"Dignity" Law & Order episode infuriates pro-aborts, can be watched on iTunes

What's going on? Pro-abortion advocates are ripping ABC-TV (yes, that ABC!) for being unbalanced on the abortion issue.

They've thrown down the gauntlet: "Cry 'God for Barry, pro-choice America and St. George!'"

(As they laud George Tiller, the baby killer, whom the L&A episode thinly veils in its depiction of the trial of an assassin who gunned down a late-term abortionist in a church.)

What they don't get is that over 92 percent of Americans actually do think that killing viable children and infants born-alive is murder. And even if they do not, no one wants to rush out to battle in the name of "abortion rights" to endorse what almost everyone knows is infanticide. Not too many people are actually that arrogant.

I haven't seen the episode, but apparently it gives a nod to the Personhood of the fetus as "deserving of another look," so maybe something good is happening?

If you have an iTunes account, the whole episode can be watched there. If not, you can download the application. It's easy.

Why the Florida Catholic Bishops are wrong to oppose the pro-life Personhood Amendment

It is our opinion, and that of the legal experts with whom we have consulted, that passage of this amendment would not achieve the goal of overturning Roe v. Wade.

If such an amendment were to pass, a feat more difficult in our state due to the requirement to achieve support by 60% of voters, we are convinced that a federal district court would strike it down based on Roe. This decision would undoubtedly be affirmed by an appellate court, and the case would either not be granted further review by today’s U.S. Supreme Court, or worse, lead to a reaffirmation of Roe. The unintended effect would very likely jeopardize current protections in state law and cause a loss of momentum in the ultimate goal of establishing full legal protection of the unborn from the moment of conception.

- The Catholic Bishops of Florida

In a nutshell: Based on the idea that the Personhood Amendment would cause the Supreme Court to rule on Roe v. Wade, no one should support this. Instead we should focus on incremental measures.

This is wrong for several reasons.

Yes, it is the culture that changes the law, but it is meaningless to talk about changing the culture unless we are actively involved in changing the beliefs, values and laws that govern us as individuals. We must do this through constant discussion, debate and education. Advocating for a Personhood Amendment is an excellent way to do this.

Furthermore, incremental measures may be seen to be counterproductive in our attemp. Every law that places a restriction on abortion is in fact a legal precedent that affirms Roe v. Wade. Even if Roe were struck down tomorrow, these incremental measures would stand even in states that had a ban or restriction on abortion prior to Roe.

"You must have parental consent, a five day waiting period, and an ultra-sound, then you have the legal right to kill your baby!"

That is the standard presented by the Catholic bishops of Florida at this time. This is no way to build a culture of life. We cannot affirm the right to life by sanctioning legal child murder only in some circumstances. The way to affirm a culture of life is to legally define the personhood of a human being from the beginning of biological development.

It is an incremental step in that regard.

We can legally define "the beginning of biological development" as constituting a human life, a legal "person" and a "natural person." That will change the culture.

To get 60 percent of the voters to agree to this, first we must ask eight percent to think about it and agree with their signatures that such an amendment is needed. Even if we fail to get the signatures needed, we are actively engaging in evangelism, getting the hearts and minds of people lined up with truth. People who have never evangelized before will lead people to Christ through their petitioning. That will change the culture.

When we get the amendment on the ballot, there will be a huge fight. A debate over abortion and when life begins has never occurred in our culture at large. Legalized abortion for any reason through all nine months of pregancy was enforced from the top down in most states by a Supreme Court decision. Even in states that had legal abortion, there were restrictions that were knocked down by Roe and Doe v. Bolton. For the first time in 37 years, we will be calling on the free will of the people to decide for themselves. That will change the culture.

If the measure fails in Florida, we will keep trying in other states until one passes. Within 24 hours there will be a legal injunction by a higher court that calls on the state to not enforce laws regulating or banning abortion. At that point, the Supreme Court will decide whether to hear the case. Even if we lose, we win. It will establish a clear cut division between the will of the courts and the will of the people. That will change the culture.

Then we will seek to pass such amendments and resolutions in other states. That will change the culture.

We will eventually get such an intitative passed in 34 of the so-called "red states" -- enough for a United States Constitutional Amendment that will protect the life of a person from the beginning of biological development. Roe will be moot. Now longer will it be the fiat "law of the land" enforced by judicial tyranny. It will only apply to Roe and Wade. And I hear Jane Roe is now pro-life.

We can change the culture, but it must come from the will of the people, not through the courts. It must come through the states.

Key facts

1. Through 2008, there were 24 voter petition initiatives on the Florida ballot since the process began in 1978 (in addition to legislative initiatives).

2. Of those 24, 20 were approved by voters.

3. Florida voters have approved a higher percentage of their statewide ballot measures than voters in any other state.

This position paper is not copyrighted and may be forwarded and distributed to anyone without prior permission.

- Jay Rogers
http://forerunner.com/

Why we should create cognitive dissonance on the “pro-life / pro-choice” issue

I found the following poll interesting because as I am out collecting petitions for Florida's pro-life Personhood Amendment, I find that many people are confused about the term “pro-life.”

More than 25 percent of people who say they are “pro-choice” on abortion really take a “pro-life” position against most abortions.

The Marist College Institute of Public Opinion conducted a survey between September 24 and October 3, 2008.

Of the “pro-life” group

• 13 percent say abortion should never be permitted.
• 15 percent say abortions should only be allowed to save the life of the mother.
• 32 percent say abortions should be allowed in that rare case and when the mother is a victim of rape or incest.

A full 60 percent of Americans say abortions should never be allowed or only in rare circumstances, such as danger to the life of the mother, rape and incest, that constitute less than two percent of all abortions nationwide.

Of the “pro-choice” group

• 24 percent said abortion should be allowed only in the first trimester.
• 8 percent believed abortions should be allowed any time during the first 6 months of pregnancy.
• 8 percent agreed that abortions should be allowed any time during pregnancy for any reason.

Just 40 percent took one of these three pro-abortion positions.

A confusion of labels

Even though the survey found 60 percent of respondents took a pro-life position against all or most abortions, 50 percent of Americans called themselves “pro-choice” while only 44 percent said they were pro-life.

Of the so-called “pro-choice” group

• 5 percent of people who self-identified as “pro-choice” said abortions should never be permitted.
• 3 percent said only to save the life of the mother.
• 20 percent said only in cases of the life of the mother, rape or incest.

In other words, 28 percent of Americans who call themselves “pro-choice” actually oppose 98 percent of all abortions.

More cognitive dissonance among “pro-choice” advocates

• 71 percent said they favored more abortion limits.
• 15 percent of those describing themselves as “pro-choice” favored unrestricted abortion throughout a pregnancy.

- LifeNews.com


Commentary by Jay Rogers

In the field of psychology, cognitive dissonance is that mental or emotional internal conflict caused by holding two contradictory ideas simultaneously. It is believed by some to be a possible source of mental illness. In the field of Christian apologetics, cognitive dissonance can be used by the evangelist to call for the “renewing of the mind” (Romans 12:2). Those hearing the Gospel must choose between one of two alternate understandings of reality or worldviews. Even as Christians, our thought patterns often conform to the pattern of this world. To remain torn between two worlds is the state of a sick mind and a suffering heart. The more we hear the Gospel preached, the more we must align ourselves with either the kingdom of darkness or the kingdom of light. The more we align our thinking with the Word of God, the more we move from doubt and unbelief to positive faith.

One of the most baffling phenomena in my experience as a pro-life activist consists of the various smokescreens surrounding the abortion issue. Two of the greatest misconceptions are the following:

1. That abortion is needed for cases of rape and incest.

2. That abortion is restricted in some way beyond the first trimester.

This was essentially the language of Roe v. Wade when it was enforced upon the American people in all 50 states. The pro-abortion advocates won the legal battle and then proceeded to wage a public relations propaganda war surrounding the so-called “exceptions.” But in fact, Roe’s companion decision Doe v. Bolton allowed abortion for any reason through all nine months. The irony is that vast majority of “pro-choice” and “pro-life” Americans are completely unaware of this.

This is one reason why I am convinced that the national campaign to pass Personhood Amendments to the constitutions of 34 or more states is the right language and the right strategy at the right time. The fact is that America has never had a national dialog on the ethics of abortion either before or since Roe v. Wade. By pressing for ballot initiatives that would enact the anti-thesis of abortion “rights,” we are conducting this needed debate. The “mushy middle” will no longer be able to ignore the facts.

As we push for these legislative and ballot initiatives to enact Personhood Amendments, we are simultaneously challenging those who hold to “only the exceptions” as to why they really believe abortion ought to be illegal in 98 percent of all current cases. In other words, why in fact should abortion be restricted for the most common excuse of convenience or economic situations? If abortion is morally objectionable because it is the killing of an unborn human person, then one must grapple with the issue of allowing killing in “only certain circumstances.” We need to create cognitive dissonance in the minds of these people.

What most pro-life advocates don’t realize is that it is possible to drive people away from a pro-abortion view simply by asking questions. No argument or debate is needed. All we need to do is offer an antithesis -- that is, to expose an accepted contradiction -- and seek to create as much cognitive dissonance as possible. Here are some questions to ask those caught in the mushy middle.

• Why would we ever allow the killing of an unborn child who is the product of rape or incest, but not call for capital punishment in cases of battery-rape and pedophilia?
• If abortion is wrong after the first trimester, then why is it wrong?
• If abortion after the first trimester is wrong because it is the killing of a human person, then what about the child at two months or one month? When does this developing human life become a “person”?
• When is it ever morally acceptable to kill a person? Why? Do any of these reasons include killing an innocent person?
  
• Does abortion “to save the life of the mother” include first making every effort medically available to save the life of both the mother and the unborn child? -- If so, why is this called an “abortion”?

By asking such pointed questions –- many more can be formulated -- we are pressing our advantage simply because as William Cullen Bryant once wrote, “Truth crushed to earth will rise again.”

If we continue to ask for truthful answers to these questions, we will win. In fact, we will find that we have already won, but most are just unaware of the victory. Due to their cognitive dissonance, they are unable to act accordingly.

By confronting the inevitable conclusions, those “pro-choice” advocates who advocate killing in only two percent of all cases will be forced to come into the light and admit that they would allow child murder. If they can live with this cognitive dissonance, then so be it. But I am convinced that the darkness cannot hide from the light.

This position paper is not copyrighted and the words and ideas it contains may be reproduced and distributed without prior permission.

Personhood: The Right Language and the Correct Strategy at the Right Time

In 1972, when Chief Justice Warren Burger appointed Harry Blackmun to write the majority opinion on Roe v. Wade it was at first rejected. Blackmun at first argued that a woman had a right to do whatever she pleased with her own body. This argument was rejected by Burger because it did not apply to drugs, public nudity, suicide attempts, and so on. It was too unsophisticated an argument for such a difficult case. Blackmun filed for a reargument and waited for Nixon to fill two vacancies on the nine member court (Roe was originally decided with seven). In October, the court heard rearguments with new appointees Powell and Rehnquist. This time Justice Stewart asked Sarah Weddington if it was critical to her case to say that the 14th amendment did not protect the fetus as a "person."

He asked: "If it were established that the fetus is a person, within the protection of the 14th amendment, you would have almost an impossible case here, would you not?"

"I would have a very difficult case," Weddington said.

Robert Flowers, representing the defense, asked, "Is the life of this unborn fetus paramount over the woman's right to determine whether or not she shall bear a child? This court has been diligent in protecting the rights of minorities, and, gentleman, we say hat it is a minority, a silent minority, the true silent minority. Who is speaking for these children?"

Weddington responded that her case was not to advocate abortion. It was to advocate that the decision was within the purview of the woman and her doctor and not the state. This has been the pro-choice argument all along -- that "choice" is protected by a constitutional right to privacy. Without getting into all the arguments over whether such a "right to privacy" can be established in the United States Constitution (and I think it cannot) let's suffice it to say that most Americans are sympathetic to this idea. They are not, however, sympathetic to abortion on demand through all nine months for any reason.

To make a long story short, Blackmun compromised and decided that late term abortion was problematic, but first trimester abortion and up to the time of viability could be protected in certain situations (rape, incest) under the "right to privacy." The decision said that the states still had a compelling interest to regulate abortion after the time of viability. In effect, it recognized the Pershonhood of the fetus after viability.

Blackmun stated that "... it must be stressed that the court does not hold that the Constitution [provides] abortion on demand."

In fact, he wrote in the decision, "We need not resolve the difficult question of when life begins. When those trained in the respective disciplines of medicine, philosophy, and theology are unable to arrive at any consensus, the judiciary, at this point in the development of man's knowledge, is not in a position to speculate as to the answer."

It's ironic that pro-choice advocates have used this to argue that we cannot know ever when life begins "because of the wide range of beliefs on this sensitive issue." But this postmodernist statement leaves open the possibility that we cannot ever make moral judgments about anything. If the vast majority of Americans see it as self-evident that killing a baby in the womb for the sake of convenience is murder, then we can legislate this moral truth into civil law.

The vast majority of Americans believe that the baby is fully human at viability. Yet we have abortion on demand through all nine months. A sizeable majority in at least 34 states (enough to enact a Constitutional Amendment) believes that life begins at conception or sometime in the first six weeks (the time when virtually no elective abortions are performed). Yet we have abortion on demand through all nine months for any reason.

"Personhood" is therefore the right language.

What happened after Roe.

Roe v. Wade still allowed states to restrict abortion. Doe v. Bolton then extended the right to privacy throughout all nine months. It swept away any notion of Personhood overriding the right to choose. Here it is important to understand the long term strategy. Even if a state-by-state Personhood Amendment fails to overturn Roe, it could result in returning the states to a pre-Doe scenario which might eliminate the 95 to 98 percent of abortions, which are provided on demand for any reason.

The Supreme Court fiat law had the effect of liberalizing abortion even in the few states that already had the most liberal abortion laws. Even the pro-choice Ruth Bader Ginsburg has written that the Court "went on to fashion a regime blanketing the subject, a set of rules that displaced virtually every state law in force.... the Roe decision left virtually no state with laws fully conforming to the Court's delineation of abortion regulation still permissible. Around that extraordinary decision, a well organized and vocal right-to-life movement rallied."

It's interesting to note that even one of the most outspoken pro-choice Supreme Court Justices sympathizes with the thinking of the pro-life movement due to the top-down comprehensive enforcement of a policy that she agrees with. It is not impossible that even some of the "liberal activist" justices would side with the idea that the states should decide the issue for themselves. In fact, it would be even more difficult for our pro-abortion opponents to argue that this is a "Republican regime" instituted decision if even one Democrat-appointed Justice recognized the constitutionality of the Amendment -- by virtue of the fact that it was decided by the people of one of the 50 states.

"Personhood" is therefore the right language and the correct strategy.

The Supreme Court is not the only avenue through which to overturn the effect of Roe.

Here's a truly radical idea. Let a majority of the voters or state legislators in 34 states decide when the life of a person begins. In the current climate of distrust and creeping federal tyranny, this strategy to go back to the root of our democratic process -- the will of the people -- is well-timed. Still it might seem to some on the surface a random, quixotic campaign to go after the difficult liberal states such as California and Colorado. Admittedly it is a Herculean task to collect 700,000 or more signatures in the huge state of Florida. But in doing so, we are pressing the antithesis. We are trying to raise the bar, so to speak, in the most difficult states so that when we have our first victory in a state like Mississippi, it will cause a tidal wave of support in more conservative states where it will pass more easily.

All that is needed is a "yes" vote in 34 state legislatures to enact a Personhood Amendment to the United States Constitution. Even if this is struck down in one state by the Supreme Court, they can't resist the two-third majority clause in the Constitution itself.

"Personhood" is therefore the right language and the correct strategy at the right time.

Does the culture change the law or does the law change the culture?

It is meaningless to talk about changing the law unless we are actively involved in changing the beliefs and values that govern us as individuals through discussion, debate, teaching, symbolism and active demonstration. Even with a Supreme Court overturn of Roe, we would still have a long way to go in changing the United States from a culture of death to a culture of life. Every law currently in place that places a restriction on abortion is in fact a legal precedent that affirms Roe v. Wade. Even if Roe were struck down tomorrow, these incremental measures would stand even in states that had a ban or restriction on abortion prior to Roe.

"You must have parental consent, a five day waiting period, and an ultra-sound, then you have the legal right to kill your baby!"

That is the standard presented by many "pro-life" measures at this time. This is no way to build a culture of life. We cannot affirm the right to life by applauding legal child murder only in some circumstances. The way to affirm a culture of life is to legally define the personhood of a human being from the beginning of biological development.

Personhood is an incremental step in that regard.

We can legally define "the beginning of biological development" of an individual. We can further define that biological development as constituting a human life, a legal "person" and a "natural person." That will change the culture.

In the state of Florida, to eventually get 60 percent of the voters to agree to this as a ballot proposition, first we must ask eight percent to think about it and agree with their signatures that such an amendment is needed. Even if we fail to get the signatures needed, we are actively engaging in evangelism. We are working to get the hearts and minds of people lined up with truth. People who have never evangelized before will lead people to Christ through their petitioning. That will change the culture.

When we get the amendment on the ballot, there will be a huge fight. A debate over abortion and when life begins has never occurred in our culture at large. Legalized abortion for any reason through all nine months of pregnancy was enforced from the top down in most states by a Supreme Court decision. Even in states that had legal abortion, there were restrictions that were knocked down by Roe v. Wade and Doe v. Bolton. For the first time in 37 years, we will be calling on the free will of the people to decide for themselves. That will change the culture.

If the measure fails in Florida, we will keep trying in other states until one passes. Within 24 hours there will be a legal injunction by a higher court that calls on the state to not enforce laws regulating or banning abortion. At that point, the Supreme Court will decide whether to hear the case. Even if we lose, we win. It will be establish a clear cut division between the will of the courts and the will of the people. That will change the culture.

Then we will seek to pass such amendments and resolutions in other states. That will change the culture.

We will eventually get such an intitiative passed in 34 of the so-called "red states" -- enough for a United States Constitutional Amendment that will protect the life of a person from the beginning of biological development. Roe will be moot. Now longer will it be the fiat "law of the land" enforced by judicial tyranny. It will only apply to Roe and Wade. And I hear Jane Roe is now pro-life.

We can change the culture, but it must come from the will of the people, not through the courts. It must come through the states.

Key Facts

1. Through 2008, there were 24 voter petition initiatives on the Florida ballot since the process began in 1978 (in addition to legislative initiatives).

2. Of those 24, 20 were approved by voters.

3. Florida voters have approved a higher percentage of their statewide ballot measures than voters in any other state.

This position paper is not copyrighted and may be forwarded to anyone without prior permission.

Personhood Florida - How to circulate ballot petitions

Cal and Corrie Zastrow train volunteers in Longwood, Florida.

Watch this video and then download a copy of the petition at:

http://personhoodfl.com/resource-kits/

1. Post this video on your web page or blog. (Get the code at YouTube.)

- or -

2. Forward the url to every pro-life Christian you know.

Let's get Personhood initiatives started in 35 states!

Senator Bob Smith endorses the Florida Personhood Amendment

This letter has been out for a few days, but it's the first time I've seen it. It's exciting, because as a former US Senator, Smith has the experience and the credibility to do well in the upcoming Senatorial race. Even if he doesn't win the primaries in a crowded Republican field, the significance of this is that it will force at least some of the other Republican candidates to support the initiative as well. This is really good news!

From: Senator Bob Smith bob_smith@bobsmithussenate.com
Subject: I Strongly Endorse the Personhood Amendment
Date: Wednesday, September 16, 2009, 1:20 PM

Fellow Members of Florida's Pro Life Community:

I wholeheartedly support the initiative for a Personhood Amendment to our state constitution. Not only does pro-life include protecting the unborn, but all people at every stage of their lives. Every individual has dignity and it is not the function of government to decide which lives have more value than others. You have my pledge that as your U.S. Senator I will pursue this at the federal level as vigorously as I led the fight to enact the Partial Birth Abortion Ban during my previous tenure in the U.S. Senate.

May God bless our efforts on this vital issue.

Senator Bob

--
Robert C. Smith
Former United States Senator (1991-2003); and
Candidate for United States Senate from Florida

This is an official communication authorized by Friends of Senator Bob Smith. Paid for by Friends of Senator Bob Smith. Not authorized by any other candidate committee or political action committee.

www.friendsofsenatorbobsmith.com

The Freudian Cult of Victimization

I was recently having a discussion with a young woman who was explaining how people like her had been victimized by a church denomination I used to be a member of 20 years ago. I am open to such discussions whenever I believe they can bring people toward reconciliation. In the course of the discussion, she made this intriguing statement. (Since it was posted on a public message board, I cite it here only for the purpose of showing an example of a common idea.)

Truth is objective, yes -- but postmodernism does contain in it this very real truth (which is, as far as I can see, it's only objective statement) -- that for humans, objectivity is a myth. Only God can be truly objective; only God can be the arbiter of truth. We humans are finite and fallible, and the kind of wisdom we are called to walk in is not the wisdom of objectivity -- because we are limited to our own heads, tied by our own cultures and experiences.

The postmodernist idea that we are too flawed to know truth is nonsense. We can't know all of God's truth obviously, but God gave His Word to us so we can know truth. Jesus prayed to the Father on our behalf:

"Sanctify them by your Word. Your Word is truth." - John 17:17

God enables us by the Holy Spirit to understand truth. Yes, we are limited by fallibility and sin. But truth is transcendent and objective and we can know it. However, I am glad for the recognition of postmodernism's inherent contradiction: If we still insist that objectivity is a myth, then we must at least admit that we can never be too sure about that!

Freudian Cultism and "Christian" Counseling

One of the most destructive postmodernists in history was Sigmund Freud. Likewise, one of the biggest problems in the church today is pastors who want to counsel church members along the lines of psychotherapy, rather than instructing them to obey what they already know God's Word says to do. Unfortunately, the philosophy of counseling that has come into the church is traced directly from Freudian psychoanalysis.

Sigmund Freud taught that there is an unconscious mind that is chaotic. There lies buried unresolved conflicts from our childhood that were constellated around one of three "psycho-sexual stages." With the exception of the "startling insight" that bad parents can cause problems for children even later in life, Freud was wrong about almost everything.

Freud was a buffoon.

His personal life showed that he cared only about himself and fulfilling his own need for carnal gratification. He taught that neurotics need to vent their repressed memories and that healing can come only through catharsis. This is completely wrong. In fact, the more we dwell on past hurts the more ingrained they become. Sometimes it helps people to have their feelings validated. "Of course you feel that way, you are right to feel that way! You would be crazy not to feel that way!" It feels like a relief to hear that, but it doesn't solve the problem ... ever.

No matter how much we vent our repressed feelings, this is not the way to heal inner emotional conflict. In fact, prior to Freud no one taught this. It's not biblical and it's never been proven that it can help to restore emotional and mental health. Almost all studies show that psychoanalysis does little more than make the patient dependent on it. At $100 an hour. What a racket!

Healing comes only through forgiveness and prayer.

Where does it say that in the Bible?

"And forgive us our trespasses,
As we forgive those who trespass against us.
And lead us not into temptation,
But deliver us from evil."

- Matthew 6:12-13

All of us deserve hell, so when we realize that we can forgive even as God forgives us, then that becomes a source of joy, healing -- and most importantly -- deliverance from evil. But if we keep talking about how much others hurt us, then we haven't really forgiven, nor have we accepted God's power to deliver us from evil.

If another Christian has hurt me, I believe in seeking justice through directly confronting the person who has sinned against me. If he refuses to repent, then I should go a second time with a witness. If he repents, I have won my brother. If he still refuses, then I can tell it to the church. Or I can just walk away from the conflict with a clear conscience (Matthew 18:15-17).

Whenever I have done the right thing in confrontation, God always has given me a sound mind about it in time. And whenever the person has refused to see his error, God has always brought providential sanctions on him further down the road. And whenever I have thought someone else wrongfully confronted me, I have stood my ground and God himself has shown who was right in the end.

God is great. God is good. God is just. In the grand scheme of things, if you just obey what He says, no one can ever rip you off.

We all need to be a bit more like Joseph and David and a lot less like Judah and Saul.

The problem is that we have this cult of victimization that teaches us that we need to dwell on our hurt, nurture it and then use it to validate our status as a loser. Somehow we think this makes us a winner. It's all Freudian nonsense and Christians should know better.

This cult of victimization has a very strong pull. People go on daytime television and spill their guts to an audience that only loathes and pities them. They think that by portraying themselves as losers that some type of justice will prevail. But the catharsis they experience as the American viewing public dines on their wretched bile makes them all the more loathsome.

Then Jerry Springer appears at the end of the show and says:

"Well, what did we learn today?"

We learned, Jerry, that a God-hating, womanizing coke-fiend from Austria named Sigmund Freud still has the ability to wreck havoc in American culture even though he's been dead for 70 years. And more tragically, the church is partly responsible.

"And God bless you, Jerry! See you next week!"

Frank Schaeffer, will you PLEASE shut up! (part 4)

Here is a great postmodernist quote by Frank Schaeffer from his blog:

While the term postmodernism is often used to describe an aesthetic, artistic worldview characterized by a distrust of theories and ideology, I think it usefully applies (or rather should apply) to the "certainties" on both sides in the religion vs. atheism debate.

Brilliant! In other words, "Postmodernism doesn't mean uncertainty; it means certainty." Or does it? One can never be too sure about these things!

In any case, one thing is certain, Frank Schaeffer has learned to use blogspot.com and since August has been blogging from his parents' basement. (Metaphorically speaking of course!)

In part two, of this series, I claimed that the best way to confront Frank Schaeffer's attacks on common sense is to realize that he's just another angry postmodernist. The way to counter him is to first realize that virtually everything he says is complete drivel.

It reminds me of the passage in Through The Looking Glass in which Alice is talking to Humpty Dumpty:

"When I use a word," Humpty Dumpty said in a rather a scornful tone, "it means just what I choose it to mean – neither more nor less."
"The question is," said Alice, "whether you can make words mean different things."
"The question is," said Humpty Dumpty, "which is to be master – that's all."
Alice was too much puzzled to say anything, so after a minute Humpty Dumpty began again.

Puzzled? That's exactly how I feel when reading or listening to Frank Schaeffer. I say: "But words mean things!" Franky Dumpty says: "No, they don't! They sneer whatever aesthetic I confuse they brrg snrffle!"

Ironically, after posting part two, in an episode of postmodernist doubt, I wondered if Frank Schaeffer himself has ever criticized existentialism and postmodernism as being an unviable philosophy, as his father, the late great Francis Schaeffer, had done so forcefully in How Should We Then Live? So I did a little research by reading his new blog.

Frank frequently quotes the 19th century philospoher Søren Kierkegaard, who was simultaneouly existentialist, neo-orthodox, postmodernist and humanist. One could sum up the entire philosophy of Kierkegaard as "uncertainty about God." Some of the most comic philosophical quotes of all time were offered by this crazy Dane. I say these are comic quotes, because they have the quality of sounding both obvious and profound, while really being nonsense. Kierkegard's philosophy is reminiscent of the "sound of one hand clapping" cliché of Zen Buddhism, which is meant to show that meaning comes only through accepting paradoxical truths. "What is the sound of one hand clapping?" the Zen master asks. It's a rhetorical question. In other words, "People who know, do not know; just as people who do not know, do not know."

I must find a truth that is true for me.

Irony is a qualification of subjectivity.

It belongs to the imperfection of everything human that man can only attain his desire by passing through its opposite.

It is the duty of the human understanding to understand that there are things which it cannot understand.

So let others admire and extol him who claims to be able to comprehend Christianity. . . . I regard it then as a plain duty to admit that one neither can nor shall comprehend it.

William Blake: "Christ in the Sepulchre, Guarded by Angels"

Both Blake and Kierkegaard emphasized the belief that fear and anxiety come from not recognizing the tension of opposite forces. In Blake's case, this idea took the form of a Neo-Gnostic dualism.

Thus Kierkegaard represents the erupting existential angst among 19th century thinkers who feverishly sought out truth and meaning, but were never content with biblical truth and historic Christian orthodoxy as a source and thereby missed the forest for the trees.

Of course, not everything Kierkegaard said was wrong and it is subject to interpretation. If understood in a Christian context, Kierkegaard's idea of a "leap of faith" has some antecedents among the writings of the Church Fathers. But to understand Frank Schaeffer, one must understand that he -- like Kierkegard, Karl Barth, Albert Schweitzer, and Rudolph Bultmann before him -- is self-consciously neo-orthodox. The term, neo-orthodoxy is somewhat misleading in that it isn't a "new orthodoxy," but a mid-20th century revision of the Historical Critical method espoused by the liberal theologians 50 to 100 years prior to that.

Today Frank has ventured to express his admiration of Kierkegard and Barth. Don't be surprised that if tomorrow you hear him echoing Bishop Shelby Spong and John Dominic Crossan. He's an iconclast who has taken to disagreeing with anyone who stands for certainty and objective truth. His mode of operation is first contradiction and then affirmation in the next breath. In this way, he is impossible to pin down.

The promo to his new book says:

Frank Schaeffer has a problem with Dawkins, Hitchens, Harris, Dennett, and the rest of the New Atheists — the self-anointed “Brights.” He also has a problem with the Rick Warrens and Tim LaHayes of the world. The problem is that he doesn’t see much of a difference between the two camps. As Schaeffer puts it, they “often share the same fallacy: truth claims that reek of false certainties. I believe that there is an alternative that actually matches the way life is lived rather than how we usually talk about belief.”

I too have a problem with Dawkins, Hitchens, Warren and LaHaye. But it isn't because they speak of certainties. On the contrary, it is because Dawkins and Hitchens are postmodernist atheists reveling in ad hominems designed to provoke an emotional response and making all sorts of illogical appeals. On the other hand, Warren and LaHaye, while being orthodox in the essentials, have spouted all sorts of bizzare minor heresies in their best-selling books. It's not an issue of "certainty" being false in and of itself, but of them being certain of their error.

Frank Schaeffer is criticizing these men not for merely being wrong. He is essentially saying that anyone who thinks he is absolutely right about something is wrong. And that is one thing he is absolutely sure about.

If everything I've written here only makes your head spin. Don't worry, it's a sign that you are sane. The point to remember is that Frank Schaeffer, supposedly a one-time champion of Reformed Orthodoxy, has succumbed to Gnostic dualism. He's adopted an elitist attitude that sneers at every Christian who grasps at the fixed anchor of biblical truth.

In part five, we'll look at whether Frank Schaeffer ever even understood Reformed theology to begin with.

Don't be fooled by Obamacare, it includes abortion!

I am on the NARAL Pro-Choice America email list because I like to see what they are thinking. As McArthur said, "Know your enemy."

This is from today.

Anti-choice politicians have drawn a line in the sand: they won't be happy until women who now have private insurance coverage for abortion lose it in the new health-care system. The stakes for women could not be higher in the health-care debate.

That's why we're meeting with key lawmakers all day today to drive the point home—and making sure that anti-choice legislators don't succeed in banning private insurance companies from covering abortion care in a reformed health-care system.

So according to NARAL, if Obamacare passes with a public option, then your tax dollars will pay for abortion. Commentators on the left have called us liars for saying the public option includes abortion, but when Nancy Keenan writes that they are making sure "anti-choice legislators don't succeed in banning abortion in a reformed health-care system," then we know that it is part of the public option. They know it is and want to save it.

Don't be fooled by the distinction between public and private. If healthcare stays in the hands of private companies then we still have a choice of what type of plan we pay into. If it becomes "public" (i.e, socialized) then you will pay for abortions.

Call your congressman and senators and do the opposite of what Nancy Keenan of NARAL says to do! And feel free to foreward this message to everyone you know.

- Jay Rogers
www.forerunner.com/blog

Franky Schaeffer, will you PLEASE shut up! (part 3)

What to say about the murder of pro-life activist James Pouillon?

Mark Browne, M.Ed, a speech-language pathologist from Melbourne, Florida offered this expert comment: "Frank Schaeffer's hateful demonizing speech against pro-lifers has created a culture where such things can occur, with little fanfare from the media."

