I can hardly recognize my country

It's unbelievable. About half the country is hoping against hope that the death count increases, that the vaccines will prove to be ineffective, that new therapeutic measures will not be developed, that the hopes and dreams of small business owners will be dashed with another lockdown, that the numbers will show an economic depression rather than have the unemployment numbers go down and investments and sales go up, and that everyone from small children with chaotic school schedules to the elderly afraid to leave their homes can be constantly living in fear.

Yes, half the country hates President Trump that much they are willing to destroy it.

Reality shows—muscle cars

I wonder who writes the scripts for "reality shows?" This morning at the gym I started watching a show about muscle cars and the guys who love and restore them. It might have been Counting Cars, a spin off of Pawn Stars, but not sure, since this was the first time I saw it and I didn't see the opening. I was sort of tired of politics, and wanted to go 10 miles. Fox was showing clips from the last debate, usually Biden bloopers about fossil fuel or Covid.

I didn't watch a whole program but it took in a car show (some restored cars $150,000), the 2 characters stopping a guy on the freeway and eventually buying his Dodge Charger to restore it (it deserved better, they said), and later we'd see it restored and the guy who was going to buy it. But the cutest human interest story was when the muscle bound, bandana head, full of tats guy brings in his two tiny dogs to the shop, sweet talking them, and hands them over to the Hungarian immigrant wash and detail guy to give them a bath. That was laugh out loud funny, and I'm not sure all of it was in the script. You know it wasn't real because no one I know would hand over their 3 lb mixed breed Chihuahua to a novice to bathe in a yellow floor bucket with a wringer. But it was good theater. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Counting_Cars And I got my 10 miles + in.

Biden on minimum wage—the debate

Don't be fooled by their sob stories. Democrats trot out this tired donkey weighed down by this burden every election. It's a tiny percentage of American workers—4.3% of hourly wage earners and 2.9% of all workers. Part-timers like your teen who has to be taught everything may be on minimum before he proves his ability to follow directions. By misleading you with the importance of minimum wage (instituted in the 1930s so whites could better compete against blacks), Joe doesn't need to talk about his tax increases, his hostility toward capitalism, his own ill-gotten family wealth, the wealth transfer out of the middle class wallet to the low income and the high income, and how his far left Marxist supporters don't believe you should have personal property let alone a decent wage. And btw, his Marxist supporters will call me a racist for quoting statistics. It's a rule. Even math is racist.

And did you hear Joe whine at the debate about first responders being paid minimum wage? On what planet? Average base pay of a firefighter in NYC is about $87,000. In Chicago, about $76,000. In Columbus, OH $47,000. But the payoff is always the benefits, especially retirement. And did he tell you, that even a federal minimum which is about half of what a lot of cities offer, 2 people working full time at minimum wage sharing a home earn to much to qualify for any common benefits like Food States or Section 8 or Medicaid?

What has happened to our prayers?

Since Memorial Day week-end and the death of George Floyd, which by the way has never been proven to be about racial  animus, which led to 3 months of protests, looting and burning. Billions were raised for BLM, the centers of many cities were destroyed, and we were being gas lit by the media who were telling us that these were peaceful protests and a result of the unhappiness over the pandemic.  This is Critical Race Theory (CRT) at it’s most obvious.  Something right before my eyes is said to be something else, and it’s the result of racial injustice, and because I’m white, I’m the cause of the unrest and inequality. That there is no objective evidence and I point that out is also racist according to CRT.

Now I see it in the community prayers sent by our church—which is still not open in October. And this isn’t the first one, just the most recent.

• We pray against the evil one, who comes only to steal, kill, and destroy. We come against the powers and principalities of this present darkness, that seek to divide us against one another by race, gender, economic status, or political affiliation, and pray for the curse of injustice to be broken in Your world.
• Father, cause those whom You have set in authority over us to lean not to their own understanding, but to acknowledge You in all their ways. Direct their paths, Lord, that they may speak in ways that will heal our divisions, and to act in ways that will overturn inequalities and lead to peace.

I’ve been a member for over 40 years had we’ve rarely had prayers about our socio-economic differences, which this prayer actually heightens and creates more divisions! It reads like the vanity signs I see in my neighbors’ yards.  Someone or a group on our large staff has managed to blend Bible and identity politics. Here we are in the midst of a pandemic,  people are living in fear and panic.  Some of it is being ramped up by government bureaucrats. Grandparents can’t hold their grandchildren, and special events are called off. We can’t worship together and church members, families and friends are divided by politics (not their race, income or sex).  The people in the pew (if we could get into the church building) are not happy, are not “loving their neighbors” and it has nothing to do with race. Some staff and members  have decided to be morally superior and woke. Wokeness is a system of infiltration.  It’s inviting the Devil in and throwing him a party. And wokeness only needs a permissive leader to open the door and we’ll never get it out of the church. The Woke movement can destroy us. Maybe it already has.

Our church staff needs to understand that the goal of Critical Race Theory is not better race relations or equality. No goals of CRT align with the gospel.  CRT goal is to dismantle not just the status quo, but also the church, the family and the Constitution that protects us from an overbearing government. It is the opposite of what God wants for us.

Go to Australia to get your updates on Biden

I just watched Sky News Australia and got a fairly complete story on the Biden Family Scandal. Why do they get the news in Australia and we don't? The report even included the Twitter and Google scandal of censoring the story. And it was over 22 minutes!  We might get 2-3 minutes on Fox and the others are mum. . https://youtu.be/_zhWHsfEa0U

Media has ‘never been so untrustworthy as it is now, said another Australian commentator. https://youtu.be/Fa4JwFj4uz4

Biden would lock us down—it’s his plan

Trump did what a president who is not a dictator is supposed to do--told the 50 governors of the states united to do what was right for their states. Some governors went out of control, but hey, that's our system. This is a very bad virus with high infectivity and low death rate, especially for children and young adults. Obama claims he left the guidelines. Yes, and I read the guidelines in JAMA and they were followed, but it isn't the job of the president to check the supply line to the hospitals, or to see if they are following them. (They weren't). That is a local and state responsibility.

To see Biden wave a cloth, non-medical mask and claim this is how he'd save us shows he hasn't looked at the "science."  But I have.

The Biden family crime syndicate

This is such a nightmare. I don’t like Biden don’t want him as a President, but I feel such pain for those who have had their party taken over by radicals, then to get this kind of a candidate. And what a horror they’ll have if he makes it to the White House. I doubt that this is unusual, and therefore Trump who is not part of the club is such an anathema.

When Trump said “drain the swamp” I doubt even he knew the level of corruption he would find once he was on the inside. As a businessman and entertainer, he was well aware of the smarmy deals and palm greasing that goes on to keep the economy moving.   The impeachment was begun on the flimsiest of stories—pushed by the Clinton campaign in 2008, but apparently started by the McCain group and then dropped. This is so huge it makes the “golden showers” story the depth of a spider web and Biden the size of Grand Central Station with millions walking through. (Shows my age—and my readers (Hi Gene!) that I can use an analogy long gone and we’d all know what I was saying).

I doubt that this will ever be investigated—the media won’t and Congress can’t and I’m not even sure the country could take it. It would look like revenge, plus the Bidens have almost a half century of history in the government. Even in personal things—his wife was a married campaign worker when they began dating (according to her first husband).  You can’t do this kind of foreign corruption alone. Hundreds know, aided, planned, covered and will believe their own lies. Those who helped are our own corporate giants. Just as big a grifter and graft as the Bidens. China is massive both in economy and peoples. Militarily it could stomp us to death. It’s an evil empire, and the U.S. has gone along with it for trade—money. One of the evils of capitalism.  Since Nixon surprised us in the 70s and opened up the deals. Men like Howard Zinn have been destroying our history and culture for 3 decades, spitting out graduates who hate the United States,  but this is worse. You just feel dirty even reading about it. This goes to our core. Who and what is the United States. Hand washing and social distancing isn’t going to cut it.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bhyYaFvELaU  Zinn

https://www.illinoisreview.com/illinoisreview/2020/10/the-biden-crime-family-from-embarrassment-to-extortion.html Biden crime family

http://www.americaslibrary.gov/jb/modern/jb_modern_nixchina_1.html  Nixon 1972

Fair and balanced?

This was posted recently by the Washington Times.

“From June 1 through July 31, the ABC, CBS and NBC evening newscasts focused 512 minutes of airtime on the President, or nine times more than the 58 minutes allotted to Biden,” it continued.

“The extra airtime devoted to Trump consisted almost entirely of anchors and reporters criticizing the President. During these two months, our analysts documented 668 evaluative statements about the President, 95% of which (634) were negative, vs. a mere 5% (34) that were positive.”

In contrast, 67% of the evaluative statements about Mr. Biden are positive.

“Do the math, and viewers heard 150 times more negative comments about Trump than Biden. That’s not news reporting — that’s a negative advertising campaign in action,” the study said.

https://www.newsbusters.org/blogs/nb/rich-noyes/2020/08/17/study-150-times-more-negative-news-trump-biden  I’m assuming this was the source Washington Times used.

Ring around the rosy, pocket full of corruption

“Last week when all this [Biden laptop] broke, the focus quickly shifted from Hunter Biden’s emails to a decision by Facebook and Twitter to censor the Post’s reporting, and, in Twitter’s case, lock the Post’s official account for posting “hacked” materials (there’s no evidence the emails were hacked). When Twitter tried to walk back but also justify its draconian policies, the media reported on that, and when a handful of Republican senators announced they’d be subpoenaing Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey over the imbroglio, the media reported on that, too.

What they didn’t report on is the obvious thing the emails reveal: Hunter Biden was trading on his family name overseas, and Joe Biden, despite his many denials, seems to have been aware of this and might have even been a part of it.”

https://thefederalist.com/2020/10/20/why-big-media-will-never-report-on-hunter-bidens-emails/?

What if Jesus had returned the summer of 2020

I think the parable Jesus told in Luke 12:39-48 might be worth looking at.  The master had put a faithful, trusted steward in charge of his servants and the steward thought it would be awhile before the master came back.  He behaved badly and encouraged bad behavior among the other servants. Things didn’t go well—the steward was cast out with the unbelievers.

She said, He’s not a gentleman and I can’t get over it

And I said,

Think of equivalencies:

• Peace for Israel and its neighbors or he's not a gentleman.
• Prison reform or he's not a gentleman.
• Freedom for veterans to get medical care close to home or he's not a gentleman.
• Late term abortions or he's not a gentleman.
• Loss of religious freedom or he's not a gentleman.
• Increased taxes or he's not a gentleman.
• A lockdown at the federal level to take all the freedoms Americans enjoy or he's not a gentleman.

You've obviously got a heart, now grab a brain. What bothers you about Trump really doesn't matter in the long run.

Election Prayer from EWTN received today

Lord Jesus Christ, You told us to give to Caesar what belongs to Caesar, and to God what belongs to God. Enlighten the minds of our people in America. May we choose a President of the United States, and other government officials, according to your Divine Will. Give our citizens the courage to choose leaders of our nation who respect the sanctity of unborn human life, the sanctity of marriage, the sanctity of marital relations, the sanctity of the family, and the sanctity of the aging. Grant us the wisdom to give You, what belongs to You, our God. If we do this, as a nation, we are confident You will give us an abundance of Your blessings through our elected leaders. Amen. (published in 1992)

When I first saw this prayer, I thought it was right on target--sanctity of life. That's my issue. That's the issue in 2020. All the wrangling about Judge Barrett, the hysterical women grieving that they might not have the "freedom" to choose to end the life within them, and the two very clear options we Christians have. Then I saw the date--almost 30 years old!

In 1992 there were 3 candidates; George H.W. Bush, the sitting president; Bill Clinton, governor of Arkansas; and business man and independent, Ross Perot. It was, in my opinion, the Republicans who voted for Perot out of anger at Bush for a tax increase, who elected Clinton. I was a Democrat then and voted for Clinton, but also realized the foolishness of my Republican friends who bolted the party. And there are Republicans today who are doing the same thing. They don't like Trump's personality, style and manner, so they ignore what he's done in giving Republicans a spine transplant and how he's achieved with no power base in DC many of the policies they used to say they wanted. Both parties are terrified of losing their sweet gigs, heady power and access to big money.

OK, Christians. Whether Democrat or Republican, you do have a higher power than party or your personal dislike you have to answer to. If an executive order from a President you hate means your favorite environmental protection regulation won't get an increase in the budget, or there's no increase to fund illegals going to college, no one dies. But abortion is a generational issue. Real people die and their descendants never exist. Thousands of women who were perhaps encouraged to abort will go through life with deep regret, missing family members and even additional life threatening illnesses. If you can't think of a fetus the size of your little finger as a "person" consider that approximately 10,000 late term abortions of viable babies 7-9 lbs. are performed a year. Roe v. Wade is almost 50 years old. That's 500,000 persons who were tossed in the trash. A city and a third of it would have been black. Now the entire Democrat party is at the level only Barack Obama held in 2008. There are none to speak up for the next generation--the so called future that Vice President Biden says he'll lead us to.

Vote for life, vote for the next generation.

The anger problem separating us

IBM Watson does polls--including health and in 2018 surveyed Americans on "anger." I heard Al Kresta (radio talk show, Ave Maria, MI, Oct. 14) discussing this, but can't find the details at the poll website, so I'll quote him. And I assumed he used newer material not available to non-subscribers. Also, I couldn't find the wording of the questions, which makes a huge difference in my opinion.

Kresta said, Americans are angrier than ever. In the 2008 election 43% of Democrats were angry about McCain; and 46% of Republicans were angry about Obama; in 2012 56% of Democrats were angry about Romney, and 75% of Republicans were angry about Obama; and then in 2016 the wheels fell off and 90% of Democrats were angry about Trump, and 89% of Republicans angry about H. Clinton. The problem, Kresta pointed out is bi-partisanship is almost impossible when everyone is angry. Which is why Obamacare had no support from Republicans, whereas all social safety net programs in the past were bi-partisan.

He also commented that in 1958 (when I was a freshman in college) 73% of Americans trusted the government and in 2019, only 17% did. (Maybe it was all those WWII movies.) With the advent of the pandemic in 2020 and the tremendous amount of misinformation, cherry picking of which "science" to believe, and the politicization of the virus, I'm sure those 2018 figures are now off the charts.

Anger is a bigger problem for Christians than the rest of you as it is one of the 7 deadly sins, and Paul chastises first century Christians who apparently also had a lot of hard feelings as Greeks, Jews, and pagans all tried to work together. Most of the people on my FBF list are baptized and confirmed Christians who, at least until the churches closed on order of their governors, were attending a recognized Christian sect, Lutheran, Presbyterian, Methodist, Catholic, etc., regularly or semi-regularly. Paul quotes Psalm 4:4 and says Be angry but do no sin. We feel the anger in response to something we perceive as wrong, so the feeling isn't the sin. Righteous anger is OK, but needs to be channeled to action. However, politicians and the media are using our anger knowing it can motivate or bring more to their side. Like the moderators of the debates and townhalls. They are making both sides angry--first, the ones who believe the lies become irate and second, the ones who are wronged are angry about the lies.

Pastors and priests who think they need to jump on the racism or climate, or income bandwagon for their sermons should probably switch gears and think about the anger seething in their congregations. They can't win, but by avoiding the clashes going on under their noses isn't a winning strategy either.

The Townhalls—only one worked for the candidate

I didn't watch the dueling townhalls (apparently some NBC affiliates didn't carry Trump's), but heard some summaries this morning on the radio. Samantha Guthrie on behalf of Democrats and NBC asked 43 questions and the audience asked 10. Is that a townhall? She asked 4 or 5 questions about white supremacists which the President answered and has answered so many times you can see it's a hate theme for Democrats not an honest question. And she continued to reword the questions. No one ever asks Biden about the violence of BLM and ANTIFA, because he thinks their violence is just an idea, not a threat and it's in our imagination that buildings have been burned and people terrorized.

Also I heard the oddest sex and skin answer at the Biden Townhall. A mother who identifies as a woman asked him about her 8 year daughter whom she identified as transgender. It wasn't clear to me if the daughter was a girl wanting to be a boy or a boy who had announced to the world he was a girl. It also wasn't clear if 8 year olds should be taken seriously, because that wasn't addressed. Anyway, Biden answered her with a personal recollection from his childhood of something his father said about 2 black gay men kissing in public. He can't seem to say anything without bringing up race. And like a lot of old people, flips back to his childhood because those memories are fresh. I haven't seen any research or gossip about gay men wanting to be women, but the gay men I’ve known didn’t seem interested in that. Then just for good measure I think he threw in something about murdered transwomen--I suppose he'll pass a law about making murder illegal.  What a concept.

Although I hate to ever pose such a question to a search engine because of all the kooky stuff that will then appear on my screen or e-mail, I did find an article about murdered transwomen (aka men). It seems a reporter located information for 157 in the last 7 years. All black. If these murders follow the patterns of other murders, they were killed by black men and they were sex workers. This was never brought up in the article which had a political purpose--to get more legislation to protect black transwomen. Federalist actually did some research, and like other murders, the sex of the victim and perp line up. 34 black transgender were killed by other blacks, 2 by Hispanic, and 1 by white. Of the 9 white murders of transgender women, 7 were killed by whites, and 2 by Hispanic. Also, domestic violence, drugs and prostitution were involved in most of the murders.

https://thefederalist.com/2019/11/04/the-left-is-lying-about-a-hatred-and-violence-epidemic-against-transgender-people/