Friday, March 31, 2006

How is the Economy?

To hear the MSM talk, America is spinning down the drain economically and taking millions of people with it.

It may not be that way though.

A Rasmussen Poll shows that 55% of Americans believe they are better off than they were 4 years ago while 36% feel that they are worse off. This is odd however because only about one third of Americans actually believe that America's economy is in reasonably good shape. Could the constant negative memes put out by the media be causing a disconnect between what people see with their eyes and what they actually believe?

In my own life I am slightly worse off than I was a couple of years ago, however things have improved drastically in the last couple of months. If the workers at Delphi don't disrupt the business I will be in pretty good shape in a couple of months.

H/T World Net Daily.

Thursday, March 30, 2006

Civil Rights - Is It For Groups or Individuals?

The attempt to get a limited ban on affirmative action in Michigan just got good news today. The Michigan Supreme Court refused to hear an appeal by a group called By Any Means Necessary to stop the vote.

BAMN insists that people were tricked into signing the petitions for a public referendum. If this is the case then they have nothing to worry about. All they have to do is present their case to the people of Michigan and they will win - if they are right about the majority of Michiganders supporting affirmative action. The problem is, and they will never admit it, is that the majority of people in this state are opposed to affirmative action. I am concerned about any group that tries to prevent any issue from being decided in the voting booth.

The core of this is the nature of civil rights. I believe that all rights and all laws are personal and that they should apply to individuals, not groups. If a qualified person is passed over for a less qualified person, and they can prove it, then they have a case.

It is a principle in America that the burden of proof lies with the accuser. This must be the case in civil rights cases as well. The proof that discrimination took place at the individual level must be documented and provable in the specific case being considered. A blanket ruling would only lead to new injustices and replacing one injustice with another is not progress.

The group spearheading the initiative is at this site. It is worth spending some time there.

Wednesday, March 29, 2006

A Diploma is No Longer Enough

(Chart taken from www. detnews.com )

Under normal circumstances I am against new government entitlements, but I am beginning to think that there is one that would be a good idea, if we can come up with the money to do it.
Today's Detroit News carries an article that includes a chart showing education requirements for new jobs opening up in Michigan, and it does not look good for those with High School Diplomas (and looks almost hopeless for High School dropouts.)

A HS dropout will be qualified for only 10% of the new jobs that are coming to Michigan. A HS Diploma will qualify you for another 22% of the jobs. Some post-secondary training (ie an Associates Degree) will qualify you for another 36% of the jobs and a Bachelor's Degree is needed for 31% of them.

A K-12 education is no longer enough. I do not know how we are going to afford it, but we are going to need to extend free public education for at least 2 more years.

Just a few thoughts to add. It is not worthwhile to give this to everyone as these years would be very expensive and should only go to those who will actually use them constructively. I would allow those 2 years to be added to those who get a minimum score in state-wide testings (say the top 2/3 of the states HS graduates each year - I don't know what the numbers would actually be.) If it was limited to just the state of Michigan I would require that the recipients graduate from a Michigan High School, having been a resident of Michigan for the last two years. Possibly a few more requirements.

Of course I am dreaming because the money is simply not there and more taxes would hurt us worse. However I do believe that we will eventually have to extend free education if we are to compete.

Monday, March 27, 2006

He Does Not Disgrace Us

Fred Phelps does not disgrace Christianity. He can't disgrace us because he has nothing to do with us. Christianity seeks to perfectly harmonize absolute love and absolute justice without diluting either. (Perfect Love and Perfect Justice became one and the same at the cross.)

Even those who do not inherit eternal life are loved by God. The thought of anyone being in Hell causes me no joy, and it causes God no joy either. A lost soul is the greatest of tragedies and there is no reason for anyone to rejoice. In the end all will get what they truly desire and those who want nothing to do with God will get what they want, but will be unable to enjoy it. God does not rejoice over the damnation of a lost soul and neither should we; He grieves for a beloved child lost forever, and we should grieve for them too. "As I live saith the Lord GOD, I take no pleasure in the death of the wicked" (Ezekiel 33: 11)

'Reverend" Phelps shows that he does not have God's character when he rejoices over a lost soul, assuming the soul truly is lost in the first place. He wants people who don't share his beliefs to die. That kind of reminds me of another group. Perhaps that group and not Christianity is his spiritual home.

The principle of "Hate the Sin, Love the Sinner" is not a copout. It is at the heart of the Christian's relationship with those outside of the Church. If circumstances require us to kill, we do so with a grieving heart, weeping for the one that we are forced to kill. An execution is not something to celebrate, but a time for reflecting on our own lives and the lives of those around us.

Some think that Hate the Sin, Love the Sinner is impossible because you cannot hate the sin without hating the sinner but that is not true. Anyone who has ever loved an alcoholic or a drug addict knows that sometimes you cannot truly love a person without hating something about them, something that is destroying them.

There are things that we should hate, but all of these are impersonal things, such as immorality, lies, unbelief etc., impersonal evils that seduce and mislead our fellow humans.

Reverend Phelps needs to read the entire Bible, not just the passages that he chooses.

Sunday, March 26, 2006

Young Christians Unwelcome in San Francisco

A group of 25,000 Christians, mostly young, held a rally in San Francisco and they were greeted by an official city condemnation and a clutch of protesters who said their event amounted to a "fascist mega-pep rally."

The article further said Earlier this week, the Board of Supervisors passed a resolution condemning the "act of provocation" by what it termed an "anti-gay," "anti-choice" organization that aimed to "negatively influence the politics of America's most tolerant and progressive city."

San Francisco has an ego problem as well as a tolerance problem. Everything they accused the Christians of is far more true of militant Islam which they refuse to condemn. (In totally non-theological terms, there are several major differences between Christian and Islamic "fundamentalists", the most important being that we don't kill people for not sharing our beliefs or abandoning them, or failing to live by our standards. )

When Christians are pointedly made unwelcome by the city's board of supervisors, freedom and the first amendment are both threatened.

