CULTURE WAR
President Barack’s Obama stunning political pandering for the Hispanic vote this week–granting amnesty to the children of illegal aliens by executive fiat–gives us another window into the soul of the world’s most powerful leader.
The picture is not pretty–and is actually quite scary.
The primary role of any chief executive, the ultimate position being the president of the United States, is to enforce the rule of law. That’s what he or she swears an oath of office to do.
But this president now seems to be making it a habit to choose which laws he desires to enforce. He is acting like a king or dictator, not the servant of law, freedom, and order.
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This is an important week in American history–and I want you to feel its significance. I especially want you to pray for nine very important human beings as a result of your understanding.
I’m sure many of you remember the name of “Dred Scott” from the history books–but you may not recall the magnitude, the infamous nature of the name in American history.
The Dred Scott Decision was handed down by the United States Supreme Court on March 6, 1857 by a 7-2 vote stating that people of African descent brought into the United States and held as slaves (or their descendants, whether or not they were slaves) were not protected by the Constitution and were not U.S. citizens.
The decision was tragic–and flat-out wrong. It led to the Civil War and the death of 600,000 precious lives–all because nine US Supreme Court justices didn’t have the clarity to “judge righteously.”
This week we are faced with another Dred Scott moment. The US Supreme Court is hearing three days of arguments over Obamacare. African-American rights aren’t at stake here–but the rights and future of all of our citizens.
We don’t need another Dred Scott. We need nine individuals to do the right thing.
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I must admit that Coach Joe Paterno–a football coaching legend at Penn State for the past forty-six years–has been a hero of mine for decades. When he became PSU’s coach in 1965, I was just entering my junior high school years when sports was very important to me.
Coach Paterno made a deep impression. He seemed to be fair, disciplined, a man of integrity and faith, and he produced a great football program. In 2011 he became the winningest coach in all of Division I football history. In an age of slick and arrogant coaches, Joe Pa seemed to be the “Gold Standard” of steadiness and grace.
So when I heard he’d been fired because of some child abuse charges being leveled at a former assistant coach, I inwardly reacted like many Penn State students did. I thought to myself, “Discipline the offender but spare Coach Joe Pa!”
But I was wrong. Joe Paterno needed to go.
Here’s why–and many other things we can learn from the Penn State fiasco.
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Though I don’t agree with either the message or methods of the Occupy Wall Street crowd, I’m glad they’ve taken the field in America’s culture war.
For quite some time the mainstream media have told us that the problem in Washington, D.C. is gridlock–that our politicians just need to listen to one another, and then come up with some bi-partisan solutions to the nation’s problems.
We are told ad nauseam that political gridlock is the problem–that both conservatives and liberals are to blame–and that the answer is to heed the call for civility made by Rodney King in 1992:
“You know, can we all get along?”
But now thanks to Occupy Wall Street, the truth is clear: The game to shape America’s future is on–the teams have taken the field–and only one team can win. It’s a cultural clash that will end in victory for one side and defeat for the other.
For which side will you fight?
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An article appeared in the Daily Caller on July 20, 2010 that revealed a conspiracy in the mainstream press to protect Barack Obama during the 2008 campaign. The evidence indicated that there were hundreds of journalists in the United States who were not interested in the truth about the man–they simply held a bias and wanted him elected.
I’ve been thinking about that bias for a year. Where did it come from? Why was it so strong and uniform so as to overlook the lack of experience, socialist policies, and radical associations of the man who now serves as our U.S. President?
We are now nearly three years into his term. By all accounts, he has been a failure on reviving the US economy, on addressing the great moral issues of our day, and in strengthening America’s position in the world.
Yet those same media outlets are lining up for the 2012 presidential run to both denigrate the eventual Republican nominee and help raise one billion dollars for Barack Obama’s re-election effort. Something seems wrong–even conspiratorial. But it’s not what you think.
There’s a “mystery of iniquity” at work in the world. It’s time for the West to admit there is a Satan. Acknowledging that fact causes many things to make sense.
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I remember when I first saw Natalie Portman’s picture. Our oldest son, Nathan, had just graduated from high school in 1999 and received his high school yearbook. As a joke, he pasted a photo of her next to his in the South Kitsap annual– as if she was in his graduating class!
He liked her then. She was a rising star.
In 2011, her stardom hit paydirt when she won her first Oscar as Best Actress for her performance in Black Swan. Her acceptance speech was short and seemed sincere–but one little sentence in it caused an old debate to re-surface:
How important is marriage to having children?
The answer to that question determines the overall happiness and stability of societies.
I hope we choose well in the 21st century.
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“We must quickly carry out the tasks assigned us by the one who sent us. The night is coming, and then no one can work” (John 9:4) — Jesus Christ.
The intelligence community talks about an increase in “terrorism chatter” when groups hateful of the West intensify their efforts. Similarly, I have recently been hearing “prophetic chatter” about great changes coming to our world. A central theme is that “everything is about to change”–that the alignments of the past one hundred and even five hundred years may be altered in the comng years.
Some are saying it could happen within twelve months. Others project one to three years. The current upheaval in Muslim countries–especially Egypt–is increasing the chatter. Is the world as we’ve known it about to experience a major downturn or alignment? I wouldn’t bet against it.
The night is coming. We must pray–and do the works God is showing us to do.
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Let’s start the New Year by being fair and balanced.
Most of you know that I enjoy Fox News for its overall Judeo-Christian outlook on life and current events. Fox is a breath of fresh air in the media world where left wing ideologies and a secular view of reality usually prevail. In past columns, I have shown this is one reason that Fox has become the leading cable news station in America.
Nearly fifty percent of Americans watch Fox News.
Recently, however, Fox News anchor Tucker Carlson, made a huge gaffe on the Hannity Show. Let’s examine his blunder, and use the occasion to talk about about football star Michael Vick, redemption, and the truth as it applies to people and animals.
Tucker Carlson, a staunch conservative, is confused. Maybe some others are too.
Here’s what happened.
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Shirley and I recently enjoyed a day at the eighth largest fair in the world–The Puyallup Fair. Located in Puyallup, Washington, thirty miles south of Seattle, the “Western Washington Fair” sports a delightful twenty acres filled with carnival rides, animal shows and displays, a rodeo, stadium concerts, and numerous buildings filled with art, hobbies, flowers, and every consumer good imaginable (all at unbeatable fair prices!)
We “ate our way” through the Fair enjoying corn-on-the-cob, elephant ears, smoothies, ice cream swirls, and famous country scones. It was a memorable day filled with delicious sights and sounds and many reminders of our illustrious western history and way of life.
But I also learned something else at the Fair. I was reminded of two spectacular lies that were told to the Baby Boom Generation in the 60s and 70s that haunt us to this day:
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Islam seems to be much in the news these days.
Of course, there is a reason for this. Islam is on the rise in the West and is now coming into close contact with our Judeo-Christian civilization. That never happened during America’s first two hundred years, and it was not on anyone’s radar screen during my childhood either.
However, the 1970s saw a resurgence of Wahhabiism (radical Islam) that has placed Islam on a collision course with other nations and cultures. In the Western World (Europe and America), an epic worldview battle is being raged between three worldviews.
One of them is true faith, another is false faith and the third is no faith. Europe and America’s choice of “faith” will determine their fate in the next generation.
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