Truth from the Source

This is not official US Military news. This is not unofficial information from unnamed sources but made official because it was whispered to an AP reporter. It is from one of the heads of one of the most influential tribes in Iraq and it is told to us by an American reporter who is not on anyone’s payroll. Al Qaeda in Iraq is defeated. In his most recent article. Michael Yon reports

“Al Qaeda in Iraq is defeated,” according to Sheik Omar Jabouri, spokesman for the Iraqi Islamic Party and a member of the widespread and influential Jabouri Tribe. Speaking through an interpreter at a 31 October meeting at the Iraqi Islamic Party headquarters in downtown Baghdad, Sheik Omar said that al Qaeda had been “defeated mentally, and therefore is defeated physically,” referring to how clear it has become that the terrorist group’s tactics have backfired. Operatives who could once disappear back into the crowd after committing an increasingly atrocious attack no longer find safe haven among the Iraqis who live in the southern part of Baghdad. They are being hunted down and killed. Or, if they are lucky, captured by Americans.

Well, we have certainly heard similar things over the years, what makes this different? Yon goes on to explain:

Sheik Omar, who has gained the respect of American combat leaders for his intelligence and organizational skills, said the tough line against al Qaeda is also enforced at the tribal level. According to Sheik Omar, the Jabouri tribe, too, is actively committed to destroying al Qaeda. So much so, that Jabouri tribal leaders have decided they would “kill their own sons” if any aided al Qaeda. To underscore the point, he went on to say that about 70 Jabouri “sons” had been killed by the Jabouri tribe so far.

Let’s see how long this story takes to get to the main stream media. It means the surge is working. It means that good Iraqis don’t hate Americans. It means that the “we must leave so the killing will stop” lie is put to rest. And it means that Democrats in Congress have been wrong about Iraq.

If this holds (always remember that war is fluid and things can change), then the implications are huge. It means that Iraq is morphing into a country that resists Islamofacism from any source. It means that Iraq will have matured beyond the point where they would tolerate militant Islam as being their oppressive government. They will go from being the most dangerous place to live on the planet to being a peaceful part of the modern world. They would be a model for other countries who are being held down by oppressive Islamic regimes.

Read the whole article here.

Insist on the Truth

One of my favorite sources for news about the conflict in Iraq is a war correspondent Michael Yon. He works for no news bureau. He simply blogs and asks for donations. This makes him very independent.

He doesn’t usually comment on the obvious news filter that exists today, but in his most recent article he talked at length about it.

Here is an important question for every Truthseeker reader. There is overwhelming evidence that all three major networks plus CNN and the major news services, AP, Reuters, and BBC, filter and slant news about the Iraq conflict. Knowing that, do you then seek other sources of news to find out what reality is or do you simply accept what they are telling you? Are you insulted that these news organizations attempt to guide the masses with their carefully shaped version of reality or are you simply OK with their version?

Michael Yon doesn’t have an editor or boss that steers the subject matter. What you see is what you get. In this article, he is not only disappointed in the media; I sense he is disappointed in us as well. He expresses a little bit of my passion. In his recent article titled “Resistance is futile: You will be (mis)informed” he comments, “America seems to be under a glass dome which allows few hard facts from the field to filter in unless they are attached to a string of false assumptions.”

In July of this year, Michael tried to offer an article to AP. The Americans and Iraqi Army found a mass grave of civilians killed in Baqubah by Al Qaeda.. This was absent from the news reports while unsubstantiated stories of Americans killing Iraqis were being published. (Remember Murtha and the Haditha Marines) Michael, who was with the military when the mass grave was discovered, documented what he had found. He offered his story, complete with pictures to the AP, under the assumption that AP would like a factual, on the scene account. His offer: “Would you publish the truth of this story if I gave it all to you for free?” AP was not interested! They told him that no military report or AP reporter new of the story, so – no story. He sent them a picture that he took of the AP correspondent who was with him and the General who investigated it. AP has yet to respond back. Meanwhile, months later the Haditha Marines have been exonerated!

Today, he writes about how Iraq is a different place because of the efforts of General Petreaus. There is a tremendously important story breaking but there is no interest in it. He is concerned that we don’t understand that because of a disingenuous media that long ago decided the outcome and for political reasons is sticking to that scenario. He laments, “No thinking person would look at last year’s weather reports to judge whether it will rain today . . .”

Thinking person? You mean a person who is not afraid to challenge a media with an obvious and proven agenda?

If more people in America were aware of the truth about the conflict in Iraq they would cease to be fooled by the rhetoric they hear from the press and the Democratic leadership. The Democratic Party line dovetails nicely with the mainstream media storyline. What ever their excuse is for not allowing the truth to be told, what is the American peoples’ excuse for failing to be truthseekers?

Quiz

Test for you! Who said it?

1)"We're going to take things away from you on behalf of the common good."

A. Karl Marx
B. Adolph Hitler
C. Joseph Stalin
D. None of the above

2) "It's time for a new beginning, for an end to government of the few, by the few, and for the few...and to replace it with shared responsibility for shared prosperity."

A. Lenin
B. Mussolini
C. Idi Amin
D. None of the Above

3) "(We)...can't just let business as usual go on, and that means something has to be taken away from some people."

A. Nikita Khrushev
B. Jose f Goebbels
C. Boris Yeltsin
D. None of the above

4) "We have to build a political consensus and that requires people to give up a little bit of their own...in order to create this common ground."

A. Mao Tse Dung
B. Hugo Chavez
C. Kim Jong Il
D. None of the above

5) "I certainly think the free-market has failed."

A. Karl Marx
B. Lenin
C. Molotov
D. None of the above

6) "I think it's time to send a clear message to what has become the most profitable sector in (the) entire economy that they are being watched."

A. Pinochet
B. Milosevic
C. Saddam Hussein
D. None of the above

Answers:

(1) D. None of the above. Statement was made by Hillary Clinton 6/29/2004
(2) D. None of the above. Statement was made by Hillary Clinton 5/29/2007
(3) D. None of the above. Statement was made by Hillary Clinton 6/4/2007
(4) D. None of the above. Statement was made by Hillary Clinton 6/4/2007
(5) D. None of the above. Statement was made by Hillary Clinton 6/4/2007
(6) D. None of the above. Statement was made by Hillary Clinton 9/2/2005


Here is the source of the quiz.

