Hilltop Lutheran

Although I’ve expressed some concern about our church’s relationship with the federal government through faith based initiatives, I have no reservations about our unordained (non-ordained?) pastor at Hilltop Lutheran and navigating around the rules of ELCA. He has a heart for Jesus and the people living in the neighborhood. Hilltop Lutheran serves a "transitional" community which 50 years ago was thriving and middle-class. Most of its members had moved to the suburbs. It became part of Upper Arlington Lutheran Church six years ago.

Hilltop‘s unorthodox mix also includes an unordained spiritual leader, Steve Scott, 51, a former lawyer. In the 70s, he worked with Young Life, an urban ministry for high-school students. He began preaching at the church two years ago and became its minister in November because of a "compelling sense that it‘s the right thing to do," he said. He can‘t perform marriages but can do most other pastoral duties. Full story in the Columbus Dispatch

Another one who escaped

Obama's fairness doctrine

The damage of Obama's slip up in talking to Joe the Plumber, and why the press is trying to take your eye off Obama and focus on an ordinary citizen working for a living for a plumbing company in Ohio, is that even the most undecided voter knows that "spread the wealth around" is socialism.

For some reason, the voters haven't caught on to the lie, "95% will have their taxes reduced." These are the same people who don't realize credit means debt and sale means spend. In this parable he's talking about reinstating welfare for millions; millions of people don't pay taxes, so they will get a tax credit, i.e., will be paid for not paying taxes. McCain has been really weak in demolishing this phony claim.

Also, voters don't seem to remember one of the most successful features during the Clinton years was the Congress forcing his hand on welfare reform. Oh! the Democrats moaned and groaned, they predicted horrible things, but the economy soared by putting people to work. And Clinton got the credit--about his only positive legacy. The "community organizations" immediately went right to work pushing the newly employed or low income into NINJA loans so they would have something to do when they took their clutches off the necks of the poor.

Also, voters in 2008 don't remember the promises Bill Clinton made about reducing taxes on the middle class during his campaign in 1992 (I voted for him, did you?)--took about a month when he told us that he really couldn't do that--we'd all have to pay more. Maybe McCain is too much of a gentleman to bring it up, but he could turn that one over to Sarah.

Someone, and I don't care if it is Governor Palin or Senator McCain, needs to tell the voters that when Obama hits up the rich for more taxes (because "it's fair" or "patriotic"), he is simply penalizing the investors. The truly rich will still hire the accountants and lawyers and buy their boats, houses, and travel, but there will be much less left to invest. I saw some figures on how much Cindy McCain has lost recently. You're not sorry? I am. That's money that won't create jobs. (And she won't pay taxes on her losses, remember, so we're hurt two ways). So tax rate for the top 10% goes up, but Joe the Plumber or Jane the Pharmaceutical rep may be 100% out of a job. Jobs are created by the rich, not the poor.

Bush certainly hasn't been frugal. He's thrown money at education like he was a drunken Democrat from Massachusetts instead of a recovering Republican from Texas. He's infuriated conservatives. But he knows the way to bring in more money is to reduce the tax rates--that really spreads the wealth. Our nation's unemployment was under 5% for most of the Bush years because of his tax cuts. And before the housing meltdown caused by Democrats failing to rein in Fannie and Fred, the market was at an all time high. Obama doesn't care. He wants your job--as long as some rich investor gets taxed more. If you are 100% unemployed, well good, it just gives him more opportunity to make you more dependent on him. Makes him feel good--or powerful--or both.

The Team Obama's treatment of Joe the Plumber is just a foretaste of what's to come.

McCain supporter attacked by Obamatite

Although the press reported some mean language at a McCain rally and the MSM was all over it, the Secret Service and police and people attending never heard or saw a thing. However, according to Pajamas Media, an irate Obama supporter attacked a McCain supporter holding a poster causing injuries and a police report. "The overly formal document doesn’t mention this important detail: the victim was a small, quiet, middle-aged woman wearing glasses, and the attacker was a loud, angry man who went into orbit at the mere sight of McCain campaign signs." Get a grip, folks. It's just our future. I don't watch the NBCBSABC news much. Have they been as good at tracking down this guy's license to assault, tax records, voter registration and divorce papers as they were with Joe the Plumber?

