Presidential lies

When Clinton lied and Republicans screamed, Democrats acted like they couldn't understand what our problem was. Now, Democrats are screaming that Mr. Bush lied and we're trying to ignore it and sweep it under the rug just like they did. The Grand Old Party ought to be better than that. I've always thought of us as the upright party. We don't dance very well, but we stand up and look problems like Social Security in the eye. If Mr. Bush did something wrong, then one of the best things that he could do for our country would be to set a good example and show that he is not above justice. I don't believe that justice ought to call for him stepping down.

With Mr. Clinton, our country showed that we expect politicians to lie to us. Democrats, you wouldn't let us get rid of Clinton for lying. Your side won. There is a new law in Washington. Our Chief Executive lying to us is now OK. Those are the rules. You made them. And now you're whining because you don't like them. Oh, well. Sorry. We didn't like them either.

Death with Dignity

The love of the Lord never ceases, his mercies never come to an end.
I don't know if I would have started watching "House" if it hadn't been for that first episode. I had recorded it. When I couldn't sleep, I got up and watched it over and over. My reaction to it was really strange. I felt comforted, fathered. Isn't that wierd. I seem to think that it was right before Christmas, though it might have been in the summer. Whenever. I was hurting. I couldn't tell anybody how or why because I didn't understand myself. The fictional Dr. Greg House, who reminds me a lot of my grandfather, in that program said something that I wanted to hear over and over. You don't die with dignity. To paraphrase: Whether you're 6 or 60, death is always painful and messy; but it's never dignified. You live with dignity, not die with it. I needed to hear that. No matter how much I plot and plan to take my own life with as little pain as possible, every way is gonna be horrible. It probably won't be clean and antiseptic. I'm no Marilyn Monroe. Swallowing so many pills so fast always makes me want to puke whether or not that has anything to do with the chemical composition of the pills. I can just picture waking up in the hospital and being told how somebody found me lying in my own vomit. Disgusting. There's an image you don't forget. Sex is good. Death is bad. That's why God made our bodies such that they really enjoy sex and really don't enjoy death.

Letterman vs. O'Reilly - Coming Conflict

Back in Intro. to Political Science at the University of Arkansas, a really fantastic professor taught something of the histories and political systems of France, Britain and the U.S., among other countries. As is probably obvious when you look at the rest of this site, just staying alive and well takes me a lot of conscious effort, day after day after day. But, I do actually think about other things. For many years, I've worried about the politics in our country. Something that long ago professor taught us has come back a thousand times. The reason that the U.S. and Britain have had such long-lasting, stable governments is, if I remember right, not entirely because of any brilliance in the political system of either country. A lot of the success of these two political systems has been due largely to the simple fact that both countries had populations that largely agreed for the most part politically. Upon hearing this, we looked at our professor like he was insane. He qualified his statement by reminding us of the difference between political parties in our country and in France, where there are scores of political parties, with very sharp ideological differences. Well, my professor said that in 1987. Since then, his words have come back to me again and again. It seems like France, though I keep track of foreign politics even less than I keep track of domestic, is coming together and America is tearing herself apart. Urban divorcing itself from rural.
Last night, I turned on the TV just before West Wing and heard something on Dateline that was disturbing to me. A reporter was talking about the most talked about subjects in the blogosphere (or whatever you call it). He briefly cited a couple of political issues and then seemed to center in on a recent meeting between Bill O'Reilly and David Letterman. This reporter said things that I found to be very offensive. He made a point about pluralism that didn't even come up between Letterman and O'Reilly. He seemed to say that I could respond on www.dateline.msnbc.com. I thought this might be better, though. Christmas is essentially a Christian holiday. To take Christ out of it is intolerant of our religion. It's like my observing Hannukah, but demanding that the observance of Hannukah be changed to accommodate me. I mean, Muslims and Buddhists and whoever else don't have to celebrate Christmas. It is, after all, a Christian holiday. I would understand if they didn't want to. But, they don't have the right to try and change the day we celebrate the coming of the Christ to suit their tastes.

I don't generally watch Letterman. I find him kind of stupid. Neither he nor Leno would know good interview technique if it crawled up and bit them. I did find a recording of the interview, however. I transcribed some little bits of it.

"Our first guest is the host of cable television's #1 news program, the O'Reilly Factor. It can be seen 5 nights a week on FOX News."