It appears as of today that Hillary Clinton will win the nomination for the Democrats. I don’t believe that she will take any chances on her running mate. I believe she will pick Barak Obama. That would give them a pretty solid left of center to extreme left coalition. It would also guarantee the full resources of the mainstream media and the money and power of Moveon.org. This team would not have to venture very far to the right at all. Hillary’s ability to talk at times as a centrist will be enough to bring in the needed extras to put them over the top. The centrist voters they could fool into voting for them would be gravy and will be ignored after the inauguration.

To the Top of the Continent

In September we went to Banff in Alberta, Canada. I have never been to a more beautiful place. Even though Banff is virtually straight north of home, it is on the other side of the Continental Divide in the Rocky Mountains. The Banff/Lake Louise area is similar to the Yellowstone area in the way that it is, for some reason, a uniquely beautiful location with more wonders per square mile than you could imagine . It reminds me that God loves beauty and he created a few incredibly beautiful places so that we can enjoy them, too.

This is Mount Rundle. It is over 10,000 feet high. Most of the peaks there are.


We're 9,600 feet high (courtesy of a tram).


I love this sign. Which road shall we take?

Bursting their Bubble in the Big House

In two weeks, the Oregon Ducks have gone from unranked to being ranked 13th in the nation. The Michigan Wolverines, Oregon’s opponent two weeks ago plunged from 5th to unranked. Oregon’s win in the Big House was the primary reason it was boosted so high, so fast. And, one play in that win has become one of the most talked about in college football so far this year. It was nationally televised. The most revealing part of this TV coverage was the reaction of the Michigan fans at the end of this clip. The Big House is one of the most intimidating places for opponents to play. To see the expressions of disbelief on the fans’ faces was priceless.

Thanks to Addicted to Quack for this YouTube video.

Fear the Ducks!

It is football season again. I get the most excited over my alma mater, the Oregon Ducks. When someone would make fun of the fact that our team mascot was a “duck”, I would inform them that we weren’t just ducks. We are Mighty Fighting Ducks! I give you two observations to prove my point.

1. This year, so far, we are 3 – 0. The first game we beat the Houston Cougars (more on that later). The second game we trounced Michigan in the Big House. And now we have just beaten the Fresno State Bulldogs.

2. Our mascot has always been the Disney duck. Years ago, Oregon got permission from Walt Disney himself to use Donald as our animal representative. Every decade or so there is a push to change the mascot to something more formidable. After all, Donald doesn’t strike fear into the opposition the way Cougars or Trojans or Bears do. A couple of years ago, in an effort to look tougher, Donald started doing push-ups at football games. Every time we would score, Donald would go out onto the field and count off the total amount of points on the scoreboard. I’ve seen some high scoring games where Donald had to do a lot of push-ups.

In our first game against the Houston Cougars this year, Donald noticed that their Cougar mascot was doing the same thing. Every time they would score, he would go out onto the field and do push-ups. Hey! Donald does the push-ups! Not some goofy guy in a cat suit. See what happened next:

Donald got suspended for unnecessary roughness. I wonder if they check mascots for steriods? This looks like 'roid rage to me.

Here's Looking at You, Kid

I remember a movie plot one time that revolved around a scene where a man was peering though a telescope across the skyline of a city. He focused in on a window of a tall building across town only to see a man peering through a telescope back at him. That’s what I thought of when I came across this picture taken by the Hubble Telescope. It is appropriately named The Eye of God.

I know that I sometimes forget that He always sees me. While we are diligently searching for him, he is always very aware of us. If for a brief moment we could focus a telescope on God, would we find him busy working on something else? I don’t think so. I think we would see him looking at us – not missing a thing. Sometimes we would like it if we could hide from him. I remember when our daughter was just two, she would cover her eyes, thinking that it blocked our view of her. Having been caught getting into her mother’s dresser drawer, she wanted to disappear. But she had little understanding that when a parent looks upon his child, he does it with love.

ONE Idol Who Invests His Fame

Lately I have been really down on the idols of our society. That would be the entertainment stars and the sports stars who have become more than just rich. They have become idolized. They lead an unreal life that is not just one of luxury, but of super-celebrity status, whom we grant permission to live outside the boundaries of decency and civility.

Many have taken this idol status and used it as a license to live lustful and deviant lives. Michael Vick is such a person. Lindsay Lohan is another. Believe me, I am not as upset at them as I am at our society that needs them and pays them. This world has lavished riches on them and they have responded by not only ignoring decency but by displaying their disregard for it.

Still others have used it for political voice. Over the past decade many celebrities have, for some reason, been granted a political voice. We all too easily gave a microphone to Rosie O’Donnell and listened to her “view” on politics as she bellowed her opposition into silence. There are many other idols such as Sean Penn and Susan Sarandon who also used their celebrity currency to push their radically socialist opinions into the heads of their unquestioning fans. I believe that for many of these people who have become political, the world travel and exposure have shown them scenes that are very disturbing. Not having a box for it and not having God in their lives they grasp at humanist socialist solutions and use their celebrity status to sell it.

Well, I have been amazed at one person who has used his celebrity status quite differently. This man is surprisingly a believer in Jesus Christ. His favorite scripture is also mine. John 8:32 “Know the truth and the truth will set you free.” He states in the following You-Tube session that he actually didn’t have much use for Christians or the Church. The interview is of Bono. His interviewer is Bill Hybels of the Willow Creek Community Church. This segment is 8 minutes of an hour long session. Watch this segment and then click on the link to watch all of it. He sets the standard for how an idol can invest his celebrity capitol to change the disturbing things that he has seen around the world.

This is Segment 4. See all the segments of this incredible interview here. Find Segment 1 and go through them all.

Here is the question that is haunting me. OK Dave, you are not Bono. You don't have that kind of celebrity clout to change the world. But you are known in your world. You have capital with your friends and neighbors. Are you as motivated by Christ's passion and peoples plights to demand that their world be changed?

Muslims dig and find the truth

I reported earlier that Israel Prime Minister Ehud Olmert had approved giving millions of dollars to the Fatah leaders in hopes that their legitimacy would grow and Hamas’s would weaken. But somehow Fatah managed to give at least $3.5 million to Hamas soldiers.

