Seeing Red Makes Me See Red

It's very disturbing to me, as an American, that the Empire State building lights would be used in this way. What, exactly, are we honoring? Communist China's stellar record on human rights? Their forced abortions, allowing only 1 child per family? Their oppression of the Christian church, since it preaches a God (and higher authority) other than civil government?

Sadly, perhaps we do have a reason to honor them. The Chinese are some of the biggest investors in our national debt, buying our Treasury bonds in enormous numbers. From a Biblical perspective, what is the relationship between debtor and lender? And so perhaps, we light the building as a vassal honors its Lord.

A quote from the article: "That doesn't seem right." No, IT ISN'T RIGHT! And so goes another small part of our liberty as we pay homage to monstrous tyranny.

Response to a Health Care Email

(From an email I got that's been around the Net a few times...)
18 REASONS TO OPPOSE HEALTH-CARE REFORM
1. Although efforts have been made to reform the healthcare industry since 1912, we should not be hasty in doing it.
2. The federal government has no business interfering in people's healthcare decisions, unless a woman is trying to terminate a pregnancy, or the patient’s last name is Schiavo.
3. The government is incapable of running anything efficiently -- but if allowed to offer a healthcare option, will run it so efficiently that it will put private insurers out of business.
4. We already have universal health care: it’s called the Emergency Room. Uninsured people, including illegal aliens, can go there for their health needs, and it only costs the rest of us a few thousand dollars per visi t.
5. The current system, with 47,000,000 uninsured, a million medical bankruptcies annually, 18,000 deaths annually due to lack of insurance, and the highest costs per capita of any first-world country, is working just fine. In fact, we have the best health care system in the world!
6. Many older couples are forced to divorce in order to avoid catastrophic financial losses due to medical expenses -- but it’s the homosexuals who are destroying families.
7. A conversation with your doctor about end-of-life issues (such as how to make out a living will) is an opportunity for your doctor to convince you to kill yourself.
8. We can afford to spend more on our military than all other nations combined, but we can’t afford universal health care.
9. Single-payer, government-run healthcare is good enough for our men and women in uniform, but to offer the same to the general public would be socialism.
10. Pooling our resources to provide roads, schools, clean water, military, police, and fire protection for each other is not socialism. Pooling our resources to provide each other health care is socialism.
11. Socialism is when the government makes any effort to assist needy citizens.
12. Health care is e best handled by individual states; like slavery and racial segregation.
13. We can afford to s ubsidize Iraq and Afghanistan , both of whom have universal healthcare, but we can’t afford it ourselves.
14. Money and corporate profits are more important than people's health. Sure, reforming the companies would save thousands of lives, but shareholders’ portfolios might be damaged.
15. Freeing people from holding on to their dead-end jobs for the insurance and allowing them to become entrepreneurs would bankrupt our country.
16. Someone like physicist Stephen Hawking would have been allowed to die under the wretched British healthcare system. Oh, he’s British? And alive? Never mind
17. We are a “Christian’ nation, but we don’t believe in helping the least among us. Some people just don’t deserve healthcare. Getting sick is God's punishment for doing something wrong.
18. The Obama healthcare initiative is part of the liberal-communist-Nazi-socialist-Islamofascist-gay-atheist-zombie-transsexual-cannibal- sociopath-evolutionist indoctrinating school children agenda to take away your freedom!

My Response:

Point by point thoughts on the email below. I will warn you that God, the Constitution and liberty are discussed in my points.

