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Monday, March 31, 2008
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Avoiding Math and Science Like The Plague By Armstrong Williams
Category: Life
Original Article Take
a minute to think about the following: When was the last time you made
a mathematical calculation in your head or by hand (yes which means not
using a calculator)? Surely, some of you avoid math like the plague –
especially when your teenage child comes around looking for help on
their math homework – but you must admit that even in this
compalculator era it comes in handy to be able to tally your bills in
your head or figure out the miles per gallon you’re getting while
driving along in traffic. Surely it seems reasonable to expect
that people with high school diplomas and college degrees shouldn’t be
afraid of a little algebra. We all took math in school, and although
most of us struggled with the subject, and many of us hated every
second of it, we did it and we got by. We got by, and it has helped us
in some way or another while at college, work, or home. But if you
thought math was hard for you, consider how hard your kids have it.
It shouldn’t be hard to understand why most American teenagers struggle
with math and other basic subjects like science and English. Schools
are overcrowded and rundown, teachers are underpaid and overworked,
kids are over-stimulated and cannot focus, and administrators are
forced to push testing over learning. The fact is that kids are left
behind, and sadly, even when they’re not, they don’t always grasp what
we think they do. So if our high school math and science
scores are dropping, our children are dreading these classes, and we
ourselves can barely go through the times tables, then why aren’t we
demanding real tutelage in math and science? Why is it socially
acceptable not to understand fractions, percentages, and exponents, not
to mention basic science principles that don’t change with time or
opinion? One reason, I submit, is relativism. Relativism
allows everyone to be right, and puts our feelings ahead of everything
else. We all know that it is not fun to find out that we are wrong
about something, but a part of growing up is learning to cope with this
negative feeling and learn from the experiences of failure. It would
seem that many people today, however, would prefer to shield themselves
and their children from ever being wrong or from feeling that hurt.
This is true on the Little League diamond, where every player now makes
the team, and in the school classrooms, where every assignment is given
a modification to make sure every student can easily get by. It
also seems that children these days prefer not to study very much; I’m
not sure if it’s because they are so busy with other things, or they
just have been handed so much that the idea of hard work is foreign to
them. But whatever the reason, it’s obvious to parents and teachers
across America that kids aren’t putting in the effort to excel in math
and science. One explanation may be because math and science generally
demand specific solutions, meaning either a right or wrong student. So
for a lot of kids who are scared to fail, or sadly even scared to try,
math and science are just pushed away at all costs. Instead, more kids
focus on subjects like History and English which tend to be more
philosophical and interpretive which allows for more wiggle room and
less hurt feelings. Don’t misinterpret my meaning, subjects like
History and English are imperative to education and add great value to
society, but they are not the only things our children should be
learning. But the fact is that far more people study these subjects
because their feelings won’t be hurt like in math or science, where
strict guidelines and exact answers are expected. Unfortunately, 20%
off will not make a $40 shirt cost $20 no matter how much you ’feel’
that it should; the shirt would still cost you $32. Also, science tells
us that it is impossible to hear a bullet, because they travel faster
than the speed of sound. Do you really think that with the
brain that either evolution handed down, or God bestowed upon us, we
are incapable of learning science and math if we put our mind to it?
Absolutely not! We can all learn everything taught in school, it merely
requires effort, determination, and perseverance. And once learned it
is empowering and enjoyable to utilize these new-learned skills. We
must pass along this attitude to our children and demand that
lawmakers, teachers, and administrators make math and science a
priority in our schools again. Then we must put away our calculators,
brush up on our arithmetic, and show our children that even old dogs
can break out old tricks. We may not always need math and we may not
always like science, but we must always learn and hone these valuable
subjects and skills.
6:27 PM
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A Truly Endangered Species By Frank J. Gaffney, Jr.
Category: Life
Original Article
So Al Gore is launching a 3-year, $300 million ad campaign to frighten us all into doing what he says (not what he does)
to counter global warming. It is a safe bet this spectacular propaganda
endeavor will feature prominently polar bears who will be described as
endangered species due to the impact of climate change on their
ever-less icy habitat.
While there remain serious disagreements about the scientific merits of
the Gore crusade, one thing is clear: If man-made greenhouse gases
actually are affecting climate change, it will be decades – if
not a century – before the effects of such changes translate into
widespread dangers to mankind. In the meantime, the world is
increasingly at risk from a far more imminent threat, one Mr. Gore and
his ilk seem content to ignore. In fact, the caviling about global
warming can be seen as a deflection from a menace that is at hand and
that risks turning vast human populations into endangered
species: the rapidly metastasizing, totalitarian ideology of our time
that has come to be known as Islamofascism or, alternatively, Islamism.
