Monday, September 19, 2016

Columnist & Christian-Persecution

Eblen pooh-poohs Governor Bevin

Lexington Herald-Leader columnist Tom Eblen (18 September) latched onto what he called “[Ky. Governor] Bevin’s ramblings about the need to ‘shed blood’ if Clinton is elected” for one of his periodic rants concerning the evils of republicans/evangelicals. The context involved a tirade against such elements as Limbaugh and Fox News, crediting them with turning the GOP into a “white nationalist party” as if the Democrat Party isn’t at least 75% white, nationalist or not.   

He actually was citing Hillary’s “basket of deplorables” as the current repubs – folks who are “racist, sexist, homophobic, xenophobic, Islamophobic” and irredeemably so…hopeless cases.  Despite the fact that everyone besides Eblen knows Bevin was not talking about an imminent bloodletting, it is instructive to see from where Bevin could be coming, i.e., a look at both current events and history. The major thrust of the column concerned persecution of Christians.  

The media, including the uber-liberal H-L, has constantly related accounts for years regarding the beheading of Christians in Muslim-governed countries, unarmed people slaughtered like animals, as over the recent weekend in NYC and Elizabeth, N.J., not to mention 9/11.  Given a modicum of power, as is happening in Europe, Islamists would do the same in the U.S., their terrorist tactics just the beginning.  Clinton has announced that hundreds of thousands of Muslims would be admitted to the U.S. in her presidency.  That’s not a “Bevin rambling,” just a truth. The bloodshed of Christians is already in the U.S.  

The lessons of history are instructive.  Those Christians who withstood the rigors of the “Mayflower episode” in the early seventeenth century were fleeing Great Britain account religious persecution occasioned by their refusal to pay homage to the official Church of England.  That’s not even ancient history.  In that day, Christians were burned alive at the stake or hanged.

To teach Mayflower Christians a lesson, Britain later deployed the strongest navy and at least the second strongest army in the world, occasioning bloodshed on a grand scale…again, not even ancient history.  The colonists/Christians paid dearly in blood and treasure in that eight-years of hell in the 1780s.  Jesus told his disciples to arm themselves with swords, and that’s precisely what the George Washington-era Christians did to save this nation then and also in 1812-15.  

Flash forward to 1861.  To save the nation, Lincoln and citizens acting largely upon Christian convictions (observing Christian beliefs as initiating and constructing the Constitution) repelled those who would split the nation and in the process freed the slaves.  The cost was incomprehensible—an average of 340 deaths of mostly white males per day…for four long years.  This was a bloody Christian-persecution matter of only 150 or so years ago.

Eblen's approach to blood/guts motivation as a less sanguinary but equally vindictive matter was seen ten years ago when he as then-H-L managing editor in collusion with the editorial folks attempted to destroy the University of the Cumberlands, which had expelled a homosexual student not for his orientation but for “outing” it, actually flaunting it in social media along with pictures of men kissing each other. The private school had that right, as noted in its student-handbook, and as a “Christian” matter as outlined in scripture. At the time, neither the military nor the Boy Scouts allowed homosexuals to serve as a practical matter.

On seven days of a nine-day period, the paper made the subject front-page-above-the-fold stuff, positioned in the area devoted to the most important news of the world. In addition to the huge front-page segments, pictures, and headlines, the paper dedicated a huge plethora of columns and pictures to the subject on its interior pages, all in the front (A) “news, editorial, op-ed” sections.

Eblen furnished the date/information concerning a statewide protest to be held at UC, Williamsburg, Ky. On the evening TV- news accounts of that “protest effort,” there seemed to be more interviews with law enforcement people standing around sort of slack-jawed obviously wondering why they were there than with the participants, maybe 35. The UC Christians were persecuted by Eblen and his gang...or so they thought.

The same thing happened four years ago when the paper attempted to bankrupt Hands On Originals, a local shirt/sweater-printing company that refused, as a Christian-beliefs matter, to produce T-shirts for the local LGBTQ organization. The paper even advertised a grand “protest” downtown nowhere near the HOO location that was virtually ignored by the citizens. There was a lawsuit, of course, and the Court ruled in favor of HOO.

