Dating

My dad warned me against women who would take advantage of me, but he should have warned me against my own predatory, testosterone-poisoned mind.

In the natural mind, the goal of dating is "hooking up" or "scoring." This puts the wrong pressures on people who date. Reaching the goal sets you up for heartbreak and endangers the future of the relationship. Most dangerously, the carnal definition of "dating" risks creating an innocent human life whom you sentence to, at best, the stigma of illegitimacy, the emotional wounds of growing up fatherless, or at worst, the torture of being chemically burned to death or being vivisected, without even the benefit of anaesthetic, before birth.

Proper dating, however, can serve as a tool of socialization: learning self restraint, learning to enjoy, understand, and honor the opposite sex, and developing friendships.

I did not realize until I was around 25 that I needed to correct my goals in dating. I changed from looking for a wife to learning to enjoy women as friends, without the sexual or marital agenda.

Think of how men and women approach shopping. A woman enjoys shopping for the experience, whereas a man sets a goal of hunting down his prey, the specific item or deal. As I matured, I learned to shop at hardware stores just to get ideas and to see what's available for solving problems later. That's similar to the mindset one needs in dating.

Around my 27th birthday, I was praying for somebody to disciple. The Lord revealed to me that a man's ultimate disciple is (or ought to be) his wife. That was the end of that prayer request.

About a month later, God gave me that disciple. It did not take years of dating to know that she was the one. By the end of the year, we were married. It's been almost 30 years, now. The point is, a guy needs to look at dating as practice lessons in leadership, discipling, and responsibility, too.

With the right mindset about the purpose of dating, it becomes a lot easier to counter testosterone poisoning. Date to enjoy, to learn, to develop restraint. Let the goals come in their own time.

What's So Bad about Being a Liberal?

First, not all that presents itself as conservative is actually conservative.

The Republican Party poorly represents conservatism. In fact, the GOP vacillates between moderately conservative on some issues and liberal economics and internationalism. I would guess that a third of the GOP is actually liberal, a third sticks a wet finger in the air, and a minority is actually conservative. For example, George W. Bush got tax cuts passed early in his administration, but cooperated with Democrat-led bail-outs of banks and GM.

So, let's not use Republicans to define the opposite of liberalism.

Second, being liberal is a good thing; and progress is good when the goal is good and the means are just. Being a liberal or a progressive, however, has a very peculiar meaning that does not necessarily connect to the root words, liberal and progress.

In my definitions (not necessarily standard, but offered for the sake of communication), conservatism seeks to preserve traditional values of liberty, self-reliance, and justice that does not respect persons.

Liberalism, or as the codeword is used today, progressivism, on the other hand, redefines a neutral term. Progress is good, right? Doesn't everybody love progress?

When you say change (as in hope and change) or progress, you have to pick a direction. You have to pick an origination and a destination. Depending on your definition of progress, it may or may not mean something good. The compass has only one North, but it has 359 degree-markers that point away from North.

Suppose your objective were to see far with an unobstructed view, so you climb the highest mountain. Progress would be pretty stupid if it meant trekking off that cliff to the West, wouldn't it? What else could you do? You could build a tower where you are, on your existing foundation. But would you leave the spot just because change is good?

The progressive compass points hard left, to 270 degrees, toward freedom for immorality and toward repression of traditional morality, toward collectivist statism, and toward "social justice" that bases rights on class, skin color, and sexual orientation.

American conservatives see progressive, liberal, socialist, and Marxist, as variations of a single philosophy. That philosophy derives from secular, materialist existentialism, in which interpretation is reality, objective truth is a myth, and the ultimate organism is the state.

Whereas Americanism states that authority flows from God through the People to the government, the progressive spectrum worships the Collective as the ultimate organism, whose people live at its pleasure. Americanism secures rights to the people and assigns responsibilities to the government, but progressivism gives the government rights and the people privileges. Conservative liberalism means personal tolerance and personal giving (to which the restaurant help will attest after any political convention), but Progressive liberalism forces promotion of the tolerable and gives at the expense of others.

If you believe black is white and right is wrong, then, I suppose, being a liberal is great.