Sal Lonberg, an ornithologist from Palm Bay, Florida said, "Like the vast majority of pro-life advocates, Jim was non-violent and never condoned violence. The great irony here is that the same people who rushed to canonize Tiller the Killer have remained deafeningly silent and have even celebrated the death of this gentle soul."

Carol Matthews, a scientist at Kennedy Space Center, was a bit more austere: "'Where do we go from here?' As Dr. Martin Luther King once said: 'When our days become dreary with low hovering clouds of despair, and when our nights become darker than a thousand midnights, let us remember that there is a creative force in this universe, working to pull down the gigantic mountains of evil, a power that is able to make a way out of no way and transform dark yesterdays into bright tomorrows. Let us realize the arc of the moral universe is long but it bends toward justice. Let us realize that William Cullen Bryant is right: "Truth crushed to earth will rise again." Let us go out realizing that the Bible is right: "Be not deceived, God is not mocked. Whatsoever a man soweth, that shall he also reap." This is our hope for the future, and with this faith we will be able to sing in some not too distant tomorrow with a cosmic past tense, "We have overcome, we have overcome, deep in my heart, I did believe we would overcome."'"

In my last post, I pointed out the number of pro-abortion related homicides is huge. It's not surprising that a profession that makes it's living from legalized child murder has a huge number of homicide convictions among its practitioners.

There have been other pro-lifers besides Pouillon who have been murdered as well. It's usually a blip on the radar screen of liberal journalism so most people don't know about this.

Huntsville, Alabama — In 1993, pro-abortion activist Eileen Orstein Janezic murdered pro-life activist minister and radio talk show host Jerry Simon in Huntsville, Alabama. After killing Simon, she held police at bay with a pistol for six hours while spouting quotes from Anton LaVey's "Satanic Bible." In October 1994, a jury found her guilty of murder, and she was sentenced to life in prison.

Monterey, Tennessee - On the morning of October 19, 1998, pro-abortionist Byron Looper, a Monterey, Tennessee county property assessor running against pro-life state Senator Tommy Burks, shot Burks in the left eye with a large-caliber handgun near a pumpkin patch where he planned to take schoolchildren on a hayride that same day. A witness said that Looper told him after the murder that "I did it, man, I did it! I killed that dude!" In 2000, Looper was convicted and sentenced to life in prison with no chance of parole.

Owosso, Michigan - James Pouillon, 63, was killed Friday morning while protesting across the street from a high school in Owosso, about 70 miles northwest of Detroit. Pouillon was in his usual spot holding a sign that pictured a chubby-cheeked baby with the word "LIFE" on one side and an image of an aborted fetus with the word "ABORTION" on the other. Authorities allege Harlan Drake, 33, of Owosso pulled up to Pouillon in a truck and opened fire. Prosecutors say Pouillon's methods irritated Drake, particularly when used near the high school. Drake also is accused of killing a local business owner earlier that day.

These are just three of over 95 convicted homicides committed in pro-abortion related incidents. The full list is found at Human Life International's pro-abortion violence Web site at http://www.abortionviolence.com/. This Web site shows detailed state-by-state and city-by-city documentation of more than 8,000 incidents of pro-abortion violence and lawbreaking.

In contrast, there have been nine homicides committed in anti-abortion related incidents: four doctors and five abortion clinic workers.

People on both sides of the debate are trying to argue that these were mentally unbalanced people whose actions do not represent the advocacy of either pro-life or abortion rights. For the sake of non-argument, I agree with that statement.

But where do we go from here?

From 1993 to 2000, I lived in and later owned a house directly across the street from one of America's most notorious abortion clinics, Aware Woman Center for Choice. The trustee of the property prior to my purchase was the National Director of Operation Rescue, Keith Tucci.

Keith once told me that before he got involved in Operation Rescue in the late 1980s, he confronted its founder Randall Terry with a serious question, "Do you think it is possible that anyone could die as a result of direct action against abortion clinics?" Randall said without hesitation that it would likely happen. The Civil Rights movement of the 1950s and 1960s was a peaceful movement, he reasoned, which encouraged direct action similar to that of Operation Rescue. Numerous arrests occurred. Yet although it is known for being a peaceful protest movement, many deaths on either side occurred as tensions rose and even the peaceful protesters sometimes broke with the pledge to non-violence advocated by Dr. Martin Luther King. In addition, 40 Civil Rights advocates were murdered.

This memorial in Montgomery, Alabama is dedicated to the 40 Civil Rights advocates were murdered including Dr. King.

Not many people know this, but Operation Rescue, and the various pro-life resistance movements that still go on today at abortion clinics, have formed the largest civil disobedience (we prefer the term "biblical obedience") movement in history. I was arrested five times from 1989 to 1996. I know other pro-lifers with dozens of arrests for their peaceful protest of child killing. In all there have been over 75,000 pro-life activists arrested for their peaceful resistance to child killing. In all that confrontation, it is amazing that more people have not been killed.

In the time that I lived across from Aware Woman until now, I have known of many pro-lifers who have received death threats and others who have been attacked, such as Patte Smith who made this video of a doctor who assailed her while she was sidewalk counseling at Orlando Women's Center.



Those holding pro-life signs along US Highway 1 often had oncoming cars swerve in their direction honking their horns at them. My property was vandalized several times.

What do we expect? We are in a war. We strive to use prayer and the preaching of the Gospel as the weapons of our warfare. But occasionally this real spiritual war is going to spill over into physical violence, which is always detrimental to the pro-life cause no matter who is harmed. The great irony is that there have been far many more murders, acts of violence and other illegal acts by pro-abortionists. But the media won't cover it because it rocks their worldview.

Into the fray steps Frank Schaeffer.

And when you look at what happened to Dr. Tiller, there's a direct line connecting the rhetoric that I was part of as a young man and this murder. And so people like me are responsible for what we said and what we did and the way we raised the temperature on this debate out of all bounds. And so when O'Reilly talks about the fact that these people of the far left are against Fox or against him or trying to muzzle debate, he's telling a lie.

I am not a member of the far right. Until I voted for Barack Obama in the last election I was a lifelong Republican and I am still pro-life. I also believe abortion should be legal, but I agree with Barack Obama when he says we ought to find ways to help women, help children, give contraceptives, sex education to lessen the number of abortions. I think abortion is a tragedy. But I also think that pretending that you can call abortion murder and Tiller the baby killer, etc., etc., etc. and that these words don't have an impact is crazy. So this is what helps unhinge a society, talking like that. And I apologize and I will apologize again. I am sorry for what I did.

Question:-- When Frank Schaefer says that pro-lifers who call abortion "murder" are "unhinged" and "responsible" for Tiller's death, can we also draw a direct line between those angry words and the death of our gentle friend, James Pouillon?

Question:-- When Frank Schaeffer says, "I am still pro-life" what does that mean? Does it mean that he dislikes abortion because it is messy and distasteful? Or does he oppose abortion because it is the wanton taking of an innocent baby boy or girl in violation of God's commandment, "You shall not murder"?

In the next installment of "Frank Schaeffer, will you PLEASE shut up?" I'll examine the discontinuity of Franks' so-called "pro-life" stance and explain further why he really needs to shut up.

A list of 95 convicted homicides by abortion doctors and pro-abortion advocates

Here's interesting trivia question:

Q:-- Not counting legal abortions, which legal profession has the highest per capita homicide rate committed by its full-time practitioners?

A:-- Abortion doctors.

If you care at all about the abortion issue, you already know about the pro-life activist who was killed by a pro-abortion advocate. It's not the only incident.

In 1993, pro-abortion activist Eileen Orstein Janezic murdered 51-year old pro-life activist minister and radio talk show host Jerry Simon. After killing Simon, she held police at bay with a pistol for six hours while spouting quotes from Anton LaVey's "Satanic Bible." On October 27, 1994, a jury found her guilty of murder and sentenced her to life in prison. During trial, she admitted that she had shot Simon to prove her love of Satan.

World Magazine, September 18, 1993; "Pro-Life Leader, Pastor Murdered by Avowed Satanist."

This and the recent murder are two of the most outrageous examples. But there have been other murders committed by abortionists. The number of homicides per capita in the US is less 1 in 20,000 per year -- or 1 in 2000 in the past 20 years. But according to the following, the number of homicides committed by abortionists and pro-abortion advocates (of born people) is 95. If there has been an abortion doctor for every abortion clinic that has ever existed in America (about 2000 -- and I think that is a high estimate) then that would make the homicide rate among abortion doctors much higher than the per capita homicide rate for all Americans. I'll leave it to someone else to do the math (the list includes both abortion advocates and doctors) but even a rough crunching of the following data shows it is no contest as to which profession commits the most convicted homicides.

This list of 95 murders is from Human Life International's pro-abortion violence Web site at www.abortionviolence.com. This Web site shows detailed state-by-state and city-by-city documentation of more than 8,000 incidents of pro-abortion violence and lawbreaking.

ANDERSON: In November 1999, Pasadena abortionist Kevin Paul Anderson strangled his business partner, neonatologist Dr. Deepti Gupta, a mother of two young children who was expecting her third. They were involved in an extramarital affair, and she was carrying his baby. Anderson was arrested by the police when a passerby noticed him pushing Gupta's Mercedes off a 450-foot cliff in the San Gabriel Mountains, after dousing her with gasoline, to make it appear that she had been killed in an accident. He confessed to Gupta's murder. In December 2000, Anderson was convicted of second-degree murder by a Pasadena jury (Los Angeles, California).
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BALDWIN: Michael Paul Baldwin, 21, had a 15-year-old girlfriend, Amanda Lynn Hanson, who was four months pregnant with his baby. He lured Amanda Lynn into a secluded area, and killed her by jamming a branch an inch in diameter down her throat with such force that her tongue was nearly torn loose. Several of her teeth were also broken out. Baldwin then jammed sticks into her other body orifices, one 10 inches inside her body. After he strangled her, Baldwin beat her and crushed her skull with a 30-pound rock. Baldwin was charged with first-degree murder, rape, and several other felonies. He confessed and, in November 2002, he pleaded guilty to first-degree murder. Sheriff John Anderson called the killing "the most vicious I've seen in my 30 years in law enforcement" (Colorado Springs, Colorado).
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BARREIRO: Abortionist Hipolito Barreiro was charged with manslaughter for the January 1983 death of Shirley Payne. Barreiro had previously killed at least three other women with his "safe and legal" abortions, including Ruth Montero in August 1979; Maura Morales in May 1981; and Marta Baptiste in December 1982 (Miami, Florida).
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BENJAMIN: Abortionist David Benjamin killed Guadalupe Negron, a mother of four, in July 1993. During the abortion, he lacerated Negron's cervix and punctured her uterus, causing severe bleeding. Then the abortionist abandoned her. Negron's autopsy report attributed her death to massive bleeding causing shock and cardiac arrest. Benjamin was indicted and convicted on murder charges due to "depraved indifference to human life" (New York, New York).
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BENSON: 16-year-old Vanessa Youngbear of Weatherford, Oklahoma, was 7 months pregnant by her boyfriend, Trevor Wayne Benson, who did not want the baby. So Benson and one of his friends took Vanessa for a little ride. They took her to a deserted field, shot her in the head, and pushed her body into a ditch. Police arrested Benson and his friend the next day and charged them both with first-degree murder for the 2002 killing (Weatherford, Oklahoma).
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BICKHAM: Abortionist Arnold Bickham aborted Sylvia J. Moore in December 1986, using first-trimester techniques for a second-trimester pregnancy. He lacerated her internal organs so badly that she collapsed. Bickham called her "lazy" and ejected her from his abortion mill. Moore then bled to death. The postmortem report stressed "gross negligence and abandonment on the part of the original treating physician. In consideration of the above, the manner of death is determined to be homicide" (Chicago, Illinois).
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BISHOP: Richard Bishop's ex-girlfriend, Tiffany Watkins, was nearly seven months pregnant, and he was not happy about it at all. So, on March 30, 2004, he awakened Tiffany, saying that he wanted to talk to her about her pregnancy. Then he repeatedly stabbed her in the chest, back and arms. Tiffany was rushed to a hospital, where she lost her viable preborn baby. Bishop was charged with murder and attempted murder for his attack (Richmond, Indiana).
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BISKIND: In April 1998, Phoenix abortionist John Biskind aborted Louann Herron's 26-week-old preborn child, then left the abortion mill while she bled to death. In February 2001, a jury found Biskind guilty of manslaughter and clinic administrator Carol Stuart-Schadoff guilty of negligent homicide in the Herron case (Phoenix, Arizona).
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BOLER: DeShone Boler was married, but was committing adultery with Emily Garrison, who was pregnant with his child. His wife, Crystal Michele, was understandably unhappy with this cheating, so she decided to take action. She went to Garrison's home, beat her up with a gun, bit her severely on the shoulder, stabbed her in the neck with a knife, and finally shot her five times (Brazoria, Texas).
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BOYD: 29-year-old Mark Boyd of St. Louis hired Malik J. Nettles to do a little job for him. His 15-year-old girlfriend, Kyunia Taylor, was pregnant with his child, and he did not want the child. So Nettles murdered Kyunia as she rode home on a school bus in February 1996. He boarded the bus and began firing, killing Kyunia and her preborn baby, named Diamond, who was delivered by Caesarean section three months premature. The baby lived for 23 days but died. Nettles also shot the bus driver, Richard Lanman, three times, but he survived. Boyd was arrested after being indicted on murder charges in both deaths (St. Louis, Missouri).
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BROWN: On January 22, 1999, the 26th anniversary of Roe v. Wade, pro-abortionist Eric Laquinne Brown of Pontotoc, Mississippi strangled to death his pregnant ex-girlfriend Shorlonda Moore and left the bodies of Moore and her preborn child in a burned-out car in Memphis, Tennessee. In November 1999, Brown received a life sentence for the murder of Moore and a concurrent 20-year manslaughter sentence for the killing of her preborn child after pleading guilty to the charges (Memphis, Tennessee).
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BULLOCK, ERIK: Erik Bullock of Little Rock, Arkansas, wanted his girlfriend, Shawana Pace to have an abortion. She refused, so he hired three thugs to kick her repeatedly in the belly and kill her full-term preborn baby. Pace pleaded for her baby's life as she was kicked, choked and punched on August 26, 1999. One of the attackers told her "Your baby is dying tonight." Pace had to have her spleen removed, and also suffered a broken left wrist, black eye and bruised face. Bullock and the three thugs were charged with capital murder in the first test of Arkansas' new Fetal Protection Law. A jury convicted Bullock of capital murder (Little Rock, Arkansas).
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BULLOCK, MATTHEW: Matthew Bullock strangled his girlfriend to death. She was six months pregnant and he did not want his baby. So he decided to abort both her and her preborn child. He then tied up her body and hid her in a closet (Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania).
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BUNYARD: Jerry and Elaine Bunyard had been married for three years, and Elaine was ecstatic that she was about a week away from delivering their first child, a little girl, in 1979. But Jerry Bunyard wasn't as excited. He was carrying on an adulterous affair with a Tracy woman and thought his wife would "take him for everything he had" if he divorced her, a witness said. So Bunyard approached a biker-type boyhood friend, Earlin Popham, and offered him $1,000 to kill his wife. When Elaine Bunyard was alone in the kitchen, Popham broke an iron skillet on her skull. He then shot her in the head with a shotgun and tried to make the crime look like both a robbery and a suicide (Stockton, California).
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CALAC: On February 15, 2004, Andre F. Calac shot his pregnant girlfriend, Marlene J. Magee, in the head. He was charged with murder (San Diego, California).
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CANO: Gilberto Cano's live-in girlfriend, Martha Isela Moreno, was nearly seven months pregnant, and was looking forward to having her little girl. But Cano was not quite so happy about it, so he decided to abort both her and her preborn child. In April 2002, he stabbed her several times in the abdomen with a long kitchen knife and then strangled her to death. Cano was arrested that night, jailed, and charged with two counts of murder (San Francisco, California).
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CARLOS: Kansas City, Missouri abortionist Lynn D. Weller was shot to death in his home in September 1973 by two masked gunmen who were hired by rival abortionist William Carlos. Carlos was angry that Weller was having an affair with his ex-wife (Kansas City, Missouri).
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CARRUTH: Carolina Panthers football player Rae Carruth's girlfriend, Cherica Adams, was eight months pregnant. He did not want to pay child support, and demanded that she have an abortion, but she refused. So he hired a hit man to shoot Adams. Carruth and three accomplices laid a trap, and Carruth helped close it by blocking Adams' car so another man could pull alongside and shoot her. In March 2001, Michael Kennedy pleaded guilty to second-degree murder in Adams' death. The triggerman, Van Brett Watkins, also confessed (Charlotte, North Carolina).
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COOPER: Abortionist Boyd Cooper performed a 23-week abortion on a 2-pound, 2-ounce infant boy, who gasped and attempted to breathe after he was aborted. Cooper made no efforts to revive or help the little one because his parents wanted him dead. So the little baby was placed in a utility room used as an infant morgue. Cooper instructed a nurse, "Leave the baby there -- it will die." The nurse testified that the infant was still gasping in the closet when she returned to work 12 hours later (New York, New York).
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DAVIS, TERRANCE: Sonya Hayes was just days away from giving birth to a full-term 7-pound boy when her boyfriend, Terrance Davis of Toledo, Ohio, gunned her down in her car as she waited to pick up her 5-year-old son. Davis was wearing a Halloween mask to impede identification, and shot Sonya six times in the belly and upper torso, emptying his revolver. Prosecutors said it was obvious that the shooter was aiming for Sonya's belly in an attempt to kill their unborn child. Davis was charged with three counts of aggravated murder for shooting and killing Hayes and her unborn child (Toledo, Ohio).
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DAVIS, WILLIAM: Matthew Elliott and William Davis of Magnolia, Arkansas, dug a grave for 15-year old Brittni Pater, who was 12 weeks pregnant. Then they lured her into the woods and bludgeoned her repeatedly with a long, heavy metal bar wrapped with heavy tape around one end, as though the person who wielded it wanted to make sure he was able to get a good grip. Then they ran her down with their car and dumped her battered body in an old gravel pit. Elliott immediately bragged to his friends about how he had killed Brittni. Elliott and Davis were both charged with capital murder after giving statements in which Brittni's pregnancy was cited as the reason she was killed. On November 2, 2000, a Columbia County jury found Davis guilty of capital murder for his part in the fatal beating (Magnolia, Arkansas).
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DEHENRE: Jackson, Mississippi abortionist Malachi Dehenre, primary abortionist at the New Women's Clinic abortion mill, was tried and convicted in April 1998 for murdering his wife, Nyesha Dehenre, who worked with him (Jackson, Mississippi).
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DRAGIN: Notorious Chicago abortion mill owner Kenneth "The Creep" Yellen literally died in the gutter after his gangland-style execution in November 1979, from five shots in the head as he walked to work. The primary suspect was Robin Dragin, a professional burglar with mob connections, who organized a Chicago abortion clinic that had been in competition with Yellin's operation. Before abortion was legalized, Dragin was a principal in the operation of an illegal abortion ring in the north-west suburbs (Chicago, Illinois).
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EASON: Marc Eason was a vocal pro-abortionist who worked at the Dadeland abortion clinic in Miami. He was sentenced to life imprisonment without possibility of parole for the ax-murders of his two roommates. Eason claimed the murders were "justifiable homicide" because the roommates had "complained about his sloppiness." He also stabbed his abortionist mother, Betty Eason, in the neck with a steak knife (Miami, Florida).
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EDELIN: In January of 1975, Boston abortionist Kenneth Edelin aborted a live and viable baby boy and then deliberately smothered him. He was subsequently convicted of manslaughter, but the conviction was overturned because of improper jury instructions (Boston, Massachusetts).
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FOAT: In 1965, Ginny Foat, president of the California chapter of the National Organization for Women (NOW), bludgeoned Argentine businessman Moises Chayo to death with a tire iron outside a bar, and murdered San Francisco hotel employee Donald Fitting after picking him up in a bar (San Francisco, California).
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FOUNTAIN: Ex-convict Tony Fountain had an affair with 17-year-old Chavanna Prather, a high school junior, and she became pregnant by him. He did not want the baby, and, in April 2001, he shot Chavanna in the stomach, abdomen and hand, then strangled her and repeatedly stabbed her in a crime so vicious that it shocked even hardened investigators. Fountain was charged with first-degree murder and the intentional killing of an unborn child (Chicago, Illinois).
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FRANKLIN: In February 1980, abortionist James Franklin killed Betty Jane Zellers Damato during a botched criminal abortion and was sentenced to three years for manslaughter (Denver, Colorado).
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GANDOTRA: San Diego abortionist Suresh Gandotra killed Magdalena Orteg Rodrigues during a botched abortion in December 1994. Gandotra fled the country to his homeland of India before authorities could formally charge him with an upgraded charge of murder (San Diego, California).
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GOINS: Even by pro-abortion standards, this case is grisly in the extreme, and perfectly illustrates the vile and murderous nature of anti-life thinking. 22-year-old Glenn Isaac Goins confessed to murdering 24-year-old Amanda Wood of Johnson City, who was at least four months pregnant, in January 2004, after police told him they had found her body in the basement of his mother's house. An investigator testified that Goins said "I did it. I killed her." Goins said he had seen Amanda, watched her a couple of times, and wondered what it would be like to kill her. Goins testified that he said "And I said "I'm going to kill you." She said "Please don't" or something like that, and I smacked her in the face and told her to shut up. She was sitting on the bed, and I took a towel and started choking her with the towel. I kept on choking her until she died." Goins then told how he stuffed Amanda's body in a sleeping bag and moved her to the basement, and then tried to clean up the scene. Goins then wrapped her body in plastic and duct tape. He said "I never felt bad about what I have done. Whenever I let her in my car, I knew I was going to kill her and nothing would stop me." Goins was charged with first-degree murder in Amanda's death. But hers was not the only murder he confessed to. On January 12, 2004, Goins was indicted in Louisville, Kentucky, on charges of murder, first-degree rape and first-degree robbery in the 1999 slaying of country singer Melissa Januskevicius, 20, of Stevens Point. He was also charged in two other cases of the murder of women. When questioned about one of his murders, Goins admitted that he "liked killing people." According to police investigators, at no time did Goins show a scrap of remorse for any of his murders (Johnson City, Tennessee).
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GRATTON: Edward Gratton, 34, of London, Ontario, raped 16-year old Glenda Tedball repeatedly, and she became pregnant. When her pregnancy became known, Gratton grabbed Glenda and held her down while her own mother, Norma Poore, forcibly aborted her. Glenda died soon after (London, Ontario, Canada).
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GREEN: On January 3, 2004, Lawrence Green savagely beat his pregnant girlfriend, 21-year-old Rashawn Peterson. He kicked her twice in the abdomen and then beat her with a broomstick and his fists at their home, causing her to go into premature labor at Barnes-Jewish Hospital. Medical examiner Dr. Michael Graham said that the beating resulted in bleeding behind the placenta, resulting in the baby's premature birth. He ruled the death a homicide. Rashawn named her dead baby "Rosie" (St. Louis, Missouri).
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GREGG: Raymond Gregg's live-in girlfriend, Angela Russell, was pregnant, and he was not happy about it. So he solved his `problem' in the most direct manner possible. He admitted to police that he killed Angela, and then buried her body in woods off Statem Gap Road in Hamblen County. In October 2003, Gregg pleaded guilty to second-degree murder and was given the maximum possible sentence, 25 years in prison without parole (Morristown, Tennessee).
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GWYNNE: Abortionist John Gwynne was convicted of the first-degree murder of his nineteen-year-old girlfriend (Los Angeles, California).
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HAMILTON, JOHN: Prominent Oklahoma City abortionist John Baxter Hamilton was having an affair with a topless dancer he had aborted, and his wife was considering leaving him. On Valentine's Day 2001, Hamilton choked his wife with a necktie, beat her over the head with a heavy blunt object hard enough to smash a hole in her skull, and then slammed her face repeatedly onto the floor. In December 2001, a jury convicted Hamilton of murdering his wife. Amazingly, pro-abortionists tried to get all charges dropped against Hamilton by sending death threats to at least three news agencies, District Attorney Wes Lane and state witnesses against Hamilton. Even more incredibly, Hamilton's lawyer said that police should be investigating local pro-lifers as suspects in the murder, not the abortionist! (Oklahoma City, Oklahoma)
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HAMILTON, MICHAEL: In November 1981, 27-year-old Michael Hamilton gunned down his pregnant wife Gwendolyn with a shotgun on a rural road near Fresno. Her preborn child was killed in the assault as well. Then he tried to collect on her $100,000 life insurance policy. In 1982, he was convicted of first-degree murder and sentenced to death (Fresno, California).
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HANNA: Abortionist Alicia Ruiz Hanna was convicted in 1994 of second-degree murder after Angela Sanchez, a mother of four, died at Hanna's abortion mill. Hanna tried to stuff Angela's body into the trunk of a car in order to dump her body across the border in Tijuana, Mexico. Hanna was sentenced to 15 years to life in prison for murder (Los Angeles, California).
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HAWKINS: Leah Hawkins of Lamar, Kansas, testified that her husband Jason beat her with a log from a woodpile while she was pregnant and after she refused to have an abortion. Her 10-month-old daughter witnessed the beating. Her son was born three months premature as a result of the beating and died December 26, 1999, at a Kansas City hospital. Jason Hawkins was charged with second-degree murder (Lamar, Missouri).
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HERRERA: Carlos Herrera and Brenda Chavez were having an affair, and Chavez became pregnant. Herrera did not want the child, so he solved the problem in the most efficient way possible. In February 2001, Herrera and Chavez met for one of their late-afternoon trysts at the Southern Ute Sand and Gravel pit. Herrera beat Chavez to death and disposed of her body and vehicle by running the vehicle off a steep embankment into a grove of trees (Durango, Colorado).
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HOHBERGER: Henry C. Hohberger III of Philadelphia found out that his pregnant girlfriend, Diane Grant, was carrying a baby girl, and he was upset about this because, as he told a maternity nurse, "I already have a daughter. ... It's supposed to be a damn boy." He also did not feel like paying child support, so he repeatedly tried to get Diane to have an abortion, but she refused every time. In November 2001, when the baby girl -- named Nicole -- was just seven weeks old, Hohberger beat and shook his little girl so severely that she suffered skull and rib fractures, and died five days later. Among Nicole's injuries were four broken ribs that were healing. The little baby girl also had eleven newly broken ribs, two fractures to her skull, and multiple hemorrhages to her head and eyes, the coroner's report stated. In November 2001, Hohberger was charged with capital murder and criminal homicide (Philadelphia, Pennsylvania).
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HOLLIMAN: High school student Tanika Fox of Greensboro, North Carolina, was pregnant by her boyfriend Shawn Kristopher Holliman. He did not want to be a father, and demanded she get an abortion. She refused. So, on December 14, 1999, he shot her twice in the head at point-blank range. He was convicted of first-degree murder and sentenced to life in prison. In 2000, the students at Tanika's high school dedicated their yearbook in her name (Greensboro, North Carolina).
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HURD: Lorie Renee Hurd gave birth to full-term twin baby girls in the bathroom of her home. Then she stuffed them into a plastic bag, cinched it closed, and abandoned her dying babies. Hurd had had previous several abortions (Los Angeles, California).
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IDELFONSO: On January 5, 2004, Antonio Dejesus Idelfonso and Eliseo Marcelino-Quintero were driving their pickup truck past a woman walking on the road when she fell down next to them. They stopped to see if they had hit her. 32-year-old Tracy Owen, who was so heavily pregnant she might have even been in labor at the time, was lying on the road, crying for help. Idelfonso told police that he responded, "Here's your help," and shot her five times in the upper body. One of the bullets struck her preborn child. Metro police detective Robert Swisher said "In my 22 years on the job, I have never seen anyone executed, and I mean executed, because someone thought they had hit the person with a vehicle. It sickens me." Both men were charged with murder (Nashville, Tennessee).
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JANEZIC: In 1993, pro-abortion activist Eileen Orstein Janezic murdered pro-life activist minister and radio talk show host Jerry Simon in Huntsville, Alabama. After killing Simon, she held police at bay with a pistol for six hours while spouting quotes from Anton LaVey's "Satanic Bible." In October 1994, a jury found her guilty of murder, and she was sentenced to life in prison (Huntsville, Alabama).
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JOHNSON, COLEMAN: Tammy Lynn Baker of Charlottesville, Virginia, was eight months pregnant by her boyfriend, Coleman L. "Mike" Johnson Jr. The only problem was that he did not want the baby to be born. He had demanded that Tammy Lynn have an abortion, but she had refused. So he planted a pipe bomb on the sidewalk outside Tammy Lynn's apartment. She picked it up, it exploded, and both she and her near-term preborn baby were killed instantly. In May 2001, Johnson was convicted of capital murder (Charlottesville, Virginia).
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JOHNSON, RICHARD: Deborah Denise Randall was eight months pregnant by her boyfriend Richard Johnson and was happily awaiting the birth of her child. The only problem was a major one -- Johnson was 18 years older than her and did not want his baby. He beat her up repeatedly, at one point squeezing her as hard as he could to induce miscarriage. When repeated beatings did not cause her to lose her baby, he emptied his pistol into her, firing bullets into her head, neck and chest (Richmond, Virginia).
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KARMAN: Harvey Karman of Los Angeles, the developer of the menstrual extraction technique of early abortion, had a three-page police record, including an arrest for murder in the death of an abortion client (Los Angeles, California).
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KEEBLE: Sundance Medicinehorn Keeble was living with his 20-year-old sister and his 21-year-old girlfriend, who was four to five months pregnant. On November 21, 2003, Keeble deliberately stabbed his girlfriend in the stomach and savagely beat his own sister. He punched her in the mouth so hard she lost several teeth, and his girlfriend's preborn baby died as a result of his attack, although the girlfriend survived. Keeble was charged with fetal homicide, three counts of aggravated assault and simple assault. Brown County prosecutor Mark McNeary said "This was a heinous act. The defendant intentionally stabbed the woman in the stomach, causing the death of the unborn child" (Aberdeen, South Dakota).
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KETCHUM: When New York legalized abortion on demand in 1970, abortionist Jesse Ketchum immediately set up shop in a Buffalo motel suite and began performing late-term abortions. Soon after, Ketchum was convicted of criminally negligent homicide after killing Margaret Louise Smith. A pathologist determined that Margaret bled to death from "laceration of the entire length of the cervix, lower segment of the uterus, and the broad ligament" (Buffalo, New York).
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KLVANA: In 1989, Los Angeles abortionist Milos Klvana was sentenced to 53 years in prison after being found guilty of the intentional murder of eight newborn babies and the stillbirth of another infant (Los Angeles, California).
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LAUFE: Abortionist Leonard Laufe aborted the 32-week pregnancy of a woman who falsely claimed that she had been raped. The prostaglandin abortion resulted in the baby being born alive. He then allowed the fully viable baby to die. The entire episode, including closeups of the baby gasping and kicking, was filmed for "educational purposes" (Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania).
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LAGRONE: Pro-abortionist Edward Lewis LaGrone had repeatedly molested ten-year-old Shakeisha Lloyd, and she learned that she was 17 weeks pregnant. He offered to pay $1,500 for her to get an abortion, because he wanted to cover up his sexual abuse. She did not get the abortion, so LaGrone decided to abort not only the preborn baby, but Shakeisha's entire family. LaGrone went to Shakeisha's home and shot her uncle. Then he opened fire on two elderly women, Zenobia Anderson, 83, and Caola Lloyd, 76, who was blind and bedridden with cancer, killing them both. Shakeisha paused to pick up her 19-month-old sister and shield her behind some boxes. She was shouting to her mother to hide when LaGrone walked up to her and shot her in the head, killing her instantly. LaGrone was convicted of multiple counts of capital murder and was sentenced to death (Fort Worth, Texas).
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LEACH: On January 18, 2004, Dan Leach murdered his 19-year-old girlfriend, Ashley Nicole Wilson, who was pregnant with his child. He strangled her and hung her body in her apartment. Her mother discovered her body, and the medical examiner ruled her death a suicide. Leach left a letter written by Ashley near her body, which said that she was despondent because she was pregnant and the father did not want to help raise the child. This was intended to make people think she had killed herself. After seeing Mel Gibson's film "The Passion of the Christ" on March 7, 2004, Leach felt severe remorse for his murder, and confessed to it. He said that he killed Ashley because she was pregnant with his child and he did not want to be involved with her anymore or care for their child. Leach said "And so, after watching that movie, I was very emotional, and so I thought about the things I had done." Leach was charged with murder after his confession (Houston, Texas).
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LETOUR: Michael Letour's live-in girlfriend, Jenny McMechan, was 36 weeks pregnant with his preborn child. She was just two weeks away from delivering a healthy baby boy. On New Year's Eve of 2001, Latour brutally shot her in the head and neck as she stood outside a friend's home in Plainfield (Plainfield, Connecticut).
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LINGLE: On January 19, 1999, Harold R. Lingle and two of his friends drove to the home of 36-year-old Erin Vanderhoef, who was just days away from giving birth. Lingle drove Erin to a nearby grocery store to buy donuts with food stamps. While they were gone, Lingle's friends strangled Erin's children, eight-year old Darlene, ten-year old Chris, and eleven-year-old Jimmy. When Lingle brought Erin back to her home, the three strangled her with an electrical cord as well, and her full-term preborn baby died as a result. One of Lingle's friends kicked Erin in the head so hard that he had a limp for several days. This was the worst mass murder in the history of Springfield, Missouri. Lingle was convicted on five counts of first-degree murder (Springfield, Missouri).
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LOOPER: Pro-abortionist Byron Looper, a Monterey, Tennessee county property assessor running against pro-life state Senator Tommy Burks, shot Burks in the left eye with a large-caliber handgun near a pumpkin patch where he planned to take schoolchildren on a hayride that same day. A witness said that Looper told him after the murder that "I did it, man, I did it! I killed that dude!" (Monterey, Tennessee).
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LUSTER: On January 28, 2003, Aaron Luster and his girlfriend, Christine Karcher, who was seven months pregnant, began arguing in his car as they drove down a road near the Pittsburgh International Airport. Luster attempted to strangle Christine, then pushed her out of the moving vehicle. She fell to the pavement, and was immediately struck by a following car. When police officers arrived at the scene, they found Christine's mangled body. During Luster's trial, jurors heard Christine's frantic cell phone call for help just nine minutes before she died. Luster's voice, encouraging her to jump from the moving car, was clearly audible. On March 26, 2004, a jury found Luster guilty of two counts of murder, one for Christine and one for her viable preborn baby (Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania).
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MACGUIRE: Roger MacGuire shot his ex-wife, Susan MacGuire, to death in January 2001. He was angry about her pregnancy by her fiance and deliberately aimed at her unborn child. He was tried and convicted of two counts of murder (Salt Lake City, Utah).
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MARSHALL: Tjane Charmeise Marshall's girlfriend, Shameka Fludd, was already the mother of two children, and was four to five months pregnant with his child. Marshall did not want his baby. He said that the unborn child would "ruin his life" and that "he was going to do something about it." He certainly followed up on his threat. In May 2003, Marshall borrowed a rental car from a friend, drove to Fludd's apartment, where he shot her in the head, killing her instantly (Baltimore, Maryland).
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MCBEATH: Roger Lee McBeath killed his former girlfriend, Ashley Lyons, who was 5-1/2 months pregnant with a preborn baby boy she had already named Landon. He shot her in the head three times with a handgun to make absolutely sure she was dead. Ashley kept a journal for her little boy. On October 31, 2003, she wrote "Your father wanted me to have an abortion. Your father told me he was going to commit suicide, that you would ruin his life." McBeath was charged with first-degree murder (Lexington, Kentucky).
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MCGRORY: Michael G. McGrory and Matthew Eshbach had committed many acts of armed robbery, and operated an armed robbery "ring." In November 2002, McGrory and Eshbach went to the home of Kerry Schadler, 21, and his 20-year-old wife, Katherine, who was 20 weeks pregnant, in order to threaten them, because they knew about the robbery gang. McGrory and Eshbach tied up the Schadlers and forced them at knifepoint into McGrory's vehicle. After driving some distance, McGrory pulled Kerry Schadler out of the car and squeezed his neck until "his body went limp," Carroll said. Returning to the car, McGrory began to look for a place to unload the body. He stopped the car, put his arm around Katherine Schadler and started to strangle her; Eshbach finished murdering her. Then they dumped the bodies in Tow Path Park in East Coventry Township (Philadelphia, Pennsylvania).
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MELNICK: In May 1990, abortionist Joseph Melnick was convicted of allowing a viable and healthy 32-week baby girl, who weighed 3 pounds and 9 ounces, to die by ordering `no care' to be given her after she survived his botched third-trimester abortion attempt. The aborted girl was only 13 years old (Philadelphia, Pennsylvania).
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MESHACK: Teshibra Bell, who was only 15 years old, met a man at a convenience store in Southern Dallas. The man, pro-abortionist Shannon Meshack, was 25 years old. She eventually began to have sex with him. In June 2003, Teshibra was five months pregnant with Meshack's baby. She was looking forward to having the child, but Meshack did not want a child. So he strangled Teshibra. He then dragged her body into his back yard, piled up some debris, and tried to burn her (Dallas, Texas).
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MINERD: In January 1999, Joseph P. Minerd firebombed Deana Mitts' Connellsville townhouse, which killed Mitts, her 3-year-old daughter Kayla, and her unborn child. He did this since co-workers refused to help him use a stun gun to shock Deana into a miscarriage of his child. Witnesses heard Deana screaming in agony after the explosion, and saw her engulfed in flames "like a human torch." Three-year-old Kayla was so badly burned in the fire that her bones fractured from the heat. United States District Attorney Leo Dillon said "It's hard to imagine more anguish than Deana and Kayla Mitts endured before they died." Minerd was sentenced to life in prison for the murders and was prosecuted under the same law used to convict Oklahoma City bomber Timothy McVeigh (Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania).
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MONTALVO: Abortionist Angel Acevado Montalvo killed at least two women during the time period 1984-1988 and was prosecuted for one of the botched abortions. The day after he was found guilty in trial, he was back scheduling illegal abortions for women in Puerto Rico (San Juan, Puerto Rico).
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MYERS, CALVIN: On December 3, 1994, Calvin Shane Myers, his pregnant ex-girlfriend, Irene Christensen, and another man, Steven Paul Howard, were driving toward Park City shortly after midnight in heavy snow. They came upon an unplowed road, and the three got out and walked toward Rockport Reservoir State Park. Myers and Christensen embraced, and then Myers stabbed her at least 12 times with a rusty 4 1/2-inch hunting blade. The two men then left the area, leaving Christensen in a snowbank. Her frozen body was found by a snowmobiler two weeks later. Myers confessed to the crime and was charged with two counts of murder. In February 1996, pled guilty to one count of capital murder (Salt Lake City, Utah).
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MYERS, TIFANY: On January 20, 2000, Tifany Ann Myers, who was baby-sitting for 21-month-old Joel Vasquez, shook him and slammed him to the floor, causing his death, when he would not stop crying. Myers was charged with first-degree murder. She filed a notice of diminished responsibility, alleging that an abortion she had had just two days before the incident exacerbated her preexisting depression. As a result, her mental state was "greatly compromised" (Des Moines, Iowa).
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NIEVES: After mailing suicide notes to both of her ex-husbands, Sandi Dawn Nieves told her four young daughters that they were going to sleep in the kitchen in a kind of "slumber party." She bedded the girls down comfortably. Then Nieves, who had just had an abortion, set fires at several points throughout the house to make sure that her little daughters could not escape. All of them burned to death in the fire (Los Angeles, California).
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PARR: LaMarr Parr of Massillon, Ohio, was charged with the September 16, 2000 fatal stabbing of his ex-girlfriend, Jean K. Toles, and the killing of her 2-1/2-month-old preborn child. She wanted the baby and he wanted her to get an abortion. After he killed her, Parr dumped her body in a ditch (Canton, Ohio).
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PECK: In October 1995, Joseph Peck beat and murdered his 25-year-old wife Jennifer, who was four months pregnant, because she refused to have an abortion. He stuffed her body into the trunk of her car at the Clique Lounge on North Dale Mabry. Homicide detective Greg Stout said that "We believe that because his wife had become pregnant and would not get an abortion, that he began making threats to her." He was indicted on first-degree murder charges by a Hillsborough County grand jury (Tampa/St. Petersburg, Florida).
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PERRY: Jake Perry and his girlfriend, Patricia Smith, were expecting a child. In November 2002, Perry grabbed Patricia by her hair, slapped her, punched her and jabbed her in the stomach, head, arms and legs. He threw her into a box of plates, and both her legs began to bleed from cuts she received. Perry finally agreed to take her to the hospital to treat her injuries, but first he demonstrated his touching concern for her safety by forcing her to drive him to his mother's house, where he stole an amplifier. Then he had her drive him across town so he could sell it and buy crack cocaine. Smith miscarried, and the next day Perry was charged with the reckless homicide of an unborn child, among many other charges (Milwaukee, Wisconsin).
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PINKSTON: On December 18, 2003, James "Herc" Pinkston beat up his pregnant girlfriend Toni Koonce at his apartment. Five days after the beating, doctors at Magee Women's Hospital in Pittsburgh performed emergency surgery on Toni, because the embryonic membranes had ruptured and the leaking fluid could have resulted in a fatal infection which might have killed her. Her preborn baby died during the surgery. Pinkston was charged with criminal homicide for the attack (Pittsburgh, Pennsyvania).
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PONDER: Jerold L. Ponder and Zaneta Browne were carrying on an affair, and Browne was 14 to 15 weeks pregnant with boy and girl twins by Ponder. Ponder urged Browne to get an abortion, but she refused. So, on July 14, 2002, Ponder and his wife Keya shot Browne, a 29-year-old Rochester mother of three, in the face and back of the head on land owned by Jerold Ponder's family in rural Orleans County (Rochester, New York).
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REYNOLDS: Oklahoma City Abortionist Joe Bills Reynolds performed breast implants, a hysterectomy, and numerous liposuction procedures on his wife. He tried to collect $500,000 on his wife's life insurance after she bled to death after he opened a two-foot long incision in her abdomen, ostensibly for liposuction, on September 7, 1989. Reynolds would not allow paramedics to aid her until he had finished stapling the huge incision. He told his wife's father that she was assisting in surgery and just "fell dead." The abortionist was found guilty of second-degree manslaughter. The punishment the abortionist received for carelessly killing his own wife? A one dollar fine! (Oklahoma City, Oklahoma).
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RINGER: Tony Ringer's girlfriend, Cassandra Betts, was pregnant by him, and he did not want the baby because he wanted to marry another woman. So, in December 2000, he shot her in the head as she sat in her car, killing her and her 6-week old preborn child, with Betts' seven-year-old daughter watching from the back seat. Ringer pleaded guilty to two counts of voluntary manslaughter (Cincinnati, Ohio).
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RIVERA: Lawrence Rivera of Barstow, California, killed his pregnant girlfriend, Kristina Garcia, in May 2002. Rivera had a previous manslaughter conviction on his record, and was also implicated but never charged in the manslaughter death of his live-in girlfriend's daughter in Germany in 1998. His former wife testified that "if I didn't get an abortion that he would pull it out of my stomach." Rivera is still at large (Barstow, California).
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ROBINSON: 38-year old Kevin Robinson repeatedly stabbed and killed 15-year-old Daphne Sulk in November 1997 because he had gotten her pregnant, and she refused to get an abortion. Authorities found Sulk's frozen body at a highway rest stop. In December 1998, Robinson was convicted of murder (Laramie, Wyoming).
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SHERMAN: Abortionist Robert Sherman killed 16-year old Carmen Rita McDowell by intentionally performing an incomplete second-trimester abortion upon her in March 1975, so he could collect additional fees. The girl collapsed and was taken to a hospital, where emergency treatment removed a mangled preborn child. She died the next day from a septic abortion. The abortionist was paroled after 22 months in prison. His indictment said that he had a "malicious interest in making more money, cutting his costs and saving his time in disregard for the life and health of his patients." After he was paroled, he began doing abortions again in Massachusetts and Virginia (Washington, D.C.).
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SHOWERY: During an April 1984 abortion, Raymond Showery tore Mickey Apodaca's uterus and severed her uterine artery. She hemorrhaged for two hours before Showery would allow her transfer to a nearby hospital. She bled to death during emergency surgery to remove her uterus. The abortionist was indicted for manslaughter. Amazingly, while Showery was in jail, six pro-abortion women protested in Showery's defense outside the courthouse, asserting that Showery "is a good man who helps the poor." He performed this abortion while still on bail pending appeal of his conviction for murder in the case of a late-term aborted baby (weighing five pounds) who survived his 1979 abortion attempt. Showery deliberately drowned the viable baby. Showery was convicted and sentenced to 15 years in prison. Showery is an Adolph Hitler aficionado who owns an arsenal of guns and reads voraciously about Hitler. Showery said that "Hitler was one of the most misunderstood men in history. He was really a great man" (El Paso, Texas).
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SMITH, ALFRED: A jury found pro-abortionist Alfred E. Smith guilty of second-degree murder in the death of his ex-girlfriend Denna Moody. Smith killed Moody in April 1997 because she refused to abort their preborn child. Her charred body was found in her burned car near the Van Nuys Amtrak station (Los Angeles, California).
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SMITH, NATHANIEL: Nathaniel Dee Smith killed his 21-week pregnant girlfriend Lorena Rivera because she refused to have an abortion and he didn't want to pay child support. He beat her and shot her twice, then buried her body in a garbage bag in a shallow grave. Smith was charged with first-degree murder in Rivera's death and manslaughter in the death of their unborn child. He was convicted and sentenced to life in prison (Oklahoma City, Oklahoma).
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STEELE: Sean Steele had impregnated his 15-year old girlfriend, Barbara Watkins, and she was seven months pregnant. Steele pressured her to have an abortion, but she refused. So Steele told Barbara that they were going to buy baby clothes. Instead, he lured her to a wooded area, smashed her with a rock, stabbed her repeatedly with a broken beer bottle, and finally strangled her and left her body in the woods. He confessed to the killing after construction workers found Watkins' decomposed body in a wooded ravine (Cincinnati, Ohio).
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STEIR: Abortionist Bruce Steir was charged with murder after Sharon Hamptlon bled to death after Steir ignored her perforated uterus during a December 1996 abortion. Showing a callous and total disregard for the safety of women, pro-abortionists raised money for Steir's defense on the Internet, encouraged their friends to put pressure on elected officials and the California Medical Board, and urged the Riverside County prosecutor to drop the charges (Los Angeles, California).
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STUART: Jerry Lynn Stuart and his live-in girlfriend, April Renee Greer, were expecting a baby. In fact, April was eight and a half months pregnant, and just days away from delivering her child. But Stuart did not want the child. So he solved his problem by beating April to death, chopping up her body, and stuffing the pieces of her and her near-term preborn baby into a trash can sealed with duct tape (Burlington, North Carolina).
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TAN YEN: In January 1989, abortionist Connie Tan Yen was charged with infanticide after allowing a third-trimester aborted baby to die of deliberate neglect (Philadelphia, Pennsylvania).
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TARVER: Paul A. Tarver II's girlfriend, Keisha Lewis, was three months pregnant with his preborn child, which he did not want. So he hired a gunman to shoot Keisha dead. The gunman deliberately aimed for Keisha's abdoment, but failed to kill her, although her preborn baby died in the attack. In July 2002, Tarver was indicted by a grand jury and was charged with complicity to commit aggravated murder. The gunman was charged with aggravated murder (Canton, Ohio).
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THOMAS: Ronnie Thomas beat his pregnant girlfriend with a steering wheel security locking device and then threw the screaming woman from an overpass onto an expressway. She was immediately killed, either by the impact of dropping onto the pavement, or by one of several vehicles that struck her -- including a semi truck (Crown Point, Indiana).
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UNKNOWN ABORTIONIST: Nurse witnesses testified that an unnamed abortionist from San Vicente Hospital, California, aborted a 7-month old preborn baby live. Some time later, he noticed that the baby was still moving, and drowned the little child in a vat of formaldehyde (Los Angeles, California).
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VILLAGOMEZ: In October 2002, after an argument in which he demanded that she have an abortion, Jesus Villagomez stabbed his pregnant girlfriend in the stomach. The stab wound resulted in the death of her 18-week-old unborn child (Las Vegas, Nevada).
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WADDILL: In March 1977, abortionist William Waddill, Jr. committed a third-trimester abortion saline abortion and delivered alive a viable baby girl, whom he then strangled to death. This was the second time he had been charged with infanticide (Los Angeles, California).
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WALRADT: In September 1999, Brodie Edric Walradt raped, tortured and murdered Beth Kennard, who was near-term and had already named her preborn baby Alexis Ann. She had refused his demands to have an abortion. He suffocated her and bludgeoned her with a log. Wadradt received a life sentence for his crimes (Seattle, Washington).
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WARD: Lavern Ward of Chicago was upset that his girlfriend Debra Evans was pregnant with his child and would not consent to getting an abortion. So, in November 1995, he shot her in the head and killed her. Then he stabbed Evan's ten-year old daughter in the neck and killed her. Finally, he hacked the unborn child out of Debra's body. He then abducted her seven-year old son Joshua and stabbed him to death. Ward was convicted of three counts of murder, two counts of kidnaping and one of armed robbery for looting the home (Chicago, Illinois).
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WIEDEMAN: 16-year old Stephanie Nicole Burnett of Athens, Georgia, told her boyfriend, Matthew John Wiedeman, that she was pregnant. He demanded that she have an abortion, and she refused. So, in April 2002, Wiedeman attacked her from behind with a heavy solid steel barbell, while a friend, Raymond Soto, stabbed her with a long-bladed knife. Deputy Coroner Grover Tuten said "I think it's one of the most gruesome [murders] I've ever seen." A Richmond County grand jury indicted Wiedeman and Soto on charges of malice murder (Athens, Georgia).
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WILCOTT: On June 8, 2002, at a graduation party, pro-abortionist Corinne Wilcott sneaked up behind Sheena Carson, who was 15 weeks pregnant, dragged her to the ground by her hair, punched her in the face, and kicked her repeatedly in the side, shouting "I hope the bastard dies! I told you I was going to get you for sleeping with Kareem!" [Wilcott's husband]. An autopsy revealed that Sheena's unborn child died four days later from blunt-force trauma to the mother's placenta. During the trial, medical experts testified that Sheena's unborn child suffocated in her womb because a blow broke the life-giving bloodlines that connected the child to his mother. Wilcott was found guilty of third-degree murder (Erie, Pennsylvania).
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WILSON: Pro-abortionist Garrett Wilson began to sexually molest 12-year-old Debbie Oliver, and emotionally browbeat her into having at least four abortions before she was 15 years old. He finally married her in 1980 when she could not have another abortion because she was too far along. Baby Brandi Jean was born shortly after the marriage. Wilson took out extensive life insurance policies on the baby girl and then smothered her to death when she was just two months old. He took the resulting $40,000 settlement and bought a brand-new Pontiac Trans Am. Wilson married Missy Anastasi in March 1986, and, in March 1987, they had a child, Garrett Michael. Wilson bought $150,000 of life insurance on the five-month-old baby and then smothered him to death. In July 1999, a jury took just two hours to find him guilty of first-degree murder in the death of Garrett Michael, and he received a sentence of life in prison without parole (Washington, DC).

