot houses" which the Israeli farmers had used to grow flowers and vegetables. Should they be destroyed, or should they be left for the Palestinians to cultivate? And along came a group of wealthy American Jews and paid the Israeli farmers $14 million to leave the hot houses for the Palestinians. You remember what happened next? The Israelis left … the Palestinians come in and burnt the synagogues down and then trashed and vandalized many of the hot houses which the American Jews had paid for. Frumkin writes: "And so I have schadenfreude. The Palestinians will not export flowers to Holland or food to France. The greenhouses will not be rebuilt. The Palestinian economy, such as it is, will continue to be mired in corruption, hatred and violence. They will suffer — schadenfreude — but still they'll never admit that it was their own fault. And I have schadenfreude toward the naïve rich Jews who thought the Arab reaction to their gift would be based on logic and not on inbred hatred. You silly people! Didn't you hear that this is the Middle East, where scorpions sting even if this means their own destruction? You lost $14 million and you know, I am glad you did."

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The Blame Game Continues

2005-11-23T15:59:00.000-08:00

By Jonathan Tobin 11/23/05

The ‘Muslim street’ and Western intellectuals share a passion for scapegoating Israel

It came as little surprise that when a gang of Islamist terrorists blew themselves up in three Jordanian hotels earlier this month, that many in the Arab and Muslim world were quick to blame Israel.

As a New York Times correspondent who was, no doubt, sent out to the pavement of a Jordanian town in search of the mythical "Arab street," discovered, there was no shortage of locals willing to see Israel as somehow at the bottom of a horrific crime committed by Muslims in the name of their interpretation of Islam.

Like the seemingly imperishable canard that no Jews died in the Sept. 11 attacks because their brethren were the perpetrators, it didn't take long for the denizens of the "street" to reassure each other that it was the Jews who massacred a wedding party and other innocent Arabs.

The fact that Al Qaeda had already claimed responsibility didn't really diminish the willingness to blame Israel, nor did the capture of one of the members of the gang whose bomb had not exploded.

IMMUTABLE RULES OF HATRED
The immutable rules of the Middle East cannot be altered for facts, logic or even the faintest trace of common sense. Since the revival of Jewish sovereignty in a part of the otherwise all-Arab region is a terrible humiliation for Muslims, anything can be blamed on it.

But the truth is, many in the West no longer pay much attention to the ravings of the "street." That's why the enormous growth of anti-Jewish incitement and hate education (specifically in Palestinian schools) has always been a minor issue for the American foreign-policy establishment and many of the other bright lights who opine on the region for a living.

But this week, we got a hint of yet another cause for the lack of outrage over the canards about Israel that have become so ingrained in Arab political dialogue. The clue came during the discussions over the negotiations about the opening of border crossings to Gaza that were concluded this week.

During the course of the talks, Israel sought to limit and control entry to Gaza while the Palestinians, strongly supported by the United States and the European Union, sought to minimize Israel's involvement.

In the end, Israel buckled and, despite some symbolic gestures aimed more at bolstering Prime Minister Ariel Sharon's domestic support than anything else, the Palestinians got their way.
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A Charlie Daniels Thanksgiving

2005-11-23T14:31:00.000-08:00

Nov 23, 2005
by Ben Shapiro

In my house, we have a great tradition on Thanksgiving: We go around the table, and each person in my family explains what they're most thankful for. It's always meaningful and often hilarious (when the second of my three younger sisters was about 5, for example, she responded, "I am thankful for my lips"). That's what Thanksgiving is about: sharing time with family and giving thanks to God for all of our blessings.

This year, it's difficult to feel especially thankful. Hurricane Katrina devastated Louisiana and Mississippi; the war in Iraq continues; the threat of terrorism remains real. But perhaps that's the challenge of Thanksgiving -- remembering, even in the face of tragedy and hardship, that there is so much to be grateful for.

So here is what I am most thankful for this Thanksgiving: I am thankful to God that I live in a country of patriots with true American values. And I am thankful that God continues to guard us. I have faith that He will continue to guard and keep us as long as we strive to bring Godliness to our own lives and to the lives of others.

That cosmic mission -- to spread American values across the globe in order to protect American values at home -- is difficult, rife with pain and sacrifice. At the same time that we thank God for his beneficence, we must thank those fighting every day to secure the blessings God has granted us. To that end, I spoke last week with Charlie Daniels, the founder of the fantastic Charlie Daniels Band. Daniels is heading up Operation Heartstrings, a "plea to corporate America to help the dedicated men and women serving in the Armed Forces overseas … by providing instruments, albums, DVDs, CD and DVD players," according to Daniels' website. (You can learn more
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Insights

2005-11-21T13:40:00.000-08:00

FOR THE RECORD
"Ironically, or maybe there's no irony at all, the Islamic nations of the Middle East are not nearly as squeamish as the girlie men of the West in recognizing the true nature of the beast at the village gate... The delicate sentiments of frightened Western girlie men have no currency this morning in Amman or other capitals of Arabia, where there is fear of how the radical Islamists will try to erase the indifference that thrived when al-Qa'ida seemed preoccupied only with the infidels of Israel and Christendom... The warfare, now spilling over in unexpected places, has a little to do with poverty, joblessness and maybe even ennui, but everything to do with the Islamist campaign to replace modern civilization with something bad from the Dark Ages." —Wesley Pruden

INSIGHT
"A nation can survive its fools, and even the ambitious. But it cannot survive treason from within. As enemy at the gates is less formidable, for he is known and carries his banner openly. But the traitor moves amongst those within the gate freely, his sly whispers rustling through all the alleys, heard in the very halls of government itself." —Marcus Tullius Cicero

A Quote For The Day

2005-11-21T09:00:00.000-08:00

QUOTE OF THE DAY

"Bad schools, crime, drugs, high taxes, the social security mess, racism, the health care 'crisis,' unemployment, welfare state dependency, illegitimacy, the gap between rich and poor. What do these issues have in common? Politicians, the media, and our so-called 'leaders' lie to us about them. They lie about the cause. They lie about the effect. They lie about the solutions."

Larry Elder

Thanksgiving

2005-11-21T08:46:00.000-08:00

In 1863 President Abraham Lincoln formally declared Thanksgiving a national holiday:

"The year that is drawing toward its close has been filled with the blessings of fruitful fields and healthful skies. To these bounties, which are so constantly enjoyed that we are prone to forget the source from which they come . . . I do therefore invite my fellow citizens in every part of the United States . . . to set apart and observe the last Thursday of November next, as a day of Thanksgiving and Praise to our beneficent Father who dwelleth in the Heavens."

Granny Deserves Self-Defense

2005-11-17T21:30:00.000-08:00

Nov 16, 2005 by Cam Edwards

It was just after midnight last Wednesday when Susan Buxton realized all was not well in her Arlington, Texas home. The 66-year old was getting ready to let her dogs out before she went to bed when she noticed her 28-year old granddaughter was still awake. “I asked her, ‘What are you doing up?’ and she says, ‘Gigi, I heard glass breaking.’”

That didn’t raise too many alarm bells for the grandmother, but when she discovered a muddy footprint on her back porch, she knew someone was in the house. Luckily, Susan Buxton wasn’t alone. Mr. Smith and Mr. Wesson have been Susan Buxton’s constant companions for the past twelve years, ever since a stranger tried to abduct another granddaughter from her front yard.

So, armed with her .38 and a flashlight, Susan Buxton went through every room in her home. Just like in the movies, it wasn’t until she had searched every room that she knew where the intruder was. Hiding in her closet in her art room, Christopher Lessner saw the door swing open. He looked at her and whispered, “Shhhh”.

Buxton was having none of it. Pointing her pistol at the intruder, she told him to get down on the floor. Then she yelled for her granddaughter to call police. When Lessner tried to grab the gun, Susan Buxton shot him. He fled the home, bleeding from the leg, and Susan Buxton shot at him again. This time she missed. Police later found him cowering under a neighbor’s backyard deck.

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Jordanians Are Shocked --Shocked!

2005-11-15T16:33:00.000-08:00

Jordanians are shocked -- shocked! -- that a wedding would be blown up

Nov 15, 2005
by Dennis Prager

Jordanians are shocked that Islamic terrorists would blow up families, including families celebrating a wedding. They are so shocked that for the first time in history, Muslims have taken to publicly demonstrating against Islamic terror.

And why are they shocked? Because the terrorists blew up Jordanians. As long as Islamic terrorists blew up men, women and children who are Jewish, Christian, Hindu, American, Australian and black Sudanese, the Arab and larger Muslim worlds were not particularly disturbed. In fact, Palestinians, who comprise the majority of Jordan's population, celebrated when Jews were blown up at Passover seders and at weddings. And they took to the streets and cheered in the Palestinian fashion, handing out candy, when Americans were incinerated in office buildings.

For some reason, Palestinians, most other Arabs and many Muslims around the world thought that the credulity-straining evil of targeting the most innocent for death, paralysis, blindness and brain damage would be confined to non-Arabs and non-Muslims. In fact, the idea that this Palestinian-made cancer would target Arab Muslims is so inconceivable to most Arabs that many now believe the terror attack in Amman was orchestrated by Jews (the Israeli Mossad).