In another act of kindness Olmert has now given permission to the Palestinians to dig a trench across the Temple Mount to replace a faulty electrical line. The trench is long and deep. Archeologists are furious. Observing from afar they can see where engraved stones have been dug up by the heavy equipment and tossed in the rubble. Experts are convinced they have uncovered a wall of Herod's Temple.

Although the major news sources have refused to give this much attention at all, the digging is a huge issue on many fronts. Muslim clerics have been blatantly claiming that there never was a Jewish Temple there. According to them the stories about a Jewish Temple are all lies. It's very ironic that they are the ones who are digging up the proof that it is there. Another huge issue is that the Temple Mount is an international historical site. There should be international outrage, but there is only silence. Then there is the obvious faith issue to everyone who is of Jewish or Christian faith. The stones that are being uncovered were undoubtedly from a wall from Herod’s temple, the same Temple that Jesus himself walked through. I visited many of the traditional sites in Jerusalem. They are just that; sites that “are traditionally believed to be ones that Jesus visited." No one has uncovered something specifically from Herod’s Temple before.

As I explained in my last post on Prime Minister Olmert, he is a favorite of the secular Israelis. They believe that the less they care about their religious past, the better chance of survival they have. They not only reject the thought of God coming to their rescue, they embrace the idea that capitulation to the Palestinians is the path to their future.

I believe there is another front to seriously consider. Remember the first Indiana Jones movie where Indy sneaks into a temple in the jungle and steals an ancient artifact? He soon realized that he touched off a huge mechanical chain reaction. Well, I believe the Palestinians’ digging could also touch off something huge. And I don’t think it will be mechanical. The very Temple where Jesus stood and spoke to every generation from then until now is being revealed. It existed. It is there just as the gospels said it was.

If you research it, you will learn that there were some amazing supernatural incidences that happened around the Temple Mount in the 1947-48 war and again in the 1967 war. In one incident, a large group of Palestinian soldiers were forced back from attacking and slaughtering a small group of Israeli soldiers. As they approached the Temple Mount they were confronted by a large image of a foreboding Father Abraham. There are other instances of Israeli’s becoming invisible and Palestinians being confused. What might happen in 2007?

The Palestinians don’t care that God told David that His temple was to go there. Prime Minister Olmert doesn’t care. Many of the Israeli people don’t care. The international community doesn’t care. Only the “powerless” believers and the Jewish faithful still care. I know that God still cares too. Let’s see what happens.

Want to read about it? Look here and here.

Galations 6: 7

How many of us are guilty of idol worship? "Never!" you say?

How many of us follow the lives of celebrities. You know, movie stars, sports stars, royalty, etc. How many of us buy their stuff, go to their new movies, go to their games, etc. I know I shouldn't be meddling with this topic. It is not fun to talk about it because we all have our favorites. But I am really put off by the Michael Vick thing. It has shown up as something that doesn't necessarily divide us, but as something that illuminates the size of the already existing chasm between us and the celebrities we worship.

We get a free look at the mental state of Michael Vick. Apparently he would throw two dogs in a pit where they would fight until one was nearly dead. According to Senator Byrd the fight would last for hours. Then Vick would take the dog that was losing and further torture it until it died. Each time, he would use a new unique way of torturing to death the dog that lost.

The ironic thing about what has happened the last few weeks revolves around the scripture, "Do not be deceived, God is not mocked; for whatever a man sows, this he will also reap (Galations 6: 7). I know God put dogs on the earth to be a loyal and faithful companion to us. Michael Vick's hobby and sideline sport was the brutal and grotesque slaying of these loyal animals. When he and his friends were caught, the prosecutors gave the friends plea bargains in exchange for their testimony against Michael Vick. Some people on the other side of this chasm were incensed. "Where was their loyalty?" Some statements were even made that those who ratted Vick out were as good as dead. Loyalty?

Now the NAACP in Atlanta has come out with an official statement that says Michael Vick should not be banned from football. After all, where is our compassion for Vick?

Compassion?

Further, today, Stephan Marbury, NBA guard for the New York Knicks told reporters that he didn't see anything wrong with what Vick was doing. "It is a sport! Is it any different from killing a deer?"

I feel like that AFLAC Duck after hearing Yogi Berra talk. My jaw drops open to speak but nothing comes out. I am not sure how Stephan Marbury goes about hunting deer, but, yes, it is very different.

The purpose of this rant isn't to heap condemnation on these wealthy idols of our society. The verse I quoted above isn't simply a Bible verse. It is a law, like gravity. We all get the fruit of what we have sown. But the purpose is for us to take another look at what our society's worship of these people has turned them into. They are not like us. They are more like the gods of Greek mythology who demanded worship but had no identity with the people at all. They have different values. The have different ideas about right and wrong, about justice. Occasionally we can make one of them face reality for brief moments, but rarely do we even want to lower them from the ranks of idol.

I want to do that now. Because of this Michael Vick episode, I am looking at super-stars differently now. They have been handed everything the world has to offer. But it is far from the abundant life that Jesus said he came to bring us.

When Dealing With A Fool, Make Sure He Is Not Similarly Engaged

Photo of Ehud Olmert (he is the one on the left)

Israel is experiencing a new low. I read just recently that most of the citizens in Israel are secular and do not believe in God. Following that tract then, most of the people want Israel to make some kind of peace with the Arab world. They see the religious issues as simply obstacles to peace. Holy sites? Let the Palestinians have them. They believe that the Arabs’ heartburn is really over the Israelis religion. No religion, no more heartburn.

Israel’s Prime Minister, Ehud Olmert is immensely unpopular. However, he is for the most part, secular. He has, in all likelihood lost his majority. But no one wants an election because they fear that Benjamin Netanyahu, someone who believes in Israel’s biblical destiny, will come to power. Thus, even though Olmert has proven to be an uncharacteristically bad leader, they stick with him. They figure that their best chance is to get peace through his efforts of capitulation.

Recently, the capitulation plan leaped forward when Olmert released some Palestinian prisoners and Israel disbursed millions of dollars to Mahmoud Abbas, the leader of the Fatah party. The plan was to take advantage of the split between Fatah and Hamas. If they could underwrite Fatah, then perhaps they could help their popularity with the general Palestinian population. Hopefully that would lead to a major Fatah victory in their next Palestinian election and the militant Hamas party would find itself out of power. Then Israel could negotiate with Abbas and his Fatah party about the West Bank and about setting up a real Palestinian country. The millions of dollars that Israel released was a huge thing because all money had been cut off for a very long time. The Fatah government and their security forces were finally able to be paid. Can you imagine how Abbas must have felt? They experienced hardship for so long and now they were receiving MILLIONS! Can you imagine his popularity! He had money and he had the power. He could disburse it in ways that would help his people the most.