Among those most immediately imperiled by the Islamofascists
are Muslims who dare to challenge the repressive, seditious
theo-political-legal code that the former describe as "Shariah" and
seek to impose on their co-religionists and everyone else. Some of
these endangered species cling to and seek to reform their faith.
Others, like the estimable Syrian-born psychologist Wafa Sultan, have
felt constrained formally to leave it. All such individuals
risk death at the hands of the Islamists on the grounds that they are,
respectively, "hypocrites" or "apostates" – capital offenses under
Shariah. At the very least, they can be charged with "slandering"
Islam, which is also according to the Islamofascists’ rule book a
capital crime. This is hardly an academic point. Dr. Sultan is
currently in hiding somewhere in this country after an appearance on
March 4th on the Islamofascists’ favorite television network,
Al-Jazeera. In the course of a heated debate about the Danish cartoons
with an Egyptian Islamist named Tal’at Rmeih, she bravely declared:
"All religions and faiths, throughout the history of humanity, have
been subject to criticism and affronts. With time, this has helped in
their reform and development. Any belief that chops off the heads of
its critics is doomed to turn into terrorism and tyranny. This has been
the condition of Islam, from its inception to this day. Islam has
sentenced [its critics] to prison, and whoever crosses the threshold of
that prison meets his death. The Danish cartoons have managed to break
down the first brick in the wall of that prison, and to open up a
window, through which the sunrays enter, after a lengthy darkness. The
Danish newspaper exercised its freedom of speech. Liberties are the
holiest thing in the West, and nothing is more important. But if Islam
were not the way it is, those cartoons would never have appeared."
Dr. Sultan added: "If you want to change the course of events, you must
reexamine your terrorist teachings, you must recognize and respect the
right of the other to live, you must teach your children love, peace,
coexistence, and productive work. When you do that, the world will
respect you, will consider you in a better light, and will draw you in
a better light." On March 16, one of the world’s preeminent
Islamofascists, Sheik Yusuf al-Qaradawi took to the airwaves of Al
Jazeera to denounce Wafa Sultan and provide the religious basis for her
murder. Qaradawi declared that she had "leveled accusations against
Islam and the Muslims, and cursed Allah, His Prophet, the Islamic
nation, the Shariah, and the Islamic faith and culture. She did not
omit anything. She was insolent and stopped at nothing."
Qaradawi has parlayed his platform as the host of Al Jazeera’s popular
"Shariah and Life" program into a prominence in the Muslim world that
makes such statements life-threatening to those he criticizes. In a
2004 interview with the Egyptian newspaper Al-Ahram Al-Arabi, the sheik
ordered those who strayed from Islam to be put to death. He has also
described "the abduction and killing of Americans in Iraq as a
[religious] obligation so as to cause them to leave Iraq immediately"
and supported suicide bombings against Israeli civilians. Al
Jazeera thought it wise to apologize for allowing Wafa Sultan to
appear. Dr. Sultan has been subjected to death threats and she and her
family have been forced to conceal their whereabouts. What
makes this story the more appalling is that such a man and his
colleagues at the European Council for Fatwa and Research have been
engaged by prominent commercial institutions to serve as "Shariah
advisors" in connection with the latters’ "Shariah-Compliant Finance"
operations. In that capacity, they not only have a say in where capital
and credit flow in Western economies. They are also able to advance the
legitimization of Shariah and to engage in what these Muslim
Brotherhood types have called "financial jihad." During the
Cold War, a great Democratic Senator Henry "Scoop" Jackson led the
effort to help protect that era’s most endangered species – Soviet
dissidents – by publicizing their plight and penalizing their
oppressors. Today, we must do at least a much for our era’s refuseniks,
the Wafa Sultans here and elsewhere, for their fates are truly tied to
our own.
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Questions that Bother Oprah and Today’s New Age Thinkers By Frank Pastore
Category: Religion and Philosophy
Original Article
I
have a few questions—but they are not about whether Oprah Winfrey,
Eckhart Tolle or Marianne Williamson are good, smart and nice people.
I’m sure they are. My concern is about the ideas they hold—since good,
smart, nice people can hold false beliefs and be wrong about all kinds
of things. Sometimes, even the most important things. I have questions about their worldview. A
worldview is made up of the answers we give to life’s most fundamental
and profound questions. It includes the answers we give to questions of
philosophy, religion, ethics and theology. And they are questions that
have been asked and answered by every culture in world history. When comparing and contrasting religions, worldview categories are the most basic level of inquiry. If
you know a person’s worldview, you know a whole lot about them.
Oftentimes, you even know more about their thinking processes than they
do. Right now, Oprah is co-teaching an online class with
author Eckhart Tolle, based upon her current Book of the Month, his "A
New Earth: Awakening to Your Life’s Purpose." And, Oprah’s promoting a
daily radio show on her XM channel featuring Marianne Williamson
teaching from "A Course in Miracles." Both Tolle and
Williamson are New Age thinkers. Oprah says she’s a Christian—arguing
that she can reconcile "her" Christianity with what they’re teaching.