Frank Schaeffer, will you PLEASE shut up! (part 2)

In a response to my last blog entry on Facebook, a friend asks:

Q:-- It looks like to me that each person has just resorted to demeaning the others and calling names. Is this what we have come to?

A:-- A polemic is a harsh, strongly worded response to an entrenched viewpoint. It’s sometimes used as a way of eliciting a response when an opponent will not offer a defense. A polemic is meant to stir controversy and get others to think about an issue they would rather accommodate or sweep under the rug. There is a time for tactful wisdom and tender love when dealing with Christians who have erred. But there is also a time to attack aggressively, because it is the only course that is left when compassion and understanding have failed to curb abuse and error.

For instance, Paul writes of the Judaizers, those who taught that converts from Gentile paganism still needed to be circumcised in order to partake of Jesus Christ’s New Covenant: "I could wish that those who trouble you would even cut themselves off!" (Galatians 5:14). Here Paul makes a play on words saying that those who are behind the circumcision controversy ought to go the whole way and be done with it. In other words, “Go castrate yourself!” Paul doesn’t mean it literally, but he is using a clever pun. To be “cut off” in Greek (and English) is a way of saying to be “shut up.” He also recognizes that it is a waste of time trying to persuade some people. They just need to be cut off. It was not “unloving” for Paul to take this hard stance against heresy because he was protecting the peace and sanctity of young lambs who otherwise would be savaged by wolves if their error was allowed to roam free among the churches of Galatia.

Paul warns in the next breath about divisions. “But if you bite and devour one another, beware lest you be consumed by one another!” (Galatians 5:15). One could be misled by this. If Paul wants unity in the church, then why does he use such rough language to describe the Judaizers? Isn’t this fostering disunity? First, Paul had already spent enough time confronting these people. Second, doctrine offends; orthodoxy divides. Today’s pietistic Christians often want doctrinal orthodoxy without offense or division – but ironically, this is what doctrine is meant to do. Truth is the dividing line against all that is false. On the other hand, we can have tremendous doctrinal unity and covenant love with other Christians if we simply focus on creedal orthodoxy as we discuss our differences. As you may not know, I’ve written on this in my e-book, Why Creeds and Confessions?

Irenaeus, Tertullian and Martin Luther were just a few of the most notorious Christian polemicists in confronting heresy. Much of their harsher language is actually satire and parody. It’s meant to be tongue in cheek. But it is only funny if you understand the specific references, such as when Irenaeus in the second century catalogs the pantheon of Gnostic “aeons” with the names: Gourd, Utter-Emptiness, Cucumber, Melon. This is more along the lines of a Monty Python sketch than what is found in the usual patristic apology – if you get the joke, that is.

This tactic is often misunderstood by today’s Christians. For instance, I found myself in tears of laughter reading Gary North’s paper aloud to friends when it first came out. It’s so funny because it is so true. However, I am sure many found it harsh and offensive. Likewise, today’s Neo-Gnostics tend to portray Ireneaus as an intolerant boor. However, I like to think that Paul, Irenaeus, Tertullian, Luther and their ilk were a barrel of laughs to be around, unless you were promoting heresy in their church, that is.

When Gary first published his position paper on blasphemy excoriating the younger Schaeffer for his idiocy, Frank was still sought after as a speaker raising money for crisis pregnancy centers. (I am sure he still advocates CPCs, but I don’t know how many pro-lifers would want to hear him now.) I remember thinking back in the early 1990s that it was okay for Frank to raise funds to help save babies, despite his defection from Protestantism to Eastern Orthodoxy. I too wondered if maybe Gary was being a bit too harsh even if it was in good fun. Now that Frank argues for legalized abortion and homosexual marriage, I think it was right on the mark. It’s merely the weakness of his deficient theology brought to a rigorously logical conclusion. Thankfully, most Christians are not that consistent. I’ll comment more on that in part three.

Polemics is also good for provoking a first stage of dialog. It is in one sense “guerilla warfare” that is meant to flush out and identify the enemy in order to engage him in a thesis-antithesis debate. I don’t expect to actually flush out Frank Schaeffer himself. He has bigger fish to fry than to deal with the likes of me. (But who knows?) What I hope to do is to categorize and critique his most egregious errors. And since there is nothing new under the sun, the reader will see that the same errors are repeated by other religious liberals such as Tony Campolo, Jim Wallis, Bill Hybels and Bill Moyers. Such postmodernist errors are also endemic in the Contemplative/Emerging Church movement.

Ironically, Frank Schaeffer's entire style continues to be polemics. He often doesn't know what he is talking about – and as the son of a famous theologian he has no excuse for his ignorance. In part three, I’ll outline some of Frank’s fallacies, which are all the more outrageous once you understand that he was steeped in doctrinal orthodoxy for many years.

Is Frank Schaeffer really a danger to anyone but himself?

Although few conservative Christians at this point take Frank Schaeffer seriously, there is the danger that some will give credence to his renunciation of his conservative political activism because it is coupled with the accusation that his parents, Francis and Edith Schaeffer, were insane, dysfunctional, abusive hypocrites.

I am also persuaded that Frank doesn’t mean a lot of what he says to be taken seriously. He is just trying to rile us up. And it’s always done with a condescending postmodernist know-it-all sneer. His first line of argument is ad hominem, strawman fallacy, and non-sequitur. Unfortunately, his arrogance is mistaken for real conviction by sympathetic listeners on the left. They erroneously believe he is a voice of reason crying in the evangelical wilderness, a true convert to progressive thought, one whom Jesus would approve. He complains that few on the left understand the Christian right. Only he does, because he was one of them. In fact, he helped found the Christian Right, he claims. Then he proceeds to get it all wrong. As Gary North points out, this was unnerving even when he was supposedly “on our side.” It is better in one way that he is attacking us now instead, because he is a buffoon.

The way that Frank defends himself to sympathetic listeners is to retreat into theoretical pluralism, which is that Kantian abomination that proposes that since the universe is chaotic by nature and our minds ill-equipped to know truth, then all knowledge is at best a theory or a model, but we can never know anything to be absolutely true. Theoretical pluralism is something that Frank Schaeffer would deny, but the self-deception of the human heart is something no man can fathom. Consider the following points.

First, instead of giving a reasoned rebuttal to evangelical theology and politics, he attacks the character flaws of his well-known family and acquaintances (even though these are unquantifiable, i.e., his parents were “crazy,” Billy Graham is a “weird” man, etc.) as if this negates their positions. Anyone who knows anything about theology, philosophy or history can see that he is factually challenged. He simply makes things up as he goes along regardless of how wrong it is. If this is not purposeful, then he is just stupid. And since Frank is reputedly quite brilliant, then he must be doing it on purpose or else he's psychologically unbalanced. Or perhaps both?

Second, Frank writes a character assassination of his deceased father and 95-year-old mother Edith, who once confessed to Os Guiness that she even doesn't read her son’s writings anymore because it just makes her cry. Think about it: Would you attack your mother in a book while admitting that she prayed for you every day of your life since you were born? Frank dishonors his parents by portraying them in their most dysfunctional moments. He defends it by saying in effect, “We are all dysfunctional. I am just doing Christians a service by helping them see it.”

Third, Frank claims in an interview with the Rutherford Institute that those who were there know his charges about his parents being abusive toward each are true.

Living in the community of L’Abri with people in our house and other workers coming and going, there are plenty of people walking around the world today who either heard or saw things that would make them draw that conclusion. That was actually not much of a secret.

It’s easy enough to rebut him as Os Guiness does in a 2008 Christianity Today article.

I challenge this central charge of Frank's with everything in me. I and many of my closest friends, who knew the Schaeffers well, are certain beyond a shadow of doubt that they would challenge it too. Defenders of truth to others, Francis and Edith Schaeffer were people of truth themselves. For six years I was as close to Frank as anyone outside his own family, and probably closer than many in his family. I was his best man at his wedding.

Os Guiness counters by saying in effect, “I was there. I was one of Frank’s mentors. And I know he is lying.” And then he gives a quantifiable example of one of his lies.

… he bucked at all formal education and serious tutoring, and his claim that he then received a "'great books' British university-level literature course" comes as quite a surprise to his tutor.

Fourth, when Frank loses ground due to confounding facts, he resorts to values-relativism. He'll go on TV and defend same sex marriage. Then he’ll defend his stance later in another interview saying that homosexuals who want to be married are no worse than adulterers who want to stay in the ministry.

How do we respond?

The best way to deal with such relativism is to be irreverent, sarcastic and mocking. To Frank, the gift of language is a weapon by which to deliver an impressive front of intellectualism. In reality, it is just a smokescreen. There is little of real substance behind it. He attacks for no reason, retreats for a few months or a few years, then appears again to change subject just to keep attacking. He is the perpetual guerilla, never able to form a lasting front of resistance. And most of the time, it’s difficult to see who he is fighting. Perhaps he is really fighting himself?

If someone, such as Os Guiness, points out proof that Frank is a hypocrite for accusing the Christian right for lying when he's a liar, he already has a retort handy, “Well, we’re all hypocrites.” Then he’ll say that there is no sin that is worse than any other, pride, lust, sodomy, adultery and fornication are all equally bad.

Well, no we're not all hypocrites. We are not all liars either. It’s true that we are all sinners, but all sin is not equally bad. This is due to a faulty interpretation of James 2:10.

“For the person who keeps all of the laws except one is as guilty as a person who has broken all of God’s laws.”

The point here of course is that since no one has kept the whole law, no one can be justified by the law. We are justified by faith; but “faith without works is dead” (James 2:20). In other words, it is not true faith if on one hand we continue to justify ourselves by the law, or if we use grace as an excuse to continue in sin. The meaning is here not that all sin is equally bad. There are no “Christian homosexuals; Christian abortionists; Christian fornicators,” etc. Christians are sinners saved by grace.

“But those who practice such things shall not inherit the kingdom of God” (Galatians 5:21).

Of course, Frank is only a relativist when he's defending his point of view against reason, evidence and logic. You can’t really ever win an argument with a relativist. All you can do is expose his worldview as nonsense. My goal here isn’t to portray the man as a traitor to the pro-life movement or to vilify him. The goal is to show the danger of his way of thinking because it is all too readily swallowed by a weak American Christian culture that is easily seduced by postmodernism in the form of irrational appeals to emotion.

I believe that Frank still cares more about the abortion issue than most Christians. It affects him on a deeply emotional level, but he is completely unprincipled. He says he is pro-life, but then says abortion should be legal. He holds forth the pro-choice apologetic of the Clintons: Abortion is a necessary evil; so let’s work to make it safe, legal and rare. He honestly believes that by attacking the pro-life movement’s errors (and I actually agree with some of what he says) he can gain the trust of the left and persuade them to be more reasonable in order to moderate their pro-abortion stance.

What we’ve tried up until now hasn’t worked, he reasons. It is now time to try finding common ground with the pro-choice advocates. Abortion is always going to be legal, so let’s work with the abortion advocates to reduce the number of abortions.

So he is seeking dialogue with the left to try to do some good. But in every case, finding common ground with the death industry is a false premise. He is actually sniping at his allies and comforting the enemy. And the moment he stands for truth his newfound friends will turn on him.

To court liberal commentators such as Rachel Maddow as though she were a sister in the Lord is abominable. Maddow openly mocks everything that is good and holy with a wry smirk out of one side of her face. In fact, he speaks to her as though she were more of a true Christian than those who actively oppose abortion. If Frank Schaeffer’s attempt to speak as an authority on moral issues on the Rachel Maddow show wasn’t so scarily bizarre and surreal, it would be funny. In fact, it should be seen as a new genre of political theater, that of “comic treachery.”

The best defense against this error is a good offense. You don't win by dialoging with these people. You win by attacking their nonsense aggressively with scorn and mockery. And that is what I intend to do.

Frank Schaeffer, will you PLEASE shut up! (part 1)

One of my favorite polemics of all time is a piece by Dr. Gary North, Franky Schaeffer, Please Shut Up! (no copyright; reprint anywhere), a March 1992 postion paper on blasphemy published by the Institute for Christian Economics (ICE). You won't find the PDF file easily on a Google search, so I've posted the correct link above.

In the paper, Gary takes issue with Franky Schaeffer’s bad theology. Schaeffer apparently was appalled at the wares being hawked by Christian t-shirt companies at a book-sellers conference he attended. According to Franky (who now goes by just “Frank”) those who produce these schlocky evangelical icons are somehow guilty of "blasphemy." Gary North, in his inimitable style, takes Frank to the woodshed. The writings of his father, Dr. Francis Schaeffer, were that of a momumental genius who made an important early contribution to both the burgeoning Christian Reconstructionist movement and the so-called "Religious Right." Gary rightly points out though that Schaeffer Sr. stopped short of being postmillennial and theonomic. Further, the publishers of Schaeffer's complete theological works edited out some of his Calvinistic doctrines that they thought would be distasteful to their readers. (But this is just a rough and dirty synopsis of the paper. To read it all, follow the above link.)