Of course, Arab Muslim men, women and children are blown up almost weekly in Iraq, but, hey, that's OK because the monsters doing it hate America and seek Israel's annihilation. And in the Arab world -- and in much of the Muslim and leftist worlds -- hatred of America and Israel gets you a moral pass. In the Arab/Muslim worlds (with individual exceptions, of course), as among the world's leftists, an act is almost incapable of being judged evil if it is committed by those who hate America (especially the America of George W. Bush) or Israel.

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Anti-Christian Bias Fuels Secular Left's War on Christmas

2005-11-15T16:25:00.000-08:00

Gibson Claims Anti-Christian Bias Fuels Secular Left's War on Christmas
By Chad Groening
November 15, 2005

(AgapePress) - The author of a new book says it reveals how the American Civil Liberties Union and other anti-Christian groups are heating up the war against Christmas, even when it comes to Christmas symbols that are purely secular in nature.

John Gibson is the anchor of Fox News Channel's "The Big Story." His new book is called The War on Christmas: How the Liberal Plot to Ban the Sacred Christian Holiday is Worse Than You Thought (Sentinel, 2005). In it, the author contends that secular militants have expanded their war on Christmas to go after things regarded by most people as innocent emblems of a primarily secular federal holiday.

"The people who are trying to keep Christians out of city hall, keep them out of schools, are now going after what are recognized by most people in America -- and the United States Supreme Court -- as purely secular symbols of the Christian holiday, Christmas," Gibson asserts. And, he points out, reverence for the so-called separation of church and state does not adequately explain the apparent particular animus toward Christmas and Christians as opposed to other religious holidays and observances.

The investigative reporter examines the ample evidence of the secular left's bias, citing such cases as that of certain state government workers in Illinois who were barred from saying the words "Merry Christmas" at work; and the case of local Rhode Island officials who banned Christians from participating in a public project to decorate a City Hall lawn.

He also points to a New Jersey school where even instrumental versions of traditional Christmas carols were prohibited; and an Arizona district where school officials banned any reference in a class project to the religious history of Christmas.

There are many similar stories gathered in the pages of Gibson's book, describing similar challenges and attacks on free expression where the celebration of Christmas is concerned.

"The common denominator is, you would ask a city manager in Eugene, Oregon, 'Why did you cause all that trouble for yourself by banning Christmas trees?' and he would say, 'Well, because they're Christian,'" the writer explains.

"There is this kind of casual and accepted bias against Christians and Christian symbols," Gibson contends, "even if the symbol is perceived to be a symbol of Christianity by the secularists or the objectors and it's not perceived to be one by the Christians themselves."

It little matters, the author insists, because the secular left in America is systematically trying to remove every vestige of Christmas from the public square, even when it comes to symbols that have nothing to do with the Christian aspects of the holiday.

"The only thing that one can conclude is that this reveals a bias against Christians which would not be expressed against any other religious group," Gibson says. But while these militant secularist liberals cloak their war on Christianity in the jargon of constitutional rights, he asks, what about the right to freedom of expression for millions of Americans who want to celebrate their traditional holiday without having to do so behind closed doors

Conservative Response to Senator Leahy's Diatribe

2005-11-10T15:51:00.000-08:00

...A conservative spokesman and pro-family leader is decrying remarks from Vermont's Senator Patrick Leahy earlier this week, in which the lawmaker compared the comments of a number of Christian leaders to terrorist rhetoric. Leahy told a hearing that comments about radical Islam from Franklin Graham, Pat Robertson, and Jerry Falwell were as offensive to him as comments by terrorists. However, Gary Bauer of the Campaign for Working Families feels the Democratic senator needs a reality check. After all, Bauer points out, "Franklin Graham and Jerry Falwell and Pat Robertson and religious conservative Christians are not hijacking planes and flying them into buildings, killing thousands of civilians. They're not decapitating the people they disagree with. They're not attempting to attack England and Canada and Australia." Bauer says Leahy's attempt "to draw a comparison between his fellow Americans who happen to be conservative Christians and the thugs we are fighting in a worldwide war is just unconscionable." [Bill Fancher]Agape Press 11/10/05

Seeing Islam Through 'Condi-Colored Glasses'

2005-11-09T16:41:00.000-08:00

Click on title to read article by Rev. Mark H. Creech regarding "Condi Colored Glasses."

Islam is neither a religion characteristic of peace or love. It is, in fact, a false religion. It makes a show of righteousness, but it is wicked to the core. Alexis de Tocqueville once said of Islam: "I studied the Quran a great deal. I came away from that study with the conviction that by and large there have been few religions in the world as deadly to men as that of Muhammad .... Its social and political tendencies are in my opinion more to be feared, and I therefore regard it as a form of decadence rather than a form of progress ...."

Obviously, de Tocqueville didn't see Islam through "Condi-colored glasses." And neither should

Well Family, What Do You Think?

2005-11-09T16:13:00.000-08:00

I am having a very hard time trying to find anything worthwhile coming from our Democrat politicians. They revile anything Christian, Jewish, or Conservative, and if the truth were told, probably most of the American population.

These two pieces were taken from Agape Press 11/09/05

...A high-profile Democratic senator from Vermont has used a Senate hearing on terrorism to attack American Christians. Senate Judiciary Committee member Patrick Leahy called remarks by Christian leaders offensive as terrorist jihad propaganda. As an example, Leahy quoted Franklin Graham's post-9/11 remarks that "'We're not attacking Islam, but Islam has attacked us" and the religious leader's comment that he believes "Islam is a very evil and wicked religion." Of Graham's statements, Leahy remarked, "Now that is extremely offensive." And the senator did not stop with Graham but also noted that "The Reverend Jerry Falwell called the prophet Muhammad a terrorist" and "The Reverend Pat Robertson has likened those who practice Islam, including a very large number of very loyal Americans, as our enemy." Leahy equated these Christian leaders' comments with those of terrorists, saying, "Just as a majority of Christians or Jews reject these statements, a majority of Muslims reject the publications [and] broadcasts we have discussed here." [Bill Fancher]

...In the ongoing battle over what U.S. public schools can teach about the origins of life, conservatives chalked up both a victory and a defeat in yesterday's voting. In Dover, Pennsylvania, a bid by local school board members to have the area schools at least consider intelligent design cost most of the board members their jobs. Voters there ousted eight of the nine school board members, all of whom had backed an initiative to force biology teachers to read a statement on intelligent design in class. The eight, all Republicans, were replaced by Democrats. Meanwhile, in Kansas, new public school science standards that have been criticized for promoting creationism while treating evolution as a flawed theory, won approval yesterday from the State Board of Education. The board's 6-4 vote was a victory for intelligent design advocates, who helped draft the standards and argued the changes would make teaching about evolution more balanced. However, it remains unclear how the new standards will affect what is taught in classrooms. Those decisions will remain with 300 local school boards. [Fred Jackson]

Imminently Concerned

2005-11-09T15:53:00.000-08:00

By Jim Waters of the Bluegrass Institute--Kentucky's free-market think tank

Introduction

Eminent domain is becoming an abusive power that should be restrained to perpetuate a civil society founded on voluntary exchange.

Our nation’s founding fathers believed not only in limiting the taking of private property for “public use,” but also in the vigorous protection of private-property rights, which they considered sacred. John Adams said: “The moment the idea is admitted into society that property is not as sacred as the law of God, and that there is not a force of law and public justice to protect it, anarchy and tyranny commence.”

A firm belief in the sacredness of property rights makes our society different than virtually all others. Frederick Bastiat wrote: “Life, liberty and property do not exist because men have made laws. On the contrary, it was the fact that life, liberty, and property existed beforehand that caused men to make laws in the first place.”

Put another way, that inimitable philosopher Frank Zappa said: “Communism doesn’t work because people like to own stuff.”

Stealing

Most of us learned in kindergarten that taking something belonging to one person and giving it to another is stealing. In civil dealings, when a buyer demands something that a seller won’t give up, it’s the same thing – stealing. And just because he throws down $5 as he’s running out the door doesn’t mean that it’s not stealing.

The Supreme Court’s recent Kelo v. New London decision indicates a growing disrespect for – and lack of knowledge concerning – private-property rights, especially at the state and local levels of government.

Too many local government officials’ economic-development policies consist of plans to eliminate successful businesses to make room for other companies they hope will succeed. Not only does such a scheme bear little resemblance to any kind of reasonableness, it’s also actually the same approach used in the planned economies of the now-defunct Soviet system.

Eminent-domain abuse often occurs when government decides it wants someone else’s property without paying for it. It ends up acting as a form of real-estate agent for people who want to buy what others don’t want to sell. Actually, a more accurate description would be: When you buy something that somebody wants to sell, you go to a Realtor; when you buy something somebody doesn’t want to sell, you go to government.

The founders were so concerned about such coercion when it came to the taking of property that they placed strict limitations on the use of eminent domain in the Constitution. They said private property could only be taken for public use – and then with “just compensation.”

“Just compensation” does not consist of a local government’s cursory analysis followed by the oft-repeated conclusion: “After all we can only pay fair-market value.” Our Constitution does not state “fair-market value.” It specifies “just compensation.”