John the Plumber, not Joe

is making robocalls in Ohio according to Maggie Thurber, a radio talk show host in Lucas County keeping an eye on local, state and national politics. When you check the caller ID number, you get recorded B.O. I still think they're mad that Joe the Plumber was more articulate than Barack the Candidate.

The Junior Senator from Illinois on the issues

was elected on 11/02/2004, and began service in 2005. He immediately began to run for President. I looked at Project Vote Smart I browsed through a few topics that interest me--abortion, agriculture, commerce, environmentalism, but you may want to check others.

Prohibiting the Funds in S 1200 from Being Used for Abortions--Senator Obama did not vote. I think he does this a lot--sort of his political footprint--tries to make it small. However,

NARAL, Planned Parenthood, National Family Planning & Reproductive Health Association give him a score of 100. National Right to Life Committee and Illinois Federation for Right to Life give him a zero.

Americans for Tax Reform which believes in a system in which taxes are simpler, fairer, flatter, more visible, and lower gave him a zero in 2005 and a 5-15 in 2007 as he was moving closer to his goal of being the party’s choice (they gave McCain a 70). Citizens for Tax Justice which wants higher taxes for the wealthy and the closing of corporate loop holes, gave him 100 (they gave McCain a 50). National Taxpayers Union, which "Seeks to reduce government spending, cut taxes, and protect the rights of taxpayers." gave him an F, or a 6 (gave McCain a 78).

National Association of Government Contractors gave him a score of 100 (McCain a zero) as did the National Ready Mixed Concrete Association (this endorsement begs for a comment about Chicago type justice, doesn’t it?) which gave McCain a 33. U.S. Chamber of Commerce which promotes human progress through an economic, political and social system based on individual freedom, incentive, initiative, opportunity, and responsibility gave him a 33 and McCain a 100.

The Arab and Iranian interest groups are very savvy; they gave both candidates almost identical scores--very high. The NAACP have Obama 100 and McCain a 5--they will just never forgive him for not voting for the day off for MLK day, no matter how much he grovels.

Club for Growth gives Obama a 33 and McCain a 100; Americans for Prosperity give Obama 42.9 and McCain 100; John Birch Index gives Obama 18, McCain a 38. American Wind Energy Association and League of Conservation Voters give Obama 100 and American Land Rights gives him an 11.

I realize McCain is older, more experienced and has been reelected often, however, when the two pages (bio/resume) are compared side by side, the differences are stunning. The item on BO's very short resume you need to notice is The Woods Fund of Chicago, which sort of bundles all the funding and scary friends together in a neat package.

What happened to the $160 million Annenberg challenge?

Through Bill Ayers, Obama got a piece and had the opportunity to “spread the good(s)” in the 90s and launch his career in politics. Peggy Noonan doesn't get it. Do You? Do you really want Democrats controlling all three branches of the government with their Just-Us radical, anti-American social plans?

“[Bill Ayers‘] hatred of America is as virulent as when he planted a bomb at the Pentagon. And this hatred informs his educational "reform" efforts. Of course, Mr. Obama isn't going to appoint him to run the education department. But the media mainstreaming of a figure like Mr. Ayers could have terrible consequences for the country's politics and public schools.”

Ayers is no education reformer

High noon for Noonan

It's too bad that print readers won't see the comments conservatives have sent to the WSJ about Peggy Noonan, who has been suffering from Bush Derangement Syndrome for years, ever since she was left at the altar--wasn't even invited to be a bridesmaid after being a big wheel in the party. Now she's really shaming herself with tantrums about Palin. Readers aren't buying it. I sent a comment, but I'm no match for the pros. They're all pretty good, but this was one of my favorites.

Ms. Noonan writes, "In the end the Palin candidacy is a symptom and expression of a new vulgarization in American politics."

And here's what the press had to say about the Gettysburg Address, back in 1863: "The cheek of every American must tingle with shame as he reads the silly, flat and dishwatery utterances of the man who has to be pointed out to intelligent foreigners as the President of the United States."

Voter fraud in Ohio

Here in Ohio we’re experiencing massive voter fraud. The Obamanation has so much money and so many volunteers we are being overwhelmed. Check out the Palestra blog for a story on "Mr. Smith," from Florida who had been living in Ohio 2 days (working for the Democrats, living with a host family) and registered and voted during our "golden" week.

