Muddling Toward Maturity Blog

WILLIAM FORSTCHEN DEPICTS ISIS TERROR ATTACK ON U.S. IN HIS NOVELLA "DAY OF WRATH"

History Professor William Forstchen is known by many as the author of One Second After, a novel depicting the mass terror and chaos resulting from an  Electric Magnetic Pulse (EMP) attack by an enemy of the United States.  Now he has come out with a 144 page ebook, Day of Wrath, which imagines a low-tech ISIS attack at our most innocent and vulnerable -- our schools and highways. Forstchen's chilling scenario shows how easy it would be to inflict mass terror on the United States.  

One reviewer wrote:

The scenario laid out here - an ISIS terror attack on the U.S. - is frighteningly possible, even likely given our current state of readiness. When the ineptness (dare I say indifference?) of our civil leaders is combined with ISIS' utter disregard for 'infidel' life - especially 'infidel' children - and our culture of appeasement in the name of 'coexistence,' you get a story which travels to another level. A rather sobering, indeed terrifying level. . . .   This is a tome I emphatically recommend. Serving as both 'engaging story' and 'cautionary prediction,' "Day of Wrath" is not a mere wake-up call - it is a swift kick in the backside. It will scare you, yes, but it will also make you aware and keep you sharp; the fact it is a captivating tale is just a major bonus.

Forstchen testifies to a deeply-felt sense of responsibility and duty:

“I was afraid that if I did not write this book, and choose the ebook format so it was available quickly, what was intended as a warning, would quite simply, come too late.   I had to take a break when writing Day of Wrath several times, it was a deeply emotional experience for me as well. It was difficult to complete, but was too important of a project not to finish.” 

Me: I have read this book and recommend it.  It is not an easy, enjoyable read, but the world has taken a very scary turn.  This book makes us face that unpleasant fact and prepare for a possible (even likely) scenario.  Read it!

BRIGHAM YOUNG UNIVERSITY PROFESSOR (DR. LYNN K. WILDER) LEAVES MORMONISM FOR BIBLICAL CHRISTIANITY

Last fall Dr. Michael Brown interviewed Dr. Lynn K. Wilder, a former professor at Brigham Young University who left Mormonism for Biblical Christianity, and wrote about her journey in Unveiling Grace: The Story of How We Found Our Way Out of the Mormon Church.   The following provides a riveting, fairly comprehensive phone interview.  In it, Dr. Wilder provides excellent, essential information about Mormonism.

 

Following, I've provided the major portion of an excellent and helpful Amazon review of Wilder's book.

. . .  As I began Lynn's book, I was skeptical of where it might go or what her message might be. Many books about Mormonism tend to land very heavily in the apologetics side of the scale, leaving the reader with a negative, almost sterile feeling in their heart about the way people are saved from Mormonism. In fact, after reading most books concerning Mormonism, all you want to do is just stay away from its deception at all costs! Lynn however has been able to skillfully reveal apologetic differences between Mormonism and Christianity by weaving what she learned into her story of salvation. Instead of pages and pages of information on the differences between Mormonism and Christianity the reader gets the story of a person fully living Mormonism and little by little coming to believe in the God of the Bible. As this story unfolds Lynn teaches about Mormon and Christian belief throughout in a way that is personal and heartfelt. Readers get a great picture of real Mormonism; a culturally enmeshed belief system that leaves little room for critical thought stranding its adherents in Zion, blissfully blind. Readers also get a real picture of the one true God found in Christianity; able to save anyone out of their situation through the truth about Christ found in the Bible as revealed to individuals by the "Dancer of grace" (314).

ONE'S POSITION ON SAME-SEX MARRIAGE MIRRORS OTHER BELIEFS

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John Stonestreet writes:     

There are some Christians who, for understandable though mistaken reasons, believe that their fellow Christians should support or at least not oppose same-sex marriage.

Implicit in this position is the belief that supporting same-sex marriage is a position that can be held in isolation—that what you believe about the definition of marriage is unrelated to other issues regarding marriage and human sexuality.

Well, according to sociologist Mark Regnerus, that simply is not the case.

In a recent article at “The Public Discourse” Regnerus asked the question, “What is the sexual and relational morality of Christians who accept the moral legitimacy of same-sex marriages?”

To answer that question, he looked at data from a recent survey of nearly 16,000 Americans between the ages of 18 and 60 entitled “relationships in America.” People responded to statements about viewing pornography, cohabitation, casual sex, divorce, adultery, polyamory, and abortion.

Regnerus compared the responses of five groups: churchgoing Christians who oppose same-sex marriage, churchgoing Christians who support it, the general population, and both gay and lesbian Christians and non-Christians.

What he found was eye-opening. A significant percentage of churchgoing Christians who supported same-sex marriage either agreed or strongly agreed with statements that approved of things like using pornography, cohabitation, casual sex, and abortion rights.

