Yukking it up about the insurance

Charlie Rose was interviewing three of Obama's speech writers. They were asked about some of the significant things they'd had a chance to say/write. One said, "If you like your insurance you can keep it," and hilarious laughter insued. Really? Do they have a clue about the pain and dollars Obamacare's lies have cost millions of Americans, and still there are over 25 million uninsured. Lovett looks like he is 12 years old, but he fooled millions. All three very young and lady-like.

 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Pkqn6wsrUfs

 

Busy with the bathroom wars

What I've always been

I’ve always been a CREATIONIST and I’ve always been PRO-LIFE. There were many years I didn’t know the HOW, but I’ve always understood the WHAT and WHO even as a very young child observing life around me (probably 3-4 years old).  There were 25 years between my baptism in 1950 and my recommitment/confirmation when I let go of God’s hand, but I never let go of those two beliefs.

I’ve always known CREATION has a purpose and LIFE has meaning, even when I was taught otherwise in school or church.  Whether CREATION took 6 days or 6 billion trillion years, makes no difference in my belief; both are equally marvelous.  Whether she is a is a zygote making a journey down a fallopian tube or a frail woman 105 years old in the nursing home bed who hasn’t spoken since she was 87 making a journey home to Jesus, I’ve always believed she is God’s creation and loved by God.

I’ve always known there was a rich and glorious life beyond what I could see, experience or understand, no matter if it was the vastness I saw in the night sky, or the pictures in the family encyclopedia with transparent drawings showing a baby’s development month by month in the womb.  I’ve always been a wise old woman, even when I was a child.

I’ve always cared about and loved God’s physical world--and wondered about the events and choices that moved lives and nations.  As a 5 year old I wondered why my grandmother was blind and my uncle was killed in the war.  And I still don’t know, but I know God does.  And until the past two decades or so, I thought caring was enough, because caring made me a “good” person.  Caring made me better than people who didn’t care as much as I do. Caring elevated me above the hoi polloi, the commoners, the great unwashed who didn‘t believe as I do.

In brief moments of extreme self-love, I even imagined I was more merciful and caring than God because I knew better how life should be ordered and what made sense and what didn’t!  At this age I know caring does nothing, so I will speak out when I am able to promote God‘s CREATION and LIFE. You can argue about candidates or fossil fuel with me, both were put here by God, but you won’t budge me on CREATION and LIFE.

Consequently, I won’t change what I believe about Man and Woman who were made in God’s image. Perhaps you are enamored by a current social or political movement and you care deeply and sincerely about this blip in time, but I care about history and the future.  Next year, next decade, maybe you’ll move on to yet another political cause-- legalizing polygamy or incest perhaps renamed to remove the stigma--but I’ll still be where I started, loving and respecting God’s CREATION and LIFE.

I believe God enjoys and delights in the sanctity of a life He created yesterday or 100 years ago. What I believe is not just who I am, but it is rooted outside myself in who God has revealed himself to be in his created Word spoken in the beginning, his written Word, in his Word Jesus Christ who came to us through the womb of a woman, in his Church on earth, and in all other forms of religions which don’t yet have his full revelation, but do grasp that Creation and Life are precious and holy.

This blog was originally published here on May 11, 2012

Feeling the Bern

This is how much Obama cares about children

                  

North Carolina's children's education just took a backseat to the LGBT agenda. Loretta Lynch and Barack Obama are threatening the state with government money withdrawal for education.  Perhaps you don't understand that changing the law is a decision for Congress, and that for 20 years the LGBT lobby has failed to do this.  Never mind.  Here comes the President, who can't put boots on the ground in Syria for fear of the Muslims, but can put men's butts in women's restrooms in our country to poke you in the eye.  What a brave man; who cares about the women and children. Remember in 2008 he was all for traditional marriage.  Then in 2012, the LGBT really went after him for his reelection and all of a sudden the dam broke. Now we not only have same sex marriage, we have business people being sued who don't want to participate, we have men being invited to use women's locker rooms and bathrooms and churches will be next. But it won't stop here; a P will be added to the acronym because why should age matter if nothing else does?