A commenter explains why ACORN submits hordes of duplicate and obviously false names on voter registration forms.

The obvious phony voter registrations keep the election boards tied up trying to locate the obvious ones. The new voters with actual verifiable addresses are over looked in this process. In the mean time these organizations have rented houses in various voting districts so dozens of out of state and fraudulent voters have a local address to use for the actual voter fraud. Usually these places are dumps unfit for human habitation so the rent is cheap. With millions of dollars backing them and the stakes of putting their man in the White House, how many of these mail drops can they afford? It's almost unlimited. Once they show up and vote at the polls that vote can no longer be traced.

I know well the passion and idealism of the Democrats, young and old, student and retiree. I'm sure they see what they are doing--destroying our country through the ballot--as honorable and just. But they're just wrong.

Obama and ACORN

We know personally how much noise an acorn can make. We lived for 34 years in a house with a metal roof with a huge oak tree overhanging it.

"A common thread in many of the cases that [John] Fund spotlights [in Stealing Elections] is the shadowy presence of Acorn. Two and a half years after the debacle in Seattle, Washington’s attorney general indicted seven Acorn workers for their role in what he called “the worst case of voter registration fraud” in the state’s history. In St. Louis, eight Acorn workers pled guilty to election fraud this past April. On the other side of Missouri, in 2006, four Kansas City Acorn workers were indicted after officials deemed nearly 15,000 of their 35,000 registrations phony.

In the mid-nineties, Barack Obama ran Acorn’s Project Vote campaign in Illinois. He sued the state of Illinois on the group’s behalf in 1995 to implement the Motor Voter law. “After he joined the board of the Woods Fund,” Stealing Elections notes, “Obama saw to it that substantial grants were given to Acorn.” Senator Obama has championed Acorn’s legislative priorities in Congress. His presidential campaign even donated more than $800,000 to Acorn. Obama is the oak grown from Acorn, a group so proud of its association that it boasts “Obama Organizing Fellows” and runs a “Camp Obama” training event. While Acorn boasts of its Obama association, the candidate, of course, is more reticent. That’s because he well knows that many non-dead, non-animal voters would not find a close association with such a group a desirable quality in a potential president." Read the article at City Journal.

Running into a PUMA

I was leaving the library today and a woman in the lobby thrust a Ted Celeste ad at me that she had just picked up from the table. "Is this the Governor Celeste we used to have?" she asked. I just look like I have all the answers, but I could remember Dagmar, his wife's name, but not Governor Celeste's first name. "Oh, he had a lot more hair than that," I said. "Yeah, but in 20 years?" she said. So together we started running through names. "Go inside and ask a librarian," I said. "They love questions like that, then come back out and let me know." So I waited while she went inside. "Richard," she said when she came out.

We chatted a bit on the way to the parking lot and I flashed my McCain-Palin badge that was under my jacket. "Oh, so you're going to vote for a woman," she said, "So am I." We both agreed that we weren't all that thrilled with either Obama or McCain. "I was a Hillary supporter," she said, "She really had some good ideas. I'm just so mad at those Obama people for how they treated her." "Are you a PUMA?" I asked. But she didn't seem to be familiar with the word, but if ever there was an angry, disenfranchised Democrat, she was it. She just wants a woman in the White House. Then in four years. . . I told her I liked Palin because she was a Conservative and so was I. We chatted a bit and then said good-bye and walked to our cars.

The food stamp challenge

A Lutheran church in Seattle took the "Food Stamp Challenge," to see what it was like to live on a food stamp budget of $1 per person, per meal for one week. I blogged about one couple, Jason and Krista, at my other blog.

The present food stamp program began during Johnson’s Great Society in the 1960s (there was a small brief program 1939-1944) and was expanded during the Carter years, and every administration since, including the Republicans. It is now a massive hot potato that no president or congress dare cut. Food stamps were never intended to replace the family’s food income, but to supplement it so they could have a healthier diet. This is the first fallacy of the “Food Stamp Challenge”--they were supposed to be supplementing a modest food plan.