N.T. WRIGHT INTERVIEW ON "LIFE AFTER LIFE AFTER DEATH"

N.T. Wright talks fast!  But everything he says is stimulating and worth hearing.  Wright is without doubt the most prolific and respected N.T. Scholar alive today.  No seminarian can study the New Testament without encountering N.T. Wright.   Here he offers an interview occasioned by his book,  "Surprised by Hope: Rethinking Heaven, the Resurrection, and the Mission of the Church."

 

I have not yet read Wright's Surprised by Hope.   Fortunately, Jonathan Pedrone has left a valuable Amazon review which I think worth publishing here as well:

N.T. Wright has written another brilliant work echoing he previously published masterpiece on the resurrection [The Resurrection of the Son of God]. Wright's expounds on a Christian hope firmly rooted in the Biblical narrative that longs for new creation.

In a world where the radio orthodoxy of Christianity espouses a gospel of fire insurance, Wright correctly and articulates a gospel and hope for so much more than disembodied bliss. "God's Kingdom in the preaching of Jesus refers not to postmortem destiny, not to our escape from this world into another one, but to God's sovereign rule coming on earth as it is in heaven".

Our hope according to Wright is not "going to heaven when you die" but rather in life after life after death. We hope not for an escape from this earth, but to the glorious day when God will make all things new.

THE U.S. MUST AWAKEN TO CHINA'S MUSCLE FLEXING IN ASIA TO PROTECT NATIONS AND INSURE TRANQUILITY

Jim Talent writes, "The U.S. Giant Slumbers:  The U.S. could check China, but our leaders need to wake up to the threat."

The leaders of the Chinese Communist party (CCP) want China to achieve hegemonic control over East Asia extending at least throughout the East and South China Seas. They have claimed sovereignty over those waters and the islands they contain, and they are developing the means to enforce their claims by a massive military buildup that is shifting the balance of hard power in the western Pacific. I wrote yesterday on the features of that buildup and in particular on how it is strategically designed to exploit the vulnerabilities in America’s military posture.

The CCP has three prime reasons for seeking hegemony:   [Read more...]

DAVID HOROWITZ - "THE HELL THAT IS THE OBAMA WHITE HOUSE"

 I have great respect for David Horowitz's and his counsels.  As written elsewhere, David Horowitz was one of the founders of the New Left in the 1960s and an editor of its largest magazine, Ramparts.  . . .  Looking back in anger at their days in the New Left, he and Collier wrote Destructive Generation (1989), a chronicle of their second thoughts about the 60s that has been compared to Whittaker Chambers’ Witness and other classic works documenting a break from totalitarianism. Horowitz examined this subject more closely in Radical Son(1996), a memoir tracing his odyssey from “red-diaper baby” to conservative activist that George Gilder described as “the first great autobiography of his generation.” His latest book is Take No Prisoners: The Battle Plan for Defeating the Left (Regnery Publishing).

 On Obama and his administration, Horowitz writes:

. . . And what exactly is the I.R.S. scandal about — to take just one case? It’s a plan unprecedented in modern American politics to push the political system towards a one-party state by using the taxing authority of the government to cripple and destroy the political opposition. The administration’s campaign to promote voter fraud by opposing measures to stop it (and defaming them as “racist” is guided by the same intentions and desire.

And why shouldn’t Obama want to destroy the two-party system since he is also in utter contempt of the Constitutional framework, making law illegally, and defying an impotent Congress to stop him? Of course every radical, like Obama, hates the Constitutional framework because, as Madison explained in Federalist #10, it is designed to thwart “the wicked projects” of the left to redistribute income and destroy the free market.

The same desire to overwhelm and permanently suppress the opposition drives the war that Obama and the Democrats have conducted against America’s borders and therefore American sovereignty. Their plan is too flood the country with illegals of whatever stripe who will be grateful enough for the favor to win them elections and create a permanent majority in their favor. The immediate result of these efforts is that we have no secure southern border, and therefore no border; and therefore we have effectively invited criminals and terrorists to come across and do Americans harm.

Which brings us to the deepest level of Obama’s hell, which is his anti-American foreign policy. When Obama was re-elected in 2012, the very first thought I had was this: A lot of people are going to be dead because of this election. How disastrously right I was. Since their assault on George Bush and their sabotage of the war in Iraq, Obama and the Democrats have forged a power vacuum in Europe and even more dramatically in the Middle East, which nasty characters have predictably entered with ominous implications for the future security of all Americans.

N.Y. Farm Owners Must Pay $13K Fine for Declining Lesbian Wedding

This story is both amazing and disgusting.  Andrew Johnson of National Review Online writes:

A New York State Division of Human Rights fined Cynthia and Robert Giffords $13,000 earlier this month for refusing to let a lesbian couple use their farm for their same-sex wedding.

