An estimated 123 people were shot and killed over the summer. That’s nearly double the number of soldiers killed in Iraq over the same time period.
Waiting for Obama to call for the troops police to pull out. It’s lost, right?
I’ll lead off with that oxymoron for a post title and just point you to Eric Posner’s collection of quotes from the Times’ editorial staff on how the surge had failed, was failing, and would continue to fail, followed by the Times’ headline noting victory in Anbar province. These huge milestones don’t just happen overnight.
An event occurred last August that hasn’t happened since 1913, almost 100 years ago.
The sun has reached a milestone not seen for nearly 100 years: an entire month has passed without a single visible sunspot being noted.
The event is significant as many climatologists now believe solar magnetic activity – which determines the number of sunspots — is an influencing factor for climate on earth.
And how would this lack of sunspots influence Earth’s climate?
In the past 1000 years, three previous such events — the Dalton, Maunder, and Spörer Minimums, have all led to rapid cooling. One was large enough to be called a “mini ice age”. For a society dependent on agriculture, cold is more damaging than heat. The growing season shortens, yields drop, and the occurrence of crop-destroying frosts increases.
The only thing worse for mankind than global warming is global cooling, if you want to look at it that way. And it looks like we could be in for quite the cold snap.
The rest of the article is worth a read. It includes charts showing sunspot activity since the year 1600 that seem to correlate with global temperatures (including a dip during the 1970s when global cooling was the cry of the scientists).
Amid Labor Day festivities and (if you read the blogs) Palin kerfuffles, something dramatic happened on the Iraqi front.
The U.S. military has handed over security control of the western province of Anbar to Iraqi forces.
The province was once a hotbed of the Sunni Arab insurgency, and the scene of some of the bloodiest battles of the Iraq war.
The handover marks a major milestone in America’s strategy of turning security over to the Iraqis so U.S. troops can eventually go home.
In the ceremony Monday in the provincial capital of Ramadi, the top American commander in Anbar, Marine Maj. Gen. John Kelly, said Al Qaeda has not been entirely defeated in Anbar. But he said, “their end is near.”
As Glenn Reynolds notes, a book he just got in the mail, “Losing Hurts Twice as Bad: The Four Stages to Moving Beyond Iraq”, was probably pitched before the surge. Now it’s just an embarrassment.
I read this post on the TalkLeft blog by “Big Tent Democrat” last Sunday. It’s regarding the issues surrounding Sarah Palin’s reassigning of Public Safety Commissioner Walt Monegan, allegedly because he wouldn’t fire Palen’s sister’s estranged husband. BTD takes fellow liberal blogger Josh Marshall to task for his coverage of the issue, specifically over the fact that Marshall seems to take all the accusations against Palin at face value (guilty until proven innocent) and Marshall’s contention that this kerfuffle may hurt Palin politically.
For starters, the Left seems to see this entirely in a political lens. BTD notes:
Let’s face it, Marshall’s interest, and everybody’s for that matter, is almost entirely based on the political implications of this story. And here is what Marshall is missing – the story is likely to have little political implications for Sarah Palin. And if there are any, they are likely to be positive.
Quite an honest admission from BTD, who reiterates this point at the end of the post. Not mentioned in this post or Marshall’s is that, while there has been an investigation opened into this, Palin hasn’t been subpoenaed — because she’s been so forthcoming! This is another example of what I’ve noted before; Palin seems to be the kind of politician everybody says they’d like and wish there were more of. And indeed this corruption-fighting, cooperative governor enjoys 80%+ approval from her constituents.
But Big Tent Democrat goes over the accusations and the facts of the case and find no “there” there, which to me is the larger point. So many on the left smell blood in the water, because it’s all political. In the meantime, there’s no credit given for the unusual openness shown by Palin simply because she’s of the wrong party.
Hey liberals. You’re watching the movie “Mr. Smith Goes to Washington” and booing Jimmy Stewart (in a brilliant disguise).
UPDATE: John Hinderaker at PowerLine notes that the NY Times called itself “squeamish” about covering the John Edwards “love child” story, and had to (in their words) devote more time to the “big issues facing the country”. But today, they had 3(!) front page stories on Bristol Palin.
Times’ Public Editor Clark Hoyt said of the Edwards coverage, “I do not think liberal bias had anything to do with it.” I’m sure he said it with a straight face, too.
A commenter recently noted that there was a tape of Sarah Palen supporting Ted Steven’s pork project nicknames “The Bridge to Nowhere”. A writer on a local group blog, “Peach Pundit” says she was for it before she was against it. As one of their commenters notes, she was for state funding if the state wanted, and her speech in Dayton confirmed that.
Yesterday, before McCain’s VP announcement, the Democracy Project blog put put their top 10 reasons why she should be VP. Definitely worth a look. My favorites ones are 9, 7, 5 and 2, but read the whole list.
