Immigration Bill Provisions Gain Wide Support in Poll
National
Immigration Bill Provisions Gain Wide Support in Poll
By JULIA PRESTON and MARJORIE CONNELLY
Published: May 25, 2007
Americans want to allow illegal immigrants to gain legal status and to create a guest worker program, a Times/CBS News poll found.
Comment: I think something should be done and I don't think mass deportation is a plan.
Seadevils (NYTimes slideshow)
From The Deep: The Extraordinary Creatures of the Abyss by Claire Nouvian/David Shale
A Christian Leader by Kevin T. Bauder
Excerpt:
Douglas McLachlan was the millionth man, the one who could actually be a shepherd to hundreds and hundreds of people. He loved them, cared for them, sacrificed for them, and prayed for them. Personally. And they felt it, and they loved him back.
Comment: As a member of Fourth Baptist, it is my job to pray for and support Dr. McLachlan's successor. His success will be a function of the prayers and support and "followship" of his leadership. Kathee and I are committed to supporting Pastor McLachlan's replacement!
I was very impressed that State Senator Terri Bonoff would return my call after I left a message for her today.
Senator Bonoff and her office do a great job of regularly communicating with her constituency. I appreciate her for that and also for seeking to govern from "the middle". While I am a registered Republican, Senator Bonoff is a fine Senator.
Thank you Senator Bonoff for your hard work for District 43!
Senator Terri Bonoff
Senator Terri Bonoff (MN Senate site)
The World From Our Window: Let's Play the Blame Game
Comment: good article.
Notice in Genesis 3:12 how Adam blames others for his own sinful choice:
"Then the man said, “The woman whom You gave to be with me, she gave me of the tree, and I ate.”"
He blames:
Slow Down and Absorb - Open borders? Mass deportations? How about some common sense instead?
Comment: Some common sense from Peggy Noonan. Noonan was a speechwriter for President Reagan and is an author an columnist.
Excerpt:
Here is the truth: America has never deported millions of people, and America will never deport millions of people. It's not what we do. It's not who we are. It's not who we want to be. The American people would never accept evening news pictures of sobbing immigrants being torn from their homes and put on a bus. We wouldn't accept it because we have hearts, and as much as we try to see history in the abstract, we know history comes down to the particular, to the sobbing child in the bus. We don't round up and remove. Nor should we, tomorrow, on one of our whims, grant full legal status and a Cadillac car. We take it a day at a time. We wait and see what's happening. We do the small discrete things a nation can do to make the overall situation better. For instance: "You commit a violent crime? You are so out of here." And, "Here, let me help you learn English."
I found my appointment with a Wellness Consultant (Sara B) valuable (earlier post):
Boy Bags Wild Hog Bigger Than 'Hogzilla'
Excerpt:
An 11-year-old Alabama boy used a pistol to kill a wild hog his father says weighed a staggering 1,051 pounds and measured 9-feet-4 from the tip of its snout to the base of its tail.
www.monsterpig.com <--- comment: site was down when I checked ... probably bandwidth issue with high traffic.
After storm, flooding and a cool-down
Excerpt:
Blowdown: In Plymouth, city crews were cleaning up roads and parks, and dealing with the loss of about 1,000 trees in what was determined by National Weather Service officials to have been a downburst of wind Wednesday. An untold number of other trees were toppled on private property. The city has extended the hours of its yard waste site, where residents should take tree and brush waste, keeping gates open from 9 a.m. to 8 p.m. through Monday.
One of a set of Medici tapestries on the Genesis story of Adam and Eve, from the Academia, Florence. The representation of the garden invites comparison with Milton, as does the portrayal of two key dramatic moments: Eve tempted by the serpent, and Eve offering the fruit to Adam. Su concessione del Ministero per i Beni Culturali e Ambientali.Edwards Didn't Always Oppose "War On Terror" Phrase
Edwards then: On CNN on October 21, 2004, he said that stopping terrorists before they harm us is "by far the most effective way to win this war on terrorism." A few days earlier he said that Bush's Iraq invasion had turned "the focus away from the war on terror."
Edwards now: Edwards made big news during his foreign policy speech by blasting the phrase "war on terror" and saying that it was a "bumper sticker" slogan that was actually weakening the U.S. internationally.
Which Edwards would be President?
Hancock's father files suit
Excerpt:
The father of Josh Hancock filed suit Thursday, claiming a restaurant provided drinks to the St. Louis Cardinals relief pitcher even though he was intoxicated prior to the crash that killed him.
The suit, filed in St. Louis Circuit Court by Dean Hancock of Tupelo, Miss., does not specify damages. Mike Shannon's Restaurant, owned by the longtime Cardinals broadcaster who starred on three World Series teams in the 1960s, is a defendant in the case along with Shannon's daughter, Patricia Shannon Van Matre, the restaurant manager.
Other defendants include Eddie's Towing, the company whose flatbed tow truck was struck by Hancock's sport utility vehicle in the early hours of April 29; tow truck driver Jacob Edward Hargrove; and Justin Tolar, the driver whose stalled car on Interstate 64 was being assisted by Hargrove.
Comment: The death of any young man is a tragedy, more so in the case of Cardinals' pitcher Josh Hancock who drank himself to twice the legal level of intoxication, then sped down the freeway crashing into a tow truck on the side of the road. In sum: intoxicated, DUI, speeding, no seat belt, and talking on the cell phone. The grieving Father turns the tragedy into a pitiful melodrama of blame! See earlier post.