"Title VII prohibits private and public employers (including state governments) from discriminating on the basis of “race, color, religion, sex, and national origin.” Title IX prohibits federally funded educational institutions from discriminating on the basis of “sex.” Neither statute prohibits sexual-orientation or gender-identity discrimination. For more than 20 years, LGBT activists have sought to amend federal law through the so-called Employment Non-Discrimination Act, a bill that would essentially add sexual orientation and gender identity as protected classes within federal nondiscrimination law. For more than 20 years, LGBT activists have failed. ENDA hasn’t passed even when Democrats controlled the presidency and both houses of Congress."

http://www.creativeminorityreport.com/2016/05/the-reckless-and-ruthless-bullying-of.html

ADGD Attention Deficit Genealogy Disorder

 When I was a child I began looking through family Bibles at my grandparents. I determined that both my parents were seventh generation Americans, both Church of the Brethren, one German descended, the other Scots-Irish. That made me eighth. For maybe 30 years, if the subject ever came up, I said, "I'm eighth generation American."

Then I discovered genealogy using the Internet.  I joined a genealogy listserv for Church of the Brethren which was very helpful in determining maiden names and found surname websites and county histories. Then I found out about Cousin Dan Wenger who had a massive database of over 3,000 pages of my "closest" relatives.  I let my software manipulate my branches and found out I was 13th instead of 8th generation American.

Monday Memories--Mom's quilt plan for the grandchildren

I was looking for a small red ribbon to tie a little note my son had given me for Mother's Day (in a bottle), and the drawer in the sewing cabinet jammed.  When I finally got it open I found a plastic bag with floss and two hexagon cut embroidery pieces for a quilt on a very light weight white fabric--one for Ohio with cardinal and carnation, and the other North Carolina with cardinal and dogwood.  Each has the date they entered the union, Ohio in 1803, the 17th, and North Carolina which was 1789, the 12th of the original 13 colonies. It was a challenge to reconstruct this memory, but I finally remembered that my mother had brought them with her on a trip to Ohio because our daughter had been working on embroidery skills. I'm not sure, but I think it was Mom's plan to hand these out to the various grandchildren and then have them pieced into a quilt.  Great idea, but if the others didn't get any further than ours I don't think it ever came together.

This is her note for the correct colors for the pattern, sort of worse for the wear being 40 years in a plastic bag--but I would know that handwriting anywhere. Seeing her letters drop through the mail slot made my day for many years. These items hadn't been in the sewing cabinet 40 years, but a few months ago I had donated my "stash" to the Cancer resale store up the street, and probably decided to save these, and then immediately forgot them.

The pattern stamp had faded, so I couldn't scan them for this blog. I sorted through some google searches for "hexagon embroidery quilt patterns U.S. state birds", and actually did find one sample of a hexagon for Missouri, although the most common were squares.

Mom's note on the color strands

  

   

New federal rule on killing eagles--"There's a lot of good news here."

 

It's a good thing these birds are "protected."  I'd hate to think how many would be killed if they weren't. 

The Obama administration is revising a federal rule that allows wind-energy companies to operate high-speed turbines for up to 30 years, even if means killing or injuring thousands of federally protected bald and golden eagles.

Under the plan announced Wednesday, companies could kill or injure up to 4,200 bald eagles a year without penalty -- nearly four times the current limit. Golden eagles could only be killed if companies take steps to minimize the losses, for instance, by retrofitting power poles to reduce the risk of electrocution. (Fox News, May 4, 2016)

https://www.fws.gov/midwest/midwestbird/eaglepermits/bagepa.html 

 http://www.newsmax.com/Newsfront/US-Wind-Energy-Eagle-Deaths/2016/05/05/id/727407/

Views on women and gays

Obama's Bathroom Wars

We know the easy, sensible solution for the Obama ‪#‎bathroomwars‬ in which the federal government bullies the states, and it isn't sharing showers and toilet rooms. It's lockable single stall facilities which many facilities like historial and church buildings already have, if an over reaching federal government thinks it's a violation of the Constitution for a man with genital deformities not to shower with women. Yes, that's absurd, but that's what government lawyers are claiming. It's far cheaper than law suits, because we know how the feds play this game--it withdraws all federal support for schools, hurting the children. Now that won't stop the LGBT steamroller, because the goal isn't who uses which toilet, but at least it won't bankrupt the states and children won't be terrorized. No, it isn't about the potential of sexual assault either, as some have been led to believe--a child or woman can just as easily be sexually assaulted by a same sex predator as the opposite sex. It's a lot more common than what is reported.