In 2012, fiancées​ Melisa Erwin and Jennie McCarthy expressed interest about using the Giffords’s Liberty Ridge Farm in Schaghticoke, N.Y., for their upcoming ceremony, which hosts various events. According to McCarthy’s own account, it appears the Giffords politely declined the request and apologized for the inconvenience.

“When we asked why it was just, ‘That’s what my husband and I decided. We’ve been married a long time and it’s great you’re getting married and all, but you can’t do it here,’” McCarthy told WNYT at the time. The Daily Signal notes that the Giffords, who are heavily involved in the planning, live on the second and third floor of the barn used for events, and use the second floor as a bridal suite on wedding days.

But a New York State administrative-law judge ruled that even though the Giffords live at the farm, it is also a place of public accommodation and must abide by the state’s anti-discrimination laws, according to the Washington Times. ​“The fact that the Giffords also reside at Gifford Barn does not render it private,” the decision reads.​

As a result, the Giffords must pay $13,000 in fines: $10,000 in civil damage penalties to the state and a $1,500 mental-anguish fine to each of the women.​

The couple’s attorney said they are considering taking further legal action or appealing the ruling.

The Gifford are just the latest individuals to face penalties for refusing to violate their faith and take part in a same-sex wedding — others include a Colorado baker and a New Mexico photographer.

 This ruling is totally unjust!  

SOME HUMOR TO OFFSET THE NAUSEA OF GLOBAL MELTDOWN

From an email:

* Since light travels faster than sound, some people appear bright until you hear them speak.

* If I agreed with you, we'd both be wrong.

* We never really grow up -- we only learn how to act in public.

* Knowledge is knowing a tomato is a fruit. Wisdom is not putting it in a fruit salad.

        * Where there's a will, I want to be in it.

 

Update: Then there's this from another email:

Smith climbs to the top of Mt. Sinai to get close enough to talk to God.

Looking up, he asks the Lord. "God, what does a million years mean to you?"

The Lord replies, "A minute."

Smith asks, "And what does a million dollars mean to you?"

The Lord replies, "A penny."

Smith asks, "Can I have a penny?"

The Lord replies, "In a minute."

JAY NORDLINGER - THE VALUE OF LIFE

Jay Nordlinger correctly observes:

Possibly the most sickening thing about America is its racial selectivity. White person kills white person. Zzzzz. Black person kills black person. Zzzzz. Black person kills white person. Zzzzz. White person kills black person — the world stops. Or explodes.

(And if the person doing the shooting is not quite white, à la George Zimmerman, you can add a little bleach, dubbing him a “white Hispanic.”)

It’s not just that some life is held to be more valuable than other life. It’s that the value of life is measured by the color of the person who takes it. Which is a little weird, at a minimum.

Michael Brown’s life or Trayvon Martin’s life would be just as valuable if a person of a different color had done the shooting. But we would not know the victims’ names, of course.  . . 

ISRAELI AMBASSADOR TO THE U.N., RON PROSOR, ADDRESSES THE U.N.'s GENERAL ASSEMBLY

This is a great non-emotional, non-expressive, but pungent, truthful, short speech.  As Jay Nordlinger of NRO says, "The speech was essentially about the moral absurdity of the United Nations. It took as its theme a statement of Churchill’s: The world is timorous and muddled “until the emergency comes, until self-preservation strikes its jarring gong.”

 

The point, often forgotten, is that Israel is the canary in the coal mine.  Her enemies are the West's enemies, and they will come after the rest of the West in due time.  Ambassador Proser concluded:

Seventy years ago, Winston Churchill bemoaned what he saw as the inability of mankind to act until the emergency comes. Today, I am here to issue a warning: Stand with Israel and stand against terror before it is too late, before the danger lands on your doorstep and self-preservation strikes its jarring gong.

ISIS SWALLOWING IRAQ: "THEY'RE BEHEADING CHILDREN"

 CBN News provides a complete report including an interview with Ret. Gen. Paul Vallely who pulls no punches in stating what he would do if he were commanding operations.

 

ERBIL, Kurdistan -- Islamic terrorists in Iraq are beheading children and burying people alive, and it won't stop there. They have a message for America: "We're coming for you."

Over the past week, the army of ISIS (Islamic State of Iraq and Syria), also known as IS (Islamic State), swallowed up swaths of Iraq like a pervading darkness.

In just one day, tens of thousands of Christians fled from towns like Qaraqosh and Bartilla, about 25 miles away. Most came to the town of Erbil with nothing more than the clothes on their backs.

"America is at a crossroad," says Retired Gen. Paul Vallely, who has more than 15 years of experiencce in special operations and other military ops. He shared his insight on the chaos in Iraq and how it will impact America, on The 700 Club, August 11.

"They take everything from the house, from the store, everything," one refugee told CBN News. "They hate Christian especially. We don't know why."

The choice was leave or die.

GEORGE GILDER - "WHAT CREATES WEALTH?"

