The tapes of what else happened on January 6

 Tucker Carlson is drawing a lot of fire from both the GOP entrenched leaders, the Democrats who wanted to lynch Trump, and the Leftist Media, not to mention the hateful women on the View.  Why?  He showed more detail of the January 6 riots.  People armed with American flags walking around with police who didn't seem alarmed.  

The link between periodontal disease and arthritis

 They are now connecting the dots.  It was known there was a connection, but which came first?

"For many years, there had been suggestions that the oral bacteria causing periodontal disease might contribute to rheumatoid arthritis. For instance, past studies have found that periodontal disease occurs even more often in people with rheumatoid arthritis. People with both conditions also tend to have more severe arthritic symptoms that can be more stubbornly resistant to treatment.

What’s been missing is the precise underlying mechanisms to confirm the connection. To help connect the dots, a research team, which included Dana Orange, Rockefeller University, New York, NY, and William Robinson, Stanford University, Stanford, CA, decided to look closer."

Connecting the Dots: Oral Infection to Rheumatoid Arthritis – NIH Director's Blog

I had gum surgery for periodontal disease about 45 years ago.  I think I also had surgery for a frenectomy at the same time (removal of labial frenulum between front teeth).  Very painful.  Don't let them tell you it's no big deal. Anyway, until recently I've had no pain in my fingers.  Some in left hand now--don't know if it's arthritis or just old age.

Makes me want to leave the computer an floss.  

I've got a cold

So, on Sunday morning I realized I had a scratchy throat, my usual sign of a cold coming on, and I stayed home from church and took a nap. (I've since watched Joe's sermon on the Parable of the Sower at our on-line site).  My son-in-law brought me some Zicam rapidmelts, an OTC homeopathic cold remedy. Instead of a 3 day lead up to stuffy head and coughing and sneezing, I had only one day. My colds are usually 2.5 to 3 weeks--let's see how this turns out. What's been your experience?

My last cold was probably July 2022 at Lakeside, a first since the Covid lockdown, which did protect many from colds and flu according to the articles I read, but then they returned with a vengeance. That one was at least 2-3 weeks before I felt comfortable being in public and not wearing a mask. Both times, to be on the safe side, I did the Covid test and it was negative.

Adults get approximately two to three colds per year, and young children who go to elementary school or kindergarten have an average of around five to eight colds per year. When my children were in elementary school our family would have about 10 colds per year (one year we were in a study which is how I remember). Bob had fewer colds than the rest of us--being out of the house more probably protected him, because we were a little cesspool of germs on Abington Road.

We had been to a wonderful concert Saturday evening, so I did call my friend Lynn I'd been chatting with closely and suggested a heads up for whatever she takes to stay healthy.  She's had so many health problems with cancer and heart the last 4 years, I didn't want her to be unsafe, since I assume I was infectious before I had any symptoms.

Dr. Zhivago redux

Flipping through the channels today I came across the Dr. Zhivago movie, 1965. It's 3 hours, but 30 minutes of scenes of Russia's Civil War, WWI, Bolsheviks and Communist regime I was reminded of the current battles in Ukraine killing thousands more Russians just as in the early decades of 20th century. It was too much. Some of the script reminded me of the lies of today's Leftists. Hollow and deadly. Anyway, it was so depressing while they were losing their home and being destroyed by the Communists, I switched to HGTV for "reality."

Once upon a time there were two presidents

President Donald Trump froze travel from China as too risky when a city with a SARS lab showed an unusual uptick in deaths. Nancy Pelosi and other leftists called him a racist.

President Barack Obama froze funding (both federal and private) of gain of function research in the U.S. as too risky. But someone at NIH found a way to fund it in China.

So which President is the racist with the most damage to the Chinese people as a result of his executive action?

Doing Diligence to Assess the Risks and Benefits of Life Sciences Gain-of-Function Research | whitehouse.gov (archives.gov)

Biden ‘Believes’ Gain-Of-Function Research Is Necessary To Stop Future Pandemics, Kirby Says | The Daily Caller

CPAC now meets all over the world.

https://youtu.be/8Oim0ZzKhnI Nigel Farage speaks at CPAC about how because of Covid we English speaking countries gave unlimited power to governments, giving up freedoms it took centuries to develop. Don't let it happen again, he says.

Ukrainians and Russians side by side in UAE

A new restaurant in Dubai offers Ukrainian expats a taste of home : NPR

Fashion isn't as important as a taste of home.

"She's dining at Yoy with Iryna Klevetenko, from Kyiv. Both women have been living in the United Arab Emirates for several years. They're enjoying borsch on Yoy's outdoor terrace overlooking a dancing fountain and the landmark Atlantis resort hotel.

Klevetenko says the bling and luxury of Dubai feel surreal as she grapples with horrors of news from the war in her country. The war changed her priorities.

"Before, you were, like, I want Dolce and Gabbana bag," she said. "Now it's like, who cares about Dolce and Gabbana bag. We just want war to finish, that's it.""

Speaking of inflation

Tonight, I was sorting through old bills--really old--like over 60 year old invoices and cancelled checks. Fuel oil, lumber, paint, furniture, taxes, insurance. Then I came across a cancelled check for a restaurant dated Sept. 11, 1961, our first anniversary. I remember it well. I was 8.5 months pregnant and could barely sit close enough to the table to eat. I was wearing my one nice outfit, a light brown 2 piece with a white fluffy blouse. But the check was for $7.00. I thought that couldn't be right, so I ran it through an inflation calculator (Federal Reserve). $7.00 in 1961 came to $70.04 in 2023, for 900.4% inflation. To double check I used a U.S. CPI inflation calculator, but it wouldn't do March 2023, so I had to use December 2022, which was $69.25.  Close enough.

My new log book for exercise

 My Strength and My Shield: A Realtree™ Journal by Ellie Claire | Goodreads

This is a cute little journal in a camo style with inspirational messages inside. My old exercise journal has no design or flair and I think I bought it in Spain at a "dollar store" run by foreigners.  The Spanish just call them "the China store," instead of Dollar Tree.  That one is dated September 5, 2018, with about 6,500 miles ending with about 15,500.  I think my first one was around January 1, 2015. My new one is made by Ellie Claire Gift and paper Expressions c2016. I bought it at Marc's for maybe a dollar or $1.49, but you can find it at Thrift store sites on the internet for about $5.00.

At first when checking this journal I found a page for Ella Claire, who had a blog, recipes, poems, etc.  Not the same person.  There is also a St. Ella Claire and she's not it either.  

Why the lab leak theory is being reported now

Why now? Why is the lab leak story issued by Dept. of Energy making headlines? Why the leftist lapdog media who rushed to support Biden at any cost especially the truth doing the duck and cover? The same liberal media which constantly spread lies about conspiracy theories, blaming Trump, and cancelled his supporters.

The 3 Ds. Desperate, Desperation, and Desperados.

1. The Biden administration is desperate to continue the war on Trump and his supporters. They accused him of xenophobia when he closed air traffic from China in January 2020. They called him a racist when he called it the China virus and said he believed it was a lab leak in April 2020. Nancy Pelosi continued to welcome Chinese tourists through the Spring of 2020 and vilified Trump supporters accusing them of "hate crimes." Democrats impeached him for a phone conversation with Zelenskyy which was monitored but which also implicated the Biden family in criminal behavior (Read the transcript--you'll be shocked how the media misled you)! Now they need to deflect as Biden has been proven wrong, wrong, wrong.

2. There is desperation to make Americans forget that it was Trump who launched warp speed, getting a vaccine into the arms of the American public before he left office. They want you to forget that Biden, Harris and others said they wouldn't trust the vaccine because Trump supported it. They want you to forget the vaccine should have been used for the elderly and compromised, and not children and young adults. They began the gaslighting and fear campaign which later was flipped to become a hallmark of their increasingly fascist regime. Trump also began the 2 week pause in our normal routines that went to 2 years under Biden, and Trump began flooding the economy with Covid money which was supposed to compensate the people for loss of income. It was overkill and Biden used that bad plan to swamp us with inflation and more spending. All the while he continued to vilify Trump and his supporters as he continued Trump's plan.

3. The desperados in the Biden administration are looking for two avenues of escape from this mess. a) Build distrust (more) of China as it now looks like it might assist Russia in the war against Ukraine, which has become Biden's war by proxy, and b) find a way to dump Joe Biden and Kamala Harris before the 2024 election by making his choices and leadership look uninformed and misguided. (No need to make Harris look bad--she may be the worst government official ever--not even Democrats wanted her in 2020.)

Desperate is from the Latin word desperatus meaning without hope (spero), or despairing. And that describes the whole crew in Democratistan who have been condemning all patriots who disagree to the "misinformation jail."

