The next day John was there again with two of his disciples. When he saw Jesus passing by, he said, “Look, the Lamb of God!”
When the two disciples heard him say this, they followed Jesus. Turning around, Jesus saw them following and asked, “What do you want?”
They said, “Rabbi” (which means Teacher), “where are you staying?”
“Come,” he replied, “and you will see.”
So they went and saw where he was staying, and spent that day with him. It was about the tenth hour.
John and his two followers saw Jesus. “Look!” says John and they do. Put yourself in the sandals of one of those followers – trying to catch up – your attention is fixed on this “Lamb”.
Suddenly, He turns around and looks you in the eye. Can you tell there’s something “other worldly” about Him? He holds your eye and draws you in.
You are hooked.
Imagine that you move closer to Jesus until you are standing face to face with Him. You know, although you don’t know how you know, that this is a turning point and that you will never be the same.
What is it like for Jesus to look at you?
What do you do when He gazes into your eyes?
When I feel Christ watching me, I am so very aware of how far I fall short. And yet, when I look to Him, I know that I am covered.
Not because I am good, but because HE is good.
It is not my righteousness, but His.
My “goodness” only gets in the way; it is when I am aware of my “badness” that I can fully fall on Him.
It turns out that half of Obamas haul in 2008 has come in contributions of $200 dollars or less. These small donations do not require public disclosure under FEC guidelines, and the Obama campaign refuses to make public its list of contributors.
It turns out that half of Obamas haul in 2008 has come in contributions of $200 dollars or less. These small donations do not require public disclosure under FEC guidelines, and the Obama campaign refuses to make public its list of contributors.
I’ve read recent reports of the Obama campaign receiving donations from dubious names and foreign locales and it got me wondering: How is this possible?
I run a small Internet business and when I process credit cards I’m required to make sure the name on the card exactly matches the name of the customer making the purchase. Also, the purchaser’s address must match that of the cardholders. If these don’t match, then the payment isn’t approved. Period. So how is it possible that the Obama campaign could receive donations from fictional people and places? Well, I decided to do a little experiment. I went to the Obama campaign website and entered the following:
Name: John Galt
Address: 1957 Ayn Rand Lane
City: Galts Gulch
State: CO
Zip: 99999
Then I checked the box next to $15 and entered my actual credit card number and expiration date (it didn’t ask for the 3-didgit code on the back of the card) and it took me to the next page and… “Your donation has been processed. Thank you for your generous gift.”
This simply should not, and could not, happen in any business or any campaign that is honestly trying to vet it’s donors. Also, I don’t see how this could possibly happen without the collusion of the credit card companies. They simply wouldn’t allow any business to process, potentially, hundreds of millions in credit card transactions where the name on the card doesn’t match the purchasers name.
In short, with the system set up as it is by the Obama camp, an individual could donate unlimited amounts of money by simply making up fake names and addresses. And Obama is doing his best to facilitate this fraud. This is truly scandalous.
Our reader was not yet done. He tried the experiment on the McCain site: “I tried the exact same thing at the McCain site and it didn’t allow the transaction.” He then repeated the experiment at the Obama site:
I went back to the Obama site and made three additional donations using the names Osama Bin Laden, Saddam Hussein and Bill Ayers, all with different addresses. All the transactions went through using the same credit card. I saved screenshots of the transactions.
I didn’t want to. Ideally, I could have contributed $0.01 and cost them money. But it was the only way to confirm the root cause of the fraudulent micro-donations to the Obama campaign (“Doodad Pro” for $17,300 and “Good Will” for $11,000).
The Obama campaign has turned its security settings for accepting online contributions down to the bare minimum — possibly to juice the numbers, and turning a blind eye towards the potential for fraud not just against the FEC, but against unsuspecting victims of credit card fraud.
The issue centers around the Address Verification Service (or AVS) that credit card processors use to sniff out phony transactions. I was able to contribute money using an address other than the one on file with my bank account (I used an address I control, just not the one on my account), showing that the Obama campaign deliberately disabled AVS for its online donors.
~~~~
DISCLAIMER: I’VE SEEN A NUMBER OF THESE “EXPERIMENTS” SO I’M HESITANT TO SAY THAT THEY’RE ALL AUTHENTIC. AT THE SAME TIME I HAVE NO DESIRE TO DONATE TO OBAMA’S CAMPAIGN TO PROVE THEM RIGHT.
Update: Instapundit notes that “if you split the tip between two homeless guys, they can outvote the waiter.