Condi Shows Some Class

If a conservative of any stripe makes a racial slur about a non-white liberal, even if it was just a slip of the tongue, they would not only have to apologize, but would need sensitivity training and then would have to grovel to get even a grudging acceptance of their apology.

A DJ said something horrible about Condi Rice but didn't mean it and it was a slip of the tongue.

Dave Lenihan of KTRS in St. Louis apologized on the air immediately after making what he said was a slip of the tongue during his morning show on Wednesday.
Lenihan had praised Rice, who has frequently said she aspires to run the NFL one day but has ruled out seeking to replace retiring Commissioner
Paul Tagliabue, who recently announced his retirement.
On his show, Lenihan said: "She's been chancellor of Stanford. She's got the patent resume of somebody that has serious skill. She loves football. She's African-American, which would kind of be a big coon. A big coon. Oh my God. I am totally, totally, totally, totally, totally sorry for that."
He said he had meant to say "coup" instead of the slur. KTRS president and general manager Tim Dorsey agreed that the remark was accidental but announced the same day that Lenihan had been fired.


If his remorse was sincere then his firing was uncalled for. Ms. Rice seems to have a very mature attitude about it. She said that that the incident is evidence that the "birth defect" of slavery infuses even mature democracies with racial tensions that take generations to heal.

This woman is a role-model for both genders and all colors. I am not yet convinced of her abilities as a potential president, but as a leader for all in many areas of life, I can think of very few who I would call her equal.

Saturday, March 25, 2006

Back for a Minute

I was just in a bookstore and saw A Field Guide to Evangelicals. I opened it and scanned through it and quickly saw things are totally untrue. I didn't read enough to tell but the writer claims it was written by "insider".

Nonetheless, do you think maybe we should riot and perhaps chop off a few heads?

Gone For the Weekend

See you Monday

Thursday, March 23, 2006

this Will Help The Anti-War Movement

American Thinker again has a link to a news article that does not seem to be getting the attention it deserves, much like the protestors in the article. It seems that a small anti-war protest thought it would a good idea to vandalize a military recruiting station. All they really did was tear up a few posters, steal a few brochures, make fools of themselves and wound up dealing with the police.

Some of the things they said were totally clueless

I was getting the impression that people did not want to hear what we had to say,

Oh really? Very observant.

Even with free food and a concert they only got about 30 people to listen ( "It's disheartening to see any side so under-represented." ) and in the end only about a dozen went on the rampage.

Wednesday, March 22, 2006

Islamic Challenge -- Part III

Now to Question III. He wants to know that if God promised Abraham that he would be the father of a great nation:

"In the Old Testament, we read about GOD Almighty promising to create "Great Nations" from Ishmael, Abraham's first Son and the father of the Muslims:
Genesis 12:1-3
1 The LORD had said to Abram, "Leave your country, your people and your father's household and go to the land I will show you. 2 "I will make you into a great nation and I will bless you; I will make your name great, and you will be a blessing. 3 I will bless those who bless you, and whoever curses you I will curse; and all peoples on earth will be blessed through you." "


And he further says The quote "I will make you into a great nation" is quite interesting. How can GOD Almighty call the Muslims, who came from Ishmael, a "great nation" if they are as the modern Christians of today consider them to be "Satan's followers"? How can we be a "great nation" in the eyes of GOD Almighty if we are hated by Him?

His error is obvious to anyone with familiar with the Old Testament.

Here is what God Himself said about this.
(19) And God said, Sarah thy wife shall bear thee a son indeed; and thou shalt call his name Isaac: and I will establish my covenant with him for an everlasting covenant and his seed after him. (20) And as for Ishmael, I have heard thee and will make him fruitful and will multiply him exceedingly; twelve princes shall he beget, and I will make a great nation of him. (21) But My covenant will I establish with Isaac, which Sarah shall bear unto thee at this time next year. (Genesis 17: 19-21)

After Isaac was born and Abraham was about to turn Hagar and Ishmael out, God assured Abraham:
And God said unto Abraham, Let it not be grievious in thy sight because of the lad (Ishmael), and because of your bondwoman; in all that Sarah hath said unto thee, hearken unto her voice; for in Isaac shall thy seed be called. (Genesis 21:12)

It is clear that God blessed Ishmael as the son of Abraham but rejected him and his offspring as heir of the covenant, just like he chose Jacob over Esau (Malachi 1: 2-4).

Later God himself told Isaac "I will make thy seed to multiply as the stars of heaven and will give unto thy seed all these countries and in thy seed shall all of the nations of earth be blessed" (Genesis 26:4) This verse makes it clear that Isaac, and not Ishmael, was the heir of God's covenant.

Isaac had two sons, Esau the older and Jacob the younger. God again chose the younger son. He told Jacob the younger son, "And thy seed shall be as the dust of the earth, and thou shalt spread abroad to the west, and to the east, and to the north, and to the south, and in thee and in thy seed shall all of the families of the earth be blessed." (Genesis 28:14)

I could go on and on and on, but I think I have said enough. The Old Testament makes it clear that it is not the seed of Ishmael who would bless mankind but the seed of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob. God loved Ishmael and blessed him, but chose to give the covenant to his younger brother and the descendants of his younger brother.

I make no secret of the fact that I do not consider the Koran to be the word of God; I believe it is the words of a false prophet who will answer to God for his lies and be held accountable for the millions who have been deceived by his deception.

It impossible for both the Koran and the Old Testament to be the Word of God for they contradict each other. It is impossible to believe both books are inerrant. If you believe the Koran then don't pretend to believe the Bible. If you believe the Bible you can't believe the Koran. It is the same lesson that Elijah gave the children of Israel on Mt. Carmel, believe one or the other because they can't both be true.