However, the real motivation behind food stamps is/was to help farmers with surpluses. After WWII, our surpluses (huge expansion during the war) went to Europe to help them rebuild, but eventually they weren’t needed there and they had their own food commodity markets and trade. But our farmers were still raising surpluses. So subsidized food surplus was distributed to prop up agriculture, and to generate additional economic activity. It is supposed to be a type of stimulus for the economy--something Jason and Krista who tried the challenge didn't understand. Like many good intentions, it has created a type of dependency, poor planning, huge bureaucracy and frustration among the poor because it doesn’t do more. Every federal budget, food stamps now called SNAP, is expanded and more people and more programs are added.

According to the Cato Institute, “The largest portion of the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s budget consists of food subsidies, not farm subsidies. Food subsidies will cost taxpayers $55 billion in fiscal 2007 and account for 61 percent of the USDA’s budget. The largest food subsidy programs are food stamps; the school breakfast and lunch programs; and the women, infants, and children (WIC) program. The federal government as a whole has about 26 food and nutrition programs operated by six different agencies.“

The biggest distributor of these programs is "faith based and community" initiatives like our church, UALC, which participates in and works at the local food pantry (over 90% funded by the government) and the summer lunch programs (all government).

Update: I didn't know that the USDA also was in the business of providing mortgage money for low income families through a church chipping in the down payment, but it is. Story here about Mennonite Self Help Housing.

Off the reservation?

Leftists can't hack it. Blacks and women are not allowed to leave the reservation/plantation/basement/kitchen. Now the working class can't either. As soon as they discovered that "Joe the Plumber" from Ohio could speak better off the cuff and was more knowledgeable than the candidates, BO and Biden, they swung into action to destroy him. Checked his plumber's license. Nope. Checked his union membership. Nope. Checked his voter registration. Yes (although some got that wrong). Checked his taxes. Wow. Look at that! He like thousands of others, still owes Ohio money. No wonder he doesn't want Obama to raise his taxes. Just like they flew a covey of lawyers to Alaska to find dirt on Palin and her husband and children, they have launched a "destroy Joe" campaign.

Joe's American Dream: "was to have a house, a dog, a couple rifles, a bass boat. I believe in living life easy and simple. I don’t have grand designs. I don’t want much. I just wanna be able to take care of my family and do things with them outdoors and that’s about it, really. I don’t have a “grand scheme” thing. My American Dream is just more personal to me as far as working, making a good living and being able to provide for my family, college for my son. Things like that – simple things in life, that’s really what it comes down to for me. That’s my dream." Interview

Now Obama is lying on the campaign trail about what Joe said. I heard him this morning on the radio. "How many of you know plumbers who make a quarter of a million a year?" he said slipping into a little patois just to be authentic. Joe never said he earned $250,000 a year--he said he'd like to buy the business some day and not pay even more taxes under Obama's plan. Joe's a working guy who'd like to do better someday. Under President Obama, that's not allowed. Step back, working folk. Do the Obama blue collar, black face shuffle.

Pot to Kettle: Martin Nesbitt's tax liens (Obama's treasurer).

See Michelle Malkin who is tracking this.

Update: This comment #23 at Malkin was good: "Thank you to all the MSM hyper Obambi lovers and supporters. Thank you, thank you, thank you. In your zeal and hatred of the American workers you have kept Joe and his story in the news. This could very possibly be your Dukakis in the tank moment. With the race tightening up voters are hearing Obambi over and over again espouse his socialism and the thug-ocracy of the Obambi machine. Thank you again." Marshall Russ

The MSM has tracked down the truth and reported: His name isn't Joe; that's his middle name. Oh the shame and horror!

Our household income fell by one-half under Bush!

Of course. We retired during the Bush years. Eeek! And our insurance costs have gone up! Just like the leftist say. Yes, we're on Medicare, a government health plan and our costs have gone up! Not nearly as good or cost worthy as what I had at the university. And we're not the only ones, we're part of a million household trend. And it will only get worse, unless Obama decrees that the Census reports can no longer be issued until he's finished with the country. Whenever that will be.

Here's a lefty who just doesn't get it.

Wall Street Journal front page feature, the black McCains

Interesting isn't it, when Barack Obama has slave owners both in his African ancestry and his American white ancestry, that WSJ choses 2 weeks before the election to write about McCain's ancestors who owned slaves?