1. Health care is not a universal human right, and we need to establish this at the forefront of the conversation; I can never be innately entitled to the benefit of someone else’s labor. I am not entitled to the care that a medical professional, or any other caring person, gives me. I see a call as a Christian to care for the needy and the poor as an individual. A government taking from some to pay for the care of others is not compassion, its totalitarianism (or socialism, as we will discuss later). Who then decides how much should be taken, from whom, and to whom should it be given? The poorest of Americans is still roughly 25 times richer than those in most of the world, per capita. Who determines what poor is, or what needy is? Once you have turned from the call of God – because we don’t believe in Him, or because we don’t believe He cares – we are left with civil government. 51% of the vote deciding right and wrong is just as much ‘might makes right’ as a dictatorship; it is the tyranny of the majority.
2. The reference here is to abortion, ruled by the Supreme Court in 1973 to be part of a citizen’s right to privacy, as put forth in the 14th amendment. But this interpretation of the 14th amendment is flawed, in that the 14th amendment’s goal was to make black and white citizens equal before the law. Abortion was never part of the picture when the 14th amendment was passed. In fact, 35 different states had various abortion laws at the time the 14th amendment was ratified, and these remained unchallenged from 1867 until 1973, when a liberal court reinterpreted the Constitution to allow the murder of unborn citizens. In the Schiavo case, we see the natural move from disdain for unborn children moving into disdain for the old and the sick; Schiavo was allowed to die because she was deemed a burden on society.
3. The government has never run a single program efficiently, including its own day-to-day operations. The reason private insurers will go out of business competing against the government is because when private insurers lose enough money, they are forced into bankruptcy and out of business. The government just continues to lose money and literally can print more (the money supply has doubled during 2009). It’s not that the government will suddenly learn efficiency, but that they don’t have to play by the same rules as private industry.
4. The cost to the rest of us is hard to quantify, and there is tremendous abuse of the system. Much of this comes from the fact that we never see exactly how much we spend for medical care. I pay cash for medical needs, despite having the income and ability to afford insurance; among a group of likeminded Christians, we then pay for each other’s medical needs according to a Biblical model (if you have more interest, go to www.samaritanministries.org). Seeing every dollar that is spent makes me more responsible about how I spend my money for medical care. I also don’t run to the doctor for every sniffle because I have an inexpensive co-pay, and I only use a prescription drug when absolutely necessary. The waste in our system comes for the overuse of doctor’s visits and medications by so many people, which will only be further encouraged by a government expansion of the system. The key here is personal responsibility leading to fiscal responsibility, and this problem is not something the government can fix; government involvement assures further waste (see number 3, research this for yourself).
5. Using those same numbers, how is it that we think adding 47 million new patients into the medical system (a number I dispute, but I’ll use it here) will solve the problem without hurting the quality of care, increasing patient wait times, or increasing the cost that we pay in taxes for the program? Simple math would tell us that insuring all these people will cost money, and that money has to come from somewhere. To the second point, people are always going to die, in any system. People die from accidents in hospitals, but do we then say that hospitals kill people, so shut them all down? The problem here is philosophical as much as medical, in that most people no longer believe in anything beyond the current, material world. So our focus has become making this earthly experience everything it can be, since this is all we have. The problem with this worldview is that it is untenable within society; at what point, when my happiness and your happiness conflict, do I have any incentive to put your needs before my own? Again, the truly Biblical worldview answers this tough question with the command to love my neighbor as myself, and do what I can help. Not through government coercion, but through my own actions and giving.
6. I have not seen any statistics that support the first part of this statement, and I fail to see how divorce would help financially. As to the 2nd part, homosexuality is not the core of the problem, sin is. Homosexual behavior is a sin, and it has consequences for societies that accept sinful behavior as the norm. This is not so much a dire warning on my part of some coming judgment, but historical fact. Cultures that have gained the riches leading to lives of vice have generally toppled soon after, having no deeper set of values to pursue as a society than personal pleasure. This is not to say that homosexuals are any worse than any other person; before God we have all sinned, and we all need Jesus Christ equally. Lying, for example, is as much a sin as homosexuality, and just as damaging to culture and society.
7. The language about end of life care has been a hot topic of debate. I think that a society that shows contempt for the unborn and has already begun allowing assisted suicide in some states is not far from wanting to eliminate the biggest ‘burden’ on the system; namely, the elderly. My worldview is that the elderly are to be respected for their wisdom, and cared for by their families – not put into homes and such to die, something I see all too often. Does a conversation with your doctor equate to death camps forming? No, I don’t think so, but I would take into account both the current worldview of your doctor, and how that worldview will change as this system (universal health care) changes over time. At some point, as in Great Britain, someone will put a dollar figure on a human life. Insurance companies do this right now – but this is a system we participate in voluntarily, not a system we are subject to, which is the crucial difference.
8. We don’t spend more on our military than all other nations combined, but I think it amounts to about the next 46 on the list, which is a big number. Could we spend our military dollars in a wiser fashion? I am sure there are ways. It’s not a matter of whether or not the dollars are there for universal health care, but whether the best use of our health care dollars is spent on a government program. The Post Office, the annual operating budget, the Congressional cafeteria, Social Security, Medicare… just show me one program, please, that isn’t losing money and is being run effectively by government officials. The problem is accountability. If we create a government insurance company, the people that oversee it are appointed by elected officials, not stockholders. And how can a President or a Senator serving a limited term be held accountable for what is spent on health care? And when the costs overrun, as they are sure to do (look at Hawaii’s health care system as a state, or Canada, or Great Britain), whose benefits are going to be cut? ‘Well, my kid deserves to be treated’ or ‘my family deserves this.’ It’s the biggest expansion of an entitlement mentality our country has ever seen.