 http://www.cnn.com/2016/05/09/politics/north-carolina-hb2-justice-department-deadline/

http://thehill.com/blogs/blog-briefing-room/news/279256-doj-files-lawsuit-against-north-carolina-over-bathroom-law

I'm not the only Evangelical without a party or candidate

"There is consternation about the hard line Trump takes on immigrants and about the morality of a thrice-married man who has long bragged about his sexual conquests. But another factor is at work as well: The traditional social and cultural positions that drive many religious conservative voters, including same-sex marriage and abortion, have been cast aside by a candidate who seems to have little interest in fighting the culture wars."

https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/theres-nobody-left-evangelicals-feel-abandoned-by-gop-after-trumps-ascent/2016/05/08/

"Heather Dreesman said thinking about the election in November makes her feel sick to her stomach. She said she now carries a sense of grief that the country is forsaking its values and feels anguish about what will happen. She would like to see a third-party candidate but doesn’t think it’s a real possibility — meaning she probably won’t vote.

“I hate to make this comparison,” she said. “I really do feel like in the future I would hate to look back and say, ‘I voted for Hitler.’ I feel like that may be what is happening if I vote for Trump.”"

Who benefits from revisionist history about the Crusades

Don't be put off by references to Catholicism in this video--that WAS Christianity at the time of the Crusades.  But even when I was learning world history as a child, we were being misinformed, and eventually lied to. Europe would have become totally Muslim if it had not been for Christians uniting and fighting Islam in formerly Christian territory in the middle east. Dan Brown's novels have convinced millions that Christians were the aggressors, when in fact, Islam came along 700 years after Jesus told his disciples to GO. They "converted" much of the middle east from Christianity to Islam, with the same methods ISIS uses today. President Clinton in 2001, continued that evil myth.  This 30 minute video may not get it all correct, but will help balance the ignorance and anti-Christian myths we've learned in the U.S.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ErybW9oJ3Cg

Dr. Paul Crawford, Crusade historian

Don't like this one bit

I like Trey Gowdy.  He'd be a fine Attorney General.  But I don't like at all that DonaldTrump has decided Hillary Clinton would be found guilty just because he appoints a certain Republican to be Attorney General.  Everything points to her guilt, but we do have a system of laws, and Trump isn't the guy to follow them. This gives Gowdy a bad name. He should turn it down.  I thought we were going to see Trump turn into someone more "presidential."  Isn't going to happen.

Greetings

A nice day.  Attended services at our son's church, Gender Road Christian Church, then had lunch with our children at a near by Bob Evans Restaurant.  And surprise, surprise.  Someone read my blog about wanting the new Bill Bennett book.  Also our daughter got us all connected to the internet so we can watch our cable programs from Columbus up at our cottage in Lakeside on my laptop and i-pad.  A busy day.

Why Obama gets the blame for the bathroom wars

 Someone (a liberal) was asking why Obama gets blamed for the bathroom wars--or, the butt stops there. It's his administration that has changed the rules by manipulating Title IX. A policy at Township High School District 211 that was mandated by the U.S. Department of Education to accommodate the transgender student, who was born male but identifies as a female. This violates all the other students in the school, and parents decided to sue. Good for them. You'll call them bigots of course, and keep the door on the bathroom in your house.