What Fact Check Sites Do You Prefer?

Do you prefer Snopes, Factcheck, what? Thanks, L

The fact-check and urban legends sites have helped me avoid embarrassing myself many times. There's nothing like forwarding a request from a 7-year-old cancer victim, only to find that he's now 27, has to pay for his own zip code, and wishes people would stop sending him post cards for his collection.

 

When it comes to political or social issues, however, I don't trust any of them.

• PolitiFact is a project of the St. Petersberg Times, an extreme left-wing newspaper. Click HERE for an example of how their Lie of the Year with which they smeared Mitt Romney turned out to be true.
    
• FactCheck, FlackCheck, and FactCheckEd are a projects of Annenberg Public Policy Center and funded by the Annenberg Foundation. As board chairman of the Chicago Annenberg Challenge, Barack Obama (or was he still Barry Soetoro?) helped fund "educational" activities of Bill Ayers, the 1960s terrorist who murdered at least one policeman with a bomb. What does that tell you about FactCheck's neutrality?
    
• Snopes is funded by George Soros, a pro-socialist billionaire and currency manipulator who boasts that he has overthrown at least two European countries. The editors of Snopes are Obama bundlers and one has even held an appointment in the Obama administration.
    
• The Fact Checker is a project of The Washington Post, a veritable media outlet for the Democrat Party.

No short-cut around visiting various sources and weighing the arguments. However, find the following sites quite helpful:

• Media Research Center (MRC) and its network of sites keep tabs on media bias.
  NewsBusters
  CNSNews.com
  MRCTV
  Business and Media Institute
  Culture and Media Institute
  TimesWatch
  MRC Action

If you have a favorite site for checking the veracity of what you hear from the media or the politicians, please let us know in the comments.

When Liberals Get Tough on Crime....

I see a common trope in the news that I call, When Liberals 'get tough on crime....'

• A kindergartener takes a 3/4" rubber GI Joe knife to school
• Seven-year-olds shoot at each other with "finger guns" while playing cops and robbers
• A teenage girl gives Midol to a classmate having menstrual cramps

...and they get suspensions and juvenile records.

• Or an Olympic rifle champion gets arrested for having his target rifle (with trigger lock and a locked bag) locked in the trunk of his car when picking up his child from school.
•  A man shoots an armed home invader and is sent to prison for illegally using a gun.

 When Liberals 'get tough on crime....' predicts the following:

• SWAT teams knocking down the doors of anybody who has ever been diagnosed with depression or anxiety (information courtesy of Obamacare) and who has a record of having applied to purchase a firearm (information courtesy of background check applications)
•  "Clean shoots" by police officers reacting to people startled out of their sleep and pointing flashlights at the intruders.

The second prediction reminds me of a little boy in Modesto, California, who was killed a few years ago by the "accidental discharge" of a shotgun pointed at his back while he laid, hands bound, on the floor during a legal (but mistaken) search of his grandfather's house.

What difference does homosexual marriage make?

JP: What difference does homosexual marriage make? How would someone getting married to someone else affect you in anyway? Never understood why we as conservatives are so hell bent on less government, but then turn around and try to twist government into a watchdog for religious or social dogma. If we want less government, then stay out of the bedroom. What 2 consenting adults do, in their own time, is none of your, or my business.

"Twisting"? 

• JP, you twist government into a watchdog for so-called homosexual rights. That twists government into a bigger government.
   
• You want to twist homosexual acts (the bedroom privacy sham) into the same thing as homosexual marriage. That twists logic.
   
• You twist government recognition of families that can create children into the same thing as a police state. That twists truth into a lie.
   
• You twist the effects on insurance rates, employment rights, and freedom of association into having no affect on others. That twists short-sightedness into a gag order.
   

In short, your cliches are just plain twisted.

Obama: You Didn't Build That

People think that Me-me-me-my-my-my-I-I-I-bama's speech makes sense only because his speechwriters sugarcoat false reasoning. His error stems from the hidden socialist dogma that the business is not responsible for the roads, utilities, regulators, delivered in tones of fake outrage. Rather, he implies, the contributions of employees, utility workers, bureaucrats, etc, add significant value to the business. This assumption deceives for two reasons.