9. Please research the problems with health care for veterans; the system is sadly lacking. Perhaps if it was fixed and running smoothly, this particular argument would show some merit.
10. Socialism by definition is: when a governing body (a small group of citizens) takes from all according to their ability to produce, and redistributes according to need. It is correct to say that we have programs already in place that are socialistic in nature. We have already begun down the path of government care from the cradle to the grave, which is why the health care debate is so crucial; this step, the current one, is the only one we can prevent. We have done nothing for far too long. Social Security and Medicare/Medicaid were and are terrible ideas, stealing individual savings and liberty with the promise that government shall provide. And interestingly, abortion is a contributing factor here, as the average age of a citizen rises due to falling birth rates. This is not to criticize those who participate in the Social Security system, since you have no choice, but rather those who put the system in place. Misguided compassion is very, very dangerous because it has contributed widely to the entitlement mentality in our culture, and eroded any sense of personal responsibility. If you would see someone else’s medical needs paid for, could you not pay for them, yourself? This would be true sacrifice and compassion. Compassion is not forcing government to collect from everyone to help the needy; that is indeed socialism.
11. Charity and meeting the needs of the poor is not the responsibility of the federal government, please read the Constitution for an overview of the limited powers inherent to our central government. I am aware, by invoking the Constitution as it was written, that I have labeled myself as a domestic terrorist. For the record, I am also pro-life. And I read the Declaration of Independence occasionally, also.
12. Again, please read the 10th amendment, perhaps the most crucial among the Bill of Rights. Race relations in America are not helped by turning suffering people into statistics to be wielded in the fight for universal health care. Some states had laws that encouraged racism, but the South did not have a corner on that market. Please look at the riots in New York during the Civil War, due to the fear of whites that free blacks would be stealing their jobs. We spend so much time running around calling everyone racist. God sees the heart, man cannot. I do my best to live at peace with my fellow men and women of any nationality. I don’t know if a person is racist or having a bad day, and perhaps a person of a different ethnic group cut them off in traffic. We are quick to judge, and slow to extend a hand in true compassion. Instead of government programs and mandates, perhaps race relations are best dealt with by individual citizens? Change all the laws you want, you cannot legislate hate out of the hearts of some men. I tend to focus on the fact that I am far from perfect, and that my value (along with every other person’s value) comes from being created in the image of God. Then I can extend the grace and mercy that God has shown me to my fellow man.
13. In short, we should not be ‘subsidizing’ either one. But two wrongs do not make a right. Pointing this fact out does not then mean we should have universal health care in America.
14. This is a slippery slope to head down. Who has the authority to decide who should make money, and who shouldn’t? This is not the role of government. The flaw here comes from the basic assumption that we have a right to something, and rich people from Wall Street are holding us back from it. But it’s too easy to throw around labels like ‘racist’ and ‘corporate greed.’ Are there rich and evil men? Yes! Are there poor and evil men? Yes! To say that reforming these companies would “save thousands of lives” is a careless and irresponsible statement. Which companies? No two are exactly alike. Each are made up of people struggling to provide for their families, pay mortgages, and pay for their own health care. Are there some at the top who make a lot of money? Sure there are. If you worked hard, studied hard, and spent long hours to get to the top, would you not then want the big salary? It is very easy to spend other people’s money. People are people, and not fundamentally different from each other – we all struggle with the same things. This particular comment seems to indicate that those with more money than me are somehow different, and I am entitled to what they have worked for. How would I like that standard applied to me by someone in, say, India, who makes about $2/day?
15. How exactly does government run health care promote the growth of small business? The assumption here is that people will run out and start companies as soon as they ‘leave their dead-end jobs.’ But the bill also penalizes businesses if they don’t offer insurance to their employees, once they have them, in the form of more taxes. I would also challenge the assumption that people will immediately start new businesses. Especially if the cap and trade bill becomes law anytime soon, but that is a whole separate email.
16. Pulling one wealthy man out of the British health care system and stating that he is ‘still alive’ hardly argues that their system is worth emulating. I would encourage you to research how and where wealthy British subjects receive their medical care; many of them come here.
17. We have discussed this already several times. Government insurance for all is not Christian charity, it is in fact a major element of socialism. Christians should be better about helping our fellow men in need, and I agree that we have failed to do a good job in many ways. Please take this as our human failing, and no failing on the part of Christ. But stating that Christians are doing a bad job doesn’t mean that government is going to do a better job. And by the way, Jesus himself spoke against the idea that sickness is always direct result of sin (John 9). We can sin, damage our bodies, and illness is a natural consequence of our foolish behavior; but this is not always the case.
18. Adding numerous mocking adjectives just sounds petty and sarcastic, it doesn’t strengthen the argument. Is universal health care part of an agenda to take away freedoms? I doubt that President Obama would put it that way, but if this passes certain freedoms will be lost. I would no longer be able to share medical needs with other people as I currently do, because by law I would have to either have insurance that I don’t agree with, or pay a big penalty in taxes. I don’t owe a dime to any doctor or hospital, and yet I would lose freedom from this bill. Will some security be gained, by some people? Absolutely. But trading security for liberty is a dangerous game, and throughout human history it has only had one outcome. Freedom in this world, short of revolution such as we saw here in America from 1775-1783, is very tough to come by. When you have it, I would think long and hard about giving it up, even for seemingly good reasons.