If she’s a Christian, she’s an ignorant one, because Christianity is
incompatible with New Age thought. Here’s how the two opposing
worldviews, Christianity (C), and New Age (NA), answer some of the most
basic worldview questions. The New Age answers are ones that would be
commonly held, though certainly not universal, as the belief system is
loose, eclectic and unique to each individual adherent. 1. Why is there something rather than nothing? Christianity (C):
God created the universe at the moment of the beginning of time, matter
and space. Big Bang cosmology and all modern science affirms this. New Age (NA): The universe is beginning-less, endless, eternal. 2. Does God exist?—and is He personal? C: Yes,
God is personal, and the Bible teaches God is three persons sharing one
essence, what Christians refer to as the Trinity. More specifically,
God is tri-personal. NA: Yes and No. Yes, God is an
impersonal force that exhaustively fills every atom of the eternal
universe: All is God, God is all, God is all of us and God is each of
us. No, there is no personal creator called God who is outside of time,
matter and space. 3. Who am I? C: A creation of God. NA: God. 4. How did I get here? C:
God created man with moral freedom and invited him to join the presence
of the Trinity. But man exercised his freedom in rebellion to God, and
now only through the work of the incarnate God and second person of the
Trinity, Jesus Christ, can that severed relationship be restored. NA:
Through the infinite process of karma. As God, you are eternal, and
have been reincarnating from object to object for trillions of years,
and when you ultimately achieve enlightenment, and remember that you
are God, you will then lose your individual sense of self and
consciousness and become One with the One. (Remember, there is no
personal God. God is a force. You must return to being a force.) 5. Why am I here? C:
The Westminster Catechism answers this question beautifully: The chief
end of man is "to glorify God and enjoy him forever." I am called to
make a decision with eternal consequences: either accept or reject
God’s offer of salvation in Jesus Christ. I am also called to help
others make a correct choice; to advance the true, the good, and the
beautiful; to fight evil and injustice; to work with God at reconciling
the world to Himself. NA: To pay off previous karmic debt gathered over trillions of years. 6. What is the meaning of life? C: To glorify God. NA: To achieve enlightenment. 7. What is the true, the good, and the beautiful? C: God—and his goodness can be seen through his creation. NA:
Since there is no distinction between creator and creation, there can
be no distinctions between true-false, good-bad, right-wrong,
ugly-beautiful, or pain-pleasure. 8. What is the best life? C: A life in the full presence of God. NA: The life immediately before enlightenment, since you will no longer exist as a person once you remember you are God. 9. Who is the best man? C: Jesus Christ, the Man who never sinned. NA: "Best" is a nonsensical moral category. 10. Why is there evil, pain, suffering, and injustice? C: The Fall. Man exercised his freedom in rebellion to God and these are the consequences. NA:
People are paying off their karmic debt. As God, we are responsible for
the reality we create for ourselves through our thinking and choices.
If we are suffering, it is because we are choosing to suffer. If we
think differently we can alter the external world and create our own
reality. 11. Why do bad things happen to good people? C:
We live in a fallen world with moral freedom. Evil and sin exist. Men
hurt themselves intentionally and accidentally. Our hope is only in God
who is able to bring good out of evil. NA: Karma. Karma
and reincarnation have all kinds of fatal logical problems. Who started
karma and reincarnation and why? Who decides what behavior gets
rewarded and what gets punished, especially since there are no moral
categories? How can there be a "who" to all this when God is a "what,"
an impersonal force like gravity? How can an impersonal force help you
in your relationships, heal your hurts, illnesses and wounds, help with
your addictions and bad habits, lead you to confront social evils,
poverty, crime, corruption, broken families, broken hearts? 12. Will good or evil ultimately triumph? C: The resurrection of Jesus proves that good ultimately triumphs over evil. NA: These are only apparent moral categories, they don’t really exist. 13. Is there life after death? C: Yes! In either heaven or hell. Our destination is based on our response to the person and work of Christ. NA:
Yes and No. Yes, in that you may have trillions of more reincarnated
bodies to inhabit as you pay off your karmic debt before reaching
enlightenment. No, in that once you’re enlightened, you will cease to
exist, since you will have remembered you’re really an impersonal force
that New Age thinkers call "God." The New Age Movement is
intellectually and spiritually bankrupt. But, it is making Tolle and
Williamson—and especially Oprah—a whole bunch of money.
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Liberals and Their False Idols By Burt Prelutsky
Category: News and Politics
Original Article
There are major differences between liberals and conservatives, and
that’s why I never know what people such as Barack Obama are talking
about when they speak of bringing us all together. And I suspect that
Jeremiah Wright’s surrogate son doesn’t know, either. For
instance, if I support the surge in Iraq and you insist on bringing the
troops home by next Thursday, what’s our compromise? Bringing our
troops only partway home? Say as far as the Canary Islands?