First, the business pays, through taxes to the government, wages to employees, interest and fees to lenders, and dividends to stockholders, for all those things Ibama says contributed to building the business. A new business may pay afterwards instead of before, but it still pays. It says that if you pay somebody to do make something you thought of, they get all the credit, as though you had nothing to do with it.

This couldn't be more wrong. If you buy a painting, you own it. If you buy a pizza, you have the right to eat it. Likewise, if you pay for all those ancillary contributions, then you get the credit for building the business.

Second, all those external factors would exist whether you build the business or don't. The contribution is mutual because, without the business, unused roads and utilities would be failures due to lack of use and would be failures due to lack of sponsorship. The electric company, the construction companies, employees, and bureaucrats profit from the presence of the business.

By Ibama's reasoning, when you build that business, you get to take credit for all those other things, too. But Ibama is a committed Marxist, so he loses his sense of reality amid all the big words and false intellectualism. "You didn't build that" is sophistic: It sounds brilliant, but when you slow down and think, you hear the foolishness.

In Business, Take Time to Do the Calculations


Reference:  Weiser, Matt . California Parks Director Resigns Amid Scandal. Sacramento Bee. Friday, 20 July 2012.

As California balances between eternal debt and bankruptcy, the Democrats in Sacramento look for excuses to raise taxes and spending. One such excuse, the shortfall of funds to keep California State Parks open, has forced many volunteers into fundraising and forced local governments into shifting their own funds into keeping state parks open to  draw tourist dollars.

The Sacramento Bee found that a deputy director at State Parks "carried out a secret vacation buyout program for employees at department headquarters last year. That buyout cost the state more than $271,000." This led to a much larger find: The State Parks department his hiding $54 million in unspent funds.

State Parks Director Ruth Coleman resigned after the Bee published news of the stash. The employee who bought back vacation time had already been demoted and later resigned. His crime, in my opinion, discriminated between his friends at the headquarters and those who work equally hard in the field.

I believe the withholding of funds could only happen in concert with Democrat attempts to extort more taxes from the public. That's how Democrats do things in California government.

The gem in the original story follows:  For the sake of argument, let's assume we have two employees:

1. Mr. Buyout sells his vacation time back to the state.
   Mr. Vacation enjoys taking time off to go protest with OWS.



2. Vacation is earned over the course of the year.
   Both employees make $50/hour.



3. Both have 160 hours/month x 12 months/year (rounding) and 40 hours vacation

This means

• Mr. Buyout works 1920 hours for 1960 hours' pay.
  Mr. Vacation works 1880 hours for 1920 hours' pay. 



• Mr. Buyout makes $98,000.
  Mr. Vacation makes $96,000. 



• Mr. Buyout has an effective pay rate of $51.042 per hour.
  Mr. Vacation has an effective pay rate of $51.064 per hour.

Mr. Buyout actually makes 2 cents per hour less.

Two cents/hour is not much, but consider a couple more factors.

First, when you add in the effects of benefits and overhead, the difference multiplies to 3 to 4 cents per hour.  Employers love forcing employees to work overtime because the benefits are paid for by the first 1920 hours' labor. With benefits costing 50% to 100% of the base pay, that means employee overtime effectively costs 33%-50% less (assuming pay at straight time rates, if any).

On a tangent, managers often put their directs in a position where overtime is forced and vacation is denied.  Both practices hinder productivity and morale.  When employees forced to work lose unused vacation, it amounts to stealing.  Therefore, vacation buyouts often form an ethically necessary action.

Second, if you multiply 2 cents/hour over a year and thousands of employees, the added productivity and lowered effective cost create a good deal for the taxpayers.

Conclusion:  The state punished the fellow who conducted the buyouts for doing a good thing. THAT, dear friend, is California government, just as much as hiding funds to force increased taxes.  The business-related point is, "do the math."  The worker who violates procedure may have done so because it was right for the company and simply, ethically right.