My final thought is that health care is a tough topic, and worthy of long discussion. Ultimately I don’t see civil government as the solution to this problem. The major thing that troubles me is how quick we are to run to government for a new law about this, or a new solution to that. Many of our health problems in America stem from our own personal behavior. I am overweight because I don’t eat properly, and I don’t exercise enough (too much time spent writing long-winded emails). Is that society’s responsibility? No, it’s my own. I need to lose weight, and eat more nutritional food. I don’t have a disorder or need weight-loss medication. I need some discipline and hard work. Our lifestyles in this modern age have done much to contribute to our various health problems. Changing how we live, and changing how we think about the health care dollars we spend – our own or the insurance company’s – is the solution to the short term problem, and then perhaps we can look at a long term solution as well. But telling people ‘you need to change’ is much more difficult than telling people ‘we have a program to fix it,’ and so I believe that we will end up with some version of universal health care. But I think it will end up costing us more than we are willing to pay.

Rejoicing in Our Insignificance

Today I was studying in the Word and it struck me just how little I truly matter in the scheme of things. Not in the sense that God does not care for me, but with a sense of awestruck wonder that He does.

Consider the infinite Being that God is. When your head starts to ache, read on. We have trouble understanding the little He has revealed to us about Himself in His Word, let alone understanding the totality of who He is. Our brains literally can't do it - we can't think in terms of the infinite. I think of Job, standing before God in the midst of his suffering, as God appears and questions him (Job 38-42). Can any of us control a tiny thing - a creature like a dinosaur, the weather - something that God created with barely a thought and a word? Consider that it doesn't take even the smallest fraction of God's power to cause the wind to blow, and yet in all our vaunted wisdom we have barely come to the point that we can track where it blows, never mind the very thought that it blows.

And so this insignificance can lead us down one of two paths: we can react with pride, saying 'I am more important than this!' and live a life based on our wisdom, in the way we think best, doing everything we can to increase our standing in this world. Or we can react with humility that leads ultimately to joyful security: we are nothing compared to the vastness of God! And yet he cares for us, elevating us into relationship with Him as His children should we respond in faith to His calling (John 3:16, Acts 16:31). With the merest whisper of a thought we came into being, and with the a similar whisper we leave this earth. But in between God has a plan for us, because he loves us - not due to our significance, but due to His Grace which surpasses all things. From before the foundations of the world we were chosen by Him (1 Peter 1).

So we can rejoice in our insignificance! God's plans - and His ability to enact those plans - far exceed our ability to understand. May we always remember this, that every human in existence bears His image (Genesis 1), and we can be saved through His grace to spend eternity with Him (Ephesians 2). Why does He choose to do this? I have no idea! But I know that He does, and His promises are true (Psalm 146). Amen.

Economics 101

Today we'll quickly cover a couple of basic points on wages and taxes:

First, wages. Minimum wage increases are always popular, and only a troll would oppose increasing it, right? But let's look at what actually happens. Raising employee wages increases costs for a company. That company makes a product or performs a service for which they collect a fee. That fee, or price, pays all of their expenses in making the product or performing the service, and it includes the profit the company earns as well. So, when wages have to increase by federal law, does a company a) sacrifice its profit or b) increase the price of its product? And when that price increases (yes, 'b' is the correct answer), what has happened to the buying power of your dollar? The product is not any different than it was, it just now requires more dollars to purchase. So the buying power of each dollar - not just for those who got their wages increased, but for everyone - just decreased, and we call that inflation. So some people are making more money, but the buying power of a dollar just got reduced for every citizen in society.

Second, taxes. "Stick it to the rich guy!" usually translates into higher taxes for both the wealthy and for companies. But can government truly increase the taxes paid by a company? On paper, yes. But in reality, that company has 4 choices when presented by the government with higher taxes: a) sacrifice its profit, b) reduce its other expenses, c) increase its prices, or d) some combination of 'b' and 'c.' For the sake of keeping this simple, we are going to ignore 'd,' but you can see the effects of that choice as we discuss the others. Choice 'a' is as laughable here as it was above (and ultimately, they'll go out of business). Choice 'b' means fewer employees, or fewer benefits for those employees, lower pay, etc. And in choice 'b,' who is truly paying this increase in taxes? Employees, who are individual citizens. Choice 'c' we discussed above - we all, as consumers, end up paying the tax.

So, when you hear about programs - health care, cap and trade, etc. - that propose to give you (or society) a benefit and charge someone else for the cost, remember our 101 class; 'someone else' actually means you.

Waterboarding, the CIA, and Terrorism

If you haven't been following the most recent developments in the CIA water boarding saga, here is a quick update:

Several former CIA directors wrote a letter to President Obama, asking him to halt the criminal investigation of CIA agents who have used 'enhanced interrogation' techniques in the past. President Obama has declined to get involved with Attorney General Holder's process, stating that he thinks everyone should be accountable to the law, so the investigation will continue.
I have heard Christians come down all over the place on this issue. As Christians who are supposed to love everyone, how could we ever torture someone? How do we balance 'turning the other cheek' with water boarding? Can we treat Islamic terrorists however we want because they don't follow Christ, or because they hate America?

Tough questions all, and we do right in asking them. I think part of the problem for us, as Americans and as Christians living in the 21st Century, is our squeamishness about violence and death. Somehow, in a civilized society of the modern age, death is distasteful (don't miss the irony here, in the fact that the brutal murder of abortion is legal, and even encouraged).

So what does the Bible say? Really, violence is all over the Bible, New and Old Testament, and it's not nearly as prohibited as many believers think. In the Old Testament, Mosaic Law has specific rules about floggings and beatings (Deuteronomy). Samson is granted power from God to destroy the nobility of Philistine society, along with himself (Judges 16). Proverbs speaks repeatedly about rods and fools in the context of discipline. Nehemiah 13 speaks about Nehemiah - considered a wise and just ruler - cursing, beating, and pulling out the hair of his disobedient countrymen in his anger. David spared Saul at least twice, even as Saul sought to kill him (1 Samuel 24, 26), and yet he kills the Amalekite who finally does kill Saul, even though Saul asks to be killed (2 Samuel 1). In the New Testament, Peter kills 2 Christians who give money to the church, but lie about how much of their profit they are giving (Acts 5), and everyone is terrified. Jesus Himself taught us to turn the other cheek when someone strikes us (Matthew 5, Luke 6), and yet He attacks the money-changers in the temple, flipping tables in a terrible righteous anger (John 2, Mark 11) - some Bible scholars think he might have done this twice.