Frank Schaeffer is a product of this inconsistent theology. Afraid to go "too far" into the austerity of Puritanism, he swung toward Eastern Orthodoxy around 1990. Now 20 years later, he's done another about face and has even renounced his father's pro-life views. He states that he’s personally against abortion, but it should be legal. We recently saw him on the Rachel Maddow show, claiming, “And when you look at what happened to Dr. Tiller, there is a direct line connecting the rhetoric that I was part of as a young man, and this murder.”

On his website, he substitutes personal attacks for reasoned argument. Those who oppose government imposed health care are "the gun-toting fringe." He speaks with mock authority on the motivation of pro-life movement as a "psychological sickness that is the basis of the Religious right's power to delude other people who are also needy and unstable."

He’s now making the news talk show rounds in an attempt to promote his new book claiming that we who work to repeal Roe v. Wade are evil Pharisees – even while he pontificates on why Roe was a bad decision. To those who admire his father’s legacy, seeing Frank the younger go through such convolutions is not only infuriating, but also dizzying.

I'll comment more on this in part 2, but here is a snippet from Gary North. Reading this, keep in mind that it was written prior to Frank Schaeffer’s slide into complete apostasy. It turns out that Gary North is a prophet.

In the fall of 1984, Franky cancelled all his future Christian audience speaking engagements, and he disbanded his own Christian Activist tabloid newspaper a few months later. He sold the tabloid’s mailing list and then disappeared from the evangelical scene. For a while, anyway. Franky simply could not sustain the theological battle without the inspiring presence of his father and without biblical law.

He goes away periodically, but he refuses to stay away. This is our problem. He has nothing positive to show for the last fifteen years of his on-again, off-again tantrums, nothing of quality to bring to the table, no published theory of Christian aesthetics, no plan of action, and no money. But he reappears periodically to perform his routine, which can be best described as whining for artistic relevance. Each performance gets more frivolous, and each one is directed not at the increasingly decadent humanist culture of our day, but at the tentative steps of evangelicals to respond, a century late, to the enormous threat of a now visibly debauched humanism.

Ironically, Franky’s father was the primary public literary figure in the appearance of the Christian cultural resistance movement. But Franky spends his time these days battling what he regards as the Philistines of fundamentalism rather than the Assyrians of humanism. Fundamentalists do not meet his standards, he tells us. Not his theological standards – he has none to speak of – but his artistic standards.

This, from a washed-up producer-director of an R-rated teenage violence film. “Physician, heal thyself!”

Freddy and Franky

There is a stupid horror movie series, enormously profitable, called Nightmare on Elm Street. The character of the series, Freddy Krueger, is like Dracula: he keeps rising from the dead. He has a shriveled up face and wears gloves with long metal blades. The advertising for each sequel announces, “He’s back!” Freddy Kruezer reminds me of Franky Schaeffer. We think he has gone, but he keeps coming back.

I think of Freddy’s long, blade-like fingers. I think of Franky, always ready to point the finger. Yet when I visualize Franky as Freddy, it is always with his “pointing finger” firmly implanted in his right nostril. “Look at me, look at me, everyone; see how outrageous I can be this week!” No matter whose reputation suffers.

There comes a time for Christian social commentators to discuss theology. Franky refuses. There also comes a time for Christians to grow up. Franky refuses. For years, Franky Schaeffer has been playing the role of Young Turk. He is not aging gracefully.

Francis Schaeffer was a serious man who devoted his life to evangelism. His son has devoted his life to whining. Even when he is on the right side of an issue, he whines. Francis Schaeffer was a self-taught, self-disciplined scholar, not a Young Turk with bad manners. I do not recall that he ever called a fellow Christian a blasphemer.

Franky Schaeffer has capitalized on his father’s name and reputation for over fifteen years, squandering a valuable legacy. He has little spiritual or intellectual capital remaining. It is time for him to go out and look for a job.

In the 1960’s, liberal talk show host David Suskind bored America weekly with his five-hour interview shows on late night television. A humorist wrote a song about him: “David Suskind, Please Shut Up.” Someone needs to write one for Franky Schaeffer. It needn’t be funny.

I think I can at least give it a shot:

Sung to the Beatles’: Obla Dee Obla Da

Franky throws a tantrum in the marketplace
Says his father’s writings are a sham
Franky says to Rachel, “Girl I like your face.
Thanks for the free promotion, Maddow ma’am!”

Please shut up, please shut up, please shut up! NOW!
Franky Schaeffer, please shut up!

And so on. Maybe someone who is good at this sort of thing can help.

The Ten Commandments of Obama

Now President Obama has even gone so far as to accuse his opponents of breaking God's commandments! While recently addressing a group of faith-based leaders, President Obama said:

There's been a lot of misinformation about this debate and there's some folks who are frankly bearing false witness.

Here now are the Ten Commandments of Obamacare:

The Ten Commandments According to Obama

By Patriot Update

© 2009 The Patriot Update.

Feel free to circulate this article, but please link and give credit to: The Patriot Update

After observing Obama on the campaign trail and during his first six months in office, we have concluded that our President lives and governs according to his own set of “Ten Commandments.” They’re certainly NOT the Ten Commandments you learned in Sunday School. In fact, many are the direct opposite! To prove that our conclusions are correct, you will find a link to source documentation for each commandment on the Patriot Update web site.

I. Thou shalt have no God in America, except for me. For we are no longer a Christian nation and, after all, I am the chosen One. (And like God, I do not have a birth certificate.) SOURCE

II. Thou shalt not make unto thee any graven image, unless it is my face carved on Mt. Rushmore. SOURCE

III. Thou shalt not utter my middle name in vain (or in public). Only I can say Barack Hussein Obama. SOURCE

IV. Remember tax day, April 15th, to keep it holy. SOURCE

V. Honour thy father and thy mother until they are too old and sick to care for. They will cost our public-funded health-care system too much money. SOURCE

VI. Thou shalt not kill, unless you have an unwanted, unborn baby. For it would be an abomination to punish your daughter with a baby. SOURCE

VII. Thou shalt not commit adultery if you are conservative or a Republican. Liberals and Democrats are hereby forgiven for all of their infidelity and immorality, but the careers of conservatives will be forever destroyed. SOURCE

VIII. Thou shalt not steal, until you’ve been elected to public office. Only then is it acceptable to take money from hard-working, successful citizens and give it to those who do not work, illegal immigrants, or those who do not have the motivation to better their own lives. SOURCE

IX. Thou shalt not discriminate against thy neighbor unless they are conservative, Caucasian, or Christian. SOURCE

X. Thou shalt not covet because it is simply unnecessary. I will place such a heavy tax burden on those that have achieved the American Dream that, by the end of my term as President, nobody will have any wealth or material goods left for you to covet. SOURCE

What is postmodernism?

Postmodernism is a separate but similar philosophy to modern atheism. In fact, postmodernism as a philosophy is inherently difficult to nail down. If we take the broadest possible definition of postmodernism, then it can be applied to modern atheism – especially the pop-atheism that is promoted among young adherents.

Modernism was a 20th century movement whose proponents felt the traditional forms of art, architecture, literature, religious faith, social organization and daily life were becoming outdated. Postmodernists have gone a step further in the rejection of traditional philosophy begun by the materialists, existentialists and modernists by also rejecting anything that resembles a traditional belief system.

Postmodernism is a philosophy that emerged from the 1960s characterized by experimental thought that is not bound by absolutes. Postmodernism can be seen as a spin-off philosophy from earlier materialism propounded by Kant, Hegel, Nietzsche and Marx. It can also be seen as a form of existentialism, essentially an attitude of liberation from traditional philosophy. Postmodernism rejects outward reality as meaningless and absurd, preferring the reality of the inward experience.

Most young postmodernists don’t know what the word means and are epistemologically unaware that this is their worldview. It’s seeped into their consciousness through their miseducation in our failing socialist government schools, their insipid reliance on the vapid Internet and cable-television media to provide them with all knowledge, and the banal cult-hero worship of their atheist gurus.

Atheists see themselves as being rationalists. In reality, they are the most irrational people I've ever encountered. There are the several related ironies here.

1. They claim to love reason and logic, but are unreasonable and overly emotional.
2. They claim that Christians cling to blind faith, and yet their propagation of lunatic conspiracy theories is endless.
3. They are obsessed with logical fallacies, but don’t know what a logical fallacy is and commit them constantly.
4. They claim to respect research and authority, but don’t have a clue on how to do proper research and will abandon a debate when faced with solid scholarship that refutes them.
5. They start endless arguments, but quickly change the topic when they have no rebuttal and resort to ad hominems and strawman arguments when they have no other place to run to.

These are all part of a pattern of mock dialogue I’ve noticed when dealing with atheists on the Internet.

“You need to read some books” and “You need to do some research,” are common replies. Despite the fact that I have read some books and not only do research, but teach it as part of a graduation requirement, these young postmodernists haven’t read any books. They’ve watched a video such as Zeitgeist that references amateur sources that borrow ideas from each other and recycle these same silly arguments over and over.

Accusations of “lying” and “dishonesty” are also common. They reject that ultimate truth actually exists, but assume someone is knowingly lying when they simply disagree or hold to opposing presuppositions. There are frequent incidents of “begging the question” or assuming their conclusion within the premise to the argument. In short, it’s difficult to argue with someone who says that you need to “do some critical thinking” who himself hasn’t learned to think critically.

I’ve come to the conclusion several times that it is a bad idea to begin a dialogue with these people. After viewing some of the nasty web wars among atheists themselves, I realized that the goal can never be to prove something to be true with these people. Only Christian compassion can be a motivating factor,

A while back I had an interesting commenter named “Thomas” on one of my YouTube vlogs, who succinctly hit the nail of the postmodernist syndrome on its head. I wrote Thomas and told him I had a difficult time defining postmodernism. I wanted to study it in order to devise a strategy to poke holes through the arguments of these “20-something” postmodernists.

I replied:

Thanks for your comments on postmodernism. I am looking for a way to be more articulate on this topic. Most of the atheists who respond to my vlogs are thoroughly postmodern. They proclaim themselves as a voice of reason, but are most unreasonable and anti-rational. I try to explain to them that they are motivated by emotion and then use cynicism (not true skepticism) they have heard elsewhere with no real critical thinking on their own. But for some reason postmodernism is hard for me to pin down. Maybe because it is so irrational? Do you know of any good resources on this that would help me to study it.

I copy here Thomas’ first reply, which is obviously written off-the-cuff, but is useful and could become a blueprint for dealing with postmodernism if it were to be developed. What he describes here is not simply just a way of dealing with atheists, but all liberals, some neo-conservatives, and especially liberal theology in the guise of popular Christian movements, including everything from the Jesus Seminar to the Emerging Church movement.

I’ve edited and rearranged the material in a few places. At the end is a reading list of books I’d never heard of. In return, I suggested that he read Van Til and Bahnsen, whom he had never heard of. I always find it interesting when I discover people who come to the exact same conclusions I do on esoteric subjects using a completely different road map.

What is Postmodernism?

1. Anti-Reason - The very nature of Postmodernism is anti-reason. They make lots of claims yet cannot live up to them because it's a cult of ignorance. I'm not kidding. It's really that bad.

Postmodernism abandoned reason for "feeling" which is why their first line of argument is ad hominem, strawman fallacies, and non-sequiturs. Unfortunately for their cause, their arrogance makes them believe they are the voice of reason.

2. Anti-Realism - They choose faith over truth. A useful historical example is that the grand failure of Marx is found in his claim that Marxism is a "scientific socialism" whereby he laid bare four predictions. He was wrong in each case. Marx was a buffoon. He said Marxism was scientific yet Hegel denied reason for spirit (feeling) and evidence for faith. Marxism is based on an anti-realist, anti-reason philosophy.

The very nature of Postmodernism, going all the way back to Rousseau, denies the achievements of the Enlightenment. This is why every Leftist revolution has failed. To the Left, they've chosen to use feelings and faith to guide their economic and moral principles since the French Revolution. Ancient Christians knew that this wouldn't work. Jesus said, "My kingship is not of this world; if my kingship were of this world, my servants would fight." There was a strong case in Christian morals for Reason. Of course, as much criticism as the Left heaps upon Christians, I was surprised myself when I found the contrary to be true (I was studying Islam and comparing it to Christianity and Judaism). Christian scholars from the beginning believed in moral judgment through Reason. This is echoed in Cicero (more clearly I'd say) and predated by the Greeks.

Why morals? To the Postmodern collectivist (followers of Rousseau and Kant), morals are only valid when we all reach a consensus (a democratic majority or a collective will). This is a logical fallacy. Morals are often taught as lessons. Why? The purpose of morals are to instill us with the judgment to determine the better behavior.

Therefore, it's fallacious to suggest that we can change the outcome of a behavior simply by agreeing that it's good (argumentum ad populus). And this is why all collectivist societies are the worst human rights violators. Because morals are based on whim rather than principles. It suggests that if we get enough people to agree that misogyny is good, slavery is good, homophobia is good (all hypersensitive leftist subjects) then the nature of collectivist morals, or morals by consensus demands it to be true. Typically, I'll trick them (because they're arrogant) by pretending to agree that morals are based on consensus. I'll say it and nod my head (it's an old trick to gain trust through body language). Then I'll prove it wrong. The disconnect with morals and principles and the Postmodern Left is found in their unhealthy obsession with collectivism, Nietzsche in particular. Everything was reduced to "values."

Values are another sticking point for the Postmodernist. To drive something home I'll remind him, ad nauseum, "Those are your values, not mine. That's what you do. That's what you love. Not me." To the Postmodernist, they believe (again wrongly) that values are a social construct (BTW, if anyone ever says “social construct” you can pretty much call that nonsense). They say this because they're anti-realist. Divorcing from both reason and reality the Postmodernists are morally bankrupt. Morals require us to discriminate, to choose the better of available options based on principles and evidence. The Postmodernist denies that either are valid. To the Postmodernist then, all behaviors have equal outcomes (I point this out just to get them to scratch their heads). Because without reason or the mind being able to reliably and accurately interpret the world then all behavior is mere chance. I'm just as likely to get hit crossing the street with my eyes closed then looking both ways. Which brings us to relativism.

The most pernicious feature of Postmodernism, and the one that sends real scientists on the warpath, is relativism. The Postmodernist, denying reason and evidence, also categorically denies that any truth can be found. It's interesting to note that Jews and Christians both believed (Christians more so) that God created the Universe with immutable laws, so perfect that God could not break them. This is why Muhammed said, "the Jews have fettered Allah." To the Muslims, Allah can do anything, including be wildly inconsistent. To the Christians and Jews this was not so. The Laws of Nature are immutable, therefore, it's possible to discover and interpret them. Human beings are imperfect but the universe is not. Thus the Western World was ready to embark on a journey of scientific discovery with Jews and Christians leading the way. To the Postmodernist, however, the universe itself is a matter of opinion. This is the most baffling but if you read all of their literature you'll find evidence time and again they believe that reality is a matter of opinion. This is why you'll state a fact and they'll say, "That's your opinion." This is the slipperiest and most intellectually detrimental characteristic of Postmodern anti-rationalism. It can destroy a person's ability to function in modern society. Interestingly enough, their collectivist interpretation (that is, cultural or group awareness suggests that reality is a social construct) is also found in Islam. Another oppressive, totalitarian, murderous ideology that explicitly states (like Rousseau to Marcuse) anyone who does not convert is either killed or subjugated. That's collectivism for you. The ways I've found to deal with relativism is to be irreverent, sarcastic and mocking.

To the Postmodernist, language is not a form of communication, but a weapon to deliver intellectual force (whatever that means). The Postmodernist will attack for no reason, then change subjects just to keep attacking. When they're losing ground they'll resort to value-relativism or what Eagleton would call theoretical pluralism. An example would be if you said, "You're indoctrinated," they'll say "We're all indoctrinated." Well, not we're all not indoctrinated. But they say that because in a relativist world, there is no right or wrong and everything meets in between. Of course, it's only relativist when they're losing an argument. So I point this out. I make it explicit. I'll tell them straight up they're retreating into theoretical pluralism. Invariably, because these elitists are impressed with obscurantism, they'll ask, "What's that?" Then I'll tell them, correct them, and continue with reason, evidence and logic.

If there is a rule #1, I guess it would have to be - never initiate the conversation. The reason is because talking to a Postmodern self-defeatist is a waste of time. If they initiate the conversation it's because they have a grievance to monger. It means they care because their feelings are being broadcast. Use that. Then challenge their knowledge about it. For some reason, I have yet to know why, but these Postmodernists tend to crumble when you give names and dates to support your arguments. I think it's because they're just a bunch of name-droppers. They don't know Oedipus from Homer. They learned him from Freud. Use specifics and remind them they're wrong and they don't know. They need to be broken down shotgun style and stuffed with double-ought. The only thing they have is faith, break it.

Reading List

Here's a list of books I've read to understand Postmodernism (Read in this order):

1. Higher Superstition - by Levitt and Gross - this is the book that started it all. The Postmodern Left failed to gain ground in the hard sciences during the communist revolutions at various colleges (a strategy developed by Marcuse). They did manage to dominate the humanities (much to my dismay). After years of establishing hegemony (a Postmodern watchword) they sought to expand their sphere of influence. These frauds met began meeting fierce resistance. It started with this book.

2. The Sokal Hoax anthology - this isn't exactly the best book but there are so many essays to explicate it helps you develop an instinct for their nonsense. Spoiler Alert!! Sokal wrote an essay that was utter nonsense. You might say, "So what?" which would be very Postmodern, but only the thesis was Alan's. The rest of the essay was quotes from Leftist luminaries. In other words, they can't even understand each other.

3. Fashionable Nonsense - by Alan Sokal and Jean Bricmont - the best part for non-scientists (like myself) are the intermezzo chapters which breakdown the nonsense into logic for laymen, explain their faults, exposing their frauds, and illustrating their fallacies.

4. Liberal Fascism - by Jonah Goldberg - not a great piece of scholarly work but it familiarizes you with the various political movements, philosophers, and movers-n-shakers of the Left that were Fascists. What this book lacks is a strong voice to carry its message. What it has is a plethora of quotes from Fascists and the Leftists today whose own politics are indistinguishable.

5. Explaining Postmodernism - by Stephen Hicks - Easily the strongest work to date. Hicks tracts a philosophic line from Rousseau to Rorty, explaining their various assertions, their weaknesses, and why successors were desperately needed. Hicks book is remarkably lucid, candid, and funny. More importantly, it's brutally honest. Postmodernists are in serious denial and Hicks throws it in their face. He explains why they choose the tactics you've described (though, if you've read everything up to this you'll have figured it out for yourself anyway). The most compelling features of this book are the three theses, which are laid bare, then thoroughly supported, and cogently argued. This is a MUST!

Enjoy your readings,
Thomas

P.S. The best book to explain the descent into ignorance (though not entirely Postmodern but the Western World as a whole) is The Closing of the American Mind by Allan Bloom, Hating Whitey by David Horowitz and Illiberal Education by Dinesh Desouza are good companion pieces.

What percentage of the world is atheist?

There are numerous takes on this. Some will say there are more atheists than we imagine because in strongly Muslim and Catholic countries, atheists are ostracized and won't publicly announce their views. On the other hand, over one-third of the world was raised under atheistic communism in the past century. Religion was discouraged and believers were persecuted. All things being equal, the common survey number of 2 to 3 percent seems about right.

It also depends on how you define the term. An atheist believes there is no God. But many people who are not traditionally religious believe in a higher power or a spiritual force of some type. If we extend the definition to those who have no opinion, who lack belief, or who have no religion, the number is obviously much higher.

A 2005 survey published in the Encyclopædia Britannica found that the non-religious made up about 11.9 percent of the world's population, and atheists about 2.3 percent. It's reasonable to suppose that there is a gray area between these two groups with some non-religious people claiming to be atheists and vice versa.

Further, in some cultures, such as in Russia and Scandinavia, it is considered impolite to be "aggressive" in sharing your inner thoughts, beliefs and emotions. Those surveyed might tend to shun the question by simply claiming no religion.

Atheists often like to point out that in these countries, which they consider to be much more civilized and advanced than the rest of the world, the number of atheists is thought by some to be more than half of the population. These are mainly northern European countries, such as Sweden, Denmark, Norway, Finland, France, Estonia and Germany.

A few Asian countries such as South Korea and Japan are cited too, however, the religions of Buddhism and Shintoism do not worship God or gods, so those surveyed cannot be compared culturally to the atheists in the west. The same is true with communist countries such as Russia and Vietnam where atheism was enforced even to the point of imprisonment and death. So it's even more surprising that Cuba and China, which are among the worst offenders in persecuting believers, have only a 7 and 8 percent atheist population respectively.

Europe is an anomaly though with its high atheist population. I've often wondered why northern Europe is so Godless. I suspect there is a factor that most people don't realize: government enforced tithing.

In many European countries, there is a national church and the tithe is essentially another tax. There is a clause in the law that allows people who are not members of the national church to opt out. If you were born in the country, whether you were baptized or not, the government counts you as a national church member. Unless you declare yourself to be a member of another religious group not supported by the government or a non-member, this is another socialist tax levied on your income. Lutheran Church members in Germany, for instance, have the ability to opt out by literally declaring themselves to be apostate.

So in fact, the world atheist population numbers are skewed as the result of a tax dodge.

If we look at Sweden for example, there are surveys stating that atheists make-up 85 percent of the population. I've found that unbelievable, and perhaps there is one reason to think it's not really true. According to the Wikipedia entry on the tithe:

Until the year 2000, Sweden had a mandatory church tax to be paid if one did belong to the Church of Sweden which had been funneling about $500 million annually to the church. Because of change in legislation, the tax was withdrawn in year 2000. However, the Swedish government has agreed to continue collecting from individual taxpayers the annual payment that has always gone to the church. But now the tax will be an optional checkoff box on the tax return.

In most of these European countries with a high atheist population, there is a state Church and tithing is compulsory. Anyone who wants to stop paying tithes has to declare in writing, in a local court or registry, that they are leaving the Church. They are then crossed off the Church registers and can no longer receive the sacraments. The tithe is less than the biblical ten percent in each of these countries varying between 1 to 9 percent.

When we contrast that with the United States, we see that there has never been a compulsory tithe. In contrast, churches here thrive in comparison to Europe. In addition, the tithe is tax-exempt and income tax deductible. It could be argued that socialism and civil government enforced tithing weakens the people's faith; while voluntary giving strengthens it.

Give, and it will be given to you. They will pour into your lap a good measure--pressed down, shaken together, and running over. For by your standard of measure it will be measured to you in return.

- Luke 6:28

Ted Kennedy's Letter to the Pope

"I know that I have been an imperfect human being, but with the help of my faith, I have tried to right my path ... I have done my best." - Edward M. Kennedy

"If I ought, I can." - Pelagius, the 4th century heretic

"Therefore by the deeds of the law no flesh will be justified in His sight, for by the law is the knowledge of sin. But now the righteousness of God apart from the law is revealed, being witnessed by the Law and the Prophets, even the righteousness of God, through faith in Jesus Christ, to all and on all who believe. For there is no difference; for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, being justified freely by His grace through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus ..." - The Apostle Paul, Romans 3:20-24

"For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith--and this not from yourselves, it is the gift of God--not by works, so that no one can boast. For we are God's workmanship, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do." - The Apostle Paul, Ephesians 2:8-10

See Kennedy's full letter below and read Jill Stanek's comments on Kennedy's misrepresentation of free will vs. grace. It is tragic if this was his misunderstanding until the end. But it is even more tragic, if his representation of grace influences others to think, "If I ought, I can" with the "help of faith, try to right my path." It is tragic if we think that our justification before God lies with whether "I have done my best."

Scripture is clear that there is none righteous, none who is able even with the help of faith to right their own path. This justification comes as a free gift of grace and it is this grace that transforms us into keepers of the law. The inability to keep the law on such a fundamental issue as protecting innocent human life is due only to the lack of grace. It's a good lesson on why politicians who are professing Christians can't keep God's law on this one vital point.

Most Holy Father, I asked President Obama to personally hand-deliver this letter to you. As a man of deep faith himself, he understands how important my Roman Catholic faith is to me, and I am so deeply grateful to him.

I hope this letter finds you in good health. I pray that you have all of God's blessings as you lead our church and inspire our world during these challenging times. I am writing with deep humility to ask that you pray for me as my own health declines. I was diagnosed with brain cancer more than a year ago, and although I continue treatment, the disease is taking its toll on me. I am 77 years old and preparing for the next passage of life.

I have been blessed to be part of a wonderful family. And both of my parents, particularly my mother, kept our Catholic faith at the center of our lives. That gift of faith has sustained and nurtured and provided solace to me in the darkest hours. I know that I have been an imperfect human being, but with the help of my faith, I have tried to right my path.

I want you to know, Your Holiness, that in my nearly 50 years of elective office, I have done my best to champion the rights of the poor and open doors of economic opportunity. I have worked to welcome the immigrant, to fight discrimination and expand access to health care and education. I have opposed the death penalty and fought to end war. Those are the issues that have motivated me and have been the focus of my work as a United States senator.

I also want you to know that even though I am ill, I'm committed to doing everything I can to achieve access to health care for everyone in my country. This has been the political cause of my life. I believe in a conscience protection for Catholics in the health field and I'll continue to advocate for it as my colleagues in the Senate and I work to develop an overall national health policy that guarantees health care for everyone.

I have always tried to be a faithful Catholic, Your Holiness, and though I have fallen short through human failings, I have never failed to believe and respect the fundamental teachings of my faith. I continue to pray for God's blessings on you and on our church and would be most thankful for your prayers for me.

Eastern European Nationalism

I posted some videos of my trips to several cities in Ukraine in the summer of 2007. These are on a travel log at YouTube, which you can watch below. When I first posted these, I did it for my own reference and enrichment, since I thought virtually no one would watch them. Now though, I've had thousands of viewers and many of the comments are arguments from Ukrainian and Polish nationalists over the correct spelling and pronunciation of the cities; which church has the religious monopoly in the region; and which country had its land stolen first.

You can scroll through all 23 videos here:



Just two examples of the responses I have been getting:

I would like to bring your attention the name Kyiv should be used instead of Russified Kiev.

Whenever you arrive to Kyiv Boryspil International, you will never miss four big shining letters KYIV on the top of the airport building. When you drive further towards the city, you will be greeted by the board Kyiv welcomes you on the side of the speedway. You may think these changes occurred after the Orange Revolution. Let me reassure you that this was already the case in earlier nineties and long time before it.

"KYIV" spelling is the only official Ukrainian spelling, used by the Ukrainian government, So that makes it OFFICIAL and correct. The fact is that the majority of foreign governments, embassies, and numerous academic and business organizations use "KYIV" not "KIEV." The US Embassy uses "KYIV."

The fact the Ukrainian Parliament, Verkhovna Rada, through many of its Commissions allows only one spelling, Kyiv. Probably, the most important argument is the Constitution of Ukraine, which clearly states that The capital of Ukraine is the City of Kyiv. In fact, it can be argued that those who persistently use Kiev instead of Kyiv could be accused of Russian Nationalism and clinging to Russian communism.

There is also the debate over whether it is Lvov, Lviv or Lwów:

I hope that one day someone will be decide about American and British territories. Maybe you should describe what means expulsion from own home/house and what means suffer in Russian Siberian gulags and in German Auschwitz camp like it was in my family.

Americans should leave own cities and give them to Eskimos and Indians. In New York should live only the Dutch because they established Manhattan. Berlin should be Polish; Paris and London Italian because were established by Romans; Russian Nowgorod by Swedes.

Polish and Hungarian roots go deeper in one region of Ukraine than Ukrainian roots. Kievan Rus conquered these region which belonged to us (Poles and Hungarian) from beginning. Before Christianization of Poland it was Polish tribes lands -- western Slavic, not eastern -- so not Ukrainian.

If you will decide about Poland again give this ugly German Wrocław/Breslau to Germany, which by the way was destroyed by Russians, and give us our Lwów. Nobody asked Americans and British for Wrocław.

Polish government never acknowledge that Lwów is not a polish city. It is the only one big Polish city which wasn't destroyed by Germans and Russians communist during WW2. The oldest monument in Lwów is from Polish times, because Ruthenian Lviv was had mainly wooden buildings.

Americans and British had no right to sold us to Russian communist after how we fought for freedom so many allied counties and nobody help to us. People in eastern Europe hate when Americans and other western countries decide about our land. Serbia likes Russians because of Kosovo independence.

My response: In English, there is no "yi" dipthong. Kyiv is the foreign transliteration of the Ukrainian spelling. However, both the Russian and Ukrainian spellings are in the Cyrillic alphabet. Kiev is the English transliteration according to common spelling rules. "Kyiv" simply has not caught on in the West. Very few people recognize it over "Kiev."

A Google search for Kyiv "yyilds" 4 million web pages, while Kiev yields 40 million.

I can't pretend to have any expertise in these conflicts that go back over many centuries. I can only give the honest point of view of the "ugly American."

The American author and satirist Mark Twain wrote: "There is not an acre of ground on the globe that is in possession of its rightful owner, or that has not been taken away from owner after owner, cycle after cycle, by force and bloodshed."

Of course, "hyi" is using hyperbole to prove a point. No nation has come into existence without displacing another nation at some point.

What I write "hyir" is also a satire. If "wyi" take your principle to the logical conclusion, then every ethnic nationality that ever conquered or colonized a "pyis" of land ought to give it up to the prior tenant. Then that nation should give up its claim to the prior one. And all the way back to Adam.

If "thyiz" nations don't exist today in pure blood we ought to honor them by changing the names of all our "cityiz."

Chicago ought to be returned to the French and be called: Chicagou. The French then ought to give it up to the Chippeway Indians as Shiggaugo. Then the Crees ought to have it and it should be revert to: Shiggaugo-ong.

And so on.

Many cities in Russia and the former USSR have been renamed to reflect their pre-Revolutionary names, St. Petersburg (Leningrad), Nizhny Novgorod (Gorky), etc. Americans don't have a problem with changing names of foreign countries as many times as they request. We think it's strange that we've been "America" for over 400 years and only added "The United States of America" in 1776. We are the "New" World, yet Europeans still can't decide what to call themselves.

Often our spelling and pronunciation of names is different from the nationalist spelling. Wien becomes Vienna; Mumbai becomes Bombay; Rocia becomes Russia; Ookraine becomes Ukraine. But we don't usually spell foreign place names contrary to our spelling rules or else we simply mispronounce them depending on their spelling.

Unless they are English or Irish -- but that's a different story.

Unending Persecution of Christians in Pakistan

The following is a report sent to us from a young woman who is doing the on-line Urdu (Pakistani) version of The Forerunner.

http://forerunner.com/urdu/urdu.html

You may also view some videos here. Although these are not in English, you can see what is going on and know exactly what to pray about.





Report by: Nosheet Gloria, Toba Tek Singh, Pakistan
Affected Areas: Korian and Gojra, District Toba Tek Singh

30 July 2009

A mob of Muslim Extremists burnt about 75 houses of the Christian People over the alleged desecration of the Holy Quran in Azafi Abadi at Chak 95-JB on Gojra-District Toba Tek Singh, later on Thursday, Christian leaders said.

It was a routine happy morning of 30th July 2009. In the wake of this economically depressed situation the peasants were heading towards their fields to seed therein with the hope of harvesting the fruit of their day to day struggle. The children went to the school to accomplish many of their forefathers’ dreams which had not yet been realized for generations, and the women were busy in their household activities, wishing to complete their household tasks before their children come back from the schools and before their men come back from the fields for their lunch. Nobody knew until then what that day was going to bring to them.

Everything seemed to be happy till the noon time, and still nobody had any idea of the great danger coming upon their heads. It was when Mukhtar Masih, Talib Masih and his son Imran Masih were allegedly reported to desecrate the papers inscribed with the Holy Quran verses at a wedding ceremony of their relatives.

An official newspaper “Dawn” said that 50 houses were damaged when the mob in a frenzy of rage held a jury where the alleged convicted of desecrating the Holy Quran Talib Masih was asked to offer apology over the incident.

Talib denied the incident and refused to apologize. Resultantly hundreds of people mobbed together and attacked the Azafi Basti.