Review: Our Favorite Sins

Todd Hunter's "Our Favorite Sins" has the right idea. For the most part, Hunter's insights are thought-provoking and inspiring. Many of his chapter start with specific examples of sins, only to veer away from the topic at hand to discuss sin in a more general sense. This lack of organization would annoy if it weren't for the strength of the rest of his writing.

I found it difficult to put down the book as Hunter found more and more ways to explain his main point - that our evil desires come from within and must be reordered if we are to deal with and quit our sins. Hunter uses the example of Joseph, whose desires were reordered in such a way that he was able to think of God first when Potiphar's wife attempted to seduce him. He refused her.

Hunter says that we can refuse sin, too, if we reorder our desires. Hunter's suggestions, which he gives in the last quarter of the book, clearly show his Anglican background, however. While reading and memorizing prayers, listening to Scripture at church and participating in communion are all good things, Hunter seems to place their importance over that of the Bible itself, of reading the Bible for oneself. And his insistence that these "spiritual disciplines" be done on a regular daily basis morning, day and night would likely have most Christians overwhelmed.

I understand the importance of making certain things regular parts of our lives in order to grow spiritually and stay strong, but Hunter never addresses the possibility that those things can be taken too far - to the point of creating a works-based faith. He never really seems to get to the heart of solution, either. His insights on our sinful desires are wonderful, but there is so much more to be said and done beyond the few spiritual disciplines Hunter focuses on. I know this from personal experience.

So, if you can read the beginning of Hunter's book by itself, or read the whole book with what I've written in mind, you'll be able to take a lot away from this book. Just be careful.

*This book was given to me for free in exchange for my honest review of it.

Liberals Misunderstand America's Melting Pot

The melting pot is just an implement. It brings to mind a stew, since it has been contrasted with a salad bowl. However, I think the correct image comes from metallurgy, where various ingredients should blend to form an alloy such as steel.

Staying with the stew pot (I think more people can relate to cooking than to metallurgy), we have three cooks brewing a terrible mess. 

One cook, the conservative, wants to maintain the stew's distinctive balance of flavors, the recipe that made the stew a distinctively American stew.

The second cook, the newcomer, comes in numbers that upsets the balance of flavors and, in fact, refuses to abandon the flavor that he left behind. He sees only the rich nutrient content of the American stew and fails to value the recipe that made it great. That is, he brings the values that caused the conditions from which he fled and clashes with values that made America great. While conservative cooks welcome newcomers, an excess of newcomers can turn the stew into a completely different dish.

The third cook, the liberal, rejects the Judeo-Christian broth on which the soup was based. He waters down and neutralizes the distinct American flavor. He tries every other continent's distinctive dish; after all "change is good." Doing so, he leaves a hole into which the newcomers add the flavors of their impoverished, oppressed, corrupt, fan-ruled countries of origin.

We don't have a situation where we neutrally teach children about other cultures' recipes. Liberals rule the State Church (the education system). They use their power to belittle and suppress the conservative flavor. In its place, they teach the recipes of materialistic humanism and even the recipes of the newcomers. Thus, we see generations of agnostics, pictures of schoolchildren bowing in Muslim prayer, and children becoming "gay" before it is even developmentally appropriate for them to know about sex.

By suppressing the conservative values that redirected rights from the state toward the individual and by encouraging those whose native cultures produce totalitarianism, liberalism -- both political and religious -- threatens to destroy American and that for which she stands -- or used to stand.

The analogy holds up for the metallurgical melting pot, too. With the right ingredients, the product can resist oxidation, spring back into shape, or separate a nucleus from its cell's membrane. With careless formulation, it can be easily dulled, can oxidize overnight, or can even be toxic -- but that's assuming you're willing to separate it from all the unmelted dross. And liberals aren't willing.

Birthers May Finally Get Their Day in Court

The question may turn out to be, “Which Republican candidate can best beat Hillary?”

According to an action letter from Proof Positive via Conservative Contacts and the web site of Attorney OrlyTaitz, a Georgia Judge has issued a subpoena demanding Barack Obama appear in court January 26 and produce his original long form birth certificate, passport records, college registration records, and more.

Georgia became the first state to pursue Obama ineligibility complaints, and the end result may keep Barack Obama off the Georgia 2012 ballot.  A number of Georgia voters filed lawsuits questioning Barack Hussein Obama's eligibility to appear on the Georgia Presidential ballot.