"Where does all wealth and economic growth come from?  This simple but powerful video explains it in under six minutes."  - from  "The Blaze":

 

Gilder is the author of “Knowledge and Power,

Surprise: Pro-Gay-Marriage Christians Reject the Rest of Christian Teaching about Sex and Marriage, Too

Andrew Walker reports on National Review Online:

Over at the Public Discourse, University of Texas sociologist Mark Regnerus offers a preview of forthcoming data revealing how support for or opposition to same-sex marriage shapes a person’s larger worldview and beliefs about sexuality.

He asks: “What is the sexual and relational morality of Christians who accept the moral legitimacy of same-sex marriages?”

His data from the forthcoming Relationships in America Survey reveals an interesting, if not totally unexpected result: that church-attending Christians who support same-sex marriage look more worldly and less Christian. Churchgoing Christians who support same-sex marriage also register support for other beliefs about sexuality that Christianity has historically considered taboo.

According to Regnerus, churchgoing Christians (who were comparably much fewer in number as a pool of respondents), register much higher support for pornography, cohabitation, casual sex, and higher support than the general population for abortion rights.

Regnerus’ sampling method is worthy of praise. In contrast to blithe surveys that merely report the opinions of all those who identify with a particular religious affiliation regardless of observance, Regnerus does the important work of determining what those in the pews actually believe. A political poll that didn’t differentiate between likely and unlikely voters wouldn’t be an accurate representation of the electorate, and for the same reasons, a survey should distinguish between someone who merely answers “Catholic” or “Baptist” when asked for a religious identity and someone who actually shows up on Sunday.

O'KEEFE STRIKES AGAIN! Dressed as Osama bin Ladin... Sneaks across border from Mexico

The UK Daily Mail has the story:  (HT: Drudge)

• James O'Keefe, known for guerrilla documentaries targeting liberals, says US Border Patrol was nowhere to be seen when he crossed border twice
• The conservative firebrand wore a bin Laden mask to show the national security implications of unmonitored borders
• A Border Patrol official said agents who ought to be on the 'front lines aren't even on the front lines anymore'
• Texas sheriff showed how a section of border fencing ends abruptly, providing easy access for immigrants to sneak in from Mexico

In Monday's video release, O'Keefe focuses on the implications for national security: He illegally crosses into Mexico twice and returns – first in street clothes and again in army fatigues, wearing an Osama bin Laden Halloween mask  [more . . .]   

 

HAMAS SAID TO HAVE EXECUTED DOZENS OF TUNNEL DIGGERS

Horrors.  The Times of Israel reports (HT: Drudge):

Hamas executed dozens of diggers responsible for its extensive tunnel system in past weeks, fearing the workers would reveal the site locations to Israel, a report on the Mako website’s army blog said.

There was no independent confirmation of the report (link here in Hebrew).

The tunnelers, many of whom constructed the tunnels over the course of months, would dig for 8-12 hours a day, and received a monthly wage of $150-$300, according to the blog.

Sources in Gaza told the website that Hamas took a series of precautions to prevent information from reaching Israel. The terror organization would reportedly blindfold the excavators en route to the sites and back, to prevent them from recognizing the locations. The tunnels were strictly supervised by Hamas members, and civilians were kept far from the sites . . . 

After the tunnels were completed, dozens were reportedly executed to prevent intelligence leaks to Israel.

“Anyone they suspected might transfer information to Israel on the tunnels was killed by the military wing,” a different source said. “They were very cruel.”

World Ignores Christian Exodus from Islamic World

Raymond Ibrahim has provided the best concise overview of recent persecution of Christians in the Middle East currently available.  He writes: (dated 8/8/2014)

While the world fixates on the conflict between Israel and Hamas—and while most mainstream media demonize Israel for trying to survive amid a sea of Arab-Islamic hostility—similar or worse tragedies continue to go virtually ignored.

One of the most ancient Christian communities in the world, that of Iraq—which already had been decimated over the last decade, by Islamic forces unleashed after the ousting of Saddam Hussein—has now been wiped out entirely by the new “caliphate,” the so-called Islamic State, formerly known by the acronym “ISIS.”

As Reuters reported:

Islamist insurgents have issued an ultimatum to northern Iraq’s dwindling Christian population to either convert to Islam, pay a religious levy or face death, according to a statement distributed in the militant-controlled city of Mosul….

It said Christians who wanted to remain in the “caliphate” that the Islamic State declared this month in parts of Iraq and Syria must agree to abide by terms of a “dhimma” contract—a historic practice under which non-Muslims were protected in Muslim lands in return for a special levy known as “jizya.”

“We offer them three choices: Islam; the dhimma contract—involving payment of jizya; if they refuse this they will have nothing but the sword,” the announcement said.

The amount of jizya-money demanded was $450 a month, an exorbitant sum for Iraq.

Hours after the demand for jizya was made, Islamists began painting the letter “n” on Christian homes in Mosul—in Arabic, Christians are known as “Nasara,” or “Nazarenes”—signaling them out for the slaughter to come.