Would it not seem reasonable that maybe spending a lot of time insulting and basically calling stupid the host of cable television's #1 news program would be found to be very insulting to a large portion of the country, ya know, the people who make him the #1 news program? Did you think that by making fun of him, you would somehow bring us to our senses? I know you all don't agree, but we believe we have very good reasons for the things that we believe. Calling our leader, and thereby calling us, stupid is not productive. It's not really very bright.

I wasn't aware that this had happened.
You weren't aware of the big, giant controversy over Christmas.

You know, I rarely listen to Bill O'Reilly; but I've heard a lot about this issue this year. I guess I probably heard it on Christian radio. When, he calls it a big, giant controversy, that might be a slight exaggeration. I had been hearing a lot about this, though. How did Dave miss it?

Well, I ignore stuff like that. It doesn't really affect me. I go ahead and do what I want to do.

Do you remember the book 1984? Remember Newspeak, wasn't that what they called it? Orwell made the point so well that by changing the language and history of a culture, you change the thoughts that people in that culture can think. You manipulate them on a grand scale. Here in Arkansas, I was sent to something called Governor's School that Mr. Clinton started when he was our Governor. There, if I wasn't neurotic enough already, I learned that I was responsible for protecting the world from its own blindness and stupidity when it comes to subtle things like this. I'm nobody. I'm disabled. I can't even keep a job. Mr. Letterman is on national TV. If I'm responsible, then why does Mr. Letterman get to "ignore stuff like that. It doesn't really affect me. I go ahead and do what I want to do."

Ridgefield Elementary in Dodgeville, Wisconsin. The song, "Silent Night," knocked out the words Winter winds whine and bite How I wish I was happy and warm, safe with my family, out of the storm." They replaced the words to "Silent Night" with that.

I hear that everyone is calling this a crock just because Mr. O'Reilly didn't explain why they replaced the words, that it was supposedly to facilitate the telling of a story about a little evergreen tree. Why does everybody tell the story of little snowmen and evergreen trees and just absolutely anything besides the unbelievable condescension of the Savior of the world that this Christian holiday is expressly designed to celebrate. Even my 17-year-old non-Christian nephew couldn't understand it this Christmas. His sisters' Christmas program was real cute and all but, he said, what does this have to do with Christmas? He was raised in the church. He knew the story they were supposed to be telling. That was the story he wanted to hear.

Now with all due respect, I even think the Baby Jesus would say, "Give me a break, yah know."

Bill, don't put words in Jesus' mouth. I think there's a verse or two about him takin' a real dim view of that. I could be wrong, but since I'm pickin' apart every word here anyway . . .

I mean, but isn't this the kind of thing where, like, once or twice every twenty years somebody gets outraged, and says, 'Oh, by God, we gotta put diapers on horses.' Isn't it just about . . . So what, let it go. It'll take care of itself.

Dave, do you live in the same world I do? I've been hearin' stuff like this for years and years. Bill O'Reilly is a relatively new guy on the scene. Marlin Maddox passed away a year or so ago, but he'd been tellin' stories like this forever.

Here's why it gets to be more than that. In court, there are lawsuits. Plano, TX. Another grammar school. The kids were told not to bring in any Christmas colors, like napkins that are red and green. That's in court. That's being litigated.

I know that there is a fight to be fought. I know that grammar school children make great copy, good sympathetic victims. We care about these issues in a grammar school, when we should care about them everywhere else. But, the result of this is, we keep putting our smallest children on our battlefields. Our kids grow up in the midst of divorcing parents. The last thing they need is a little more conflict surrounding them.

Now, you can say, okay, it's just a little thing. It doesn't effect you. But, it isn't. The erosion of the culture and the protection of traditions is important in this country.

Let's talk about your friends in the Bush administration. Things seem to be darker now than they might have been heretofore. How do things look to you?

And wasn't that the whole point of inviting Bill O'Reilly to make him answer for Mr. Bush's failings. Exactly what makes Bill O'Reilly responsible for George W. Bush. Did Mr. Letterman think that the usual Bush skewering would just be more fun if there was a live target?

This simplistic stuff about hating Bush, or he lied does the country no good at all. We have to win this thing even though it's a screw up, giant massive, alright. Right now, for everybody's protection, It's best for the world to have a democracy in that country, functioning and friendly to the west. Is it not?
Yes, absolutely.
So let's stop with the lying and the this and the that and the undermining and 'let's get him.' That is putting us all in danger. So, our philosophy is, we call it as we see it. Sometimes you agree; sometimes you don't. Robust debate is good.

The soldiers and marines are noble.