The first Islamic assault on African culture was the jihad that annihilated Coptic Egyptian culture and Greek culture in Northern Africa. Today these areas are Arabic and Islamic.

That was just the thin end of the jihad wedge. Over the next 1400 years, Islam took approximately 25 million slaves out of Africa. An Arabic word for African is abd, the same word that is used for black slave. Arabic has about 40 words for slaves. White slaves are mamluk. Islam took more than a million European slaves into slavery. The highest priced slave in the Meccan slave market was a white woman.

There is great deal of collateral damage when a slave is taken. A warring party attacks a tribe and when enough of the protectors are killed, the rest will surrender and become slaves. All of those who were strong enough to work were taken away in a forced march for days. But there are many who are left behind -- the young, the old, and the sick and injured.

Estimates vary, but from 5 to 10 people left behind died as the result of taking one slave. So for 25 million slaves, we have the deaths of 125 million Africans over a 1400-year period.

When the story of slavery is told in America, as in the movie Roots, the sailors get off the boats and capture the Africans and make them slaves. Wrong. Wrong. Wrong.

When the white slaver showed up in his wooden ship, he made a business deal with a Muslim wholesaler. Jihad was the machinery that Mohammed used, and his model worked well in Africa as slavers filled the slave pens for the same reason that Mohammed did it: profit. Whites only traded slaves with Islam for about 200 years. Islam was in the slave trade before and after selling to the West

.From every educational and personal achievement measurement, the black McCains and the white McCains seem pretty well matched in the 21st century, regardless of what transpired in the 19th century. We'll never know if the NGOs and western aid hadn't virtually destroyed African culture and propped up despots, 21st Africans would be doing as well as 21st century African-Americns.

WSJ news coverage is among the most liberal of all the MSM. It's difficult to tell sometimes if journalists or left wing social workers are doing the writing, because much of it belongs on the op-ed pages. Generally, the editorial staff and letters to the editor are conservative. I wonder, do the two cultures of this paper even sit together in the lunch room?

What housing crisis?

If there is a housing slump or melt down in my neighborhood, it would be hard to tell from the real estate ads in our SNP Upper Arlington News. If you are from San Francisco or the east coast, these may sound low, but for our neck of the woods, they are high. Plus, I'm familiar with some of these properties and I don't think they were anywhere near these prices 5 years ago. My comments appear after the double slash.

South of Lane. Wonderful 2 story in historic Old Arlington. Spacious living room and dining room. Hardwood floors, French doors, screened porch, rec room in lower level. Beautiful gardens. $498,500. New Price. // The key word here is "old." The important thing to notice is the agent doesn't mention bathrooms or garage--the photo appears to feature a home about 80 years old, so I'm guessing a 1 car garage and 1.5 baths.

Cottage style home. Charming 2-story in the Northam Park area. Great details, hdwd floors & built-ins. Generous size living & dining rooms. 1st flr den. 3 BRs, 2 full baths. Paver patio & deck. $398,000. // This is near our old neighborhood, only a bit older--probably built late 20s. From the photo I can see that the "den" is a filled-in porch with windows that don't match the original architecture, a frequent mistake in remodeling. These lots are very small, but with huge gracious trees (very expensive to maintain, btw). Landscaping looks way over grown--probably from early-90s upgrade and now is out of control.

Loch Lomond. Stately entrance to a limestone terrace. Private 1+ acre lot. Gourmet kitchen, open floor plan. 2-sty great room. 5BR, 5 full & 2 half baths. Terrific floorplan for entertaining. $1,475,000. // Not quite sure where Loch Lomond is but I think it is the northern edge of UA. From photo I'd guess a late 80s design from a catalog. This description means "this is a hard to heat barn"--you can square dance in the entry and fly kites in the great-room. The utility bills for houses like this could put a kid through college.

Desirable location. This beautiful 4 BR home is located in a prime UA neighborhood on the corner of Abinton and Redding. Recently renovated, the home features a gourmet kit w/granite counter tops, top of the line appliances & a wine cooler. Each BR is completely renovated, while new French drs lead to the extraordinary patio. Boasting new Pella windows, driveway, and exterior stucco, this home is truly a must see! $739,000.// We lived on Abington so I know this house--I think everyone who has ever lived there has remodeled it which might be why the price is so high. That sounds like a fab kitchen, but Redding Rd is a main thoroughfare through Arlington that cuts through what would be a very small area on the edge of Canterbury addition. Virtually no useable yard. If you have young children, I'd look elsewhere.