Ultimately, the debate centers on what constitutes “just compensation.” Ordinarily, this should be an easy debate to win – or at least it should be in America. Owners determine the value – and the amount of just compensation – of their properties. The market price is the intersection of what a buyer is willing to pay and the owner is willing to take. Our Constitution guarantees that government purchases must adhere to that same formula.
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Cut Power Of Eminent Domain

2005-11-08T10:44:00.000-08:00

By HAROLD CUNLIFFE
Published on: 11/07/05
The U.S. House last week passed legislation to withhold federal tax dollars from local governments if they use the power of eminent domain to take private property for financial gain. Georgia Gov. Sonny Perdue and Georgia General Assembly leadership have promised to pass new laws banning this practice. More than 20 states have enacted similar laws since the Supreme Court ruling earlier this year that local governments may have the power to seize private property for purely "economic development" purposes.

Despite strong pressure from all levels of government, some local governments continue the practice, which is allowed under current Georgia law. The city of Stockbridge, for example, has used its unfettered discretion to pursue private property against the wishes of the owners. Prosperous Stockbridge floral shop owners Mark and Regina Meeks had their property declared a slum by the City Council — despite the fact that they received two legitimate offers for their property from major drug store chains
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This kind of garbage is taking place all over the US. Everyone needs to be aware of what can happen to us as law-abiding citizens.

Blight Loophole

2005-11-08T09:10:00.000-08:00

By Shikha Dalmia 11/08/05

For most people, urban blight means crumbling homes, abandoned offices, and toxic waste sites. But for many municipal authorities blight is anything that comes in the way of their grand redevelopment plans.
The Michigan Senate today is likely to vote on a constitutional amendment to protect property owners from government seizures after the U.S. Supreme Court's recent Kelo decision. This decision allowed New Haven city authorities in Connecticut to use their eminent domain powers to condemn property owned by poor homeowners and transfer it to rich developers.
But if supporters are serious about deterring property grab abuses in Michigan, they should allow only a narrow exception for blight.
Anyone who doubts this should consider the case of Nancy Kurdziel, president of Prime Housing Group Inc. in East Lansing.
A case of vibrant "blight"
For eight years, Kurdziel, a mother of two, has worked hard to maintain the seven apartment buildings she jointly owns with her parents and rents out to Michigan State University students. Some buildings were under receivership when her parents bought them. Keeping them profitable requires constant, daily attention, Kurdziel says.
But East Lansing city authorities have declared her properties blight. Why? Not because they are unsafe or unkempt: Rental properties have to pass city inspections to renew their license every year.
Rather, they are located in a 35-acre area near the university where authorities have decided property values of homes are not rising fast enough and the conversion of single-family homes to multifamily rental properties and commercial buildings is undesirable.
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Right Is Wrong, Wrong Is Right

2005-11-08T08:06:00.000-08:00

Taken from the Federalist Patriot 11/04/05

Judicial Benchmarks...
From the Leftjudiciary, the same Court that ruled the Pledge of Allegiance "unconstitutional," the 9th Circus, is at it again, this week ruling parenting basically unconstitutional when it "interferes" with the state's school-indoctrination system. Sex surveys are being handed out to Palmdale, California's first-, third- and fifth- graders that ask things our Editor for Standards and Practices won't allow in our publication! Many parents filed suit, arguing that they—not public schools—should have the sole right "to control the upbringing of their children by introducing them to matters of and relating to sex."

The Court disagreed, saying, "There is no fundamental right of parents to be the exclusive provider of information regarding sexual matters to their children... Parents have no due process or privacy right to override the determinations of public schools as to the information to which their children will be exposed while enrolled as students." Judge Stephen Reinhardt went even further, saying, "No such specific right can be found in the deep roots of the nation's history and tradition or implied in the concept of ordered liberty." There are simply no words for this abhorrent travesty. No news yet on any appeal.

There is currently a Republican proposal in a House budget reconciliation bill to split the Ninth Circuit Court territory up with the Twelfth Circuit in order to create a Leftcoast venue from the planet earth. House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (from some other planet) complains, "On the merits, there is no justification for the Republican court splitting proposal. It is simply a partisan exercise to appease the radical right."

From the "Court Jesters" File, the judge who was to preside over Tom DeLay's campaignfinance trial was removed this week because he is a Republican. Prosecutor Ronnie Earle, a big donor to Democrat campaigns and causes, maintains with a straight face that his case against Congressman DeLay is not a partisan witch-hunt

The piece regarding parental rights is sickening. Is there much doubt that things are not as they should be. We have been told that right would become wrong and wrong would be considered right; and, here it is shoved right in our faces.

Liberty And The Last Word

2005-11-07T09:16:00.000-08:00

These pieces were taken from the Federalist Patriot 11/7/05
LIBERTY
"Why...must government be neutral about religion? Because, we are told, the First Amendment demands it by forbidding any 'establishment of religion.' But this is nonsense. The First Amendment says nothing of the sort, and I wish atheists would read it as literally as they think most Christians read the Bible. 'Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof' means something very different from 'Government must be neutral about religion.' It bars the Congress of the United States from legislation that either establishes a religion or prohibits its free exercise. This left the states free to do both, and for a long time they did. Several states had official religions as late as the 1830s. You may deplore this, but don't say the Constitution bans it, because it plainly doesn't. Now we are told that the Constitution forbids everything from a moment of silence in the classroom to the phrase under God in the Pledge of Allegiance!" —Joseph Sobran

THE LAST WORD
"[President Bush]...needs to stop trying to placate the very people who hate and revile him. For generations the American people have proven over and over again that they love a man who fights for what he believes, even when the odds seem to be against him. They'll get behind him and give him their full support. On the other hand, they have no respect for anyone who seems namby-pamby about defending what they know is right and just and good. George Bush is in the White House because the people in a huge majority of states believed he represents the values and virtues they hold dear. They have every right to expect him to do everything in his power to defend those virtues and values—and they expect him to do battle and show no mercy to those who oppose everything they hold dear. His foes deride those who support America's traditional values, calling them 'right-wing extremists.' He needs to stand up and shout that if being a right-wing extremist means being pro-life, adhering to the Constitution of the United States as it is written and not as some wooly-headed judge wants it to mean, being pro-military, and favoring smaller government and less spending, then he is proud to be a right-wing extremist as defined by the socialist anti-democratic left-wingers." —Michael Reagan

When Your Home Becomes Another's Castle

2005-11-05T17:51:00.000-08:00

Peter Lamb
© 2005 WorldNetDaily.com

The American dream that has motivated generations is the hope of owning a home, a sanctuary where the family is safe and the future secure. Millions of people who have scrimped and saved to realize this dream are now faced with a nightmare as sustainable development is imposed upon them.

Florida flourished as "snowbirds" flocked to the warm climate to retire. For every millionaire who bought a condo on the beach, a hundred retired factory workers and shopkeepers bought a mobile home in a retirement park to enjoy their remaining days fishing and playing shuffleboard with their neighbors.

Some of these retirement parks were created and operated by municipalities. Others were private development projects in which the residents owned their mobile home, but rented the lots. Now, as the planners' vision of sustainable development crashes across these communities, many of these retirement villages no longer fit the plan. Residents are being forced to find new living arrangements. The land on which these mobile home parks are located can produce substantially higher tax revenues if the mobile homes are replaced by high-rise apartments and office buildings.
Please click on title for rest of the story.

Your Best Life: Now or Later?

2005-11-03T16:31:00.000-08:00

11/03/05, Ingrid Schlueter, Christian Worldview Network

On the Lord's Day morning of July 20th, 2003, 60-year-old Pastor Ake Green ascended his pulpit in his small village church in Borgholm on the western coast of Sweden and opened his Bible. He began to preach humbly from God's Word. He spoke of the bondage of homosexuality and how despite what society says, it is a sin against God. He spoke of God's grace and redemption through the blood of Christ and he announced that there was a way out of the bondage of this sinful lifestyle through the Lord. In Sweden that summer morning, Pastor Green could not have known what that simple sermon would mean to him and his family. He had committed a crime in the eyes of the Swedish government. By preaching from God's Word, he had shown “gross disrespect” for homosexuals and had entered the ranks of criminals, officials said. After a long protracted court case in which the homosexual lobbyists sought to make an example of him, Pastor Green was sentenced on June 29th, 2004 to a month in prison for his “crime”. The pastor appealed but the case has now been sent to the Swedish Supreme Court where the case will be heard on November 9. The small remnant of Christians in this hardened socialist nation is rallying around the pastor and his family as he looks at a possible two-year prison sentence for preaching the Gospel.

Somewhere in the go-go, materialistic West of the last few decades, the fact that following Christ will cost something has been obscured. As Christians in America more closely resemble the world, the price for following Christ isn't much of an issue these days. Joel Osteen isn't likely to be arrested anytime soon for his messages to his millions of adoring fans. Christianity is mainstream now; at least what passes for it. Conservative Evangelicals are still pumped from getting George Bush elected a second time and Christianity Today recently featured a muscle-flexing column on Evangelical power and influence in America entitled, “We're Prime Time Now, Baby!” We may be prime time, but are we faithful? I would suggest the evidence is to the contrary.