Before the arrival of the mob, the residents had fled which gave a walkover to the mob which put on fire 75 houses. The ablaze also burnt many a cattle.

District Police Officer (DPO) Inkisar Khan fielded MPA Bilal Asghar Warraich and Maulana Noor Ahmad to calm down the mob. The DPO also suspended the Gojra Sadar station house officer at the demand of the mob.

The mob blocked the road to block the entrance of fire brigades to the village. Federal Minister for Minorities Shahbaz Bhatti and Punjab Minorities and Human Rights Minister Kamran Michael visited the locality on Friday and urged both sides to remain peaceful.

They said the Christians would be compensated for their loss. Minority MPAs Rafiq Pervaiz and Khalil Tahir Sandhu also visited the village.

DPO Inkisar Khan said a case has been registered under section 295-B of the Pakistan Penal Code against Mukhtar Masih, Talib Masih and Imran Masih without any arrest.

Local ulema and traders demanded the arrest of the accused and announced a complete strike on Saturday (1st of August 2009). Former MNA M Hamza condemned the violence against Christians as well as the alleged desecration act. In a press statement, he demanded a judicial probe into the incident..

Labour Party leader Tariq Mahmood, National Workers’ Party Punjab Secretary Rana Azam, Labour Qaumi Movement’s Shabbir Ahmad and Kissan Committee President Chaudhry Fateh Muhammad and other remarkable officials condemned the violence.

1st of August 2009

A mob of Muslim Extremists burnt about 100 houses of the Christian People over the alleged desecration of the Holy Quran in Gojra City-District Toba Tek Singh, later on Saturday.

When the incidence in in Azafi Abadi at Chak 95-JB was being condemned from right and left and by the officials of the government and by the TV channels, no rescue measurements were taken to avoid any other possible sad incidents. Almost everyone was talking in every corner of the region that the mob of the Muslim Extremists is very likely to attack again. The extremists were reported to have inquired from the people walking on the streets and roads if they were not Christian. They even were present in bus stops, taxi stands and other public places to take the Christian people to task. Some people were beaten just because they appeared to be Christian. In Pakistan normally black colored people are considered to be Christians. But there are some Muslim people as well who are of black skin, and they had to pay the penalty for their black color in spite of the fact that they were Muslims.

In spite of these facts no security was provided by the government, the result of which was that another sad incident was given a chance to take place. A mob of 1500 to 2000 people has been reported to have gathered for a peaceful political procession. They purposefully chose the place from where they could have accessed the Christian Locality easily.

The procession started moving dramatically, giving all indications of being attackers and incited their prey to concern about their security. It was blamed that Christians opened fire upon the mob first and the mob, in response, put the 100 houses on fire, killing 10 people including 4 women and 2 children with the fire, blaze and suffocation.

Chief Minister’s delegation consisting Dost Mohammad Khosa and Minority’s Minister Shahbaz Bhati visited the locations for sharing their concern and condolence over the great loss and promised the Christian Communities and steps will be taken to ensure that the lives and the belongings of the Christian Families shall be given all possible security. The Christian leaders and people shared their concern in their loud voices that such incidences are taking places in spite of all the vows and promises of the Government. Each new coming government does not care about things, and that the governments wait till the things are destroyed and then the officials only come for sharing their condolence.

Legal cases against the DPO (District Police Officer) and other concerned authorities have been filed who showed their all negligence which ended towards this sad incidence.

Mixed reports are coming from right and left. Some people say that it was Political Procession who got furious, while others believe that it was planned attack by the Taliban of Afghanistan.

We request you to pray for us all. We know and keep our faith in the fact that we are persecuted in His name. I believe that God is in control of everything, and He gives power to His people to fight against the Satanic powers.

I would like to request you to keep us in your daily prayers, and also please pray for the leaders of the Christian Community so that they may play their positive role to ensure the lives and belongings of the Christian People.

May God richly bless you and keep. May He smile for you and shine His face upon you. May His light keep burning in your heart!

Lord's Blessings,

Nosheet Gloria

The Wrath of Angels & Exposing Late Term Abortion

A video produced by Eric Holmberg and Vorthos Forum (a/k/a The Apologetics Group, Reel to Real Ministries) got the attention of the Margaret Sanger Papers Collection website at New York University.

http://www.nyu.edu/projects/sanger/sightings/index.html

Margaret Sanger: Solid as Barack

Sanger’s name has cropped up in several right wing blogs that attacked Barack Obama for his support of a woman’s right to choose. For instance, on Aug. 24, 2008 in Human Events Online, Senator Obama was condemned for opposing the Born Alive Infant Protection Act, legislation that would require hospitals to care for infants who survive an abortion. Obama, who viewed this as an anti-abortion rights law, recognized that doctors already have a legal and ethical obligation to preserve life in the rare instance when a baby survives an abortion procedure. Nevertheless, the columnist warned “somewhere in hell, Margaret Sanger is filling out her absentee ballot.” Similar attacks on Sanger and Obama appear in a YouTube video that links them to a plot to eradicate the black race through abortion www.youtube.com/watch?v=YI67MuPwsX0, and yet another piece on black genocide.

Another of the videos produced by Vorthos Forum, "A Tale of Two Babies," points out that Obama did not vote for Illinois' version of the "Born Alive Infant Protection Act" because he feared it could be used to curtail abortion rights. The struggle to outlaw all late term abortions of viable infants ought to be the next step in the pro-life movement's focus.



I am now reading the book, Wrath of Angels, which chronicles how the pro-life street activist movement branched off the political lobbyists. The book then focuses on the so-called "violent fringe" of the pro-life movement. Having known some of the people in the book personally, I see not everything is accurate. But the book reads like a novel and is interesting if you can read between the lines of two "pro-choice" journalists attempting to be objective. (I recommend the book because it has some good insights that I agree with and I'll be posting a review later on.)

Many pro-lifers saw the reality that Roe v. Wade was far too sweeping a measure of judicial activism. It had to be repealed either by stacking the court with constructionist justices or with a constitutional amendment.

They saw that we do need to dramatically change public opinion first. To get a human life amendment to the Constitution was and still is too big of a step. Baby steps need to be taken. Exposing late-term abortion is a key first step. Even though it's only two or three percent of all abortions, the legal victory is not what is important. It is getting the vast majority of the public to see the humanity of a viable child and to provoke outrage at the legalized killing of these little ones. Right now most are in the dark. Many think it is already illegal. Others cite the "danger to the life and health of the mother" exception. We heard this lie in many of Dr. George Tiller's eulogies, for instance. However, a viable baby never needs to be aborted. In the case of a danger to the life of the mother, the baby simply needs to be delivered (by c-section if necessary) and cared for. In the vast majority of cases, these little ones can be saved.

But according to Planned Parenthood's research arm, the Alan Guttmacher Institute, are the list of reasons women had not obtained the abortions earlier in their pregnancies. The results were as follows:

71% Woman didn't recognize she was pregnant or misjudged gestation
48% Woman found it hard to make arrangements for abortion
33% Woman was afraid to tell her partner or parents
24% Woman took time to decide to have an abortion
8% Woman waited for her relationship to change
8% Someone pressured woman not to have abortion
6% Something changed after woman became pregnant
6% Woman didn't know timing is important
5% Woman didn't know she could get an abortion
2% A fetal problem was diagnosed late in pregnancy
11% Other

Dr. Tiller, of course, was lauded as a saint by abortion rights advocates because of all the women's lives he saved. But according to Planned Parenthood's own statistics, this simply isn't the case.

In the second chapter of Wrath of Angels, "The Struggle for Roe," the authors explain how prior to 1973 some states had loopholes in their restrictive abortion laws to allow for the "mental health of the mother" to be an exception. All that was needed case of the "danger to a mother's life or health"

The book also points out that the original language of Roe v. Wade allowed abortion in cases of the danger to the health and life of the mother, rape or incest in the the first trimester of pregnancy; and danger to the health and life of the mother in the second trimester. A key component of allowing this was the "right to privacy." During the oral arguments, Sarah Weddington conceded that if the humanity of the child could be established she would have no case.

Doe v. Bolton then extended the right to be defined as a private decision between a woman and her doctor under the protection for the "right to privacy." This was the slippery slope leading over the cliff to what almost all now consider to be infanticide. At this point, there was assured a "right to abortion" through all nine months in any case in which the doctor and the woman decided that her health dictated she could not bear a child. Mental health and "thoughts of suicide" are often cited, for instance.

We need to consider that the so-called exceptions to abortion (rape, incest, the health of the mother) are accepted even by many so-called pro-life advocates such as Sean Hannity and John McCain.

Many "pro-life" politicians and pundits are actually pro-Roe, but merely anti-Doe. Their argument is that these exceptions are no more than two or three percent of all abortions.

"Wouldn't we would gladly take that victory than none at all?"

Or so the argument goes. However, it is a defensive tack that cannot result in a reversal of our current culture of death. The abortion matrix needs to be exposed from the other extreme two or three percent -- those infants who are killed after viability (now at about 22 to 24 weeks). On the surface, it seems too small a victory to pursue. However, securing the right to life for any unborn infant can ultimately reverse Roe at least back to it's original intent. We must do that by establishing in the public consciousness the humanity of these late-term babies that are being slaughtered by the thousands each year.

If we can do that we have a secured beachhead and ultimately we may end up saving millions.

Late-term Abortionist Pendergraft Loses License Suspension Appeal

I've collected this from various pro-life news sources. No local news source in the Orlando area has yet covered the story.

- Jay Rogers

KISSIMMEE, Florida (The Forerunner) — Late-term abortionist James Scott Pendergraft III has lost his appeal of the suspension of his medical license for committing illegal third-trimester abortions. The suspension issued by the Florida Medical Board remains valid and in effect.

In an opinion filed yesterday, the Florida District Court of Appeals rejected all of Pendergraft’s arguments and stated that they “found no reversible error” in the Board’s suspension order.

The opinion further stated:

“Dr. Pendergraft violated sections 456.072(1)(k) and 458.331(1)(g) when he performed a third trimester abortion in his clinic, which is not a hospital.”…

• “violated section 390.0111(1)(a)… which prohibits third trimester abortions unless two physicians certify in writing to the fact that, to a reasonable degree of medical probability, the termination of the pregnancy is necessary to save the life or preserve the health of the pregnant woman.”

• [violated] “section 390.0111(1)(b)… because he did not certify in writing “to the medical necessity for legitimate emergency medical procedures for termination of pregnancy in the third trimester, and another physician is not available for consultation.”

• “the [Administrative Law Judge] found that there was clear and convincing evidence that Dr. Pendergraft committed medical malpractice.”

Pendergraft has a long history of violations and problems with the law. In 2006, Pendergraft’s license was suspended for similar infractions.

In 2001, Pendergraft was convicted of extortion and spent 46 months in prison.

It’s a sad commentary on the state of our media when a political slant keeps news outlets from informing the public of an important story. In the wake of Dr. George Tiller’s death, law enforcement needs to prosecute abortionists who violate the law. Such enforcement in Tiller’s case may have prevented unnecessary violence.

Earlier this year, I produced a series of videos chronicling Pendergraft’s late term abortion practice and one case that involved a baby boy born alive who was left to die.

Dr. Peter Hammond and Frontline Fellowship

I had a couple of dynamic spiritual experiences this week. The first was meeting Dr. Peter Hammond of Frontline Fellowship, South Africa. Dr. Hammond is a personal “hero” of mine and is doing more to promote true Revival than anyone I can think of. He spoke of his mission’s work in Africa – the vision is no less than “All of Africa for Christ.” Hammond understands that Revival isn’t simply life-changing on a personal and pietistic level, but nation-changing and world-changing as well.

I highly encourage people to visit their website: http://www.frontline.org.za/

Other resources are available here: http://www.reformationsa.org/

Not only are there numerous messages available for download, but sermons have also been prepared as power point presentations that you yourself can present and teach to your small group or church meeting. When presented under the anointing of the Holy Spirit, these presentations are truly life-changing, nation-changing and world-changing.

Dr. Hammond emphasized the following points:

1. John Calvin, although he is not primarily known as a social reformer and an evangelist, was more full-orbed in his theology and social theory than most people realize. Calvin’s view on justification by faith and a resulting sanctification translated into the increase of Christian efforts to reform the society of his own day and in succeeding generations.

2. John Knox and the Scottish Covenanters are primarily known as the founders of the Presbyterian movement. Yet this revival was not just a reformation of doctrine in the Scottish church, but also a spiritual awakening that affected the entire country of Scotland. This was the first nation in modern history that was literally converted en masse to Christ. According to Iain Murray, author of The Puritan Hope, there was not a household in Scotland in which one of the members experienced a profound conversion to Christ. The nation itself was born-again and the people of 16th and 17th century Scotland covenanted with God.

3. The English version of the Presbyterians, the Puritans, were responsible for bringing this vision to England and America. Men such as Oliver Cromwell, William Bradford and John Winthrop changed not only the politics of the west, but their lives resulted in a greater evangelistic thrust for the fulfillment of the Great Commission.

4. In the 18th century we can say much the same about the lives of George Whitefield and Jonathan Edwards. Their preaching of the Gospel, far from being a “salvation-only” message, affected all aspects of society.

5. By comparison, today’s Calvinists (and we evangelicals in general) are frozen in our devotion to God. We tend to neglect fervent prayer, emotional expression in worship and evangelism. If they were alive today, the Calvinists of the past would hardly recognize today’s Calvinists as being representative of their lives’ work.

6. We are currently undergoing a paradigm shift in the evangelical church from pervasive and being an ardent dispensational premillennialism to a postmillennial activism. This shift in eschatological outlook will be vital to the future of Christian cultural transformation.

7. The greatest century of missions was the 19th century. The world missions movement was initially fueled by the postmillennial hope. The eschatology of the founders of modern Protestant missions was almost universally optimistic. The result of this postmillennial worldview was claiming the nations for Christ.

8. The prospects faced by William Carey, George Mueller, David Livingstone and others in plowing the rocky soil in Africa, Asia and other “dark continents” was thought to be “dismal.” The immediate result of their efforts was a handful of converts. If these men had the eschatology and vision of today’s Christians, they would not have had the long term outlook that enabled them to persevere. The great irony is that by the end of the 20th century, hundreds of millions of Christian converts have streamed into the kingdom of God. These men didn’t live to see the fulfillment of the promise, but believed. Yet most Christians today are seeing the fulfillment, but don’t have their hope.

9. Frontline Fellowship’s vision is the transformation of all of Africa and the world. Neo-Puritanism is having an impact in these nations from children in home schools and church schools to the highest levels of government where presidents and high ranking officials are being impacted with world changing Gospel teaching.

10. In Sudan and other places, Christians are being martyred for their faith. What should be our response to this? We need to elect politicians with the backbone of Margaret Thatcher and Ronald Reagan who stood up to communism, not to appease anti-Christian tyranny, but to defeat it. Our attitude toward militant Islam should not be a “turn-the-other-cheek-pacifism.” Military action by African Christians in defense against Islam is not only permissible from a New Testament perspective, but mandated to defend the faith. There could even come a time in America when Christians may have to take up arms against invasive regimes, false religions and an oppressive government in our own land.

Gallup Poll: Most Americans now pro-life

The first time I participate in a Gallup Poll I change history!

Last week I got a phone call from Gallup asking for ten minutes of my time in order to participate in a poll. The first question was about whether I approved of President Obama, so wanting my voice to be heard on this issue, I persevered to the end. Almost every demographic question possible was asked including: "Do you consider yourself pro-life or pro-choice?"

Imagine my surprise about a week later when I read this news item:

The latest Gallup poll on abortion found that 51 percent of those questioned call themselves "prolife" - the first time a majority of US adults have identified themselves as such since Gallup began asking this question in 1995 ... Results are based on telephone interviews with 1,015 national adults, aged 18 and older, conducted May 7-10, 2009.

This might seem like a trite statement to say, "I changed history," but people really are influenced by public opinion polls. If the trend continues the pro-aborts can no longer say, "The vast majority of Americans are pro-choice!"

If there is a lesson to be learned here it is that if you want to be a world changer, you must often participate in the process, no matter how mundane it sometimes feels.

Is “Nero” in the new Star Trek movie an intentional Christian allegory?

If you haven’t seen Star Trek XI, you need to drop everything and go out and spend $10 (or whatever it costs in your town to see a movie these days) and see it. Not only is it the best Star Trek movie by far, but it will be the biggest movie of the year and shockingly, despite all the hype, it is much better than expected. I could go on and repeat all the critical drivel about how it will revive the franchise, how great is Chris Pine’s portrayal of Captain James T. Kirk, blah, blah, blah, but I won’t.



I am thinking that the “Nero” character in the new Star Trek movie is an intentional Christian allegory.

The “mythology” of a science fiction or fantasy series, whether it is The X-Files, Star Wars or Dune, works on several levels. There is the “back story” of a series, which enables the audience suspend ignorance and disbelief about the characters and their world. In The X-Files, Fox Mulder is obsessed with UFOs because he wants to believe that his younger sister’s disappearance when they were children is due to an alien abduction. It is what drives him to believe that “the truth is out there.” In Star Wars, the audience is asked from the beginning to understand that this is a mythological setting, for the story takes place, “A long time ago in a galaxy far, far away ...” And thus we are willing to accept that there can be no reference to the world we are from. In Star Wars the impossibility of faster than light travel is explained by the existence of “hyper-space” – another dimension where those nagging laws of Einstein’s do not interfere. In Dune, the entire mythology revolves around the production of spice on the desert world of Arrakis or Dune, which not only makes interstellar travel possible, but drives the entire culture of the galaxy as well.

Science fiction and fantasy writers also draw upon mythic symbolism and universal archetypes. They capture the audience’s sense of wonder appealing to a deeper level of emotion and spiritual awareness. Therefore, George Lucas became an avid follower of Joseph Campbell, author of The Hero With a Thousand Faces, and self-consciously used these symbols and stories in each of the Star Wars movies. Ursula K. LeGuin, author of The Dispossessed and The Left Hand of Darkness, wrote what she called not science fiction but “thought experiments” relying on Jungian psychology and Eastern symbolism found in the Tao Te Ching. Frank Herbert, author of Dune, drew from biblical messianic prophecy tinged with ancient mythology and Arabic sounding words suggesting the religion of Islam. Other fantasy authors such as J.R.R. Tolkien and C.S. Lewis used Christian symbolism, although Tolkien claimed he hated the very idea of allegory and had no such intentions.

The original series of Star Trek was no stranger to allegory, mythology and dense symbolism. However, Christianity is the most common mythic reference. (Here I use the word “myth” in it’s proper literary sense.) One example is Episode 44 of Star Trek: The Original Series, entitled “Bread and Circuses,” a story about a planet whose leader has imitated the culture of the Roman Empire, but with 1960s technology. In the episode, the crew of the U.S.S. Enterprise encounters a persecuted minority known as “sun worshipers” who help McCoy and Spock escape certain death in the gladiator arena.

KIRK: Gentlemen.

MCCOY: Captain, I see on your report Flavius was killed. I am sorry. I liked that huge sun worshiper.

SPOCK: I wish we could have examined that belief of his more closely. It seems illogical for a sun worshiper to develop a philosophy of total brotherhood. Sun worship is usually a primitive superstition religion.

UHURA: I'm afraid you have it all wrong, Mister Spock, all of you. I've been monitoring some of their old-style radio waves, the empire spokesman trying to ridicule their religion. But he couldn't. Don't you understand? It's not the sun up in the sky. It's the Son of God.

KIRK: Caesar and Christ. They had them both. And the word is spreading only now.

MCCOY: A philosophy of total love and total brotherhood.

SPOCK: It will replace their imperial Rome, but it will happen in their twentieth century.

KIRK: Wouldn't it be something to watch, to be a part of? To see it happen all over again? Mister Chekov, take us out of orbit. Ahead warp factor one.

CHEKOV: Aye, sir.

A scene from “Bread and Circuses”

When I was a child I liked Mr. Spock and I even had a Vulcan haircut for a while, but I became a more serious fan of the show once I realized that each episode was a social commentary on one of the many issues during the turbulent 1960s. I was chagrined to realize when I visited Russia and Ukraine eleven times in the 1990s that the show never caught on in Europe or even in the post-Soviet Union. It made no sense at first, since the average Russian school child knew more about the American space program than we did and the whole society idolized its cosmonauts. They loved The X-Files and Star Wars, so why not Star Trek?

Finally, I realized that most Europeans disdained Star Trek as a crass expression of the American notion of Manifest Destiny. Not only would we take over the world, but an American styled “United Federation of Planets” would one day colonize space. Note that the crew of the Enterprise is multicultural and multi-ethnic, but the captain is predictably American. They hated that.

In the 1980s, when Ronald Reagan stepped up nuclear arms production in an attempt to win the cold war, William Shatner’s character appeared in the lyrics to a song, “99 Red Balloons,” by a one-hit-wonder German group, Nena, in a wry screed against the idea that a nuclear war is winnable.

Ninety-nine knights of the air
Ride super-high-tech jet fighters
Everyone’s a super hero
Everyone’s a Captain Kirk
With orders to identify
To clarify, and classify
Scramble in the summer sky
As ninety-nine red balloons go by

But I digress.

A few years ago, I produced a preterist video commentary on Revelation 13 featuring Dr. Kenneth Gentry called The Beast of Revelation: Identified. Copies are always available on our website.

The preterist view of Revelation sees most of the events taking place in the first century since John was writing to seven churches in Asia Minor. In contrast to the preterist view, there are three other hermeneutic approaches to the book of Revelation.

Futurism is the most common “end-times view” of our day. According to the futurist, the book of Revelation is yet to be fulfilled. The locust plagues of Revelation 9 might be interpreted to be Cobra helicopters attacking modern day Israel. The Beast of Revelation 13 is a future world dictator.

Historicism is a view that states that the prophecies of the book of Revelation was fulfilled sometime in history, but not in the first century or in the future. The black plague of the Middle Ages might be interpreted to be one of the plagues brought by the four horsemen of Revelation 6. The pope at the time of Martin Luther is thought to be the Beast of Revelation 13.

Idealism is the spiritualist approach to Bible prophecy. This view states that the prophecies of Revelation are not to be taken literally, but have a general symbolic application in all history. The heavenly battle of Revelation 12 is thought to describe the ongoing battle between good and evil in the spiritual realm. The Beast of Revelation 13 might be any ruler in history who persecutes the church.

I find the preterist view to be most compelling because it has Caesar Nero as the Beast of Revelation 13. In fact, when we understand the historical background of the New Testament, we can see a lot of historical parallels in John’s vision to events that took place in the first century.

In Revelation 12 particularly, we see the figure of the Christ child who is persecuted by the dragon.

Now a great sign appeared in heaven: a woman clothed with the sun, with the moon under her feet, and on her head a garland of twelve stars. Then being with child, she cried out in labor and in pain to give birth. And another sign appeared in heaven: behold, a great, fiery red dragon having seven heads and ten horns, and seven diadems on his heads. His tail drew a third of the stars of heaven and threw them to the earth. And the dragon stood before the woman who was ready to give birth, to devour her Child as soon as it was born. She bore a male Child who was to rule all nations with a rod of iron. And her Child was caught up to God and His throne. Then the woman fled into the wilderness, where she has a place prepared by God, that they should feed her there one thousand two hundred and sixty days. And war broke out in heaven: Michael and his angels fought with the dragon; and the dragon and his angels fought, but they did not prevail, nor was a place found for them in heaven any longer. So the great dragon was cast out, that serpent of old, called the Devil and Satan, who deceives the whole world; he was cast to the earth, and his angels were cast out with him (Revelation 12:1-9).

From a preterist point of view, this speaks of Israel, the Christ child, and the Church. Israel, the Old Covenant church, gives birth to the Christ child. But as soon as this happens, Satan, symbolized by the dragon, leads a war against Christ attempting to kill him through the Roman Empire’s military rulers. The first instance of this was the attempted murder of the Christ child by King Herod the Great.

Then Herod, when he saw that he was deceived by the wise men, was exceedingly angry; and he sent forth and put to death all the male children who were in Bethlehem and in all its districts, from two years old and under, according to the time which he had determined from the wise men … Now when Herod was dead, behold, an angel of the Lord appeared in a dream to Joseph in Egypt, saying, “Arise, take the young Child and His mother, and go to the land of Israel, for those who sought the young Child’s life are dead.” Then he arose, took the young Child and His mother, and came into the land of Israel. But when he heard that Archelaus was reigning over Judea instead of his father Herod, he was afraid to go there. And being warned by God in a dream, he turned aside into the region of Galilee. And he came and dwelt in a city called Nazareth, that it might be fulfilled which was spoken by the prophets, “He shall be called a Nazarene” (Matthew 2:16-23).

After this occurs, Christ is finally crucified under the Roman procurator Pontius Pilate. He is resurrected from the dead, however, and is caught up to God’s throne. There He now rules the nations with a rod of iron. In the meantime, Satan is enraged with “the seed of the woman,” the church, and persecutes her through the Emperor Nero.

Now when the dragon saw that he had been cast to the earth, he persecuted the woman who gave birth to the male Child. But the woman was given two wings of a great eagle, that she might fly into the wilderness to her place, where she is nourished for a time and times and half a time, from the presence of the serpent. So the serpent spewed water out of his mouth like a flood after the woman, that he might cause her to be carried away by the flood. But the earth helped the woman, and the earth opened its mouth and swallowed up the flood which the dragon had spewed out of his mouth. And the dragon was enraged with the woman, and he went to make war with the rest of her offspring, who keep the commandments of God and have the testimony of Jesus Christ (Revelation 12: 13-17).

In Revelation 13 and 17, the “beast from the sea” and his number, “six hundred sixty-six,” is a symbol and cryptogram for Caesar Nero. This “Beast” has his power and authority to persecute the church from the dragon, the devil. The judgments on the “land” of the Jewish people are recounted in Revelation 18 and 19 leading up to the demolition of the Temple.

I cannot delve into a full-blown exposition of a difficult and controversial text here. I recommend if you want to know more about the preterist view that you check out the DVD, The Beast of Revelation: Identified, or one of Ken Gentry’s or David Chilton’s excellent books on the subject. It’s an interpretation that has had a minority following in church history, but is gaining ground among academics who see the frequent error of end-times hysteria in our culture.

Anne Rice, the recently converted Vampire horror fiction writer and author of a novel series, Christ the Lord, points out two important facts on preterism. A correct understanding of the biblical significance of the destruction of the Temple in 70 AD not only vanquishes crippling dispensationalism, but it also refutes the modernist conjecture that the New Testament was written late by non-eyewitnesses to Jesus.

When Jewish and Christian scholars begin to take this war seriously, when they begin to really study what happened during the terrible years of the siege of Jerusalem, the destruction of the Temple, and the revolts that continued in Palestine right up through Bar Kokhba, when they focus upon the persecution of Christians in Palestine by Jews; upon the civil war in Rome in the ‘60s which Kenneth L. Gentry so well describes in his work Before Jerusalem Fell; as well as the persecution of Jews in the Diaspora during this period – in sum, when all of this dark era is brought into the light of examination – Bible studies will change. Right now, scholars neglect or ignore the realities of this period. To some it seems a two-thousand-year-old embarrassment and I’m not sure I understand why. But I am convinced that the key to understanding the Gospels is that they were written before all this ever happened.

I understand the Star Trek XI movie as a prophetic landmark for the church pointing us toward a correct understanding of not just the book of Revelation, but of the entire New Testament. Let's look at how perfectly the Star Trek mythology dovetails with the following biblical truths.

As any Trekkie can tell you, Spock’s sacrificial death and resurrection in Star Trek II and III cast him as the perfect Christ figure. Not only does he save the crew of the Enterprise, but he also saves the entire Federation of Planets from a doomsday machine called “Genesis.” The project is intended to create new inhabitable worlds in a few days or weeks out of barren planets. However, Dr. Leonard “Bones” McCoy sees it for what it really is.

[In the film, Star Trek II, Kirk, Spock and Bones have just viewed a proposal video for the Genesis Project]

MCCOY: Dear Lord, do you think we're intelligent enough to … suppose … what if this thing were used where life already exists?

SPOCK: It would destroy such life in favor of its new matrix.

MCCOY: Its new matrix? Do you have any idea what you're saying?

SPOCK: I was not attempting to evaluate its moral implications, Doctor. As a matter of cosmic history, it has always been easier to destroy than to create.

MCCOY: [Sarcastically] Not anymore. Now we can do both at the same time! According to myth, the earth was created in six days. Now watch out! Here comes Genesis. We'll do it for you in six minutes!

In Star Trek II, subtitled The Wrath of Khan, a genetically engineered super-villain named Khan captures Genesis and intends on using it to conquer the galaxy. The parallels between the biblical Genesis story here are all too obvious. Man, in his pride, succumbs to the desire to be like God by creating worlds. Then his adversary, the devil or Khan, manipulates man’s error in an attempt to rule the galaxy.

Ironically, Spock not only defeats “Genesis” by giving his life for the Enterprise, thus enabling the crew to destroy Khan, but later a newly created Genesis planet becomes the resting place of Spock’s body. Unknown to the crew of the Enterprise, Spock cannot remain dead on a planet that creates life out of non-life. In Star Trek III: The Search for Spock, McCoy discovers that upon Spock’s death he has received Spock’s soul which was imparted to him upon his death through a mind meld – a Vulcan ritual of laying on of hands and transferring thoughts and emotions. Spock’s DNA is reassimilated on the Genesis planet well into this third installment and he is resurrected and reunited with the crew. The Christian allegory here is obvious.



Fast forward to Star Trek XI, a movie that is all the more satisfying because the background mythology of the series alluded to elsewhere is spelled out clearly. While the story line is comprehensible to the newbie, Star Trek fans will see references to the mythology of the series in every scene, which makes it enjoyable on a deeper level.

Spock has been working as an ambassador toward universal peace among the planets for many decades. He attempts unification between his home world, Vulcan, and their ancestral enemies the offshoot race of the Romulans. Many years after this (Vulcans live much longer than humans you must know, it’s part of the mythology) it is discovered that a giant supernova threatens to destroy a large part of the inhabitable galaxy. Equipped with a substance called “red matter,” Spock attempts to cause the supernova to collapse on itself transforming the stellar phenomenon into a black hole. In the process the Romulan home world is destroyed.

A Romulan miner named “Nero” escapes death because he captains a vast starship apparently outfitted to drill, pulverize and process planetary matter and asteroids. He travels back into the past through this black hole. Nero resolves to eliminate the Federation by killing its greatest starship captain, James T. Kirk, before he could take command of the Enterprise. Kirk's best friend, Spock, tries to undo the damage caused by Nero by following him through time. Arriving 25 years later than Nero due to the time distortion, Nero is waiting for Spock. Rather than killing Spock, he imprisons him on an ice planet close to Vulcan. Spock is forced to watch the death of his own home world in this alternate universe. (Star Trek is no stranger to the time paradox theme as introduced in what is arguably the best episode, “City on the Edge of Forever.”) Nero then plans to use “red matter” to destroy the worlds that make up the Federation over 100 years prior to his own planet's destruction in order to alter the future.

Star Trek XI’s theme becomes the “Wrath of Nero.” Or as the King James version of the Bible has it:

And the dragon was wroth with the woman, and went to make war with the remnant of her seed, which keep the commandments of God, and have the testimony of Jesus Christ (Revelation 12:17).

This war between the dragon and the woman becomes the mythic theme of Star Trek XI. In the plot of the film, there are several striking parallels. First, the elder Spock watches his mother killed and then he is forced to contend with the war of Nero against the Federation, the prime targets being the younger versions of Spock and Kirk.

