In 1987, right or wrong, this was a career killer:
In 2022, this is a resume enhancer:
There was a time when Caligula's Court was a cautionary tale. Today, it's the prize at the end of the race.
By now I hope we realize that the West and historical United States died some decades or even generations ago. It's just that now we're finally beginning to see the decomposition and rot before our eyes. .
I've underlined the sentences that leapt out at me. False and misleading narratives? Narratives? I found that choice of words interesting, but I can't quite put my finger on why.
Also undermining trust in Government institutions is somehow a fast track to being a terrorist threat. All my life I've heard nothing but challenges to faith in our government. But now it's a potential threat?
I love the inclusion of conspiracy theories as terrorist threat. I notice that's a big thing now. Any challenge of an official narrative - Covid measures, BLM, voting legislation, or what have you - is dismissed as racist, bigoted, or similar. If you provide some amount of data or facts, you're told it's all part of a vast conspiracy. Naturally the conspiracy is driven by racism, bigotry, or similar.
It almost sounds like we're being told to sit down and shut up. Any questions or challenges to the official narrative will mark you as an enemy of Caesar.
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| What it feels like blogging about the West's crazy suicide |
I think the last time was the Kavanaugh hearings. Right about that time I chose to step away. It was around that time I heard Trump had nominated a fellow many conservatives were none too happy about.
Then came the lynch mob. The idea that the Dems would try to destroy someone over such allegations was nothing new. But the accusations themselves were so threadbare it was stunning. The obvious fact that they had been held in reserve to be exploited on cue was also appalling.
What was most shocking, however, was that for the first time in my adult life, politicians, media pundits and even religious leaders appeared fine with saying it isn't a case of guilt or innocence. It's about not offending pro-abortion women. If an innocent man and his reputation must be destroyed, so be it. Furthermore, we need to stop thinking that worn out concepts like burden of proof, presumption of innocence and due process apply to anything but old, dusty courtrooms. In the new world, your guilt or innocence is based purely on group identity and the group identity of the accuser.
That was an eye opener, make no mistake. It was also a realization that America had already died, we just missed the funeral. Since then, I've kept a fairly consistent blogging schedule, trying to keep up with the crazy and the shadows. That so many conservatives and even conservative Christian leaders threw in the towel and joined the rise of Mordor kept me here. I watched as our pope and Church leadership made it clear there was a new power in the East, and if we have to burn authentic Christianity to the ground to keep getting high fives at the best parties, so be it. The true enemies will be those who still think Christ has some bearing on the World's salvation and that Christian morality is a thing.
That kept many people paying attention, as it did me. Nonetheless, times change. At this point it's clear the battle is over. I've said before that you can tell the emerging order sees the battle won, and is more or less engaging in mop up operations. The GOP is generally useless. And those who cling to the historical Christian Faith and the belief that God was working through the course of Western Civilization will increasingly find themselves in the role of a Christian diaspora.
Nonetheless, I still might have kept chasing cars and yelling at trees if life itself wasn't changing. As I said, my second youngest is engaged to a right fine young woman - the wedding date being forthcoming. Likewise, my wife recently got a long deserved promotion to VP at her company. A nice bump in pay, but with extra cash comes extra obligations. As my mom needs more direct care, and the boys are moving up and beginning to move on, it's demanding more and more of my time. That's time we want to spend with each other before the long awaited empty nest begins to emerge. Plus, I'm always in the market for anything I can do to bring in a few dollars here and there while watching over the homestead, and that also puts demands on time.
All of that means I won't be able to keep up the pace I've been running on since the days of the Kavanaugh lynch mob crazy. Not that it does much good, and I wonder if those who would resist the new world order need to pull away from Social Media since it doesn't seem to work for us as much as for those in alliance with this new order. The real resistance might need to be outside the modern world of digital and Internet madness. I don't know.
I just know it will be tough for me to keep up with things. If my writing merely consists of typing off the top of my head and hitting spell check, I do spend quite a lot of time reading and researching to find out about what's happening and what to comment on. I try not to be the type who comments on an article that I clearly haven't read. Or wade into a topic I've not looked into beyond a FB headline. But reading and scouring for stories takes time. It's likely why I've recently settled more and more on just commenting on Twitter posts and FB posts that people bring to my attention. Which is fine as far as it goes. But it doesn't really do much but become part of the problem, if you think on it.
So instead of announcing some big retirement from the blog, I'm merely backing off. A couple times a week perhaps. Monday and Friday? Wednesday and Tuesday? Once a week? Or just when I can get to it? I dunno. Beginning this week I'll will drop the daily output to more manageable levels in order to devote more to the demands of family and changing fortunes.