Pastor Ake Green understands something that we in America have yet to grasp. He is taking part in the fellowship of Christ's sufferings. He doesn't want his “best life now”. He wants it later, when it counts forever. He and the millions of persecuted Christians around the world who understand that the message of the cross is hated and despised aren't deluding themselves by confusing temporal power with spiritual victory. They know that the road is narrow and difficult. But they also know that it is the only road that will take them to the Lamb.

The Swedish government needs to be confronted over the rank hypocrisy of a nation that views itself as tolerant, while criminalizing a village pastor over his views on the Bible. We should call the embassy in Washington and let Ambassador Lund know that the world is watching how Sweden treats this man. International pressure has ultimately forced the Chinese at times to back down from brutalizing house church leaders. Nothing disinfects like sunlight. But at the same time, let's not be surprised or shocked at what is happening, even though it is difficult to watch. Jesus said that if He was hated, so would we be hated. The servant is not better than his master, He said. The Lord is looking for a remnant Bride that will follow him no matter what the cost.

We in America have a choice to make. Persecution of Sweden's kind and certainly, China's kind has not yet made it to the shores of America. It may someday soon. Until then, how are we living our lives as American Christians? Are we prepared now to turn our backs on temporal comfort to gain the pleasure of our precious Savior, or are we selling our souls for a few more bowls of pottage? If we can't shoulder our crosses now in the midst of freedom, how will we manage when our choice is prison or denying Christ?

Ake Green has it right. May God sustain him and all of those around the world who know that taking up our crosses is not an option. It is essential if we are to navigate the path to the Celestial City.

Once to every man and nation, comes the moment to decide,
In the strife of truth with falsehood, for the good or evil side.
Some great cause, some great decision, offers each the bloom, or blight,
And that choice goes on forever, twixt that darkness and that light...

Though the cause of evil prosper, yet the truth alone is strong,
Though her portion be the scaffold and upon the throne be wrong
Yet that scaffold sways the future, and behind the dim unknown,
Standeth God within the shadow, keeping watch above His own.
James Russell Lowell

Honor Troops For Serving

2005-11-02T10:25:00.000-08:00

"One way to honor the troops is to stop spreading the idea that they died for a mistake or that they were 'wrongly sent to Iraq.'... The loss of every life in Iraq is heartbreaking. But the number 2,000 is not, as Lt. Col. Steve Boylan said, 'a milestone.' Frustrated by the media's anticipation of the 2,000th casualty and the planning of anti-war protests to commemorate it, Boylan called it what it is—an 'artificial mark on the wall set by individuals or groups with specific agendas and ulterior motives.' What is truly worth noting is the number of young men and women who are willing to serve their country in an age of such cynicism." —Oliver North, Federalist Patriot

Update On 8 Days Of Hope

2005-11-02T10:02:00.000-08:00

After coordinating the donation of almost 50 recreational vehicles to victims of Hurricane Katrina, a pro-family group in Mississippi is taking their commitment a step further to aid even more people whose homes were damaged by the destructive storm. The American Family Association has announced it is donating $100,000 to the hurricane relief effort knows as 8 Days of Hope, a major volunteer relief effort scheduled just before Christmas. The effort, being organized by a father-and-son team, hopes to bring together 500 volunteers from around the United States to repair homes damaged by the hurricane. According to press statements, the volunteers will be doing such tasks as roofing, replacing windows and drywall, and painting -- with an emphasis on helping those who have been hit the hardest and have no money or insurance to help put their homes back in order. AFA founder Don Wildmon says funds for his group's donation to 8 Days of Hope were given by AFA supporters specifically for the cause. "AFA isn't taking a penny, even for administration," Wildmon says. The relief project, which begins on Saturday, December 10, and concludes on Sunday, December 18, will work through and with local churches along the Gulf Coast of Mississippi. Agape Press

Who Believes In American Exceptionalism?

2005-11-01T09:05:00.000-08:00

Excerpt from Townhall.com by Dennis Prager 11/01/05

The cultural civil war in which America is engaged is, in large measure, about American exceptionalism. Conservative America generally believes in the concept; liberal America generally finds it chauvinistic and dangerous.

What is American exceptionalism? The belief that America often knows better than the world what is right and wrong. This belief drives most of the world's opinion-makers crazy. And it particularly infuriates the American Left, that part of America that trusts what is called "world opinion" more than it trusts the American people.

And from where does this belief in American exceptionalism derive? Mostly from the religious beliefs that underlie American values. That is a major reason the current culture war is about the place of Judeo-Christian values in American life. Those who believe that America must remain a Judeo-Christian nation (in terms of values) are far less respectful of international institutions than those who wish to make America a secular nation.

Judeo-Christian America -- American exceptionalism America -- loves John Bolton, has contempt for the United Nations, mistrusts the World Court, regards Amnesty International as another morally confused leftist organization, thinks little of the world's media and academic elites, and regards "world opinion" as morally confused and left-wing media manipulated.

On the other side are those, like the ACLU, who regard even the smallest cross on any county or city seal as a religious threat to the secular republic, who think it America's fault that this country is not highly regarded in public opinion polls from Canada to Germany to South Korea, who passionately opposed John Bolton becoming ambassador to the U.N. because he is highly critical of that institution, and who believe that other nations' laws should be cited in U.S. Supreme Court decisions.
Click on title for the rest of the story.

Two Senators Fail Test

2005-10-31T17:26:00.000-08:00

Monday, October 31, 2005
Michigan's two U.S. senators -- Democrats Debbie Stabenow of Lansing and Carl Levin of Detroit -- shamed the state last week. The Michigan duo joined most of the Senate in voting to waste $453 million.

That's what Congress appropriated to start building two bridges in Alaska. One of these bridges is so important, it would eliminate a seven-minute ferry ride between Ketchikan, population 8,000, and Gravina Island, population 50. Sen. Tom Coburn, R-Okla., authored an amendment to defund the Alaska projects and divert as much money as possible to rebuild bridges in Louisiana.

Eighty-five colleagues, though, disagreed, including Levin and Stabenow. We asked their offices why Michigan's senators were so eager to ease Alaska's burden.

The Stabenow response: "(The senator) joined an overwhelming number of senators in this bipartisan vote against this amendment because we need to get back to creating a real and comprehensive plan for reconstruction in the Gulf states following Katrina."

Levin's response: "This issue should have been debated when the highway bill was before us. There were many projects in the highway bill -- hundreds of projects -- that I wouldn't favor if voted on separately. Pulling one project out of a bill Congress has already passed would no doubt lead to reopening the entire package, which overall would probably leave Michigan far worse off."

Is Sen. Stabenow telling her constituents that saving $453 million for Katrina relief is bad for Katrina relief plans? Is Sen. Levin telling Michigan that he and his colleagues failed to perform due diligence on the Alaska projects when they approved the mammoth transportation bill this fall?

The next time Sen. Stabenow tells you she is protecting the needy, remember this vote. The next time Sen. Levin tells you he's defending the public interest, remember this vote. And the next time Congress comes asking you for help, tell them "you gave at Alaska."

--The Lansing State Journal

Holiday Card Drive Reminder

2005-10-31T14:42:00.000-08:00

Just want to remind you of the Holiday Card Drive. Time is running out to get them sent.

South Washington County Military Support Group
% Lynn Jones
P.O. Box 223
Keedysville, MD 21756

Holiday Card Drive begins October 1st through November 20th 2005.
Cards can be home made or store bought, they may be read by many service members, no envelopes or postage, cards & messages should be appropriate, no blank cards, may include messages of well wishes/support, and you can request a pen-pal. Donations for mailing costs, phone cards and holiday candy are needed and greatly appreciated. E-mail Lalollie2278@aol.com if you have any questions

GOVERNMENT

2005-10-31T14:33:00.000-08:00

Here is a follow-up on article that was posted 10/23/05 regarding "Mr. Smith Returns to Washington." Follow-up taken from Federalist Patriot 10/31/05

"Americans...are getting increasingly angry with out-of-control government spending, waste, fraud, and abuse... It is the sense of increasing disgust about blatant overspending and our ability to make the tough choices people on budgets have to make each and every day... In the State of Washington alone there are 17,590 homeless people, and we are going to take money from Housing and Urban Development and we are going to build a sculpture park. I think that is not the right priority. It may be a good idea, but the priority is certainly out of line with what the fiscal needs are, and certainly out of line with the expectations of the American people on how we are spending their money... I also remind our fellow Members [of Congress] that if you read the Constitution, there are great difficulties—regardless of what our history has been—justifying, looking at the Constitution and saying this is a role for the Federal Government... It is probably a great project, but not now, not at this time, and not with Federal money." —Sen. Tom Coburn

Rosa Parks: Where have you gone?

2005-10-30T08:59:00.000-08:00

Oct 30, 2005
by Horace Cooper

Like Paul Simons lament for Joe DiMaggio, a nation turns its lonely eyes to Rosa Parks, an authentic American hero who passed away this week. She was a model of virtue a legend, one of TIME magazines 100 Most Important People of the Century, a hero the likes of which well not see again soon.
Her path to glory had humble beginnings. She was an ordinary woman a seamstress in fact who did the extraordinary. Born Rosa Lee McCauley in Tuskegee, Alabama, she grew up on a farm with her Methodist grandparents. Today we remember her as the very image of serene dignity: Rosa Parks, the unassuming seamstress who galvanized the nation to the injustice of raced based discrimination when after a long days work she refused to give up her seat to a white man.