If you’re in favor of same-sex marriages and I happen to think the
whole idea is a very silly joke, where’s our common ground? Doing away
with opposite-sex marriages? If I believe in capital
punishment and you don’t, what constitutes a midway point between our
positions? Only executing convicted killers whose last names start with
the letters between A and M? One of the most unpleasant things
about liberals is the way they tend to place the politicians they
endorse on pedestals. Frankly, I have never understood this phenomenon.
How is it that so many people turn into besotted teenagers once they
decide to vote for someone? I’m not saying that I don’t like
some politicians more than others. I like those who vote the way I want
them to and I dislike the ones who don’t. But when you get right down
to it, most politicians on either side of the aisle are pretty mediocre
human beings. What is their great accomplishment, after all? These are
people who have devoted their lives to convincing other people to hand
over their hard-earned money so that they can get or keep a job that
essentially consists of spending other people’s tax dollars. Often
enough to keep the tabloid press occupied, these palookas are caught
taking bribes, using drugs and getting involved in sex scandals. In
other words, they often behave like the rock stars they aspire to be,
even though they can’t sing, cavort around a stage or play a musical
instrument. Politicians, unlike cops, firemen and members of
the military, are not called upon to do anything dangerous, heroic or
the least bit self-sacrificial. Instead, they build up fiefdoms on your
tax dollars, go on junkets around the world, receive the sort of health
care only millionaires can dream of and the sort of pensions no working
stiff can even imagine. If they deign to place their names on
ghost-written books, millions of you will rush out to buy them, and if
they manage to give a speech, also ghost-written, that doesn’t put
everyone into a coma, they’re hailed as great orators. I
swear, when I see the ladies gazing up at Hillary Clinton, adoration
shining in their eyes, or at the hordes of born-again left-wingers
gathered to watch Barack Obama transform water into whine, I feel
grateful that I don’t know any of them. It’s not because I’m a
conservative that I haven’t mentioned John McCain. For one thing, most
Republicans have no illusions about him. Many of them will vote for him
in November for one very good reason; namely, that their blood runs
cold at the mere thought of either Democrat being the next
commander-in-chief. For another thing, conservatives tend to be
realists, and just about the only politician who really excites them is
Ronald Reagan, and he’s been dead since 2004. I don’t happen
to think it’s a coincidence that left-wingers are much more juvenile
than conservatives when it comes to making idols of politicians. As
psychiatrist Lyle H. Rossiter, Jr., points out in his new book, "The
Liberal Mind: The Psychological Causes of Political Madness," liberals
are very much "like spoiled, angry children. They rebel against the
normal responsibilities of adulthood and demand that a parental
government meet their needs from the cradle to the grave." For
over 35 years, Dr. Rossiter has diagnosed and treated more than 1,500
patients and examined nearly 3,000 civil and criminal cases as a
board-certified forensic psychiatrist. Regarding the sort of liberalism
being espoused by Obama, Clinton and their devout worshippers, he
states: "A social scientist who understands human nature will not
dismiss the vital roles of free choice, voluntary cooperation and moral
integrity, as liberals do. A political leader who understands human
nature will not ignore individual differences in talent, drive,
personal appeal and work ethic, and then try to impose economic and
social equality on the population, as liberals do. And a legislator who
understands human nature will not create an environment of rules which
over-regulates and over-taxes the nation’s citizens, corrupts their
character and reduces them to wards of the state, as liberals do."
Dr. Rossiter goes on to say that the liberal agenda preys on weakness
and feelings of inferiority in the population by creating and
reinforcing perceptions of victimization; satisfying infantile claims
of entitlement, indulgence and compensation; augmenting primitive
feelings of envy; rejecting the sovereignty of the individual and
subordinating him to the will of the government." Take that,
Hillary and Barack! Take that Ted Kennedy and Nancy Pelosi! Take that,
Harry Reid and Charles Schumer, Chris Matthews and Barbara Boxer! Take
that, Jesse Jackson and Al Sharpton, Keith Olbermann and John Murtha!
In summation, Dr. Rossiter writes: "When the modern liberal mind whines
about imaginary victims, rages against imaginary villains and seeks
above all else to run the lives of persons competent to run their own
lives, the neurosis of the liberal mind becomes painfully obvious."
At the risk of burying you all in psychological jargon, suffice to say
that the good doctor agrees with my own diagnosis: Liberals are
cuckoos.