So...there's Bevin's “rambling” and Eblen's “rambling,” the former a credible warning, the latter a mean-spirited bit of hypocritical hogwash.

And so it goes.
Jim Clark

Thursday, September 15, 2016

Election-year Limericks

Election campaigns can be such a bore, especially the quadrennial ones vis-a-vis the presidency, when lies seem most often to supplant truths as part of the standard to use in determining trust or distrust of the candidates. Observing the lowly limerick might be a lighthearted respite from the grind of listening to boring speeches filled with hyperbole and promises, most of which will never be kept after a winner takes office and discovers he must engage with both the Congress and the Courts to get anything done...or undone. A few limericks:

The Donald called her “Crooked Hillary,”
To whom the truth was her worst enemy
**She dodged truth like the plague
**As something far too vague
To trust it to the dumb citizenry.

He said he would make U.S. great again
As if right then it was as black as sin
**But little did he know
**All candidates thus so
Have always said the same...rarely begin.

Islamaphobes she said the Donald drew
To all his rallies...wicked through and through –
**Of Muslims she thought well
**Despite their wish of hell
For her and all her apparatchik-crew.

Trump's crowds were huge, just like his hair,
Protesters in it were not rare
**They tried to shut him down,
**The greatest show in town,
But quickly given quite a scare.

The Donald said McCain was no hero,
That people who got caught were kinda slow,
**But ere the votes cause fact
**Those words he must retract
As nothing more than hot air his to blow.

She said the Donald would be dangerous,
Would start a war account a simple fuss,
**He said she was too weak
**To give ISIS a tweak,
Much less a blow to bring on quietus.

She said Trump would protect his rhyming part
If ever Putin said he was not smart,
**Trump said that Clinton lied
**From morn till night betide,
And for the working poor she had no heart.

A government of Trump would just be rump
Opponents said in speeches on the stump,
**Aides running it each day
**With Trump always away
Just making deals more cash to to Trump to pump.

She said that Trump and Putin had conspired!
To hack both of her servers they had hired
**A fifth-grade prodigy
**Who had no tech degree
And so her own experts she quickly fired.

Bad vibes is what the Hill said Bernie had...
Though not admitting it this made her mad
**She said it was her turn
**Amid near meltdown burn,
She said old Bern was chauvinistic cad.

Hillary said she regretted she said
Half Trump's supporters deplored and head-dead,
**Percent eighty-nine
**She said would be fine...
The Donald just laughed...which made her see red.

Tisket-a-tasket Donald's weird basket
Holding some cases Clinton called basket,
**With xenophobes piled there
**And racists compiled there,
Donald just smiled there—she blew a gasket!

She said her basement server was okay,
But F-B-I director said no way,
**So then she blamed poor Powell,
**Who put up raucous howl,
From disbelief, then, no one could she sway.

She said she never, ever told a lie
But mentioned sad Benghazi with a sigh,
**She said what now the difference...
**Protesters simply jumped a fence...
And wielding signs bashed only four to die.

The Donald said illegals had to go,
That he would chase them down quite to-and-fro
**As if he really could
**Or even that he would
Since millions of them help this country grow.

Trump said Obama was not native-born,
That Hillary all truth would just suborn,
**Odd couple they had formed
**And government deformed...
Throughout the world invited naught but scorn.

She claimed her server was for privacy,
Her e-mails not for everyone to see,
**Too bad she just forgot
**That e-mails never rot,
To all the world top-secrets now are free.

Some citizens she called deplorable,
By contrast said she was adorable...
**To vote republican
**Meant brain that needed scan,
Assuming one be found explorable.

Some said she lacked lucidity
While others charged stupidity
**But all agreed Hill knew
**Already whom to screw –
The Sanders-gang unceasingly.

The Clintonite was said to be ahead,
She claimed her prime opponent's head was dead,
**Her charge—he lacked experience
**That coupled with a brain so dense
Meant USA was doomed if by him led.