It is important to understand here that the “woman” of Revelation 12 is not singularly Mary the Mother of God, but Israel and later “New Covenant Israel” or the church. In Revelation chapter 13, a new character is introduced, “a beast arose up out of the sea.” This is the Roman Caesar Nero who actually did kill the “seed of the woman,” the founders of the Christian church, in large numbers. The Roman historian Tacitus, writing in about 116 AD, records that Nero sought to use the Christians as the scapegoat for a great fire that consumed much of Rome on the night of July 18th, 64 AD:

But all human efforts, all the lavish gifts of the emperor, and the propitiations of the gods, did not banish the sinister belief that the conflagration was the result of an order. Consequently, to get rid of the report, Nero fastened the guilt and inflicted the most exquisite tortures on a class hated for their abominations, called Christians by the populace. Christus, from whom the name had its origin, suffered the extreme penalty during the reign of Tiberius at the hands of one of our procurators, Pontius Pilatus, and a most mischievous superstition, thus checked for the moment, again broke out not only in Judaea, the first source of the evil, but even in Rome, where all things hideous and shameful from every part of the world find their centre and become popular. Accordingly, an arrest was first made of all who pleaded guilty; then, upon their information, an immense multitude was convicted, not so much of the crime of firing the city, as of hatred against mankind. Mockery of every sort was added to their deaths. Covered with the skins of beasts, they were torn by dogs and perished, or were nailed to crosses, or were doomed to the flames and burnt, to serve as a nightly illumination, when daylight had expired. Nero offered his gardens for the spectacle, and was exhibiting a show in the circus, while he mingled with the people in the dress of a charioteer or stood aloft on a car. Hence, even for criminals who deserved extreme and exemplary punishment, there arose a feeling of compassion; for it was not, as it seemed, for the public good, but to glut one man's cruelty, that they were being destroyed (Annals 15.44).

Writing about 20 years earlier (c. 96 AD), the Roman bishop Clement records that Peter and Paul were among the list of martyrs of his “own generation.” Clement is thought by many to be an eyewitness to the martyrdoms of the Apostles and other Christians in the arena under Nero from 64 to 67 AD.

But not to dwell upon ancient examples, let us come to the most recent spiritual heroes. Let us take the noble examples furnished in our own generation. Through envy and jealousy, the greatest and most righteous pillars [of the Church] have been persecuted and put to death. Let us set before our eyes the illustrious apostles. Peter, through unrighteous envy, endured not one or two, but numerous labors and when he had at length suffered martyrdom, departed to the place of glory due to him. Owing to envy, Paul also obtained the reward of patient endurance, after being seven times thrown into captivity, compelled to flee, and stoned. After preaching both in the east and west, he gained the illustrious reputation due to his faith, having taught righteousness to the whole world, and come to the extreme limit of the west, and suffered martyrdom under the prefects. Thus was he removed from the world, and went into the holy place, having proved himself a striking example of patience (1 Clement 5).

Star Trek’s villain Nero seeks first to punish Spock by destroying his home planet, but his family escapes except for his mother, an earth woman named Amanda. Spock is half Vulcan and half human and this too fits into the Christ myth that is developed throughout the Star Trek canon. Nero then seeks to kill “the remnant of the woman’s seed,” the young Spock and the crew of the Enterprise.

Likewise, Caesar Nero after proclaiming himself a god, was unable to countenance the existence of a growing Christian movement that placed a man from Palestine above his own authority. In his great wrath, Nero destroys the Apostles, but cannot destroy the church after three-and-a half years of bloody persecution. The Beast is said to “make war with the saints and to overcome them” (Rev. 13:7). He is said to conduct such blasphemous warfare for a specific period of time: 42 months (Rev. 13:5).

As a consequence, Nero commits suicide stabbing himself in the neck with his own sword. The Beast not only slays by the sword, but ultimately is to die of a sword wound. “He that leads into captivity shall go into captivity: he that kills with the sword must be killed with the sword. Here is the patience and the faith of the saints” (Rev.13:10). Finally, we see the Beast “cast into a lake of fire” at the end of John’s prophecy (Revelation 20:10). Star Trek’s Nero meets a similar end as he too dies in a conflagration.

As in any allegory, the weakness is found when we begin to stretch it too far. Obviously the time travel element and having two Spocks complicates “the seed of the woman” analogy a bit – or perhaps makes it more interesting. However, I have made it my purpose here to note the biblical parallels between Star Trek XI and the biblical story of the woman, the child, the dragon and the beast and to point out how the history of Nero can be understood to support the preterist interpretation of biblical prophecy.

Why I am not an atheist

Evangelist Ray Comfort recently sensationalized the atheist blogosphere by saying he'd pay $20,000 to the Richard Dawkins Foundation for the opportunity to debate Dawkins.

Comfort's proposition is that atheists base their skepticism on their supposed intelligence, but in reality they are some of the most thoughtless people in the world. If you believe there is no God, then you believe, without any scientific proof, that the universe could have come into existence from nothing.

I've explained the impossibility of this from the pure standpoint of physical science in another blog post.

http://www.forerunner.com/blog/2008/09/why-does-universe-exist-answer-to.html

Even better is Chuck Missler's succinct explanation from his book, The Creator Beyond Time and Space:

The creationist's model begins with an infinitely intelligent, omnipotent, transcendent Creator who used intelligent design, expertise or know-how to create everything from the sub-atomic particles to giant redwood trees. Was it a miracle? Absolutely!

"In the beginning (time), God created the heavens (space) and the earth (matter)" (Genesis 1:1).

The atheist's model begins with an even more impressive miracle - the appearance of all matter in the universe from nothing, by no one, and for no reason. A supernatural event. A miracle! However, the atheist does not believe in the outside or transcendent "First Cause" we call God. Therefore, the atheist has no "natural explanation" nor "supernatural explanation" for the origin of space-time and matter. Consequently, the atheistic scenario on the origin of the universe leaves us hanging in a totally dissatisfying position. He begins his model with a supernatural event. This supernatural event, however, is accomplished without a supernatural agent to perform it.

In short, I cannot be an atheist because to believe in the spontaneous appearance of the entire universe out of nothing makes no sense.

As a thinking person, I have to be some type of theist. I'll reserve for another post why only Christianity among the world's theistic religions has to be correct.

Here I want simply to point out that much of the postmodern atheist strategy is simple posturing. Dawkins routinely refuses to debate Christians because he wants to put forth the idea that debating theism would give it credibility. He simply wants to ridicule faith and portray any belief in the supernatural as impossible to reconcile with his superior intelligence. I saw an interview with Dawkins and the so-called "Rational Responders" in which they admitted that their entire strategy was riducule and abuse Christians, not giving theism the dignity of a public hearing. It's much easier to do guerilla tactics, hit-and-run, ridicule -- and other forms of diversion -- and never face the fact that everything that exists had to have an antecedent. The atheist never faces this existential paradox -- that something in the natural world can never come from nothing. The only answer to the existential paradox is a supernatural one.

At the very least, the atheist should admit that his belief in no God is as much a supernatural faith as is Christianity in that no known natural laws can account for an ex nihilo creation of the universe.

I have no doubt Dawkins is intelligent. However, Christians ought to view him as a useful idiot. His books and atheist activism are a good opportunity to expose the soft underbelly of post-modernism -- the retreat into pure emotion and subjectivity -- that is the entire undergirding for today's atheism. In fact, this atheist's refusal to engage in formal debate is the proof of this retreat from rationalism.

ABC News Poll: 92 Million Evangelical Christians in America

I was looking for some statistics on the number of self-professed evangelicals in America and I found this poll from June of last year:

http://abcnews.go.com/sections/us/DailyNews/beliefnet_poll_010718.html

According to the poll, 83 percent of Americans describe themselves as Christian.

Of this number, 37 percent of all Christians describe themselves as born-again or evangelical; that includes nearly half of all Protestants (47 percent), as well as a small share (14 percent) of Catholics.

So assuming the current census numbers of just over 301 million, there are 250 million "Christians" in the United States and 92 million evangelicals.

Evangelicals are by definition people who believe in the bodily resurrection of Jesus Christ; the inerrancy of scripture; and that salvation comes through faith in Christ alone.

If we include conservative Roman Catholics who don't describe themselves as "evangelical," but who nevertheless share our values, the number swells even larger -- perhaps more than 100 million or one-third of all Americans.

Consider that this voting block goes for the Republican presidential candidate by 70 to 80 percent in every election. Then consider that no presidential candidate has ever won with more than 70 million votes.

What we have is a sleeping giant among evangelical non-voters.

If conservative Christians want to capture the majority of the executive, congressional and judicial offices at the national level and in most states in the next four to six years, a simple strategy can be employed.

1. Promote the truth that voting is not only a privilege it is a duty.

Jesus taught: "Render unto Caesar that which is Caesar's, and unto God that which is God's." For too long, many Christians have taken this to mean that we are exempt from political involvement. "We belong to God and therefore our vote does not need to be rendered unto Caesar." Whether this is thought consciously or unconsciously, this is the attitude and the behavior. However, in a representative democracy, "Caesar" is "We the People." This means that we have the God mandated responsibility to represent ourselves by casting our vote. We cannot simply opt out of the process and say that we are exempt from rendering to Caesar since we belong to God. Evangelical Christians as a potential majority voting bloc are Caesar. In our democratic republic, Caesar -- "We the People" -- belongs to God!

2. Hold two national caucuses made up of prominent evangelical leaders every two years to endorse candidates.

The Conservative Christian Caucus could be called prior to the primaries in each election year to examine Democratic, Republican and Independent candidates according to a three pronged test.

* Pro-life and pro-family issues

* Domestic spending and tax reform

* Lessening size of the federal government and regulation

All candidates would be invited to give a short speech on their policy positions. Then each delegate would give each candidate a "yea or nay" on each area and votes would be tabulated with each candidate receiving a rating.

In each presidential primary cycle the evangelical vote is usually split between several candidates and what invariably happens is that the plurality ends up going to a moderate Republican who then disappoints conservative evangelicals by caving in on one or more of the three areas of our concern.

After the third or fourth primary, the Caucus would reconvene in order to unite behind a single candidate. The same process would be used as before, with the "winner" of the caucus publicized. In this way, evangelical voters would not be hoodwinked into thinking that they must support the "front runner" in order to win the presidency in the fall. The tail will no longer wag the dog. The front runner would become the candidate we unite behind.

In every two year congressional election, these caucuses might occur on the state and district level as well to evaluate conservative candidates.

A national caucus would be also be held during the mid-term election cycle in order to evaluate the performance of the sitting president and to evaluate some important senatorial and congressional races.

Waking The Sleeping Giant

Let's face it. Gulliver has been held captive by the Lilliputians for too long. We have been told we can't organize or risk losing our 501(c)3 status. But a majority of conservatives in power (not just "Republicans in name only") would have the power to abolish the IRS with one stroke of the pen. We could revert to a "fair tax" -- a national sales tax -- that would make losing 501(c)3 status moot.

(And for those church and ministry leaders who fear the losing the motivating factor of having tax exempt donations on donors 1040 "Schedule A" forms, please realize that donations would still be tax exempt under a "fair tax" in that we would not pay any income tax or sales tax on these donations!)

We therefore need to complete steps one and two and then revert to step one in an effort to motivate all evangelical voters to participate in the primaries and the general election. It is not even necessary at this point to educate evangelicals how to vote, but to get them to vote. This huge voting bloc is going to generally fall along an 80/20 ratio and has the ability to tilt any election if enough vote. A few strategies can be employed.

1. Encourage pastors and priests to give short election day sermons in which the Christian duty to vote is expounded upon.

2. Distribute absentee ballots to church members with simple easy to explain instructions on how to use them. Absentee ballots are far more effective than "voter guide" because it requires the individual to examine his or her choices prior to election day. Absentee ballots might be coupled with voter guides, but might be better received than voter guides among pastors and church elders who are squeamish about having a "Christian Coalition Voter Guide" available among the church's "Gospel" literature.

3. Conduct frequent voter registrations in churches prior to the primaries, after Easter Day service and prior to the general elections.

These two strategies of uniting behind a single candidate through local, state and national caucuses and mobilizing the "sleeping giant" can have a huge effect in restoring some moral sanity to the politics and culture of our nation.

A Muslim Turk converts to faith in Jesus Christ

In this series, Yuce Kabakci tells of his conversion to faith in Jesus Christ as well as his vision for planting churches and ministries in Turkey. He explains that even in a "secular" Muslim country, such as Turkey, there is a cost for discipleship.

I'll be posting some more information on Yuce and his vision in the next few days.

Is Barack Obama a Christian? (part 1)

Matt Barber, director of cultural affairs with Liberty Counsel, believes many Americans will be shocked to find out just how radical some of Obama's positions are on social issues.

"I certainly cannot judge whether or not Barack Obama has a relationship with Christ. That's between him and God, and only they know that. However, scripture tells us that you will be known by your fruits, and here Barack Obama is promoting counter-biblical, anti-Christian policies. [These are] policies that elevate deviant sexual behaviors and dangerous sexual behaviors that are destructive spiritually, physically and emotionally, and certainly -- when embraced as Barack Obama has embraced them -- are destructive societally. For all the talk of hope, change and coming together, it's becoming abundantly clear that Barack Obama's administration will be the most leftist, divisive, and discriminatory in recent memory.

Barber is essentially correct, but the whole idea of "having a relationship with Jesus" clouds the issue. Of course, Obama has a relationship with Jesus. We all do. Even enemies of Christ have a "relationship" with Jesus -- that of an enemy!

A good question to ask here is whether it says anywhere in scripture that we are to judge someone's salvation, and whether it's on the basis of their "relationship with Jesus."

We substituted "personal relationship" in the 1960s for theological words such as regeneration, justification and sanctification -- none of which comes without the others in salvation.

We can't know if someone is regenerate or justified, but we can measure the attainment of sanctification by whether basic doctrines and biblical commandments are being kept.

Does Obama think the whole Bible is the inspired inerrant Word of God?

He admits he has doubts about this.

Does he believe abortion is child murder?

No, he does not. To say that is above his pay grade.

That is how we should phrase the argument. Let's forget about subjective, post-modernist terms like "a personal relationship with Jesus."

- Jay

Some Inventions Of Man That Have Become Essential Parts Of the Modern Gospel

The Term and Concept of "Personal Savior." I find it very disturbing when something unnecessary is added to the Gospel. The use of the term "Personal Savior" isn't very harmful in itself, but it shows a kind of mind-set that is willing to "invent" terms, and then allow these terms to be preached as if they were actually found in the Bible.

But why must we do this? Why must we add needless, almost meaningless things to the Gospel? It is because we've taken so much out that we have to replace it with "spiritual double talk."

That's right, double talk! Would you ever introduce your sister like this: "This is Sheila, my personal sister"?! Or would you point to your navel and say, "This is my personal bellybutton"? Ridiculous! But nevertheless, people solemnly speak of Christ as their personal Savior, as if they've got Him right there in their shirt pocket - and as if when He returns, He will not have two, but three titles written across His thigh: King of kings, Lord of lords, and PERSONAL SAVIOR! (See Rev. 19:16.) This is only one example of how a non-biblical term can be elevated to reverence by the Church, as if to say, "Well even if it isn't in the Bible - it should be!"

-- Keith Green, What's Wrong With the Gospel? Section 2: "The Added Parts"

An Imprecatory Prayer Proclamation: Barack Obama

As Barack Obama takes office, we are reprising an initiative we launched in 1994 with President Clinton. It is called an Imprecatory Prayer Proclamation. It was used extensively by the early church Fathers notably St. Augustine and later John Knox in the 16th century. Here you have it in file format and via email. Our goal is to get 300 signatures by January 20th. Just email us through the SGI website at www.s-g-i.org.

Best Regards and God Bless,

Jeffrey A. Ziegler, President: SGI

The SGI Presidential Prayer Proclamation 2009

1. Whereas: The providential history of mankind is covenantal in nature, comprised of Divine blessings for obedience to the Law-Word of God, and negative sanctions for transgression of the same, and under consideration of the historic precedent of public covenantal proclamations regarding the unlawful actions of civil magistrates established by John Knox in 16th century Scotland, the combined members and associates of SGI have during the month of January 2009, conducted concerted and public prayer for the President of the United States, Barack Obama, along covenantal lines, having the Davidic imprecatory Psalms as our form and pattern.
2. This proclamation serves as a synopsis of our activity.
3. Resolved: To the end that the President of the United States, Barack Obama, fulfills his duties as the covenantal head of this nation along Biblical lines; we as Christ's ambassadors pray and proclaim blessing. That is, if the President executes his duties in a fashion that would not be tyranny to good works and would uphold the abiding validity of God's moral law as delineated in the Ten Commandments along with the justice-mercy ethic derived from the New Testament, we do declare that blessing, honor, and good success would be upon him, his associates and policies.
4. Resolved: In that the President of the United States Barack Obama has thus far sought the codification of behavior condemned in the infallible Law-Word of God, specifically homosexual "marriage" and tax-funded state-sanctioned murder in the form of abortion, we as Christ's ambassadors proclaim negative sanctions. That is: if the President continues to hold in disdain the Law-Word of God by ratifying evil and by such ratification holds our lives as citizens of the republic in bondage to the same idolatry, we as Christ's ambassadors do pray that Barack Obama would now repent and cease from his cruel persecution of innocent pre-born babies and his tyrannical oppression of God's people who would not be part of his pro-homosexual agenda. If the President ceases not from his malicious cruelty, we then earnestly pray that his days in office would be few and another man take his office, and that the name of Barack Obama would remain a reproach to all succeeding generations of Americans.

Join SGI in The Presidential Prayer Proclamation! Write to us by sending an email through our website www.s-g-i.org. When sufficient signatures are received (300) a framed copy of the proclamation will be sent to President Obama!

SGI
PO Box 787
Madison Ohio 44057

www.s-g-i.org

What is "AdSense for Content Host"?

Here's something for web publishers in the YouTube/Adsense partnership program. It belongs in the Johnny Carson, "I DID not KNOW that!" category and is a follow-up to my earlier article: "Can You Make Good Money in the YouTube/Adsense Partnership program?"

I was vaguely aware when I signed up for the YouTube/Adsense partnership program that not only would I make money on clickable ads placed on my YouTube video logs, but when others would embed my "video units" on their site there would also be a three way revenue sharing. But I had forgotten I would make money this way until I started seeing money show up in this strange category on my Adsense page called: "AdSense for Content Host."

I am seeing a considerable spike in my Adsense income since I started the YouTube/Adsense partnership program. Although this started out slowly, August's income in this category more than tripled from the previous months' averages and it has stayed consistent since then. From my understanding of the program, YouTube partners are paid by impressions and not just clicks on ads shown on YouTube pages. But Google is very secretive and publishes no statistics on the YouTube partner ads, so I am not 100 percent sure how this works.

But hold the phone!

Last month, my "AdSense for Content Host" category started spiking and this month it is spiking even more. I had to Google what the term, "AdSense for Content Host," actually meant and I found a plethora of people who were puzzled by this sudden spike in their earnings as well.

This income comes from my YouTube videos that are embedded on other people's websites. Here is how YouTube explains it:

In AdSense Reports Overview, 'YouTube' refers to revenue earned on your channel at www.youtube.com.

'AdSense for Content Host' refers to revenue earned from embedded videos ads and AdSense for Video Ads. AdSense for Video ads can run both on your videos on YouTube.com, and on your videos on an AdSense publisher's website. These ads consist of text overlay ads contextually targeted to a combination of signals in your videos and on the site.

In other words, I am making money from ads on my YouTube pages, which is a separate category, but I am also making money from "video units" -- that is, my YouTube videos shown on other websites.

In fact, if the trend I am seeing this month continues, the income from YouTube may top my regular Adsense income from ads on my website.

A friend of mine who does web development for a living first implored me to try AdSense in 2006. Around the same time, he suggested that I use YouTube to stream my videos. This was a few months before YouTube's jump in popularity. I had complained that I had more video I wanted to show than I had server space. I was kind of shocked that YouTube allowed me to stream video for free. I got into it not even thinking there could ever be a profit in it on my end.

I have to learn to take such suggestions more seriously, no matter how esoteric and impractical they may sound to me at first. It's the curse of being a genius: No one understands you at first, but people who do may end up cashing in on your brilliance.

How to end voter fraud forever

Every time I hear about voter fraud and election irregularities, I realize that the problem could easily be solved by doing away with the secret ballot. If we could simply match every voter identification card with each ballot and publish the results, every vote could be accounted for. Further, anyone could go on-line to see if their vote was counted.

I usually vote by absentee ballot and I always wonder whether my ballot was mysteriously lost in the mail or somehow didn't get counted. It would be great if I could simply go on-line and see that I voted.

We publish the names of registered voters and which political party they registered under, so I have always wondered why the ballot must be secret by law. The majority of Republicans vote Republican; Democrats vote for Democrats; and so on. Therefore, given a person's political party, age, sex, income, profession, and religious beliefs, pollsters can determine who you will vote for within a 90 percent degree of accuracy. If all of this is published, why then do we have a "secret" ballot?

Now some will point to intimidation, discrimination and a hundred other reasons why their vote needs to be private. We can accomplish the same thing, however, without disclosing a voter's identity publicly.

The answer is simple: encryption.

In the same way that people feel safe to let retailers use computers to scan their credit cards, every voter identification card could be assigned a PIN and then voters could use their number on the internet to see how they voted and thereby police the polling officials. No one could see how you voted until the PIN was entered into the system. That way the ballot would remain "secret," but people could see that their vote was counted.

Of course, if we do that, some will falsely claim they voted for another candidate or will discover they made a mistake, but once scanned, ballots must remain irretrievably fixed. There can be no "do-overs." Even though there will always be some who will abuse the PIN system to "cry wolf," we would still be able to see which polling places exhibit the greatest irregularities. Since voter fraud is a federal felony, this tracking system with encryption would effectively end voter fraud and help to fix irregularities due to human error.

Clearing the Media Smokescreens: Sarah Palin didn't know Africa was a continent?

There was a story reported to Fox News yesterday that had an anonymous McCain aide complaining about Sarah Palin resisting their input in prepping her for interviews. The story says that Palin didn't even know Africa was a continent and not a country.

I am sorry if I don't swallow the bait, but something smells fishy about the story.

First, it's from an anonymous source leaked to the press. It may be a distortion or sour grapes. At most I imagine the following scenario: in a mock interview she may have mistakenly referred to Africa as a country. Of course, we all make mistakes and missteps in our speech when we are tired.

Second, it plays into the line that Plain didn't have enough foreign policy experience to be president. It is true that in just two years as a governor, she doesn't have much experience, but I don't believe that she didn't know Africa was a continent.

Third, it plays into the misperception that Palin is dumb, in the same way that Dan Quayle was painted as a lightweight because he supposedly didn't know how to spell "potatoe" when he dutifully read a spelling bee flash card at an elementary school that had the word misspelled. (Note that none of the press attacked the "stoopid publik skool teecher" responsible for the gaffe.)

The Africa bungle is obviously fabricated, but because it was told on a conservative news network it is being taken as an established fact. It will be drivel for the left to gleefully spew for years to come: "Palin thought Africa was a country! Can you believe how dumb that is!"

What bothers me most about the story is it is hearsay from an anonymous aide leaked to a reporter. If this has any credibility then it behooves the alleged witness to make himself known. But amateurish second and third-hand reporting with an agenda doesn't bother the press. In fact, there is little distinction now between what used to be worthy news outlets and the frothing-at-the-mouth screeds of liberals blogging from their mothers' basements. Just watch MSNBC on any given night if you want an example.

Back when our pro-life activist group in Melbourne, Florida was often in the news, I discovered how often the press distorted news, got the facts wrong, and repeated unconfirmed fallacies. If you are a news maker, you become extremely suspicious of the press after you see the low standards of local reporters for confirming the facts. These stories get passed on verbatim in other news articles.

It's also obvious that the liberal press is going to continue to work hard to smear Palin amid any speculation that she might seek the presidency in 2012. It's interesting that they are keeping up the campaign. They must instinctively fear something. However, in all the lies and distortions we can see that they are fearful of a pro-life Christian who could become a powerful force in conservative politics. Therefore, her opponents simply dismiss each of her strengths by floating a contradiction.

Her ability to connect and communicate with the average voter electrifying huge crowds wherever she speaks is met with the falsehood that she is dumb and inarticulate.

Her knowledge of the oil industry and campaign for energy independence is met with the glib accusation that she knows little about economic or foreign policy.

The plain fact that she is a self-made woman from working class roots plays into the contradiction that she is a "diva with a $150,000 wardrobe."

Her charming and gracious personality is countered with the charge that she is mean-spirited and vindictive. Most were misled to think she was convicted of a crime in "troopergate" when in fact the first opinion saying she "abused power" was just that of one independent investigator. When the board that had the legal authority to decide made a ruling, she was cleared of any wrongdoing.

I could go on. The point is that whatever poison that liberals spew at Palin, you can be sure that they are reaching and the opposite is true.

None of the facts surrounding these mini-bites of misinformation matter much to liberal bloggers and political pundits searching for fodder. They are just convenient barbs that the public may be led to believe if the lie is repeated enough times. You can be sure that the "Africa bungle" is just one of many fabricated falsehoods about Sarah Palin.

Polls prove to be inaccurate

It looks like the margin between Obama and McCain is about five points. That's a lot closer than a lot of pollsters had it. In fact, I see only two polls that had it as a five point race yesterday, Diageo/Hotline and Battleground. Check RealClearPolitics for the final polling.

If McCain had won, I was going to decry the way that the media uses false poll information to influence public opinion. Since Obama won, it is a moot point. It probably sounds like sour grapes to say that several polls that had him 9 to 11 points ahead (and they have the audacity to claim they have a 3 point margin of error).

It's impossible to know how much the polls influence people's decisions, but the fact that McCain was within five percent is much different than the scenario the media painted

The Catch-22 of this election is that even if McCain had won, he'd have an impossible economic situation. He'd have to cut spending and taxes and then the Dem majority in congress would be crying bloody murder for two years. Also, having a moderate Republican just postpones true reform. If you look at mid-term elections usually the president's party suffers loss of seats. If McCain was president 2010 would have given the Democrats a super-majority in the Senate and more seats in the House. So much for a conservative Supreme Court with 60 plus seat Senate for the Democrats.

Barack Obama's Catch 22 is that he has promised to balance the budget, cut taxes on 95 percent of wage earners, introduce universal healthcare and a trillion dollar package of social programs. Most would agree that this is a tall order. If he fails, will it be possible to blame the Republicans?

If the Democrats go too far to the left and the economy continues to scuffle along, we'll likely see something similar to to 1994 and the Gingrich revolution against Clinton. I don't think the USA will become a left wing country so quickly. But we will see.

There were going to be positives and negatives about either outcome for the Republicans, so I am not depressed today. The failure of Bush's big government spending policies opens a door for a mini-revolution within the Republican party in the next two years. Candidates who never would have had a chance can now emerge.

I was never a big McCain fan. He actually impressed me as I got to hear him more. I thought he would have been better on spending than Bush who I did not vote for (I voted for Howard Phillips and Mike Peroutka three times) and of course I was excited about Sarah Palin. I was thinking down the road what could happen with her if something happened to McCain.

It's amazing that Palin is so similar to me -- about the same age, baptized as a Catholic, converted to Christ in an Assemblies of God Church, now a member fo an independent evangelical church and with a Christian spolitical philosophy and worldview. I've never heard a candidate speak so clearly about what matters. It's amazing that someone like this would have been picked.

If McCain won, I had an article ready, "The Swiftboating of Sarah Palin." The idea from the Republicans and goes back to Lee Atwater's strategy against Mike Dukakis.

Since Dukakis was a fiscal conservative, they attacked him as "a card carrying member of the ACLU and a tax and spend liberal." It wasn't true, but it worked.

Then John Kerry was a war hero and also somewhat fiscally conservative, so they destroyed him with the Swiftboat ads trying to show that he was a traitor -- not true, but many were willing to believe it.

The Democrats caught on to this because they saw that Sarah Palin was a bright, fresh, articulate rising star who was energizing the Republican base with her ability to speak directly to people like me. The media cynics were able to somehow portray her as inarticulate, dumb and anything else they could concoct. If McCain won though there was a real danger that she would have quickly become a Dan Quayle with the left waging a propaganda war to prove to the world that she is a stupid bimbo. Now at least she has a chance to show what she can do in Alaska with energy and fiscal responsibility.The irony is that if she remained the Governor of Alaska, the media would have continued to refer to her as "America's most popular and successful new governor."

As a vice presidential candidate Palin's negatives rose, but she remained hugely popular with the conservative base. I was at one rally with 70,000 people in The Villages, Florida. That's unheard of for a VP candidate. It will be interesting to see where she will go from here.

McCain's hope rests in five states

McCain must win Florida, Ohio, Virginia, and Nevada -- plus at least one other state -- either Pennsylvania, Hew Hampshire, New Mexico or Colorado to pull this out. Commentators call this an inside straight, but the odds aren't as unlikely as they paint them. But an early and decisive win in Pennsylvania by McCain may signal a historic upset.

Since the weekend polls show these races tightening, I have to conclude that the momentum for McCain will continue through Tuesday. The first three are not so tall an order and even though Obama is ahead withing the margin of error in the most recent polls, he is at or under 50 percent in all these critical states and that is the key.

Watch Obama's numbers in the in polls tomorrow, not the spread between the two candidates. With this many undecided who say they intend to vote so late in the game, Obama's numbers have probably peaked at where they are right now. If Obama falls to 48 or 49 it bodes well for McCain.

Then there the Nader/Barr wild card factor that could shift the election either way -- but probably favors McCain since Nader is more popular than Barr and will pull votes from Obama.

Obama peaks early in polls

Here's something interesting. As you read this blurb from PoliticalWire.com remember that this is from March 2, 2008:

Clinton Internal Polls Show Close Race

"Privately, Clinton campaign advisors say their own internal polls show the race tightening in Ohio and remaining very close in Texas," according to ABC News. "In their best case scenario, Clinton aides hope she could win Ohio by 3 to 6 points and squeak out a victory in Texas. They would consider that a good night and reason to fight on to Pennsylvania, which holds its primary on April 22. Other scenarios, they admit, are not so pretty."

Here were the final RCP poll averages:

Ohio
Clinton: 50.1
Obama: 43
Spread: Clinton +7.1

Texas
Clinton: 47.4
Obama: 45.7
Spread: Clinton +1.7

Here were the actual results:

Ohio
Clinton: 54.2
Obama: 44.1
Spread: Clinton +12.1

Texas
Clinton: 50.9
Obama: 47.4
Spread: Clinton +3.5

In Pennsylvania too the results for Clinton were higher than expected.

PA Polls
Clinton 49.5
Obama 43.4
Spread: Clinton +6.1

PA results
Clinton 54.6
Obama 45.4
Spread: Clinton +9.2

If you look at the polling data just a few days before, you'll see a surge by Obama and then a drop off. Is it likely that the polls could shift 3 or 4 points in key battleground states between November 3rd and 4th?

My prediction is that if the national polls average 4 points or less in Obama's favor the day before the election, McCain wins.

Will Catholic undecideds swing the election to McCain?

An Investor's Business Daily poll today had John McCain holding steady nationally at 43.6 percent and Barack Obama at 47.7 percent. That leaves a huge number of undecideds -- 8.7 percent.

The recent movement toward McCain has him leading over Obama among self-described Protestants (56% to 38%), Catholics (46% to 42%) and Other Christians (48% to 45%). The Catholic undecided vote is 12 percent -- a huge number this close to election day. The recent movement toward McCain is attributed mainly to undecideds from these groups who seem to be deciding almost wholly for McCain. In other words, the remaining undecideds among Christian groups are a lock for McCain, because Obama supporters have already decided. Since Catholics in Pennsylvania make up roughly one-third of the population, that is four percent that could be added to McCain's column. Protestants and Other Christians are at 6 and 7 percent undecided respectively.

In my opinion, these Christians are like me -- conservative pro-lifer voters who are not for Obama, but have lingering doubts about pulling the lever for McCain. I expect most of this undecided group -- up to 90 pecent -- to break for McCain. If the most recent Mason Dixon poll in Pennsylvania that has McCain trailing by 4 points is correct, then this amount would be enough to put him over the top and pull off a stunning upset next Tuesday.

If the same trend is true nationally -- with self-described Christians making up about 80 percent of the population -- then an 80 percent pull from this undecided 8.7 percent gives McCain at least an additional 7 percent.

What does that mean? Expect McCain to win every state where he is trailing by less than 6 percent in the most favorable polls.