Yesterday on my way to lunch at Olive Garden, I passed one of the homeless guys in that area, with a sign that read “Vote Obama, I need the money.”
Once in Olive Garden my waiter had on a “Obama 08″ tee shirt. When the bill came, I decided not to tip the waiter and explained to him while he had given me exceptional service, that his tee shirt made me feel he obviously believes in Senator Obama’s plan to redistribute the wealth. I told him I was going to redistribute his tip to someone that I deemed more in need–the homeless guy outside. He stood there in disbelief and angrily stormed away.
I went outside, gave the homeless guy $3 and told him to thank the waiter inside, as I had decided he could use the money more. The homeless guy looked at me in disbelief but seemed grateful. As I got in my truck, I realized this rather unscientific redistribution experiment had left the homeless guy quite happy for the money he did not earn, but the waiter was pissed that I gave away the money he did earn. Well, I guess this redistribution of wealth is going to take a while to catch on, with those doing the work.
The next day John was there again with two of his disciples. When he saw Jesus passing by, he said, “Look, the Lamb of God!”
When the two disciples heard him say this, they followed Jesus. Turning around, Jesus saw them following and asked, “What do you want?”
They said, “Rabbi” (which means Teacher), “where are you staying?”
“Come,” he replied, “and you will see.”
So they went and saw where he was staying, and spent that day with him. It was about the tenth hour. (John 1:35-39)
Put yourself in the shoes of one of those disciples of John the Baptist. In the middle of town, the hustle and bustle of the marketplace, John says, “look”.
What do you see? There is nothing special about the way He looks. But you follow.
He asks, “What do you want?”
~~
What do I see in Jesus that catches my attention today?
What do I want?
I see peace in the time of turmoil. Shelter in the storm. A refuge and strength; an ever present help in trouble.
I am drawn to Him like a moth to the flame; I cannot help but believe.
Now more than ever, as Reformed, I understand that there is nothing in me that would make me search out Him. The power, the sovereignty, the sacrifice all catch my attention.
That HE LOVES ME – not because of what I am, but because of who HE is.
What did pre-legalization abortions look like in practice? There were physicians who ran abortion mills, physicians who did selected abortions on their own patients, physicians who worked patients in through loopholes in the law. In addition to physician abortionists, there were the professional non-physicians, often operating with training, equipment, medications, and back-up provided by physicians. Here are more representative stories of pre-legalization abortions:
The last murder of an abortion clinic worker was 10 years ago Thursday.
~~~
~~~
What is FOCA?
A government may not
(1) deny or interfere with a womans right to choose
(A) to bear a child;
(B) to terminate a pregnancy prior to viability; or
(C) to terminate a pregnancy after viability where termination is necessary to protect the life or health of the woman; or
(2) discriminate against the exercise of the rights set forth in paragraph (1) in the regulation or provision of benefits, facilities, services, or information.
Section 6 adds:
This Act applies to every Federal, State, and local statute, ordinance, regulation, administrative order, decision, policy, practice, or other action enacted, adopted, or implemented before, on, or after the date of enactment of this Act.
The section highlighted above in bold italics means that FOCA, if passed, will accomplish two things:
it would invalidate all current and future statutes, ordinances, regulations, administrative orders, decisions, policies, or practices–at any level of government–that regulate or restrict abortion in any way;
it would mandate taxpayer funds to be used at the state and federal level for abortion services (not to do so would discriminate against the “rights” of abortion set forth in the bill).
The National Organization of Women says that FOCA “would sweep away hundreds of anti-abortion laws, policies.” Planned Parenthood says FOCA “would invalidate existing and future laws that interfere with or discriminate against the exercise of the rights protected.”
What are some of these state laws? The Family Research Council has complied the following list:
All 50 states have abortion reporting requirements
46 states have conscience-protection laws for individual health-care providers
44 states have laws about parental notification
40 states have laws restricting late-term abortions
38 states have bans on partial-birth abortions
33 states have laws requiring counseling before an abortion
16 states have laws about having ultrasounds before an abortion
Do you know what you get if you run a DNA test on an embryo, a fetus, and a baby? Human, I expect, and I would be very shocked to hear anyone even try to maintain otherwise. Too easy to take samples to labs and have the matter settled once and for all. I mean, you could hardly screen for Down Syndrome in utero if you didn’t know where in the human DNA sequence to look for the genetic problem, could you? In the case of a human pregnancy, “embryo” is an early stage in human development. “Fetus” is a later stage in human development. “Baby” is, in Abortion Rights terms, a still later stage in human development. What cannot be so easily escaped at this point is that we are talking about an early stage in human development: the developing human being is not fully developed but is fully human. The Abortion Rights supporters have long confused the two issues, equating “human” with a certain developmental stage. This is the ground on which they are, factually, simply wrong. We have some options in bringing this to light. We could factually call that which is aborted:
human life in the early stages of development
the embryonic (or fetal) stage of human development
developing humans at the embryonic (or fetal) stage.