Oh, some of them are really good guys. Some of them aren't. They're people, who we've made pawns, both in the actual war, and in the little word game between liberals and conservatives. Just as much as we should never have demonized Vietnam soldiers, let's not deify today's soldiers. Reality, ya know. Let's think, reality.

They're not terrorists. And when people call them that. Like Cindy Sheehan called the insurgents freedom fighters. We don't like that. It is a vitally important time in American history. We should all take it very seriously and be very careful with what we say.
Well, and you should be very careful with what you say also.
Give me an example. Give me an example.
How can you possibly take exception with the motivation and the position of someone like Cindy Sheehan?

Being a victim doesn't make you right or good. It doesn't even make your motivations spotless and pure. I don't really know much about Cindy Sheehan. I've known a lot of victims, though. We're people, tarnished, damaged, dirty, hurt, occasionally shining. We just are. Given too much attention, victims can become little tyrants. They're still hurting, and honestly all the attention keeps them from healing healthily. Like I say, I know almost nothing about Cindy Sheehan

This is important. This is important. Cindy Sheehan lost a son, a professional soldier in Iraq. Correct?

A blog I read picked up on the words "professional soldier." He said someone had pointed out to him that the men in Iraq had signed on for the risk that they were taking. This seemed a horrible thought to him. I think he said something to the effect that those soldiers signed on assuming responsible leadership. I'd have to question that. Most of the guys I know signed on simply as a way to finance college. None of them had any illusions of responsible leadership. I mean, they knew that they were signing up to be at the mercy of politicians. I can't imagine that there's anybody left in this country who has a lot of respect or trust for politicians. They made a bet. They lost.

She has a right to grieve any way she wants, she has a right to say whatever she wants. When she says to the public that the insurgents are freedom fighters, how do you think, David Letterman, that makes people who've lost loved ones by these people blowing the hell out of them, how do you think they feel? What about their feelings, sir?
What about, why are we there in the first place?

My grandpa used to change the subject everytime he was losing.

The president, himself, less than a month ago, said we are there because of a mistake made in intelligence. Well, whose intelligence. It was just . . . Somebody got off a bus and handed it to him. No, it was the intelligence gathered by his administration. Why are we there in the first place? I agree with you that we have to support the troops. They are there. They are the best and the brightest in this country. There's no doubt about that. I also agree that now we're in it, it's going to take a long, long time. People who expect it to be solved and wrapped up in a couple of years. Unrealistic It's not going to happen. However, however that does not eliminate the legitimate speculation and concern and questioning of "Why the hell are we there to begin with?"
If you want to question that and then revamp an intelligence agency that is obviously flawed, the CIA. But remember, M16 in Britain said the same thing. Putin's people in Russia said the same thing. Mubarak's intelligence people in Egypt.
The intelligence across the board makes it alright.

I don't know whether it makes it alright or not. That's not the point. You just said that it was all our, specifically Mr. Bush's, intelligence. Now Mr. O'Reilly points out that it wasn't all just our intelligence that has the problem. But, Letterman doesn't seem to get the point. A debater he's not.

I'm very concerned about people like yourself who don't have nothing but endless sympathy for a woman like Cindy Sheehan. Honest to Christ. Honest to Christ. I just . . .

Oh, goodness. #1. It's "don't have anything." Don't have nothing is a double negative if I'm not mistaken, and the very idea of a hillbilly from Arkansas correcting you on your grammar, Dave, is pretty bad. #2. When interviewing and trying to skewer a representative of the fundamentalist right, you might want to not use the Lord's name in vain.

I'm not smart enough to debate you point for point on this. But, I have the feeling that about 60% of what you say is crap, but I don't know that for a fact.

If you don't know something for a fact, isn't it responsible journalism to keep you mouth shut until you do know it. And, if you're not smart enough, then get off the air and make way for someone who is; or at least stick to talking about stuff you understand.

60
60% That's just a . . . I'm just spitballing.
Listen, I respect your opinion. You should respect mine. Our analysis is based on the best evidence we could get.

All that tolerance stuff only goes one way. You demand a lot of it from us, but you don't give any of it to us.

Yeah, but I don't think that fair and balanced. I don't think that you represent an objective viewpoint.
I don't think You have to give me an example if you're going to
I don't watch your show so that wouldn't be possible.

What was it I said earlier about interview skills. Dave, have you ever heard of research.

You're going to take things that you've read. Do you know what they say about you? Come on. Come on. Watch it for a half hour. You'll get addicted. You'll be a Factor Fan.