Lenten goals--cleaning instead of fasting

My Lenten goals are getting a slow start. This week it was tackle the cupboards and bookshelves of the kitchen. I'm on the first shelf of cookbooks in the kitchen--next will be the "junk drawer."  I'm already stuck at the computer. I'm looking at a recipe take away from the Home & Garden Show, Feb. 25-Mar 5, 2006. As I recall I picked it up because we went to a demo for a chocolate peanut butter torte with bananas in honor of Elvis' birthday at Gourmet Galaxy Cafe which was sponsored by Whole Foods, Columbus Dispatch, Home Source Interiors, etc. Before I put this in the stay or go pile, I'll just mention 2 recipes easy enough for 80-somethings to learn (each 2 pages features a Columbus chef or personality with their favorites. 

1)  Manny Malhotra of the Columbus Blue Jackets (hockey) offered, "Asparagus a la Manny" which requires 1 bunch of asparagus, salt and pepper and olive oil and aluminum foil.  2) The COO of Donatos (pizza chain based in Columbus) and daughter of the founder reported that she had worked in all areas from take-out window, making night deposits, spreading sauces and cheese to dotting pepperoni slices to the edge, but there was no recipe.

When I went back and checked my blog, I see I had written about this cookbook in 2006. https://collectingmythoughts.blogspot.com/2006/03/2228-chocolate-peanut-butter-cream.html.

By the time I got to shelf 3 I was browsing Vols. 3-5 of "A Taste of Columbus" by Beth Chilcoat. Vol. 5 was 2000, and she began the series when her children were small, and by this one she had grandchildren. I had inherited these from my daughter who had given them originally to her mother-in-law, Marilyn.  All are done in calligraphy with lovely drawings of Columbus' historical scenes. Chilcoat's husband (also co-author) died in 2006 of ALS, and she later wrote about widowhood and grief. Cap City Diner Meatloaf by Jimmy Mohammed has 28 ingredients (mostly herbs and spices) in vol. 5.

DEI ODI SDPTA OSU

The Office of Diversity and Inclusion's Strategic Diversity Planning, Training, and Assessment Unit at Ohio State University is offering a fine selection for minds of mush at a stomach turning and very expensive buffet. After 9 months student/staff/faculty gets a certificate in a new mind set, the entry key to the various corporations trying to meet DIE standards.

DEI Foundations

Social Identity 101

Microaggressions 101

Microinterventions (follows Microaggressions)

Microaggressions and Me

Navigating Difficult DEI Conversations

Practice Makes Progress: Microinterventions

Reflect and Reset

Covid 19 and anti-Asian Racism

"In addition to the above workshops aimed at DEI educational experiences, the Office of Strategic Diversity Planning, Training, and Assessment also offers Inclusive Excellence Workshops providing guidance on planning and assessment. We also maintain a list of additional DEI education resources and trainings available from other units at Ohio State."

Dr. Robert Califf, FDA and misinformation

"I strongly believe that misinformation is a leading cause of preventable death in America now." Robert Califf, FDA

I believe that too, but I believe it is the result of government misinformation and not the victims' fault.

I strongly believe that misinformation, fear, and confusing messaging begins and ends with the government. Masks don't help; masks do help; masks are mandatory; or maybe not, just kidding. Not enough ventilators; President Trump's fault; ventilators found; ventilators turned out by millions; not enough people need ventilators; President Trump's fault. The virus can live 3 days on surface; wrong, lives 15 days; wrong again, I'll get back to you on that. Pets can't get covid 19; pets can get covid 19. We need temporary hospitals and hospital ships; tent hospitals standing empty; President Trump's fault--he should have known better. Remember Biden and Harris told Americans in 2020 not to trust the vaccine because Trump had advocated for it and it was his "win". 

The lockdown of people who weren't in danger (power hungry bureaucrats at the local level), and totalitarian ideology are the primary reason for the deaths; and the vaccination itself has caused great harm to younger people. Airline pilots have been fired, athletes are refusing it, doctors aren't allowed to prescribe safe and trusted medications, and just about everyone I know who's had Covid has also had the shot and boosters. Remember what we were told in Jan-Feb 2021? Protection and efficacy--off the charts! Then we discovered protection dissipated after a few months, but even that truth was squelched and ridiculed as a conspiracy theory, then later revised to "it will be less severe but can't protect us from infection.

I said in summer 2020 (see links below) there was no peer reviewed literature on masks offering either protection for the user or the exposed, and I kept checking for months. Zip, nada, zero. Yet children have probably lost 2 years of education, especially low income who didn't have parents to fill in the gaps. Churches were closed as being "non-essential." Now Cochrane Reviews has just come out with the same information as a retired medical librarian found 2.5 years ago. No evidence that masks or distancing stopped the spread. Handwashing possibly, but even that's inconclusive.

CDC, FDA and especially Fauci became the new Lysenkoism (caused millions of deaths in the USSR in early 20th century), where only they knew the science and not the many researchers/scientists who disagreed. One had to believe the science of the day, and if not obeyed tenured, published professors were under threat of having their careers destroyed by Big Tech fact-checkers.

By far the majority of deaths from Covid were the elderly, pre-existing conditions and obesity, yet I never saw jazzy ads about weight loss from athletes and movie stars, only the necessity of getting the shot. Instead, sick people (non-covid) couldn't get in to see their doctors. I don't know Califf or his record for research or teaching, but I do know of the work and talent of many of those he's calling snake oil salesmen. Like Bret Weinstein, certainly no Trump supporter and not a Republican or Conservative by any stretch, yet the leftist media refer to him as "right wing." This is government CYA as the non-Covid deaths continue to increase. It makes no difference if one is a tenured faculty in biology, a billionaire who was on board at the beginning, or a researcher who helped develop the mRNA technology, they will be silenced by smears, threats to their income and reputation, or firing.

The strategy that the government is using is to fund their own "misinformation" campaigns with our tax dollars to silence any news agency, blog, website or platform that disagrees with the party line, and that is not only Covid, but the GreenNew Deal, CRT, the border, or billions for Ukraine. If they are successful in silencing all who disagree with them on Covid, they will silence/censor on everything else, too.
1) Hamilton 68 Saga Illustrates Scope Of America’s Institutional Rot (thefederalist.com)

2) State Department Funded Foreign Think Tank Working To Censor Americans | The Daily Caller

3) Disinformation Inc: Meet the groups hauling in cash to secretly blacklist conservative news (washingtonexaminer.com)

4) Matt Taibbi: "Twitter Files" Reveal The Structure Of The Relationship Between Social Media Companies And FBI Requests For Censorship | Video | RealClearPolitics


Collecting My Thoughts: Finding research on medical masks for the public

Collecting My Thoughts: To mask or not to mask

Collecting My Thoughts: The battle of the masks.

Collecting My Thoughts: Evidence for cloth masks? Not much

Collecting My Thoughts: No published trial on the effects of masks in Covid-19 transmission

Ukraine, Russia and Namibia

While Joe continues spending $113 Billion and hot air on Ukraine's battle with Russia, his wife is touring Africa. Africa is also in a terrible mess with ethnic and regional battles in Sudan and Ethiopia and Eritrea, although she's not in that area. The U.S. has been dropping money bombs all over Africa for years, but can't seem to back a winner. https://www.reuters.com/world/africa/jill-biden-arrives-namibia-africa-tour-2023-02-22/ She supposed to talk about rights of women--but she represents a party that can't even define woman. She'll address Democratic values--that must mean her party, because her husband thinks little about our values that established the country. She'll also visit Kenya which is battling a drought--wow, don't let the Democrats advise on that--or on fertilizer.

Cochrane Reviews--still no evidence for masks stopping the spread

In the first year of the pandemic Cochrane Library which identifies, appraises and synthesizes all the empirical evidence that meets pre-specified eligibility criteria, looked at all the then known evidence for stopping the spread of Covid.

"Cochrane has responded to the crisis by gathering its community, working closely with the World Health Organization (WHO) and other stakeholders, in developing and publishing several systematic reviews on the effectiveness of behavioural public health measures for reducing COVID‐19 infection.[1] These measures include masks, handwashing, physical distancing, quarantine, contact tracing, screening, and travel restrictions. Because COVID‐19 is still so new, however, these reviews have largely summarized effects on transmission of other viruses in non‐pandemic conditions. Policy makers must act on incomplete evidence in responding to COVID‐19 | Cochrane Library (November 20, 2020)

The results were inconclusive for masks, handwashing, physical distancing, quarantine, contact tracing, screening, and travel restrictions. That didn't stop policy makers from what they do best--making policy. OK, that's what Cochrane found 2.5 years ago, but the policy makers went right ahead, especially the teachers unions which appeared to be advising the CDC.