Note: At 4:48pm central, a call was made to the Clarion Hotel in Cherry Hill, New Jersey. The clerk was asked to confirm whether a discount was offered to patients at the Cherry Hill Womens Center (abortion clinic). The female clerk answered, Yes. The rate would be $59 dollars a night instead of $109. The caller than said: Let me get this straight, if I KILL my baby, I get a discount from your hotel. If I KEEP my baby, I dont.
The clerk answered, Yes.
Wow. Just wow.
~~~
On the “Born Alive” act
Obama’s case against the bill did not revolve around existing state law, as he seemed to suggest last night. The law Obama referred to in the debate was the Illinois abortion statute enacted in 1975. But at the time of the debate about the Born Alive Act, the Illinois Attorney General had publicly stated that he could not prosecute incidents such as those reported by nurses at Christ Hospital in Chicago and elsewhere (including a baby left to die in a soiled linen closet) because the 1975 law was inadequate. It only protected ”viable” infants-and left the determination of viability up to the ”medical judgment” of the abortionist who had just failed to kill the baby in the womb. This provision of the law weakened the hand of prosecutors to the vanishing point. That is why the Born Alive Act was necessary-and everybody knew it. Moreover, the Born Alive Act would have had the effect of at least ensuring comfort care to babies whose prospects for long-term survival were dim and who might therefore have been regarded as ”nonviable.” As Obama and the other legislators knew, without the Born Alive Act these babies could continue to be treated as hospital refuse. That’s how the dying baby that Nurse Jill Stanek found in the soiled linen closet got there.
This is the bill that Obama voted against even allowing the bill to leave committee and be voted on by the full Senate and voted “present” when it was voted on.
In the middle of 1998, the state of Kansas instituted a mandatory reporting policy that required Tiller to submit information about the abortions that he performs. The Kansas Department of Health and Environmental Statistics has recently published this information: http://www.kdhe.state.ks.us/hci/absumm.html.
The information sends a clear message: the majority of late-term abortions are purely elective. They typically involve healthy babies and healthy mothers. If you are inclined to disagree, or if you have a hard time believing that mainstream abortion practitioners would be willing to kill babies that are months from being born, then I ask that you continue reading. You will be amazedand hopefully outragedwhen you see the data for yourself.
I am not a fan of Jeanie Miley – and I’m not a fan of “meditation” (Eastern religion style). But this book has some good points. It’s out of print now, but Amazon still has links to book sellers who have it.
The thrust of the devotionals is that we can reach out for Christ, know Him better, become more like Him – by getting into the Gospels, meditating on the Word, seeing the narratives from different points of view.
From the introduction:
An old tale from the desert fathers related by George Maloney in his book “Why Not Become Totally Fire?” tells of a disciple who went to Abba Joseph and said, “Father, according to my strength I sing a few psalms, I pray and fast a little, I meditate, and as well as I can I cleanse my thoughts Now what more can I do?”
Abba Joseph stood up, spreading his hands toward heaven. His fingers were like ten lamps of fire.
“If you want,” Abba Joseph said, “why not become totally fire?”
Encountering Jesus through the stories in the Gospels is a way of becoming fire.
The first few devotionals are based on John 1:35-39
The next day John was there again with two of his disciples. When he saw Jesus passing by, he said, “Look, the Lamb of God!”
When the two disciples heard him say this, they followed Jesus. Turning around, Jesus saw them following and asked, “What do you want?”
They said, “Rabbi” (which means Teacher), “where are you staying?”
“Come,” he replied, “and you will see.”
So they went and saw where he was staying, and spent that day with him. It was about the tenth hour.
So we have 644,197 people eligible to be registered in Marion County/Indianapolis, and 677,401 people registered. Congratulations go to Indianapolis for having 105% of its residents registered!
Just remember, the New York Times will continue to tell its readers that theres no voter fraud across the country and that efforts to try and clear the rolls of bogus entries is somehow illegal or restricts the rights of those people to vote. The Times is wrong.