But Rosa Parks was not the first black person in Montgomery to refuse to give up her seat; she was the first black person whose rights had been violated that the nascent civil rights movement was willing to stand behind. Many Americans may not realize that some nine months earlier a young woman named Claudette Colvin had also been arrested in Montgomery for refusing to give up her seat on the bus. Miss Colvin was charged with misconduct, resisting arrest and violating city and state segregation laws. The civil rights community initially thought she might be just the person to stand behind. But when reports came out that she was a teenager, pregnant by a married man and that during her arrest had allegedly uttered a stream of obscenities, leaders in the civil rights community decided that hers was not the case to rally around.

Subsequently when Mrs. Parks was arrested, the response was immediate and unequivocal. Fifty leaders of the civil rights community in Montgomery lead by a then relatively unknown minister Dr. Martin Luther King declared that unlike Claudette Colvin, unwed and pregnant, "Mrs. Parks, on the other hand, was regarded as one of the finest citizens of Montgomery not one of the finest Negro citizens but one of the finest citizens of Montgomery." A boycott was initiated which lasted for 382 days, until the local ordinance segregating African-Americans and whites on public buses was lifted. The success in Montgomery transformed Dr. King into a nationally known figure and triggered other bus boycotts ultimately igniting a nationwide assault on the injustice of segregation.

Sadly this commonsense notion has completely vanished from any discussions of the civil rights movement. Worse than perhaps the troubling trend towards an ever expanding definition of civil rights grievance and a glaring failure to acknowledge significant progress and achievements has been the civil rights communitys almost wholesale rejection of the notion of using the finest individuals or causes as occasions to promote their goals.
Please click on the title for the rest of the story.

I'm Drinking From My Saucer

2005-10-29T12:00:00.000-07:00

I've never made a fortune, and it's probably too late now.
But I don't worry about that much, I'm happy anyhow
And as I go along life's way,
I'm reaping better than I sowed.
I'm drinking from my saucer,
'Cause my cup has overflowed.

Haven't got a lot of riches,
and sometimes the going's tough
But I've got loving ones all around me,
and that makes me rich enough.
I thank God for his blessings,
and the mercies He's bestowed.
I'm drinking from my saucer,
'Cause my cup has overflowed.

I remember times when things went wrong,
My faith wore somewhat thin.
But all at once the dark clouds broke,
and the sun peeped through again.

So Lord, help me not to gripe,
about the tough rows I have hoed.
I'm drinking from my saucer,
'Cause my cup has overflowed.

If God gives me strength and courage,
When the way grows steep and rough.
I'll not ask for other blessings,
I'm already blessed enough.

And may I never be too busy,
to help others bear their loads.
Then I'll keep drinking from my saucer,
'Cause my cup has overflowed.

When I think of how many people in this world have it worse
than I do, I realize just how blessed we really are.
Anonymous

Do We Still Have Reason To Rejoice?

2005-10-27T19:43:00.000-07:00

The Federalist Patriot
Founders' Quote Daily

"We have abundant reason to rejoice that in this Land the light
of truth and reason has triumphed over the power of bigotry and
superstition, and that every person may here worship God according
to the dictates of his own heart. In this enlightened Age and in
this Land of equal liberty it is our boast, that a man's religious
tenets will not forfeit the protection of the Laws, nor deprive
him of the right of attaining and holding the highest Offices
that are known in the United States."

-- George Washington (letter to the Members of the New Church in
Baltimore, 27 January 1793)

Reference: Washington's Maxims, 180.

Eminent Domain Bill Has Exceptions

2005-10-25T12:57:00.000-07:00

This article is for you Eddie. It kind of relates to a posting you did on sports arenas recently
Updated: Oct 24, 2005 5:49pm
Texas can no longer take your land away for a private developer, but there are exceptions. Monday in Waco, Governor Rick Perry signed a new eminent domain bill.

It bans Texas governments from taking away your land for a private development project – but there's a catch. The governor said some projects, like the controversial Dallas Cowboys Stadium deal in Arlington, don't count as private.

"A stadium like the Dallas Cowboys’ is a -- yes, it's privately held, but it's no different privately owned telephone companies, privately owned utilities that serve the public good," Perry says.

The governor also said the Trans-Texas Corridor Highway Project isn't covered by the bill either, even though a private company is building the roadway.
You can click on title for more news from Texas

Gone With The Water

2005-10-24T21:37:00.000-07:00

This is an excerpt taken from an article written by Joel K. Bourne Jr. It was in The National Geographic dated October 2004. Click on the title for the rest of the story. I think it is fascinating.

The Louisiana bayou, hardest working marsh in America, is in big trouble—with dire consequences for residents, the nearby city of New Orleans, and seafood lovers everywhere.

It was a broiling August afternoon in New Orleans, Louisiana, the Big Easy, the City That Care Forgot. Those who ventured outside moved as if they were swimming in tupelo honey. Those inside paid silent homage to the man who invented air-conditioning as they watched TV "storm teams" warn of a hurricane in the Gulf of Mexico. Nothing surprising there: Hurricanes in August are as much a part of life in this town as hangovers on Ash Wednesday.

But the next day the storm gathered steam and drew a bead on the city. As the whirling maelstrom approached the coast, more than a million people evacuated to higher ground. Some 200,000 remained, however—the car-less, the homeless, the aged and infirm, and those die-hard New Orleanians who look for any excuse to throw a party.

The storm hit Breton Sound with the fury of a nuclear warhead, pushing a deadly storm surge into Lake Pontchartrain. The water crept to the top of the massive berm that holds back the lake and then spilled over. Nearly 80 percent of New Orleans lies below sea level—more than eight feet below in places—so the water poured in. A liquid brown wall washed over the brick ranch homes of Gentilly, over the clapboard houses of the Ninth Ward, over the white-columned porches of the Garden District, until it raced through the bars and strip joints on Bourbon Street like the pale rider of the Apocalypse. As it reached 25 feet (eight meters) over parts of the city, people climbed onto roofs to escape it.

Thousands drowned in the murky brew that was soon contaminated by sewage and industrial waste. Thousands more who survived the flood later perished from dehydration and disease as they waited to be rescued. It took two months to pump the city dry, and by then the Big Easy was buried under a blanket of putrid sediment, a million people were homeless, and 50,000 were dead. It was the worst natural disaster in the history of the United States.

When did this calamity happen? It hasn't—yet. But the doomsday scenario is not far-fetched. The Federal Emergency Management Agency lists a hurricane strike on New Orleans as one of the most dire threats to the nation, up there with a large earthquake in California or a terrorist attack on New York City. Even the Red Cross no longer opens hurricane shelters in the city, claiming the risk to its workers is too great.

For The Record

2005-10-24T21:07:00.000-07:00

FOR THE RECORD
"Guns are dangerous. But myths are dangerous, too. Myths about guns are very dangerous, because they lead to bad laws. And bad laws kill people. 'Don't tell me this bill will not make a difference,' said President Clinton, who signed the Brady Bill into law. Sorry. Even the federal government can't say it has made a difference. The Centers for Disease Control did an extensive review of various types of gun control: waiting periods, registration and licensing, and bans on certain firearms. It found that the idea that gun control laws have reduced violent crime is simply a myth. I wanted to know why the laws weren't working, so I asked the experts. 'I'm not going in the store to buy no gun,' said one maximum-security inmate in New Jersey. 'So, I could care less if they had a background check or not.' 'There's guns everywhere,' said another inmate. 'If you got money, you can get a gun.' Talking to prisoners about guns emphasizes a few key lessons. First, criminals don't obey the law. (That's why we call them 'criminals.') Second, no law can repeal the law of supply and demand. If there's money to be made selling something, someone will sell it. A study funded by the Department of Justice confirmed what the prisoners said. Criminals buy their guns illegally and easily. The study found that what felons fear most is not the police or the prison system, but their fellow citizens, who might be armed. One inmate told me, 'When you gonna rob somebody you don't know, it makes it harder because you don't know what to expect out of them.' What if it were legal in America for adults to carry concealed weapons? I put that question to gun-control advocate Rev. Al Sharpton. His eyes opened wide, and he said, 'We'd be living in a state of terror!' In fact, it was a trick question. Most states now have 'right to carry' laws. And their people are not living in a state of terror. Not one of those states reported an upsurge in crime. Why? Because guns are used more than twice as often defensively as criminally." —John Stossel--Federalist Patriot 10/24/05

Mr. Smith Returns to Washington

2005-10-23T09:06:00.000-07:00

That was quite a shock wave rocking the hallowed halls of the U.S. Senate Thursday when a freshman senator from Oklahoma stood on the floor of "the world's greatest deliberative body" and challenged his colleagues to end the charade.

The charade of endlessly mouthing the cliches of fiscal responsibility, that is, while carrying the shameful practice of log-rolling - "I'll vote for your pet spending project no matter how bad it is if you vote for my pet spending project, no matter how bad it is" – to record levels.

Members of Congress call it "congressional courtesy." Weary taxpayers don't.

Closely related to logrolling is the congressional maxim that "to get along, you have to go along," especially if you are a freshman or from a small state. Coburn is both a freshman and from a state with only a handful of electoral votes.