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Saturday, March 22, 2008
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American Taxpayers Beware By John Boehner
Current mood: hungry
Category: News and Politics
Original Article
House Republicans have taken a stand against wasteful Washington
spending by calling for a complete freeze on all "earmarks" and
pork-barrel projects. While our challenge has largely fallen on deaf
ears — House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, California Democrat, could shut down
the earmark process tomorrow if she wanted to — our cause has a strong
ally in Sen. John McCain. Mr. McCain has been a leader in the
quest to end pork-barrel spending and has led by example — the senator,
like myself, doesn’t request earmarks. He strongly supported a one-year
moratorium on all earmarks in the U.S. Senate. And as president, Mr.
McCain has promised that any "earmarked, pork-barrel bill that comes
across my desk, I’ll veto it."Mr. McCain’s opposition to wasteful
spending is a breath of fresh air to taxpayers who foot the bill for
congressional spending sprees. Americans aren’t interested in paying
for teapot museums, peanut storage and "monuments to me," where
congressmen name buildings and other projects after themselves. And
with families feeling the pinch of high gas prices and skyrocketing
health care costs, they’re certainly not interested in tax increases. Not
surprisingly, Mr. McCain’s Democratic opponents have quite a different
record on spending. In 2007 alone, Sen. Hillary Clinton, New York
Democrat, earmarked $340 million in taxpayer dollars. Sen. Barack
Obama, Illinois Democrat, earmarked more than $91 million. As recently
as last week, both campaigns refused to disclose their full list of
earmark requests. The pressure finally got to Mr. Obama, who
released his 2005-06 earmark requests on March 13. His requests include
$1 million for a hospital where his wife served as vice president of
community and external affairs. While Mrs. Clinton continues to
decline demands that she make her requests public, one nonpartisan
watchdog group says the senator landed 360 earmarks from 2002 to 2006.
In 2007, Mrs. Clinton admitted to seeking funding for a hippie museum
in Bethel, N.Y. Her spokesman has stated flatly that Mrs. Clinton is
"very proud" of her earmarks, which cost taxpayers more than $2.2
billion. Both Mrs. Clinton and Mr. Obama received poor marks on
the Club for Growth’s 2007 report on pork-barrel spending and
government waste. Mr. Obama received a score of 33 percent for his
votes against anti-pork legislation, while Mrs. Clinton scored even
worse: 11 percent. Another group dedicated to protecting tax dollars,
Citizens Against Government Waste, echoed the Club for Growth’s poor
rankings. They gave Mr. Obama a lifetime rating of 22 out of 100. Mrs.
Clinton received a lifetime rating of 10 out of 100. In other words,
taxpayers beware. Last week, Mrs. Clinton and Mr. Obama both
voted for the Democrats’ $3 trillion budget that included the largest
tax increase in American history. According to the Associated Press,
the budget would raise income taxes "on individuals making as little as
$31,850 and couples earning $63,700" to pay for more wasteful spending. In
fairness, Mrs. Clinton and Mr. Obama followed Mr. McCain — and other
fiscal conservatives — and signed on as "11th hour cosponsors" of his
proposed earmark moratorium. I know what you’re thinking: Why
would two Democrat senators — who have fed at the trough as much as
anyone — suddenly support a one-year ban on all pork? Simple: They
understand that taxpayers oppose pork-barrel spending, and they’ll say
anything to get elected. Americans aren’t going to buy it. They know that Washington spending is out of control and dramatic change is needed to fix it. As
the year goes on, voters will find out who is really serious about
fixing Washington and reforming how taxpayer dollars are spent.
Consider that one party is calling for a complete freeze on wasteful
pet projects and for a balanced budget that doesn’t raise taxes, while
the other is raising taxes and refuses to curb wasteful spending. Which really represents an attempt to fix Washington? Which represents the status quo? I think the answer is clear. House
Republicans recognize that the failure to control spending helped cost
our party the majority. We’ve learned our lesson, and our nominee for
president is the one with the record and the commitment to working with
us to eliminate wasteful Washington spending once and for all. The
election-year posturing of Mrs. Clinton and Mr. Obama is another
example of why neither candidate is fit to be president. Come November,
voters are sure to embrace John McCain’s positive vision of freedom,
security and an end to wasteful spending.