Title IX was intended to help women, not terrorize them. Before Title IX, few opportunities existed for female athletes and now 2.6 million are competing. But now transgendered men with more muscle mass, stronger hearts, different blood pressure and blood volume, and no menstrual cycles will be competing with real women. Showers and toilets aren't the goal, but neither are athletic competitions--they are just by-products. It's bullying and shaming in the worst manner--destroying women's natural modesty and sense of decency because some man is embarrassed by his same sex attraction so he gets breast implants, a vagina made out of a penis and hormone shots--with 37 trillion cells that are still male.

 http://deneenborelli.com/2016/05/n-c-house-were-not-going-to-get-bullied-by-the-obama-administration/

 http://dailysignal.com/2016/05/04/50-families-sue-over-illinois-high-schools-transgender-bathroom-policy/

Catholics in the CIA

"The United States is a country in which – with the recent exception of the Supreme Court – Catholics have never dominated the highest offices. Only one out of 44 US Presidents has been Catholic. The first and only Catholic Vice President is the current one, Joe Biden. Before John Kerry, the last Catholic Secretary of State was Alexander Haig, who left the post in 1982. Catholics are a rarity in other top positions such as Secretary of Defence.

By contrast, three out of the last five CIA directors have been Catholic: Michael Hayden, Leon Panetta, and the current director, John Brennan. Looking back, a number of Catholics led the agency in critical periods during the Cold War. (There were no Catholic directors in the 1990s.)

Some of the most influential directors in CIA history have been Catholic – men such as Walter Bedell Smith, John McCone, William Colby and William Casey. They were not just casual Catholics. They were devout Mass-goers – in many cases, members of groups like the Knights of Malta. The conspiracy theorists usually start there, with nefarious plots about the Vatican steering world affairs. Of course, they never ask why an all-powerful Vatican can’t engineer more Catholic presidents."

Why so strong in the CIA?  A possible explanation.

The Hillary Hacker

"In interviews from his federal jail cell this week (he was arrested in 2014 and extradited to the U.S. earlier this year), Guccifer claimed to have easily and repeatedly hacked Mrs. Clinton’s server. “It was like an open orchid on the Internet,” he told NBC News. “There were hundreds of folders.”

Clinton spokesman Brian Fallon went ballistic, claiming that no one should believe “the claims made by this criminal from his prison cell.” He pointed out that Guccifer offered no evidence, and said it was “unfathomable” that the hacker would have accessed Mrs. Clinton’s email and not leaked it. Maybe. Then again, Mr. Fallon has no idea what Guccifer did with his material or why, and the hacker can hardly prove anything from a stripped jail cell. . .

The Chinese are bright—even brighter than Romanian taxi drivers. They employ hackers whose only job is to infiltrate the U.S. government. Those hackers have supercomputers at their service. They have lists upon lists of relatives and friends and aides of powerful people. When they break into accounts, they don’t publicize it."

Hillary gets Guccifered

I wonder how this affects the campaign?

The future of Mother's Day

Photo from 1991.  Flowers from our patio today.

I'm enjoying seeing the mother stories as we near Mother's Day on Facebook. Just saw an amazing one about a mother who had been a missionary with babies in the bush and still reads her Bible in 6 languages every morning despite a debilitating disease, just to keep her mind sharp. 

I'm wondering how long posting or writing about mothers will be legal--it could be hate speech to say biology means something. After all, a transgender man/woman can't have a baby, at least until they get that womb transplant figured out so it works as well as the remodeled penis turned inside out to be a vagina. And even then s/he would have to borrow someone else's eggs. And what about those moms who decided to become men?  How do their children feel about this holiday made up to sell cards and flowers? Do they miss her soft chest and pleasant voice?

And some millennial in college won't be able to find a safe place because she had a bad mother, or mom won't extend her credit. Or maybe someone with 2 mothers will demand that they get two special days. Really, our "fundamentally transformed" society is moving so quickly, I really don't know what to expect next for holidays. Last year we never dreamed we'd have trouble finding a restroom for mom, yet here we are.