Now, Cochrance has again published its results of more current studies (although in my opinion there are too few since some researchers were "cancelled" or were prevented from studying or publishing their results if it went against policies already put in place using no evidence). Do physical measures such as hand-washing or wearing masks stop or slow down the spread of respiratory viruses? | Cochrane (January 30, 2023)

"We are uncertain whether wearing masks or N95/P2 respirators helps to slow the spread of respiratory viruses based on the studies we assessed. Hand hygiene programmes may help to slow the spread of respiratory viruses."

I recall writing about the mask literature in summer of 2020 at my blog and Facebook. I checked every few weeks in the medical databases for evidence that masking could stop the spread of Covid-19. I never found it, and the virus continued to spread despite masks, distancing, isolation, and vaccine/boosters. I got a lot of push back from people who knew nothing except what they'd heard from the media.

I continue to believe that masks and hand washing can reduce the spread of colds and flu by blocking the air borne molecules which transport the virus, but Covid, no. Too small to block.

Wisdom from the Bible

"Better is a poor but wise youth than an old but foolish king who will no longer take advice." Ecclesiastes 4:13

That Democrats continue to support Joe Biden despite his demeaning, stereotypical racist beliefs and comments tells me that all their whining about systemic racism, defund the police and microaggressions, is just that, whining. It's simply a way to impose their own brand of power and oppression. Imagine the outrage if a Republican president called a black governor, "boy."

“You got a hell of a new governor in Wes Moore, I tell ya,” Biden said during remarks on the economy Wednesday to an audience of IBEW union workers in Lanham, Maryland.

“He’s the real deal, and the boy looked like he could still play. He got some guns on him,” Biden added, eliciting cheers from the crowd.

California dreaming

Why are eggs so expensive in California? Over regulation for animal rights drives out egg farms.

Why are there so many homeless people in California? Over regulation of housing to meet green goals so only the rich live in neighborhoods that meet those requirements.

Why are there so many fires in California? Over regulation of forests to protect the environment. 

Why is gasoline so costly in California? Higher gas taxes to feed a hungry bureaucracy.

California's economy is larger than Germany's. Why are there so many poor people? Democrats.

No wonder men are happier by Unknown

Men are just happier people.! What do you expect from such simple creatures? Your last name stays put. The garage is all yours. Wedding plans take care of themselves. Chocolate is just another snack. Car mechanics tell you the truth. The world is your urinal. You never have to drive to another service station to find a loo that isn’t too icky. Same work, more pay. Wrinkles add character. Wedding dress: five thousand dollars. Tux rental: a hundred dollars. People never stare at your chest when you’re talking to them. New shoes don’t cut, blister or mangle your feet. One mood, all the time! Phone conversations are over in 30 seconds flat. A five-day vacation requires only one suitcase. You can open all your own jars. You expect and get extra credit for the slightest act of domestic work. If someone forgets to invite you, he or she can still be your friend. Your underwear is $8.95 for a three-pack. Three pairs of shoes are more than enough. The same hairstyle lasts for years, maybe decades. You only have to shave your face and neck.
One wallet and one pair of shoes – one color for all seasons. You can wear shorts no matter how your legs look. You can ”do” your nails with a pocket knife. You have freedom of choice concerning growing a moustache. You can do Christmas shopping for 25 relatives on December 24 in 24 minutes.

No wonder men are happier.

Things my grandfather used to say

Things my grandfather used to say: By Sean Dietrich (Sean of the South)

Be nice; because if you’re not being nice, what are you being?

Don’t cut in line. Don’t interrupt. Don’t pout. Never, ever take the last biscuit.

Smile, it increases your face value.

The wise man knoweth how to dumb it down.

You can’t think your way into the right action, but you can act your way into the right thinking.

Try your hardest, do your absolute best, and when all else fails, cuss.

Always obey your mother when she is around.

Everyone should pee in his own backyard at least once.

Listen to the elderly, they’re smarter than you. Unless they are men.

Treat other people the way you want to be treated. If the Golden Rule were actually practiced today, there would be no karaoke bars.

You never know what a consummate ass you can be until you give someone else advice.

Never judge a Denny’s menu by the photographs.

Let him who is without sin throw the first boomerang.

Whenever something stinks, check your own diaper first.

Don’t point fingers unless you're standing in front of a mirror.

Always, always, always trust your gut.

Tomorrow is a day with no mistakes in it, but you’ll change all that.

Be nice to kids, one day they’ll be running your nursing home.

Feed strays.

When in doubt, do it the way your wife told you.

Never pass up an opportunity to hold a baby.

A good wife always forgives her husband when she is wrong.

‘Fess up when you mess up. Admit when you’re wrong. Don’t gloat when you’re right. And above all, don’t act like you know everything. Know-it-alls make life so incredibly difficult for those of us who actually do.

Change your oil before you think it needs to be changed.

Quit watching the news for 72 hours and just see how you feel.

Doctors don’t know everything. Neither do preachers. Neither do granddaddies.

Your heart knows a lot more than you give it credit.

Life is too short to work for bosses who treat you like crap.

Make a resolution to rid yourself of all bad habits, you can start with perfectionism.

Never, ever be lazy unless you absolutely feel like it.

Always bury politicians at least six feet below the soil, because deep down they’re good people.

Everyone is screwed up. The only ones who aren’t screwed up live in graveyards.

If you love someone, love them hard. If you hate someone, love them even harder.

There is nothing half as exciting as canceled plans.

If you’re hogging all the credit, you’re going to hog all the blame, too.

This is not the end.

Neither was that.

Ninety-nine percent of the things you worry about will never happen.

If you really want to believe in God, you already do.

Always listen to your grandparents. And if you don’t have any, then you can always listen to mine.

HLN's long journey from founding in 1982

HLN is having a Closer marathon this weekend my husband said. He loves Closer, and since he found it recently on a channel that has been airing it about 6 p.m. I think he's gone through it twice. HLN? Isn't that a cable news channel? I said. So I looked it up. Here's Wikipedia shortened to its most recent merger.

"With the 2022 merger of CNN parent WarnerMedia and Discovery Inc. to form Warner Bros. Discovery, HLN became a sister to Discovery's true-crime channel Investigation Discovery (ID). In December 2022, new CNN president Chris Licht announced that HLN would abandon original live news programming entirely as part of a reorganization, with HLN now being overseen by ID's staff, and news programming limited to a simulcast of CNN This Morning for contractual reasons."

I thought CNN was in there somewhere.

Oral care for tips for caregivers

I get many inquiries to review books and to post items on my blog. Most I don't accept, but this one on dementia and dental care is one I hadn't thought about. Now that we're not looking at mask mouth (I hope), time to look at mouths.

https://www.newmouth.com/resources/dementia/There are several things caregivers can do to help maintain good dental health for people with dementia.

For example:

• Help the patient brush his or her teeth after every meal. If this isn’t reasonable, have them rinse their mouths out with water after eating or a few times each day. Or, consider wiping out their mouth with gauze or a wet cloth, especially after consuming sugary foods and beverages.
• If you’re reminding someone how to brush, offer short, simple instructions. Go step-by-step and be as patient as possible.
• Demonstrate by brushing your teeth. Brushing together is a great way to help people with dementia remember what they should be doing. It also avoids embarrassment in the early and middle stages of the disease.
• Find a dentist who has experience working with dementia or other special needs patients. This makes those twice-yearly visits less stressful. Also, make sure the patient’s dentist has the contact information of other healthcare providers caring for the patient.

What public figure is the most dangerous?

I get asked, said Mike Pompeo, former Secretary of State, ‘Who’s the most dangerous person in the world? Is it Chairman Kim, is it Xi Jinping?’ The most dangerous person in the world is Randi Weingarten,” Pompeo said.

 
“It’s not a close call. If you ask, ‘Who’s the most likely to take this republic down?’ It would be the teacher’s unions, and the filth that they’re teaching our kids, and the fact that they don’t know math and reading or writing,” the former top U.S. diplomat added. "

From The Hill.com 11/21/22. I think Weingarten responded with something blaming Trump and the right wing for children not being able to read, write and do math. She's also not very creative.