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40 Acres
By
Caedmon's Call
Release date: 13 April, 1999
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Friday, March 21, 2008
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The Truth About Everything By Chuck Colson
Current mood: hungry
Category: Religion and Philosophy
Original Article
Easter
for many of us is a day of family gatherings and a celebration, not
only of Christ’s resurrection, but also the coming of spring. Today, on
Good Friday, let’s not rush the celebration before coming face-to-face
with the paradoxes that are at the heart of the Christian faith. Those
paradoxes are the subject of a wonderful book Death on a Friday
Afternoon: Meditations on the Last Words of Jesus written by my friend
Father Richard John Neuhaus. A paradox,
as G. K. Chesterton famously put it, is "Truth standing on her head to
get attention." Our aversion and resistance to truth is so strong that
God often finds it necessary to employ extreme measures to get us to
see past the lies we have embraced. Never was this truer than
on what Christians call "Good Friday." As Neuhaus writes, "If what
Christians say about Good Friday is true, then it is, quite simply, the
truth about everything." That "everything" starts with telling the
truth about the human condition. And how does God do that? By
paradoxically punishing the offended party, instead of the guilty one. As
Neuhaus tells us, we are all aware that "something has gone terribly
wrong with the world and with us in the world." It is not just
history’s best-known list of horribles. It is also "the habits of
compromise . . . loves betrayed . . . lies excused . . ." Yet,
instead of acknowledging our complicity in the world’s evil, we
minimize our own faults and regard our sins as "small." Good Friday
puts the lie to that claim. If the Son of God had to suffer such a
horrible death, then our sins cannot have been "small." The
Cross reminds us that "our lives are measured," not by us or by our
peers, but "by whom we are created and called to be, and the measuring
is done by the One who creates and calls." Instead of glossing over our
sin with an understanding nod, the Cross renders "the verdict on the
gravity of our sin." Our unwillingness to see our sins as they
really are—that is, as God sees them—leads us to embrace another
falsehood: that is, that we can make things right. Even though our
culture is, in many respects, post-Christian, it still clings to the
idea of redemption. However, just as with our ideas about sin and
guilt, our ideas about redemption are pitiful and impoverished. On
Good Friday, God made it clear "that we are incapable of setting things
right." He made it clear by taking our place. On the Cross, "the Judge
of the guilty is Himself judged guilty." This is, of course, the great
scandal, one that paradoxically points to the great truth at the heart
of Good Friday. We are powerless to set things right, and only God, the
offended party, could undo the mess we created. The Cross—God’s
way of bearing witness to the truth about our condition—is as offensive
today as it was 2,000 years ago. Now, as then, we insist on
misinterpreting the events of that Friday afternoon, but to no avail.
Our sin has been judged, and God Himself bore the punishment. And that
is the truth about everything.
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Throw Grandma Under The Bus By Ann Coulter
Current mood: sleepy
Category: News and Politics
Original Article
Obama
gave a nice speech, except for everything he said about race. He
apparently believes we’re not talking enough about race. This is like
hearing Britney Spears say we’re not talking enough about pop-tarts
with substance-abuse problems. .. -->BEGIN_TEXT-->By now,
the country has spent more time talking about race than John Kerry has
talked about Vietnam, John McCain has talked about being a POW, John
Edwards has talked about his dead son, and Al Franken has talked about
his USO tours.  US
Democratic presidential candidate Senator Barack Obama (D-IL) speaks
during a campaign event at the National Constitution Center in
Philadelphia, Pennsylvania March 18, 2008. Obama criticized his
preacher for racially charged rhetoric but said he could not disown the
man who baptized his children and officiated at his wedding during the
speech about race and politics in America. REUTERS/Tim Shaffer (UNITED
STATES) US PRESIDENTIAL ELECTION CAMPAIGN 2008 (USA) But
the "post-racial candidate" thinks we need to talk yet more about race.
How much more? I had had my fill by around 1974. How long must we all
marinate in the angry resentment of black people? As an
authentic post-racial American, I will not patronize blacks by
pretending Obama’s pastor, Rev. Jeremiah Wright, is anything other than
a raving racist loon. If a white pastor had said what Rev. Wright said
-- not about black people, but literally, the exact same things -- I
think we’d notice that he’s crazier than Ward Churchill and David
Duke’s love child. (Indeed, both Churchill and the Rev. Wright referred
to the attacks of 9/11 as the chickens coming "home to roost.") Imagine
a white pastor saying: "Racism is the American way. Racism is how this
country was founded, and how this country is still run. ... We believe
in white supremacy and black inferiority. And believe it more than we
believe in God." Imagine a white pastor calling Condoleezza Rice, "Condoskeezza Rice." Imagine a white pastor saying: "No, no, no, God damn America -- that’s in the Bible for killing innocent people! God damn America for treating our citizens as less than human! God damn America for as long as she acts like she is God and she is supreme!" We
treat blacks like children, constantly talking about their temper
tantrums right in front of them with airy phrases about black anger. I
will not pat blacks on the head and say, "Isn’t that cute?" As a
post-racial American, I do not believe "the legacy of slavery" gives
black people the right to be permanently ill-mannered. Obama
tried to justify Wright’s deranged rants by explaining that "legalized
discrimination" is the "reality in which Rev. Wright and other
African-Americans of his generation grew up." He said that a "lack of
economic opportunity among black men, and the shame and frustration
that came from not being able to provide for one’s family, contributed
to the erosion of black families." That may accurately describe
the libretto of "Porgy and Bess," but it has no connection to reality.