Yes, there seems to be 1) a lot of money still available, or 2) people not too anxious to move.

Global cooling suggested

Don't buy those funny light bulbs yet. The regular ones help heat your home. Old Farmer's Almanac is predicting we're going into a cooling period and they're not looking at fuzzy caterpillars crossing the road.

These factors—the cooling Pacific, the yet-to-cool Atlantic, and the historical reduction in recent solar activity—suggest that a staggered cooling period could continue. Absent from most headlines about global warming is a discussion of measures suggesting that the warming has ceased and a cooling may have begun. For example, deep-ocean heat content has not increased during the past five years. Looking at just one year, from January 2007 to January 2008, we find that satellite-derived atmospheric temperatures indicate that Earth was about one degree Fahrenheit cooler at the beginning of 2008 than it was at the beginning of 2007. The United Kingdom's Hadley Centre ocean and land temperature records show cooling in the last seven to ten years.

Are you government approved?

Check out this website and see! I am approved--my BMI was 22.46. But all these folks the government says are overweight:

OVERWEIGHT:
Barry Bonds: 6'2": 228 lbs: 29
David Boreanaz: 6'2": 218 lbs: 28
Tom Brady: 6'4": 225 lbs: 27
President Bush: 5'11": 191 lbs: 26
Nic Cage: 6'1": 210 lbs: 28
George Clooney: 5'11": 211 lbs: 29
Tom Cruise: 5'7": 170 lbs: 26
Matt Damon: 5'11": 187 lbs: 26
Johnny Depp: 5'7": 190 lbs: 27
David Duchovny: 6'0": 212 lbs: 29
Vin Diesel: 6'2": 200 lbs: 26
Cheryl Ford: 6'3": 215 lbs:27
Harrison Ford: 6'1": 218 lbs: 29
Brendan Fraser: 6'3": 234 lbs: 29
Richard Gere: 5'11": 187 lbs: 26
Ethan Hawke: 5'9": 172 lbs: 25
Hugh Jackman: 6'2": 210 lbs: 27
Lebron James: 6'8": 240 lbs: 26
Dale Jarrett: 6'2": 200 lbs: 26
Bobby Labonte: 5'9": 170 lbs: 25
Nick Lachey: 5'10": 180 lbs: 26
Karl Malone: 6'9": 259 lbs: 28
Dr. Phil McGraw: 6'4": 240 lbs: 29
Mark McGuire (playing weight): 6'5": 250 lbs: 30
Donovan McNabb: 6'3": 240 lbs: 30
Yao Ming: 7'6": 310 lbs: 27
Brad Pitt: 6'0": 203 lbs: 28
Keanu Reeves: 6'1": 223 lbs: 29
Cal Ripken: 6'4": 210 lbs: 27
Andy Roddick: 6'2": 197 lbs: 25
Will Smith: 6'2": 210 lbs: 27
Sammy Sosa: 6'0": 220 lbs: 30
Denzel Washington: 6'0": 199 lbs: 27
Bruce Willis: 6'0": 200 lbs: 29
Billy Zane: 6'2": 210 lbs: 27

Do American schools not graduate any physics students?

Does the Zhong Group at Ohio State University look a little unbalanced to you?

Older, male and Protestants lean toward McCain

Jews (78%), other (71%) and no religion (61%) are going for Obama big time. People over 45 are going 45% for McCain, with only 32% in the 65+ age group for Obama. Protestants are 53% for McCain. Males about 50% and single women are all ga-ga over Obama, 62% to 25%.

The one that really puzzles me is investors in a dead heat, 45% and 45%, with 11% undecided. Someone really doesn't understand economics or how we got this melt down. Or how the Democrats tried to block for the last year and a half (since they came into power) any investigation of the GSE's roll role in the subprime housing mess. See IBD poll as of yesterday.

http://www.ibdeditorials.com/Polls.aspx?id=308947386648301

From the fraud we see in Ohio perpetrated by the Obama campaign, I doubt this poll will mean much.