The blessings that our challenger claims for Ishmael rightly belong to Isaac and Jacob.

Tuesday, March 21, 2006

Some Posts Worth Reading.

I have not seen anything that I moved to post on tonight so I will leave a few links that I have found good tonight.

Gagdad Bob at his One Cosmos Blog, my second visit there thanks to Dr Sanity, has a cool posting about Liberals and Conservatives that is really well done and actually kind of funny. But I loved this line "Thus, many liberal ideas are believed not because they are true, but because they are beautiful." Sadly that is the truth.

Our fellow blogger at Born Again Redneck has a posting on the victims of Sharia, including a couple of very upsetting pictures. I hope we do not come to regret bringing Democracy to these people and I really don't understand the sympathy that gays and feminists have for these Jihadists.

The Gates of Vienna have a very good analysis of the terrorists, why we haven't yet defeated them, and why we must. It is important to note that the old theories of war need to be thoroughly reworked in order to be effective against a non-national enemy with no official territory to defend.

ABFreedom also chimes in on the failure of Socialism and its failure to acknowledge its failure.

Finally, People Covered With Fish has a semi-regular "Tuesday Trivia". I offer one of my own. Regardless of our opinion of it, Archie Comics and the gang from Riverdale are part of the American culture and has been since December of 42 (Archie first appeared in the same month WWII started). My question is this: In the 1940's comics, Riverdale is consistently described as being a city in what state and a suburb of what major US City? (It's now a generic city that could be anywhere with mountains and oceans nearby - but it was once specific in its general location.) Again what major US City was Archie Comic's Riverdale originally a suburb of?

Monday, March 20, 2006

Another Horror Story From the Taliban Era

Another horror story is coming out of the middle-east. I cannot imagine a 30 yo man marrying a 4 yo girl but it happened in Afghanistan about 8 years ago. The story of the girl, now 12 and emotionally recovering, is disturbing as are the pictures of the physical scars from abuse on her back. I cannot imagine being happy to be in a orphanage, but this little girl is. I thank God that she got away, but how many untold stories like this will end in sorrow.

Even Hollywood's Biggest Names Fail PC-Test.

Steven Spielberg is being sued by some Apache Indians because he violated one of their tribal taboos (cutting a girls hair before the coming of age ceremony.) Now to be honest I do not know enough about the situation to even guess which side is right in this, though I lean toward the girl's father. What kind of hit me though was that even Hollywood's biggest and brightest occasional fail to be sufficiently sensitive to other cultures. It doesn't suprise me.

This Would Be Good - If Done Wisely

I have a cousin, who was born and raised here in Michigan, who for a number of years could not enter the state without fear of being arrested for non-support of his children. Now under most circumstances I would say get a posse and go find the deadbeat, but his circumstances were a bit different. He married right out of high school to a girl that wasn't the best of all possible choices and ran into a number of problems, including economic ones. He joined the Army to support his wife and while he was in Basic she let him know she was pregnant and he signed the documents needed as it was, he assumed, his child. However when the baby was born, it was clearly not his. The courts ordered him to pay child-support and he refused. As a result he could not enter his home state for a number of years, and had they chosen to pursue him they probably could have.

Michigan is considering a law to protect men from being forced to support children that are not their own. Similar laws exist in twelve other states but progressive Michigan is behind the curve. In Michigan it is for the judges to decide and since family law is often hostile to fathers, men often are forced to pay for children that aren't theirs.

Many men have raised and loved children that they knew from day one were not theirs (One of my brothers adopted and raised his ex-wife's daughter that was not biologicially his and one day she was arguing with her mother over her loyalty to him and she said, "I know he is not my father but he is my Dad.") Such men are worthy of praise and should be praised, but by the same token, no man should be made a fool of either.

I favor this law, but I do believe that a man who knowingly takes a child that isn't his and formally adopts that child, he is as obligated to that child as he is to one he fathered. That is one little tweaking I would want. I also have problems with men remaining with a parental relationship with the children but not supporting them financially which some seem to want. But as I said earlier, no man should be made a fool of and then be forced to pay for it.

I Answer Part 2 -- Can This Person Even Read?

Now for the second question and I must admit that I am a bit perplexed, not by what the prophecy is about but how in the world did our questioner ever come to the conclusion he came to.

Our questioner said "Prophet Isaiah peace be upon him prophesied that two leaders whom he called "Chariot" would come -- one riding a donkey, and another riding a camel:

"And he saw a chariot with a couple of horsemen, a chariot of asses, and a chariot of camels; and he hearkened diligently with much heed: (From the King James Version Bible, Isaiah 21:7)"

When I read Isaiah 21:7 I read this.

And he saw a chariot with a couple of horsemen, a chariot of asses, and a chariot of camels; and he hearkened diligently with much heed:

I suppose it is possible to read this differently, but I read that he saw 4 people there, (2 horsemen, a chariot of asses and a chariot of camels - as horsemen and chariots are two completely different things.) But he proceeds to say quote John 12: 14 which says "And Jesus, when he had found a young ass, sat thereon as it is written". He then claims that the "as it is written" points back Isaiah 21:7 but our challenger apparently did not bother to read the next verse (John 21:15) which says "Fear not daugher of Sion; behold, thy King cometh, sitting on an ass's colt." which is a somewhat paraphrased quote from Zechariah 9:9 (Rejoice greatly, O daughter of Zion,shout, O daughter of Jerusalem; behold, thy King cometh unto thee; he is just and having salvation; lowly, riding upon an ass and upon the foal of an ass.) Apparently our challenger did not expect us to read the next verse. He associated the fulfilled prophecy with the wrong verse.