The revival at Asbury

There's a revival going on at Asbury University in Kentucky. No one knows why or how, no planners came to town and set up the venue with rock bands, room reservations for seminars, housing and food. God arrived and did his work and the young people prayed. It has happened before--at least 4 times in the 20th century at Asbury. People are coming from all over the nation, some from other countries. These are young people who have had incredible challenges from our culture all their lives--all manner of evil available at the touch of a finger on a small screen; from k-12 and beyond their education system has filled their minds with fears and anxiety about the planet; the entertainers have wooed them with all manner of gross and disgusting images, thoughts, and words; their parents' material luxury has stunted their appreciation for work and merit; not even their science classes in college are safe as they have been lied to about their sexuality and ethnicity. If I were in college, I'd be on my knees, too. Oh praise God, I can join them right here at my desk. Pray especially for their protection, as Satan and his helpers will certainly not be pleased with this.

Isaiah 40: 28-31

28 Have you not known? Have you not heard?
The Lord is the everlasting God,
the Creator of the ends of the earth.
He does not faint or grow weary,
his understanding is unsearchable.
29 He gives power to the faint,
and to him who has no might he increases strength.
30 Even youths shall faint and be weary,
and young men shall fall exhausted;
31 but they who wait for the Lord shall renew their strength,
they shall mount up with wings like eagles,
they shall run and not be weary,
they shall walk and not faint.

https://www.kentucky.com/opinion/paul-prather/article272483797.html

https://thebaptistpaper.org/god-is-moving-10-observations-from-asbury-revival/

Trump speaks about the Witch Hunt

"I have been newly reinstated on Twitter and various other social media platforms, and my Tweets, which were taken down by Big Tech censorship, and thus seen by very few, have just been made public. My clear and unequivocal statements on January 6, 2021, which I conveyed to my over 100 million followers, are no longer under “wraps.” The highly partisan January 6th Committee did not want these messages to be part of the Historical and Legal Record, but they have now been fully restored—a sad shock to what I call the Unselect Committee of Political Hacks and Thugs." From President Trump, continue reading: https://sharylattkisson.com/2023/02/read-a-statement-by-president-donald-j-trump-on-the-witch-hunt-of-january-6th/?

Fighting the misinformation police--Check My Ads

The targets, almost invariably, are conservative publications such as Human Events and The Post Millennial, and right-wing media figures such as Dan Bongino and Charlie Kirk. https://dailycaller.com/2022/02/03/check-my-ads-reid-hoffman-good-information-inc/

1. Check My Ads, a group started by Sleeping Giants co-founder and activist Nandini Jammi and advertising consultant Claire Atkin, bills itself as “adtech’s first watchdog” and claims to “cut disinformation off at the source,” invariably targeting conservative publications such as Human Events and The Post Millennial and right-wing media figures such as Dan Bongino and Charlie Kirk.
2. While Check My Ads’ self-declared mission includes fighting against disinformation, the group works with several figures and organizations that have themselves pushed misleading or false content.
3. Both Jammi and Atkin serve on the advisory committee of Good Information Inc., an investment vehicle backed by LinkedIn founder and left-wing philanthropist Reid Hoffman and financier George Soros, and led by Democratic strategist Tara McGowan.
4. Check My Ads’ main project is an initiative to “defund the insurrectionists,” which launched Jan. 5 and seeks to pressure advertisers to abandon several right-wing media figures that Jammi and Atkin believe “incited” the Jan. 6 Capitol riots.

Look out--they want your cars, even the EVs

"Replacing all gasoline-powered cars with electric vehicles won’t be enough to prevent the world from overheating. So people will have to give up their cars. That’s the alarming conclusion of a new report from the University of California, Davis and “a network of academics and policy experts” called the Climate and Community Project."

Everything bad begins in "academe." Look out. They don't have enough to do, so they just try to destroy society.

https://www.wsj.com/articles/the-climate-crusaders-are-coming-for-electric-cars-too-global-warming-energy-power-fossil-fuels-environment-31a692ca

How old is this guy?

One evening a grandson was talking to his grandfather about current events.

The grandson asked his grandfather what he thought about the shootings at schools, the computer age, and just things in general.

The Grandfather replied, "Well, let me think a minute, I was born before:
' television
' penicillin
' polio shots
' frozen foods
' Xerox
' contact lenses
' Frisbees and
' the pill

There were no:
' credit cards
' laser beams or
' ball-point pens

Man had not invented :
' pantyhose
' air conditioners
' dishwashers
' clothes dryers
' and the clothes were hung out to dry in the fresh air and
' space travel was only in Flash Gordon books.

Your Grandmother and I got married first,... and then lived together..

Every family had a father and a mother. Until I was 25, I called every woman older than me, "mam". And after I turned 25, I still called policemen and every man with a title, "Sir".

We were before gay-rights, computer-dating, dual careers, daycare centers, and group therapy.

Our lives were governed by the Bible, good judgment, and common sense. We were taught to know the difference between right and wrong and to stand up and take responsibility for our actions.

Serving your country was a privilege; living in this country was a bigger privilege... We thought fast food was eating half a biscuit while running to catch the school bus.

Having a meaningful relationship meant getting along with your cousins.

Draft dodgers were those who closed front doors as the evening breeze started.

Time-sharing meant time the family spent together in the evenings and weekends-not purchasing condominiums.

We never heard of FM radios, tape decks, CDs, electric typewriters, yogurt, or guys wearing earrings.

We listened to Big Bands, Jack Benny, and the President's speeches on our radios. And I don't ever remember any kid blowing his brains out listening to Tommy Dorsey.

If you saw anything with 'Made in Japan' on it, it was junk.

The term 'making out' referred to how you did on your school exam....

Pizza Hut, McDonald's, and instant coffee were unheard of.

We had 5 &10-cent stores where you could actually buy things for 5 and 10 cents. Ice-cream cones, phone calls, rides on a streetcar, and a Pepsi were all a nickel. And if you didn't want to splurge, you could spend your nickel on enough stamps to mail 1 letter and 2 postcards.

You could buy a new Ford Coupe for $600, but who could afford one? Too bad, because gas was 11 cents a gallon.

In my day:
' "grass" was mowed,
' "coke" was a cold drink,
' "pot" was something your mother cooked in and
' "rock music" was your grandmother's lullaby.
' "Aids" were helpers in the Principal's office,
' "chip" meant a piece of wood,
' "hardware" was found in a hardware store and
' "software" wasn't even a word.

And we were the last generation to actually believe that a lady needed a husband to have a baby.

How old do you think I am?

I bet you have this old man in mind...you are in for a shock!

Read on to see -- pretty scary if you think about it and pretty sad at the same time.

Are you ready?????

This man would be 76years old. today (2023)

(sent by a friend)

----------------------------------

I don't recall cars being that cheap, or gasoline either.

What is the purpose of public higher education in a democratic society?

"Principally, it’s to help students acquire the habits of mind and heart necessary to live as informed, virtuous citizens. I say “principally” because there are other educational aims, or purposes, to a university, such as the cultivation of intellectual autonomy or “universal knowledge,” as John Henry Newman once argued. A university should also aim at career preparation, skill acquisition, and other learning objectives specific to one’s “major.” But United States higher education should primarily be concerned with helping to guarantee the successes associated with the American Experiment; it should educate in view of the Common Good."

True, this was published in a conservation publication (City Journal), and the author was a DeSantis appointee (Henry Mack), but it's been at least 50 years, and maybe 85 since higher education promoted these virtues and objectives. Read the rest at https://mailchi.mp/city-journal/weekly-update-usfs-dei-cult-populism-scotus-nuclear-power-ken-burns-more scroll to the bottom. Today you'd have to avoid higher education in order to be virtuous citizens. They'd have to boot all the woke faculty (probably 90%) before it could be an education for the Common Good.

Daily Signal publishes top woke corporations

I shop at both of these. Find Out Which Companies Promote Leftism (dailysignal.com)

"#4.  CVS. The drugstore chain famed for its mile-long receipts is apparently woke on everything except wasting paper. It “advocates for the Equality Act and transgender participation in girls’ sports” and “the company signed an open letter opposing a Florida bill that would prevent teaching gender identity and sexual orientation in schools to kids in K-3rd grade.” CVS gives employees abortion travel “benefits” and “fired a Catholic nurse practitioner after she refused to prescribe or administer abortifacients, citing her religious beliefs.” In a somewhat surprising twist, though, CVS does say it protects employees’ differing viewpoints.

#7.  Kroger.  If you thought your views on gay marriage would be irrelevant in a supermarket, think again: The grocery store chain “fired two Christian employees who requested not to wear the gay pride logo on their work aprons.” Kroger also “enables community donations to Planned Parenthood” and will pay travel costs for employees to get an abortion. " 

There's a new database that rates the "wokeness" of corporations. I was very sad to see that CVS was #4 and Kroger #7. Neither are my favorite stores, but they are convenient and easy to get to. They are located in a wealthy suburban area, one that does not reflect their values, yet they are back stabbing us as they take our money. https://www.dailysignal.com/2023/02/06/find-out-which-companies-promote-leftism/? Mattel has a trans doll, and many have fired Christians for refusing to support the company's LGBTQ pins or flags or emblems. They have reeducation camps for executives and support the misnamed "Equity Act." 