Focusing specifically on David and Jesus, we see the context of what the Bible teaches. When we are wronged, we are to respond in meekness, sparing our enemies and even turning the other cheek. But when God's designs are perverted by evil men and their acts, when others are threatened who are in our care, there is a place for righteous anger. In short, there is a difference between vengeance and justice. Our CIA, acting to secure the safety of America, should have great latitude to interrogate. If the CIA, FBI or the military have good evidence that the suspect knows information that can prove vital to our national defense, then I am in favor of 'enhanced interrogations' far beyond simple water boarding. Death is not too extreme a penalty in this case, depending on the crimes in question. Justice can be served without the proceedings of a court, which is a right specifically given only to American citizens in the Constitution.

In summary, justice must be our goal, not vengeance. We must make wise choices about those who defend us, and then trust their judgment. There is accountability built into our current system, and we should not just wantonly torture anyone. But when tough choices have to be made, we have to give our defenders the ability to defend us, or we will suffer the consequences. President Obama is helping to create a terrible choice for our CIA agents: defend your country and go to prison, or play nice, obey the 'rules,' and bear the terrible responsibility of another attack on American citizens. As a Christian I don't see that torture is prohibited by the Bible, and as an American I certainly hope that we do everything we can to stop evil men from doing evil things.

The Bible is Old! Is It Even Relevant Today?

This is a very common question, especially from young people inside the church who are seeking answers to tough questions. Several variations include:

What can the Bible have to say about modern day problems?
Society is so different, that stuff can’t apply now.
They were so primitive, we’ve come so far from then – times have changed.

The problem with all these statements is the underlying assumption: that society has altered to the point that the Bible can no longer speak its Truth on the issues surrounding us. This is a lie that comes to us from evolutionary theory being applied not just to science, but sociology and history: the idea that society itself is evolving, and that humanity’s various cultures have become something that they were not in the days of the Bible. When we look at the technologies that rule our lives today, they seem to bear this out: life does look a lot different now than it did in during Jesus’ earthly days. But are we truly superior? Does the ability to quickly navigate the virtual world of the Internet, or deftly manipulate the buttons of my iPod to bring forth sound, really demonstrate that I am a superior being to those of earlier cultures?

If we ask ourselves some hard questions, particularly those of us in urban areas, how many real skills to do we actually have? If the power went out tomorrow and didn’t come back on, could we even survive for a month? Sure, we’ve learned how to use computers, cars, and all sorts of neat gadgets. But do you really believe that if Paul had been shown a computer and given some basic instruction, he could not have used it?

Consider several passages of Scripture:

Genesis 1-2, the account of Creation. Adam and Eve were both created directly by God Himself, prior to the Fall. Has anyone lived in a state of physical perfection since then?
Genesis 3, the Fall itself. Things were perfect until sin, at which point death entered the world. Most people would call that a negative.
Genesis 5-6, the genealogy from Adam to Noah. Are people living longer, better lives today than at the beginning? And when people’s lives were longer, what were they doing with their time?
1 Kings 3:5-14, of the wisdom of King Solomon. The Bible is specific here that no one who ever lived or ever will live has been or will be as wise as Solomon was.
Ecclesiastes 1, written by King Solomon about the nature of man and the world. He tells us directly that there is nothing new under the sun: man does today what man has done from the beginning of time, and he will do it again and again unto the end of time.

So then, if the most physically perfect and wisest have already lived thousands of years ago, and we live shorter lives even more affected by sin and death than those who came before us…
In which direction is time truly marching?

Truly, the very first men struggled with obedience to God and with sin. Sin grew until there was one – one! – righteous man left in the entire world. In starting over with Noah’s family, we watched the cycle repeat (Genesis 11) up until Babel, at which point people and languages were scattered. Now we live the shorter lives that God ordained so that we cannot explore the evil of our flesh to the fullness we did before (Genesis 6:3). Many today would point out that we are moving toward a one-world government; we worry about this new development. But what have we just seen from Scripture? This is not new, it’s been tried (and it failed, we must note)! The fact is that our lives are the same as always. We’re born. We marry. We have families, and try our best to provide for them. We live, and then we die. And what do we struggle with today? Obedience to God and with sin. Technology has given us new ways to express our basic natures, but it’s the same basic nature still being expressed. There is nothing new under the sun, and the Bible is no less relevant today than it ever was. Truly, it is more desperately needed today than it has ever been because history is moving in one direction, and it’s not the one we’d like to think.

Have a Yard Sale, Go to Jail!

Behold good intentions running wild in the form of big government! The latest installation in our unfortunately ongoing series has to do with dangerous toys and YOU. Is $200 from a yard sale worth $10,000 in fines? Read here to find out more.

The 2008 Consumer Product Safety Improvement Act is a great lesson on unintended consequences, and a great lesson on why less government is generally better government. Unsurprisingly, its original scope has been expanded from new toys to used toys, which means any resaler (and yes, yard saler) of prohibited items can be prosecuted.

Now, will they show up at your yard sale and haul you away? I seriously doubt it. But are you comfortable with the fact that they have the power to do so?

"You Lie!"