As far as his question goes, he wants to know if Jesus came on a donkey, which religious leader came on a camel in fulfillment of Isaiah 21:7 and I respond that verse he points to had nothing to do with Jesus riding a donkey, but rather, if you read the context -- always read the context - basic rule of Biblical Hermeneutics -- that verse points to an army on horses, asses and camels (ie the Medians and Elamites - named earlier in Isaiah 21) attacking Babylon. It is a totally senseless question that would not be even asked if he would have read both verses in full context.

Which religious leader came on a camel to fulfill prophecy? Simple -- There is no such prophecy. This is not even a strawman; it is simply absurd. Second question answered by context.

Saturday, March 18, 2006

The Location of Sinai - More of I Answer


This is more added to the previous post. One of his more believable statements was when he pointed out that Paul said in Galatians 4:25 that Mt Sinai was in Arabia. Yes he said that.

However, if you will take a look at the map, please note what country Sinai was considered part of when Paul wrote the Galatian letter.

I Am Challenged -- I answer


I received an anonymous comment today linking to a nonsense story about America using either nukes or dirty bombs in Iraq. (If we had used either the press and especially the left would be all over it -- it would be a major scandal, but apparently no one with any sense wants to touch it.) I attempted to find out what was really going on, but all I found was a few scattered references in the most paranoid conspiracy sites on the net. (The pictures on the page were horrible and heartbreaking but I don't think America is responsible for them.)

What got me was a challenge to prove that 3 "prophecies in the Bible do not predict Mohammed and Islam. I think it is predicted there, but I don't think it's predicted in the way that Muslims want it to be.

Tonight I will answer only the first one.
He quotes part of Deuteronomy 3: 2
"And he said, The LORD came from Si'-nai, and rose up from Se'-ir unto them; he shined forth from mount Pa'-ran [Mecca in Arabic], and he came with ten thousands of saints: from his right hand went a fiery law for them. (From the King James Version Bible, Deuteronomy 33:2)"

He then says that it points to the "liberation" of Mecca by 10,000 Moslems.

Note that he says that Paran = Mecca. Not true at all.

The Holman Bible Dictionary says
PARAN
(pay' ruhn) 1. Wilderness area south of Judah, west of Edom, and north of Sinai. Israel camped there after leaving Sinai during the Exodus and sent spies to scout out the Promised Land from Kadesh, a location in Paran (
Numbers 10:11-12; Numbers 13:3,Numbers 13:26). Chedorlaomer turned back his military campaign at Padan (Genesis 14:5-7). Ishmael made his home there after Abraham was forced to send Hagar and him away (Genesis 21:21). King Hadad of Edom eluded Joab by going through Padan to Egypt (1 Kings 11:17-18). 2. Mount Paran appears as a poetic parallel to Mount Sinai (Deuteronomy 33:2; compare Habakkuk 3:3) as the place of revelation. If not the same place as Sinai, the location is not known.


Here is a map that shows the location of Paran, which is duplicated above in the post. As you can see, it is nowhere near Mecca, which is a little south of the southern edge of the map near the eastern shore of the Red Sea.

The Paran of the Old Testament is equated with Mecca only in the fevered imaginings of a false prophet. The author attempts to prove the Paran is Mecca and not Sinai, but his proofs are nothing more then quoting Islamic fables.

His first challenge is refuted by a simple geography lesson. I will answer the second, hopefully tomorrow or Monday.

You're Not Supposed to Laugh -- But Go Ahead!

I was over at Ashes of Tyranny and there was a note that North Korea was accusing US soldiers of stealing eardrums from Iraqi children to sell to Israel. Whatever!!! So I followed the link to our good friends at Songun blog and just started laughing. They take pictures of soldiers in Iraq doing good or innocuous things and interpret them as the most horrid of war crimes.

I believe this site is a parody of North Korean propoganda because it is so absurd but I am not 100% certain of that.

You also should take a look at their posting Comrade Jay Bennish. I wonder if I should include this site in my humorous links. I suspect it is a parody because when I check the world map on their site-meter, not one person comes from North Korea as the blog owner is listed as a visitor when they post. It appears to be done inside the United States or Canada.

Yet the links are very real to some very real sites. hmm.

update:10:25 It is a Parody. ABFreedom has given me the inside story.

Friday, March 17, 2006

Teaching to Hate

It wasn't that long ago that two 13 year old girls raised eyebrows as Prussian Blue. Not a lot needs to be said about them but I wonder if there isn't more similarities between them and Autumn Ashante, then differences. The only differences between them is the color of skin they have and the color of skin they have been taught to hate; beyond that they have no discernable differences (and I consider skin color morally irrelevant).

Autumn Ashante is a 7 year old girl who recently recited a poem called "White Nationalism Put U In Bondage," and the whole story is heartbreaking that such a smart little girl would be taught to hate an entire segment of our population. Disapproval of someone's behavior, beliefs or conduct is one thing and can be quite acceptable - depending on circumstances, but hatred of a mere skin-color or ethnicity is ridiculous. (Some people do need to learn the difference between disapproval and hatred, but that is another subject entirely.)

She also called for a pledge that she only allowed blacks to say. Michelle Malkin has the entire pledge and her poem quoted at Conservative Voice.

I do not hate or dislike this little girl. I pity her just like I pity those two teenagers of minimum talent in Prussian Blue, because a heart full of hate can never know joy. They are all being taught to hate, not disapproval but hate for something that does not matter. I support the right of parents to raise their children according to their beliefs and values, and I am afraid that is where the real problem lies; it lies with their parents.

Wednesday, March 15, 2006

Let's Get Married For an Hour.

I was doing some exploring in Yahoo and came acrossed an interesting site called Al Islam which is a general information site on Islam written by Moslems. Might be useful so I go there and start poking around.