The New York Times and Washington Post forgets that every bogus vote cast or indicated means that your legitimate vote gets offset by someone who is voting illegally. Your right to vote is harmed by these illegal and bogus votes. Thats the crime committed here, not trying to clear the voter rolls of bogus names, preventing those who are barred from voting (illegal aliens or felons or dead people) from casting votes, and ensuring that the voter rolls are accurate.
MORE REPORTS OF MASSIVE VOTER FRAUD BY ACORN. “They turn in 5000 new voter registration forms in Indiana, election officials start checking them and give up after the first 2100 were found to be fraudulent.” Where’s the Department of Justice on this? CNN report below.
News articles on “voter registration fraud” (or voter fraud)
O’jahnae Smith is ready and registered to vote this November.
There’s only one problem: She’s 7 years old.
The Connecticut girl is 11 years too young – and nobody in her family knows how she ended up on a voter registration form submitted by ACORN, the Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now.
Investigative reporter Amy Davis shows you how hundreds of voters could sway this year’s election — voters who are not even alive.
“All-in-all, a great person, a great woman, just a wonderful person” is how Alexis Guidry described her mother to Local 2 Investigates.
“As far back as I can remember, they’ve always voted in the election,” Guidry said of her parents.The March 2008 Primary was no exception.
Voting records show Alexis’ mom, Gloria Guidry, cast her ballot in person near her South Houston home.”It was just very shocking, a little unsettling,” said Alexis Guidry.
It’s unsettling because Gloria Guidry died of cancer 10 months before the March Primary.
“She’d be very upset,” Guidry said when asked what her mom would think.
The New Mexico Republican Party said they believe 28 people voted fraudulently in an Albuquerque state House district in the June Democratic primary.
The Republican Party found the problems in a review of 92 newly registered voters in House District 13.State Rep. Justine Fox-Young, an Albuquerque Republican, said a number of the suspected fraudulent voters voted by absentee ballot.
Republicans released details for 10 of those votes. The registration cards that were filled out had no social security numbers, drivers license numbers or birthdates for the voters.
LANSING – Michigan’s attorney general is charging a former employee of a community organizing group with forgery after he says the man falsely submitted six voter registration forms.
Antonio Johnson is being held in Jackson County on a parole violation. The 23-year-old is accused of falsifying the registration forms between May 20 and June 6 in Jackson.
He worked for the Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now, or ACORN.
Jackson Clerk Lynn Fessel suspected a problem and asked police to investigate. Two residents said they didn’t sign the forms and that some information used to complete the forms was incorrect.
(Ellen’s not: This means that the forger didn’t sign up “Mickey Mouse”- he signed up real people again. )
So, Sarah Palin’s advisors decide that it is time for her to meet a bunch of serious world leaders. They head to Europe, where, first up, she has an appointment with the Pope. The Pope and some of his Cardinals invite her for a boat ride on the Tiber. As they are sitting in the gondola talking, a wind starts up and blows the Pope’s hat into the water. Palin looks around and realizes that no one is going to do anything about it, so she calmy rises, takes off her her high heels, and steps off the side of the boat. Instead of diving into the water, however, she walks across it, to the hat, picks it up and walks back across the water to the boat. She climbs in, hands the Pope his hat and continues discussing whatever it was they had been talking about. The Cardinals are open mouthed in astonishment at what they have just seen. The news media, in nearby boats are busy discussing among themselves how to report it. Headlines the next day at the New York Times, The Washington Post and the networks all blare: New Revelation: Sarah Palin Can’t Swim.
cAs usual, the extremes are where the problem lies.
On one hand, the link of centering prayer to the meditations of Easthern religions might be seen as a bad thing. One another hand, even the most vile untruths may contain a kernel of something we can use. The danger is in trying to sort it out.
A long time ago I bought a book, “Becoming Fire” by Jeanie Miley. I disagree with a lot of what Miley teaches…but this book was very helpful to me at a critical part of my life.
Looking at definitions:
contemplate: To consider carefully and at length; meditate on or ponder: contemplated the problem from all sides; contemplated the mystery of God.
Meditate: To engage in devotional contemplation, especially prayer.
And I’m reminded of this passage
Finally, brethren, whatsoever things are true, whatsoever things are honorable, whatsoever things are just, whatsoever things are pure, whatsoever things are lovely, whatsoever things are of good report; if there be any virtue, and if there be any praise, think on these things. (Phil 4:8)
Anyway…back to the book. Miley takes several Scripture passages about the life of Christ and turns them into devotional meditations…she asks the reader to look at the passages from the viewpoints of different people within the passage; to put oneself in those shoes.