But wait! Something happened! In the rush to spread the wealth, $3.2 million went an unexpected direction. Who could blame Abbas if he disbursed too much to hospitals or to orphanages. Being the man with all the money, it probably was pretty hectic deciding who gets money and who doesn’t. I am sure his headquarters was a pretty busy place.

But no, the $3.2 million did not go to help the sick or the orphaned. It “accidentally” went to the HAMAS MILITARY!! Abbas “accidentally” paid his “enemies” $3.2 million! He is reported to be really embarrassed about it.

Poor Ehud Olmert. He has put his money and his faith in Mahmoud Abbas. Israel has spent the last year holding onto the theory that Abbas would overcome the dangerously militant Hamas party. They fought a small war with Hamas and they suffered so much for this plan. Hamas was out of money and losing popularity. Then, somehow a clerical error happened and some of Israel’s millions ended up breathing life into the very terrorists they have been fighting against.

Things are very complicated in the Middle East. They are never as they seem. Olmert has chosen to back a man who learned everything he knows from Yassar Arafat. Mr. Olmert is a fool.

Read about the payday for Israel's enemies here: Hamas Payday

Adventures in Truth Seeking

Three things that you don’t want to hear in a tattoo parlor:

1. “Eagle?! I though you said beagle!

2. ”We ran out of red, so I used pink instead.”

3 “Bob has two ‘O’s in it, doesn’t it?”

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Moving Testimony

Three buddies die in a car crash, and they go to heaven.

There, they are all asked, "When you are in your casket and friends and family are mourning, what would you like to hear them say about you?"The first guy says, "I would like to hear them say that I was a great doctor of my time, and a great family man."
The second guy says, "I would like to hear that I was a wonderful husband and school teacher who made a huge difference in our children of tomorrow."
The last guy replies, "I would like to hear them say, 'Look! He's moving!"

OK, one more:

My Dad Is Better Than Your Dad

Three boys are in the school yard bragging about their fathers.
The first boy says, "My Dad scribbles a few words on a piece of paper, he calls it a poem, they give him $50."

The second boy says, "That's nothing. My Dad scribbles a few words on a piece of paper, he calls it a song, they give him $100."

The third boy says, "I got you both beat. My Dad scribbles a few words on a piece of paper, he calls it a sermon...and it takes eight people to collect all the money!"

Who You Gonna Call?

There is a scene in the 1984 comedy, Ghosts Busters where they are in the basement of their headquarters being confronted by a shrieking EPA agent. “Shut that thing down!” he yelled as he is pointed to a big electronic device on the wall that somehow housed all the spooks that the Ghost Busters had captured.

In the scene the Ghost Busters were trying to convince the police to not listen to the EPA agent. “I wouldn’t do that if I were you! You have no idea what you are dealing with!”

Then they started covering their heads and running towards the exit as they realized that the policeman had to acquiesce to the authority of the EPA agent and turn off the switch. Moments later, all hell broke loose, literally, as all the spooks escaped and ran amok through New York.

It’s a funny scene. I remember it because the EPA agent had absolutely no wisdom, no sense of reality of what he is dealing with, and yet couldn’t help but act on his absolute authority. To me, he is the personification of the Democrats in Congress and the Senate with regards to their authority and the issue of the Iraq War.

“Shut that thing down!”

Those who understand the situation in the Middle East reply, “I wouldn’t do that if I were you. You have no idea what you are dealing with.” Like the character in the movie, that fact has no impact on the Democratic leadership. They have the authority and they are going to throw the switch. In the movie, what happened next was funny. I am sure the reality of what happens next after shutting down the war in Iraq will not be funny.

Like the EPA agent, it is apparent that the Democrats in power in Washington have no understanding or fear of the demonic forces that are now being held at bay. They don’t understand that these forces have no appreciation of the conventional rules by which we abide. The Democrats came to power in the Senate and Congress because those who were in power before allowed them to. We live here by rules that we all have agreed upon. Democrats won in enough elections to gain the majority. Republicans surrendered their seats to them. This “convention” has no meaning at all to the evil forces who will be allowed to roam the world at will, when we shut down the war in Iraq. Borders mean nothing, existing laws mean nothing, existing authority, customs, and cultures mean nothing. Like the ghosts who were liberated to freely terrorize the city, these evil forces will be suddenly liberated to terrorize the world.

You can laugh at this analogy. But if you read it, then someday you will remember it. It will be a day when you are done laughing. Who you gonna call, then?

4th of July

Today is another birthday of our Country. Happy 4th of July! For me, it is always worth celebrating. It is also my mother's birthday. This year I cannot make it to her party (the first time we have missed it that I can remember). So I am dedicating this post to her. In my life, our family cannot separate the two birthdays. The 4th of July is about celebrating Mom's birthday with sparklers and firecrackers. And celebrating our country's birthday is all about making a birthday cake and gathering around home. I will miss it this year.

So anyway, I thought I would search out a nugget of truth for my Truthseeker blog for this occasion. Below is a statement that was made on my mother's 3rd birthday by the President of the United States. He is talking about the Declaration of Independence and the troubling notion that we have come far and are perhaps now more modern than those who signed it.

About the Declaration there is a finality that is exceedingly restful. It is often asserted that the world has made a great deal of progress since 1776, that we have had new thoughts and new experiences which have given us a great advance over the people of that day, and that we may therefore very well discard their conclusions for something more modern. But that reasoning can not be applied to this great charter. If all men are created equal, that is final. If they are endowed with inalienable rights, that is final. If governments derive their just powers from the consent of the governed, that is final. No advance, no progress can be made beyond these propositions. If anyone wishes to deny their truth or their soundness, the only direction in which he can proceed historically is not forward, but backward toward the time when there was no equality, no rights of the individual, no rule of the people. Those who wish to proceed in that direction can not lay claim to progress. They are reactionary. Their ideas are not more modern, but more ancient, than those of the Revolutionary fathers.