This is ESG lite--a political tool to turn us all into good little globalists with China in charge. Smaller, non-compliant companies will be bought up or destroyed.  At one time, all these companies stood for merit, hard work, fair play, good service and a good return for their investors. Now, nothing matters except skin color and sex, while the CEOs laugh all the way to the bank as they play the game.

How nations slip from greatness

Although this is circulating as "anonymous" at various sites it is from the opinion column of Don Feder, Front Page, June 17, 2021. https://www.frontpagemag.com/how-nations-slip-greatness.../ Democrats call it hyperbole and misinformation. You may disagree, but this is "his truth," and Dems are all for that.

"Men, like nations, think they’re eternal. What man in his 20s or 30s doesn’t believe, at least subconsciously, that he’ll live forever?

In the springtime of youth, an endless summer beckons. As you pass 70, it’s harder to hide from reality.
Nations too have seasons. Imagine a Roman of the 2nd. century contemplating an empire that stretched from Britain to the Near East, thinking: This will endure forever.

Forever was about 500 years, give or take.

France was the thing in the 17th and 18th centuries. Now the land of Charles Martel is on its way to becoming part of the Muslim ummah.

In the 19th and early 20th centuries, the sun never set on the British empire. Now Albion exists in a perpetual twilight. Its 95-year-old sovereign is a fitting symbol for a nation in terminal decline.

In the 1980s, Japan seemed poised to buy the world. Business schools taught Japanese management techniques. Today, its birth rate is so low and its population is aging so rapidly, that an industry has sprung up to remove the remains of elderly Japanese who die alone.

I was born in 1946, almost at the midpoint of the 20th century – the American century. America’s prestige and influence were never greater. Thanks to the Greatest Generation, we won a World War fought over most of Europe, Asia and the Pacific. We reduced Germany to rubble and put the rising sun to bed.

It set the stage for almost half a century of unprecedented prosperity. We stopped the spread of communism in Europe and Asia, and fought international terrorism. We rebuilt our enemies and lavished foreign aid on much of the world.

We built skyscrapers and rockets to the moon. We conquered Polio and COVID. We explored the mysteries of the Universe and the wonders of DNA, the blueprint of life.

But where is the glory that once was Rome?

America has moved from a relatively free economy to socialism – which has worked so well nowhere in the world. We’ve gone from a republican government guided by a constitution to a regime of revolving elites. We have less freedom with each passing year.

Like a signpost to the coming reign of terror, the cancel culture is everywhere. We’ve traded the American Revolution for the Cultural Revolution.

The pathetic creature in the White House is an empty vessel filled by his handlers. At the G-7 Summit, Dr. Jill had to lead him like a child.

In 1961, when we were young and vigorous, our leader was too. Now a feeble nation is technically led by the oldest man to ever serve in the presidency.

We can’t defend our borders, our history (including monuments to past greatness) or our streets. Our cities have become anarchist playgrounds.

We are a nation of dependents, mendicants, and misplaced charity. Homeless veterans camp in the streets while illegal aliens are put up in hotels.

The president of the United States can’t even quote the beginning of the Declaration of Independence correctly. Ivy League graduates routinely fail history tests that 5th graders could pass a generation ago.
Crime rates soar and we blame the 2nd. Amendment and slash police budgets.

Our culture is certifiably insane. We have men who marry men. Men who think they’re women. People who fight racism by seeking to convince members of one race that they’re inherently evil, and others that they are perpetual victims. A psychiatrist lecturing at Yale said she fantasizes about “unloading a revolver into the head of any white person.”

We slaughter the unborn in the name of freedom, while our birth rate dips lower year by year.
Our national debt is so high that we can no longer even pretend that we will repay it one day. It’s a $28-trillion monument to our improvidence and refusal to confront reality.

Our “entertainment” is sadistic, nihilistic and as enduring as a candy bar wrapper thrown in the trash.

 Our music is noise that spans the spectrum from annoying to repulsive.

Patriotism is called insurrection, treason celebrated, and perversion sanctified.

A man in blue gets less respect than a man in a dress.

We’re asking soldiers to fight for a nation our leaders no longer believe in.

How meekly most submitted to Fauci-ism (the regime of face masks and hand sanitizers) shows the death of the American spirit.

How do nations slip from greatness to obscurity?

• Fighting endless wars they can’t or won’t win
• Accumulating massive debt far beyond their ability to repay
• Refusing to guard their borders, allowing the nation to be inundated by an alien horde
• Surrendering control of their cities to mob rule
• Allowing indoctrination of the young
• Moving from a republican form of government to an oligarchy
• Losing national identity
• Indulging indolence
• Abandoning faith and family – the bulwarks social order.

In America, every one of these symptoms is pronounced, indicating an advanced stage of the disease.
Even if the cause seems hopeless, do we not have an obligation to those who sacrificed so much to give us what we had?

I’m surrounded by ghosts urging me on: the Union soldiers who held Cemetery Ridge at Gettysburg, the battered bastards of Bastogne, those who served in the cold hell of Korea, the guys who went to the jungles of Southeast Asia and came home to be reviled or neglected.

This is the nation that took in my immigrant grandparents, whose uniform my father and most of my uncles wore in the Second World War. I don’t want to imagine a world without America, even though it becomes increasingly likely.

During Britain’s darkest hour, when its professional army was trapped at Dunkirk and a German invasion seemed imminent, Churchill reminded his countrymen, “Nations that go down fighting rise again, and those that surrender tamely are finished.”

The same might be said of causes. If we let America slip through our fingers, if we lose without a fight, what will posterity say of us?

While the prognosis is far from good, only God knows if America’s day in the sun is over." By Don Feder

Normal or crazy

“The dividing line in America is no longer between right or left,” Sarah Sanders said Tuesday night. “The choice is between normal or crazy."

In case you can't decide who is crazy and what is normal, let me remind you that at the SOTU speech, in public, and on TV, some Democrats wore "I love abortion" pins instead of the American flag pin. And they were proud of their evil hearts. Proud of evil, sin and death to the unborn.

Look at the Minnesota law--up to due date; look at the California law.  Now that's certifiably crazy.

Sarah at 40--it's good to have her back

Governor Sarah Sanders in response to Biden's State of Denial on Tuesday said, "At 40, I’m the youngest governor in the country. At 80, he’s the oldest president in American history. I'm the first woman to lead my state, he's the first man to surrender his presidency to a woke mob that can’t even tell you what a woman is."

Republicans are being silly if they think Biden won't be reelected because of his deficiencies and obvious lies. Look who they elected in Pennsylvania--a rich man who's had a stroke and dresses like a bum. They seem to love to elect people like that because they are more easily controlled by those who can't get elected.

Joe Biden plagiarizes Trump's Maga speeches

Although I didn't watch the "State of Denial" on Tuesday, I think I heard about 5 or 6 analyses, mostly conservative, with clips from the fawning, lapdog, non-curious media with their million dollar salaries.

 
1) He tried to out-Maga Trump--appeal for the blue collar vote, the patriotic, police support and praise and bring American business back home. If he'd been coherent I would have thought it was Trump up there mumbling. We heard all that in 2016. It just doesn't work for Joe. All his personal millions have come from China and Ukraine via political deals organized by his son; Trump's came from being in business and his successful TV shows.

2) You don't even need to be a news addict to see both the blatant lies, and the lies he never told, like about the border and the balloon. China and Ukraine barely got a mention.

 
3) The videos of him in 1975, 1984 and 1995 proposing (did he say 4 times?) sunset rules on social security were a nice touch by the Biden-watchers. Sort of deflates his attempts to terrify people getting Social Security (not me, I'm not eligible).

4) I'm thinking the kiss on the lips between his wife and Kamala's husband was a set up to stir the media pot so they'd ignore his other terrible lies and gaffs--and they all fell for it, complete with background music and valentines.

https://nypost.com/2023/02/08/biden-supported-sunsetting-all-federal-programs-including-social-security-and-medicare-as-a-young-senator/

If I get dementia, by Anonymous

This was recently posted on Facebook. It's always a sobering reminder. It seems every month or so I see someone who is acting a little differently.  So perhaps it's time for understanding. . .