I'll still keep up with things to a degree, especially those things which reinforce my gnawing suspicion that our Catholic leadership desperately wants to go the way of Mainline Protestants denominations and ditch this silly old fairy tale of Gods born in mangers and get back to partying with the secular pagan Joneses. I might try to think on the overall trends, rather than just chase the latest headline or FB post. Of course I reserve the right to post fun things dealing with the family, friends and other parts of life that make it worth the living.
Unlike those times in the past, this isn't a decision I've made just because I'm tired of the blogging world. This time it's a case of being unable to keep up as life changes. Again, I'll try to post somewhat , be it once or twice a week, just to encourage myself to keep up with what's happening in the world. If nothing else, blogging on issues does demand following the news, FWIW. But that will be that. As I see so many have backed off from their output from days of yore, I can see why. So I'll be around, just not as often as before. I'll see everyone in the meantime.
And I do wish it would stop. More and more I'm convinced that we royally screwed up generations ago as we began throwing away age old wisdom for the latest pop scholar fad. Add to that a world of endless luxury and leisure, and you have something Rush Limbaugh observed some years ago. You have the Baby Boomers, the first generation that never had to grow up. I think we've been getting younger and younger as the generations pass. Worse, with each generation we discard reality and set up fanciful lies about what the world is really all about. The results, as I often say, speak for themselves.
FWIW, I hold no brief for Congresswoman Greene. Nonetheless, I remember years ago when bloggers agreed that if you're reduced to trying to rip someone over a spelling error on Social Media, it's as good as saying you've been owned.
So Gloria Purvis, BLM supporter and CRT narrative advocate for the Catholic Church, posted this:
Now, it could just be she mentioned this during Black History Month. Perhaps she added the point that he was never recognized, just because. You know, bit of trivia. Why do I get the impression, however, that it's supposed to imply he was never recognized ... because he was black?
As the NFL world rebounds from yet another charge of racism from a fired black coach, I thought it might be worth pointing out that not everything that happens to black people is because they are black. Sometimes it just happens. Sometimes employees who happen to be no good, black or white, get canned. Sometimes a talented and celebrated assistant coach craps out in the head position. Sometimes a veteran is overlooked because that's what happens.
For instance, my dad's next older brother served in WWII. He was a medic, as he asked for something where he wouldn't have to hurt anyone. He served with Patton in the breakout period until the end of the war. And yes, he was involved in the legendary Battle of the Bulge.
Nonetheless, it wasn't until shortly before his death from cancer in the late 1990s that he received any decorations. I don't know what they were, and for that matter, neither did he. He called my dad and asked what this was all about. Some medal and talk of an Ardennes Offensive in December, '44. My dad chuckled and said that was the Battle of the Bulge. He said he didn't know what it was called. He just remembered that it was freezing and people kept trying to kill him.
We still laugh at that. That was my uncle. But you see Ms. Purvis, my uncle spent most of his life being quite white. Unless there was some vast anti-white conspiracy, it's likely the failure to recognize his heroism in that legendary battle was anything other than what happens in the bureaucracies of massive countries with the third largest population in history. No ill will or malice.
This isn't to say no black serviceman was ever overlooked because of race. Nor is it to say no black was ever fired because of race. That's would be an absurd suggestion. But there are other forms of prejudice that can enter into play. And sometimes it has nothing to do with prejudice, bigotry or racism at all. Sometimes it's just that thing Prince called Life. Common sense should say nothing else.
But how much longer can we keep beating this horse until it is dead? How much longer can we act as if America and Racism and Race are the only things in its existence, apart from misogyny? Or is there any intention of not beating it until it is dead? Who knows? If we stop attributing everything under the sun to race and race alone, perhaps it might help us look at other reasons there are so many problems in the black community. You never know!
I think of nothing so much as this:
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| And this was written almost 30 years ago. It's only gotten worse since. |
Yep. Most of what passes for academia and scholarship today would make Cliff Clavin blush. Your average Neanderthal would call it out for the stupid crap that it is. But for generations now, the world of intelligentsia has forged its own cant, filled to the brim with jargon, multisyllabic buzzwords, and linguistic codes that only the inner cliques of exclusive same-thinking research clubs can decipher.
In short, acting like snake oil salesmen, they've learned how to hide the fact by sounding like someone wiring the latest space shuttle. In reality, they're just shoveling manure.
Yet with a combination of almost mandatory secondary education, and a sympathetic media and Washington sympathizers propping them up as geniuses and sages, they're the prophets proclaiming the laws of the new godless paganism here to drive out the One, True God. The results of the last fifty years more than speak for themselves.