I don't consider Joe Wilson a hero, and his comment (yelled during President Obama's speech) was inappropriate. While conservatives might agree with Mr. Wilson and say that Obama was indeed lying, the accuracy of the statement is beside the point. Wilson's behavior was wrong in the timing of his comment, for which he apologized, as he should have done - an apology that the White House accepted.

That being said, this report is much more disturbing. The implication here is that any criticism of a Black President made by anything other than a Black citizen or Congressman is racist. Joe Wilson is White, President Obama is Black, and so Joe Wilson must be either racist himself, or he is assisting racists in their cause. It puts any of us who are not Black in the impossible situation of having to prove a negative; that is, that we are not racist when we criticize President Obama's policies.

Questions to consider: what about when Black people criticize a White President? Or a Chinese person criticizing a Black? What about a Black from one country criticizing someone who is Black but from a different country? Am I racist for saying 'Black' instead of 'African American?' Why is someone not racist for calling me 'White' instead of Scottish American?

There are no end to the questions, and really no answers to be had either, outside of Christ. We (as Christians) can say that judgment on the basis of color is wrong, because we are all of us created in the image of God (Genesis 1:26-27). We can further warn those who would judge the heart that this is not the realm of mankind (1 Samuel 16:7, Revelation 2:23). In other words, we can say that Joe Wilson is wrong, because he broke the rules of Congress. We cannot call Joe Wilson racist because we don't know the workings of his heart. Were we to witness a series of events in addition to this one, then we could begin to see a pattern of behavior that could be accurately labeled (James 2). But instead we see proponents of an ideology - in this specific case, liberals - painting both Joe Wilson and many of the protesters that were in Washington over the holiday weekend with the same broad brush of 'racist.' They are acting in the exact way they accuse Joe Wilson and others of acting, which is a sin (again, James 2).

Let none of us do this ourselves - either in response to this story, or in life. Loving our neighbors and teaching them Truth in gentleness and patience will lead them to Christ (2 Timothy 2:24-26). Hurling insults and labels back and forth - however accurate we think they are - does nothing to advance His Kingdom.

09-11-2001 Remembered

They'll be many lengthy speeches and opinions given today, which largely serve to elevate the speaker while demeaning the sacrifice of the Americans who died. It is for us, the living, both to remember and learn from what happened, and to study how some of our fellow Americans responded.

I will offer only this, two words that sum up the courage of ordinary citizens thrust into an extraordinary moment:

Let's roll.

Iran: Nuclear Chicken, Part II

If you needed further evidence that Iran has not been dealing squarely with the US, here it is! Apparently a dishonest man is dependably dishonest.

Good to know I didn't completely waste my 2 hours watching that movie.

Let the Little Children Come Unto Me

Here is the text of President Obama's speech today, as released beforehand to the AP. This was broadcast in many public schools directly to the students: (makes for a long post, my comments at the end)