“If I get dementia, I want my friends and family to embrace my reality. If I think my spouse is still alive, or if I think we’re visiting my parents for dinner, let me believe those things. I’ll be much happier for it.
If I get dementia, don’t argue with me about what is true for me versus what is true for you.
If I get dementia, and I am not sure who you are, do not take it personally. My timeline is confusing to me.
If I get dementia, and can no longer use utensils, do not start feeding me. Instead, switch me to a finger-food diet, and see if I can still feed myself.
If I get dementia, and I am sad or anxious, hold my hand and listen. Do not tell me that my feelings are unfounded.
If I get dementia, I don’t want to be treated like a child. Talk to me like the adult that I am.
If I get dementia, I still want to enjoy the things that I’ve always enjoyed. Help me find a way to exercise, read, and visit with friends.
If I get dementia, ask me to tell you a story from my past.
If I get dementia, and I become agitated, take the time to figure out what is bothering me.
If I get dementia, treat me the way that you would want to be treated.
If I get dementia, make sure that there are plenty of snacks for me in the house. Even now if I don’t eat I get angry, and if I have dementia, I may have trouble explaining what I need.
If I get dementia, don’t talk about me as if I’m not in the room.
If I get dementia, don’t feel guilty if you cannot care for me 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. It’s not your fault, and you’ve done your best. Find someone who can help you, or choose a great new place for me to live.
If I get dementia, and I live in a dementia care community, please visit me often.
If I get dementia, don’t act frustrated if I mix up names, events, or places. Take a deep breath. It’s not my fault.
If I get dementia, make sure I always have my favorite music playing within earshot.
If I get dementia, and I like to pick up items and carry them around, help me return those items to their original places.
If I get dementia, don’t exclude me from parties and family gatherings.
If I get dementia, know that I still like receiving hugs or handshakes.
If I get dementia, remember that I am still the person you know and love... “

Copy and paste in Honor of someone you know or knew who has dementia/alzheimer's.....

Article 2 Section 2

I've been reading the Constitution. The President doesn't even get the honor of being Article I--that goes to the Congress. The President is Article 2. And Section 1 of Article 2 explains how he is elected. Not until we get to Section 2 of Article 2 do we get to the job description: he is the Commander in Chief of the Army and Navy; then the power to make treaties and appoint ambassadors and fill some vacancies in Congress. Section 3 says the President shall from time to time give a State of the Union. Section 4 says he can be impeached. That's about it.
So in the State of the Union I think he should mention how he and his advisors blew it because that balloon could have been anything, even chemicals or another virus, but most likely gathering information on how cowardly the poorly prepared government is, and it was covered by Section 2 of Article 2. If the people of Montana hadn't noticed and alerted the media it could still be "calling home."

Afghanistan
Ukraine-Russia
China

One job and he's done nothing but put our country in danger since he took office.

Obama's Nobel Peace Prize

Does anyone know why Obama was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize for doing nothing? Even his ego probably didn't request it. I recently noticed a comment about that committee which choses the winners and losers in an Ethiopian newspaper (from 2021, but it's still true). Someone is always at war in that part of the world, and we hear little about it here in the U.S.

"The Norwegian Nobel Committee has developed a lazy habit, at best, and, at worst, displayed dubious motives when it awards its Peace Prize to distant third-world countries like Myanmar and Ethiopia.

It never adequately does its homework when it throws prizes at leaders who promote their perverted version of ‘peace’; always couched in words amenable to Western ears, but always with ulterior priorities in their minds.

This is especially so when the committee adds other factors than unadulterated peace in its calculation, such as ‘the indispensability of Ethiopia’s stability to the region’ or ‘promoting democracy in the region’ that the West has been peddling with for decades, to the detriment of minor actors in the region. A little bit of vetting would have provided the committee with a complex picture of Abiy, enough to put doubts even on the biased minds, however implicit, of its members." ethiopia-insight.com

George Santos' lies

 

Loneliness affects health

"The Weaponization of Loneliness" [book] offers a message of hope. We can resist this psychological warfare if we have strong bonds in our families, faith communities, and friendships. Let's resolve to talk to one another openly and often, especially about the consequences of giving in to social pressures and media hype. Indeed, totalitarians always seek to destroy private life because it is the very fount of freedom. (promo)
https://www.barnesandnoble.com/.../the.../1142494107

I haven't read this book, but research in the social and medical sciences had long shown for decades the importance of faith communities and friendships for good health. (Remember "Bowling alone?") So what do you do when the government tells the churches to close because they aren't essential? Well, we know the answer to that one. The churches (all but a few) complied.

Two years ago (too late to help much) research at Harvard reported by Fee.org noted the damage isolation had done. "The most obvious solution to the accelerating loneliness epidemic during the pandemic response is to lift the lockdowns and related public health policies that keep people cruelly separated from one another." Follow the science didn't apply to the obvious; the "science" was too busy trying to destroy President Trump. But research did find younger people were hurt more than older. Liberals and the over-educated academics and politicians particularly revered the bad advice of Fauci and the Biden Administration which damaged the young both physically and mentally for years ahead.

Yesterday I stopped at Panera's for a cup of coffee.  A group of about 12 women rearranged tables for their get-together.  Didn't look like a church group--could have been retired teachers.  As they were gathering, I heard one of them say she'd had Covid three times.  Remember three years ago how thrilled we were to get the vaccination, only to learn later the protection only lasted about 3 months?

Who governs? Emergency powers

I don't know if this book addresses how churches responded to the government lockdowns, but someone should.

"Overview
In a democracy, a government's authority derives from the consent of the governed. When emergencies hit—such as the COVID-19 health crisis—how are authorities, both elected and unelected, empowered to act? Experts in political science, democratic governance, and jurisprudence examine the wave of executive orders that followed the onset of this pandemic in 2020, as well as the legal and public responses to them, to consider what is right, lawful, and just."

Who Governs? Emergency Powers in the Time of COVID | Hoover Institution Who Governs? Emergency Powers in the Time of COVID

Who Governs? | Hoover Institution Press (ipgbook.com) check out for book order

The Great Awokening, Lecture 7

In this lecture series, "The Idolatry of Identity," Dr. Matthew Petrusek discusses contemporary progressive ideology, also frequently referred to as “wokeism,” and the response of the Catholic social thought tradition.

https://youtu.be/7AU9HPzsmCM In Lecture 1, Dr. Petrusek identifies the ideological components that constitute progressivism and examines what makes contemporary progressive ideology attractive. He also demonstrates how progressivism both appropriates and distorts competing political theories—and yokes those distortions into the service of a particular group’s self-interest.

https://youtu.be/Qm9If1EQ3yc Lecture 2

https://youtu.be/KsAzLPKyPZs Lecture 3

https://youtu.be/BmzYsBvSr8Y Lecture 4 Post modernism

https://youtu.be/WNR3ehSzpQ4 Lecture 5 Post Colonialism, Pt. 1 Fanon

https://youtu.be/jZNG81w-eEw Lecture 6 Post Colonialism, Pt. 2

https://youtu.be/hVfGzO65SiM In Lecture 7, Dr. Matthew Petrusek sheds light on the shadow side of “Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion” as he explains how all the widely disparate strands of progressivism/wokeism find a tenuous but politically potent unity in the concept of “intersectionality.”

https://youtu.be/vL9IRQxElBE Lecture 8

https://youtu.be/XdvE3O7Iye8 Lecture 9

NRSVue has deleted homosexuality

Christians of different traditions and denominations have disagreed over the years on what books are included in the Biblical canon, and how it should be translated into our (heart) language and style of translation. The Bible of The Ethiopian Orthodox Tewahedo Church and the Eritrean Orthodox Tewahedo Church has 81 books! The Protestant Bible has 66 books, and the Catholic Bible 73. Many Protestants enjoy "The Message" and "The New American Standard Bible" (sometimes called English as it was never spoken), but they are so different you might not even recognize the writer let alone the verse. But translators have mostly agreed NOT to rewrite it. I have several translations--NIV, NASB, NAB, KJV, ASV, plus there are dozens of translations and paraphrases on the internet. I have both the RSV and the NRSV, and I think they retain the beauty of their grandfather KJV and update our language to at least the 1950s. But in 2021 the committee completely bowed to the culture and eliminated any reference to homosexuality. When members of the committee were asked about it, they each denied responsibility or even knowledge of who did it!

New Frontiers in Politically Correct Bible Translation! | Catholic Answers

New Revised Standard Version Updated Edition (NRSVUE) - Version Information - BibleGateway.com

Critical Theory and Woke

It's not Diversity Inclusion and Equity. It's not ESG.  It's not BLM Woke. It's not Climate Change or Sustainable Development. It's not Feminism. It's not LGBTQ or Intersectionality. But you'll need all those words. It's all of them, trussed and tied and tortured together.