Exhibit A:
Because there is nothing that says terrorist more than calling people racist and encouraging protests in major US cities when things don't go your way. Apparently Sean P. Dailey approves this message.
When our Speaker of the House told our Olympic athletes to avoid angering China. Really. I looked it up to make sure it wasn't some right wing lie. She actually told them to avoid angering China. And she's one of the most powerful politicians in Washington.
I know. It's smart, it's logical. And it's the 21st Century. If did speak out and they got swept away by China, what could America do? America is close to becoming a 2nd World country. I think we know it. I think the World knows it. This is why Madison Avenue, Wall Street, Hollywood, the NBA, and not a few other industries and interests are embracing the anti-Westernism of the Left, while sucking up to .
As my oldest son said, and it was true: We grew up in the Age of Democracy because the people with the wealth and power in the 18th Century felt it was in their best interest to build a world striving for freedom, democracy and equality. Now, the people with the wealth and power no longer see value in a world striving for freedom, democracy and equality. In fact, as they see the billions that countries antithetical to such principles are enjoying, it might just be that our best and brightest see such things as freedom, democracy and equality as obstacles to their best interests.
This sort of thing makes me itch. As if she's giving some unbiased, neutral appraisal. A quick glance at her Twitter feed shows the typical leftwing templates:
And on and on. The usual assumption that it's impossible to be a non-leftist and not be a stupid white racist. Therefore you can guess how she portrays those trucker protests, as so many immediately have done - including the good political leaders in Canada.
It's fine that someone is left of Lenin liberal. That's on them. But to leave that out of the supposedly qualifying post, as if what we're about to hear is the unvarnished, unbiased truth, smacks of either a lack of self-awareness on this young lady's part, or duplicity of the highest order.
The only thing worse is how many apparently lapped up everything she said like a thirsty dog.
I remember that line from the famous All in the Family episode "Everybody Tells the Truth." A classic, it's been copied many times over the years in a variety of shows and series.
The premise is simple: the Bunker family is eating out tonight. Archie screwed up the refrigerator and blew the power in their apartment. What follows are three accounts of what happened.
Meathead Mike and Archive give their take on the events, which center around a refrigerator repairman and his African American apprentice. When hyper liberal Mike tells the tale, Archie is the undisputed villain. The repairman is a beat down, good natured blue collar guy, and his apprentice is a meek and cowering 'Uncle Tom', browbeat by Archie's bigotry and fire breathing racism.
Then Archie gives his side. In his version, the repairman looks like someone eloped from the set of The Godfather. And his apprentice is right out of the Black Panthers. Sporting an afro that could fit on a dump truck's axle, a Woodstock shawl, and a switchblade the size of a medieval lance, he waves the knife in the face of a humble and kindly Archie and growls, "Black is beautiful baby."
Edith finally steps in and sets the record straight (we're expected to trust her view as she is not the other two - which speaks toward reputation I should add). Two guys came to their apartment and tried to fix the fridge. While spewing his bigotry, Archive got reprimanded by the apprentice. Then Archie shooed them out the door and tried to save money by fixing it himself, having used them to learn of the problem. But Archie is no repairmen, and the Bunkers find themselves eating out.
Anyway, I thought of that glorious episode when I saw this:
I've seen the story several times now. I have no clue who or what they are, other than obviously something that caters to the homeless, which is fine.
But note the tale told. Everything about those trucker protesters is - horrible. Their trucks block things (you know, like BLM shutting down highways, overpasses and neighborhoods). They honk their horns. I guess that would be annoying. They abuse the staff and demand unwarranted food. They bark racist slurs at a security guard (a security guard at a soup kitchen?).
Sorry, but something about that seems, well, Archie. I see them looking at those protesters through the same lenses that Archie saw the repairman and his black apprentice. There's just too much 'check the box' in the description.
Disregard for people? Check.
Abusive? Check.
Threatening the wellbeing of the community? Check.
Greedy and disinterested in others? Check.
Racist? Check.
That just seems a bit slanted for me. If they had been a little more low key in their description of the event, perhaps I'd more easily take it at face value. . Something like this perhaps: 'A couple protesters, no doubt not representative of the majority, came in here and wanted meals even though they didn't appear to be at the level of need we cater to. We explained this, but they became abusive, and we had to ask for security to help deescalate the situation.' Leave it at that, and it's more believable.
Had what they said not echoed what I've heard critics of the protesters accuse them of since the news first broke of their protests, would also help. Had it not appeared like an attempt to paint the whole protest in a negative light, just maybe.