McCain will likely win the red states of Florida, North Carolina, Ohio, Colorado, Nevada, Virginia, New Mexico, I think that Pennsylvania will seal the deal early and perhaps he'll even pick off Iowa, Minnesota, Wisconsin and New Hampshire.

McCain 3 points behind in the most accurate poll

I filled out my absentee ballot yesterday and will mail it a few hours from now. I voted McCain/Palin. I would have voted Constitution Party if I didn't think the election would be decided by just a few points -- if that much.

It's the first time since 1988 that I did not support the Constitution Party candidate, although I supported Frank Zilaitis, an independent running for U.S. Congress in my district. So you can put me in the column of millions of undecideds and independents who have suddenly shifted for McCain in the last week. I'll explain more about that shift the day after our stunning victory next Tuesday.

The 2004 Indepedent Business Daily/TIPP poll was by far the most accurate indicator of the presidential election, having accurately predicted the election to within three-tenths of a point.

Here is the most current IBD/TIPP polling data:

Date: 10/29/2008
McCain: 43.9%
Obama: 46.9%
Not Sure: 9.2%
Spread: Obama +3.0

What is remarkable about this poll is that it shows a 3 point swing from just eight days ago.

Date: 10/21/2008
McCain: 40.9%
Obama: 46.9%
Not sure: 12.1%
Obama +6.0

While a three point swing is within the margin of error for most polls, what is remarkable is that it shows Obama's support remaining constant while McCain has shifted all three points from the undecideds into his column. Nine percent of likely voters still remain undecided. That is unheard of this close to an election. In 2004, no poll showed more than four percent undecided with a full week to go.

In light of the huge number of undecideds, the race may easily end up one or two points in McCain's favor and moving upward. Here's why: The average of all polls in October have shown that Bob Barr (1.4 percent) and Ralph Nader (2.6 percent) have a consistent 4 points between them. This support seems constant although third party support is notoriously hard to gauge.

If we give a generous 4 points to the various independents, then that still leaves 5 points to be divided between Obama and McCain. It's likely that Obama has peaked at 47 percent of the vote. Those who will vote for Obama have already decided to do so. Those undecideds who will still change their mind will break toward McCain. Few McCain supporters will shift to Obama.

McCain will probaby finish a point or two above Obama according to this model, but if some Obama supporters switch to McCain at the last minute, it could be a shocker of an election and over faster than anyone imagined. I remember 1980 when I was a freshman at the very liberal UMASS/Amherst. Ronald Reagan had trailed Jimmy Carter by 6 points just the week before, but Reagan won me and millions of others over in his last debate. It was over before most Californians has a chance to vote.

Last week, I changed my support to John McCain and I believe millions more will follow that pattern. If I am right, then it is going to be a lot of fun watching liberal commentators announce blue states such as New Hampshire and Pennsylvania turning red early in the night. That could tilt the election and we could see McCain picking off some unexpected blue states in the west.

Polls are tightening in McCain's favor

I've been saying for over a month that most of the pollsters and media pundits are wrong -- that they are intentionally skewing the poll data to influence public opinion. Now with less than a week left before the election, Obama's lead in an average of all polls at RealClearPolitics.com is under six points. The most reliable polls (the ones that have been the best predictors in the past) all have McCain within 2 to 4 points of Obama.

The most bizarre development is that several of these polls have swung 5 points toward McCain in just four days. May I suggest that in order to save face, the media pollsters are now releasing more accurate data.

In the last week, both McCain and Obama have been campaiginig strong in states where the polls have a "lock" for Obama. Why is that? Internal Democratic and Republican Party polling data has McCain ahead in Ohio by two points and behind in Pennsylvania by only two points. Several other sources have said it will be a shocker if McCain does not win both states.

But assuming that the most accurate polls are correct, can McCain make up as much as 4 or 5 points nationally in less than a week?

Here is some recent history:

George W. Bush held a 5 point lead in the RealClearPolitics tracking poll over Al Gore with six days left in the 2000 race. Gore then won the popular vote by less than half a point.

Bush then led Democratic challenger John Kerry by one point in the polls in 2004 before winning re-election by 3.

If recent history is a guide, then a four point swing is not so unlikely. If we go all the way back to the Kennedy-Nixon race, what we see is that the Republican usually gains on the Democrat as election day draws closer. If McCain does win, it is going to be fun to watch MSNBC and CNN and hear the demonic ranting and raving.

The key indicator to watch is not McCain's numbers, but Obama's numbers. If Obama drops to 47 points in any number of polls, it is unlikely that he'll break that ceiling on election day. Then when we throw Nader and Barr into the mix, McCain can win with 49 percent of the vote. Obama's history has shown that he usually peaks early and then wins by less of a margin than what the last few polls show.

Obama and Infanticide: The issue that will not go away

By Jeffrey A. Ziegler
President: Statesmen Global Initiatives

In the 2008 election cycle, the issue of abortion is being systematically silenced in the cacophony of Presidential rhetorical ballyhoo. From communist populism in the Obama camp to neo-conservative nativistic urges in the McCain entourage, the cause of pre-born babies is but an inconvenient blip on the political radar. Only Sarah Palin has had the intestinal fortitude to not only stand for the babies but to actually speak on behalf of the children.

Obama is what he is. He even advocates the extermination of babies born alive. This horror is known and it is unequivocally clear. Those so-called "Christians" who vote for Obamanation and the codification of state sponsored slaughter of innocents, do so in willful commissionable sin against God. McCain at least will stand for justices and states who promote the life ethic. Yet very few politicos have the guts to speak affirmatively and act pro-actively to end this horrid blight upon our nation. Most of the would be politicians who say they are pro-life do so in very hushed tones, especially at the local level. They are afraid, even embarrassed at their more strident brethren who actually defend the defenseless. For these anemics their "pro-life" stand is akin to "standing in a garage and calling yourself a car."

Saying so doesn't make it so.

With only a few days left to the election, I was struck by a missive from Russia, which in brief, hailed Vladimir Putin for decrying abortion (Russia's national suicide) and its deleterious long term effects on his nation. How ironic that the ex-KGB operative signaled a "national copulation day" so as to bring more babies into the world. Now that would be an interesting policy don't you think? Do you think our politicos would ever sound the alarm in such fashion?

I'm enclosing a video to distribute wherever you can before the election. This production brings it all to a crystalline clear message.

YOU WILL NOT BE THE SAME AFTERWARDS.

VIDEO: http://durarealidad.com/

How McCain can still win and win big!

Looking at the polls alone, most media pundits have already decided to call the 2008 presidential election for Barack Obama. There is no need to let the voters decide when we have the fourth branch of government at MSNBC, CNN and The New York Times, right?

When all is said and done, voters in 2008 will come to see how much the media manipulates polling data to influence voters. The liberal elite disdains the critical thinking skills of the great "unwashed" American electorate. Therefore, they have taken the responsibility of telling us what to think and how we are going to vote. Never mind that just a few months ago John McCain was their darling "moderate Republican" and Sarah Palin "the most popular governor in America." According to experts, McCain's campaign is in disarray and Palin is a drag on the ticket. It's already too late for McCain. The polls show it. The talking heads have decreed it. The media has prewritten the script.

There is a problem with their duplicity. Polls are accurate on average within 3 to 4 points. If the polls on election day show that the pollsters were intentionally skewing the samples to break far outside the margin of error, the public will lose faith in polls. This tool to influence public opinion will be gone in the next election cycle. It is in the best interest of the pollsters to maintain accuracy. They realize though, that they need to be accurate only in the few days immediately preceding the election in order to maintain credibility.

This is also part of the prewritten script. It was foretold last week that the polls would tighten in the last few days. Several polls already show a statistical tie within the margin of error.

How did they know?

It is a loosely guarded secret that the political parties' private polling data shows a much closer race. We saw McCain campaigning in Iowa, a state that the pollsters have far out of his reach. A leak from the Obama camp a week ago had their Pennsylvania poll as a one point race. Here is problem for the liberal pundits. With a McCain win, the public's trust in polling must be thrown out the window.

There is yet another fact we hear little about. Obama needs to poll at 50 percent or higher in the last week in order to win. Here is why that may be a problem for him. In the primaries, Obama nearly always polled higher than the actual voting results. If the polls show Obama at 50 percent, then he is most likely now at 47 or 48 percent. The IBD/TIPP Tracking Poll -- the most accurate presidential poll in 2004 -- has Obama at 47 percent and McCain only 2.8 points behind at 44.2. If Obama is at that "iron ceiling" of 47 percent right now, it's unlikely that he will move beyond that in the next seven days.

McCain is probably trailing at the moment, but he is within 3 or 4 points of a plurality. He merely has to shave one or two points from Obama supporters who may still change their mind. Then it is likely that most the "undecideds" will break in McCain's favor. He will be the benefactor of most of the uncommitted vote. To have such a large block uncommitted this late in the story is unusual. So if Obama dips to 47 percent in the polls -- a statistical tie -- McCain could finish with an electoral college landslide.

The "x-factor" that Obama has to be concerned about is the three percent that according to almost all polling data will go toward Ralph Nader. These are points taken from Obama's column. The one percent that might go to Bob Barr will be taken mostly from McCain. It's possible that on November 5th, a statistical tie in the polls may yield the following results:

McCain .... 49 percent
Obama ..... 47 percent
Nader ........ 3 percent
Barr ........... 1 percent

That's a slim two point plurality, but it could be an electoral college landslide for McCain.

Saturday Night Live "Sarah Palin Rap"

one two three

my name is sarah palin you all know me
vice president nominee of the gop
gonna need your vote in the next election
can i get a ‘what what’ from the senior section
mccain got experience, mccain got style
but don’t let him freak you out when he tries to smile
cause that smile be creepy
but when i be vp
all the leaders in the world gonna finally meet me

how’s it go eskimo
(eskimos)
tell me what you know eskimo
(eskimos)
how you feel eskimo
(ice cold)
tell me tell me what you feel eskimo
(super cold)

i’m jeremiah wright cause tonight i’m the preacha
i got a bookish look and you’re all hot for teacha
todd lookin fine on his snow machine
so hot boy gonna need a go between
in wasilla we just chill baby chilla
but when i see oil lets drill baby drill

my country tis a thee
from my porch i can see
russia and such

all the mavericks in the house put your hands up
all the mavericks in the house put your hands up
all the plumbers in the house pull your pants up
all the plumbers in the house pull your pants up

when i say ‘obama’ you say ‘ayers’
obama (ayers) obama (ayers)
i built me a bridge - it ain’t goin’ nowhere.
(ohhh)

mccain, palin, gonna put the nail in the coffin
of the media elite
(she likes red meat)
shoot a mother-humpin moose, eight days of the week

[three gunshots]
now ya dead, now ya dead,
cause i’m an animal, and i’m bigger than you
holdin a shotgun walk in the pub
everybody party, we’re goin on a hunt
la la la la la la la la
[six gunshots]

yo i’m palin, i’m out!

Bottom line on the Sarah Palin "Troopergate" Report

The bottom line that no one in the liberal media will mention:

The Alaskan Legislative Council has no authority under law to sanction Palin for ethical misconduct. That's up to the state Personnel Board, which is running a parallel investigation that Palin is cooperating with.

The current collusion of socialist Democrats and the liberal media is an abomination. We live in an age in which candidates try to speak directly to the people, but two seconds later a thousand media pundits tell us what they said and what to believe. And they are obsessed with telling us what to believe 24/7.

The Troopergate Report is a good example of this. Here is an independent investigator hired by an Alaskan panel to INVESTIGATE. The report gives several facts -- and concludes with an OPINION based on a weird Clinton-esque interpretation of what words really mean. The investigator pronounces an opinion that Palin abused power not by her "actions" but by her "inactions."

Yet the media has pronounced her guilty of a crime comparable to the Nazi holocaust just on the basis of a non-binding OPINION of ONE investigator. Some of the Legislative Council have said they don't agree with the conclusion of report, but they released it because the facts contained in it are sound. The facts actually say that Palin committed no crime or ethical breach.

Yet what do the headlines read?

PALIN BROKE THE LAW -- PALIN FOUND GUILTY

False. Demonstrably false.

No legally binding judgment has occurred yet.

All of this is aimed at Palin because she is a conservative Christian -- no other reason. According to the liberal media, she's already lost the election for McCain. Yes, John McCain -- once the Democrats favorite Republican -- a moderate's moderate -- is now being portrayed as an extremist right wing hate-monger. If sanity prevails in the minds of most voters, McCain will win by a landslide. That's a big IF. But in the next three weeks McCain just needs to spell it out.

"I am a moderate with a conservative running mate. Obama/Biden are socialist liberals who are supported by terrorists."

That is true. Demonstrably true.

That being said, McCain never ceases to disappoint me. I am actually considering him and rooting for him, but aside from picking Palin, he's failing miserably. At this point, he is trying to out-socialize the socialists -- something that will bring long lasting judgment on our nation if he were allowed to put this into practice. If he can formulate an economic plan that makes sense, he'll beat Obama handily, because his opponent has nothing but air and contradictions. Obama can't keep all his promises and propose a plan to reform federal policies on the economy.

The Barack Obama - Fidel Castro Odinga axis

I've been getting emails on this all day. It should be the news story of the year if it is true.

Fidel Castro Odinga (left) is the eldest son of Kenyan Prime Minister Raila Amolo Odinga who claims to be a first cousin to Barack Hussein Obama. The late Barack Obama Sr. supposedly is the prime minister's maternal uncle. Although the exact realtionship has been disputed, Obama Sr. and Odinga are descended from the same Kenyan tribe. Prime Minister Odinga named his son "Fidel Castro" breaking with Kenyan tradition. He normally should have named him for the boy's grandfather, Jaramogi Oginga Odinga (the Kenyan "Fidel Castro"), a Marxist-Leninist revolutionary who led an unsuccessful coup to topple the government of Kenya on behalf of the Soviets in 1982. Also implicated in the coup attempt was his son Raila Odinga. It is not known whether Obama Sr., was involved in the coup.



Above: Obama campaigning for Odinga.

Barack Obama and Raila Odinga formed a political alliance in August 2006 when Senator Obama went to Kenya to campaign on his cousin's behalf in that country's presidential election. Raila lost the election when a secret pact was revealed with Kenya's Muslim Brotherhood to institute sharia law in all the country's courts in exchange for their support of his candidacy. Although not an observant Muslim, Odinga represents Moammar Kadhafi's oil interests in southern Africa.

Sharia law is essentially an interpretation of Islamic law in which the Muslim clerics guide the civil policy and courts of a Muslim nation. This is remarkable because Christianity (66 percent of the population), not Islam (10 percent), is the largest religion in Kenya. Furthermore, English common law, not the Koran, is the basis for Kenya's legal system.



Above: Post-election riots in Kenya instigated by Odinga. Jim Corsi claims he has proof that Obama knew about the memo from Odinga promoting the violence and still continued to support his cousin.

When Odinga lostthe presidential election, he instigated riots between tribes. Odinga's connection to Barack Obama was brought to light after Odinga's political rival offered him the prime minister's position as a consolation prize. Obama called and emailed Odinga from Delaware during the primary. At that time, Odinga signed a memo of understanding for calling for Sharia law in Kenya. After Odinga’s memo was released Obama kept supporting him.

Jim Corsi, author of the controversial book, Obama Nation, claims he has the emails from Obama’s senate office received in Kenya in which political strategy is discussed. Obama allegedly provided complete campaign strategies, finances and managers for Odinga. Corsi claims he has the emails and campaign memos showing that Obama knew about the memo from Odinga calling for tribal wars and race riots if they lost, and in fact supported it.

Corsi also claims the emails between Obama’s Senate office and Odinga show Obama advising Odinga on how to run his campaign so that Odinga could institute Sharia law in Kenya.

Corsi will be on Hannity and Colmes on Friday or Monday. He says he will show copies of the emails. If this is as explosive as it sounds, it may explain why Corsi was detained and deported from Kenya -- the present government no doubt wants to quell further riots and retaliations between tribes. There is no doubt that the Obama campaign can easily deny the content of the emails if they are falsified. If the emails originated from Obama's Senate office, then they are public record. They can further prove the emails did not originate from their campaign by cooperating with an investigation.

Stay tuned ...

Clearing the Media Smokescreens - Elections and Economics

I've written a few of articles in the past entitled, "Clearing the Media Smokescreens," which listed various myths propagated by the liberal media -- especially the abortion issue. In this one I want to focus on the presidential polls and the failure of government run mortgage lenders.

Propaganda is the art of influencing public opinion. Although the term has negative connotations, that is what media does. All media outlets are propagandists. Our job is to influence how you think and feel. The ones that claim to have "journalistic integrity" and to be "neutral" or "unbiased" are either lying to themselves or they are consciously deceiving the public. Without a doubt, the largest media outlets have an agenda to influence public opinion. Two of the biggest media smokescreens of recent times concern the current election coverage and the economic crisis.

Myth #1:-- Barack Obama has such a big lead that it is unlikely that John McCain can make up so much ground in only one month.

There are several things wrong with this statement. First, polls do not give us the answer as to who will win an election. Polls are only a snapshot in time. We see some polls this week with Obama up by as many as eight points nationally. We also hear from the pundits that the vice presidential debates did nothing to sway opinion toward McCain. The liberal media has done all but eulogize McCain's candidacy. Yet lo and behold, no less than four polls released today -- Hotline Tracking, Zogby, CBS News, and Democracy Corps -- had John McCain trailing by 2 or 3 points -- well within the fabled "margin of error."

Those who think John McCain cannot overcome a deficit in the last four weeks of the election campaign do not understand presidential elections. I spent a few hours studying the history of presidential polling from July to November going all the way back to 1960. A few things were immediately apparent.

The poll leader in a competitive election who "peaks early" more often than not loses the general election. The Democrat often begins with a big lead at the time of his convention, yet the Republican more often than not gains ground in the final weeks. Most likely this is due to the large number of "undecideds" and independents in rural areas who trend toward the GOP in the last few weeks.



Poll leads often criss-cross in the last few weeks. In 1980, Carter was ahead by three percentage points in October, but lost to Reagan in one of the greatest electoral college landslides in history.

In 2000, most pollsters had George W. Bush well ahead in the last week of polling, and yet Al Gore won the popular vote.

Then in 2004, John Kerry was ahead by 7 points in July and was tied or held a lead several times in September and October. A final Gallup poll on the eve of the election had Kerry up by a point, yet he lost handily to Bush.

The only poll that really matters is the one taken on election day. Even then, early returns can be deceptive. Remember 2000 when all the major news outlets announced that Al Gore had won Florida? I've been predicting that McCain could wind up with an electoral college landslide one month from now. But to hear the media outlets tell it, he'll be lucky to win narrowly.

Myth #2:-- The current eonomic crisis is due to deregulated capitalism and greed.

This one is so simple that even a child ought to understand the basic fallacies here. (I am reminded of Groucho Marx's ageless joke: "Someone run out and find me a four-year-old child, I can't make head or tail out of it!") The reason for the confusion is the intentional dissonance offered up by the media. We hear the mantra of "deregulation" and "capitalism" repeated endlessly by the pundits. Maybe it is due to their neo-Marxist worldview, or worse, maybe they are manipulating the data to bolster their flawed presupposition that capitalism is evil, but this explanation doesn't fly when we look at some basic facts.

Unregulated capitalism did not cause Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac to fail. These are government founded institutions who bought up billions of dollars of low interest loans in order to "cook the books" so they could qualify to give out even more loans. In other words, unbridled capitalism is not the practice of government programs lending money created out of thin air to unqualified individuals. This sounds more like failed socialism to me. Yes, greed was involved, but it was corruption fostered by big government, not the free market.

The ridiculous inflation of the past few years of housing and oil prices was not driven by real dollar worth, but by speculation. When lenders and mortgage brokers discovered they could get almost anyone into a house they could not really afford, money started flowing like water. It wasn't only the demand that drove prices through the roof, but the creation of fiat money that flooded into the real estate economic system. Most of what was leant was not even real money, but credit given by the federal reserve to lending institutions, who in turn doled out billions of invisible credit dollars to people who could not afford to repay their mortgages.

The inflation at the gas pump was likewise driven by speculation. It was not due to the typical law of supply and demand, but due to the fact that people once again began to pull money from loans falsely bouyed by an insane housing market in order to invest in the stock market. Oil futures were the financial bubble this time around. Now with the collapse of readily-available hyper-inflated credit, oil prices are plummeting. We may even see gas at its real cost by the end of the year, which is about $2.50 a gallon.

When that happens, people will scratch their heads and wonder why with such deflation of prices that a government bailout was needed.

And this is the myth I'll cover next:

Myth #3:-- A trillion dollar taxpayer bailout is needed to save America from another Great Depression.

Sarah Palin Takes on Big Oil: A Book Preview

There is a new book out on Sarah Palin describing factually how she took on the oil industry in Alaska. Since it's not tainted with sensationalist bias, it probably won't be a best-seller.

I've read only the excerpt online. I have no idea if it is pro-Sarah or anti-Sarah from what I read. It just appears that the author wrote the bulk of the material prior to the vice presidential nomination and didn't have an agenda.

Even the "God's Will" quote often lampooned by liberal journalists is put in proper context. That is, she said it would have to be nothing short of God's will to unite all the warring and corrupt factions in Alaska in order for a pipeline to be built. And then she asked students in her former church to pray for God's will to be done.

That was it!

---

Some snippets from the book:

“Let me help you out if you’re looking for skeletons in my closet. I got a D in a macro-econ course 24 years ago in college (and) hollered at the wrong kid this morning for not taking out the garbage.”

— Sarah Palin, The Associated Press, August 2006, during Alaska gubernatorial campaign

---

“With Frank Murkowski and Ben Stevens in charge, it’s like the Night of the Living Dead. We’re being guided by two people whose political careers are over.”

— Sen. Hollis French, D-Anchorage, Petroleum News, Aug. 27, 2006, after incumbent Gov. Frank Murkowski lost to Sarah Palin in the Republican primary, and after Alaska Senate President Ben Stevens’ office was searched by the FBI as part of an ongoing investigation into political corruption in Alaska.

---

“In my personal belief, we have gone from being in front of the curve to being in back of the curve…”

— Joe Marushack, vice president of gas development for ConocoPhillips Alaska, told the Alaska Legislature’s Senate Resources Committee early in February 2007, after Sarah Palin became governor and scrapped the fiscal contract ConocoPhillips, BP and ExxonMobil had negotiated with the previous governor.

---

“I think God’s will has to be done in unifying people and companies to get that gas line built, so pray for that.”

— Sarah Palin, on the multi-billion dollar gas pipeline project she wanted built from the North Slope to markets in and outside of Alaska, speaking to students at the Wasilla Assembly of God Church, June 2008

---

“How does Gov. Palin manage it all? The kids, family, responsibilities as governor?”

– Kay Cashman

---

“She doesn’t do anything else. It’s all kids and work. … Her idea of a big night out is a barbecue in her backyard.”

— Judy Patrick, photographer and close friend to Palin

---

“... Your leadership and that of your administration has been outstanding and your integrity and transparent style are a breath of fresh air in what has proven to be a rather shady and smoke-filled past in regard to energy issues in Alaska.”

— David Sokol, chairman and CEO of MidAmerican Holdings Co. (a Warren Buffet company), to Gov. Sarah Palin, related to her work on a pipeline to carry North Slope gas to market.

Judy Patrick and Sarah Palin baking cookies.
COURTESY JUDY PATRICK

Review by Trish Harren:

For all the conversation about Sarah Palin, there are very few factual references materials regarding who this woman is and what she has actually done as a leader. There is a new book set to hit the shelves by mid October that will finally end that void. The book is being published by Petroleum News Alaska and is call 'Sarah takes on Big Oil'

This book is the story of Gov. Sarah Palin's battle with Alaska's 'Big3' oil companies, as told by the state's top oil and gas writers Kay Cashman and Kristen Nelson. These woman are uniquely qualified to tell the story of Palin and her dealings with the oil industry. Cashman is the publisher and executive editor of Petroleum News, an independent news-driven weekly newspaper. Nelson, editor-in-chief of Petroleum News, has maintained a long-time eye on Alaska government and its interactions with the state's most lucrative industry.

Cashman and Nelson deliver a three-dimensional portrait of the Palin administration and the unusual circumstances that have bracketed her leadership. The authors bring a perspective based on knowledge rarely available to general news reporters. As a result, "Sarah takes on Big Oil" is a good read, full of lively personalities and verifiable facts.

My mom is the co-author and while this book lacks the entertainment of SNL, it will give you some facts and insight into a woman who has us all asking, regardless of political persuasion: Who is Sarah Palin?

To find out more visit:

http://www.sarahtakesonbigoil.com

Barack Obama - "Punished with a baby!"

This is an examination of Barack Obama's infamous quote in which he said that if his daughters were to get pregnant by "mistake" that he didn't want them "punished with a baby!" Obama thinks some babies are "punishments" for "mistakes." What a contrast to Sarah Palin who accepted her daughter's baby and her own Downes Syndrome baby with open loving arms.

Sarah Palin - The Tale of Two Babies

Here's a pro-life ad a few friends of mine produced.

Powerful!

Pollster Zogby predicts a McCain landslide

While most polls show Obama ahead nationally, a few that include third party voters and likely voters are tied or go in McCain's favor.

On Thursday, Pollster John Zogby released a national poll in which John McCain had a slim two point lead over Barack Obama.

Similar results were seen in two other polls released on Thursday. A George Washington University Battleground poll showed McCain up by one point and a Gallup poll showed them tied.

Zogby was one of the most trusted pollsters in the 1990s when his polls were accurate to within one percent on average. The key to his success lies in the way he approaches "likely voters" over registered voters. He gained renown in the 1996 Presidential election when his final poll came within a tenth of a percentage point of the actual result.

Zogby was the only major pollster to predict the cliffhanger election of 2000, while most others predicted Bush winning handily.

Another of his "pet doctrines," which I've read in various interviews, is that large blocks of "unsure" voters tend to wait until election day to decide.

In the 2004 election, Zogby lost some credibility when on the very day of the election, he predicted a huge victory for John Kerry. Some accused him of trying to skew the results in the western time zone states with a perceived Kerry trend in the east. Despite his personal prediction, Zogby's final poll showed Bush with a one point lead over Kerry. Zogby later released an apology in which he stated, "I will do better next time: I will just poll, not predict." - John Zogby, November 8, 2004

Since John Zogby is a self-described Democrat, and a liberal by most accounts, I find the following news item of interest:

According to John Zogby, president of Zogby International, Barack Obama still needs to sell himself to the country. If not, voters will likely side with “a comfortable old shoe.” That shoe is John McCain, the Rochester Democrat & Chronicle quoted Zogby as saying. Zogby also questioned if Americans are still asking of Obama, “Who are you, where are you from?” - The Boston Herald, 9/25/08

To put this a few other ways:

1. The make-up of the electoral college favors rural voters.

2. No Democrat since Jimmy Carter has won more than 49 percent of the popular vote. Clinton won with 43 percent and 49 percent. Carter won with 51 percent to Gerald Ford's 49 percent.

3. Both Carter and Clinton ran as moderate Democrats and appealed to rural voters in the south.

4. Obama may have reached that Democrat "iron ceiling" of 43 to 49 percent.

5. Media run polls tend to underestimate Republican strength and especially the outcome of the more conservative or moderate candidate.

We saw that especially with Mike Huckabee and Hillary Clinton in the primaries. They both won huge victories in states where they were polled as close or trailing.

6. This is not a national election, it is a state by state election where the Democrats are historically more vulnerable.

Despite McCain's showing in the national polls, he only has to pick up one or two states currently in Obama's column to win. If we use the rule that the tie goes to the Republican, Zogby could be right in predicting a McCain landslide.

7. Even during the national economic turmoil, the numbers remain fairly competitive.

Listening to Zogby, one could only predict a McCain resurgence if an economic package is passed early next week with McCain seen as favoring the average taxpayer in the bailout.

The Party Is Over

Rusty Thomas is one of the few people I trust who has true prophetic insight into what is happening in America. A while back I posted his imprecatory prayer proclamation to the state of California. I post this as well. It is not a predictive prophecy in the biblical sense, but it applies scripture to the current situation America is facing. I endorse it fully.

- Jay Rogers

A Message from Elijah Ministries

"To make ready a people prepared for the Lord." (Luke 1:17)

Dear Champion of the Lord and the Preborn,

The Lord richly bless you! Based upon our earlier message, I decided to send out a national press statement called "THE PARTY IS OVER." Please keep this in prayer. It is scheduled to be released tomorrow morning. If you find any merit, please pass it on.

- Rusty Thomas

THE PARTY IS OVER

"The wicked shall be turned into hell, and all the nations that forget God (Psalm 9:17) ."

For the last twenty years, courageous men of God have warned our nation of these days. Our nation has sowed to the wind and we are reaping the whirlwind. America stands on the verge of possible economic collapse, where the bail out cure may be worse than the financial disease. Meanwhile Russia, China, and the Islamic nations smell our vulnerabilities. Added to these dangers is the increase of natural disasters. What can our beleaguered country do in such a time as this? Repent and bring forth fruit meet for repentance.

Legalized evil has flourished under our watch and stands as God's indictment against America. We can run, but not hide. America will never escape God's accountability for shedding innocent blood through the crime of abortion and parading our sin like Sodom through the godless, homosexual agenda.

The message and mandate are clear, either abortion and the homosexual agenda ends or America as we know it will end. Until now, America has refused to connect the dots between our spiritual and moral condition and the litany of woe challenging our nation. We pretend this party with death and perversion will continue with our homes, churches, institutions, and economic security remaining intact. Thomas Jefferson stated, "If a nation expects to be ignorant and free, in a state of civilization, it expects what never was and never will be."

Due to the seriousness of the hour, the call is twofold. First, every Church needs to immediately form a pro-life and pro-family missions program to address and defeat the abortion industry and the homosexual agenda, while at the same time opening our hearts to those enslaved by Satan's lies to see them liberated by the truth of the Gospel of Jesus Christ. If, however, the Church continues to turn a blind eye and deaf ear to these sins that have reached heaven, our survival as a nation will continue down the primrose path to destruction. The Church's silence and inaction is partially responsible for the corruption of our nation to continue unabated.

Secondly, we call upon all branches of government to recant of calling good, evil and evil, good by codifying the abominable practices of abortion and homosexuality into law. For far too long, they have defended the indefensible. They cannot make straight what Almighty God has called crooked and expect America to thrive as a nation.

If we summon the moral will to do these necessary changes, we may avert going the way of every other nation that shook its puny fist in the face of a Holy God. Otherwise, America prepare to reap what you have sown!

Obama Nation? A prediction of the November 4, 2008 Electoral Map

With the current economic crisis and the trooper-gate flap in Alaska, liberal pundits are predicting a sure Obama victory in November. My prediction is that McCain will have pulled even in the polls even before the first debate next week. On November 4, the Electoral College vote will be so skewed, that every media outlet will be embarrassed that they missed the obvious.

This is just my objective analysis of what I think is sure to happen. In other words, don't believe the liberal media hype! In the primaries, Obama usually polled a few points higher than where he ended up in the final results.

Although I am a big fan of Sarah Palin, I am not a McCain supporter. I may end up voting Constitution Party for the fifth time since 1992.

Here is what the Electoral College map could look like on November 4.

McCain vs. Obama -- It's all about the electoral college

Looking at an electoral map of the country, such as the one Dick Morris put out earlier today, it's hard to see how McCain can lose the 2008 presidential election. History shows that whenever a Democrat wins the presidency, he begins with a sizeable lead in the polls at the time of the Democratic convention. As time inches closer to election day, the Democrat invariably loses ground.

Obama's lead is one of the slimmest in history this early in the campaign. Although the popular vote shows Obama ahead by 2 percentage points, most of that can be explained by the huge lead he has in California and the Northeast -- the bluest of the blue states. For instance, a lead of 15 points among California's 12 million voters translates into about two million votes. Assuming 100 million Americans will vote on November 4th, the imbalance in California alone accounts for Obama's slim lead.

Looking at the remaining states on the map, I can't see how McCain can lose.

1. All McCain has to do is pick off one or two purple states currently in Obama's column, such as New Mexico or Colorado (or one of the yellow states on Morris' map) and it will be all over.