Georgia Secretary of State Brian Kemp's office decided to pursue five of the ineligibility complaints.  Each complaint argues that Barack Hussein Obama II is ineligible to appear on the 2012 Georgia Presidential ballot. Secretary Kemp assigned 5 different hearings under five different judges so that the complaints could move forward.

Failure to appear on the Georgia ballot could bring Obama devastating media and cost him 15 electoral votes.

Dr. Orly Taitz, attorney for one of the plaintiffs in the Georgia eligibility cases working their way rapidly through the courts, posted a copy of what is reportedly a subpoena, issued by Judge Michael Malihi of Georgia.

Georgia Judge Michael Malihi ordered Obama's attorneys to appear in court January 26, holding that, according to state law, every federal and state candidate must prove eligibility for office – including Barack Obama.

The White House's badly forged "birth certificate" has not ended the debate on Barack Obama's eligibility. Rather, it has opened the door for further allegations of fraud and ineligibility.  The subpoena demands that Barack Obama personally appear in court on January 26 and bring with him a a "birther's" dream list of official documents that will prove or disprove his eligibility for office.

Unlike previous cases, where only certain documents were requested or discussed, this subpoena issued by Judge Malihi includes every document that serious eligibility experts have been discussing from the beginning. 

The list requires Obama to produce each of the following:

• Any and all certified birth records including a long form birth certificate.
• Certified school/university registration records. Certified immigration/naturalization records.
• Certified passport records
• Redacted certified Social Security card applications for each of the aliases and other legal names used by Barack Obama, including but not limited to his legal surname when adopted by step-father Lolo Soetoro

In addition, Judge Malihi has reportedly also subpoenaed Hawaii Health Department officials and commanded them to produce an original certified copy of Obama's long form birth certificate.

In an order written January 3, 2012, Malihi ruled that Georgia state law is very clear – any candidate for federal or state office must meet the qualifications of that office and that Georgia electors have the right to challenge those qualifications in court.  Accordingly, Malihi flatly denied Obama's motion to dismiss and scheduled a hearing for January 26.

Obama has some of the highest-rent attorneys in the country working to keep the question of his eligibility for office out of court.  And no wonder, because whether he was born in Hawaii or not, according to binding precedents laid out by the Supreme Court, Barack Hussein Obama II does not qualify as a natural born Citizen.

Georgia resident Kevin R. Powell wrote in his complaint, "Barack Hussein Obama II has publicly admitted his father Barack Obama Sr. was a Kenyan native and a British subject whose citizenship status was governed by The British Nationality Act of 1948.  Barack Obama Sr. never became a U.S. citizen.  Therefore, Barack Hussein Obama II is not now and never can be a natural born citizen of the United States…"

The U.S. Constitution very clearly requires, in a unique usage and application of the term, that the president must be a "natural born Citizen" to be eligible for the nation's highest office.  "Natural born Citizen" is demonstrably held by the Founders in Article II, Section 1 as distinct and different from "Citizen" and even "native born Citizen" – that is, born under jus soli, on native soil.

In the Founding era, the common law view held that a natural born Citizen was born within United States territory to parents who were themselves United States Citizens.

In the 1875 unanimous Supreme Court ruling of Minor v. Happerset, the Supreme Court explicitly held a "natural born Citizen" to be a Citizen whose parents were both U.S. Citizens at the time of the person's birth. 

This finding was, and continues to be, fully consistent with U.S. history in Supreme Court case decisions and with laws enacted and enforced by the United States Congress.

By Barack Obama's own admission, his father was a native of Kenya and was NEVER a U.S. Citizen.  Therefore, Barack Hussein Obama II would, under long-standing custom, common law, and Supreme Court precedent, automatically be ineligible to hold the office of President of the United States.

The January 26th hearing should be a blockbuster.  It is the first in the nation that proposes to consider on the merits whether Barack Hussein Obama II is eligible to be President of the United States of America.

This article was re-written from a letter from Americans United for Freedom,

http://www.AmericansUnitedForFreedom.org.