Most Christians have since fled. A one-minute video in Arabic of their exodus appears here—women and children weeping as they flee their homes—a video that will not be shown by any Western mainstream media outlet, busy as they are depicting instead nonstop images of Palestinian women and children.

Children of jailed US pastor Saeed Abedini make video plea to Obama

  

From Fox News:

A heart-wrenching new video shows the teary-eyed young children of imprisoned American pastor Saeed Abedini in an impassioned appeal to President Obama for help in getting their father freed from an Iranian prison.

The YouTube video shows Rebekka and Jacob Abedini pleading with Obama for help in bringing their Daddy home.

“I miss him so much,” Rebekka says in the video, posted last week.

“I don’t want him to miss another birthday or Christmas or Father’s Day,” Jacob adds.

The 33-year-old Saeed Abedini is in his second year of an eight-year prison sentence handed down to him for allegedly evangelizing in his homeland.

Krauthammer - "Why in God's Name Will Not Obama Arm the Kurds?"

 

From National Review Online:

Charles Krauthammer cannot understand why the Obama administration is unwilling to provide arms to Kurds battling ISIS in Iraq: “The Kurds are allies of the U.S. They have a civil society, they’re pro-American, and they fight really hard. But they’re essentially using javelins and harpoons here, and we have not given them anything.”

The White House has claimed that all American arms must go through the Iraqi government, an obligation at which Krauthammer scoffed: “The Iraqi government — that’s Maliki, that Shiite chieftain — has cut off all aid to the Kurdish area [of Iraq] since December of last year.” None of the arms the U.S. has sent through the Iraqi government have arrived, says Krauthammer.

“Why in God’s name we don’t resupply or supply our allies who can hold back ISIS is beyond me.

WHY CAN'T OBAMA SPEAK OF THE SUFFERING AND SLAUGHTER OF CHRISTIANS IN IRAQ?

Yes, I know Obama recently did manage to mention "Christians" but only in the context of ISIS persecution of Yazidis as well.  He  uttered nary a word when  hundreds of thousands of Christians were driven out of Mosul and their ancestral home area  fleeing for their lives.   I believe Obama harbors a disdain, an antipathy (a hatred?), towards Christianity.   

View the following video in which Kirsen Powers takes Obama to task for his failure to recognize Christian suffering:

  

Powers:

“He has not uttered the word ‘Christian,’ and now suddenly he throws it in with the Yazidis,” Powers said. “We’re not doing any airdrops to the Christians, who are refugees in the Kurdish region. [Virginia Congressman Frank] Wolf has taken to the floor, I think, seven days in a row now, pleading with the administration: Please help these people. They need humanitarian aid; they need drinking water. They have nothing. They’ve lost their homes; they’ve lost everything. The White House has done nothing; they’ve said nothing. And then the president goes on and goes into quite a lot of detail about the Yazidis, and never really gets into the specifics about Christians. I mean, it’s really unbelievable, and he has no right to invoke humantiarianism, because he is not a humanitarian president. A humanitarian president does not sit quietly by, while hundreds of thousands of Christians in Iraq [are uprooted or killed]– forget about the rest of the Middle East — and doesn’t say a word.”

BOYCOTT TARGET

The National Organization for Marriage sent out an email today calling for a boycott of Target.  Brian S. Brown, President of NOM, explains why:

On Tuesday, the retail giant Target signed on to an amicus brief for the 7th Circuit Court of Appeals in two pending cases challenging the definition of marriage in Indiana and Wisconsin.

Target joins with a number of other companies in signing the brief, including the Starbucks Coffee Company. But it is the spirit behind the brief, and its language, which are most noteworthy.

The brief uses extremely charged language to refer to laws defining marriage as the union of a man and a woman. It calls them "the states' bans [on same-sex marriage]" and, even more radically, "marriage discrimination" laws!

Without providing any rationale at all, the brief states bluntly that "Same-sex couples should have the same right to marry as opposite-sex couples," and refers to Indiana and Wisconsin's traditional marriage laws as "an unproductive, inequitable, and unjust status quo."

Perhaps most ridiculously, the brief—while touting the benefits of pro-LGBT businesses—presents the claim that "corporate cultures that don't encourage openness and inclusiveness leave employees feeling isolated and fearful."

Well, tell that to the employees at Chase bank.

There, employees were recently asked on a survey to identify whether they were members or "allies" of the LGBT community. The spirit of "openness and inclusiveness" behind that question worked to the opposite effect from what this brief suggests.It was this radical and intrusive question precisely that left some employees "feeling isolated and fearful." As one of them put it,"The worry among many of us is that those who didn't select that poorly placed, irrelevant option will be placed on the ‘you can fire these people first' list."

RICH LOWRY - "THE CALLOW PRESIDENT"

Rich Lowry, editor of National Review,  today offered a biting assessment of President Obama' s character and governing ability.  Particularly sharp (and accurate) is the last sentence, which I've highlighted.