Take this for instance under a listing of things that invalidate prayers:
1166. It is Makrooh that a person in namaz slightly turns his face towards right or left, an angle which would not be construed as deviation from Qibla, otherwise namaz will be void, as explained earlier. It is also Makrooh during prayers to shut the eyes or turn towards right or left, and to play with one's beard and hands, and to cross the fingers of one hand into those of another, and to spit. It is also Makrooh to look at the writing of the holy Qur'an, or some other books or a ring. It is also Makrooh to become silent while reciting Surah al-Hamd, or any other Surah, or Zikr, so as to listen to some conversation. And in fact, every such act which disturbs attention and humility is Makrooh.

Must neither shut your eyes nor look at anything. Hmmm.

I came to a section on marriage laws and was astounded at the very first entry.

* The relation between man and woman becomes lawful by contracting marriage. There are two kinds of marriages:
(i) Permanent marriage
(ii) Fixed-time marriage
In a permanent marriage, the period of matrimony is not fixed, and it isforever. The woman with whom such a marriage is concluded is called da'ima (i.e. a permanent wife).
In a fixed time marriage (Mut'ah), the period of matrimony is fixed, for example, matrimonial relation is contracted with a woman for an hour, or a day, or a month, or a year, or more. However, the period fixed for the marriage should not exceed the span of normal lives of the spouses, because in that case, the marriage will be treated as a permanent one. This sort of fixed time marriage is called Mut'ah or Sigha.


They call Jesus a prophet yet He taught that marriage was supposed to be permanent; God tolerates divorce but does not like it at all! A temporary marriage is nothing more than sanctified fornication, especially the one which is only for an hour.

There is so much there that I can't comment on all of it. I did however notice that much of it was written by Sayyid Ali al-Husayni al-Sistani. Does that last name ring a bell?

Tuesday, March 14, 2006

What Is Going On in Iran?

I was at World Net Daily and read that there was rioting in Iran. Now to be blunt, World Net Daily is a site where you double check all stories. (In their hurry to get a scoop they make almost as many mistakes as CBS News.)

Apparently there is some truth to this story. Iran Focus has no fewer than five postings on the riots right now. Cars are being burned, posters of President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and former Iranian leader Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini are also being burned. Security forces are now attempting to bring order back to the areas. Most of the rioters are young people and encouraging it all is the main Iranian opposition group, Mojahedin-e Khalq.

I dare not hope that this marks the end of the current regime in Iran, but It does mark that Iran may have to deal with internal difficulties as well as launch its holy war against the entire world.

Peace at What Cost?

The death of Tom Fox is a tragedy, and he is a true martyr who gave his life for what he believed in. Sadly his life was wasted. Nobody is going to gain a thing, be it material or spiritual, from his death. The bottom line is that he died at the hands of the people who had the most to gain from his work, which shows how much they appreciate it.

If you want something so badly that you will pay any price for it, and people know you will pay that price, odds are you will pay a terrible price. That is doubly so when you want peace at any cost.

We need to face the fact that there are times when peace is simply not an option. Tom Fox paid far too high of a price for a peace that simply cannot happen right now, because there are those who want victory worse than they want peace (and I am not talking about our government) and believe they can have it for a price that is well within their price range. The only way we can bring temporary (which is all we can ever hope for - this side of the Kingdom) peace is to make the cost of victory so high, that they are not willing to pay it. The Jihadists understand this and believe that they are willing to pay more for victory (and peace on their terms - Sharia for the entire world) than we are willing to pay for victory and peace on our terms (peaceful co-existence.)

We could have had peace in late 30s and early 40s by agreeing to peace on Hitler's terms but we wisely chose not too, and paid the price, but it was a price well worth paying. It prevented the world from becoming a Nazi empire.

Mutually Assured Destruction or MAD was certainly not the most wonderful idea in the world, but by lifting the cost of victory to a level that was unacceptable to both sides, an uneasy, armed truce marked a good portion of the Cold War and ultimately may have saved many lives. MAD will not work for the Jihadists because they value the life of no one, including their own.

I would rather have peace, but right now we simply can't have it. Only a fool says "Peace is always an option." Peace is most likely to happen when those who wish to dominate others are unwilling to pay the price to do so.

We need to find the price that these people are not willing to pay for victory.

Monday, March 13, 2006

"Throwback Mountain"

I guess I'm a throwback.

The Detroit News has a regular columnist (every single Monday) by a woman named Deb Price; she is a lesbian and her columns only have one theme -- gay issues.

Today she is mad at the Democrats because they take millions in gay dollars in campaign funds, take millions of gay voters for granted, and don't do a thing for them.

That is probably for a good reason. The Democrats are not completely stupid and they know that the majority of Americans do not support same-sex marriage and other such issues. It used to be that they could vote the way the American people wanted while winking at Supreme Court justices who would later bypass the will of the American people by "creatively interpreting" the Constitution to find new meanings. They may not be able to do that any more; at least I hope not.

Sunday, March 12, 2006

Should've Been A Professor

When I was in college several of my teachers urged me to go into teaching. They said with my skill in language and insight into meaning (their words - not mine) I would be very good at it. I, for a number of reasons, some good but most not, I did not pursue that career. It looks like I made a mistake.

The State of Michigan paid its public university professors 23.2 million dollars for paid sabbaticals. The idea of a sabbatical was originally for professors to update their learning so that they would not be passing on dated information. That was back when professors actually spent more time in the classroom then they do today.

I do agree with the question: If universities are so strapped for money, is this the best use they can put it to?

Professors are supposed to give the school reports on how they used their sabbaticals. At Michigan State 77.8% of sabbaticals were not reported properly.

I wish I could take a semester off from my job with full pay.

Curiously enough, the critic of sabbaticals in the article is a professor of economics from Ohio State named Richard Veddar who wrote a book called Going Broke by Degree: Why College Costs Too Much. Sabbaticals are not the whole reason but they need to be looked at.

Please note: I am not criticizing professors who make proper use of sabbaticals, but with schools facing a money crunch and every dollar counting, we need to make sure these are properly used and not merely extended paid vacations from the classroom. The proper use should be encouraged but improper use should result in disciplinary action.