By Rev. Wright’s own account, he was 12 years old and was attending an
integrated school in Philadelphia when Brown v. Board of Education was
announced, ending "separate but equal" schooling. Meanwhile, at
least since the Supreme Court’s decision in University of California v.
Bakke in 1978 -- and obviously long before that, or there wouldn’t have
been a case or controversy for the court to consider -- it has been
legal for the government to discriminate against whites on the basis of
their race. Consequently, any white person 30 years old or
younger has lived, since the day he was born, in an America where it is
legal to discriminate against white people. In many cases it’s not just
legal, but mandatory, for example, in education, in hiring and in
Academy Award nominations. So for half of Rev. Wright’s 66 years,
discrimination against blacks was legal -- though he never experienced
it personally because it existed in a part of the country where he did
not live. For the second half of Wright’s life, discrimination against
whites was legal throughout the land. Discrimination has become
so openly accepted that -- in a speech meant to tamp down his
association with a black racist -- Obama felt perfectly comfortable
throwing his white grandmother under the bus. He used her as the white
racist counterpart to his black racist "old uncle," Rev. Wright. First
of all, Wright is not Obama’s uncle. The only reason we indulge crazy
uncles is that everyone understands that people don’t choose their
relatives the way they choose, for example, their pastors and mentors.
No one quarrels with idea that you can’t be expected to publicly
denounce your blood relatives. But Wright is not a relative of
Obama’s at all. Yet Obama cravenly compared Wright’s racist invective
to his actual grandmother, who "once confessed her fear of black men
who passed by her on the street, and who on more than one occasion has
uttered racial or ethnic stereotypes that made me cringe." Rev.
Wright accuses white people of inventing AIDS to kill black men, but
Obama’s grandmother -- who raised him, cooked his food, tucked him in
at night, and paid for his clothes and books and private school -- has
expressed the same feelings about passing black men on the street that
Jesse Jackson has. Unlike his "old uncle" -- who is not his uncle
-- Obama had no excuses for his grandmother. Obama’s grandmother never
felt the lash of discrimination! Crazy grandma doesn’t get the same
pass as the crazy uncle; she’s white. Denounce the racist! Fine. Can we move on now? No,
of course, not. It never ends. To be fair, Obama hinted that we might
have one way out: If we elect him president, then maybe, just maybe, we
can stop talking about race.
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Saturday, March 15, 2008
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Deadly Trend By Chuck Colson
Category: Religion and Philosophy
Original ArticleSociologist
Stefan Timmerman has observed that "Humans in every society studied to
date are more likely to be murdered on the day they are born than on
any other day of their lives." Timmerman was quoted recently by
bioethicist Wesley J. Smith in the online publication To the Source. Smith
rightly claims that while infanticide was commonly accepted in ancient
times, only the Jews and the Christians actively opposed it. The
strength of their opposition paid off "when infanticide was outlawed by
Emperor Valentinian, a Christian, in the 4th century." So, as Western culture abandons its Christian roots, we ought not to be surprised that infanticide is making a comeback. Take
a look at what is already happening in the Netherlands. In 2004,
doctors from Groningen University Medical Center admitted to killing,
or "euthanizing," to use the euphemism, dying or profoundly disabled
babies. That practice came to be known as the Groningen Protocol. Under
those guidelines, not only are dying infants killed, but so are
disabled infants who do not even require intensive care. The criteria
for euthanizing a baby are subjective: Either the baby is judged to
have no chance of survival; may survive after intensive treatment but
with a grim future; or endures "suffering [that] is severe, sustained,
and cannot be alleviated." These criteria depend on the doctor’s whim. So much for the Hippocratic Oath. By
judging which life is valuable or not, doctors are doing precisely what
the Nazis did over 60 years ago. The Nazis even had a phrase for this,
which translated means "life not worth living"—and not because of the
individuals’ suffering, but because of their burden and cost to society. "As
the West loses some of its Biblical moral footing," writes Smith,
"there is a new effort to decriminalize infanticide." In fact, he
asserts, "the notion is ’positively trendy’." Most notably, of course,
is Princeton Professor Peter Singer who has advocated for some time
killing disabled infants. But he is not the only one. When the
Groningen Protocol was revealed, others began—not condemning it—but,
sadly enough, defending it. Smith noted a New York Times feature and a New England Journal of Medicine report, both giving credence and sympathy to Dutch infanticide proponents. And now the Hastings Center Report,
the most respected journal on bioethics, has published another
pro-Groningen Protocol article in which the authors not only "support
lethally injecting dying babies, but also those who are disabled." "The article assumes that guidelines will protect against abuse," writes Smith, but, as he points out, "infanticide is by definition abuse."