You didn't listen

Fortieth Day after Easter Sunday, Ascension Day

Ascension Day occurs ten days before Pentecost and it always falls on a Thursday. However, some churches, particularly in the United States, celebrate it on the following Sunday.*

"The observance of this feast is of great antiquity. Although no documentary evidence of it exists prior to the beginning of the fifth century, St. Augustine says that it is of Apostolic origin, and he speaks of it in a way that shows it was the universal observance of the Church long before his time. Frequent mention of it is made in the writings of St. John Chrysostom, St. Gregory of Nyssa, and in the Constitution of the Apostles. The Pilgrimage of Sylvia (Peregrinatio Etheriae) speaks of the vigil of this feast and of the feast itself, as they were kept in the church built over the grotto in Bethlehem in which Christ was born (Duchesne, Christian Worship, 491-515). It may be that prior to the fifth century the fact narrated in the Gospels was commemorated in conjunction with the feast of Easter or Pentecost. Some believe that the much-disputed forty-third decree of the Council of Elvira (c. 300) condemning the practice of observing a feast on the fortieth day after Easter and neglecting to keep Pentecost on the fiftieth day, implies that the proper usage of the time was to commemorate the Ascension along with Pentecost. Representations of the mystery are found in diptychs and frescoes dating as early as the fifth century." (Catholic Encyclopedia)

I watched this observance on Canadian TV.  I believe the President of the network is the priest. 
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g_hV5_oJ8uo
  This service includes "spiritual communion."

It takes a long time for a Protestant (at least for me) to become accustomed to a Catholic mass because all the focus is on the Bible readings and on Jesus, instead of the preacher's sermon (brief) or the music style. However, there is more continuity among these services all over the world than those in our Lutheran church in one location.

*I also watched the Sydney, Australia and Toronto mass. They apparently will be celebrating this on May 8.

Let's Pretend you had Target rules in your house

           

Let's pretend you are a progressive.  You have no problem with the new bathroom/toilet wars, and you think those who do have a sense of modesty are bigots and hateful, because it's OK to make 99.9% of the population feel uncomfortable so .1% can continue in a fantasy.

Let's pretend when I come to your house to play cards, and there's no door on the bathroom, but also no sexual predators, and you call me weird for feeling uncomfortable.

Let's pretend your adolescent daughter isn't comfortable with your naked boyfriend lounging in front of the TV, and he complains she's a prude for her sense of modesty.

Let's pretend your son has a very small penis and the other boys make fun of him in the shower room.  You tell the P.E. teacher to send him to the girls' shower because you believe he would feel better about himself there and the girls will just have to get over it. And of course, girls would never tease a boy about the size of his penis, right?

Let's pretend you invite visiting relatives in town for a church conference to spend the night at your home. There is no guest bathroom for them to use, but you tell them, just walk through the master bedroom and ignore your husband who likes to sleep in the nude. And don't worry about the sleepwalking.

Let's pretend you're at a crowded venue--maybe a rock concert.  Lots of beer flowing and some other unsavory stuff. The management has put up outdoor toilets stalls with no doors, open to all where people can get rid of the beer, and the occasional undigested pizza because there are too few stalls in the ladies room, plus now they are open to men anyway. The guys are too potted to even be dangerous so why are you so narrow minded, you're asked.

Thursday thoughts

The reason it's called "Adam's sin" and not Eve's or the Sin of Adam and Eve is because of headship and leadership. IMO. He got the instructions before she was even created, then stood around and watched what happened when Satan showed up.
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Here's how you spell third party. R-O-S-S   P-E-R-O-T. He was so successful he put Bill Clinton in the White House. I think it was 19% of the vote he took from Bush.
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The April 5 JAMA is filled with praise and hymns to Obamacare, noting of course, all the changes and reforms that are needed, assuming those mean old, greedy, haters cooperate. Ezekiel Emanuel, MD, one of the ACA architects, has an article (Rahm's brother). Had you heard there are still 25.3 million eligible "residents" (in other words, he's including non-citizens) without insurance? And of course, it's the fault of those states that wouldn't bankrupt themselves by expanding Medicaid. He flat out lies about the costs going down. Elsewhere in the issue there is a chart that shows the rate of increase in healthcare costs fell more under Bush than Obama, and it has now spiked again. Sloppy editor must have not caught that.
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I'd never heard of Larry Wilmore, the comedian at the White House Correspondents Dinner, who threw around the N word, but they are all liberal and all laughed, even the President. So coarseness certainly was acceptable before The Donald's appearance on the political scene. And fulfilling their role, the media are explaining to all of us in fly over country who would get fired or ostracized for the same speech, that it's really OK.
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I can think of at least three Catholic universities that should stop calling themselves Catholic. We don't call Harvard and Yale Christian colleges any longer; same with Marquette, Notre Dame and Georgetown and probably many others.
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Fox News and the Fox talkers have been 24/7 trumpeting Trump; I had enough and am desperate enough to watch PBS and QVC.
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"Of all the disheartening signs of the utter ignorance of so many American college students, nothing so completely disheartened me as seeing on television a black college student who did not know what the Civil War was about. Fifty years ago, it would have been virtually impossible to find a black adult, with even an elementary school education, who did not know what the Civil War was about." Thomas Sowell, May 3, 2016