Body Piercing Kills (?)

I do not know for certain, and neither do those examining the girls body, but at this point it appears that an infection from a nipple piercing killed a 17 year old girl in Newfoundland.

I know this will offend some readers but I do not like body piercing . . . Period! No, I don't think it should be outlawed, but I do think people need to be educated about the possible dangers (and how to minimize them), and I do believe that every state should limit what a minor can do their body, including tatoos (no minors), piercings (minors limited to ear piercings), and branding (the less said the better).

Not too long ago Mad Magagine had a satire on future body alterations, including cosmetic amputations and interspecies transplants. I wish that was on the net somewhere. I do wonder how far it will go.

I agree with Dr Simon Avis, who is handling this girl's case that: "This is health dollars that are essentially wasted treating infections that shouldn't have occurred because of some desire to have a piece of metal sticking out of your body. It doesn't make much sense to me."

Saturday, March 11, 2006

DIY Abortion

(DIY means Do It Yourself)

H/T Anklebiting Pundits

Live in South Dakota and want an abortion? You can still get one. A blogger named Molly here on blogspot will tell you how to do it yourself with complete instructions. First off she gives a little disclaimer: DISCLAIMER: I am posting this as information only. Whether anyone chooses to act upon this information is their own concern. I believe in the free exchange of information and ideas. I believe this information has been kept from women for too long, and there is no reason they should not know about a procedure being performed on their own body, and no reason women should be kept in the dark about how to perform it -- especially if someone they know is having their health jeopardized by this law.

Having said that she proceeds with a list of equipment and gives her e-mail address to help people who need to find this stuff. I read on for a while but I had to stop reading. Some things you just don't want to know - like how to perform an abortion.

What scares me is that some women might actually try to do this. The majority of comments thought it was useful column and should be widely circulated. The morality of abortion completely aside, this is a very dangerous thing to be performed by a non-professional; these instructions are going to kill somebody.

By the way, the initial post in her blog says she is phone-sex operator, who was once a journalist.

We Should Have Nipped It In The Bud

In spite of their co-operation with us in the ISS (and I consider this a mistake on our part) Russia is neither our friend nor ally.

In spite of our economic "co-operation" and massive trade deficit China is not our friend either.

Mr. Bush needs to seriously reduce or eliminate our work with both countries right now. What is happening is a major threat, far worse than our porous border to the south. Unfortunately neither party is willing to do this.

Both countries are co-operating with our enemies on the war on terror. What is even worse is that we knew of the problems in the 90s. They were ignored for political reasons. (And it makes no sense for Russia to help Iran considering that they have their own problems with the Jihad right now - talk about suicidal policies.)

Frontpage Magazine once again leads the way with the transcript of a speech by Congressman Curt Weldon of Pennsylvania, who was also the chairman of the Defense Research Subcommittee.

According to the speech by Congressman Weldon, we gained evidence that Russia was helping Iran build the Shahab-3 Missle (which is now ready for use) in 1997. Here is what happened afterwards: Because of Gordon Oehler’s work, we introduced the Iran Missile Sanctions bill. I was a prime sponsor and had bipartisan support. In spite of Al Gore personally lobbying against the bill, we passed it in the House with 398 votes. I got called back down to the White House a second time. The vice president lobbied us for another 90 minutes, before the Senate voted and passed it with 98 votes. That was four months before Clinton vetoed the bill.

Further endangering us was the transfer of missle technology to China; that happened in the 1990s as well. That technology is now being transfered, by China, to Iran. It is AMERICAN technology that is being used to build these missles. Missles that are now threatening Israel and other non-Islamic countries.

I was especially intrigued to know that our defense budget was 9% of our GNP under John Kennedy and by 2000 had slipped to 2.5% and saddened by his testimony of friends lost on 9/11.

As I read about Able-Danger and Gorelick, it is all I can do to avoid screaming in frustration. We knew about Atta and his boys in 2000 but the data was destroyed before it could be used. The press needs to pursue this like a pack of bloodhounds, but they won't because it will take them in direction they do not wish to go; the politics are all wrong so it must not be pursued.

There is more to say but I need to cool off a little so I can write coherently.

Thursday, March 09, 2006

Appears to be Good News -- Til You Look Closer

On the surface this is very good news. Michigan's unemployment rate is at 6.2% which is the lowest it has been in 42 months. That sounds like good news but there is a little problem with this.

While there are some news jobs, a good share of this appears to be something else entirely.

The article itself comes out and tells us:

But East Lansing economist Bob Kleine said that, until Michigan starts adding jobs, a lower unemployment rate won't mean that much.
"It's important, but total employment is more important," Kleine said.
"People are leaving the state, withdrawing from the labor force," he said. He added that economic forecasts predict Michigan will continue losing jobs this year before beginning to see a slight recovery in 2007.
"Even though I know the job loss has been getting smaller each year," Kleine said, "we need to see some employment gains before you can get very excited."


People are leaving the state looking for work and that will have a ripple effect as service jobs are no longer needed, costing us more jobs. The fact that we are losing fewer jobs every year is nice, but it would be better if we were gaining them.

Wednesday, March 08, 2006

Where Are The Feminists?

Yesterday I blogged on a symposium at Frontpage Magazine about an epidemic of rape by Moslem boys and men against non-Moslem women. One issue I did not comment on, but has been picked up by Dr Sanity is that American Feminists, who are so concerned about a non-existent spike in domestic violence on Super-Bowl Sunday, are not saying a word about this outrage. (The posting is called The Unveiled Woman)

Why?

I commented on her posting and will say here what I said there. It is because American Feminism does not truly care about the rights of women. That is a banner they have appropriated as a cover for their all-out assault on traditional American values. Since Militant Islam is also opposed to America, they are not to be questioned. To do so would undermine their agenda.