And, as Smith reminds readers, Dutch euthanasia guidelines for adults
and teens have been "violated for decades," so why should we expect
anything different with infanticide guidelines? "[W]e are moving
toward a medical system," says Smith, "in which babies are put down
like dogs and killing is redefined as a caring act." But this can
happen only in a society that has forgotten that every human life is
made in the image of God—and, therefore, worthy of protection. Think
worldviews do not matter? Think our Christian heritage is irrelevant?
Too bad we cannot ask the infants of Groningen what they think.
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Sunday, March 09, 2008
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I Have a Dream: No More Women Abused, Raped, or Murdered - By Doug Giles
Current mood: hungry
Original Article
I'd
like to see a nationwide tsunami of ladies equipped to the teeth with
the physical prowess and the firearm capability to kill any and all
would-be murderers and rapists should such a creeps ever accost them. I have a dream! 
Singer Britney Spears poses on the press line at the Scandinavian Style
Mansion party in Los Angeles in this Dec. 1, 2007 file photo. Britney
Spears' father and attorney John Eardley who claims to represent the
pop star, traded legal barbs Monday, Feb. 25, 2008, in an intensifying
fight over whether James Spears is violating his daughter's civil
rights by controlling her finances and life. (AP Photo/Dan Steinberg,
file)
A dream where girls walk in utter confidence amongst the masturbatory
me-monkeys that surround them. A dream where women have solid assurance
that they can and will serve some ham-fisted tool his own scrotum if
need be. I have a dream! A dream where instead of
reading about a cute college coed left dead and naked out in a vacant
lot or bloated and floating in a river, the story reads, "dead jack ass
found double-tapped and dead on the curb as his soul wings its way to
hell, all because he messed with the wrong mama." A dream
where it's normal for girls to know Jui Jitsu and mixed martial arts. A
dream where they can shoot golf ball sized groups with their .38 at
15ft. A dream where they have a BS detector that's so sensitive they
can read people and environments with godlike clarity within a
nanosecond. I have a dream! A dream where the Johan
van der Sloots and all the other Bobbie Cutts-like splooge brained
droogies in the midst of us live forever in fear. A dream where parents
will raise their daughters to be sweet and deadly dames. I
have a dream where if some douche bag in the name of his stupid
religion ever abuses his wife or daughter and God doesn't strike him
dead on the spot, that his wife or daughter will. Okay, maybe that's
too extreme. How about put him in an irreversible coma? I have a dream!
A dream where the tide turns in the news cycle and we start hearing
reports of molesting men going to an early grave instead of a good
girl. A dream where if a girl tells her buddies that a guy is bothering
her, her friends scare the living daylights out of him. Can I get a
witness? I have a dream where Christian parents will flush
this "turn the other cheek" stuff down the crapper once and for all
when it comes to their daughter being assaulted by an autoerotic mook
trying to work out his Silence of the Lambs fantasy in real time. I have a dream!
How did this dream come about? This holy vision came from God in direct
response to my prayers over the cultural nightmare women in the US live
with now, namely: • One rape or sexual assault occurring every two minutes • One violent crime occurring every five seconds • 172 women being physically and/or sexually assaulted every hour • 261,000 rapes and sexual assaults occurring in the US in 2006 • 2.8 percent of college women experiencing rape (according to a six-month US Department of Justice study) • 17 percent of rape or sexual assault victims being victimized by someone they knew • One murder occurring every 34 minutes
How do I know it was God who spawned this afflatus? It's was easy for
me to know it was Him because every time He speaks to me (and it's
quite often), it's always in a high-pitched, angry Chinese accent.
In addition to God birthing this vision within me, another factor gave
rise to this would-be dream world of mine: I just realized that
protective fathers, brothers, friends and bad-ass uncles aren't
omnipresent (I know . . . I'm slow. I went to public school), and
therefore all girls everywhere have to rely upon themselves as their
first line of defense. Yes, since their gallant male
counterparts can't be everywhere at all times to render aid, we've got
make certain that our babies know how to leave a bad guy severely
inoperative and, if need be, kill them all by their lonesome. That is
my definition of "girl power." This is my dream: all girls of every
conceivable stripe having the attitude, skill, and force to pulverize a
felonious punk. I'd like see the following: • One million girls flooding into martial art classes • One million girls getting handgun training • One million girls purchasing their own piece and getting licensed to carry it • One million girls getting a taser for the less egregious attacks (www.shieldher.com) • One million girls getting a heavy dose of common sense to avoid, as much as possible, dangerous scenarios This concludes my heavenly vision.
*Not only do I have a dream, I'm writing a book on the topic "How to
Keep Thugs and Bad Boys away from Daddy's Little Girl" (Thomas Nelson,
Nov. 2008).
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Currently
watching
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Air Force One
Release date: 10 February, 1998
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