Together they mean the Oppressed and the Oppressor. Marxist-inspired movement in social and political philosophy. No matter the color or race of the speaker, or the income, or the sex or gender of the agitprop, or whether they wear a pink hat or a black hoodie, it's all critical theory, so someone has to be oppressed, got to have victims. In this class/race/gender system, the poorest, disabled white child in Appalachia is the oppressor of the billionaire black NBA star.

And it's all the mischief of a bunch of old white guys, mostly European--Marx, Nietzsche, Sarte, Foucault and Freire (he was Brazilian). They've danced, partied and slept promiscuously with academics for 40 years, then moved in to seduce politicians, and now are colonizing the largest corporations, the very oppressors they've learned to love (because that's where the real money is).

The original perps failed in real life, and their claim to fame until recently was a hundred million dead in the 20th century; but now it's constant turmoil, death and destruction in the 21st.

Joe and Whoopi beating the drum of unrest

We're probably in for another race war because of high profile trouble makers like Joe Biden and Whoopi Goldberg. He plans to have the parents of Tyre Nichols at the State of the Union speech, and he's been wrong on so many of these incidents. Whoopee announced on the View, "do we 'need to see white people get beat' before changes are made to policing." She suggests that this sort of thing never happens to whites--because she's never seen it! Such idiocy. In fact, study after study, report after report by DoJ show whites are more likely to be shot by police than blacks, even though the crime rate for blacks is 8x higher! But the narrative is so strong that the media continue to lie.

 
What the media are doing by beating this drum is endangering black people--and the whole nation. Blacks are now even more likely to be victims because police actually are less likely to confront a criminal in the act of a crime for fear of being disciplined. The 5 Memphis police officers could be representative of many problems--like diversity hiring requirements, poor training, or defunding the police memes on social media, but let's have the trial before the President causes another decrease in qualified men and women entering the force! Because that seems to be what high profile Americans want--people who can hire their own private security. And the stupidity of calling this racism by second tier celebs like Sharpton shows they believe blacks can only be pawns and fools, can't even beat up someone--5 against 1--on their own volition.

 
Tyre Nichols' beating and death was a terrible tragedy and a crime, and too many people on the left are dancing on his grave for their personal gain.

Yesterday (Jan. 31) I listened to Jason Whitlock's podcast. He blames "baby mama" matriarchal culture, not racist cops or white racism. He says he can't see any reason for this except it was personal, like gang violence spun out of control. https://whatdidyousay.org/2023/01/30/jason-whitlock-op-ed-yes-baby-mama-culture-explains-the-tyre-nichols-tragedy/?

Biden's EO 13990 and EO 14008 on Climate

"On January 20 and January 27, 2021, President Biden signed two executive orders (EOs)—EO 13990 and EO 14008—to deploy an “whole-of-government” regulatory agenda to rapidly phase out the production and consumer use of conventional energy. The goal is to halve U.S. greenhouse gas emissions by 2030 (relative to 2005 levels) and ultimately reach “net zero” emissions by 2050.

With these two orders in the first week of his term, Biden took his hands off the wheel and let regulatory agencies do the rest of the job via obscure rulemakings, guidance, reports, standards, and bureaucratic forms. For example, the Federal Reserve, Department of Defense, and Bureau of Land Management are all currently seeking comments on new climate regulations.

It should concern every American, whether conservative or liberal, climate catastrophist or realist, that these executive orders have made nearly every agency a climate agency, regardless of its statutory mission established by Congress.

 
Most Americans haven’t heard of EO 13990 and EO 14008, and for good reason: They are busy living their lives and being productive. These two executive orders put in motion a whole-of-government regulatory agenda that is only just beginning to affect Americans’ everyday lives. (The Charge, Heritage Foundation, January 26, 2023)

Hamilton 68

"Matt Taibbi released the most recent Twitter Files on Friday. The focus of this batch is the role a dubious source played in helping shape the false narrative of Russian influence on Twitter.

To some Twitter exec’s credit, they were uncomfortable with the dubious claims that pretty much anything a conservative, MAGA supporter, et al. said was considered “Russian misinformation.” Even accounts that had no ties to any known Russian bot or activity were deemed to be spreading Russian propaganda unknowingly and should therefore be silenced.

If this sounds familiar, it’s because it is. This is the same “logic” used to assert that all white people are racists. Even if they don’t think they are, they are racist. Without knowing it on a conscious level. Or something. It’s an intentionally crafted no-win construct that is now being applied to “misinformation” as well as “white supremacy” and “systemic racism.” #TwitterFiles: Twitter Execs Knew The Russian Misinformation Hysteria Was Based On A Dubious Source (legalinsurrection.com)

'Twitter Files' 15: MSM's Partitioning of Political Discourse | Newsmax.com

Highly-Cited ‘Hamilton 68’ Russiagate Tracker Is Total Hoax: Taibbi’s Twitter Files #15 – NewsWars

Latest Twitter Files show media, Dems relied on single source alleging 'Russian bot' activity: 'It was a scam' (msn.com)

Pfizer and its Director of Research and Development Walker

I don't know how many millions have now seen the expose by Project Veritas of the Pfizer executive, Jordon Trishton Walker, Pfizer Director of Research and Development, Strategic Operations and "mRNA Scientific Planner, spilling the beans about the lab experiments and using Covid as a cash cow (his words), but it was horrifying. It's not that we hadn't suspected or whispered about it (some lost careers by even questioning the vaccines), but when you see it, it's gut wrenching. Then there was this wealthy executive who's been helping to fool millions crying out the race card when he finally discovers "smile you're on Candid Camera" moment, also exposes the whole racialist moves of corporate American to use as a stun gun when he tries to call the police while vandalizing the restaurant and their equipment. Later when interviewed, Dr. Malone points out that by even doing the development of new viruses, Pfizer is admitting it can't keep up with the current new variants. The whole mess was chilling. Tucker said no other media source (at that time) had covered this. The collusion of 1) government, 2) media, and 3) Big Pharma/Big Tech is just shocking--a word so over used these days.

After he realized he was being recorded, Walker claimed he'd been lying to impress a date. Well, if it were true, then he should be fired (cancelled) for sullying his company's reputation on a date to make himself look good (?). Unfortunately, it was just too compelling and frightening to be a pick up line. What he described was a bad plot for a TV crime show.

“You have to be very controlled to make sure that this virus [COVID] that you mutate doesn’t create something that just goes everywhere. Which, I suspect, is the way that the virus started in Wuhan, to be honest. It makes no sense that this virus popped out of nowhere. It’s bullsh*t.”

(Walker talking to the Honey Pot date)

Pfizer Executive Caught By Project Veritas: We're Exploring Mutating COVID So We Can "Preemptively" Develop New Vaccines | Video | RealClearPolitics

O'Keefe Scoops and Shames the Mainstream Media...Again (townhall.com)

We all await Pfizer's response.

Jean and Jeans, pant and pants

 Today I received the February 2023 Talbots catalog.  I shop there at a sale, or when exchanging a gift.  Jeans and pants are a mystery to me, and since I saw only 2 dresses in the catalog, I noted the variety of styles, waists, leg length, hems, and "wash" for the pants.

First I noticed some are called jean and others jeans; some are called pant and others pants.  Not sure of the differences.

Slim ankle jean, with slimming panel

Chic wide leg pant

Wide leg jeans

High waist jeans above waist

High waist relaxed jean in various "wash" colors

Everyday relaxed jeans

Tie waist slim ankle pant

Chino straight leg

Slim ankle jeans with stripe on side

Jegging, button front

Jegging frayed hem

Bristol pant with elastic back waist, pleated front

Chatham ankle pants, side zipper

Soho leggings

Montauk pant flare, pull on elastic waist

Hampshire ankle pant

Everyday stretch straight leg

California's recent killings can't be used by Schiff and Pelosi for politics

In the hours immediately following the Boulder, Colorado, shooting on March 22, 2021, at a supermarket a story had begun to develop that the shooter was a typical gun-loving white supremacist. It’s the narrative that’s all too common, and often perpetrated by Democrats in power. But the shooter Ahmad Al Aliwi Alissa is a Muslim. The story went quiet very quickly and Facebook took down his account, which revealed a violent past, even back to high school. I just looked at the court record and as of January 23, he hasn't had a trial or sentence. He has an additional 43 felonies. Just a few days before that incident, Biden and other Democrats were suggesting that a hate crime against Asians in Atlanta could be blamed on President Trump’s “words.” It wasn’t a hate crime against Asians, it was a very young man Robert Aaron Long with a sex addiction and 3 of his victims were white. The truth never stops a Democrats’ urge to lie and there was no apology for the "misinformation." When the Colorado Club Q (LGBTQ club) shooter/killer, Anderson Lee Aldrich, claimed to be non-binary, the reporters just had to fumble, but he/she/they was still charged with a hate crime.