This is Different

How about a crab covered with hair. If this is not a hoax, then they just found one near Easter Island.

Be sure to look at the enlarged picture.

It is probably legit, but I can't help but think of all the stuffed and mounted jackalopes that you can see at tourists traps all over Michigan, and I assume other states as well.

Tuesday, March 07, 2006

An Educated IDIOT Speaks

Stop the presses! America has another major crisis! Actually it's American women facing another threat.

Seems that a feminist named Linda Hirshman is furious because of it. What is this terrible plague?

Here it is: ABC cited census data showing 54 percent of mothers with a graduate or professional degree no longer work full-time. This is bolstered by Hirshman’s own study of 30 women whose wedding announcements appeared in The New York Times in 2003 and 2004. Only 5 are now working full-time outside the home. Ten work part time. The rest lead lives unsatisfactory to Hirshman and her allies.

Dear, dear, dear (sigh)

Women are choosing to stay home and be mothers and raise their children. How dare they? Who do they think they are?

I do not criticise women who choose to (or have to) work but I for one say "hats off" to these women who are doing the most important job of all.

The hand that rocks the cradle rules the world!

War = Rape = War

Some time ago I posted on Moslem men in Europe believing they had the "right" and "duty" to rape improperly dressed women.

Frontpage Magazine has a Symposium today on this issue and, while quite long, it worth the time to read. If only we could get the MSM to pay a little bit of attention to this epidemic.

Here are some amazing quotes from it:
" During the Algerian independence war the freedom fighters used to publicly sodomize French officers in order to achieve the enemy's maximum degradation."

"A friend of mine is a retired chief of police, who used to be in charge of the security of a major city in the south of France. He reported to me that his men had to face an average of 10 rapes a week, 80% made by Muslim young men. 30% being what we call, in French, a “ tournante “, meaning that the victim is being raped by an entire gang, one after the other, often during an entire night. My friend reports that, in many cases, he was able to locate and arrest the rapists, often very young ones, and, as part of the investigation, call the families. He was astonished that, in most cases, the parents not only would back up their rapist children, but also would not even understand why they would be arrested. "

"Inside the Palestinian territories, I collected a lot of different stories involving raping of an innocent girl who later on was slaughtered by her own father or cousin, because she had lost her virginity."

It also bothers me that Islam considers women to be little more than animals. The article uses the term "a necessary evil."

One of the panelists, Peter Raddatz, suggests that they are essentially children trapped in a society that does not allow them to truly grow up, and as a result they remain infants who throw a tantrum when things go wrong. He does not, however, use that as an excuse to tolerate the behavior but insists that it be corrected.

I believe we should hold these Moslem men to the same standards we are held to. If they want to be equal to us then they should act as our equals; if they are better than us then they should be held to a higher standard, not allowed more license to hurt people. But as this Symposium points out several times, they don't even have the same definition of evil as we do.

A Book I'm (Re)Reading

Right now I am in the process of reading, for the unteenth time, a book that is considered a cult classic (ie a small smattering of very devoted readers not a cultish book). That book is David Lindsay's A Voyage to Arcturus. In spite of its weirdness, it is one of my favorite books ever. I have given away close to a dozen copies of it to people and the vast majority of them are fascinated and amazed by this book.

David Lindsay, like another favorite - HP Lovecraft, was a man who rejected religion and in the end found insanity. However, also like Lovecraft, he was a man of great intelligence and deep insight, though somewhat clumsy as a writer. When he died, his mind was so far gone that he died of blood poisoning caused by his own rotting teeth!!

It is a story of a man seeking for meaning in the universe and in the end finding only despair. (If you read the entire series of Douglas Addams' Hitchiker series, it is basically the same philosophical journey, though Addams wrote with humor and irony instead of mind-boggling visions and open philosophical discussion of Lindsay's writings.) What fascinates me about this book is the Lindsay did it. Maskull, the protagonist in the story, is taken to the planet Tormance (torments?) where he is left alone and wanders the planet seeking some word of God. Each country he visits, and he visits several, has different laws of physics and biology that reflect the philosophy of the people who live there; in that land the philosophy is the truth. Along the way he learns that while most of the natives think they are serving God they are in fact serving the Devil and the true God is further back than we can see and is unknowable.

A Christian would agree, to a point, with that assessment except for one small problem. Lindsay considered our God evil and there was Something greater and truly good beyond Him. In this regard he is much like some of the ancient Gnostics with a bit of Buddhism thrown in. I believe that he was mostly right, but failed to follow his own advice. If he would have looked a little further and understood a little more, he would have seen that the world did indeed misunderstand God and that the God of Bible is not the God of popular culture. His failure to see this cost him dearly, as it ultimately cost him his mind and life.

As it is now public domain, it can be downloaded as an E-book from project Gutenberg. Here is a LINK that leads directly to it.

Among the people who loved the book was CS Lewis who said it partly inspired his book Perelandra ( which was initially called A Voyage to Venus and was written partly as an answer to Lindsay) and gave him some ideas for The Screwtape letters. Lewis had the same opinion of the man as I did, that his theology was diabolical because he hadn't followed his thoughts to their logical conclusion, which Lewis and I both agree, would have led him to God.

In spite of the man's problems, I consider the book to be quite worthwhile. As far as some of its content goes, you need to realize the book was written in 1920.

Monday, March 06, 2006

Vets From Long Ago.

When I was a boy, there was an older couple who lived across the street from us. The guy was a WWI vet and I remember hearing him talk about it many times; he loved to talk about his war experiences, though to me it was the names of towns, hills, and rivers far away in I-had-no-idea-where. He died quite a few years ago.

We are losing WWII vets at an astounding rate, but there are are only 8 KNOWN WWI vets alive in the USA. (The actual number is unknown because the question about being a WWI is no longer on the census.) There are fewer than 50 WWI vets alive world-wide.

