A few odds and ends while waiting for Mitt Romney to sew up the Republican nomination for President. The Republican "base"--meaning the people outside Washington, D.C.--who want anybody but the moderate Romney, will eventually weary and accept him as the nominee. What the people want is rarely of any concern to the power brokers in Washington.
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For more evidence of what I wrote in the last sentence above, witness the Obama administration. Here's a question for you: what do Evergreen Energy, Eners, Amonix, and Solyndra all have in common? They are all "green" industries which the Obama administration wasted hundreds of millions (billions? I don't know the exact amount) of dollars of taxpayer "stimulus" money, and all four of them have either filed for bankruptcy or have recently severely downsized (three of them in the last week). The people of America don't want green energy; if they did, it could survive on its own in the open market. But this is a perfect example of arrogant, liberal elitism. They think they know what's best for us so they are going to ram it down our throats whether we want it or not (remember Obamacare?). Mr. Obama patronizingly told us during his State of the Union address that America (read: taxpayer dollars spent by liberal politicians) needs to "invest in the industries of the future." Yeah.
How does Barack Obama know what "the industries of the future" are?
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Speaking of matters regarding the planet, it's 19 degrees in Dalian right now. Yesterday it was minus 50 in Fairbanks, Alaska. Debbie and I almost moved to Fairbanks once. I would have liked it; I'm not sure she would have. A study just released by (apparently) credible sources (the University of East Anglia's Climate Research Unit was involved) claims that global warming stopped 15 years ago and that we may actually be facing a "mini ice age" (there is some NASA evidence supporting this as well). Of course, "scientific studies" are being done all the time, proving all sorts of things, so it's really hard to know what's going on out there. Keep in mind that science can be a political football; most of the money for these studies come from government grants, so it behooves the researcher to find something wrong so that he can continue his "research", thus needing more government grant money. That thought is not original with me, it's widely known in academia. It's also interesting that most of the people/groups that support man-made global warming are on the left side of the political spectrum. That, in itself, doesn't disprove man-made global warming, but if they are right about it, it's the only thing the left is right about. I find it interesting that all of this hoopla about global warming started right after the fall of the Soviet Union. I've said it before, and I still believe it: Marxism didn't die after the fall of communism. They simply changed colors and now support the anti-industry, anti-capitalist "green" movement. And they are getting as much help as possible from "useful idiots" like Al Gore and Barack Obama.
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Police fired tear gas and arrested about 300 people in an "Occupy" rally in Oakland this weekend. Can anybody recall how many hundreds of people were arrested during the Tea Party rallies a couple of years ago? Do not be surprised if there is violence on the streets in this year's election. Obama is preaching class envy. Envy leads to hatred. The left has no moral absolutes and hatred leads to violence. It's coming, and soon, to a street near you.
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Two men were shot at a mall in Visalia, California a few days ago; two more outside an apartment building not far from the mall. There was also a police standoff with a man recently in south Visalia, who had duct-taped his girlfriend to a chair and was assaulting her. Don't blame me. I preached for four years in Visalia, California, and obviously somebody wasn't listening. I don't know who these people were who were doing the shooting, etc., but I do know one thing for certain--they were not faithful New Testament Christians.
But, of course, more Christianity will be detrimental to the United States. Everybody knows that. Yes, who needs a country where there is more love, joy, peace, longsuffering, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control (Galatians 5:22-23). No, what we need is more adultery, fornication, uncleanness, lewdness, idolatry, sorcery, hatred, contentions, jealousies, outbursts of wrath, selfish ambitions, dissensions, heresies, envy, murders, drunkenness, and revelries (Galatians 5:19-21). That's obviously what will save America. It's "progressive"...
Has anybody (but me) noticed that, since Christianity has been attacked, mocked, ridiculed, ostracized, and effectively removed from the education system in the United States that there has been a whole lot less of the former (love, joy, etc.) and a whole lot more of the latter (adultery, fornication, etc.)? Amazing coincidence...
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A recent Gallup poll says that, concluding Obama's 3rd year as President, 80% of Democrats approve of the job he is doing and only 12% of Republicans do. That makes Obama the most polarizing President in American history (at least since such polls have been conducted. He also won the prize for his 1st and 2nd years in office.) This from the man who said he was going to heal all divisions in the country and bring us together. But, of course, every politician says that and none can do it. The fact is, always has been, and always will be, that people are different, and they disagree on many, many things, and will never agree on most things. That's human nature. What Obama--and politicians in general have done--is politicize these differences. They've gotten government involved in supporting one side or another and thus creating bitterness and more visible, active division in the country. We now fight for government largesse. There is nothing more diametrically opposite the founding principles of the United States than that. Government should be settling disputes (protecting people's property), not creating them by setting one group of citizens against another. But the latter is what government has become and Barack Obama is simply the best at it in American history.
Here's an assignment for you. Read the Constitution and see if you find anything in there about political parties. Then especially read Article 1, Section 8 (the powers given to Congress) and see if there is any power given to Congress that allows it to support one group of citizens against another (except law abiders vs. criminals, of course). The powers the Founders gave the federal government were neutral--they benefited all people equally. There is not one power that allows Party A to take money from the people of Party B and use it for Party A's pet causes. The American Founders didn't believe in political parties because parties are divisive and force people of one "party" to support causes they do not believe in when their "party" is not in power. The Founders had a word for that sort of thing--tyranny. Our current government is expert at it. We can thank Abraham Lincon for that. He started it. Well, actually, he didn't start it, he only made it official by forcing it on a large segment of his country that had gotten tired of it. Party politics (North vs. South) produced the American Civil War! And it wasn't slavery that started it, it was money. And power. And patronage.
So, yeah, given that principle, Barack Obama can claim he's walking in the the footsteps of old Abe.