A Democrat friend asked if I would vote for Trump

This is not the friend, but could be.  1957 class picnic

My earliest thought was he was a decoy to get Hillary elected. Then as the populist thing got going, he began to believe he could do it. He would say awful, cruel things, tell lies and people would cheer. He may still be the decoy of your team, and at this point it doesn’t matter. He’s not pro-life, he’s not free trade, he’s not anything conservatives have wanted and complained that Obama wasn’t. He’s big government, a huge (YUGE) statist, just like Hillary and Obama. He just rattles off all the things as president he will do, and with Obama as his example of the terror and power of the executive branch, who’s to say he’s wrong. We’ve been living with it for 7.5 years. Orange is the new black. No, I don’t intend to vote for him, I have no party, but I have a conscience.

You’ve always been straight line loyal to your party even if it was awful. If gay marriage, and the Planned Parenthood baby parts scandal didn’t convince you, sharing a bathroom with men won’t bother you. If blowing up the student loan debt doesn’t remind you of 2007, who am I to say, Look out, here it comes again. If the plans to get all those criminals out of prison and back on the streets to undo all the good of the Omnibus Crime Bill of Clinton One, then let the violence soar. If ISIS doesn’t scare you, well, we’re old and have no grandchildren. Not me. I’ve never been a party girl. But now there’s no place to go.

I’ll still vote for best of show in local and state, and that usually is Republican, but not always. Our conservative suburb is becoming more and more Democrat with each election. There were plenty of times I didn’t choose either and left the slot blank. And no, I wasn’t a “Cruzer,” all my choices (Walker and Jindal) left long ago. Loved Fiorina, but she never had a chance, no wealth or power—women have to have coat tails in this country. You remember how they crucified Palin because she was just an ordinary person who chose not to abort. But Cruz is loyal to constitutional principles, which is why he was so hated by Boehner and other Republicans who just wanted to be in DC, go to the parties, fly around the world to meetings and support anything they could throw money at.

But it was all an accident

Researchers at Indiana University have combined scaling laws with a model of biodiversity to produce a new estimate of the number of microbial species on Earth: somewhere between 100 billion and 1 trillion. (The Scientist, May 4). And at the other end, Hubble reveals an estimated 100 billion galaxies in the universe or so, but this number is likely to increase to about 200 billion as telescope technology in space improves. Minor league stuff--the human body may have 37.2 trillion cells--depends on who is counting--and each cell has a sex--male or female. But hey, it's all an accident, it all evolved. No thought or design.

Welfare for all, even the rich

"As the Democrats, every day, become the party of socialism, Hillary is promising a $15 minimum wage, a lifetime of unemployment insurance, and free health care if people’s jobs get shipped overseas for some unknown reason. She promises an expansion of an already bankrupt Social Security system. She promises more federal money for public schools, a bailout for student loan debt, expanding Obamacare to 12 million illegal immigrants, but she’s not done there.

Welfare isn’t just for people. She also promises to continue Obama’s programs of corporate welfare and cronyism, with hundreds of billions of dollars, your dollars going to fund green energy schemes and companies, while driving the coal and oil industries out of business. . .

She is also the warmonger-in-chief. . . That seems strange, a Democrat. But she has supported or directed using the U.S. military to intervene in every circumstance and at every turn, killing thousands of innocent civilians along the way. Led by her policies, America is now active in 160 countries worldwide. I believe we have military operations in more countries than ever before in our — in our country’s history."

Glenn Beck on the Clinton presidency, and he has some words for the Republicans, too.