I don't know what astonishes me more. That there are so few or that people live that long.

A Little Bit About Current Books and Authors

Our local paper carried a column by a religious writer, Richard N Ostling, in which he discusses a couple of books written by militant atheists. One of whom, Sam Harris, treats religion as a neurosis, while the other, Daniel C. Dennett, believes that religion, while false, can be a positive thing for individuals and group cohesion. There was nothing really new in the column, and probably nothing really new in their books.

What got my attention was another writer that was mentioned, a former Atheist named Alister McGrath who is working on, what appears to be an attempt to blend theology and science. He appears to be a rising star in the Christian academia, but I must confess that I have never heard of him. This is a link to his personal website. I see I going to have to make a trip to the bookstore very soon.

What really intrigued me was that Mr. McGrath freely acknowledges that attrocities have been committed by nonminal Christians, but the deeds of militant Atheists (such as Hitler, Stalin, Mao, Pol Pot) are far worse. The Atheists do not seem to want to acknowledge this, or just try to skip around it.

Another interesting line is that "Atheism and skepticism wield some advantages in the religious aspect of America's culture wars, including sympathy among strategic opinion leaders in higher education and the media." That sums up a good share of our challenge.

Sunday, March 05, 2006

It's Really, Really Bad For You

Some health crusaders want warning labels on soft drinks (we just call it "pop" here but it's "soda" in other parts of the country). Seems that 1/5 of our calories comes from liquids.

I have mixed feelings about this. I do drink a lot of pop (local water is Yeech). but very little of it has caffeine and 90% of it is diet. (caffeine free Diet Coke). I certainly don't agree with that idiot who wants a fat tax on these things.

No question about it; a lot of sugar causes weight to go up, but we do not need more regulations to change this. What we need is to educate people of the dangers of excessive sugar and to encourage other drinks and diet soft drinks instead.

Nah. Some people just need an excuse to hire a few more meddling government officials.

Saturday, March 04, 2006

Alberta May Rise Above the Other Nine

At least one Canadian province is having the courage to admit that the Canadian healthcare system is an unmitigated disaster. Alberta may soon defy Ottawa and allow for private medical care. While there is a lot of politics involved, hopefully Canada's conservative provinces will be able to lead the rest back to freedom. The history of the rest of Canada blackmailing Alberta is also intriguing.

Go Alberta!! Lead Canada back to freedom!!!

Friday, March 03, 2006

MSM Misses Another Big Story

It seems that the only place in the world to get the news anymore is the blogosphere. How in the world did this story, found in Little Green Footballs (follow the links to the original story), not make headlines all over the country? (Don't answer that.) Another follower of Mohammed thought it would be a good idea to punish UNC-Chapel Hill students because a newspaper published some of the cartoons of Mohammed. He drove a rented SUV into a crowd of pedestrians. By the Grace of God there were no deaths.

Another Dumb Criminal

Most idiot criminals are guilty of misdemeanors or petty theft, though there are some biggies. Like this idiot, currently serving time (and rightly so) in the prison in Ionia Michigan. His crime? Statutory rape. This graduate student thought that sex with a minor was a misdemeanor and he would, at worst, spend few days in jail.

Dumb ... Dumb ... Dumb

First off, I don't think I'd want to spend a few days in jail for sex. Idiot knew it was a crime, but he did it anyway thinking the penalty was light.

Secondly, a graduate student should know better; he should have known it was a felony.

Third, I don't know if his repentence is sincere or not, but it won't help one bit when the other prisoners discover why is there.

Font Test

A few people politely agreed to help me with an experiment with a personal font. I hope this works.



This is simply a test to see if I can use this font, which is taken from my actual handwriting. If it works correctly ( and you are one of the people I sent the fonts to ) then you should be seeing this as something similar to what I write with my own hand.



Now I am truly hoping that this does what it supposed to do. This section should look like I printed it. My printing is readable, but still not pretty. (Sigh!)

Well? Did you see it in my personal fonts?

Islam's Bloody Borders

The Gates of Vienna blog have an excellent commentary and link on Islamic terror. The link leads to a map revealing the location and severity of Terrorist Attacks around the world since 9/11. What truly amazes me, and you would never know it from the press, is that the worst of it, and the most dangerous place is nowhere near America's troops. (The Baghdad area is bad, but the northern section of the India-Pakistan border is by far the worst; it's worse than the Israel-Palestine bloodshed.)

I notice they kind of understate the French riots of a few months ago, but they do include the sniper killings that happened around Washington a while ago.

One thing they don't do is differentiate between Moslem killing Non-moslem and Moslem killing Moslem which is also a major source of death in terrorism.

Wednesday, March 01, 2006

What Kind of Millionaire

If you won the lottery, what kind of millionaire would you be? The Lansing State Journal asks this question. They offer examples of bad rich people (such as Paris Hilton) and one "good" rich person (George Clooney). Now I am not going to say much about Miss Hilton as I find it difficult to even take her seriously. Secondly, in spite of his charity which is good, I am not so sure about Mr. Clooney either.

If I was a millionaire, I would hope that I would be able to improve the lives of others, not merely by charity (which is good but only a temporary fix at best), but by creating jobs. I don't know if I would succeed, but I seriously hope that is what I would try to do.

I get sick and tired of millionaire entertainers complaining about the greed of millionaire businessmen when most businessmen create jobs. I understand that Oprah was, at one time, making 60 million dollars a year; with that money she could have invested and opened a factory a year creating many, many jobs, having a much greater positive effect than her charities, and had a good financial return as well. Same with the man who is now governor of California. I know it is not easy, and the risk of failure is real, but I would hope that I would be that kind of millionaire. One who creates jobs for others.

Of course I would actually have to have the money to find out if I actually have it in me. That is not likely.