Not Romney, Pawlenty, and not Lieberman. John McCain has made either party choice in November a historic one by choosing Gov. Sarah Palin of Alaska as his running mate. This is so big, the Drudge Report website is overwhelmed with readers (I can’t get a link in edgewise).
Aside from the obvious appeal to history, and the disenchanted Clinton voters, Palin brings experience. “Experience?”, you may say, “She’s not even been governor a full 2 years.” Indeed, but that’s 2 years more executive branch experience that the other 3 candidates — Obama, Biden and McCain — combined. Prior to that (via Wikipedia):
The Wikipedia article has much more about her that I find absolutely excellent. Great job, Senator McCain.
The Catholic church has had to correct the thinking of some Democrats in the past in reference to the church’s position on abortion. (Well, they’ve spoken out in the past; there’s no evidence yet that the actual thinking was corrected.) Most recently, the Speaker of the House herself has come under fire for misrepresenting Church teaching in order to buttress her own views.
Politics can be treacherous. But House Speaker Nancy Pelosi walked on even riskier ground in a recent TV interview when she attempted a theological defense of her support for abortion rights.
Roman Catholic bishops consider her arguments on St. Augustine and free will so far out of line with church teaching that they have issued a steady stream of statements to correct her.
The latest came Wednesday from Pittsburgh Bishop David Zubik, who said Pelosi, D-Calif., “stepped out of her political role and completely misrepresented the teaching of the Catholic Church in regard to abortion.”
It has been a harsh week of rebuke for the Democratic congresswoman, a Catholic school graduate who repeatedly has expressed pride in and love for her religious heritage.
Enough “pride” and “love” for her to, y’know, accept her Church’s teaching? Apparently not. The “steady stream” of corrections don’t seem to do much. More below the fold…
In pictures taken or made by both adoring fans and by the press, Barack Obama keeps getting the heavenly, messianic treatment. Check out this blog that highlights all sorts of examples. And see here for a few others. Covering enthusiasm is one thing; framing the shot it another.
But it looks like the guy’s starting to cater to this feeling by giving his acceptance speech in a mock-up of a Greek temple.
Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama‘s big speech on Thursday night will be delivered from an elaborate columned stage resembling a miniature Greek temple.
The stage, similar to structures used for rock concerts, has been set up at the 50-yard-line, the midpoint of Invesco Field, the stadium where the Denver Broncos’ National Football League team plays.
Some 80,000 supporters will see Obama appear from between plywood columns painted off-white, reminiscent of Washington’s Capitol building or even the White House, to accept the party’s nomination for president.
He will stride out to a raised platform to a podium that can be raised from beneath the floor.
The show should provide a striking image for the millions of Americans watching on television as Obama delivers a speech accepting the Democratic presidential nomination.
(Click here for a picture.)
The keyword here is “image”. Granted, both parties manage the image of their candidates; perception is too often reality for many folks and the parties play to this. But this is simply way over the top, and McCain’s ad about Obama’s celebrity starts to ring truer and truer. The whole Adonis imagery he’s playing to is indicative of a guy who is drunk on his own Kool-Aid.
After this, you can’t say that messianic imagery is simply foist upon Mr. Obama by his fans. He’s participating in it and encouraging it. And now we know why he chose Invesco Field; the convention center was too small for his head.
Poverty, as Glenn Beck notes, is an issue that unites us all, at least on the surface. It’s not a political condition, he says; it’s a human condition.
According to the U.S. Census Bureau, nearly a third of the residents in those cities [Detroit, Michigan and Buffalo, New York] are living beneath the poverty line, the highest rates among large cities in the entire country.
No matter what side of the political aisle you’re on, that is nothing short of appalling. Yet if you ask people what we should do about it, you’ll probably hear answers that inexplicably break down right along party lines.
Indeed. Instead, we should see what works and do it. Additionally, we should see what doesn’t work and stop doing it. I mean, if providing the same solution for decades hasn’t helped, it’s time for a radically different answer.
But as Glenn observes, there are some places that will stick with their solution through thick and thin (and failure).
I was talking with an old buddy of mine about a political topic last night (whether allowing China to keep its MFN trade status with us has helped or hurt Chinese Christians) when he told me that didn’t care one way or the other how our government interacted with their government (I’m paraphrasing) because God is bigger than any government and that He will work His will in that country regardless.
I was a little disconcerted about this, since I believe that we can and do have a part to play in the world as Christians, including the political sphere. My friend then got a little more specific. For him, politics was just not something he was gifted or interested in. He had relatives who were very politically inclined, and he’d had a number of conversations with them where they suggested that he needed to be more informed and involved. His point to me was this: There are those who are interested and gifted regarding politics just like any other ability (encouragement, teaching, etc.). For those that are gifted (and all these gifts come from God), they should get involved and active. It would be a misuse of their talents not to. For he and others who are not gifted in this area, it would be a waste of time to try to fit in where God had not intended them to.