That was written by Calvin Coolidge on the 4th of July, 1926. It helps us to remember that some very special things like the principles that established our country - - and my mother - - grow more valuable with age.

Under the Bridge

I was all alone as I waded down the Ninilchik River in Alaska. The sun was shining and the weather was warm. My waders kept my feet and legs insulated from the icy water that rushed passed me to the Cook Inlet about a mile downstream. In the week that I had been on the Kenai Peninsula, I had fished several rivers and caught Halibut on a rolling deck in the ocean. I had experienced “combat fishing” on the Russian River and fished late into the evening on the Kasiloff River. My two fishing buddies, Norm and Ray took an opportunity to go out for one more halibut fishing trip, so I dropped them at the charter launch point and headed for the Ninilchik. Now I was standing in the middle of it all alone. I was awe-struck by the beautiful setting. The river, about as wide as a big one-lane road meandered through meadows and around big rocks. Upriver it passed under the highway bridge. Downriver, it meandered back and forth through a meadow that led through a village and the mouth.

The beauty, warmth, and solitude allowed me to think about a recurring dream that I had as a boy. I hadn’t thought about it in years, but it was fresh again, prompted by the desire to catch a fish. The dream was a scene where I as a young boy was pulling a fish from a stream that ran through our pasture. As I was pulling the fish from the stream, without looking, I knew my Dad was walking up behind me. I grabbed the fish, turned around and held it up for him. I was laughing and he was beaming. I loved that dream. The problem was that it was just that. My Dad was a wonderful father, but he never took me fishing. My whole childhood, he worked 6 days a week. The one day he got off we worked to keep the farm going. He promised but we never went fishing. Other boys my age went fishing with their dads.

So as I stood all alone on the Ninilchick, I called out to God. “Father, this place is so beautiful, would you spend some time with me, here? Would you walk with me? Would you show me what to do; where to go? Do you have time to spend with me? I know you must be busy but can we go fishing together?”

When I said that last bit, I could feel a bit of anger that I had held for all those years towards my Dad. As I sat and retied my salmon rowe bait, I repented of that immature resentment that I had somehow harbored all these years. The emotion of the moment caught me by surprise. Sitting there in the sun, with that beautiful river flowing by, I felt God’s tender presence and the strong desire to be with the Lord. I told him that His presence, enjoying this stream with me was what I longed for. Actually catching a fish was not nearly as important. As I stood up, I asked Him which way we should go. I had been heading downstream, but I sensed the desire to go upstream, wade under the bridge, and follow the river as it turned left and headed east.

I made my way slowly upstream, sometimes on the bank, sometimes in the water. I fished the holes and still water as I went. Earlier, downstream I had caught two steelhead. Normally I would be elated, but I had to release them as I was after 30 lb. king salmon. Upstream I was not even getting steelhead bites. I entered the shade of the bridge and stepped into deeper water. As I did, I was still directly under the bridge when I glanced up ahead of me and saw an odd looking little man on far bank about 40 yards ahead of me. Beside him sat a very large black dog with white eyebrows and a grayish white muzzle. It was staring at me, not with any kind of alert, but with eyes that indicated I was of no threat to him.

The little man had seen me first. He was pacing back and forth on the bank, alternating glances at me and glances into the river below him. I kept slowly approaching him, but I had to walk from the middle of the stream to the opposite bank. The bank he was standing on was about 6 feet higher than the water level. My bank was more like a beach, directly under the bridge.

As I walked up it, he spoke in such a manner that almost sounded like we were in the middle of a conversation. “There are 5 right below me. I can see them. There are another 4 where you are, under the bridge.” He was now kneeling and pulling pieces of a small fly rod out of his backpack. “We’re all alone,” he continued. “There are a bunch of people at the mouth of the river digging clams. Wasting their time. Here is where the real action is.” Now he was plunking his hook in the water, allowing it to go to the bottom and then jerking it up. “I’ll show you they are down there. Then you will believe me,” he said with excitement in his voice.

At that point, several things were running through my mind. This little man was very odd looking. Everyone on the river wore the same uniform. Fishing vest, sunglasses, ball cap, and hip waders were all the standard wardrobe. This little man was wearing a blue wool plaid jacket, blue coveralls, and an odd looking black hat. His hair was long and curly as was his full beard. Even though there was no gray in his hair, the skin on his face was very wrinkled and looked like he had spent many an Alaskan winter out in the elements. His eyes were large and dark. Fishermen wore sunglasses so we could see the fish in the water. He wasn’t wearing any, but he was claiming he could see all these fish below us. I wondered if he wasn’t looking at logs below the water’s surface, or perhaps he had spotted some more steelhead.

He continued to plunk his line into the water and jerk up. “We’re the only ones here,” he said again. “I’ll show you that these fish are here.” Suddenly, the still water below him exploded. A good sized king salmon leapt into the air, hit the water and raced to the opposite shore. He let out a whoop as his little fly rod became a lightning rod and he hung on as it jerked up and down, left and right. The fish’s energy was only increasing as it crisscrossed the little river in an effort to get unhooked. Suddenly the water stopped churning and went silent. The fish had succeeded in losing the hook. “Whoo hoo,” he yelled. “I hooked that one in the ass! Now do you believe me?”

I admit I am not a very good fisherman. But I have learned a couple of things. One thing I learned was when you see something like what I just saw, you rig your hook with the same setup and you get it in the water, fast.

“Bait won’t work,” the little man said. “Do you know how to do the Kenai flip?” The Kenai flip is a legal snagging cast used by the locals for fish that are not responding to lures or bait.

“Yes, I know how” I replied as I sat down to rig my pole with the right hook, leader length, and weight to do the Kenai flip.

“That fish stirred up the others,” my new friend told me. “Some of them are headed towards you beneath the bridge.” As I waded back beneath the bridge, he caught another. “I got this one in the mouth!” he yelled as he played it along the bank. I was now below the bridge flipping my line into the water and jerking it up when the weight hit the bottom. I could see ripples in the water; proof that he was right. His action was moving the fish down river.

But as I walked away from him, down river giving chase, something then occurred to me. The scene seemed surreal, that was plain enough. But my recent prayer suddenly came back to me. “Would you spend time with me? Would you have some fun with me? Would you show me what to do, like a dad would do?” Even though this man is pretty strange, I thought, “Lord if this is you, I am absolutely crazy to be walking away from you.” So I abruptly turned around and started fishing towards the little man who was still wrestling with his big salmon.

