Profits By Any Other Name

Whether it's big pharmaceutical, big oil, big insurance, or a small plumbing company, the idea that there are billions of dollars in profits being made in this big government political age is unacceptable. This hearkens back to the Marxist roots of socialism where profit was seen as the unfair taking from the laborer the fruit of his labor that was rightfully his.

For all the caterwauling about this "problem" of profits from the most compassionate amongst us-(whisper)and fabulously well to do too-there seems to be a huge blind spot by those singing the loudest.

Keeping with St. Marx's idea of profit-the difference between the value that the worker has created and the wage that the worker receives from his employer-there is an entity, the same entity in fact that Marx saw as the savior for the oppressed proletariat, that seems to be getting away with a little profit action in their own right. That entity would be the state. And as Shakespeare once alluded, you can change the name of your irk, but that doesn't change the fact that your a hypocrite.

So how is this so? Well consider Marx's definition-that I got here by the way. The next time you look at your pay stub look at the difference in the wealth that you have created by the sweat of your brow, minus of coarse what your employer has taken for himself. That would be your gross. Then look at the amount that you received from your employer. Or the next time you purchase an item that "costs" ten dollars, pay attention to how much of the tender representing your labor you must hand over at the cash register. Upon a little reflection you will begin to realize that your employer is not the only one feeding at the trough of your labor.

Now go home and turn on the TV and watch your president, the most flagrant example of such, living like a king, vacationing, flying to and fro making important speeches, and batting spheres around. His ability to do this comes from non other than the taking of the sweat of your, and millions of other's, brow. While some prefer to call this taxing, according to Marx, it is profits.

The Hypocrite's Hypocrite

A lady reading a magazine with a picture of the conservative Dr. Laura Schlessinger on its cover was asked about the story. "It says Dr. Laura doesn't practice what she preaches" was the reply. This raises a question, does this lady or the author of the article live up to any kind of standard? The truth is that both might just as guilty of the same sort of hypocrisy for no one really lives their lives without some sort of standard.

The problem arises because Dr. Laura, a self proclaimed Jew, holds up a Judeo Christian standard of morality. But if the foundations of the charges of hypocrisy are analyzed, Christians may actually be the least culpable, and their accusers the most. How can this be?

First, consider that without a standard from which to measure, the word hypocrite is meaningless. Christians not only point to an objective set of moral standards that apply to everyone, they also point out that all fall short of those same standards. So let's consider the Christian standards. But let's not stop there but also examine the standards held by those who are quick to accuse Christians of hypocrisy. The charge cuts both ways.

The starting point of Christianity is the admission of the fallenness and depravity of all mankind, including self. It points to a God who cannot be both just and merciful. God's wrath puts all of mankind in a position of condemnation before Him. But his mercy provides an escape. As an aside, it is in recognizing this that we begin to understand the ire of those who are vehemently opposed to Christianity and relish in debasing it. Who, after all, likes being confronted with the truth that they are condemned?

But this is also why the good news is good news. So, that said, not only does the Christian agree with God that he has fallen short of God's standards, but he also acknowledges his failures before man. That said, anyone who accuses Christians of hypocrisy are actually a little late to the party.

Secondly, what of the standards held by those quick with the Christians-are-hypocrites accusations, and how do they fair in holding to their standards? They have their standards too you know. This is proved by the fact that accusations are being made. If one has no standard then there is nothing for another person to fall short of, and no reason to accuse.

The fact is that no one has no standard. In the same way that it is judgemental to judge someone as being judgemental, it is also hypocritical to judge someone as being hypocritical if the person making the judgement has fallen short of his own standards. And no one has not fallen short of his own standards, no matter what those standards might be. So, in one sense, all people except Christians are hypocrites. Of course I don't buy that. There are clearly glaring Christian hypocrites.

It seems to be a common thing in these acrimonious times for accusations of "does not practice what he preaches". Although such charges may be true, it is also true that the one making them is making them from a position of self-righteousness. In the end it is just as important to realize that everyone has standards to fall short of as it is that all fall short of standards. The teachings of Christianity embrace this reality. The fact that the accusers do not raises the question of who is the more authentic hypocrite?