. . . It’s certainly true that the president is much further left than he’d ever admit, but the deepest truth about Obama is that there is no depth. He’s smart without being wise. He’s glib without being eloquent. He’s a celebrity without being interesting. He’s callow. . . 

It’s a trope on the right to say that Obama has quit, that he’s not interested in the job anymore. It isn’t true.  If you are smug, overly self-impressed and unwilling to bend from your (erroneous) presumptions of how the world works, this is what presidential leadership looks like. . . 

His greatest rhetorical skill turns out to be mockery. The man who once promised to transcend political divisions is an expert at the stinging partisan jab. What Churchill was to thundering statements of resolve, he is to snotty put-downs.

SOCIOLOGIST: GARDENING SPREADS RACISM, FACISM

This will have to be placed on my "hard to believe" pile.   Whacky whacky whacky.  Read on:

Katherine Timpf of National Review Online reports: 

A sociology lecturer at the University of Westminster is claiming that panelists on a BBC radio show are covertly spreading racist and fascist messages when they talk about gardening.

Dr. Ben Pitcher claimed that people on Gardeners’ Question Time are really just using gardening as a covert way to talk about white identity without seeming racist.

“Gardeners’ Question Time is not the most controversial show on Radio 4, and yet it is layered with, saturated with, racial meanings,” he said on another Radio 4 show, according to an article in the Daily Mail.

“The context here is the rise of nationalism,” he continued.

The topics discussed on the show include different plant species and soil purity, which Pitcher identified as code language for racial purity. The Caucasian sociologist said radio personalities use discussions of “invasive” and non-native plant species to express opposition to foreigners. Another guest on Radio 4 — a baroness and former professor of cultural studies — agreed with Pitcher, comparing British concerns about rhododendrons to anti-Pakistani sentiments in the 1980s.

A frequent panelist on Gardeners’ Question Time, the aptly named Bob Flowerdew, called Pitcher’s claims “ridiculous.”

“Does he want us to stop using words altogether? Perhaps we shouldn’t use Latin names to avoid offending the Romans,” Flowerdew said.

COMMON CORE STATE STANDARDS: FRC POSITION

 On July 30, 2014, the Family Research Council in Washington, D.C. hosted a Common Core forum, a video of which is available  here  

Sarah Perry of the Family Research Council has formulated FRC's 10-point position as follows:

1. The children of this nation belong first to their parents and families, not to their communities or governments. The primary authority over and direction of a child's education lies with that child's parent or guardian.

2. The Common Core State Standards (CCSS) were created without benefit of transparency, by a non-profit organization, with the involvement of very few educators, and majority funded and influenced by corporate interests. Democratic participation, educator input, and opportunity for revision during the "closed door" development of the Standards were utterly lacking. The Standards were introduced and later adopted without benefit of field testing, and multiple members of the Standards validation committee refused to approve them.

3. The CCSS "dumb down" the teaching of America's students by emphasizing "perspectives" and "critical thinking" over content and facts. The CCSS utilize uniform standards that not only eliminate more advanced material from previous teaching curriculums, but also prohibit teachers from teaching students individually and instead promotes a "one size fits all" approach to teaching. CCSS also lower the standards of higher-performing states in order to align educational content and testing to the CCSS.

4. The CCSS Initiative represents a massive and dangerous overreach on the part of the Federal government.The principle of states' rights is outlined in the 10th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, which states that any powers not delegated to the federal government are granted to the states. Education is best accomplished when it is left to local communities, parents, teachers, and states.

5. The CCSS Initiative has resulted in, and will continue to result in, an exodus and demoralization of the nation's experienced educators. With the elimination of teacher creativity in content and approach, the CCSS shifted the delivery of education from teachers to technology, with test scores serving as the ultimate standard of educational success. [1]

HORATIO ALGER STORIES IGNORED BECAUSE OF "POLITICAL CORRECTNESS"

Jay Nordlinger writes:  (Be sure not to miss the last  paragraph!)

Years ago, I worked for a man who was a fairly high-flying lawyer. He went to three storied schools: Princeton, Oxford, and Harvard (in that order, I believe). One day, I got to asking him where he was from. West Virginia, he said. The family was poor. I don’t think there was a father. I believe it was a no-electricity, no-running-water situation. I believe he did not have a proper pair of shoes until 14 or something.

What I remember specifically is this: There were no books in the house, of course. But there was one guy in town who was well off — he was the banker, maybe — and he had books. He let Michael read pretty much all of them.

I remember thinking, “To much of the world, Michael is just another ‘privileged white male.’ Yet if he were of a different color — or even of the other sex — he would be hailed as a great bootstraps story.”