I watched it for days while I was volunteering in Louisiana. It didn't really make me a fan. I agreed with a lot of what Bill said, but sometimes the far right can just get so annoying.

Christmas Parade

Things have been a lot better the last few days. That's why I haven't been blogging. It seems like I only blog when I've got something I've just got to get off my chest. And, that usually is the case when I'm irritated about somebody or something.

I'm kinda sick right at the moment. I had been fighting off a sore throat for about a week when one of my nieces needed me to walk with her and her brownie troop in the Christmas parade. We ran up and down the parade route giving out candy. After we ran out of candy, we sang Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer and yelled Merry Christmas a thousand times. It was really cold. My intention, being there, was to watch my niece Micah and make sure that she didn't find some little friend of hers and get to talking and get left behind by the parade. Then, she'd get scared because she wouldn't know where she was or how to get back to where she was supposed to be. She's very impulsive on the one hand, very, very generous, but a real worry-wart when something unexpected happens. She gets herself in jams with her impulsive, wonder-where-she-will nature. Then, she gets really scared that the whole world is never going to be set right again. She reminds me so much of myself. I love her. The problem was, I am just like her in some ways. As much as she might have been a first grader, she really had the right idea. The city had passed an ordinance that people in the parade could not throw candy. Our little brownie troupe was told that we had to go to each little boy and girl and give them a piece of candy, up close and personal. Well, I guess the other little kids and adults saw the ridiculousness of this suggestion as soon as the parade started out. The roads were very wide. It was hard to run over to one side of the road and distribute candy and then catch back up to where you were supposed to be in the parade. Then, try to catch the kids on the other side of the parade route. It was just impossible. She couldn't bear to see anybody get left out. So, at first, we were falling way behind the rest of our brownie troupe. That's what you get for trying to follow the rules. It was fun, though. It's too bad her sister couldn't have gone. About halfway through the parade route, she sat down in the wagon I was pulling for that purpose. She just looked exhausted, kind of shell-shocked, overstimulated. I turned around to see how she was doing. I encouraged her to wave at the crowd while she was sitting there. That got her motor turning again. She loves attention. She couldn't sit still while there was the opportunity to get attention. She's like a little sprite, dancing from tree to tree, a glorious vision that you're not sure you saw. I hope she didn't come down sick, too. Her sister had strep throat. That's why she couldn't go in the parade.

Faith is not denial

I was just practicing this song for choir tomorrow. It just highlighted something. I usually only show one side of myself on this page, but there are two.

The song was called: "God is good." Its words are simple. God is good. He's always good. He's never anything less. God is good. He's always good, that's why I know I am blessed. So great, so great is His goodness. So good, His excellent ways. I'm so glad for His lovingkindness, so glad to give Him all my praise." Then it repeats the chorus over again. "There's peace beyond understanding. There's love flooding my soul. There is joy, joy everlasting, the half has never yet been told." After another chorus, it elaborates on the theme. Oh, God is good. He's good all the time. God is good. He's such a friend of mine." And then winds things up.

I am of such a divided mind. As I'm singin' this song, I really believe it. It's simple, some would say simplistic, faith at its best. Faith is not denial. It never refuses to see the evidence against God. Too often we Christians stand spluttering and get all defensive in the face of evidence that our God is not who we claim He is. One of the first verses that I remember memorizing holds the key to my faith: "For My thoughts are not your thoughts, nor are your ways My ways," declares the LORD. "For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are My ways higher than your ways and My thoughts than your thoughts." Isa. 55:8 For a person to look at the evidence available to us and think to prove or disprove God is to put the God of the universe on trial in our court. We have evidence throughout history of the things that we have misunderstood over the years. Doesn't the word "atom" mean the smallest particle that a thing can be divided into. Well, that's not true. Aren't we even looking inside the protons, neutrons and electrons that form atoms now? And we would think to judge God? Yeah, right!

Isaiah 55 continues: "For as the rain and the snow come down from heaven, and do not return there without watering the earth and making it bear and sprout, and furnishing seed to the sower and bread to the eater; so will My word be which goes forth from My mouth; it will not return to Me empty, without accomplishing what I desire, and without succeeding in the matter for which I sent it." There is so much information on the web. There are so many words that people say. There are so many books, good books even. How many of the words that you hear can you really be sure will have a good effect on your life? Only the words of the Bible. As soon as I memorized these verses from Isaiah 55:8-11, I started writin' out verses on just hundreds of little notecards. My pastor couldn't figure out what I was doin' and I couldn't really tell Him. I didn't know why I was doin' what I was doin'. I just had this feeling that God's word was the key to everything for me. If I could just get the WORD, everything would be alright after all. Somehow God would work my life out, if I just got His WORD.

Remember the Scribes and the Pharisees in the Bible? They had God's Word, but they couldn't see the Word for the letters. They got so wound up in themselves and their fascinating analysis of God's words that they didn't love the Son of God. Well, I've been called a scribe.

I still believe that the Bible is the answer. I just think that I went at it wrong. I'm kind of into quantity, not savoring the quality. I stuffed tons of Scripture into my head, making me responsible for all of it all at once, and just really overloading my circuits. I should have started with one nugget, memorized, meditated, completely digested that morsel, acted on it, then gone on to the next morsel.

The Bible says that I can choose to be a slave of one of two kingdoms. I can choose to be a slave of sin, or a slave of Christ, but slavery is my lot in life no matter what I choose. Slavery to Christ can feel relatively freeing once you learn to live within its confines I'm told. I see people who have grown up as slaves to Christ. They do look free.

Gaming & Male Leadership

It is quarter to five in the morning. I've been up all night doing two things: Playing The Sims (a game I got for my nephews and then found out that they already had it, which was great because I'd always wanted to have it), and making a list of games that the boys could choose from so I don't make the same mistake twice. They're old enough now (14 + 17) to be able to choose their Christmas presents before Christmas. But, after spending all this time making this long list of games, a thought just hit me. Well, maybe it didn't just HIT me. I'd been growing more and more dubious the more I saw the descriptions of some of these games. I know the boys play these things, and they're really not my cup of tea. They're gonna play them anyhow. That's how I justified buying them exposure to such violence, besides I've never minded violence in movies that I watch. One of my favoite movies is Fight Club. The violence isn't my favorite part of the movie, but I don't refrain from watching an excellent movie just because violence is a necessary part of it.

(The plotline of Fight Club can be reduced, in my opinion, to this formula. Nihilism destroys civilization. Its end result is total anarchy, survival of the fittest. If you don't believe that you are the biggest, baddest, fittest character on the planet, stop with all the nihilism already. It sounds sophisticated, but it will make fools of us all. We will tear our world down around our ears and have nothing left but the hollow words of some dead hero that we followed to our peril. It is excellent philosophy. The words in that movie are POWERFUL, though some of them are dirty. It's the thoughts. Maybe that movie just speaks for my generation or something. I don't know. "We are a generation of men raised by our mothers. I don't think another woman is really what we need. Do you?" What does it mean to be a generation of women raised in divorce? Perhaps that's a question for another day, but I think it partially means the rejection of one's own feminine qualities. Women get rejected and abandoned, so don't be feminine. Be strong, somehow masculine and feminine both, and neither. Sick. Twisted. I hear people going on and on about giving male mentors and role models to young boys. I think people are so intent on this because they think it will curb the violence in our streets. What they forget is that women who were raised by mothers only are the women who will bear the next generation of children, and probably raise them by themselves. We need godly men in our lives to teach us our worth as women, to show us that there are godly men in the world, to make us dissatisfied with ungodly men. The best way to convince young boys to take God seriously is to convince young girls that guys who don't take God seriously aren't worth having. Beth Moore says that women have the power of influence, and it is a power that we we'd best learn how to wield well. I couldn't agree with her more. If you want to change men, change the women that they're competing for.)

Anyway. I was speaking of games. Once, I threw my games in the dumpster. I believed that that's what God wanted me to do, but then I made the mistake of telling my mom what I had done. She was apalled. So much money wasted. I said, yes, but the money had already been wasted when I spent it on games. Why should I waste both the money and the immense quantities of my time that those games would consume if I let myself get hooked on them. There is a verse in the Bible. Redeem the time, for the days are evil. If you apply that verse to The SIMS and to Civilization III, how do the hours spent playing those games qualify as redeemed time? If the days are evil and you only get so many of them, then how many of them am I wasting playing stupid computer games? They seem harmless. The ones I play aren't violent or anything, but they're not the best I can do with the hours of this life. When I get up to heaven and my life is reviewed by my creator, will I want to show off to him my top score on some game? I don't think so.

So, if I don't think that gaming is good for me, then should I encourage my nephews in it? They're going to do it whether I encourage them in it or not, but should I endorse this habit of theirs, or should they see me stop playing again and maybe sell my games. God, please give me the courage of my convictions.