Poisoning My Children's Well

When the ideological arguments of an opponent are presented by you first, along with an answer to those arguments; that is called Poisoning The well. By doing this you are able to frame their arguments in the worst possible terms and respond to them in the best possible terms. It might look something like this.  Teacher says: "Your parents are going to tell you that God created the world.  But we now know that such views are antiquated and are nothing more than remnants of an old, unscientific way of thinking. Science has now shown that our existence is due to evolution."

My first exposure to this tactic occurred during a prolonged encounter with Jehovah's Witnesses. These poor souls were taught beforehand exactly how Christians would respond to their message.  So when Christians actually responded as predicted, it made their leaders look intelligent, insightful and even prophetic. 

Anti-Christ cultural apologists do the same sorts of things by presenting a cultural issue along with a caricatured version of the anticipated Christian response. They then follow with a more "reasonable" sounding explanation. This, in effect, poisons many children's well against their parents. When the parent attempts to contradict the teacher, they will say what their children were told they would say, and the counter to that teaching will have already been programmed into the child's mind. The parents will have unwittingly made themselves into silly caricatures without even realizing it.

On the other hand, if I am the first to make the world's case to my children, then I can also be the first to give a response to why the world's views and arguments are flawed.

I have come to appreciate this tactic and have employed it in teaching my own children in ways that help insulate them against the lies they're certain to hear.  My goal is one of firsts.  I make it my business to be the first to present the messages of our culture as well as the first to help them evaluate those messages in light of scripture, logic, and objective truth, and also the first to provide a response to those messages. In this way I am the one setting the table for my children's future worldview discussions with others.

Francis Schaeffer understood this problem in the early sixties and had this to say in, "Escape From Reason", published in 1968:

"The reason we often cannot speak to our children, let alone other people's, is because we have never taken time to understand how different their thought-forms are from ours. Through reading and education and the whole modern cultural bombardment of mass media, even today's middle-class children are becoming thoroughly twentieth-century in outlook. In crucial areas many Christian parents, ministers and teachers are as out of touch with many of the children of the church, and the majority of those outside, as though they were speaking a foreign language."

C.S. Lewis also, in "The Abolition Of Man", spoke of the school boy who had had the seed of indoctrination planted in his mind early in his life:

"It is not a theory they put into [the school boy's] mind, but an assumption, which ten years hence, its origin forgotten and its presence unconscious, will condition him to take one side in a controversy which he has never recognized as a controversy at all."

Parenting as a Christian in a culture hostile to Christianity requires that one be, among other things, proactive and intentional. If the Christian parent is not the first to introduce the views that oppose the faith that the parent is attempting to instill, he will likely discover later that the very act of articulating those same views will lend credence to those who oppose his views. The parent will indeed be fulfilling "prophecy".  This makes the "prophet" look really smart and the parent look predictable... even stupid, kind of like the caricature.

When my children are confronted with such opposition, my hope is three-fold. First, that the issue will already have been settled in their minds. Second, that their father's credibility will be enhanced in hearing exactly what he warned them they would hear. And third, that they will be critical thinkers.

It is naive to think that our children's well will not be poisoned if we do not take action to prevent it. Fallacious arguments against the Christian's worldview, and what we teach our children, are very much an integral part of our culture, which not only includes institutions of education, but also entertainment. Unless the parent is proactive in preventing it, those arguments will take hold. The parents will simply find one day that their children have rejected their worldview and faith.

To avoid the poisoning of the hearts and minds of your children consider a few thoughts:

1. The younger our children are, the more open they are to an adult's teaching. As C.S. Lewis alluded, we must plant the seeds into our children's hearts early, then be vigilant in guarding against the birds who desire to steal them. Do not teach things that are not true, like Santa Clause, or the Easter Bunny. You destroy your own credibility by doing so. Your child will one day reject them both, and may well throw Jesus into the mix of things that you taught that were not true.
2. Understand the tools and methods that will be used against your teaching, poisoning the well is but one. To learn how these tools are used, we ought to engage the world; think critically about its messages; and learn to refute the arguments if they are untrue. This will require work and critical thinking on our part. As someone once said, parenting is not for cowards.
3. There is a temptation to wait until our children are older when they will better be able to understand more complex issues. Wisdom is in order here but do not wait too long. Many of the concepts are fundamental, like a thing can't be both true and untrue at the same time, or be both black and white.  Develop the means early in simplistic forms while they are still open. God did not design them to always be under your protection and roof. They become their own persons much earlier than this culture and society would have you believe. The world knows this as is shown by the pro-homosexual messages and agenda being carried to elementary schools.
4. Avoid ad hominem attacks (that is attacks on the character of the opposition as opposed to the merit of their viewpoint) against those who hold differing views. While this is effective when used by anti-Christian forces (because those attacks will constantly be reinforced by culture and society) it is antithetical to a Biblical worldview. Moreover, if you are successful in teaching your children to think critically, it will only be a matter of time before they put what you have taught under that same microscope. Don't discredit your own teaching in the future minds of your children by teaching contradictions and falsehoods.  Study, study, study.
5. Insulate rather than isolate. Learn to find the hidden messages in entertainment and then teach your children to seek and find the good and bad messages hidden there. Remember one mistake does not determine your child's future, nor does one success. With this in mind, teach your children to interpret movies and literature, to think critically about propaganda/news stories themselves and to keep their guards up. You should then challenge them by openly playing devil's advocate.
6. Bring in real life events and issues as they get older. I have found You Tube a great resource for this. A point can be made and examples can be shown and re-shown.
7. Have fun. Eventually picking out fallacious arguments and assertions can be like egg hunts, and the people who are making them begin to look ever more ridiculous.
8. The truth never hurts the truth. Keep in mind that anti-Christian forces are not the sole proprietors of fallacious arguments. Fallacy and truth are mutually exclusive no matter who engages in them. Truth should reign supreme.
9. Teach and live scripture. This does not mean teach and live perfection. A common well poisoning tactic is to make a strawman attack on Christians as not living what they preach. The Christian knows that this is impossible because he preaches that everyone sins and falls short of the glory of God. So then, when we as parents fall short, we repent and apologize as necessary, including to our children, and according to how we teach. Point out that any time a standard exists, people who hold to that standard will fall short. Inquire as to what standard the person making this accusation of hypocrisy may be falling short of.
10. Above all, pray without ceasing that our Father in Heaven will guide the steps of our children into His service and into His glory. Pray that He will capture their hearts at an early age. Pray that they would always seek His face, and His will for their lives and that he would make it plain to them what that will and plan is. Pray for wisdom-as a parent-that the wiles and schemes of the Evil One would be plain. Pray for their salvation and for their eternal destiny.
11. Last but not least, teach the fear of God.

Although They Claimed To Be Rational, They Became Irrational

C.S. Lewis wrote in The Abolition of Man of the man who has never been able to conceive of the Atlantic as anything more than so many million tons of cold salt water as he quiped about the person who interprets his world strictly from a material perspective. Any feelings of awe that might be experienced by a man standing next to such a vast body of water are simply explained away by that man as nothing more than electrical currents shooting around in the brain. His feelings are then meaningless, just as is his existence.

God has granted man with this ability to reason, but man has taken that ability and applied it in ways that are… well, unreasonable. It would seem that as man’s knowledge about his world increases, so does his willingness to believe that his world is all there is. Using his increased knowledge as a springboard he attempts to make a leap from his increased knowledge about his physical world to determining how man ought to be, but in so doing he falls into the chasm of the irrational, for it does not follow that merely because man learns how his world works, that he also knows why his world works-or why it exists either for that matter-for his conclusions about what he ought to do or be are based, not on what he has learned, but instead on the mere fact that he has learned. It is not reasonable to conclude that "survival of the fittest" would in any way suggest that we ought to “save and protect the weak". It is irrational to be shocked and appalled when, after mandating that “survival of the fittest”, be taught exclusively to the next generation in our educational institutions as the only rationally acceptable bases for our existence, when that generation conducts itself as if it is true.

The irrationality of man's attempted leap can also be seen in what we are told ought to be legislated, educated, and sacrificed in our lives. From seemingly every cultural institution and corner we are flooded with an ever increasing array of causes that involve everything from feeding the poor to saving the planet.  These causes are begging for our participation and the realignment of our society. Never is an explanation as to why we ought to devote and sacrifice our lives to these causes given beyond the end for which the causes exist. All of these irrational causes seem to have one thing in common. They seem to be herding humanity toward some ultimately irrational utopian vision; the hope, one might suppose, being that those utopian ends will one day finally be achieved for some future generation before the sun burns out.