Senators and Representatives have been logrolling since the First Congress, of course, but never before with the intensity of the current GOP-led Congress. Appropriations bills now routinely gain approval with hundreds or thousands of "earmarks," which is Hill-talk for pork barrel projects inserted by individual members to benefit their district or state.

But then came Hurricane Katrina and Coburn, who previously served time during the Clinton administration in the U.S. House before taking a voluntary term-limit induced sabbatical before returning to win a close election to the Senate in 2004. Frankly, Coburn hadn’t made much of a splash in the Senate until this week.

He stood on the Senate floor Thursday and committed the unpardonable sin of not going along to get along. He offered amendments requiring that previously approved earmarks favored by colleagues be cancelled and the tax dollars instead spent on hurricane recovery. There wasn't much money at stake in the particular projects targeted by Coburn, but it was the principle that mattered.

What Coburn got in response was pure bipartisan outrage. Sen. Patty Murray, the very liberal Washington Democrat, warned that any senator supporting the Coburn amendments would find projects in his or her own state getting the evil eye by annoyed colleagues who don't want to rock the log-rolling boat.

And Alaska's Ted Stevens, the Old Bull Republican moderate who has been one of the biggest obstacles in Congress to conservative reform since the Reagan administration, stood on the floor and thundered that he would leave the Senate if the Coburn proposal passed.

Stevens needn't have worried, at least for now. His colleagues, many of whom learned long ago not to cross him, marched in lockstep to soundly defeat Coburn's proposal. In fact, only 15 brave senators said aye when the roll was called. The only surprise was how many familiar conservative names were among the 82 senators opposing Coburn. This speaks volumes about why so little actual conservative reform has been achieved since 1994 despite all those GOP majorities. Too often, they have talked the talk without walking it.

So what's next? No matter what they think, the future doesn't depend on the Ted Stevens or Patty Murrays of the congressional world. Tom Coburn can be in the driver’s seat.. He forced the Senate to decide Thursday which was more important - building a shelter for dogs and cats in RINO Republican Sen. Lincoln Chaffee's home state or helping the good people in Louisiana and Mississippi made homeless by Hurricane Katrina.

Ted Stevens' purple rage and Patty Murray's veiled threats represent the corrupt essence of Establishment Washington politics and Thursday we saw what that establishment truly cares about. It isn't people without roofs over their heads in Louisiana or Mississippi.

The question now is will Coburn remain steadfast? Senate rules still give individual senators significant leverage to force legislative showdowns. If Coburn stands his ground today, odds are the American people will take care of tomorrow just fine.

Coburn understands that, which is why he is just the man for the job. He isn't here to stay here; he came back to Washington to do what he can as long as he can to help change America for the better. That's why the shouting and blustering on the Senate floor only confirms for Coburn the rightness of his path.

The timing of all this must be divine; how else to explain a doctor with nothing to lose and a disaster of biblical proportions appearing at exactly the right place at the right time to make possible the right decisions?

Go get'em Tom!

FOR THE RECORD: The Yeas and Nays on the Coburn amendment

YEAs ---15--- Nays 82

8 Days Of Hope

2005-10-23T08:58:00.000-07:00

By Randall Murphree
October 20, 2005

(AgapePress) - Five hundred contractors, builders, remodelers, painters and volunteer assistants will descend on Gulfport, Mississippi, December 10-18 for "8 Days of Hope." The 500 volunteers will repair homes of Hurricane Katrina victims in a project coordinated by Steve Tybor, Jr., of Buffalo, New York, and his son, Steve III of Tupelo, Mississippi.

In early September, the younger Steve sat in his Tupelo home numbed by stark images of flattened homes and flooded streets scrolling across his television screen. He wept with hopeless victims as they surveyed the unprecedented damage Hurricane Katrina had brought to the Mississippi Gulf Coast.

Steve hasn't lived in Tupelo all that long. He's still a fanatic about the Buffalo Bills. Still talks like a Yankee. But since his work brought his family south six years ago, they have settled comfortably into a laid-back southern lifestyle.

"This is my state, now," he declared. "With my contract with my employer, we could move anywhere we want in the country. But we love it here. It broke my heart, seeing all the damage on the Coast. I wanted to go down there and physically make a difference. I wanted to go down and encourage people. I wanted to smile, to love on them."

Father telephoned son, and they began to brainstorm about what they could do to help Katrina victims. Son Steve is VP of sales for Jancor, Inc., which owns four building material manufacturers, two based in Mississippi and two in the Northeast. Dad Steve is sales manager for Niagara Aluminum, a building materials distributor in Buffalo.

It was only natural that their thoughts quickly ran toward hands-on building projects. They soon had the preliminary plan for 8 Days of Hope. As they prayed about direction and details, a practical plan began to emerge. Desiring to go to a smaller city that had not received much national attention, they chose Gulfport, Miss., as beneficiary of the project.

"The goal is to bring hope," said Steve. "We already have churches and some corporations that have decided to come alongside us, donating thousands of dollars. We want to raise a quarter of a million dollars, sign up 500 volunteers and have tons of building materials donated to this area."

A letter and articles at the project's website give more information on how to make tax-deductible gifts to the project. "Gifts for 8 Days of Hope can be sent to New Creation Ministries and designated for this project," said Steve. His fellow church member Frank Scott heads New Creation Ministries, a registered nonprofit 501(c)(3) organization. The two men attend First Evangelical Church in Tupelo.

Poorest of the Poor
The Tybors hope to serve the poorest of the poor, those who had no insurance or inadequate insurance. They won't build homes, but will repair, remodel, paint, and replace water-damaged drywall or flooring for families where government or private agencies have not yet gotten around to helping them. A core group of project planners will visit Gulfport churches, government agencies and others who will help identify families to receive the benefits of 8 Days of Hope.

Steve believes many home products manufacturers will join the effort. "It's a perfect tax write-off for companies with discontinued products sitting in their warehouses, and it's great exposure for them as they give to the community. It's a win-win situation."

Adding another dimension to the project is the trailer load of new toys shipped from a Buffalo radio station. The toys are sitting in a Tupelo warehouse, waiting for the Christmas season. "We're going to ask women's ministries, Scout troops and churches to wrap these toys," Steve said. "The last day in Gulfport, we're going to put up Christmas trees in the homes we've worked on, put toys under the trees and leave Bibles."

There are still a lot of details to cover, chief among them to secure donated food and lodging for the army of volunteers, but Steve is confident God will provide those things.

"We're trying to get the word out now," he said. "We're encouraging people to give up a week of their lives. Or they can come for one day. We have about 100 volunteers already committed." Already on board are two bus loads of Amish workers from Ohio.

American Family Association president Tim Wildmon commends the project. "The devastation on the Gulf Coast has impacted our whole nation in many ways," said Wildmon. "There are still people whose lives have been uprooted indefinitely. We urge people to give, to volunteer and to pray for 8 Days of Hope."

The Tybors look at how the project has taken off so far and say, "It could only be God."

I, Me, Mine, Myself

2005-10-20T18:35:00.000-07:00

I have been reading a truly good book written by Charles R. Swindoll. It is titled "Improving Your Serve". The Art of Unselfish Living. I will be sharing parts of this book on a regular basis. We are living in the "me" era according to most advertisements and best selling books. We almost worship gifted people out there who entertain us, and we have a tendency to get uncomfortable when God comes calling.

"I would like to buy $3worth of God, please, not enough to explode my soul or disturb my sleep, but just enough to equal a cup of warm milk or a snooze in the sunshine. I don't want enough of Him to make me love a black man or pick beets with a migrant. I want ecstasy, not transformation; I want the warmth of the womb, not a new birth. I want a pound of the Eternal in a paper sack. I would like to buy $3 worth of God, please." Wilbur Rees

When Leonard Bernstein,the late great conductor of the New York Philharmonic, was asked what is the most difficult instrument to play? He responded with:

"Second fiddle. I can get plenty of first violinists, but to find one who plays second violin with as much enthusiasm or second French horn or second flute, now that's a problem. And yet if no one plays second, he have no harmony."

J.B. Phillips changed the wording of the Beatitudes to read:

Happy are they who are the "pushers": for they get on in the world.
Happy are the hard-boiled: for they never let life hurt them.
Happy are they who complain: for they get their own way in the end.
Happy are the blase: for they never worry over their sins.
Happy are the slavedrivers: for they get results.
Happy are the knowledgeable men of the world: for they know their way around.
Happy are the troublemakers: for they make people take notice of them.