As secretary of the State
And public figure quite sedate,
**A million miles she flew,
**Said nothing that was true...
With snickers round the world her fate.

He said he would construct a southern wall,
That Mexico would ante for it all,
**But Mexicans said, “Whoa,
**To pay we will forgo,”
Insisted that the Donald would install.

Broadcasted live on C-Span—perjury,
Caught under oath with falsehood—Hillary,
**She lied there in Congress,
**With charges no progress,
Loretta Lynching not—Hillary free!

For years she longed to be the president,
She said a woman's turn was evident,
**But basement server sank her,
**Erased e-mails betrayed her,
While twisting in the wind she wailed lament.

With braggadocio the Donald speaks
And talks of all the wonders that he wreaks,
**But he misspoke badly,
**Punctured his pride sadly,
His word about McCain with venom reeks.

The N-C-A-A cut N-C right out
Since transgender guys could not hang about
**In womens' restrooms where
**No urinals found there...
Ordered they go where their sex not in doubt.

Powell's e-mail hacker brought light to payback
To Clinton, who caused him unwelcome flack
**He said she was not nice,
**Had greed as profound vice...
With Trump a disgrace, he cut them no slack.

A basket of deplorable
With sanity improbable,
**She said supported Trump,
**Their brains a solid lump
That constitutes insoluble.

The homophobes, said Hillary,
Are Trump supporters, hatefully,
**They are deplorable,
**Are not charitable,
Do not observe diversity.

Yeah...I know – apologies! And so it goes.
Jim Clark

Tuesday, September 13, 2016

Political Potpourri

The professional football (NFL) season started Sunday on the fifteenth anniversary of 9/11.  I watched the pre-game ceremony in both New York (Jets and Cincinnati) and Dallas (Cowboys and NY Giants).  In both locales, the flag was stretched the entire length of the field and held off the ground by a multitude of people.  In New York, it bobbled up and down…so what!  In Dallas, it was held taut without an unintended squiggle.  The national anthem was literally butchered by a soul-singer in New York.  In Dallas, it was played excellently on the trumpet by a gifted musician.  The approaches/words speak for themselves.  The tune needs no embellishing.  Just the notes, ma’am, just the notes.

As if it mattered one whit, some of the players chose the day to exhibit their political/social stances, having been encouraged by Kaepernick, black quarterback of the Chargers, earlier during the exhibition season for not standing during the performance of the national anthem.  Some of the players also raised their fists.  Supposedly, this was to draw attention to injustices a la the menu of the “Black Lives Matter” movement.  Actually, at least for some if not most, the actions simply expressed their hatred for this country, in which mostly white spectators pay great gobs of greenbacks to see mostly black millionaires beat the stuffing out of each other…quite an irony.

Much is being made by the media reporters/gurus (is there a difference anymore?) about Hillary Clinton’s health problems at the Manhattan 9/11 observance/memorial.  She apparently fainted briefly and had to be helped into her vehicle for a short trip to daughter Chelsea’s house, where she apparently recovered, at least well enough to later be seen again in public.  It turns out that she had known since Friday that she was suffering from pneumonia.  She should have been cooling it until she gets better, especially at her age.  If she pushes it she may suffer a preliminary relapse instead of one that comes after this ailment is thought to be over and returns too soon to the grind…any grind.  

Speaking of which, in his excellent, just-published book (and major motion picture), Hillary's America, highly respected author/political analyst Dinesh D'Souza quoted famous (or infamous) eugenicist Margaret Sanger: “We are paying for and even submitting to the dictates of an ever increasing, unceasingly spawning class of human beings who should never have been born at all.” This is the elitist approach to the general population taken by the current “progressives,” of whom Hillary Clinton and Bernie Sanders have been the highest-profile agitators for more than a year. These are the folks—well, just half, she said—who make up the famous Trump-supporting “basket of deplorables” in her well-teleprompted speech (not off the cuff stuff) a few days ago. Since she is guaranteed 95-99% of the black vote and most of the Latino vote, she was talking about white citizens, Trump supporters. And to think of the heat Trump took (by Hillary?) over what he said about some Mexicans! Hypocrisy, thy name is Hillary! She called the white folks racists, sexists, homophobes, xenophobes and (worst of all—gasp) Islamaphobes. These are Hillary's typical white people.