Hello, everyone — how's everybody doing today? I'm here with students at Wakefield High School in Arlington, Virginia. And we've got students tuning in from all across America, kindergarten through 12th grade. I'm glad you all could join us today.
I know that for many of you, today is the first day of school. And for those of you in kindergarten, or starting middle or high school, it's your first day in a new school, so it's understandable if you're a little nervous. I imagine there are some seniors out there who are feeling pretty good right now, with just one more year to go. And no matter what grade you're in, some of you are probably wishing it were still summer, and you could've stayed in bed just a little longer this morning.
I know that feeling. When I was young, my family lived in Indonesia for a few years, and my mother didn't have the money to send me where all the American kids went to school. So she decided to teach me extra lessons herself, Monday through Friday — at 4:30 in the morning.
Now I wasn't too happy about getting up that early. A lot of times, I'd fall asleep right there at the kitchen table. But whenever I'd complain, my mother would just give me one of those looks and say, "This is no picnic for me either, buster."
So I know some of you are still adjusting to being back at school. But I'm here today because I have something important to discuss with you. I'm here because I want to talk with you about your education and what's expected of all of you in this new school year.
Now I've given a lot of speeches about education. And I've talked a lot about responsibility.
I've talked about your teachers' responsibility for inspiring you, and pushing you to learn.
I've talked about your parents' responsibility for making sure you stay on track, and get your homework done, and don't spend every waking hour in front of the TV or with that Xbox.
I've talked a lot about your government's responsibility for setting high standards, supporting teachers and principals, and turning around schools that aren't working where students aren't getting the opportunities they deserve.
But at the end of the day, we can have the most dedicated teachers, the most supportive parents, and the best schools in the world and none of it will matter unless all of you fulfill your responsibilities. Unless you show up to those schools; pay attention to those teachers; listen to your parents, grandparents and other adults; and put in the hard work it takes to succeed.
And that's what I want to focus on today: the responsibility each of you has for your education. I want to start with the responsibility you have to yourself.
Every single one of you has something you're good at. Every single one of you has something to offer. And you have a responsibility to yourself to discover what that is. That's the opportunity an education can provide.
Maybe you could be a good writer — maybe even good enough to write a book or articles in a newspaper — but you might not know it until you write a paper for your English class. Maybe you could be an innovator or an inventor — maybe even good enough to come up with the next iPhone or a new medicine or vaccine — but you might not know it until you do a project for your science class. Maybe you could be a mayor or a senator or a Supreme Court justice, but you might not know that until you join student government or the debate team.
And no matter what you want to do with your life — I guarantee that you'll need an education to do it. You want to be a doctor, or a teacher, or a police officer? You want to be a nurse or an architect, a lawyer or a member of our military? You're going to need a good education for every single one of those careers. You can't drop out of school and just drop into a good job. You've got to work for it and train for it and learn for it.
And this isn't just important for your own life and your own future. What you make of your education will decide nothing less than the future of this country. What you're learning in school today will determine whether we as a nation can meet our greatest challenges in the future.
You'll need the knowledge and problem-solving skills you learn in science and math to cure diseases like cancer and AIDS, and to develop new energy technologies and protect our environment. You'll need the insights and critical thinking skills you gain in history and social studies to fight poverty and homelessness, crime and discrimination, and make our nation more fair and more free. You'll need the creativity and ingenuity you develop in all your classes to build new companies that will create new jobs and boost our economy.
We need every single one of you to develop your talents, skills and intellect so you can help solve our most difficult problems. If you don't do that — if you quit on school — you're not just quitting on yourself, you're quitting on your country.
Now I know it's not always easy to do well in school. I know a lot of you have challenges in your lives right now that can make it hard to focus on your schoolwork.
I get it. I know what that's like. My father left my family when I was two years old, and I was raised by a single mother who struggled at times to pay the bills and wasn't always able to give us things the other kids had. There were times when I missed having a father in my life. There were times when I was lonely and felt like I didn't fit in.
So I wasn't always as focused as I should have been. I did some things I'm not proud of, and got in more trouble than I should have. And my life could have easily taken a turn for the worse.
But I was fortunate. I got a lot of second chances and had the opportunity to go to college, and law school, and follow my dreams. My wife, our first lady Michelle Obama, has a similar story. Neither of her parents had gone to college, and they didn't have much. But they worked hard, and she worked hard, so that she could go to the best schools in this country.
Some of you might not have those advantages. Maybe you don't have adults in your life who give you the support that you need. Maybe someone in your family has lost their job, and there's not enough money to go around. Maybe you live in a neighborhood where you don't feel safe, or have friends who are pressuring you to do things you know aren't right.
But at the end of the day, the circumstances of your life — what you look like, where you come from, how much money you have, what you've got going on at home — that's no excuse for neglecting your homework or having a bad attitude. That's no excuse for talking back to your teacher, or cutting class, or dropping out of school. That's no excuse for not trying.
Where you are right now doesn't have to determine where you'll end up. No one's written your destiny for you. Here in America, you write your own destiny. You make your own future.
That's what young people like you are doing every day, all across America.
Young people like Jazmin Perez, from Roma, Texas. Jazmin didn't speak English when she first started school. Hardly anyone in her hometown went to college, and neither of her parents had gone either. But she worked hard, earned good grades, got a scholarship to Brown University, and is now in graduate school, studying public health, on her way to being Dr. Jazmin Perez.
I'm thinking about Andoni Schultz, from Los Altos, California, who's fought brain cancer since he was three. He's endured all sorts of treatments and surgeries, one of which affected his memory, so it took him much longer — hundreds of extra hours — to do his schoolwork. But he never fell behind, and he's headed to college this fall.
And then there's Shantell Steve, from my hometown of Chicago, Illinois. Even when bouncing from foster home to foster home in the toughest neighborhoods, she managed to get a job at a local health center; start a program to keep young people out of gangs; and she's on track to graduate high school with honors and go on to college.
Jazmin, Andoni and Shantell aren't any different from any of you. They faced challenges in their lives just like you do. But they refused to give up. They chose to take responsibility for their education and set goals for themselves. And I expect all of you to do the same. That's why today, I'm calling on each of you to set your own goals for your education — and to do everything you can to meet them. Your goal can be something as simple as doing all your homework, paying attention in class, or spending time each day reading a book. Maybe you'll decide to get involved in an extracurricular activity, or volunteer in your community. Maybe you'll decide to stand up for kids who are being teased or bullied because of who they are or how they look, because you believe, like I do, that all kids deserve a safe environment to study and learn. Maybe you'll decide to take better care of yourself so you can be more ready to learn. And along those lines, I hope you'll all wash your hands a lot, and stay home from school when you don't feel well, so we can keep people from getting the flu this fall and winter.
Whatever you resolve to do, I want you to commit to it. I want you to really work at it.
I know that sometimes, you get the sense from TV that you can be rich and successful without any hard work — that your ticket to success is through rapping or basketball or being a reality TV star, when chances are, you're not going to be any of those things.
But the truth is, being successful is hard. You won't love every subject you study. You won't click with every teacher. Not every homework assignment will seem completely relevant to your life right this minute. And you won't necessarily succeed at everything the first time you try.
That's OK. Some of the most successful people in the world are the ones who've had the most failures. J.K. Rowling's first Harry Potter book was rejected twelve times before it was finally published. Michael Jordan was cut from his high school basketball team, and he lost hundreds of games and missed thousands of shots during his career. But he once said, "I have failed over and over and over again in my life. And that is why I succeed."
These people succeeded because they understand that you can't let your failures define you — you have to let them teach you. You have to let them show you what to do differently next time. If you get in trouble, that doesn't mean you're a troublemaker, it means you need to try harder to behave. If you get a bad grade, that doesn't mean you're stupid, it just means you need to spend more time studying.
No one's born being good at things, you become good at things through hard work. You're not a varsity athlete the first time you play a new sport. You don't hit every note the first time you sing a song. You've got to practice. It's the same with your schoolwork. You might have to do a math problem a few times before you get it right, or read something a few times before you understand it, or do a few drafts of a paper before it's good enough to hand in.
Don't be afraid to ask questions. Don't be afraid to ask for help when you need it. I do that every day. Asking for help isn't a sign of weakness, it's a sign of strength. It shows you have the courage to admit when you don't know something, and to learn something new. So find an adult you trust — a parent, grandparent or teacher; a coach or counselor — and ask them to help you stay on track to meet your goals.
And even when you're struggling, even when you're discouraged, and you feel like other people have given up on you — don't ever give up on yourself. Because when you give up on yourself, you give up on your country.
The story of America isn't about people who quit when things got tough. It's about people who kept going, who tried harder, who loved their country too much to do anything less than their best. It's the story of students who sat where you sit 250 years ago, and went on to wage a revolution and found this nation. Students who sat where you sit 75 years ago who overcame a Depression and won a world war; who fought for civil rights and put a man on the moon. Students who sat where you sit 20 years ago who founded Google, Twitter and Facebook and changed the way we communicate with each other.
So today, I want to ask you, what's your contribution going to be? What problems are you going to solve? What discoveries will you make? What will a president who comes here in twenty or fifty or one hundred years say about what all of you did for this country?
Your families, your teachers, and I are doing everything we can to make sure you have the education you need to answer these questions. I'm working hard to fix up your classrooms and get you the books, equipment and computers you need to learn. But you've got to do your part too. So I expect you to get serious this year. I expect you to put your best effort into everything you do. I expect great things from each of you. So don't let us down — don't let your family or your country or yourself down. Make us all proud. I know you can do it.
Thank you, God bless you, and God bless America.