Now walking under the bridge towards him, I encountered the deepest water yet. I suddenly noticed that one of my waders was taking on ice cold water. I was in the shade, under the bridge working to about 20 yards from the little man standing in the sunshine when the water exploded around me. My rod bent over and nearly jerked from my hand as beside me, not 10 feet away a huge king salmon lunged to the surface. I had my drag set pretty tight but he easily stripped out line as he took off down river in an effort to get unhooked. I let out a yell and I could hear the little man yell back, encouraging me on.

Suddenly then the line went slack as I could see the big fish change directions and head directly towards me. I reeled as fast as I could to take up the slack, all the while backing up towards the beach under the bridge. But when the fish saw the bank coming up, he abruptly turned and headed across the river again towards a partially submerged log. “Oh no you don’t!” I yelled as I tightened my drag down some more and pulled with all my might. I knew if he got under the log he would be able to catch my line. I pulled again and just got his head turned in time. But there were more logs and he headed for the next one. Again I got his head turned in time and again he race towards me, causing my line to go slack. I reeled in as fast as I could. Things were looking good. I had him headed towards the beach and I knew he had to be tiring.

But I was also aware of the eventual fate of this fish. You see, it had a dorsal fin. It was a native and when I got him to shore, (if I got him to shore), I was going to have to release him. The rules were strict that we could keep only hatchery kings like the one that I had caught on the Kasilof River a few days earlier. This was a much bigger fish. He was mad at me for disturbing his peace. But at this point he was cooperating. I had him heading my direction a second time and I new I just needed to back up and bring him onto the beach.

But there is a funny thing about king salmon. I think that is why they are called kings. He took one look at the beach, turned his head down river and with more energy than even before, he took off. My drag on my reel was cinched down as hard as I could get it but it did no good. This king shot off down river, leaving a wake as he went. My reel was singing loud in protest as he shot past the two logs and over a little rock ledge to a pool below. Suddenly I saw my weight flip up in the air towards me with the leader and hook following behind. Somehow he had pulled off his hook. I watched his wake as he disappeared around the next bend.

I was far from disappointed about how this battle had ended. I knew he was destined to be set free. The fact that he did it himself only added to the thrill. The fish was huge. The battle was thrilling. I yelled out with pure elation only to hear the little man behind me adding to my cheers. “That was sure a lot more exciting than clam digging, wasn’t it!” he boomed out. I couldn’t agree more. I turned around to see him and his big dog on the bank behind me. He had real joy in his eyes as he spoke again. “Have a great Holiday!” Then he turned and stepped into the forest. His dog lingered just a bit longer, looking at me, then also turned, following on the little man’s heals as they both disappeared up a small trail.

It was suddenly quiet. I was standing in the middle of the river. Sun was bathing me in warmth and I was all alone. The water was quiet around me. I strained to catch a glimpse of the old man but he had vanished. I looked around to hopefully see another witness. I wanted to ask someone, “Did you see what just happened? But, there was no one.

If someone would have walked up then, he wouldn’t have understood. Here was a 56 year old fisherman standing in the middle of a river with tears streaming down his cheeks. A dam had burst inside of me and waves of emotion were causing me to let loose with some tears. I was remembering what I had prayed earlier. I was also remembering everything the little man had done and said. His disdain for the people digging clams at the mouth of the river when the real prize was here under the bridge was humorous. But I felt convicted, because I spend way too much time on and put way to much importance in my own version of clam digging. His ability to see the fish, his joy at showing them to me, and then his elation when I caught one were the things that I kept remembering.

Now I wrestle with this next part. Probably a good fisherman would have turned back into the water to see how many more he could hook. But I made my way to the bank, sat in the sun, embraced the solitude and simply enjoyed what had just happened as I inconspicuously wiped tears from my eyes. I also allowed my logic to take over, thinking that if the little man was not a divine being, he certainly was someone who God used. But why does everything that he said have a depth of meaning for me? Why do I remember bits of our conversation days later only to realize that each thing he said speaks deeply to me?

Virgina Tech: An Assault of Reason

Senseless carnage. I guess all carnage is senseless, but the massacre at Virginia Tech today has really made people pause. I walked into a sandwich shop at noon. It is usually teeming with conversation and laughter. Today it was quiet. Everyone’s eyes were glued on the TV. There wasn’t even any conversation back and forth about what people were seeing. There was no, “We should have done this” or “If only we did that.” When you think about what we were seeing, it was a perfect example of something so absurdly wrong that it assaulted our sense of reason. There is no rational way to explain why this might have happened. It is even more ironic when the scene is a college campus; a place where reason supposedly prevails.

One of my first blog posts was about a scene on a college campus where this very thing happened before. I believe it was the first time this type of thing (a school shooting) had ever happened. I was visiting the campus 30 years later when I saw the place of the massacre. I instantly remembered the scenes that I saw as a 15 year old boy on our black and white TV set. It is interesting that a TV picture was indelibly etched into my young mind, only to come back with extreme clarity 30 years later. I believe that happens when you witness or you are a part of something that assaults your sense of reason.
The irony of the University of Texas massacre was the message carved on the face of the building. Read about it here.

Leaving is Leading

Last month I said good-bye to some people that I had been with for many years. My role at the bank had changed so that I was needed in another town. So, after over 25 years at one location, I was changing to one that was about 90 miles away. I had commuted for over a year and it was evident that my move was inevitable. Although the signs were clear to me, it was a shock for many people that I had worked with for a long time.

One by one, I was able to have a private conversation with many of them. There were some very sincere, very touching moments. I had hired most of them. I got to be with them as their boss when several had gone through some very tough personal times. One, a very successful loan officer told me that my hiring her, my believing in her changed her life. Another reminisced about the time a decade ago when I had put my own position on the line to fight to save her position. Several told me that they had a certain security just knowing that I was always there. A gentleman, over drinks even got a little emotional and was able to tell me how he had relied on me.

It all got me questioning the move. There is no question, I was relied upon. I was the one who steadied the ship, no matter how severe the storm. They all knew that I am Christian. I never tried to wear that, but I always tried to live it. Quietly praying with a fellow worker who was facing a crisis was not an unusual event. I never preached at them but it was well known that I was always there for them. My relationship with all of them was not perfect, but it was real.