Speaking of which as D'Souza mentioned, it was southern democrats (immediate ancestors of the “progressives”) who were determined to keep blacks on the plantation...just give them something to get their votes and keep them quiet. Lyndon Johnson referred to them as N******s. Senator Bobby Byrd, besides being a Ku Klux Klan honcho in the 1940s, wrote in a letter to Mississippi Senator Bilbo back in the day that he would never fight beside blacks and referred to them as “race mongrels.” The elitists such as Hillary, Bernie and Obama know what is best for everyone (but not the Wall Street bankers). It's called socialism...rule by the oligarchs. Completely taken for granted by the elite “progressives,” blacks have sold their souls. They are whom Sanger had in mind for extinction.

And so it goes.
Jim Clark

Tuesday, September 06, 2016

Minister Confused by Sexuality

Actually a rather simple subject, at least for most people

In an op-ed of 03 September in the Lexington Herald-Leader, Presbyterian minister Robert Cunningham, citing a study, asserted that sexual orientation as an innate biological property (born that way) is “not supported by scientific evidence.”  The Bible, conversely, seems to insist that there are exclusively males and females, with no other genders, transgenders, homosexuals, lesbians, queers, etc., signifying, even though perverted behaviors common to these groups are profoundly condemned.  

Cunningham later doubled-down on his declaration: “To put it bluntly, nobody is ‘straight’.”    Written for shock value or not, he indicated that people who think they are of a specific sex are mistaken. Or, given the consensual definition of “straight,” everyone is homosexual or some other kind of sexual, quite a stretch, though he explained that this applies only if “straight” is considered more than heterosexual-attraction, as if attraction preempts quite observable biology.  

Cunningham represents the politically correct approach to somehow normalizing the LGBTQ population lest these folks be offended, never mind that birth-certificate data indicate only male or female.  Clinically, any other classification is impossible, a stretch of the imagination too far, meaning that another classification is merely claimed, not born, comporting with the biblical approach.  

Cunningham insisted that all people are haunted by their sexual desires, thoughts, secrets and practices, knowing that something is “off,” whatever that means.  However, the minister can speak only for himself but not for everyone else, not in matters that private.  He may have heard some weird things in counseling sessions, for instance, but they could hardly be held as universally applicable.  

Cunningham: “In other words, the data leave us searching for different ways to explain the immense pain that accompanies human sexuality.”  Whose human sexuality?  There seem to be a few hundred million folks who aren’t particularly pained by their sexuality – might even enjoy it.  Previous to this statement, he mentioned the “alarming mental health crisis within the LGBTQ population,” notably suggesting anxiety, depression, substance abuse and suicide, all of which are problems in the general population, not just confined to the LGBTQ community.  Just check the problems in especially drug-ridden, poverty-stricken eastern Kentucky that comprise everyday news items.  

Cunningham: “It may come as a surprise, but the Bible actually shares a complex view of sexuality.” This is the most outrageous statement in the op-ed. Essentially, sex is mentioned in two ways in the Bible, the normal one in which the admonition is always to a man and woman, who must be married to “have sex,” and be fruitful and multiply. The other is to condemn anything else like anal/oral sex, adultery and bestiality. In Matthew 11, Jesus held up Sodom and Gomorrah as the standard by which to measure evil regarding cities.

As a cultural matter, one need only read Plato, Aristotle and Socrates – homosexuals/pedophiles – to see how a nation is headed when it becomes obsessed with perverted sex, the Greek empire long since gone to the ash-heap of history. A current example is in TIME magazine in an article about a transgender woman with a female partner (both lesbians?), who starts the medical effort to become a man, decides she/he wants a baby, stops the testosterone gig long enough to conceive artificially ($12,000 worth), has the baby, then restarts the male-creator regimen, so the child will have both mother and father in one package. Lurid? You bet! The grossest picture shows her “chest-feeding” the infant.

This current obsession with the LGBTQ population, especially in the “mainline denominations” (most evangelicals justly horrified), is hard to understand because there's nothing to understand in the first place. Until about 1973, homosexuality was officially considered a mental illness by the professional psychology community. For instance, until Obama came along homosexuals (mentally unacceptable) were not tolerated in the military.

No clinical explanation contrary-wise has ever been offered. All one has to do to become officially homosexual, bisexual, transgender or queer (whatever that is) is simply affirm that to be true. This is sort of like a Boy Scout announcing he's a Navy Seal, and VOILA! everyone genuflects before him.

And so it goes.
Jim Clark

Friday, September 02, 2016

Debate Moderators or Narcissists

Debate-Season is nigh and there’s been much back-and-forth among the candidates and the news-people, though news per se is out the window now as commentators, sometimes masquerading as reporters, seem to be stealing the media.  This is especially true of the cable networks, which have an advantage over the long-established biggies since they are 24/7/7.  

The crux of the problem lies with the choosing of moderators, an especially thorny problem since according to the polls the public believes neither of the candidates nor the media is honest.  In the Activist Post on 19 April 2016, writer Joe Jankowski, quoting the Associated Press, asserted that only 6% of the citizens trust the media, so whoever might apply from that venue is subject to suspicion.  

According to CNN on 31 August, Clinton and Trump have, respectively, unfavorability ratings of 59% and 60%, meaning that a large majority of voters equally don’t trust either one to occupy the presidency.  Add that to the unfavorability rating of 94% for the media and what’s a voter to do?  

The candidates constantly make speeches the people don’t believe and the media constantly give reports of them that the people don’t believe, essentially because they believe the media have agendas and are more interested in somehow “fixing” the election than honestly describing the respective campaigns.  

The debates might actually be worth watching, if only to see how the candidates behave themselves and, of course, whether or not they seem knowledgeable about the many issues and problems of the day, both domestically and internationally.  Currently, both Clinton and Trump seem more interested in mutual character-assassination than anything else, which makes one wonder if they have little to offer otherwise.  

No debate-moderator should be a member of the media this time.  It has been only too graphic lately to see how the media try to campaign rather than be objectively seeking the truth.  Think Fox’s Meghan Kelly in the first Republican dust-up last year attacking Trump about women, virtually gnashing her teeth and being just short of hysteria on the non-subject.  

Or think of “powder-puffing” it with respect to Clinton and NBC, ABC, and CBS.  Newsies are attention-crazy and will argue with candidates or even help them along sometimes, depending on the candidate and circumstances.  Think Martha Raddatz helping a smirking Joe Biden in the veep debate in 2012 or Candy Crowley torpedoing Romney.  

And then, of course, there’s Dan Rather (CBS at the time), who made up an elaborate humongous lie (remember the “fatal” typewriter) about George Bush in an effort to deny him the presidency.  This caused some firings (even Rather, eventually) at CBS.  Rather also tried to sabotage GHW Bush years before, advertising his intent to bring him down on his evening news program, only to make a buffoon of himself.  

Media representatives are totally unacceptable as moderators. Remember Chris Matthews (MSNBC) pacing back and forth like a drill sergeant and firing away at the wannabes, his leg probably tingling at his own verbosity.  There are exceptions but most TV folks seem more interested in furthering their careers by one-upping the candidates and thus proving superior intellect.  

People who might actually be objective—former judges, for instance—would be much better possibilities as moderators.  Whereas they would command a certain respect from both public and candidates, the news-group and the candidates currently hold each other in mutual contempt.  They distrust each other to an even greater extent than the public distrusts them both.  

The loser in the current debate-format is the viewer/listener.  The moderators, besides being biased, are unable to demand a modicum of decorum, with the candidates arguing among themselves and with the moderators—one huge shouting match at times—and time limits are ignored by all parties.   

There has to be a better way.  

And so it goes.
Jim Clark