New York Region
Iraq Presents Graduating Class at West Point With New Challenges
By MICHAEL WILSON
Published: May 25, 2007
The war in Iraq has hovered over the West Point class of 2007, perhaps more than any class before.
Iraq Presents Graduating Class at West Point With New Challenges
Excerpts:
The war in Iraq has hovered over the class of 2007, perhaps more than any class before. The 1,000-plus cadets graduating on Saturday were the first to enter West Point after the invasion of Iraq in March 2003. Most arrived on campus in June of that year.
The events of the last four years have directly shaped the curriculum at West Point, as instructors who for years taught the fine points of battlefield strategy found themselves leading drills with fake bombs made of pop bottles and clocks. “Ain’t no front line anymore,” Colonel Jones said. “It’s all front line.”
....
of the graduating class of 2007, 14 percent agreed to serve eight years of active duty instead of the required five, in exchange for being able to choose their branch of service, a privilege generally held for top students in a class. The largest number of cadets chose infantry, followed by aviation and armor.
Comments: Although I do not know any of them, I am proud of them and commend them for their patriotism and their willingness to serve our country! (The picture is from the 2006 graduating class)
On the resignation of Pastor Douglas McLachlan
Excerpt:
I am thankful for Pastor McLachlan’s example to me in fidelity to the Saviour. I have classmates who have already disqualified themselves from gospel ministry by bringing reproach to the name of Christ. Here was a man who was faithful in his personal life to the Gospel and its implications for his life. In an era that saw drastic changes in the venues and possibilities for immorality, here was a man who remained faithful to his God. He not only showed this in his fidelity to his wife, but in his handling of church funds, and even in how he spoke and loved. He was greatly influenced by the writings of Francis Schaeffer, and exemplified the kind of Christian love Schaeffer had called for a generation earlier. The body of Christ has been weakened by the number of pastors who thought they were exempt from the demands they themselves proclaimed, and brought ruin and scorn to the cross of Christ. Doug McLachlan, on the other hand, has shown himself to be a true “blameless” servant of the Lord.
Comment: Excellent article by Ryan Martin!
Bob Bixby tribute
200 Miles an Hour All the Time
Excerpt:
I had been in and out of drinking, and any time I was drinking, bad things happened, and when I wasn't drinking, good things happened. And so, why? I had had my stretch, after learning about the disease, and still trying to figure out another way around the corner, and it wasn't working, and so I dug deep inside and said, I'm an alcoholic. I cannot pick up one drink.
Comment: Good read! He has been 116 days without an alcoholic drink!
Dems Want You to Take a Hike
Excerpt:
The tax cuts have also produced substantial tax revenue increases--14.5% growth in 2005 and 11.7% in 2006. For the first seven months of the current fiscal year, total revenues were up 11.3% over last year, and individual income tax receipts were up by 17.5%. Total tax receipts in April were $70 billion higher than in April 2006.
The Congressional Budget Office and the Congressional Joint Tax Commission estimated that a reduction in the capital gains rate to 15% from 20%, which was passed in 2003, would cost the U.S. Treasury some $5.4 billion over three years. But actual revenues exceeded expectations by $133 billion, so the government profited substantially from our strong economy and the tax rate reduction. In fact, the tax cuts have actually expanded revenues as a percentage of gross domestic product. Over the past 40 years, federal tax receipts have accounted for 18.3% of GDP. That figure was 18.4% in 2006, and the CBO projects it at 18.6% in the current fiscal year.
These revenue increases have also had a positive impact on the federal deficit. Since the 2003 tax cuts the deficit has declined from $413 billion (3.5% of GDP) in fiscal 2004, to $318 billion in 2005, then $248 billion in 2006, and an estimated $150 billion to $200 billion (1.1% to 1.5% of GDP) in the current fiscal year.
Lower tax rates have also produced another important economic change: fewer and shorter recessions. As economist Brian Westbury noted in the Wall Street Journal last month, in "the high-tax, highly regulated years between 1969 and 1982 the economy was in recession 32% of the time. Since then, following Ronald Reagan's tax cuts, and deregulation . . . the U.S. economy has only been in recession 5% of the time."
Comment: I'm for lower taxes but I would also like to see government restraint on spending!
The The Creation Museum by
www.answersingenesis.org opens this weekend!
Adam and Eve in the Land of the Dinosaurs
Museum Review | Creation Museum
Adam and Eve in the Land of the Dinosaurs
By EDWARD ROTHSTEIN
Published: May 24, 2007
At the $27 million Creation Museum evolution gets its continual comeuppance, while biblical revelations are treated as gospel.
Excerpt:
The entrance gates here are topped with metallic Stegosauruses. The grounds include a giant tyrannosaur standing amid the trees, and a stone-lined lobby sports varied sauropods. It could be like any other natural history museum, luring families with the promise of immense fossils and dinosaur adventures.
....
Outside the museum scientists may assert that the universe is billions of years old, that fossils are the remains of animals living hundreds of millions of years ago, and that life’s diversity is the result of evolution by natural selection. But inside the museum the Earth is barely 6,000 years old, dinosaurs were created on the sixth day, and Jesus is the savior who will one day repair the trauma of man’s fall.
Comments:
