Twelve members of America’s troops are dead, and at least another 31 have been wounded. These 42 soldiers and their comrades were preparing for deployment to the front. This is major calamity, not just because it occurred on American soil, but this crime was committed, it appears, by one some of their own, on an American base. The shock to hundreds of individuals comprising the related families will last a lifetime.

The priority for the Commander In Chief, IMHO, would be to bypass any planned speech and immediately fly to Austin, Texas, act like a Commander In Chief, go to the site of the shootings, meet with senior staff, assess the situation and events that led to the shootings, speak to the troops, particularly the injured, demonstrate concern and take action based on the findings of your assessment. Such actions should include addressing the families of the fallen and the injured. Assure the American people that their military bases and the security of the bases are not compromised and all possible measures will be taken to tighten what already has been established to safeguard the safety of soldiers.

Once satisfied that orders have been issued on all potential fronts of the follow-up, fly back to the White House, and get on with the addressing the challenges of the Nation.

Would you have remained in Washington, and while giving a speech, mentioned the killings in a “by the way,” addendum? Perhaps not.

Crossposted from The Pacific Gate Post

L-R: Rev. Rob Schenck, president of the National Clergy, President Rev. Patrick Mahoney, of the Christian Defense Coalition and Father James Heyd hold a prayer service in front of the Supreme Court building in Washington. Today the high court will hear oral arguments in a case on involving the building of a memorial with a cross by the Veterans of Foreign Wars (VFW) in a remote area within what is now a federal preserve.
Mark Wilson-Getty Images

Is anyone really damaged by seeing the 10 Commandments displayed on a government building? Are any of you offended when you see a Christmas tree in a public square? When the White House hosts an Easter egg hunt each year, as well as iftar dinner and menorah lighting? Are your feelings hurt because we have national holidays that are Christian?

Why?

Religious expression is part of this nation’s history. The jihadist crusade of the ACLU and militant secular extremists is beyond reason in its successful attacks over the last several decades against public expression of Christian traditions and national heritage that has been a part of this country’s 200-plus year history.

Today, the Supreme Court began deliberations over the Mojave Desert Cross:

At issue was a cross that sits atop Sunrise Rock in a remote part of the Mojave National Preserve. Since 1934, the cross has existed, in one form or another, as a war memorial. Different court documents refer to it as 5 to 8 feet tall.

A decade ago, it came under legal attack from a former park service employee who, though a Catholic, thought it was inappropriate to favor one religion over another in the preserve. The National Park Service had turned down a request to have a Buddhist symbol erected nearby.

A federal judge and the U.S. 9th Circuit Court of Appeals ruled that the stand-alone display of the cross in the national preserve was unconstitutional and, further, Congress’ move to transfer it to the private VFW did not solve the problem.

The Obama administration, joining with the VFW, urged the high court to uphold the display of the cross now that it is in private hands.

U.S. Solicitor General Elena Kagan said that the “sensible action by Congress” to give the VFW control of the cross and the land under it solved the 1st Amendment problem. The cross is no longer on government land and under government control, she said.

“It’s VFW’s choice” how to preserve it and maintain it now, she said.

Not all of the justices sounded convinced. Justices Ruth Bader Ginsburg and John Paul Stevens noted that the Mojave cross was designated as a national memorial and that Congress said it must be preserved as a cross to honor America’s war dead. If not, the land and the cross would revert to government control, they said.

Eliasberg argued that the transfer was an obvious ploy to maintain the cross after it had been declared unconstitutional by a federal court.

He agreed that crosses in a national cemetery would not pose a constitutional problem because other religious symbols, such as a Star of David for Jewish soldiers, are included as well.

By the end of the hour, it was not clear what issue the justices would decide. They could decide whether the transfer of the cross to the VFW solved the legal problem. Or they could go further back and decide whether it was constitutional to erect the cross on public land.

Some lawyers thought the justices could focus on whether the original plaintiff, former park service employee Frank Buono, had legal standing to object to the cross. But that issue was hardly mentioned in the court Wednesday.

It will probably be several months before the court hands down a decision in the case of Salazar vs. Buono.

More here.

Celebrating the 30th anniversary of the “Star Wars” film saga, fans gather for Star Wars Celebration IV at the L.A. Convention Center downtown. Jasper Manning, 2, assumes the character of Yoda in the company of his father, Chad Manning.
(Mel Melcon / LAT)

The Force is weak in this one….

First we have Muslims crying foul when not allowed to “cover up”; and now this?! Unbelievable:

Tesco has been accused of religious discrimination after the company ordered the founder of a Jedi religion to remove his hood or leave a branch of the supermarket in north Wales.

Daniel Jones, founder of the religion inspired by the Star Wars films, says he was humiliated and victimised for his beliefs following the incident at a Tesco store in Bangor.

The 23-year-old, who founded the International Church of Jediism, which has 500,000 followers worldwide, was told the hood flouted store rules.

But the grocery empire struck back, claiming that the three best known Jedi Knights in the Star Wars movies – Yoda, Obi-Wan Kenobi and Luke Skywalker – all appeared in public without their hoods. Jones, from Holyhead, who is known by the Jedi name Morda Hehol, said his religion dictated that he should wear the hood in public places and is considering legal action against the chain.

“It states in our Jedi doctrination that I can wear headwear. It just covers the back of my head,” he said.

“You have a choice of wearing headwear in your home or at work but you have to wear a cover for your head when you are in public.”

He said he’d gone to the store to buy something to eat during his lunch break when staff approached him and ordered him to the checkout where they explained he would have to remove the offending hood or leave the store.

“They said: ‘Take it off’, and I said: ‘No, its part of my religion. It’s part of my religious right.’ I gave them a Jedi church business card.

“They weren’t listening to me and were rude. They had three people around me. It was intimidating.” Jones, who has made an official complaint to Tesco, is considering a boycott of the store and is seeking legal advice.

Tesco said: “He hasn’t been banned. Jedis are very welcome to shop in our stores although we would ask them to remove their hoods.

“Obi-Wan Kenobi, Yoda and Luke Skywalker all appeared hoodless without ever going over to the Dark Side and we are only aware of the Emperor as one who never removed his hood.

“If Jedi walk around our stores with their hoods on, they’ll miss lots of special offers.”

Just what kind of Jedi is this Daniel Jones Morda Hehol? You’d think he’d use his Jedi mind-tricks on his persecutors; otherwise, what good is his religion?

Splash, crash, there goes another one!

9-9-09 SACRAMENTO, Calif. (AP) – A Republican state lawmaker from Southern California was ousted Wednesday from two legislative committees after he was caught on tape bragging about having sex with female lobbyists

The short answer of course, is an attempt to save man from himself. The only ‘revolution’ that will ultimately matter is the one fewer and fewer Americans understand. It has nothing to do with politics and everything to do with morality.

All of America’s problems are rooted in immorality; a consequence of course of throwing out God from the public square; a loss of conscience.

Being that morality is rooted in conscience, it would behoove us to remember Chuck Colsen’s “Cop and Conscience law.”

Colson’s Law states that the only alternatives to conscience are cops or chaos. If the inner shield of a community is lowered, the outer shield must be raised to stave off chaos. Therefore, a community, especially a free democracy, that loses its conscience, will necessarily become a police state.

It’s worth noting that no secular society has ever survived more than 72 years, the former U.S.S.R. being the best example. America will be no exception.

Even John Lennon saw it coming. He might have been misguided, and may not have ever personally found his own inner piece, but even in his ‘Maharishi TM altered state’ at the height of the radical 60’s, Lennon inherently knew that ‘peace’ was more than the absence of war, that the “real revolution” was within. Imagine!

“You say you want a revolution.
Well, you know,
We all want to change the world.
You say you’ll change the Constitution,
Well, you know,
We all want to change your head.
You tell me it’s the institution,
Well, you know,
You better free your mind instead.
But if you go carrying pictures of Chairman Mao,
You ain’t going to make it with anyone anyhow.
Don’t you know it’s gonna be all right.”

Here’s a piece of little known Beatle Trivia regarding ‘Revolution’:

Lennon really wanted this song to be the ‘A’ side of the single instead of “Hey Jude,” and kept changing it around to come up with something that would make Paul see it his way. He basically wrote the song because he felt like he was being pulled in so many directions by different people, all of whom wanted his backing, politically. It was also him questioning his own belief in the revolution that was going on… whether he was “out” or “in.” In truth, he was writing about a revolution of the mind rather than a physical “in the streets” revolution. He truly believed that revolution comes from inner change rather than social violence.

If Lennon doesn’t resonate with you, how about Solzhenitsyn? After all, who could know better than an intellectual Nobel Prize winning Russian Novelist who personally experienced horrors of communism? As I’ve written many times, the Harvard elite booed “the prophet” after he dared to go beyond literature and into the realms of morality, not to be ‘out ousted’ by the NY Times, who condescendingly dismissed his “hectoring jeremiads.” In all the reviews I’ve read since the death last year of Solzhenitsyn, Dinesh D’Souza nailed it better than anyone; ‘The Prophet at Harvard’. Here’s an excerpt:

On what has happened to the rule of law: “People in the West has acquired considerable skill in using, interpreting and manipulating law….If one is right from a legal point of view, nothing more is required, nobody might mention that one could still not be entirely right and urge a willingness to show restraint or sacrifice. Everybody operates at the extreme limits of those legal frames….A society without any objective legal scale is a terrible one indeed, but a society with no other scale but the legal one is not quite worthy of man either.”

On the rights of criminals: “Legal frames especially in the United States are broad enough to encourage not only individual freedom but also certain individual crimes. The culprit can go unpunished or obtain undeserved leniency with the support of legions of public defenders. When a government starts an earnest fight against terrorism, public opinion immediately accuses it of violating the terrorists’ civil rights. There are many such cases.”

On the abuses of freedom: “Destructive and irresponsible freedom has been granted boundless space. Society appears to have little defense against the abyss of human decadence, such as misuse of liberty for moral violence against young people, motion pictures full of pornography, crime and horror…Such a tilt of freedom in the direction of evil has come about gradually but it was evidently born out of a humanistic concept according to which there is no evil inherent to human nature.”
On freedom of the press: “The press, too, enjoys the widest freedom. But what use does it make of this freedom? The press has become the greatest power within the Western countries, more powerful than the legislature, the executive and the judiciary. One would then like to ask: by what law has it been elected and to whom is it responsible? How many hasty, immature, superficial and misleading judgments are expressed every day, confusing readers, and without any verification? Thus we see terrorists made into heroes, or secret matters pertaining to the national defense publicly revealed, or shameful intrusion into the privacy of people under the false slogan: everyone has the right to know everything.”

On the atrophy of the spiritual life: “Mere freedom does not in the least solve all the problems of human life and it even adds some new ones….We have placed too much hope in political and social reforms, only to find out that we were being deprived of our most precious possession: our spiritual life.”

How many more sex scandals, how many more tax cheats, traitors, communists, and porno kings within the White House; how many more radicals, hidden agendas, corrupt ‘no accountability czars”, and how many more lies from our “elected by the blind’ sophist, elitist, “I really don’t care about you America” President is it going to take before America wakes up to the fact that it’s all an illusion? Isn’t the only ‘problem’ not the act but getting caught in the act? Imagine how much we DON’T know; how much gets suppressed by “the thugs.”

Sex, lies, greed, thieves, tax cheats, thugs, Marxists, phony Christians, sycophants, and cowards; the sins of our elected, (to name a few). How is it that Glenn Beck (and Sarah Palin also to be fair) is the only one with an audience big enough to matter, has the guts to yell, “STOP, wait, at least ask the bold questions.”

It takes being in the light to see the light, and right now, America is looking pretty dark. How can a country that calls itself “Christian” remain so “voiceless” while infested with the sins of pornography, homosexuality, abortion on demand, euthanasia, easy divorce, and embryonic stem cell research? How can this same “Christian” country not know the perils of pseudo new age “Christians” like Oprah and feel-good evangelists, who have hijacked Christianity for “Christ without a cross?

How can that same country remain for the most part silent while the mainstream Protestant Lutherans allow “homosexuality within the clergy?”

9-21-09 After an emotional debate over the authority of Scripture and the limits of biblical inclusiveness, leaders of the country’s largest Lutheran denomination voted Friday to allow gay men and lesbians in committed relationships to serve as members of the clergy.

To not know the consequences of homosexuality on the family and society is simply not to know God. It certainly isn’t Christianity (or Judism). Congrats to the Lutheran Church of America for also joining the ranks of the illusionists.

Isn’t it a bit strange that the same MSM that turned this country upside down over the Catholic Sex Abuse scandal, which was for the most part a “gay problem”, not only has no problem with gays within the Protestant clergy, but celebrates the gay lifestyle?

Where’s the “equal outrage?”

Sexual perversion destroys lives, undermines civilization and ultimately wounds us all. The problem that unfolded in the Roman Catholic Church has its roots in homosexuality, not pedophilia. It is an important distinction. If Pope Benedict XVI can’t bring moral clarity on this issue to a world rapidly descending into homosexual acceptance, then who can?

(Since this article, Pope Benedict DID change and address homosexuality; details outside the scope of this post-another time)

If we allow ourselves to see outside of the illusion, it’s not a stretch to understand two things: God and family are the two big obstacles to Marxism/Communism taking hold; a concern we just might want to take seriously if we can ever get beyond the rose colored glasses.

Why do you think Obama is encouraging “moms” to go school, homosexuality and transgender is the new “norm”, and the Catholic Church is the last acceptable prejudice in America? For any real “truth seekers”, you might find it interesting to understand how and why the Catholic Church is under so much attack (recent article in American Thinker).

That too is another topic, another time, except to say that the “Divide and Conquer Catholics in America” has proven most effective, much thanks to George Soros and friends. After all, it was the Catholics who put Obama into office. Had Catholics voted like Catholics, Obama clearly could not have won

And that brings it all back to Glenn Beck, the Mormon (although, like Sarah Palin, does have the seal of an indelible Catholic baptism).

It’s my belief that God is using Glenn Beck in his all of his brokenness, as God himself has revealed to us that He will use the “weak to humble us.”

Besides, the Catholics, especially those in high office, have failed him. I would argue that Beck is more “Christian” in his Mormonism than most Americans are in their “feel good Christianity.”

Never under estimate who God might use in his “fly swatting”, especially in courage and humility. This last thought can only best be summed up by the great American Philosopher, Dr. Peter Kreeft.

Who are the fly-swatters? Not censors, but saints, the heroes who embody Colson’s Law. Love makes more waves than hate. Wicked men will hate and fear you more for loving them than for hating them. They will forgive you for being wrong, but never for being right.

Saints always go into the ghettos, especially the moral ghettos. They make waves. Moses made waves. Jesus made waves. Muhammad made waves. The waves make the garbage come to the surface, and the waves of garbage often drown the saints and make them martyrs, white corpuscles that give themselves up to fight an infection. Saints are society’s white corpuscles, society’s saviors. If nobody wants to crucify you, you’re not doing your job. Or else your job isn’t His work

St. Glenn? Who knew!

The idea of the White House subsuming the Census just seems so wrong on so many levels.  Even assuming the probity of any Administration taking such a step, the very act is per se, in itself, a horrible precedent and ripe with potential for, at least, non-intended problems and injustices.  ACCOUNTABILITY is a hallmark of our American system.  If this Census is taken away from the purview of the Cabinet, we are, in effect, putting our representative power further out of our hands (in that oversight of the process is further removed).  To paraphrase one of our cherished ideals, “Enumeration without Representation is Tyranny”!  The fact that the Obama group, in particular, was doing it seemed even more worrisome to me and, I’m sure, even to a lot of his more honest supporters. His team, throughout the campaign, kept betraying the “Chicago Way” mentality over and over again (just ask all those Hillary people!).  Not only is the action itself almost unthinkable, having THESE people do it made it far worse.

Since then, one shocking and unnerving revelation about these people’s OTHER plans has leaked out bit by bit, making the Census problem one more brick in an ever-rising patterned wall that should alarm thinking patriots in terms of giving them hidden blanket powers.  The Census problem worsened.  The news came out that the group who caused so much turmoil with their unethical practices during the campaign, ACORN, is going to be asked to be part of the Census! I don’t really care WHAT role they will be playing.  If it’s coming out of the White House, and using ACORN, a group notorious for inflating numbers for political gain, the very least we can assume is horribly gauche lack of consideration for the appearance of impropriety.  At the least, it is a slap in the face of those who still assume freedom is an American ideal.  And shouldn’t history and experience warn us about the worse types of impropriety we have already SEEN?

Just when I thought it couldn’t be worse, we now learn that materials are being sent to children across the country, involving them in the process directly.  Previously, teachers had to request such materials. As a teacher, I have received an email already from the government.  As a Catholic, the principle of subsidiarity, guaranteeing that the larger organs of society should try not to excessively interfere in the smaller groups such as families and schools seems to be violated.  Using the force and prestige of the Government to enroll children in a process that is not accountable doesn’t jive with this sense:

One of the key principles of Catholic social thought is known as the principle of subsidiarity. This tenet holds that nothing should be done by a larger and more complex organization which can be done as well by a smaller and simpler organization. In other words, any activity which can be performed by a more decentralized entity should be. This principle is a bulwark of limited government and personal freedom. It conflicts with the passion for centralization and bureaucracy characteristic of the Welfare State.

Why reach the “Tendrils” of powerful government so far unnecessarily?  And children? Pervasive early submersion in powerful government direction is not the optimum way for Americans to ‘be involved’.  After what we have seen already on the Census, and, in view of all the talk of mandatory volunteerism, civilian armies, and ‘not being allowed to NOT join in’, perhaps I may be excused for my suspicions without being accused of paranoia.  This is yet one more thing that “We the People” have to raise a stink about and not let it be done in darkness.  The reach of this Census should not be lengthened if it is being done in the way it is.  The goal should be to return the Census to an accountable Cabinet Office; if that is not possible we must unveil it for all to see as we did with the Health Care threat.  Shock them back to their SENSES!

In the current brouhaha about the Obama health care proposal and the town hall meeting anger expressed in opposition, it seems like proponents of HR3200 want to use the language of “choice”, “freedom” and the like to support it, while, at the same time, they are labeling opponents as “un-American”. In my previous post, I described the phenomenon of accusing your victims of what you’re doing. Now, I want to talk about how those ideologically and radically opposed to traditional American beliefs and practices are actually using the language of that same authentic Americanism in order to destroy it. They, secretly, or not so secretly, hate it! Do you think this is the first time such a thing has happened? Of course not!

In the First Book of Kings in the Bible, there is some of the best historical narrative and story-telling anywhere. In Chapter 16, we first meet Ahab, King of the newly split northern Kingdom of Israel, someone who is a central figure in the story we will tell. We are told “he did evil in the sight of the Lord more than any of his predecessors.” He introduces the worship of fertility gods and goddesses with their obscene rites; he builds temples to Ba’al. As a result, a drought of three and a half years befalls the land as predicted by Elijah. [This is very symbolic: three and a half is exactly half of SEVEN, the number of Covenant with God. The measuring stick of the people’s promise to God has been, as it were, snapped in two.] Ahab even marries the daughter of the King of Sidon, JEZEBEL!

{We should stop to understand the significance of marrying someone from Tyre or Sidon. The Sidonians were Phoenician pagans. Even other pagans, like the Greeks and Romans, tended to look down upon them [such as those famous Phoenicians at Carthage with whom the Romans fought in the Punic Wars]. They looked down on them because they not only engaged in human sacrifice (how awful compared to gladiatorial games!) but they also specialized in killing children; and their fertility rites involved cult prostitution publicly carried out in their temples. The degradation of their culture was unsettling to others, above all what they did in their homeland around Tyre and Sidon.}

This brings us to the other main character in the story we will tell: Jezebel. The name, Jezebel, by the way, has become, for many, synonymous with the quintessential evil woman. Bette Davis starred in the movie “Jezebel”, set in the Antebellum South; she plays a truly BAD woman in this movie!

*Bette Davis in “Jezebel”*

But I think this stereotype misses something very crucial about the real Jezebel. Jezebel was not only a princess of Sidon, she was a high priestess of her religion. In fact, reading in between the lines of the Bible’s depiction or her, it becomes clear that her motives are not typical evil motives per se. One insight explains everything: Jezebel was a religious FANATIC! She hated the RELIGION of the Israelites with an irrational passion. She was willing to do ANYTHING to further her own religion and destroy her own kingdom’s religion. Now, this would seem to put her in a somewhat delicate position. She was the Queen of ISRAEL, after all, and had duties, at least in appearance, towards the ancestral religion and traditions of her adopted people. How, did she deal with the conundrum of such a divergence in heart and persona?

She talked one way and acted another! She gave lip service to her duties as Queen; but most all her actions of power, actions that really meant something, were leading to the opposite place. Like the Marxists today, her concern was not truth but power. She had all the prophets of the God of Israel put to death for false reasons (save for Elijah). If the people had no one to speak out for them or challenge their consciences, then “without a vision” ‘the people’, as traditionally envisioned, would perish. She diverted funding and favor to the temples of Ba’al.

As First Kings goes on, Elijah defeats Jezebel’s prophets of Ba’al by means of an amazing miracle (which is quite a story in itself). She sends her army to kill him. He flees to Sinai, aided by the angels, to prepare for his next prophetic step.

At this point in Chapter 21, we come to a very revealing incident indeed, the event to which we have been leading: the story of Naboth’s Vineyard.

I Kings 21:1-12. 15-16

1. Some time after this, as Naboth the Jezreelite had a vineyard in Jezreel next to the palace of Ahab, king of Samaria,

2. Ahab said to Naboth, “Give me your vineyard to be my vegetable garden, since it is close by, next to my house. I will give you a better vineyard in exchange, or, if you prefer, I will give you its value in money.”

3. “The LORD forbid,” Naboth answered him, “that I should give you my ancestral heritage.”

There was a deep religious significance to the original gift of the land from God to his Tribe, sub-tribe and family. To a devout Israelite, things like genealogies and land titles were objects prompting devotion, to be treasured, kept and remembered. To give it up would be, in effect, a betrayal of God and country. Ahab had apparently lost all sense of his ‘roots’ as an Israelite.

4. Ahab went home disturbed and angry at the answer Naboth the Jezreelite had made to him: “I will not give you my ancestral heritage.” Lying down on his bed, he turned away from food and would not eat.

How telling this is as to the character of Ahab! He his is weak, wishy-washy and self-centered. I picture him curling up in a fetal ball and sucking his thumb! He’s sulking. The next line shows us how little respect he has elicited from his wife.

5. His wife Jezebel came to him and said to him, “Why are you so angry that you will not eat?”

6. He answered her, “Because I spoke to Naboth the Jezreelite and said to him, ‘Sell me your vineyard, or, if you prefer, I will give you a vineyard in exchange.’ But he refused to let me have his vineyard.”

7. “A fine ruler over Israel you are indeed!” his wife Jezebel said to him. “Get up. Eat and be cheerful. I will obtain the vineyard of Naboth the Jezreelite for you.”

I guess we know who wears the pants in this family! Her fanatical certainty impels her to go where less brave, and perhaps wiser, ones would not go. She is used to getting her way and is supremely self-confident. It’s clear just how much she despises and undervalues Ahab.

8. So she wrote letters in Ahab’s name and, having sealed them with his seal, sent them to the elders and to the nobles who lived in the same city with Naboth.

Now, wait a minute. She’s using the King’s own SEAL!?! She has become the secret power driving things behind the scenes.

9. This is what she wrote in the letters: “Proclaim a fast and set Naboth at the head of the people.

10. Next, get two scoundrels to face him and accuse him of having cursed God and king. Then take him out and stone him to death.”

11. His fellow citizens–the elders and the nobles who dwelt in his city–did as Jezebel had ordered them in writing, through the letters she had sent them.

Wow, what a dastardly deed! She will stop at nothing. Notice that she has Naboth accused of cursing God and king, breaking the Law of Moses! Isn’t SHE cursing the God of Israel day after day under her breath? Hasn’t she cursed and disrespected her husband the King to point of mocking him and usurping his power? From the appearance of the one statement recorded from the mouth of Naboth, I highly doubt that Naboth ever tried to offend God a day in his life. And yet, it is HE who must suffer. Jezebel is once again achieving her end of trying to appear to support God and country, all the while, furiously working to destroy it and transform it into the Phoenician homeland she knew and loved: CHANGE!

15. When Jezebel learned that Naboth had been stoned to death, she said to Ahab, “Go on, take possession of the vineyard of Naboth the Jezreelite which he refused to sell you, because Naboth is not alive, but dead.”

16. On hearing that Naboth was dead, Ahab started off on his way down to the vineyard of Naboth the Jezreelite, to take possession of it.

How nonchalantly Jezebel snuffs out a life and tosses the carcass to the man she treats like her underling. How blithely Naboth acts! He immediately runs to “take possession” of what he coveted. We can picture him like a spoiled little kid, clapping his hands and yelling, “Yippee! Goody! Goody! I got it!” blissfully unaware of the horrible injustice and loss of innocent life that was the price for this illusory, passing pleasure. He is deadened and asleep spiritually; he can’t see what’s happening right around him.

Elijah, strengthened by his sojourn to Sinai, and no longer afraid, returns at this absolutely crucial moment to uncover everything that has been going on. Elijah confronts Ahab in the Vineyard with the full truth of everything that has happened with the Vineyard and, surprisingly, Ahab wakes up spiritually, changes his ways and asks for mercy. He begins to realize the wider implications of this small incident and begins to make the changes he needs to make. Elijah reassures him that the doom that had already been threatened for Ahab will not occur. On the other hand, Elijah predicts that the dogs will lick the blood of the corpse of Jezebel right where she had oppressed Naboth. And so it happens later in the story. [Cue the Twilight Zone Intro. music!] Some admire the defiance of Jezebel at her death as she dresses in all her best finery before she is killed by those around her. She is thrown from the window. It is a tragic end.

It seems to me that there are some similarities to the present situation. Obama and his friends speak the language of traditional American values but they are trying to hide where their heart is on purpose. They say you have a “choice” and all those reassuring platitudes, but they plan to eventually get to a very UN-traditional, and a very UN-American single-payer system as some have let slip. They are ideologues like Jezebel.

Like Jezebel, they despise the traditional values of God and country and are zealots for socialism at least and Marxism at the worst. No matter what they’ve been SAYING for public consumption, it’s crystal clear what they really want from their private words and by their actions, by what it is they are DOING and plan to do.

Like Jezebel, they try to silence any prophetic voices that are pointing out any inconvenient truths. They try to cow and threaten, to flood the air with their powerful rhetoric, just like Jezebel silenced the prophets of the Lord.

Like Naboth, let our devotion to our land and to our traditions stand and not bend under the pressure of the whims of a short-sighted and selfish government which does not respect our God-given freedom and property. Though they hire “scoundrels” (paid liars) to besmirch and mock us, calling us what those liars really are, like Naboth, let us not give up the heritage that is more precious than life itself.

Like Elijah, at this crucial moment, now that HR3200 has been providentially delayed and we can reveal ALL the truth about it, let us not be afraid to confront our friends with the truth and with the tough love that is needed. Look up the page numbers; make the contrast with our traditions obvious; use the tools you’re good at using to expose it. Like the Vineyard Incident, let us use this Bill to wake up the country to the wider implications.

Yes, like Ahab, let us help ourselves and our country wake up to the true situation. We have ‘married’ ourselves to an attractive ‘wife’ (Obama and all he represents) with great attractiveness and promises and yet have not noticed that she despises us and is working behind our backs to neuter our identity as Americans and usurp our power (the power that for us rests not in a king but in “We the People”). We have been confronted by our modern-day Elijah’s; let us, like Ahab, do something about that realization and avoid the consequences we have been warned about. The time is NOW! Elijah is pointing his finger at our Ahab. Let us change the “change” we are threatened with. Once, we have committed to the slow path to Government Health Care, there is probably no going back. Let’s NOT go through with it! You know the saying: MARRY IN HASTE, REPENT AT LEISURE. Let’s get the word out. Let’s roll!

TEHRAN, Iran – A backstage struggle among Iran’s ruling clerics burst into the open Sunday when the government said it had arrested the daughter and other relatives of an ayatollah who is one of the country’s most powerful men.

Threats Watch:

Folks, this is huge. Huge. A report from Saudi Arabia’s al-Arabiya, Iranian clerics seek supreme leader alternative, indicates that Rafsanjani is seeking to eliminate the Supreme Leader. Not just the man, but the position and role presiding over Iranian politics and the Iranian society.

Religious leaders are considering an alternative to the supreme leader structure after at least 13 people were killed in the latest unrest to shake Tehran and family members of Ayatollah Rafsanjani were arrested amid calls by former President Mohammad Khatami for the release of all protesters.

Iran’s religious clerks in Qom and members of the Assembly of Experts, headed by former President Mahmoud Ahmedinejad, are mulling the formation of an alternative collective leadership to replace that of the supreme leader, sources in Qom told Al Arabiya on condition of anonymity.

Skipping down a bit, here’s what they seem to have in mind, obviously a bit sketchy at this point.

Members of the assembly are reportedly considering forming a collective ruling body and scrapping the model of Ayatollah Khomeini as a way out of the civil crisis that has engulfed Tehran in a series of protests,

The discussions have taken place in a series of secret meetings convened in the holy city of Qom and included Jawad al-Shahristani, the supreme representative of Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani, who is the foremost Shiite leader in Iraq.

An option being considered is the resignation of Mahmoud Ahmadinejad as Iran’s president following condemnation by the United States and other European nations for violence and human rights violations against unarmed protestors.

This is a huge development. One of the biggest questions I and others have had since the Iranian protests/revolt/revolution began was whether Mousavi would be any different in tangible effect (Hizballah & Hamas support, etc.) than Ahmadinejad and whether Rafsanjani was seeking to sack ‘Supreme’ Leader Khamenei simply to acquire the powerful position for himself. That question perhaps may have been answered today.

My ears first perked up when word made it through the grapevines over the weekend that Rafsanjani had been meeting with other Ayatollahs and clerics in Qom, and had among them a representative of Iraq’s Ayatollah Ali Sistani.

Why? Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani in 2007 made two very critical statements: that “I am a servant of all Iraqis, there is no difference between a Sunni, a Shiite or a Kurd or a Christian,” and that Islam can exist within a democracy without theological conflict. You will never hear such words slip past the lips of Iran’s Ayatollah Khamenei. Ever.

Sistani’s presence at the Rafsanjani talks in Qom, Iran, through a representative brings therefore added significance. And the al-Arabiya report above seems to suggest that Rafsanjani is not seeking Sistani’s support for superficial reasons.

Read the rest.

I love the photo.

Love expressions of faith and piety; and respect soldiers’ needs and desire to draw comfort and inspiration from religion.

I myself am non-religious but appreciate the virtues of American Judeo-Christian traditions and heritage.

But this I find disturbing:

I don’t know much about this story beyond the video and the U.S. Army apparently destroying Bibles they confiscated at Bagram in wake of the Al Jazeera story. But unlike the cover sheets on intelligence briefings provided to President Bush, the circumvention around General Order Number One comes across to me as stupid on the part of the Army Chaplain and those involved in this. Trying to convert Muslims to any other faith is a crime in Afghanistan and feeds into the propaganda of our enemies who wish to recruit more Muslims to their cause by creating the perception of a religious war by Christian aggressors in Muslim lands.

Here he is being asked which person he would chose to be a Republican. Rush or Powell:

Some other parts of the interview are equally as good. Schieffer pulls out the party line talking points here:

SCHIEFFER: What do you say to those, Mr. Vice President, who say that when we employ these kinds of tactics, which are after all the tactics that the other side uses, that when we adopt their methods, that we’re weakening security, not enhancing security, because it sort of makes a mockery of what we tell the rest of the world?

CHENEY: Well, then you’d have to say that, in effect, we’re prepared to sacrifice American lives rather than run an intelligent interrogation program that would provide us the information we need to protect America.

The fact of the matter is, these techniques that we’re talking about are used on our own people. We — in a program that in effect trains our people with respect to capture and evasion and so forth and escape, a lot of them go through these same exact procedures. Now…

And here is Newt about Pelosi and her lies over what she knew and when she knew it about waterboarding….and check out the ending when he is asked to comment about Colin Powell stating the average American wants higher taxes for services:

More here.

This day is designated by the Jewish people to remember those who were lost in the Holocaust.

Jews who were classified as “not fit to work” waiting in a grove outside of Crematorium IV before they were to be gassed.

‘Men to the left! women to the right!’ Eight words spoken quietly, indifferently, without emotion. Eight short, simple words. Yet that was the moment when I parted from my mother. I had not had time to think, but already I felt pressure of my father’s hand. We were alone. – Elie Weisel, Night

I am not Jewish. I was born into and raised by a Christian family but have always had very close Jewish friends. My friends welcomed me into their homes and families and I became very aware of their deeply rooted traditions and the reasons behind them. As a Christian, and a believer in the Old Testament, I was able to relate to these traditions because Christians share a heritage with the Jewish people.

My friend Judy’s mother, Marilyn, lost all of her family with the exception of one uncle in the concentration camps. Marilyn vividly recalls how they were herded up with nothing more than the clothes on their backs. She tells of how they were packed shoulder to shoulder in cattle cars and hauled away. She has told me the stories of how her grandparents stitched diamonds and gold into the hems of their coats and dresses in an effort to keep them away from the Germans.

If you haven’t read Elie Wiesel’s book Night, I encourage you to do so. It is a haunting account of his first person experiences at the hands of the Germans.

The following photographs are from The Auschwitz Album. This is the only surviving photographic record of what went on withing Auschwitz as it was happening.

In a world where Jewish people are still hated and targeted for nothing more than their heritage and religious beliefs, we must never forget what can happen when evil is allowed to run rampant.

h/t – Atlas Shrugs for the first picture.

A rock dove with a pin through his brain, a ‘pinhead pigeon’

This little essay is about a turn of phrase used by the prophet Hosea in regards to some mistakes being made by the leaders of his day; and it is about the similarity of the mistakes being made by our leadership right now.

In the mid-700’s BC, the chickens – or should I say, the pigeons – were coming home to roost for the Northern Kingdom of Israel. They had been warned about the coming destruction by Amos earlier but they hadn’t changed. Hosea arrived on the scene to plead with even greater urgency, because now the horrible threat of the Assyrian Empire was becoming clear to everyone, not just prophets.

The Assyrians were the first great world empire, centered in Nineveh in Northern Mesopotamia. Their standard modus operandi was the use of intimidation and terror to cow their subjects; they were universally feared and hated and their cruelty was calculated and legendary. [They would eventually get their comeuppance at the hands of the Babylonians.] They were beginning to bully and hector the Kingdom of Israel. What were the leaders of Israel going to do?

Now, the advice of Amos and Hosea was to ‘turn to the Lord’. The cause of the nation’s problems was their lack of identity and social cohesion. Israel’s unity, uniquely, was not purely racial or ethnic; it was centered on a belief in one God and a moral code not mere genetics. In turning to the worship of the fertility gods and goddesses, they were also engaging in the immoral practices associated with them. Since those primitive religions were divorced from moral requirements and did not involve a sense of a personal relationship with their gods (using a magical or instrumental approach) the Israelites began turning away not just from their unifying belief in one God and their common set of moral values, but also from their personal obligations to the needy among them as emphasized so often in the Law of Moses. If what unifies you is weakened, the result is weakness, disunity and chaos.

“Without a vision, the people perish” is what the Book of Proverbs tells us. Even so, without the glue of their common beliefs, the Kingdom of Israel began to come apart at the seams. The Prophets describe a justice system that no longer worked: ever-rising violence, crime and fraud; what justice there was could only be obtained by bribe or government influence. The leaders in the capital Samaria were especially excoriated. They spent a lot of time lining their own pockets and did little to foster a sense of nation. Amos had mocked the character of the rich women there who abused the needy and overindulged their appetites as “cows of Bashan”. Private charity withered on the vine and social solidarity was destroyed as the government in Samaria grew in size and power like in the time of Solomon. Those who had power took advantage of those who could not fight them.

An icon of the Prophet Hosea

In regard to our present topic, Hosea noted a response of the leadership to the coming crisis and mocked it as well. Israel apparently preferred the prestigious role-playing of high politics. They wanted to become one of the gang of nations, becoming mixed up with them: “Ephraim mingles with the nations”. They apparently tried to ‘negotiate’ with the Assyrians to save themselves. From our perspective, the very thought is utterly ridiculous. The Assyrians had already made it abundantly clear they were the qualm-free terror agents of their day. To ‘sit down’ with them was desperate and futile. Israel, also (like their Southern sister Kingdom Judah later in the face of the Babylonians) tried to rely on alliance-building with the nations around them. They even apparently reached out to the Egyptian Empire for help. It seems they did everything BUT turn to their OWN God.

This is from the book of Hosea, Chapter 7: [By the way ‘Ephraim’ is one the sub-tribes of the tribe of Joseph which is often used to represent all of the Northern tribes.]

• 8 – Ephraim mingles with the nations, Ephraim is a hearth cake unturned.
• 9 – Strangers have sapped his strength, but he takes no notice of it; Of gray hairs, too, there is a sprinkling, but he takes no notice of it.
• 10 – The arrogance of Israel bears witness against him; yet they do not return to the LORD, their God, nor seek him, for all that.
• 11 – Ephraim is like a dove, silly and senseless; They call upon Egypt, they go to Assyria.
• 12 – Even as they go I will spread my net around them, like birds in the air I will bring them down. In an instant I will send them captive from their land.

Hosea 7:8-12 (NAB)

When you try to mix up an amalgamated ‘nations’ pancake and you forget to turn it over, what happens? It starts to burn and the smoke alarms go off. When you start making deals with all these other nations, and becoming just another one of the gang, you begin to imperceptibly lose your national identity and strength. Like the proverbial boiled frog, you don’t even notice how it’s slipping away.

And then, he calls them “a dove, silly and senseless”. Have you ever watched doves? The mourning dove, or turtle dove, has a tiny little head in proportion to its body, and, hence, a tiny little brain, and they act it. They are not the sharpest tools in the shed. But there’s another dove which might be more applicable: it’s the ‘rock dove’ more popularly known as the pigeon. We all know pigeons. Once again, not a whole lot brain power happening there. Hosea pictures Israel dumbly ambling along – duuhhh, duh, duh, duh, duh, duh, duuuhh – totally clueless and oblivious to the fact that the Assyrian’s net is just about to be plunked down on them to capture them.

In 723 BC, this is what happened and the Israelites were scattered throughout the Assyrian Empire, becoming the famous ‘Lost Tribes of Israel’. {Descendants of all these tribes have been discovered and confirmed through DNA testing in places like East Africa, Cambodia, Afghanistan and elsewhere. Many of them have been returning to Israel recently, seemingly as predicted by the Prophets. This has caused some friction with Jews descended from the tribe of Judah, of course, but it sure is an interesting development!}

Now, we have a set of leaders in our country who apparently want to “mingle with the nations” in an unprecedented way, trying to be part of the gang to the point where other nations might be given power to control our economy, for instance. Obama seems to want to lose our uniqueness in the mixture of the cosmopolitan pancake.

Obama and company also want to sit down with people like Iran, N. Korea and the Taliban who make the Assyrians look nice. Future generations will probably look on in as much mystification as we do when we look back at Israel trying to ‘negotiate’ with the Assyrians.

He does NOT rely on our national identity but downplays it, saying we are not a Christian or Jewish nation; we are “citizens” indistinguishable from any other nation. Our national identity is a VERY similar thing to that of the ancient Hebrews. Yet it is this very thing he denigrates. (Tell me, is Turkey not a Muslim nation in its history? Is India not a Hindu nation culturally? Why is it that we only we are not allowed to acknowledge our undeniable Judeo-Christian heritage that makes us what we are?)

Obama is denying us our national vision, the glue that has held us together for all our history, based not on race or happenstance but on values which inform our moral and social conscience. He prefers, like a silly, senseless dove, to seek alliances and cheap approval while our strength and identity imperceptibly seep into the socialist soil. How can the results be any different than what happened before?

It’s time to call it what it is. This is betrayal of our national identity. This is silly. This is senseless. It is a mistake that has already been made that does not need to be made again.

I wonder, if a metal rod were driven through the brain of THIS leadership, would they just keep on going with their foolhardy policies? I suppose it wouldn’t matter – if the policies are brainless springing from dumb instinct or blind ideological fervor and not from reason. Let us pray and raise our consciousness prophetically like Hosea tried to do with the Northern Tribes.

Let’s not let our leaders move on with this course of action unchallenged. I’m going to a Tea Party April 15th, are you?

They don’t think we can see what they’re doing. They don’t think we’re going to do or say anything. We’ll see about that. Silly, senseless doves!!

Back home in the U.S., Newsweek editor Jon Meacham welcomed The End of Christian America: “The decline and fall of the modern religious right’s notion of a Christian America creates a calmer political environment and, for many believers, may help open the way for a more theologically serious religious life.”

I guess its settled. God is now outdated, at least among our political and media elite. In their world view, what they sneeringly call the religious right is now merely a fringe group. America itself has evolved to a higher plane. A more progressive plane, if you will.

The overwhelming majority of Americans who profess faith in God are being told that the times have changed. Christianity, our ruling elite inform us, is only one of many religions, all of which are equal.

In case we don’t get it, President Obama, while abroad, expressed a deep appreciation for the Islamic faith while, here at home, he appointed a gay-rights activist to the federal government’s faith-based initiative. Said activist described Pope Benedict XVI and certain Catholic bishops as “discredited leaders.” Get it?

The election of Barack Obama has ushered in a new era in the war for hearts and minds in America. Obama, representing the left, believes that man, not God, is omnipotent, thus paving the way for man (Obama) to take control of every facet of life in America. Obama and the government know best. They are now in charge.

President Obama is asking for your blind faith, the faith usually reserved for God. Without any record of achievement, he asks that you believe in him, that you follow his dictates. That you allow him to lead us from the wilderness.

What Obama is doing has been done before. Successfully. In the former Soviet Union, churches operated only with permission of the state. In China, the crackdown continues on underground churches. The ’state’ knows it must have supremacy over God in order to effectively rule (subjugate) its citizens.

Pol Pot knew this. Lenin knew this. Mao Tse Tung knew this. Any dictator who conquers a country through force knows this. And Obama knows this.

In order for the state to be supreme, fealty to God, to family and to communities, must be replaced with fealty to the state. This strategy is now being implemented in America, with increasing success.

The traditional family, the backbone of our nation, is being redefined as we speak. The institution of marriage is being undermined by the creeping acceptance of gay marriage. Faith in God is being replaced with faith in Mother Earth.

Its no mistake that the Obama administration is jumping aboard the environmental bandwagon. They recognize the basic human desire to believe in a cause or ideal greater than ourselves.

By making the environment the new religion, all those higher feelings may be directed and manipulated by the state. And all that money, formerly called tithing, may now be directed towards supposed efforts by the government to ’save the planet.’ In other words, God can’t save the planet, only man can.

Liberalism frees man from pesky moral restraints and abolishes sin in favor of the celebration of self. Guilt may now be assuaged by advocating for environmental purity. Best of all, total redemption is available for those who care enough to become ‘carbon neutral.’

In order for this to work, government has to get God out of the way. And they’re doing a bang-up job. The ACLU has terrorized cities across the country with threats of lawsuits for allowing the barest hint of religion into state policy.

The secularist media portrays anything smacking of Christianity as totally beyond the pale. Newspapers, magazines and television are of one mind, depicting any show of faith in God as a fringe mentality, as unseemly as picking one’s nose in public.

God is now passe, at least according to those elites who set the agenda in our country. Environmentalism is the new religion for all right thinking people. And if you don’t agree, well, it doesn’t matter. Obama won, haven’t you heard? He has claimed a mandate, and, so far, no one is challenging it. We voted for it. We got it.

We have probably all heard of WISE Solomon and the many references to the wisdom of the third king of Israel, the son of David. True enough, Solomon began with humility and asked for wisdom to serve his people and we are told that he was given it. There is much evidence given in the First Book of Kings for this wisdom of his. He wrote many proverbs and he promoted knowledge and arts. His shrewd insight into human motivations and character was revealed when he judged the case of the two women and the baby. He did oversee the creation of the First Temple, one of the most beautiful edifices ever created. He did build a seeming political peace with those around him. The Queen of Sheba traveled from far away to see this astounding wisdom for herself and was suitably impressed.

But there is more to the story than that. God warned Solomon ahead of time of TWO main dangers to him and thus to his people. He must avoid IDOLATRY and the immoral practices associated with it; and he must not OPPRESS his people or put unreasonable burdens on them. If he did not heed this warning, his kingdom would be split at his death.

You would think he would have studiously avoided any hint of these two dangers. But human nature being what it is, very gradual change can fool us. If you put a frog into boiling water, it jumps out, but if you simply put up the heat slowly by degrees, the frog will boil to death without realizing it. What was it that fooled Solomon into his fatal errors? Faith in the power of Government!

One way he began to expand his Empire was through the diplomacy of marriage. This meant not only the daughter of the Pharaoh, but the daughters of every small city or state in the area, assuming them into the Empire or making an alliance. We are told he had 700 wives and 300 concubines. He brought them all to Jerusalem, built them palaces and temples to worship their own gods. As time went on, he began to join them in their temples ‘for company’s sake’ but, eventually, of course, he began to join in their IDOLATRY and immoral practices. (Now what was it that unified Israel as a nation? It wasn’t an ethnic unity but the uniqueness of their belief in one God and their morality very much like the United States today. What happens when that glue of unity is weakened by becoming “like the nations”? King Solomon was dooming the future identity of the nation.)

We’ve seen he was building many palaces for all those wives; well, he built many more for himself, all with the most expensive materials and needing many servants to support them. He rejected the traditional tribal organization and artificially imposed a massive bureaucracy beholden to his government; this was very troubling to his people but he did not respect their wishes to keep the religiously significant Twelve Tribe pattern. He began to build more and more roads. For the first time, he established a large standing army (including the famed “stables of Solomon”). How was this enormous expansion of government going to be supported? You guessed it: TAXES and FORCED SERVICE! Farmers had to surrender large amounts of their produce and livestock to the government. Their sons and daughters were forced to give long parts of their lives to serve in the palaces, working on the roads or in the army. He ended by crushing his subjects, something he was specifically warned about.

In I Kings 10:14, the author makes an offhand, seemingly innocuous comment that is actually very significant. He tells us the amount of yearly income that Solomon’s government took in: “SIX HUNDRED AND SIXTY SIX gold talents”. (One talent, by the way was an enormous amount of money in itself.) Now, I’m sure that wasn’t the exact amount every year. Why use that number? The perfect number is SEVEN, the number of the Covenant with God, where there is peace and wisdom; in fact, the Hebrew word for making a Covenant with God is literally “to seven”. Six Hundred and Sixty Six will always fall short of ‘Seven’. This is a way of saying Solomon had fallen short of the Covenant and broken it. He was the very powerful ruler who turned to Apostasy, the seeming peace-maker who brought the dis-ease of massive social injustice.

[No doubt, you may have recognized this number from the Book of Revelation in the New Testament. This verse in First Kings is what John was referring to. When trying to describe the future Antichrist or Man of Sin who will lead all to Apostasy, the seeming peacemaker who will bring Apocalypse, John could think of no one better than Solomon and that evocative number of his. The Antichrist will be very much like Solomon. By the way, I in no way am implying I think Obama or any of these people is the Antichrist! I don’t. I am comparing them to Solomon in what they have done and in their practical results. It’s the pattern I want to underline, not a conspiracy theory.]

After Solomon died, his young, inexperienced and arrogant son, Reheboam, refused to lighten the horrible government load and succeeded in splitting the Kingdom, just as predicted. The resultant fledgling kingdoms were doomed to be swallowed up by the Assyrians and Babylonians in future years.

There are too many parallels between this foreboding example and the present cabal’s behavior to list them all. The seizing of the Census, spending more money than has been spent in the history of the world, the biggest Government power grab in history in the ‘porkulus’ bill, ‘required voluntarism’, the diplomacy of go along to get along with no thought to future consequences, the looming threat of Universal Health Care and domestic militias: all of this points to the same kind of blind grab for power that seduced Solomon. Whatever they think they will get out of this, the power-grabbers should know that history does not lie; they will bring horrible disunity and injustice and suffering, if they do not change. Let us pray that they will be changed or thwarted in their deluded schemes. And let us all do everything we can to avoid these mistakes.