This brings me to Maine: and the governor, Paul LePage. He was born in Lewiston — no garden spot — in 1948. He was the first of 18 children. The family was Franco-American, and French-speaking. Paul’s father was a mill worker and drunk. A violent drunk. He beat the hell out of Paul, who escaped home at age eleven. Paul lived on the streets for two years — sleeping in stables and strip joints and the like. Eventually, a couple of families kept an eye on him. When he got to college age, he could not get in, because his English wasn’t good enough: He spoke French. But he finessed that — there’s a French word — and he worked his way up.

Okay, my point is this: LePage is a conservative Republican — and fantastically, sometimes thrillingly unpolished — but he if were a liberal Democrat, he would be a national celebrity as Horatio Alger incarnate. There’d be movies and songs and poems about him.

Am I expressing conservative paranoia and self-pity about the media and “the culture”? Or am I simply acquainted with reality?

By the way: If Clarence Thomas were a liberal Democrat, instead of a conservative Republican, his story would be taught to every child in the land, and his poster would be ubiquitous on kids’ walls. Hell, he might be on a coin already.

"HAND OF GOD" WITNESSED IN HAMAS-ISRAEL CONFLICT

Joe Kovacs of World Net Daily reports:

More claims of divine intervention are being reported in the ongoing conflict between Israel and Hamas, with an operator of Israel’s Iron Dome missile-defense system saying he personally witnessed “the hand of God” diverting an incoming rocket out of harm’s way.

Israel Today translated a report from a Hebrew-language news site, which noted the Iron Dome battery failed three times to intercept an incoming rocket headed toward Tel Aviv last week.

The commander recalled: “A missile was fired from Gaza. Iron Dome precisely calculated [its trajectory]. We know where these missiles are going to land down to a radius of 200 meters. This particular missile was going to hit either the Azrieli Towers, the Kirya (Israel’s equivalent of the Pentagon) or [a central Tel Aviv railway station]. Hundreds could have died.

“We fired the first [interceptor]. It missed. Second [interceptor]. It missed. This is very rare. I was in shock. At this point we had just four seconds until the missile lands. We had already notified emergency services to converge on the target location and had warned of a mass-casualty incident.

“Suddenly, Iron Dome (which calculates wind speeds, among other things) shows a major wind coming from the east, a strong wind that … sends the missile into the sea. We were all stunned. I stood up and shouted, ‘There is a God!’

“I witnessed this miracle with my own eyes. It was not told or reported to me. I saw the hand of God send that missile into the sea.”   [more . . .]

INDIAN TV CREW CAPTURES HAMAS ROCKET SETUP AND FIRING NEAR HOTEL (VIDEO)

Wow!  Incredible footage!  Daniel Greenfield from the Freedom Center posts:

It took India’s NDTV to finally do the job that Reuters, CNN, the BBC and the news organizations of a dozen Western countries refused to do.

Apparently NDTV is the only news agency actually willing to chronicle a rocket setup and launch.      [Click the link for the accompanying story from India NDTV]

 

 

But that's not all, French TV shows Hamas rocket setup outside UN building   .

 

It's Daniel Greenfield who once again reports:

Now France 24 shows a rocket setup outside a hotel filled with the international media… and a UN building.

FRANCE 24 has exclusive footage of a Hamas rocket launching pad that appears to prove the militant group has been firing from areas heavily populated with civilians.

Correspondent Gallagher Fenwick says the site, in Gaza City, is some 50 metres from a hotel where the majority of international media is staying, and just 100 metres from a UN building.

“This type of setup is at the heart of the debate,” says Gallagher. “The Israeli army has repeatedly accused the Palestinian militants of shooting from within densely populated civilian areas and that is precisely the type of setup we have here.”

These two videos are important, but I can’t help but wonder whether it is Israel’s pullback from Gaza that has allowed some media orgs to feel like they can show what Hamas is doing without worrying that it will help Israel or prolong the fighting.

ANTI-SEMITIC VIOLENCE HAS FRENCH JEWS HEADING TO THE EXITS

Stephen Brown reports the facts on the ground in his article,  "Exodus - French Style".

BRITAIN'S NATIONAL HEALTH SERVICE (NHS)TO FUND SPERM BANK TO "MEET INCREASING DEMAND FROM LESBIAN AND SINGLE WOMEN"

News like this makes one's stomach turn.    Christian Concern reports:

The first NHS-funded sperm bank is set to be launched in Britain to enable lesbian couples and single women to have children at less than half the cost of a private clinic.

The initiative, which will be funded by taxpayers’ money, will enable women to search an online database and select a donor based on various factors including ethnicity, height, profession and even hobbies.

The bank will then send that donor’s sperm to a clinic chosen by the client for use in trying for a baby.

The Department of Health said that the initiative would “meet increasing demand from lesbians and single women who wish to start a family without having a relationship with a man.”

The bank, which is set to open in October, will charge £300 for the service - considerably less than the private sector. 

CALIFORNIA DROUGHT PRODUCING MODERN-DAY DUST BOWL

Shocking!  Scary!  Serious!  We don't hear a great deal about the great California drought now taking place.  Holly Bailey has written a comprehensive and extremely helpful article that tells us what we need to know. 