More Words Of Wisdom

2005-10-20T09:34:00.000-07:00

LOUIS FARRAKHAN, "When you have people who politically feel that they get their advantage by killing people and blaming it on somebody else, then it makes us wonder what really happened to the Twin Towers... Was the heat from fuel from two airplanes sufficient to compromise the steel in that building? (sic) People had said they heard explosions and the buildings came down like we see old buildings in Vegas or in Florida or in other places, implode... [I]t is the duty of government to either prove the rumor is false or prove that their suspicions are true and that somebody is not only guilty of the mass destruction of billions of dollars worth of property, but that somebody is guilty of mass murder." ... "FEMA is too white to represent us and so is the Red Cross, so we're going to demand our place at the table... FEMA is insensitive because there are not enough blacks high up in FEMA, and certainly the Red Cross is the same. It's too white. It is. If it represents those who are victims of disaster, should not those who are culturally sensitive to us be a part of that?" ... "Every Cuban has a house to live in, no matter how meager. That house is provided by government. Every Cuban who gets sick can go to a doctor or a hospital and get medical attention while 45 million Americans don't have medical insurance. Every Cuban can get education from the kindergarten through college and they don't have to pay. What is Castro doing that we might benefit from—if we are not too arrogant and falsely proud to see what he is doing in a small nation and what we have not been able to do or not been willing to do in the greatest nation on the earth?"—Louis Farrakhan at the "Millions More" rally in DC, which attracted thousands of people
This was taken from the Federalist Patriot--10/19/05

Life and Death Flu

2005-10-15T16:55:00.000-07:00

Life-and-death flu
Oct 14, 2005
by Charles Krauthammer ( bio | archive | contact )

-- While official Washington has been poring over Harriet Miers' long-ago doings on the Dallas City Council and parsing the Byzantine comings and goings of the Fitzgerald grand jury, relatively unnoticed was perhaps the most momentous event of our lifetime -- what is left of it, as I shall explain. It was announced last week that American scientists have just created a living, killing copy of the 1918 ``Spanish'' flu.

This is big. Very big.

First, it is a scientific achievement of staggering proportions. The Spanish flu has not been seen on this blue planet for 85 years. Its re-creation is a story of enterprise, ingenuity, serendipity, hard work and sheer brilliance. It involves finding deep in the bowels of a military hospital in Washington a couple of tissue samples from the lungs of soldiers who died in 1918 (in an autopsy collection first ordered into existence by Abraham Lincoln), and the disinterment of an Alaskan Eskimo who died of the flu and whose remains had been preserved by the permafrost. Then, using slicing and dicing techniques only Michael Crichton could imagine, they pulled off a microbiological Jurassic Park: the first ever resurrection of an ancient pathogen. And not just any ancient pathogen, explained virologist Eddie Holmes, but ``the agent of the most important disease pandemic in human history.''

Which brings us to the second element of this story: Beyond the brilliance lies the sheer terror. We have quite literally brought back to life an agent of near-biblical destruction. It killed more people in six months than were killed in the four years of the First World War. It killed more humans than any other disease of similar duration in the history of the world, says Alfred W. Crosby, who wrote a history of the 1918 pandemic. And, notes The New Scientist, when the re-created virus was given to mice in heavily quarantined laboratories in Atlanta, it killed the mice more quickly than any other flu virus ever tested.

Now that I have your attention, consider, with appropriate trepidation, the third element of this story: What to do with this knowledge? Not only has the virus been physically re-created. But its entire genome has now been published for the whole world, good people and very bad, to see.

Please click on the title for the rest of the story. I think it is a very important one.

The ACLU Exposed

2005-10-15T13:14:00.000-07:00

The ACLU exposed: that is the subject of this evening's "Talking Points Memo".

Last night, we reported that the Supreme Court of Oregon had ruled 5 to 1 that live sex shows are permitted in that state under the freedom of expression banner. The ACLU and The Oregonian newspaper both filed briefs in favor of that ruling. But why would the ACLU do that? What's in it for them?

The Supreme Court has consistently ruled that states and local communities have the right to limit expression. This is the U.S. Supreme court, in a time, place, and manner, application of standards. That is, you can't have sex on your front lawn, even if it's a personal expression on private property. The Supreme Court realizes the Constitution requires boundaries for what Americans do. If you don't have boundaries, you have chaos. Thus, community standards and public safety trump personal expression.

But the ACLU doesn't believe that. The organization has moved so far left, that now anything goes.

This excerpt was taken from Bill O'Reilly's October 12th 2005 show. Just click the title for the rest of the story. It is very interesting & makes me wonder if members of the ACLU should be deported to another country of their choice.

Iraq chaos threatens ancient faith

2005-10-12T20:24:00.000-07:00

This is an excerpt taken from BBC News by Kate Clark. Click on the title for the rest of the article.

There are fears for the future of one of the most ancient, as well as the smallest, communities in Iraq - the Mandeans. Their religion, Mandeanism, comes from the same general background as Judaism, Christianity and Islam. They share many of the same prophets, but particularly honour John the Baptist.

This is a religion almost solely confined to Iraq, but since the US-led invasion in 2003, many Mandeans have fled the country and now more than half of them live outside its borders. The refugees speak of kidnap, murder and attempts at forced conversion.

MANDEANISM FACTS
The only surviving Gnostic religion from late antiquity. About 20,000-50,000 adherents Centred in southern Iraq and SW Iran, but many living abroad
Focus on John the Baptist as central figure in faith

One woman, Ibtisam Sabah Habib, said there had always been some threats and pressure to convert to Islam, but under the previous Iraqi regime there had been limits.
"Now, there are no rules and no government," she said, describing how an armed gang of Islamic extremists had got into her house, killed her father and stolen all their money. "They would telephone us at home, threatening us and trying to convert us. Then they tried to kidnap me. "It was our neighbours who saved me. They're Muslims - not all Muslims threaten us. But the extremists are very strong now - our neighbours couldn't protect us all the time."

New Orleans Worries About Resident Exodus

2005-10-12T11:11:00.000-07:00

There sure seems to be a lot of determination to rebuild.This is an excerpt taken from Yahoo News. Click on title for the full article.

For decades, New Orleans had been losing population (142,000 from 1960 to 2000) and wealth (just over half its property value between 1950 and 1998), while it saw an increase in crime and the flight of jobs, money and whites to the suburbs.

Many now see a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to remake a major American city.

Some civic leaders want to see New Orleans rebuilt so as to narrow the gap between the have and the have-nots, better integrate the city racially, and embrace the poor black residents who gave the city much of its identity, including its food, its music and its celebrated street life.

For example, Canizaro and others envision mixed-income housing, where poor would live in subsidized homes side-by-side with the middle-class. There is also widespread agreement on some of fundamentals needed to draw people back to New Orleans and help them prosper, such as overhauling the school system and creating job training programs.

"If you're talking about building a city, you've got to create a place for everybody. This city doesn't just belong to rich white folk, and it doesn't belong to poor black folk," said Barbara Major, who runs the St. Thomas Health Clinic, working with poor from across the city.

Suspicions run deep, however.

"I've heard conversations — some by good people, some by evil people — those who would leave the poor out," said former Louisiana Gov. Buddy Roemer, who nevertheless believes that "New Orleans goodness and decency" will win out.

Citizenship In Heaven

2005-10-11T21:06:00.000-07:00

I thought this passage from the Bible would explain my post of October 9. It took a little reading for me to find it.

Brethern, join in following my example, and note those who so walk as you have us for a pattern. For many walk, of whom I have told you often, and now tell you even weeping, that they are the enemies of the cross of Christ; whose end is destruction, whose god is their belly, and whose glory is in their shame-who set their mind on earthly things. For our citizenship is in heaven, from which we also eagerly wait for the Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ, who will transform our lowly body that it may be conformed to His glorius body, according to the working by which He is able even to subdue all things to himself. Philippians 3:17-20

Citizens Of Heaven

2005-10-09T14:47:00.000-07:00

We are not citizens of this world trying to make our way to heaven; we are citizens of heaven trying to make our way through this world. That radical Christian insight can be lifechanging. We are not to live so as to earn God's love, inherit heaven, and purchase our salvation. All those are given to us as gifts; gifts bought by Jesus on the cross and handed over to us. We are to live as God's redeemed, as heirs of heaven, and as citizens of another land: the Kingdom of God...We live as those who are on a journey home; a home we know will have the lights on and the door open and our Father waiting for us when we arrive. That means in all adversity our worship of God is joyful, our life is hopeful, our future is secure. There is nothing we can lose on earth that can rob us of the treasures God has given us and will give us.---Taken from The Anglican Digest via Patches of Godlight

Pledge Of Allegiance

2005-10-06T10:39:00.000-07:00

The following words were spoken by the late Red Skelton on his television program as he related the story of his teacher, Mr. Laswell, who felt his students had come to think of the Pledge of Allegiance as merely something to recite in class each day.

Now, more than ever, listen to the meaning of these words.

"I've been listening to you boys and girls recite the Pledge of Allegiance all semester and it seems as though it is becoming monotonous to you. If I may, may I recite it and try to explain to you the meaning of each word?"

I
me, an individual, a committee of one.
Pledge
dedicate all of my worldly goods to give without self pity.
Allegiance
my love and my devotion.
To the flag
our standard, Old Glory, a symbol of freedom. Wherever
she waves, there's respect because your loyalty has given
her a dignity that shouts freedom is everybody's job!
United
that means that we have all come together.
States
individual communities that have united into 48 great states.
purpose; all divided with imaginary boundaries, yet united to
a common purpose, and that's love for country.
And to the republic
a state in which sovereign power is
invested in representatives chosen by the
people to govern. And government is the people
and it's from the people to the leaders, not from
the leaders to the people.
For which it stands, one nation
one nation, meaning "so
blessed by God"
Indivisible
incapable of being divided.
With liberty
which is freedom -- the right of power to live one's
own life without threats, fear or some sort of
retaliation.
And Justice
the principle or quality of dealing fairly with others.
For all
which means, boys and girls, it's as much your
country as it is mine.