For indecisive voters

For all you wishy washy Democrats who thought possibly you could cross over because you hated Hillary so much and you Republican  fence sitters thinking you could support Kasich if he ran because he was such a nice guy, said such sensible things and didn't say any of that negative stuff--I think we've seen him today for what he is. A tool. Stayed in just long enough to insure that Trump would be the candidate.

 

Trump is a wild card--an alternative view for pro-lifers

"Even if the candidate of the Left were winsome and squeaky clean, an Administration of the Left would be unrelenting in its war to make Catholic institutions fund abortions and contraceptives and recede from any moral objections to same-sex marriage.

We would see an extension of the same drive to detach Executive orders ever more from the statutes that supply, at once, their authority – and their limits. A “rule of law,” now teetering at the very edge, would pass well over that edge, not merely disfranchising us, but diminishing us all.

Mr. Trump is a wild card, but he is likely to sign pro-life measures, and he is seeking advice now from the right people to appoint a plausible successor to Justice Scalia. In this Guide for the Perplexed, we may find reason to bite our lips and take the Wild Card over the brutal Sure Thing on the other side."  Hadley Arkes

We all lost in Indiana

Elections have consequences. In 2008 there were many black and white Republicans who crossed over and voted for Obama, thinking, "Finally, we can put racial hatred and animosity behind us." Ha! It's never been worse in my life time and now we have the marriage and bathroom wars. And in 2012, there were so many self-righteous Christians who sat it out because they didn't want to vote for a Mormon. So we've finally come to the day I thought would never happen. (Last night my son reminded me of all the times I lectured him on voting.) I will not vote for a misogynist, narcissistic, pro-choice, buffoon who feeds on fear of immigrants and "others" and makes promises even more vague than Hope and Change. I've believed all along he was a decoy to get Hillary elected, so my vote won't matter, but my conscience will be clear.

I'm with Ilya Somin who is an immigrant (USSR), a professor at the George Mason University School of Law, an adjunct scholar at the Cato Institute, a blogger for the Volokh Conspiracy, a libertarian, author, and daddy of a darling baby girl . He wrote a book titled Democracy and Political Ignorance: Why Smaller Government is Smarter. Maybe now he can write one on how we threw it all away.

"A great evil has come to pass tonight. The GOP has taken a big step towards becoming ...a US version of the National Front. I have never had much confidence in voters. But, in 2016, even the little I had has proven to be excessive. Still, I am as ‪#‎NeverTrump‬ as ever, and the fight against him must continue by any and all available means. 

It is a dark time in American politics, the darkest in my lifetime (and not solely because of Trump). But they also serve who work to keep evil times from getting even worse." (FB post)

 "The followers of Donald Trump did not act like Republicans, did not act like Christians and did not act like Americans. They acted like a pack of dogs looking to kill anything that was good and right about our country and our freedoms. Donald Trump legitimized their hatred and they let it show on a daily basis." http://thecommontruth.net/.../-freedom-died-today-05032016

EATING IN THE FIFTIES

• Pasta had not been invented. It was macaroni, noodles or spaghetti.
• Curry was a surname.
• A take-away was a mathematical problem.
• Pizza? Sounds like a leaning tower somewhere.
• Oranges only appeared at Christmas time.
• All chips were plain.
• Oil was for lubricating, fat was for cooking.
• Tea was made in a teapot using tea leaves and never green.
• Cubed sugar was regarded as posh.
• Chickens didn't have fingers in those days.
• None of us had ever heard of yogurt.
• Healthy food consisted of anything edible.
• Cooking outside was called camping.
• Seaweed was not a recognized food.
• 'Kebab' was not even a word, never mind a food.
• Sugar enjoyed a good press in those days, and was regarded as being white gold.
• Prunes were medicinal.
• Surprisingly muesli was readily available. It was called cattle feed.
• Pineapples came in chunks in a tin; we had only seen a picture of a real one.
• Water came out of the tap. If someone had suggested bottling it and charging more than gasoline for it, they would have become a laughing stock.
• The one thing that we never ever had on/at our table in the fifties...was elbows, hats and cell phones!