But then the sun burns out.

Yet we are told that belief in the existence of a creator is irrational. But by denying the existence of a creator, we have also denied any rational bases upon which to conclude that man ought to do anything at all except eat, drink and be merry through any means available or necessary during his short time of ultimately meaningless consciousness, for these are the very things his evolved mind tells him to do; and the grave is his reward weather he does them or not. It would only seem rational therefore for the rational mind to say, why not? For this reason, it should be no surprise that man’s “causes” ultimately begin to look and feel more and more like the religions that are so despised for being irrational.

This may also explain the abysmal success rate for many such causes as well, for staying true to the materialism that animates the causes; success is judged solely by material. Success is seen then as the spiritually-impoverished wealthy successfully mandating that material wealth be taken by force from other spiritually-impoverished wealthy for the purposes of divvying the booty for the exaltation and enrichment of the takers and pittances for the spiritually and materially impoverished. Never mind the long term ramifications of lost dignity, destroyed families, drug abuse, illiteracy, suicides, fatherlessness, hopelessness, lawlessness, and dilapidated and deteriorating inner cities where the recipients of this kind of guilt-assuaging materialistic pittances are retained. That such maladies are the result of spiritual problems that ever more material cannot alleviate is lost on those who are themselves spiritually-impoverished. The rational mind might would want to stop and consider the results of the materialist’s crusade, but then again, that would be a rational thing to do.

So round and round the irrational vortex society spirals in its irrational denial that man is the handy work of his creator God. And with its denial that it is reasonable and rational to think that there is more to life than our small minds can grasp, so goes the denial of our only hope, a hope that can ultimately compel the hearts and minds of men to real and true greatness and goodness, the hope that we were all created for a purpose, and that there is way more to life than mere material gratification can fulfill.

Interesting Brown/Coakley Perspective, a must see

On Conspiracies

I was speaking with a friend who believes there are elaborate conspiracies involving banks and shadow governments and such.  These powerful conspirators have been on a multi-generational track from well before our own time, so we're to believe.  In another conversation I was told that the conspirators have now developed mind-control techniques.  Well that certainly helps get past a lot of questions concerning the obvious whys and hows of their supposed ability to pull off their incredible plans. But it raises more questions, like how do you, the conspiracy theorist, know you're own mind is not controlled? Anyway...

Like the liberal who always directs our attention to a future Utopia, a re-entry into Eden as it were, the conspiracy theorist always fixes his eyes on the future when the great culmination of some centuries old scheme, complete with the starting and ending of wars, economic failures, and now terrorist activities, achieve their end.  The internet provides fertile ground for these cockamamie schemes to take root, grow and then flourish.

A meaningful coherent conversation with those who believe these things is almost impossible once the topic "conspiracies" comes up. Just watch the Video, they say. There's only one problem. I have been so subjected to propaganda for so long I have developed somewhat of a resilience to it I think. The videos look like someone is desperately grasping at straws, and filling in all kinds of blanks, to come to the conclusions they do. They see what they want to see, and then disregard the rest, explaining it away with answers like "thought control".

There has been one You Tube video out for some time called "Small Change", or something like that.  It supposedly shows how 9/11 was an "inside job".  But in reality, it only shows how most any conspiracy can be made to sound plausible if the right things are focused on or ignored.  It leaves the viewer with lots of questions, but they always have an answer... always.

The outing of the hoax of global warming is a wonderful example as to why I don't believe in these elaborate multi-generational conspiracies. Someone, you see, always spills their guts. But if I were a conspiracy theorist, I would simply respond that the conspirators intended for the outing to happen, for nothing happens that the conspirators don't intend to happen, and nothing doesn't happen that they intend to happen.  If this sounds like an attribute of God, then it shouldn't surprise you that "conspiracy" theories appear to function much like religions.

As for me, I do believe in a multi-generational conspiracy in the heavenly realms. I believe that there is an enemy of our souls who is orchestrating the un-renewed minds of men to carry out his elaborate plans. I believe that there is no neutral ground,  Everyone serves one side or the other in this demonic conspiracy.   There are no third, or neutral sides. And I believe that current events attest so well to the fact that "the prince of the power of the air"¹ is controlling things that many are buying into a fleshy shadow of his existence.