I suggested that perhaps saying that everyone should follow politics is like saying that everyone should be a missionary. As high a calling as missionary might be, if God’s not made you for that, there is an even higher calling that He has you for. (Perhaps, policy wonk?)
We were at the church working with a professional sound technician who was helping us get more out of the system we have, so our conversation was done at that point as we got back into that subject. That was last night, and I’ve had some more time to consider that conversation today. Here are some additional thoughts I’ve had.
In California, the First Amendment is subordinate to the whims of the judges. The Associated Press reports:
California’s highest court on Monday barred doctors from invoking their religious beliefs as a reason to deny treatment to gays and lesbians, ruling that state law prohibiting sexual orientation discrimination extends to the medical profession.
What "treatment" was denied? How was care withheld, as the AP headline claims?
Justice Joyce Kennard wrote that two Christian fertility doctors who refused to artificially inseminate a lesbian have neither a free speech right nor a religious exemption from the state’s law, which "imposes on business establishments certain antidiscrimination obligations."
In the lawsuit that led to the ruling, Guadalupe Benitez, 36, of Oceanside said that the doctors treated her with fertility drugs and instructed her how to inseminate herself at home but told her their beliefs prevented them from inseminating her. One of the doctors referred her to another fertility specialist without moral objections, and Benitez has since given birth to three children.
Nevertheless, Benitez in 2001 sued the Vista-based North Coast Women’s Care Medical Group. She and her lawyers successfully argued that a state law prohibiting businesses from discriminating based on sexual orientation applies to doctors.
So what we’re really talking about here is an elective procedure, not "care" nor "treatment" of some condition. And the doctors did everything up to the point where their religious convictions wouldn’t let them continue. Even then, they instructed Benitez how to do it herself.
A detail you won’t find here but is brought up in the WorldNetDaily coverage, the case was dismissed when it was originally brought, but liberal Californians can be certain that, no matter the obstacles, their Supreme Court can be counted on to come through.
But don’t doctors have constitutional rights, too? Well the California Medial Association used to think so, but they changed their tune "after receiving a barrage of criticism from the gay-rights community." We have the bullying tactics of the "tolerant" Left connect with the political correctness of the medical community, with the result being a trampling of the Constitution.
This is what passes for the imprudent "jurisprudence" we find on the Left Coast. This almost calls for a Constitutional amendment, except we already have one and it doesn’t seem to be working.
[tags]California Supreme Court,Constitution,homosexuality,First Amendment,religious rights,Douglas Fenton,Christine Brody,Guadalupe Benitez[/tags]
Don’t know how it got there, but this song was going through my mind this weekend, so I thought I’d plant it in yours as well. :) Video’s OK, but it’s the music that I’m really passing along.
In the continuing study of John 15, we came to verse 2 today.
He cuts off every branch in me that bears no fruit, while every branch that does bear fruit he prunes so that it will be even more fruitful.
Among the points, noting that God the Father does make the tough calls and cuts off those branches not producing and pruning those that do, is the question of what is spiritual fruit?
First, fruit is Christ-like character, and here we see a parallel with Paul’s list of the fruits of the Spirit from Galatians. And later on in John 15, Jesus talks about how one of these fruits comes about.
As the Father has loved me, so have I loved you. Now remain in my love. If you obey my commands, you will remain in my love, just as I have obeyed my Father’s commands and remain in his love. I have told you this so that my joy may be in you and that your joy may be complete.
Our joy is complete when we follow Jesus’ example of following his commands.
Secondly, fruit is answers to prayer. Again, John 15 points to this.
If you remain in me and my words remain in you, ask whatever you wish, and it will be given you. This is to my Father’s glory, that you bear much fruit, showing yourselves to be my disciples.
Thirdly, fruit is soul-winning. Earlier in John, chapter 4, Jesus describes what doing his Father’s work entails; bring other to know Him.
"My food," said Jesus, "is to do the will of him who sent me and to finish his work. Do you not say, ‘Four months more and then the harvest’? I tell you, open your eyes and look at the fields! They are ripe for harvest. Even now the reaper draws his wages, even now he harvests the crop for eternal life, so that the sower and the reaper may be glad together. Thus the saying ‘One sows and another reaps’ is true. I sent you to reap what you have not worked for. Others have done the hard work, and you have reaped the benefits of their labor."
We don’t all perform the same task each time; sometimes planting the seed, sometimes watering it, sometimes reaping the harvest. But we should be laborers with Christ as part of the fruit He wants to see in us.
The gardener’s cutting and pruning are done because he wants a return on his investment, and because he wants the branches to flourish. That is what God the Father wants from us; flourishing. His correction is meant to bring that about.
[tags]sermon notes,Gospel of John,Christianity,fruit of the Spirit[/tags]