***~~**~~***
Since I was a small boy, two states have been added to our country
and two words have been added to the pledge of Allegiance...

UNDER GOD
Wouldn't it be a pity if someone said
that is a prayer
and that would be eliminated from schools too?

God Bless America!

Democracy & Bondage

2005-10-05T20:40:00.000-07:00

"A democracy cannot exist as a permanent form of
government. It can only exist until the voters discover
that they can vote themselves largess from the public
treasury. From that time on the majority always votes
for the candidates promising the most benefits from the
public treasury, with the results that a democracy
always collapses over loose fiscal policy, always followed
by a dictatorship.

The average age of the world's great civilizations
has been 200 years. These nations have
progressed through this sequence:
from bondage to spiritual faith
from spiritual faith to great courage
from courage to liberty
from liberty to abundance
from abundance to selfishness
from selfishness to complacency
from complacency to apathy
from apathy to dependency
from dependency back to bondage.
-- Alexander Fraser Tytler (1742-1813)

George Washington

2005-10-05T08:53:00.000-07:00

The propitious smiles of Heaven, can never be expected on
a nation that disregards the eternal rules of order and right,
which Heaven itself has ordained."

-- George Washington (First Inaugural Address, April 1789)

Churches Of America

2005-10-05T08:07:00.000-07:00

I ran across this piece last night from a book I have not read from for a while. I think it is appropriate for our time and age.

I sought for the greatness and genius of America in her commodious harbors and her ample rivers, and it was not there; in her fertile fields and boundless prairies, and it was not there; in her rich mines and her vast world commerce, and it was not there. Not until I went to the churches of America and heard her pulpits aflame with righteousness did I understand the secret of her genius and power. America is great because she is good and if America ever ceases to be good, America will cease to be great.

Alexis de Tocqueville, 1805-1859

Practicing Benevolence

2005-10-03T09:15:00.000-07:00

When you rely on the government to help those who need it, you don't practice benevolence yourself. You don't take responsibility for deciding whom to help. Just as public assistance discourages the poor from becoming independent by rewarding them with fixed handouts, it discourages the rest of us from being benevolent. This may be the greatest irony of the welfare state: It not only encourages the poor to stay dependent, it kills individuals' desire to help them." —John Stossel--

The above paragraph is an excerpt from an article I had posted 8-31-05 titled The Government.

I would not even be mentioning this except for the fact that benevolence was brought up while we were with some other people yesterday. Katrina was the subject of course, and the 250 billion dollars the government has promised for recovery, most of which seems to be going to New Orleans . That is a whole bunch of money we the taxpayers are going to have to come up with. One person's statement was that he had given $100 to the Red Cross right after the disaster had happened, but knowing what he does now he would not have given any. The other people said that they would not either. The point being that giving this type of assistance kills the individuals' desire to help. We will be made to do it through taxes and will not have any say so in what it is spent on. I didn't think America had the kind of money to rebuild a city that involves so much risk; and how many more billions to see to it that everyone gets what they think they are entitled to get. Are we going to take responsibility away from people as well as the insurance companies? One of the people we were with asked me if I thought they were being too hard-hearted with this stance. Apparently this person doesn't know me well at all, nor reads my blog. I wouldn't really expect them to as they are extremely busy people. I am sure if we did more socializing we would be hearing a lot more of this kind of talk.

I am also curious as to when the government asked the churches to help with all of this. Was it before or after the churches and the faith based organizations had already stepped in to help. I personally do not believe the churches should be reimbursed by the government for giving aid and comfort to the victims of the hurricane. I am a Christian and I thought that is what we are supposed to do as the Church. Will the government then take away the tax exempt status of the Church if they pay the churches back. I would not trust them (government)in that respect. There seems to be a lot of hatred and bias out there. Please let me know what thoughts or feelings you might have on this subject.

A Canadian's View On Katrina

2005-10-03T07:59:00.000-07:00

This was just received via e-mail. I know it is a little late, but I thought you might enjoy a Canadian's take on G. Bush and America.

Ottawa Citizen, Sunday Sept 11,'05
George Bush, the man. David Warren The Ottawa Citizen Sunday, September 11, 2005

There's plenty wrong with America, since you asked. I'm tempted to say that the only difference from Canada is that they have a few things right. That would be unfair, of course -- I am often pleased to discover things we still get right.

But one of them would not be disaster preparation. If something happened up here, on the scale of Katrina, we wouldn't even have the resources to arrive late. We would be waiting for the Americans to come save us, the same way the government in Louisiana just waved and pointed at Washington, D. C. The theory being that, when you're in real trouble, that's where the adults live.

And that isn't an exaggeration. Almost everything that has worked in the recovery operation along the U. S. Gulf Coast has been military and National Guard. Within a few days, under several commands, finally consolidated under the remarkable Lt.-Gen. Russel Honore, it was once again the U. S. military efficiently cobbling together a recovery operation on a scale beyond the capacity of any other earthly institution.

We hardly have a military up here. We have elected one feckless government after another that has cut corners until there is nothing substantial left. We don't have the ability even to transport and equip our few soldiers. Should disaster strike at home, on a big scale, we become a Third World country. At which point, our national smugness is of no avail.

From Democrats and the American Left -- the U. S. equivalent to the people who run Canada -- we are still hearing that the disaster in New Orleans showed that a heartless, white Republican America had abandoned its underclass. This is garbage. The great majority of those not evacuated lived in assisted housing and receive food stamps, prescription medicine and government support through many other programs. Many have, all their lives, expected someone to lift them to safety, without input from themselves. And the demagogic mayor they elected left, quite literally, hundreds of transit and school buses that could have driven them out of town parked in rows, to be lost in the flood.

Yes, that was insensitive. But it is also the truth; and sooner or later we must acknowledge that welfare dependency creates exactly the sort of haplessness and social degeneration we saw on display, as the floodwaters rose. Many suffered terribly, and many died, and one's heart goes out. But already the survivors are being put up in new accommodations, and their various entitlements have been directed to new locations.

The scale of private charity has also been unprecedented. There are yet no statistics, but I'll wager the most generous state in the union will prove to have been arch-Republican Texas and that, nationally, contributions in cash and kind are coming disproportionately from people who vote Republican. For the world divides into "the mouths" and "the wallets."

The Bush-bashing, both down there and up here, has so far lost touch with reality, as to raise questions about the bashers' state of mind. Consult any authoritative source on how government works in the United States and you will learn that the U. S. federal government's legal, constitutional, and institutional responsibility for first response to Katrina, as to any natural disaster, was zero.

Notwithstanding, President Bush took the prescient step of declaring a disaster, in order to begin deploying FEMA and other federal assets, two full days in advance of the storm-fall. In the little time since, he has managed to co-ordinate an immense recovery operation -- the largest in human history -- without invoking martial powers. He has been sufficiently presidential to respond, not even once, to the extraordinarily mendacious and childish blame-throwing.

One thinks of Kipling's poem If, which I learned to recite as a lad, and mention now in the full knowledge that it drives postmodern leftoids and gliberals to apoplexy -- as anything that is good, beautiful, or true:

If you can keep your head when all about you Are losing theirs and blaming it on you; If you can trust yourself when all men doubt you, But make allowance for their doubting too; If you can wait and not be tired by waiting, Or being lied about, don't deal in lies, Or being hated, don't give way to hating, And yet don't look too good, nor talk too wise

Unlike his critics, Bush is a man, in the full sense presented by these verses. A fallible man, like all the rest, but a man.

The Rest Of The Story

2005-09-30T14:41:00.000-07:00

This Pastor has guts!! Thought you might enjoy this interesting prayer given in Kansas at the opening session of their Senate. It seems prayer still upsets some people. When Minister Joe Wright was asked to open the new session of the Kansas Senate, everyone was expecting the usual generalities, but this is what they heard:

"Heavenly Father, we come before you today to ask your forgiveness and to seek your direction and guidance. We know Your Word says, 'Woe to those who call evil good,' but that is exactly what we have done. We have lost our spiritual equilibrium and reversed our values.

We have exploited the poor and called it the lottery.
We have rewarded laziness and called it welfare.
We have killed our unborn and called it choice.
We have shot abortionists and called it justifiable.
We have neglected to discipline our children and called it building self esteem.
We have abused power and called it politics.
We have coveted our neighbor's possessions and called it ambition.
We have polluted the air with profanity and pornography and called it freedom of expression
We have ridiculed the time-honored values of our forefathers and called it enlightenment.

Search us, Oh, God, and know our hearts today; cleanse us from every sin and set us free. Amen!"

The response was immediate. A number of legislators walked out during the prayer in protest. In 6 short weeks, Central Christian Church, where Rev.. Wright is pastor, logged more than 5,000 phone calls with only 47 of those calls responding negatively. The church is now receiving international requests for copies of this prayer from India, Africa and Korea.

Commentator Paul Harvey aired this prayer on his radio program, "The Rest of the Story," and received a larger response to this program than any other he has ever aired.

With the Lord's help, may this prayer sweep over our nation and wholeheartedly become our desire so that we again can be called "one nation under God."

If possible, please pass this prayer on to your friends. "If you don't stand for something, you will fall for everything."