Just so all who come by here know where I stand.
__________________

Note 1.   Eph 2:1-3
And you were dead in your trespasses and sins, in which you formerly walked according to the course of this world, according to the prince of the power of the air, of the spirit that is now working in the sons of disobedience.
NASU

When Reality Parodies Comedy

Below is a clip from the 1979 Steve Martin movie The Jerk. Martin's response to a serial killer trying to kill him in this clip has for years come to mind as I have digested elitist and the media's responses to some of the problems we have encountered.

To set it up, Martin's character believed that a person was a nobody until his name was in the phone book. When he finally got a phone, the killer, who picked his victims randomly from the phone book, picked Martin's name and was trying to kill him.

Martin's response to what was happening was classic. After several misses, he concluded that the killer hated the cans and advised everyone to "stay away from the cans!". His response is eerily reminiscent of the elitist media type's responses to terrorism in particular, and almost all problems in general. But regardless, I am almost daily reminded of this little clip as I watch elites tell us why things happened and what our responses should be.

More Dishonesty

As the old saying goes, figures lie and liars figure. And so it is with the deficit neutral promise of health care reform.

The deficit neutral promise is a gimmick of looking ten years down a road in which the funds are confiscated for the entire ten and are only given away for the last five; kind of like taking into account only the the running start and the first five miles of an attempt to climb an infinitely high and increasingly steep mountain. A less dishonest look at the bill would consider dole vs. confiscation within a time period in which both are occurring simultaneously, but I guess that's a little much to ask.

One example of the use of dishonest accounting gimmicks can be seen in the myth of Clinton's surplus. Here are the actual numbers from the Obama administration's Treasury Dept. web site showing increasing debt for the entire eight years of Clinton. How can this be? Well, it can be if one closes one eye while journaling about government ledgers to make the journalist's man look better to the willingly duped plebeian.

This is accomplished by taking into account only one of the two ledgers in congress. One shows the money borrowed from our trans-pacific friends and the nation's citizens. The other shows the money the government borrows from itself out of its surplus receipts from the SSI "trust" fund. The link above shows this as debt because it is in fact debt; but more of a Bernie Madoff style debt which similarly allows for the dishonest claim of a "Clinton Surplus".

In a similar tactic, this congress will be passing a huge tax increase for promised free hand-outs that will not come due for two election cycles. During this time, if the tax increases don't damage the economy to the point that a sufficient gain is not seen, the government and its media accomplices might well be able to tout a Clinton/Madoff style "surplus" for a couple of election cycles.

Someone told me during my engagement to my wife to keep both eyes open, then after our marriage to close one. With this in mind it looks as if the media has married the Democrat party. So the real question now is will the democrat party and its husband the media be able to pull off a similar dishonest deception with enough of the politically unsavvy?

Like Warm Jello

I was just finishing a cup of Starbucks here in San Francisco when I read the side of my cup.

"I wish everyone could see how much we all have in common"

Supposing that we did see our commonalities, then what? Does it remove our wickedness? Supposing that a home invader was getting ready to unload his shotgun into your family. What good would the many ways in which you share common ground with the criminal do you? Or from a global perspective suppose Iran was getting ready to keep its promise to annihilate Israel by turning it to a sea of glass. What good would the things that Israel has in common with Iran do Israel, even though there are probably many times more things both have in common than not?

These little naive idealistic sayings are like jello. They are sweet thoughts, sure, but they don't stand up when the kitchen gets hot.

Dishonesty

Here is Kathleen Sebelius talking about the end run that will be made around the anti-abortion wording in the so called "health care reform" legislation that the blue dog Ben Nelson fell on his political sword to obtain.

Notice how Sebelius uses the words "accounting ah measure" instead of "accounting gimmick". Well that's nice. I love the "women's health services" code talk that those stupid Bible Thumpers are not suppose to understand. And as a nice icing at the end the other person's response was: "that's very confusing". Hmmmm... you bet ya.



H/T Jill Stanek -where transcrip is available-by way of Eternity Matters