Having read the speech, I like the text. Hear me clearly: I see a problem with the government educating all our children, but I don't see an enormous difference between our government's philosophy taught on a daily basis, and having the actual President come and speak to children.

The issue here is greater than the content of one speech, and it speaks to the heart of education: whose responsibility is it to educate your children? And many of us, having turned that responsibility over to our government on a daily basis, are now upset over the direction of that education (at least in this one instance). I would encourage Christians to research what your kids are being taught everyday, not just during one speech.

Iran: Nuclear Chicken

In searching the most unlikely places for sound wisdom, I came across this gem:

"Me? I'm dishonest, and a dishonest man you can always trust to be dishonest. Honestly. It's the honest ones you want to watch out for, because you can never predict when they're going to do something incredibly... stupid." -Jack Sparrow, Pirates of the Caribbean

Read here about Iran's refusal to limit their nuclear program, and their claim that all they are trying to do is generate electricity. Then see the first sentence above; should we base our foreign policy with Iran, and perhaps our security against nuclear attack, on the belief that a dishonest man is finally being honest? Ahmadinejad is a liar, a murder, a terrorist, and a fool. He has participated in attacks against Americans, has good friends such as North Korea, denies the Holocaust happened, and has publicly stated his desire to "wipe Israel off the map." Other than that, I'm sure he's a great guy and good with children.
So the right thing to do here is fairly simple: don't trust a word he says. And be prepared to take strong action should he persist in his dream of nuclear power to use against Israel. Er... I mean to keep the lights on at the children's hospital.

Grace, Truth and Love

I have not posted in a while, having taken some time to reflect on what message God would have me share. I spent some time reading several prominent news sources online (from both CNN and FOX), and examining the comments at the end of the articles. While the content of the articles - in general, stories about government spending and policy - was disturbing, the very saddest part were the comments.

And I am not dividing these comments into camps with labels such as 'conservative' and 'liberal.' If you read nearly anything I have posted here, you know that I am a conservative and a Christian. But in reading these comments from both sides of the aisle, I see a total lack of anything resembling grace or love, with the occasional truth being obliterated by the angry tone of the speaker.

Brothers (and sisters), this is not what we have been called to. Proverbs 3:5-6 and Colossians 2:2-3 explicitly tell us that all wisdom and truth comes from the Lord; why is it we expect wisdom and understanding from those held captive by the empty philosophy of this world? 2 Timothy 2:24-26 explicitly calls us to gentleness and patience as we share the truth with those 'held captive by the devil.' Where is our gentleness and patience? I understand that most of the comments that saddened me came from non-believers, but many came from those identifying themselves as Christians.

So how should this look, when (not if) we disagree with the world on critical issues? I am no paragon of virtue, and I struggle with this like everyone else. I think we should ask ourselves: what are my expectations from this conversation? How do my words reflect Christ? We should disagree firmly, but respectfully. I think the biggest piece that we miss is empathy. This world is held captive - like we were, before Christ - so we need to remember we aren't better than anyone, we are just saved by grace. We did nothing to achieve our salvation; Christ set aside His divine rights to die horribly on a cross. Realizing, then, that our only advantage is Christ within us, it should temper our speech so that God may grant repentance to those with whom we speak (2 Timothy 2:25). Aside from Christ we have nothing to offer.