2. Pick up both Pennsylvania and Ohio and it's a sure victory for McCain. He then can afford to lose several of the smaller "swing" states now in contention and still win.

3. The polls for Obama in the primaries showed an effect in which the numbers were inflated compared to where he ended up on election day -- in some cases much inflated.

This is explained by the fact that undecided voters will often tell pollsters they support the more liberal candidate, but when these moderates and independents go to the voting booth, they most often shy away from the liberal or progressive candidate and vote for the "safer" moderate or conservative.

Come November 4th, there may be not just a McCain victory, but an electoral college landslide akin to Reagan '82 and '84, and Bush '88.

What McCain needs to do to ensure a Republican landslide

1. Hammer on the fact that Obama is the most liberal of the 100 Senators. McCain voted with the Republicans 90 percent of the time, a slogan that Obama is using to tie McCain to Bush. But this ought to backfire on Obama since he voted with the Democrats nearly 100 percent of the time. By comparison, the Independent "maverick" Joe Lieberman voted at a 90 percent rate with the Democrats -- a record the Democrats cited in trying to oust him. McCain needs to run ads showing the Democrats' hypocrisy on this issue: "How can Obama reach across the aisle if he is so far to the left?"

2. Emphasize McCain's history of opposing lobbyists and special interest groups while blaming the savings and loan crisis on the Democrat's reliance on money from Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac to run their campaigns.

3. Counter the perceived strength of the Democrats in the current economic downturn by continuing to preach the theme of a pair of proven reformers who will shake up Washington.

4. Continue to call on George W. Bush to fire a few well-chosed political cronies in Washington as a signal of what McCain/Palin will do when they take office.

5. Portray the McCain/Palin team as representing the common people, while showing Obama/Biden as elitist insiders.

As every jet fighter pilot knows, McCain just needs to gain a slightly higher advantage over his opponent, and then hone in on him from above firing as often and as hard as possible to bring the Democrat campaign down in flames. It's really a no-brainer.

McCain called for reform of Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae in May, 2006

I never thought I'd be writing a blog entry defending John McCain's record, but the Obama campaign has responded to the recent loan company bail-out by charging that McCain has "lobbyists" on his campaign staff. However, Obama's campaign staff is more directly linked to Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. Obama is a top recipient of contributions from these organizations.

Here are the top recipients of campaign contributions from Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, 1989-2008:

1. Dodd, Christopher J D-CT $133,900
2. Kerry, John D-MA $111,000
3. Obama, Barack D-IL $105,849

An article from June 11, 2008 reports that "Barack Obama's taking serious heat for his reliance on former Fannie Mae CEO James Johnson to vet potential vice presidential prospects. Obama has presented himself as an outsider and a Washington change agent and Johnson, whose favorable loan deals with Countrywide Financial Corp. made him a lightning rod, is as inside as they come in the capital. How much of an outsider can Obama be, really, GOP skeptics ask, if he's turned to somebody like Johnson for important spadework in finding a running mate? Johnson announced he quit the Obama campaign earlier today, but the question likely will linger. John McCain's campaign manager, Rick Davis, also has ties to Fannie Mae, though less directly."

In 2005, the Democrats voted adown a bill co-sponsored by McCain that purported to bring reform. Could it be a coincidence that Obama is now scrambling to deflect the blame with irrelevant charges?

On May 25, 2006, John McCain called for reform of Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae. He co-sponsored the S. 190 [109th]: Federal Housing Enterprise Regulatory Reform Act of 2005 that was introduced in January 2005.

Sen. John McCain [R-AZ]:

Mr. President, this week Fannie Mae’s regulator reported that the company’s quarterly reports of profit growth over the past few years were “illusions deliberately and systematically created” by the company’s senior management, which resulted in a $10.6 billion accounting scandal.

The Office of Federal Housing Enterprise Oversight’s report goes on to say that Fannie Mae employees deliberately and intentionally manipulated financial reports to hit earnings targets in order to trigger bonuses for senior executives. In the case of Franklin Raines, Fannie Mae’s former chief executive officer, OFHEO’s report shows that over half of Mr. Raines’ compensation for the 6 years through 2003 was directly tied to meeting earnings targets. The report of financial misconduct at Fannie Mae echoes the deeply troubling $5 billion profit restatement at Freddie Mac.

The OFHEO report also states that Fannie Mae used its political power to lobby Congress in an effort to interfere with the regulator’s examination of the company’s accounting problems. This report comes some weeks after Freddie Mac paid a record $3.8 million fine in a settlement with the Federal Election Commission and restated lobbying disclosure reports from 2004 to 2005. These are entities that have demonstrated over and over again that they are deeply in need of reform.

For years, I have been concerned about the regulatory structure that governs Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac–known as Government-sponsored entities or GSEs–and the sheer magnitude of these companies and the role they play in the housing market. OFHEO’s report this week does nothing to ease these concerns. In fact, the report does quite the contrary. OFHEO’s report solidifies my view that the GSEs need to be reformed without delay.

I join as a co-sponsor of the Federal Housing Enterprise Regulatory Reform Act of 2005, S. 190, to underscore my support for quick passage of GSE regulatory reform legislation. If Congress does not act, American taxpayers will continue to be exposed to the enormous risk that Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac pose to the housing market, the overall financial system, and the economy as a whole.

I urge my colleagues to support swift action on this GSE reform legislation.

Here is a summary of the bill: 1/26/2005–Introduced. Federal Housing Enterprise Regulatory Reform Act of 2005 - Amends the Federal Housing Enterprises Financial Safety and Soundness Act of 1992 to establish: (1) in lieu of the Office of Federal Housing Enterprise Oversight of the Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD), an independent Federal Housing Enterprise Regulatory Agency which shall have authority over the Federal Home Loan Bank Finance Corporation, the Federal Home Loan Banks, the Federal National Mortgage Association (Fannie Mae), and the Federal Home Loan Mortgage Corporation (Freddie Mac); and (2) the Federal Housing Enterprise Board.Sets forth operating, administrative, and regulatory provisions of the Agency, including provisions respecting: (1) assessment authority; (2) authority to limit nonmission-related assets; (3) minimum and critical capital levels; (4) risk-based capital test; (5) capital classifications and undercapitalized enterprises; (6) enforcement actions and penalties; (7) golden parachutes; and (8) reporting.Amends the Federal Home Loan Bank Act to establish the Federal Home Loan Bank Finance Corporation. Transfers the functions of the Office of Finance of the Federal Home Loan Banks to such Corporation. Excludes the Federal Home Loan Banks from certain securities reporting requirements. Abolishes the Federal Housing Finance Board.

An electoral college landslide for McCain?

Even without Sarah Palin on the ticket, John McCain already had the electoral college sewn up just after the Democratic convention.

That's if the pre-convention polling results of the last 35 years are an indicator.

Let's look at the data. A Democratic challenger needs at least an 18 to 19 point lead going into a convention.

McGovern had a 17 point lead in 1972.

Mondale had 14 in 1984.

Dukakis had 11 in 1988.

All ended up as landslides for the Republican candidates on election day.

On the other hand, Carter had a 21 point over Ford in 1976 and he barely eeked out a win in one of the closest elections in history.

Bill Clinton had the largest lead in history prior to the Democratic convention in 1992. Then the Democrats got an additional 16 point "bounce" (the largest in history) causing Ross Perot to drop out of the race temporarily. Of course, Clinton went on to win.

Barack's outlook is dismal if we use this as a precedent.

Obama went into his convention with a 3 point and came out a 6 point lead -- the lowest bounce ever.

The Democrat insiders saw the handwriting on the wall. Senator Jim Webb of Virginia and Senator Ben Nelson of Nebraska both were asked to fill the vice president slot before Senator Biden. They saw the numbers and decided not to go down with a sinking ship. Biden apparently thought he had nothing to lose.

Now McCain is up by three or four points nationally according to the most recent polls and has been gaining a point or two per week in the key counties and states. The momentum is swinging toward McCain in every state.

The liberal media is going to keep saying that it all comes down to Pennsylvania, Colorado and New Mexico. If McCain loses all three, Obama loses the popular vote, but wins the electoral college. If McCain can take just one (which is almost a certainty) he slips in. If he wins all three and perhaps one or two more of the "blue" states, then it is an electoral college landslide. There is the strong possibility that even states such as Washington and New York are now moving toward McCain.

Of course, the media will try to paint it as a horse race and do everything they can to spin public opinion toward Obama, but this is going to be a landslide victory if trends continue -- not as big as Nixon over McGovern in 1972 -- but still a landslide.

(Thanks to JAZ for his historical analysis and insights.)

The Atheist Syndrome

Dr. George Grant sat for a video interview a back and he talked about the book, The Atheist Syndrome. The author, John Koster, profiles the lives and personalities of four of most well-known atheists and their followers. In the most extreme cases, atheism is not just a healthy skepticism, such as agnosticism (the admission of "not knowing" if there is a God) or "free thinking" that eschews supernatural theology in favor of naturalist explanations. The atheist claims to speak as infallibly as God in claiming there is no God. In its extreme form, atheism is a mental disorder.

George Grant explains:



If you think this is pure polemics, I'll go as far as to agree that on the surface it seems that this profile is too naïve. To say that all atheists are bed-wetters, sexual deviants, victims of abusive fathers and promiscuous mothers is at best an over-generalization based on four of the most well-known atheists and some of their followers. I'd never go to this extreme to say all atheists are like that.

But there is a syndrome that is very real and more endemic to atheists than any other group.

Since 1987, my passion for ministry has focused on media projects, eschatology, theonomy, evangelism, foreign missions, political action and pro-life activism. Therefore, most of the criticism I get from our web presence has been from liberals, witches, pagans, and pro-abortion advocates. It is completely understandable and expected. The liberals (both theological and political) fear that a growing Christian movement represents a throwback to the fear and prejudice of the so-called "Dark Ages." Witches and pagans fear that biblical law will lead to a return to the "burning times." Pro-aborts oppose pro-life activism out of their desire for selfish autonomy and a license for irresponsible behavior.

Most of the emails and comments I have received from these groups have taken the form of hysterical screeds. In effect, they say: "You Christians want to kill and repress us all!"

Of this group, King Solomon lamented when he wrote:

"The wicked flee when no one is pursuing" (Proverbs 28:1).

When faced with left-wing paranoia, I usually try to explain in a rational and calm tone that there is always great freedom in a Christian society for people to hold other views and practice their religion in private just as long just as they do not break the civil laws of the society. Of course, Christians want these laws based – if not wholly, then at least in principle – on biblical law.

As a person who was converted to Christ as an adult, I realize that everyone is in a different place in their journey toward God. We can offer a great deal of tolerance when dealing with groups who do not share our worldview. It took me 23 years to see the truth. I try to keep that in mind and that I should bear with people who don't see it my way.

My vision for a Christian America is the Puritanism of Oliver Cromwell – a ruler who invited Jews to return to England 100 years after being banished by King Henry VIII. Cromwell also protected the rights of Roman Catholics to worship publicly in Protestant England – although he was adamantly opposed to their theology on a personal level. He strengthened a republican form of government in England and fought the idea of the "divine right of kings."

Recently, due to some side comments I made on a blog post regarding imprecatory prayer, I've flushed out droves of new antagonists – the militant atheists. Except for a few notable champions, most prefer to remain anonymous while sniping at Christians and all theists in general from the bushes. Their most effective field of battle is the blogosphere of course.

They are even more hysterical than the usual suspects – the liberals, pagans and pro-aborts – but they are different in that they share in common several pathological characteristics. While I don't necessarily think that Koster's thesis is entirely correct, I've noticed several common denominators among atheists – or at least the these anonymous atheist flamers on the Internet. These include:

1. Decrying the supposed stupidity and lack of intelligence on the part of Christians without ever condescending to a focused debate on worldview issues.
2. The use of invective, profanity and ad hominem attacks when refuting Christians, ironically acting extremely insulted when the tables are turned.
3. Focusing on the supposed hypocrisies of Christianity, while never owning their own behavior or the inhuman criminal history of recent atheistic societies.
4. An obsession with sexually demeaning comments bordering on harassment in an attempt to assault the moral sensibilities and sexual ethics of the Bible.
5. An obsession with irrelevant details.
6. Frequent accusations of lying and dishonesty even while purposefully interpreting Christian writings and biblical theology in a skewed and satirical manner.
7. An irrational insistence that experimental science is the only form of rational thought. In other words, a belief in metaphysical naturalism (the idea that all truth is knowable through naturalistic experimentation and observation) rather than traditional scientific rationalism (the idea that science can only observe, reproduce and describe natural events according to an imperfect paradigm.)

I didn't need to do case studies or conduct a scientific study to discover this syndrome. I have enough data in my mail box over the years. (I am sure that I'll get many more of these now as a result of P.Z. Myers free advertisement of my website.)

No atheist's response is complete without the "bearing false witness" charge. Although mountains of materials defending Christianity have been written and collected over the centuries, the charge is always that it is a "lie" to say so. On the contrary, if a religious opinion can be proven demonstrably wrong, it is only an opinion, not a lie.

Another ploy is to portray Christians as "hateful." The idea that Christianity promotes a "love you neighbor" ethic is freely admitted by atheists when they berate us for our alleged "hatred hypocrisy." They need to borrow from Christianity's moral code of the "law of love" even while they mock us!

I sometimes use sarcasm in my responses to non-believers. Jesus and the Apostle Paul used sarcasm, so it's not wrong to use it in a measured way. But usually I try to answer rationally – not with my answers, but with a theological consensus based on years of study on the matter. I don't get into arguments over things I know nothing about. In this case, silence is usually treated as an admission of surrender.

It is supposed to be hypocrisy for Christians to treat biblical morality as binding on non-believers. It's hypocritical for us hold a black and white view of morality. Who are we to say what is "good" and "evil"? But that's not to stop the pot from calling the kettle black. Atheists have their own version of morality that they seek to impose on society.

Neutrality is a myth. Every civil law is an imposition of someone's morality on another person. No culture can exist for long as an amalgamation of diverse "moralities." Eventually one worldview is going to win out. And that is really what this debate is about. It's a battle for our culture. The militant atheists are worthy adversaries in this battle because they understand that theirs is a battle for cultural dominion far better than most Christians. Although atheists are a small minority, they understand that they can win by holding forth in the battle of ideas. No matter how vacuous they may sound at first, many of their core ideas are already the ruling presuppositions of the media, entertainment industry and liberal politics.

That is why the Sarah Palin nomination has them hysterical. Win or lose, she is a bright, young, articulate defender of the Christian political worldview who will be around for years to come.

So get ready. The culture wars are back.

Why I support Chuck Baldwin for President

"Always vote for principle, though you may vote alone, and you may cherish the sweetest reflection that your vote is never lost."

- John Quincy Adams

Have you considered voting for the Constitution Party candidate in the last few election cycles, Howard Phillips or Mike Peroutka or Chuck Baldwin, but were discouraged by the following argument?

“A vote for Chuck Baldwin is a vote for Barack Obama!”

or …

“You are throwing away your vote on a candidate that can’t win!”

There is a fundamental problem with this statement in that it assumes that the Republican choice is acceptable. I had this argument with Ron Paul supporters in the Republican primaries. I argued that Mike Huckabee was an acceptable candidate and actually had a chance of winning. If only the Romney and Paul supporters would unite behind the frontrunner we could have beaten McCain.

The problem with my thinking was that the Paul supporters – even though they could not win – thought Huckabee was an unacceptable choice. While I disagree with them, I respect them for their uncompromising stance.

Likewise, I would vote for Sarah Palin without any hesitation she were running for president. She's not perfect, but acceptable. I am willing to make a mistake on a relative unknown who has done all the right things so far and stands for all the right things (at least in word). However, Sarah Palin isn't running for president, John McCain is. It is the "known" quantity of McCain that I can't support. I simply can't bring myself in good conscience to support a liberal Republican.

The Constitution Party is by far a better choice. I am supporting Chuck Baldwin because he's the best man running. If you doubt this, I ask you to visit his website and make your decision based on his positions.

http://www.baldwin08.com/

The Constitution Party is the only political party that recognizes Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior of humanity in its platform. Up and down, every issue that Christians care about is advocated – not without flaws – but in a far better way than what I have seen in any other political party.

http://www.constitutionparty.com/party_platform.php

Now some will object:

“What if millions of Christians support Baldwin, but we get only 10 percent of the vote and throw the election to the Democrats?”

It’s possible.

Many people blame Ross Perot for Clinton’s election to office with 43 percent of the vote in 1992 and then 49 percent of the vote in 1996. But there is a flip side to the argument.

First, the Republican Party needs Christian conservatives in order to win. If we “throw” an election or two, the damage is short term. Then we may get the candidate we want in the next cycle, or else the Constitution Party is an option again. It’s the age-old political strategy of purposefully taking one step backwards in order to take two steps forward. If we continue the way we are going now with the Republican Party, we are surely going backwards. Bill Clinton’s election in 1992 spawned the “Contract with America” – a conservative movement that didn’t go far enough and yet brought the greatest era of economic growth our nation has ever seen. A loss is not a loss when the better of the two frontrunners is a disaster.

Second, there are probably just as many disaffected leftists who would vote Green Party, Libertarian Party or some other third party instead of voting for a Democrat from a congressional session that has a 17 percent approval rating. When they see many of us leaving the Republican Party, fewer of them will be afraid to leave the Democrats.

Third, we will win eventually. I believe strongly in the “Puritan Hope” – that one day the whole earth will be filled with the glory of God. Supporting the Constitution Party is supporting the winning side. It is the only self-consciously Christian party. It can be our vehicle until something even better comes along. America will be a Christian nation, or another Christian nation will take its place. If we succeed in restoring America to the vision of our Puritan and Christian Patriot forefathers, our support of the Constitution Party in the darkest days before the fall of western humanism will be a source of joy and pride for our children and grandchildren.

On the other hand, I am afraid that future generations might look back and see that I supported “the lesser of two evils” – and hid my talents in the ground, while our country’s destiny weighed in the balance.

I realize an Obama presidency would be a disaster. I hope and pray that if it is truly a choice between Obama and McCain that somehow McCain wins and he either repents of his weak views on the sanctity of life, marriage and big government – or that he dies soon after his election and Palin gets the executive office.

And yet God holds us accountable for our actions as individuals. If we have the choice between two sinful actions and a morally correct decision, and yet the morally correct decision would cause us to suffer a personal setback, then it is still wrong to pick the lesser of two evils. We only win when we obey God.

Is Baldwin God’s Candidate?

I am not claiming that Baldwin is “God’s candidate.” Every Christian needs to follow his own conscience on this matter. If you can vote for McCain with a clear conscience, then by all means do it, but remember, “whatever does not proceed from faith is sin” (Romans 14:23).

But if you think your only option is a vote for McCain, consider this. Twenty years ago it would have been unthinkable for evangelical Christian to support a candidate who said in 2005:

The constitutional amendment [banning gay marriage] strikes me as antithetical in every way to the core philosophy of Republicans.... It usurps from the states a fundamental authority they have always possessed and imposes a federal remedy for a problem that most states do not believe confronts them.
http://www.cnn.com/2004/ALLPOLITICS/07/14/mccain.marriage/

Since that statement McCain has equivocated all over the place on the issue of gay marriage vs. civil unions – he's for fetal tissue research, but he's "pro-life" – and so on.

If McCain was acceptable or even near the threshold of acceptability I'd vote for him. However, a vote for a lesser evil is still a vote for evil.

Now most of my friends are supporting this man simply because he suddenly talks the right talk. We are no longer governed by the rule of law and we Christians need to do what our conscience tells us to do in order to resist lawlessness.

If we support this candidate, how far will we be willing to compromise 20 years down the road?

God does miracles and it's possible that some weird national crisis could catapult a third party candidate into national prominence. It has happened a few times in our history, Abraham Lincoln’s election in 1860 being the most notable example. However, God does not usually perform "miracles" without a human agent acting according to natural means. God sets up providential circumstances and then requires His people to act in the right way to receive the blessing.

Most people don't want to admit it, but we are living in the first stages of a tyrannical state. I don't think it is as bad as some conspiracy theorists would have us think, but it is headed in that direction. What was unthinkable 20 years ago is reality today and God only knows what lies down the road if the slide is not reversed.

Can the slide be reversed? Can we restore our nation as a beacon of righteousness? Will God do such a miracle and bring a spiritual awakening to our land?

Yes, under one condition.

If my people, which are called by my name, shall humble themselves, and pray, and seek my face, and turn from their wicked ways; then will I hear from heaven, and will forgive their sin, and will heal their land. – 2 Chronicles 7:14

Samuel Adams said referring to the overthrow of George III’s tyranny in America:

He who sets up and pulls down, confines or extends empires at his pleasure, generally, if not always, carries on his work with instruments apparently unfit for the great purpose, but which in his hands are always effectual ... God does the work, but not without instruments, and they who are employed are denominated as his servants; no king, nor kingdom was ever destroyed by a miracle which effectually excluded the agency of second causes ... We may affect humility in refusing to be made the instruments of Divine vengeance, but the good servant will execute the will of his master. Samuel will slay Agag; Moses, Aaron, and Hur will pray in the mountain, and Joshua will defeat the Canaanites.

Yes, God does the work, if His people are willing to obey His commandments. I pray that enough would be willing.

PZ Myers weighs in on my Sarah Palin entry

One of my good friends here in Florida is a young media expert who keeps telling me that I should post more of my writings to my blog instead of constantly writing to a ring of five or six friends with my most imaginative ideas. His rationale is that a blog that goes viral is a valuable commodity. At first, I doubted that most people are ready for my ideas in their raw form, but now I think he may be right. At the very least, I will get some attention.

I found out today that my most read read blog post so far for the month of September is my recent entry about Sarah Palin, in which I suggest that (even though I may end up supporting The Constitution Party once again) I am secretly (now not so secretly) praying that McCain/Palin beats Obama/Biden. Then when McCain wins, we ought to pray for McCain's true conversion making use of imprecatory prayer.

I must be doing something right when PZ Myers calls me a kook.

See: Pharyngula Blog

Myers, if you remember, was the outspoken atheist featured in Expelled the movie.

As an atheist, he thinks that imprecatory prayer is hateful and outrageous. Of course, he gets the intent wrong: I want God to bless the president (whoever he is) if he does right in the eyes of God, and curse him if he disobeys God's law. It's the prayer of David for King Saul in about a dozen or two Psalms.

(Note: Although David's Psalms were used of God to bring about Saul's death, David loved Saul and wanted to see his true conversion.)

PZ didn't read our imprecatory prayer articles.

But due to PZ's blog entry I've gotten a lot of notice as an example of an extremist right wing Christian hate-monger.

Once again.

He even throws in a Mr. Rogers' joke. It's very funny actually. Ironic. If PZ only knew the how mild-mannered and congenial I am with my high school students. I am Mr Rogers!

One my most favorite passages of scripture is Judges 5:20, the Song of Deborah:

“They fought from heaven; the stars in their courses fought against Sisera.”

The idea of course, is that every political battle, every war, is also a spiritual battle when it involves God's people. Justice is written into every atom of the universe. There is a war going on, a spiritual revolution. There is no neutral ground on which to stand. And judgment at the moment of our death is inescapable.

So I need your advice.

My next entry on Sarah Palin vs. Obama/Biden may be called:

"Deborah vs. Sisera: the stars fought in their courses"

- or -

"The First Blast of the Trumpet Against the Monstrous Regiment of Girly Men"

(I won't explain this last one now. Just read the John Knox article here.)

Which do you like better?

The Todd Bentley "revival" fall-out

"I insisted much on the necessity of a new birth, as also on the necessity of a minister's being converted before he could preach aright. Unconverted ministers are the bane of the Christian Church. I think that great and good man, Mr. Stoddard, is much to be blamed for endeavoring to prove that unconverted men might be admitted to the ministry. A sermon lately published by Gilbert Tennent, entitled 'The Danger of an Unconverted Ministry' I think unanswerable."

- George Whitefield, Journal, 1741

If you are a person who was affected by the "revival" meetings conducted by Todd Bentley in Lakeland, Florida this past year, you might be confused or asking questions in regard to the fallout surrounding his ministry.

I hope you will read what I have to say here and consider it.

Prior to August 3rd, I had an internet conversation with a friend whose church is experiencing a similar "revival" movement. I had heard a message on CD from the pastor of this church and I thought it was very sound. At the time, I spoke my mind that what I had seen of Bentley on GodTV looked "vacuous" in comparison. A few days later, Bentley was forced to step down from public ministry. I wrote to tell my friend that I blame those people responsible for endorsing this as much as Todd Bentley.

How can it be a "revival" if the leader is preaching heresy and engaging in immoral behavior?

My friend wrote back to say that it is really too bad that people have shut out Bentley's message just because he faltered.

I then explained that I shut out Bentley's message even before I knew about his moral failings. It was the message that made me shut out the message! And in the end, we know a tree by its fruit.

My friend then suggested that to be consistent I should not receive the message of God's grace carried through prophets such as King David, King Solomon or the Apostle Paul, since they too sinned. Yet they were used of God to write scripture. I might as well in effect "shut out" what they have to say about God too.

So the reasoning goes.

I've heard the "David" argument many times before.

I have one word for that idea: antinomianism.

This is the heresy that faith is divorced from works or that faith does not produce obedience to the law of God. If these men are preaching the Gospel yet living in gross unrepentant sin, then they may not even be converted.

Here is what I believe God is leading me to say about all of this.

There are revivals all over the world today. They aren't in the spotlight or on GodTV every night. But they are genuine. I am not saying we should not seek God or that there isn't something wonderful going on in churches who are promoting "revival." I am just against the idea of treating these men differently when they sin and preach heresy because they supposedly have the "anointing."

The Emperor's New Clothes

The strategy of preachers in these revival meetings -- Lakeland, Toronto, Pensacola, etc. -- is to tell people who see their nakedness, that they just aren't "spiritual" enough to receive all the wonderful things God is doing, that they are "blocking" the anointing, and so on. It's a heresy in and of itself -- elitist Gnosticism.

Beyond the issue of personal character, I don't believe that meetings emphasizing gifts, miracles and the "presence" of God are necessarily "revivals" at all. Salvation is by grace alone through faith alone. Once we are saved, we do not become sanctified through spiritual experiences. We become sanctified by obeying God day by day as we are enabled by grace. In other words, there is no "fast track" to sanctification.

Therefore, we cannot "miss the anointing" simply because our hearts are not "open to receive" an experience. There are no higher levels of anointing you can attain in a revival meeting. It's complete nonsense. It's manipulative and it's totally contrary to the message of historic revival -- the message of the Gospel.

In 1994, I decided that experiences with God are a good thing, but you can have them in your living room -- or anywhere God chooses to move. Four years ago, God healed me of a ten day bout with atrial fibrillation in a hospital room. I was simply praying by myself. I rebuked the enemy and my heart converted to a normal rhythm. A coincidence? Maybe. I believe it was a providential healing through prayer. But this experience didn't bring me any closer to God than I was a minute before. Even though I certainly felt closer to God due to that experience, it didn't change my standing in God. Our position with God is a judicial standing, not an experience.

People feel the rush they get in a room of thousands of people worshiping God, and they assume this is the "presence" of God. It's not a bad thing to feel this, but it's totally contrary to scripture to claim that our standing with God is gained through a good feeling or an experience.

My Eyewitness Account

1. I was living in Orlando during Rodney Howard Browne's "laughing revival" in Lakeland, Florida in 1993. I visited several times and wasn't overly impressed. There was not any "supernatural presence" of God there that I could not find through personal devotion or in any church service or prayer group.
   
2. I moved to Melbourne, Florida soon after that and was disturbed by the worldly carnality of Michael W. Thompson and the antinomian teachings of Randy Clark. I wrote a position paper on that in 1994 called Revival: It's No Laughing Matter. I won't repeat the content of it here, but I tried to explain what historic revival is and why this was not it. This was several years before the leaders of that renewal movement were exposed in sin.
3. I lived in Pensacola during the Brownsville Revival. I had a friend who came all the way from Russia to sit in those meetings. He claimed it was the strongest anointing he had ever experienced. I sat there with an open mind and an open heart. I just couldn't bring myself to fake being slain in the spirit or to lie and say I experienced something amazing when all I saw was a religious meeting with a lot people seeking an experience.
4. Todd Bentley was more vacuous than all the others, but I expected the usual crowd to go along with it and claim, "This was the greatest revival since The Great Awakening!" as they always say. Even though I live in nearby Kissimmee, I did not visit the Bentley meetings.
   

How many times can people be fooled by the Emperor's new clothes?

I am nothing special. I don't have a "super-anointing" or a special gift of discernment. If it were not for the grace of God, I could be fooled too.

In fact, you may think I am fooled by a "hard heart."

So I will leave you with this.

George Whitefield preached that one of the signs of God beginning to judge a nation is that He will give the church over to unconverted ministers -- even those who do not behave as sinners -- and God will turn the people over to blindness so that they will receive them as angels of light.

The Sarah Palin "sigh" factor

I was going to sit down yesterday and explain why I've supported the Constitution Party presidential candidate in every general election since 1992. I still plan to vote Constitution Party. I will write on that shortly, but first I wanted to give my reaction to the Sarah Palin V.P. nomination.

If Palin was running for president against Barack Obama, I'd support her with no qualms. She's pro-life and would work to overturn Roe v. Wade. She would lower taxes and return America to a supply-side free market in the philosophy of Adam Smith. She's a strong Christian who isn't afraid to confront moral issues and corruption in politics.

Palin is going to win this election for John McCain.

I can think of many reasons why. Here are just three.

1. She is going to be extremely popular among young voters who tend not to walk lock-step with one party. This will hurt the Democrats among young would-be Obama and Clinton supporters who tend to be influenced more by the "sigh" factor than on the issues. In general, a large block of American voters are incredible shallow and Palin ... well, just look at her.

2. She is also a great person. She has a sparky personality you can't help fall in love with. She's strong, uncompromising, spiritual and practices what she preaches. Barack Obama's appeal is that he represents change, but Barack has also been shown to be the ultimate contradiction on many levels. Obama claims to represent the common people, but many can't help but wonder if he is really one of us. It's almost as if he is trying to be liked by everybody. Sarah Palin is just the opposite. She really is one of us and she doesn't care if you like her -- even people in her own party.

Now here is the most obvious selling point:

3. Scientists claim there is more untapped oil in the Arctic than in Saudi Arabia. When gas prices start climbing way above $4 a gallon in the aftermath of a few Gulf of Mexico hurricanes, Palin is simply going to look into the camera, smile, and with her sparky sanguine squeaky voice, she is going to say: "For the good of our economy, we need to tap America's oil wealth! We've also got to protect the habitat of those caribou, moose and polar bears. So we will drill in a way that's environmentally sensitive. And I am just the woman to do it!"

(Note: one reader pointed out that I ought to include all American territory in this claim as well. The point is that we have enough oil within our borders to supply our energy needs.)

Let's face reality for a moment. When people see gas prices hurting their wallet and then see an attractive, young woman politician on television saying she'll help them because she's from Alaska, has hunted moose, and has been trying to get the drill ban on federal lands lifted all along, the choice is going to be very obvious.

I was hoping for a good showing for a pro-life third party candidate in this cycle, which could in turn affect the next elections in favor of conservative Christians. I'll explain my thinking on that later. The Palin nomination turned that chance on it's head. Even James Dobson, the Constitution Party's most well- known supporter who said he'd "never" support John McCain, has now reversed his decision based on Palin's nomination.

So here is my three point plan:

1. Vote Constitution Party. (I vote my conscience and cannot support McCain even with Palin.)

2. Hope and pray for McCain/Palin to win. (I am an idealist, but also a realist!)

3. Pray for John McCain's salvation and pray specific imprecatory prayers if he fails to pro-actively defend the sanctity of human life.

(Note: If you don't understand this term, Google The Forerunner's articles on Imprecatory Prayer.)

(In a few days, I'll write my explanation on why the Constitution Party is the way for Christians to go. But I want to see what happens at the Republican convention first.)

I Invented the Internet (Ep. 4: Kill and Destroy)

link: I Invented the Internet (Ep. 4: Kill and Destroy)

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