But my verdict? A couple protesters may have done what the accusation says. Furthermore, the protests as a whole, like BLM in 2020, can sometimes cause inconveniences. And while I'm not saying the people at Shepherds of Good Hope are outright lying, I'm saying their way of seeing the events might have been tainted by their own biases about the greater issues in question.
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| The trick isn't to deny your biases, but be aware of how they inform your appraisal of the world |
"Four.'
The needle went up to sixty. |
| Note, pregnant person, and pregnant man. Women, in this case, are erased, to be mentioned again when convenient. |
New Prolife Catholic activist Mark Shea spent much time during the March for Life ripping into the March for Life this year. Why? Because of the vaccines of course. If you ignore last year, it's obvious that if we get the shot, we stop the spread. That's what they said last year. Nothing has happened to call that into question. Various statistics continually taken out of context prove this is correct. If you disagree, how can you be pro-life? Right? Right? Anyone?
Of course not. By now, insisting that the current vaccines will Stop the Spread or End Covid is like insisting the moon is made of cheese. As I said here, when more people in the ICU with Covid have been vaccinated than are unvaccinated, it's time to pull the ripcord on the sales pitch. That is true even if they manage to find just the right stat that keeps the narrative alive.
By now medical pros are admitting there needs to be a different approach to the vaccines than the current one, along with reports showing that other measures for fighting Covid may have done more harm than good. You just can't keep screaming 'GET THE SHOT NOW!' and not sound like Trelane at the end of The Squire of Gothos.
That Mark chose not to pray with the marchers despite disagreements, but attack them with unchristian vitriol and character assassination, along with his his usual broadsides against his typical bogeyman villains, is a shame. Such is "apologetics" in the Internet age I suppose.
Mark's version of being authentically New Prolife:
Because if we change the Church's teachings on our core natures as human beings, you can just open the lid and flush. That's what liberal Protestant denominations have continually refused to discover.
It's very simple. If the Church continues to insist the first 2000 years were no doubt wrong, but now science is showing how right we can be, it plays right into the hands of the World. Young people today, already evangelized by secularism in our cultures, schools, and media, have learned that religion was just made up by ancient humans anyway. It's just institutions with rules made up by people as they go.
Every time we try to change our teachings to keep up with the latest, it goes nowhere but down. It reinforces what people my age have been taught our whole lives - that when push comes to shove, religion is no different than a club or a sports franchise. You adapt, you change, you make it up as you go. That's because you know it was never real to begin with.
Obviously the World is setting up for the other part of the trap: To deny the 90 ft. idol of the Left is to be Nazi in need of eradication. To stand up against the World will mean persecution and oppression and torture and death. It's not there yet. Heck, it doesn't have to be. By just threatening bad jokes from late night pundits and not getting invited to the best parties at Harvard, we're seeing boat loads of religious leaders jump ship. Already vast numbers of people in the pews have likely done so as well.
After all, we've all been evangelized by the secular for generations now. It has to be taking its toll. But the cardinal's solution is simply suicide for the Church, if that matters at all. It accomplishes nothing to continue to act as if they Church could be wrong about anything. On the other hand, if it wasn't wrong, and the pre-modern Faith was true, such naked accommodation of sin and evil will not just result in nog temporal benefits. It will also result in terrible eternal consequences.
I know where you live—where Satan has his throne. Yet you remain true to my name. You did not renounce your faith in me, not even in the days of Antipas, my faithful witness, who was put to death in your city—where Satan lives.
Nevertheless, I have a few things against you: There are some among you who hold to the teaching of Balaam, who taught Balak to entice the Israelites to sin so that they ate food sacrificed to idols and committed sexual immorality. Likewise, you also have those who hold to the teaching of the Nicolaitans. Repent therefore! Otherwise, I will soon come to you and will fight against them with the sword of my mouth.
A warning for the modern Church.
Hope for America? Maybe not. But when the time comes, perhaps more Americans will remain faithful than we sometimes believe.
So 76% don't want the president to automatically exclude all candidates who are men, and any women who don't have black skin, just because they are men or don't have black skin. Imagine that. When we've officially been taught for two years that we must embrace equity and reject equality (that is, treat people differently based on group label rather than everyone the same), that's amazing.
The Left wishes for racial segregation and political oppression. Right now, it's had its way, at least among the elites, leaders and institutions and corporations of our nation. Nonetheless, perhaps America has not forsaken wisdom, even if so many in our seats of leadership have buckled and given up and embraced the bigotry. It's not a war won, or even a battle. But it's at least a small bright spot in the darkness.