This past Sunday, January 22, there was a shooting at a nightclub killing 11 Asians.  Both Senator Chuck Schumer and Rep. Adam Schiff began denouncing Asian hate crimes and bigotry, and the Twitter trolls took up the call. This before there was any arrest or investigation. Wisconsin state Rep. Francesca Hong, sharing her condolences for the victims, tweeted: "We are broken as a nation to have mass shootings and white supremacy reign terror." It's possible it was a personal grudge and the shooter, an elderly Asian man, Huu Can Tran, later committed suicide. That was followed within days by another Asian shooter, Chunli Zhao, in a workplace killing in Half Moon Bay, an agricultural community in California.

But also in California on January 16, 2023, six people including a ten-month-old baby were killed in a house in Goshen, California, by alleged cartel gang members. Now that one is hard to track down and got little attention by Reps. Schiff or Pelosi—wrong shooter and wrong victims> It seems they can't make political charges with it. I hope you watch this video--I didn't see that the Democrats jumped on this, perhaps because the Sheriff condemned the soft on crime California governor (a Democrat) and Biden's open border policy. Brutal killing of California family a 'clear message' from the cartel, sheriff warns: 'They were targeted' | Fox News "When you slaughter, when you shoot a 16-year-old mother in the head and a 10-month-old child in the head, that is a very clear message to everyone that this was a cartel-style shooting, execution, and these types of things with our unsecure open border, with our soft on crime approach here in California, this is the result of some of that failed policy," (Tulare County Sheriff Mike Boudreaux). CNN account of the massacre didn't include the sheriff's remarks.

Charles McGonigal, Another FBI scandal?

Charles McGonigal, a 22-year veteran of the FBI who retired in 2018 as the special agent in charge of the FBI's counterintelligence division in New York, was charged by the Justice Department with conspiring to violate and violating the International Emergency Economic Powers Act and with conspiring to commit and committing money laundering as well." (Gazette.com)

"While not connected to the investigation, McGonigal was one of the leading figures behind the investigation into alleged Russian collusion in the 2016 election. McGonigal was one of the first FBI figures to be made aware of allegations that George Papadopoulos, a campaign adviser for Trump, boasted that he knew Russians had dirt on Democrat candidate Hillary Clinton. . . . Trump said: "The FBI guy after me for the Russia, Russia, Russia HOAX, long before my Election as President, was just arrested for taking money from Russia, Russia, Russia. May he Rot In Hell!"" (Newsweek.com)

Expect this to be ignored by the lapdog press, or reworded so carefully that you would never know how the Democrat party conspired with the deep state to sink Trump's campaign and presidency. Trump had no idea how deep the swamp actually is, and they are terrified of everything that is being vomited up now that the 2016,  2020 and 2022 elections are history. Combined with 1) the FBI and NARA raid on Mar a Lago and 2) the oozing documents scandal from the Biden houses/Penn office and 3) the evidence of a counter-counter intelligence mole in the party and bureaucracy, and 4) the clever use of the pandemic lockdown to promote mail in voting, 5) the January 6 committee looks like it has egg on its face(s), especially the turn coat Republicans.

Former FBI official Charles McGonigal had ‘distressing day’ | Watch (msn.com)

Ex-FBI official arrested for alleged money laundering, violating Russia sanctions, taking money from former foreign agent (nbcnews.com)

SEAN HANNITY: The disgraced former agent is the poster boy for political corruption (msn.com)

Retired FBI counterintel agent reportedly involved in Trump-Russia probe arrested for ties to Russian oligarch | Fox News

Move over Detroit

"No major American city has failed at the same level as Detroit, whose population dropped from 1.85 million people in 1950 to about 630,000 today. Move over Detroit, here comes San Francisco, which lost 6.3 percent of its population between 2019 and 2021, a rate of decline larger than any two year-period in Detroit’s history and unprecedented among any major US city."

San Francisco Falls Into The Abyss | Hoover Institution San Francisco Falls Into The Abyss

. . . drug and crime issues, its poorly performing public schools, its homelessness, its extremely high cost of doing business, and other issues that people have tolerated for so long, . . .

While Pelosi has been ruining the lives of the rest us, she hasn't done much for her district.

A heart of gratitude

 https://youtu.be/7578oSauX1c  Family Research Council on a grateful heart with Tony Perkins

This morning I found a copy of an article "Thank you, no, thank you" published in The Wall Street Journal, November 23, 2010 by Melinda Beck. She quoted research on gratitude by Jeffrey Froh of Hofstra University. There was a photo of him reading to his 4 year old son a book about gratitude.  So thinking that 13 years plus 4, that little boy would now be 17, and wondered if a grateful dad made a difference.  I looked through the internet and found out he's still at Hofstra, and writing about all the ways gratitude helps us develop as mentally healthy, kind people, and he recently published a book especially for teens using the 10 commandments as his model. 

Unity in the church

Is there a solution for the conflict in the unity appeals in Paul's letters, like 1 Corinthians 1:10 and the divisions in the church--not only THE church, but our local church congregation? It's not much comfort to see the local churches of the first century were very divided on many issues. Even if read in context about who baptized whom, Paul confirms the message in other letters. But in the 21st century, it is no better and Christians have had 2000 years to get it right.

The abortion conflict really does not allow for "unity." And we are at least a decade or two behind grappling with the genetic manipulation problem that technology has wrought. But the abortion/race/climate/border/gender factions are keeping us putting out fires so we don't have the energy or time to work together on other issues. If we can't agree that a 9 month old baby in the womb is a "life" worthy of protection, we're certainly not prepared to deal with designer babies, or using body parts of aborted babies to correct defects.

I can not pray for unity with people who say conservatives are perverse and obsessed with sex when they destroy life and believe the sexual abuse of trans surgery is OK.

When the U.S. has enough fuel to keep others from starving and we're asked to have unity on Biden's death policies, I just see no good in that.

Running drugs and sex trafficking when it could be stopped but Christians fight each other on what to do and take government grants to assist, is serving God how?

That's defiling the whole concept of unity in Christ. Maybe mercy. Yes, I can ask for God's mercy and grace for all of us. When I read of David's battles, I don't see him asking for unity with those who defy God's will.

Letter to God by a mother for her gay son

I've enjoyed listening to Becket Cook's podcasts. He's a celibate man who gave up the gay lifestyle 12 or 13 years ago after becoming a Christian (and that story alone is amazing). He has since attended seminary and has a popular podcast where he interviews many of the people from his former Hollywood life. But yesterday he told about a letter his mother wrote to God before his conversion, that he never knew about. His mother knew about his homosexuality, but she never condemned or nagged him and they remained very close speaking on the phone every night. His sister-in-law found the letter recently (mother died in 2016) and he reads it on his program. In the letter she claims many Bible verses for him and her, and lists about 12 specific requests including protection from HIV. If you have a child you're praying for who has left or never found the Christian life, perhaps you can be Becket's mom or St. Augustine's mother Monica. It's a beautiful prayer.

A Mother's Prayer for Her Gay Son - The Becket Cook Show - Omny.fm

From the web page: The Becket Cook Show

"The Becket Cook Show was created by Becket Cook to discuss relevant topics and to crush the lies of culture with truth. Becket Cook was born and raised in Dallas, Texas. After graduating from college, he moved to Los Angeles to pursue his dream of writing and acting, finding success in both. He eventually became a production designer working on fashion shoots for brands such as Vogue, Harper’s Bazaar, Gap, L'Oréal Paris, and Nike. Becket lived as a gay man until 2009, when he reluctantly agreed to attend a church service at which he was transformed by the gospel and gave his life to Christ. He also knew that homosexuality was a sin and that he could no longer live that life. Becket spends much of his time in ministry speaking at churches, universities, and conferences helping people understand this issue biblically, theologically, culturally, and personally. Becket graduated from Talbot School of Theology at Biola University in 2017 with a Master of Arts in Theology."

Vivek Ramaswamy on excellence

Take a look at the advice and wisdom of Vivek Ramaswamy, an American entrepreneur in the healthcare and technology sectors, . He was born in Cincinnati, and his wife is an Asst. Prof. at OSU. He says (paraphrase) "Excellence, not victimhood, should be our agenda." His 2021 book: Woke, Inc.: Inside corporate America's Social Justice Scam. His 2022 book: Nation of Victims: Identity Politics, the Death of Merit, and the Path Back to Excellence. Although I think he is a Hindu, his publisher, Center Street, is a publisher of Christian books. I've seen him on various Fox programs, also podcast at PBD Podcast, (Patrick Bet-David). Sounds to me like he might be running for office--or maybe president.