I could have stayed. I have enough equity with my employer that I could have claimed the right to stay, and made them send someone else to the new territory. But the most powerful part of leadership is the part that gets up and faces the new challenge first. My role here was to go to the new town, develop a new line of business for my bank that did not exist there, and make it pay. There were no guarantees that it would work. There was just the need for it to be done right.

If you are a true leader, you might be facing the same dilemma right now. The challenge put ahead of you has no guarantees. The people around you now love you, respect you, and would all love for you to stay. None would condemn you for turning down the unknown.

One of the words in the New Testament for leader is a military term that literally translates, “The first one out of the foxhole.” It means that you could order anyone else to take the assignment, but you are the leader. You do it. In Iraq, the hardest part of training the Iraqis is the part where the soldiers teach them that the captain leads his company into enemy fire. In Iraq, it was traditional that the captain ordered his troops forward while he stayed in the rear. Our soldiers are teaching them just the opposite. The captain leads. He is seen leading. When he gets reassigned or promoted, or goes down, then the next one leads the same way. He knows precisely how, because he saw his captain do it.

Can you handle the truth?

I named my blog Truthseeker because that is its mission. I love to dig out the truth. In this present age that can be a challenge. I am posting a You-tube video of a recent speech given by a Mr. Evan Sayet at the Heritage Foundation. It is pretty long. However, please view it. I am picking it up off of the Little Green Footballs website, but it is one of those Internet phenomenons that has grown every day. Many remarks that I have seen say, "VIEW THIS VIDEO!!! You will come to a new understanding of something very important." Mr. Sayet is a brilliant communicator. It is easy to see why Bill Maher employed him as a writer. It is also easy to see why he doesn't employ him now. I am sure this is not the last we will hear from this man.

Evan Sayet

John 15:13

When I was a sophomore in college, I changed my major from Architecture to Political Science. Architecture was not me. And I was deeply interested in what was happening on the world scene. Part of the draw to Political Science was that in some ways, the Oregon campus provided a front row seat. Every so often, we would hear that Oregon’s Senator Wayne Morse was on campus. After dropping in virtually unannounced, he would let the word out that he was going to speak in the big PLC lecture hall. I always skipped class to hear him. Senator Wayne Morse, the Tiger of the Senate was the most electrifying speaker I has ever heard. They do not make orators like him any more.

It was a very unique time. The Vietnam War had escalated to 500,000 troops, President Nixon’s plan to get us out by escalating was not working, and campuses like Oregon were becoming very volatile.

It was reason enough to be excited when a U. S. Senator came to speak, but this was not any U. S. Senator. A little bit of history is in order here. President Johnson got us deeply committed to the war by passing through the Congress and Senate the Gulf of Tonkin Resolution. It was the “line in the sand” that Johnson drew to establish our presence there. It passed the Senate 98 – 2. The two “no’s”were Senator Wayne Morse and his sidekick Earnest Gruening of Alaska. Please note that when it came to the Vietnam conflict, 98 Senators were for it before they were against it. Senator Morse was a brilliant constitutional scholar. His reasons against it were not political. They were based on his firm belief that our presence there was unconstitutional. By the early ‘70’s, most everyone was against it too, and they all were now listening to him. After hearing him lecture for 90 minutes, everyone within ear shot was against the war, too.

My term project that year was to make sense out of the validity (or nonvalidity) of the war. So, my skipping class and listening to Senator Morse was “research.” Besides, most of the Political Science Professors were there, too. No Poli Sci prof wanted to be conspicuous by his absence at a Wayne Morse event.

Well, actually, there was one professor who was not there. His name was Joseph Fizman. Old Joe seemed to be barely tolerated by the younger Poli Sci profs. He was kind of a throw-back. He dressed “old world” and had an Eastern European accent that I couldn’t place. I had to take a course from him that quarter, because it was all that I could fit into my schedule. I remember very clearly, one day, when Professor Fizman glared at us through his thick glasses and said “You think that getting marijuana legalized is politics?” Then he shouted, “That is shitty politics! I will tell you politics.”

Then he proceeded to tell us over the next 90 minutes how thirty years before, he hid under the floorboards of an old house in Poland as Nazi’s searched the house above him. He described how he ran for his life, and how some in his family did not make it. It was then that I got the accent and the look. He was Jewish. Then he explained that he is alive today, and living in America because Americans came and fought and died to stop the slaughter of his people. He was not the orator that Senator Morse was, but with an emotional voice, sometimes booming, other times weeping, he helped us understand that to him, politics that matter are life sacrificing, life taking, and most importantly, life giving.

In that one class, my position on the Vietnam War was severely challenged. Senator Morse’s argument against the war was unshakable. It was not legal. But so what? Our world would not be the same unless there were people, countries, and armies that would stand between those who would commit genocide and those they wanted dead. I needed to come to grips with the reality of what Professor Fizman had told us. I tried to rewrite my paper to explain that even though the Vietnam War was illegal, it was, in some very crucial ways, right. I think I got a C. But I learned that politics is not just about what is legal. After all, what is legal is simply what the last judge or jury says it is. It is necessary to take the side of what is right. I ended up feeling that way about Vietnam.

I took some heat from my friends for thinking that way. The common feeling was that protecting the Vietnamese was not worth the lives of our people. I lost some friends in that war and I sometimes agreed with those feelings, but the friends I lost would not have. And there was the feeling that when we left Vietnam, things would settle down soon, anyway. I graduated from school and wasn’t around Professor Fizman when the last of our troops pulled out of Vietnam. My brother-in-law saw first-hand from the deck of his ship, the unreal chaos surrounding the final withdrawal. I often wondered what Professor Fizman told his new classes after up to 5 million Vietnamese and Cambodian people were then slaughtered by the Communists. I am sure he was angry, and I am sure he also wept as he told them. And . . . I am sure he remained unpopular with the other professors.

Why Diplomatic and Political Efforts Would not have Worked

With the Democrats achieving the majority in the Senate and the House, some of their issues that have been beaten down in the past have been rejuvenated. Here is one of my (yawn) favorites.