Then, read the passage…again. and again. And then spend 20 minutes going over the passage in your head…just you and Scripture.
What happens when the people paying most of the taxes are not paying enough to cover the direct tax credits that are promised to the people who even now are paying little or nothing?
What will happen when the 40% of the people who pay 95% of income taxes can no longer pay for the checks that the feds (under Obama) will be sending those of the 40% of the people who currently pay ZERO taxes, who will be getting the direct tax credits (not deductions) under Obama’s plan?
What will happen when the 5% who pay 60% of the taxes cannot cover Obama’s new spending?
I’ve only really read about Obama/Wright(or Ayers) and McCain/Keating.
The Obama case is about what Obama believes. Wright and Ayers are both radical leftists in their politics. If sharing a belief in radical leftist political figures is an indication of one’s own political leanings, it is very relevant. If the experience with Wright helped shape Obama’s political ideology, why would we not take that into account?
On the other hand, McCain/Keating is also very relevant – it is about what McCain has done. The question I ask is “What did you learn and how have you changed?” In the case of McCain, it was his dealings with Keating that was the trigger for his strong political beliefs and actions on campaign finance reform and governmental deregulation. He (in an article I read not too long ago) said that he did nothing wrong(illegal), but that brush with Keating was a “light bulb moment” (my term). In that moment, his ideology was formed. If the experience with Keating helped to shape McCain’s political ideology, why would we not take that into account?
The difference between Obama and McCain? Obama says, “that’s not the guy I knew” (as if he could sit in the guy’s church for 20 years and not know…AND write about the political beliefs of Wright and not know about them).
McCain says, “it looked wrong, I should not have done it and because of my experience I’m going to work toward fixing the system.
It’s not about “GBA”. It’s about what formed the political ideologies, how close are the ideologies of the student to the ideologies of the mentor (which is how Obama has described Wright).
It is about “what have you learned and how have you changed?”
McCain has told us and shown us. If Obama sat in Wright’s church for 20 years and cannot tell us what he has learned and how it has changed him…that says volumes about Obama.
Yes. I believe that Barack Obama’s connection with William Ayers matters. It matters a lot.
Yes, William Ayers was a member of a radical domestic terrorist group who bombed a number of buildings. Yes, he is unrepentant. Yes, Obama had to have known about Ayer’s history.
But…is it really the connection between terrorism and Obama that is important (or even real?) Not really.
Obama’s connections to radical leftists of all sorts of flavors is the concern, whether or not they were “terrorists”.
Barack Obama’s list of radical, liberal associates is varied:
Jerehiah (God damn America) Wright
William Ayers
the “New Party”
ACORN
When one choose to have associations with radical left-wing people or groups, it is generally because one has idealogical commanalities. The more you have in common with leftist idealogies, the more associations you have.
Ultimately, as with most elections, I think that the election will fall – not necessarily to Obama or McCain – but to the party that is liberal or conservative.
We tend to look beyond the problems with “our” candidate – if we are relatively sure that the candidate will stick to the party line.
When looking at McCain, we ask, “what party line will McCain stick most closely to?
When looking at Obama, we can also ask, “what party line will Obama stick most closely to?” This is where his radical associations are most important, because they give the best clue into his idealogy.
This is funny…I can tell when history classes have a research paper due. How?
Google searches. One of the research papers I wrote that I had the most fun with was: Compare and contrast Martin Luther and Henry VIII. I put a few of my papers online and this one is there also. That is by far the most popular search that brings people to this blog.
Of the top 5 google searches on my sitemeter page, 4 of them are looking for…yep. And they’re not in the same place. The cities:
Dallas, Texas
Tallahassee, Florida
Staten Island, New York
Van Buren, Arkansas
And I just thought my professor was being inventive…
So…if you’re googling for information…please don’t plagerize; give credit where credit is due…and enjoy history.
I started October 2 pounds lighter than I started September.
My first bike ride was August 17 and 10 miles was a hard ride.
Since then
45-50 miles is an average weekend ride
My longest ride was 65 miles
I rode 344.99 miles in the month of September.
I burned 12,485 calories riding my bike
After being sick for a week, I rode today (22 miles) and it was the worst average speed in a while. I have a lot of work to do in two weeks (I’m still planning a ride to Big Rapids and back).