Oh, for those who say But Reagan! Yes, Reagan made the pledge that he would nominate a women to the SCOTUS. This was because no woman had ever been a Supreme Court justice. It was a nomination that would often haunt conservatives in the years go come. In hindsight, I think Reagan was as wrong then, even if it would have been a major breakthrough (we have, in fact, had women and black justices before Biden's pledge). Given the track record, it appears posturing like this eventually seems to set up more bad than good.
The weapon of division. The perpetual 'us vs. them' or 'me vs. you' mentality. It is part of the anti-Western revolution's primary strategy. First learn to hate America and the West. Then learn to hate yourselves. Finally learn to hate each other.
I've said many times that I've seldom known a religious figure to spend so much time constantly calling out the sins of 'those believer over there.' He has practically based his papacy on that.
More than that, he has encouraged a generation of Catholics to continually thank God, or at least Pope Francis, that they aren't a bunch of rigid reprobates like those Catholics over there. Almost as if on cue, when Pope Francis blasts some other Catholics, these Francis Catholics will take to the digital world and rejoice that he has once again called out those other sinful slops who are the problem.
Thus once again, Pope Francis embraces the 'you ladies and them men fight' call of old feminism and tells nuns to fight when treated unfairly by 'men' of the Church. Not unfairly by the Church. But specifically 'men' of the Church. Those dirty, nasty men. And the world rejoices there's a pope like Pope Francis.
Group A vs. Group B is key of course. Today the number of groups who must be at each others' throats is legion, for they are many. Pope Francis either misses this fact, or rejoices in it. And always knowing, apparently, that wherever the groups fall, he will always be among the groups with a star on their bellies. I wager this because he so seldom bothers with the first person plural in his appraisal of the Church's problems, but almost always uses the third person plural.
Anyone who struggles to maintain a steady exercise regiment gets it:
I keep weight down by one way and one way only: exercise. I could eat grass my whole life and I'd still gain weight. I have to exercise. Generally about an hour's worth, with at least half being jogging. As long as I do that, I'm OK.
For me, however, I'm also a creature of habit. When I worked at a massive mega-bank years ago, I was able to exercise in the mornings and then do stairs during my breaks at the company. That's because the building was over a quarter of a mile long, and had about a half dozen stairwells that were five stories high. Starting at one end and walking and running the stairs five days a week, along with my morning workouts, I was about where I needed to be. For a fifty year old, I was in fairly good shape.
Leaving there, it took a while to get back into a routine. And at this stage in life, going a week without exercise is like Tim Allen in The Santa Clause. But I finally found a good routine with a walk path through some nearby woods that, so far at least, are right by our house. A couple times thorough those in the morning and afternoon and it works about the same.
Since my wife's heart attack, however, we've not been able to get back into things. Starting with Covid, we began exercising together as we were both home. Which was nice. But since then she's been in therapy and that's left me high and dry. Call me a creature of habit, but having gotten used to having her with me made it tough to go back out on my own. Plus bad weather and then getting Covid didn't help.
Nonetheless, as Covid wanes and hopefully the weather turns a bit, we should be back soon. She's almost done with her therapy, and the goal is to have her back where we were when this all happened. It can't happen too soon. I feel the several months off of exercising. The only good news was the loss of appetite from Covid. Though, as I said, even grazing on grass has its limits for helping where weight is concerned.
Laura Klassen is an underappreciated gem in the fight for life. Brash and sassy, she's willing to say what no man could say, and what few people in general are willing to say. Thank you Christian leadership.
Initially she made a splash with several videos mocking the pro-abortion rights talking points we've come to accept as gospel truth. \
Ouch.
But she's moved on by making sure time and effort goes to helping expectant mothers and new mothers and their babies. Of course it's a lie that pro-life advocates don't care about the mom or child after birth. Are there any stats or research to suggest this is true? It doesn't matter. It's something pro-abortion rights activists say as if it's a mantra.
I don't know tech stuff, and can't link to her Facebook page but by this. I don't know if it will get you there or not. But you can get to her FB page and go from there. Click the links and you'll see a way to help these, and other, babies and moms. It's not just giving money, but purchasing needed items for the individuals in question. From what I can tell, in this case the only thing needed that hasn't been taken care of is a small freezer.
This isn't being done just to stick it in the eye of abortion rights allies. After all, most post-orthodox Christians allying with pro-abortion activists thrive on simply ignoring inconvenient people like Ms. Klassen anyway. I've gone to several New Prolife Catholic sites to see how they address Ms. Klassen's work, and have yet to find a single reference.
This is just about helping if you can. It's what we should do. And that's why we do it, as well as fight for life.