8/6/14 - To the above, I came across another worrisome article, "The Drought Apocalypse Approaches as the Colorado River Basin Dries Up: Scientists discover that seven Western states are depleting groundwater reserves at an unprecedented rate."

VICTOR DAVIS HANSON - ASSESSING THE ISRAELI - HAMAS WAR

VDH, whose  judicious opinions I almost always find compelling, suggests "Israel in fact is on its way to emerging in a far better position after the Gaza war than before" and explains why.  His analysis is helpful and hopeful.  

CHRISTIANS: THE WORLD'S MOST PERSECUTED PEOPLE

That's the headline from a UK Independent article by Paul Vallely:  (HT: Wintery Knight)

. . .  Most people in the West would be surprised by the answer to the question: who are the most persecuted people in the world? According to the International Society for Human Rights, a secular group with members in 38 states worldwide, 80 per cent of all acts of religious discrimination in the world today are directed at Christians.

The Centre for the Study of Global Christianity in the United States estimates that 100,000 Christians now die every year, targeted because of their faith – that is 11 every hour. The Pew Research Center says that hostility to religion reached a new high in 2012, when Christians faced some form of discrimination in 139 countries, almost three-quarters of the world's nations.

All this seems counter-intuitive here in the West where the history of Christianity has been one of cultural dominance and control ever since the Emperor Constantine converted and made the Roman Empire Christian in the 4th century AD.

Yet the plain fact is that Christians are languishing in jail for blasphemy in Pakistan, and churches are burned and worshippers regularly slaughtered in Nigeria and Egypt, which has recently seen its worst anti-Christian violence in seven centuries.

SIGNS POSTED FOR ILLEGALS INCREASINGLY WRITTEN IN CHINESE

Kit Daniels at Infowars.com reports:  (HT: Drudge)

Illegals from China and over 70% of the world's nations are flooding into America as its border collapses

The Border Patrol is increasingly posting signs written in Chinese near the U.S./Mexico border, which underscores the booming human smuggling trade as illegal aliens from China flood into America.

Case in point, the emergency beacons placed in desolate border regions which allow stranded illegals to request help from the Border Patrol have instructions in English, Spanish and Chinese, but back in 2001 when they were first deployed, the instructions were written only in English and Spanish.

Since then, human smuggling has exploded into a billion dollar institution, with people of various nationalities paying smugglers, known as coyotes, thousands of dollars to be transported illegally into the United States.

“The Chinese are paying $50,000, the Indians are paying $10,000 to $20,000, [for] all the Central Americans the average is about $7,000 and the Mexicans are, especially [from] southern Mexico, are paying $3,000, so it’s a huge, huge money event for the cartels, probably even more lucrative than the drug business,” Dr. Michael Vickers of the Texas Border Volunteers told Infowars.  [more. . .]

Me:  This came as news to me.  Like many others, I had assumed those crossing the southenrn border into the United States were from Latin America.  A nation that fails to patrol its borders is a nation nearing collapse.

Other Drudge headlines and stories:

Border Official: 'I'd Almost Guarantee People Have Been Released That Are Sick'...

 

Measles, H1N1, TB 'Pretty Common'...

 

PAPER: Hundreds of dead border-crossers in single Texas county...

 

Rancher shares grotesque photos...

DINESH D'SOUZA'S RECENT TV AND RADIO INTERVIEWS

Dinesh D'Souza's book, America: Imagine A World Without Her, is #1 on the next New York Times best seller list.   This week he dialoged with Richard Dreyfus on the Huckabee show (video), and debated leftist David Corn on NPR Radio (audio).  He was with Glen Beck on a  TV interview, in which D'Souza said, "I explained what it was like to sit down with some of the country's most infamous leftists (such as Bill Ayers, Noam Chomsky, and Ward Churchill) in America the movie."  

The next morning D'Souza joined Glenn, Pat, and Stu on TheBlaze Radio to tell them why he was not giving up on America.  In an email he said, "We're in a fight for survival. Listen to the interview and find out why I think America is worth fighting for."

Review of America, the movie.  

BuzzPo radio interview together with an article giving good backround on D'Souza's earlier books and projects.

Update:  Frontpage Magazine posted a 36 minute video interview with Dinesh D'Souza:

 

American Jailed in N. Korea Feels 'Abandoned' by US

 

From CBN News 8/1/14 - 

An American Christian held in North Korea says he feels 'abandoned' by the United States government.

Kenneth Bae, a former tour guide, has been imprisoned in the communist country for nearly two years.

In an interview with a pro-North Korea newspaper based in Japan, Bae said nothing seems to be happening in his case.

He also said he's afraid of being sent back to a labor camp.

Bae's sister said it's the first they've heard of him since April and she called on the White House to do more to secure his release.

Bae is one of three Americans held in North Korea.