· Bush did not give diplomacy a chance. We could have increased the sanctions, encouraged the internal opposition, isolated Saddam and waited for him to be overthrown. Jim Wallis in his God’s Politics blog writes,

“Over time, the brutal Saddam Hussein could have been isolated, undermined, and overthrown (a very worthy goal) from pressures internal and external, and serious proposals were on the table to do just that when Bush went to war.”

Serious proposals? By who? The UN? Our European allies? I guess Wallis wants us to forget the history.

When the decision was made to go to war, we were ignorant of the reasons why since 1996 the UN Sanctions were not toppling Saddam’s regime. In case you have forgotten, we attacked and rolled into Bagdad in record time. We stormed the Palaces and captured vast amount of records. What we found should have been headlines around the world for the next year. After all, it was absolute proof of the biggest financial scandal the world had ever seen. The fact that so little was written about it is mind boggling. It involved officials from 30 countries, some being permanent UN Security Council member countries. It involved a high UN official and even Koffi Annan’s own son.

Suddenly it made sense why Saddam was not getting weaker. The Oil for Food program was a complete sham. The UN was winking at us and passing our UN resolutions against Saddam in the General Assembly while some of their officials and a few key members were working a back-door operation that was making them all rich. Saddam didn’t need a healthy internal economy to prosper and he didn’t care that his people were suffering. This off-the-books cash machine was allowing him to spend money freely on what he wanted and he could blame the poverty of his people on the rest of the world.

Documents showed that this was going on through all of Clinton’s second term and half of Bush’s first term. To think that this would have ceased, or we would have eventually stumbled upon the truth is foolish conjecture at best. The very countries that we were counting on to stand with us were on the take. What should have been the largest international multinational scandal in the world continues to be successfully suffocated in an amazing demonstration of unity by the UN, the international community and the international press. They all have too much to lose. Need to refresh your memory? Look here.

Would diplomatic and political efforts have accomplished a Saddam overthrow? In a word - No.

I Like These Blogs

Political blogs come from every direction. It doesn’t take long to figure out the underlying beliefs of the blogger. In my Who’s Politics article, I identified a Christian Blog that comes from a more liberal point of view. In the interest of being fair and balanced, I wanted to say a few words about some other blogs.

Victor Davis Hanson, in my opinion, is one of the finest political blogs going. Hanson is Christian and he highly values the real and rare leadership you would find in a Winston Churchill. When the networks are covering a major development their homogeneity can put into play the dominant spin on how that development is being interpreted. VDH cuts through the spin faster than anyone I know. His understanding doesn’t come from American politicians or European leaders. His perspective isn’t global. It is eternal.

One of the biggest problems our culture is facing regarding the war in Iraq, is that of understanding the reality of what is really happening there. The main-stream press is very wary of official military reports. They overcompensate by accepting and trusting stringers and their stories from the opposition. However, there is an incredibly talented blogger by the name of Michael Yon. After serving in the military, he became a freelance writer. A year ago he became imbedded with a Marine outfit and reported the first really clear picture of daily life and sacrifice in the war. He left Iraq for about a year and now he is back. He calls his blog an online magazine.

Want to see the best political cartoon in existence today? I remember in the 70’s when Dunnesberry was the best. The trouble with Dunnesberry is that he hasn’t grown politically in 30 years. Thus his audience has gotten smaller. Cox and Forcum are as funny as they are accurate. It just takes 15 seconds to get a good laugh and a good understanding of what’s going on. Enjoy it.

Who's Politics?

I have some regular political blogs that I read daily. And, I have some regular Christian blogs that I check. There are some sites that I read that are both. Recently, during a search, I happened upon one I hadn’t seen before. I found it at the Christianity Today Website. The author is Jim Wallis and the name of his blog is God’s Politics. Right away I was taken by the frank declaration in Wallis’s blog’s name.

Now one of the purposes of my blog is to search out where God is in the political climate today. That is not always easy. Thus, my blog, Truth Seeker reflects that effort, but hopefully includes a humility that confesses God’s ability be at work in ways that we don’t always understand. So, with curiosity, I waded into Wallis’s most recent posted article, “A Criminal Escalation of an Unjust War”. I must say that my naive belief that informed Christians generally have a consistent view of the political landscape was really challenged. Wallis doesn’t just question the conservative view, he summarily rejects it.

I have read many political blogs with his point of view. They all have similar trouble points. They hang the proof of their position on their own definition of a “just war”. They all don a set of politically correct blinders and declare that there was no connection between Iraq and 911. They then quote and align themselves with like stances from Capital Hill politicians and European heads of government. Standard fare for liberal blogs. For a Christian blog labeled God’s Politics? As I reread it, I am still shocked and profoundly disappointed. If God lines up with the liberal politicians in Washington and Europe, then his blog is aptly named. If He doesn’t then Mr. Wallis is doing God a disservice. There are several contributors to the blog. Actually, I found the others generally interesting. It is worth a visit, especially if you want to understand diverse points of view within the Christian world.

The Greatest Game I Ever Saw

I hope everybody got to see the Fiesta Bowl last night. Today, it was not uncommon for office workers, sports writers, and any one else to declare that it was the greatest football game ever played. It was one of those rare magical moments that if you were watching it, you knew you were seeing something extraordinary.

The game was pitched as David versus Goliath. Little Boise State University was given an opportunity to play against powerhouse Oklahoma by virtue of its 12 – 0 record. The WAC conference doesn’t usually get to participate in a BCS Bowl Game, but no one could argue against their undefeated record.

As the game wore on, it became evident that the Boise State Broncos were living up to the challenge. They battled the Sooners the whole way. Prior to the game, one of the Bulldogs was asked about how he liked the David and Goliath analogy. “Well, in that story, David wins, right?” he offered.

Boise State shocked the Sooners with two quick touchdowns in the first quarter. But Oklahoma didn’t fold. Bob Stoops, Oklahoma’s coach is tenacious. He is reputed to be one of the highest paid coaches in the land (up to $3 million). The players are big, very athletic, and very deep. Late in the 4th quarter with a little over a minute to go, they finally caught up. Then, on the first play following the kick-off, Boise State’s quarterback threw a sideline pass. The receiver turned the wrong way and the defender turned the right way. He took the ball into the end-zone and Oklahoma suddenly led by a touchdown. At that point everyone, me included, was ready to hand Boise State the “good effort” award. Hey they came close but, after all, they aren’t the Sooners.

Boise State then marched down the field and scored on a perfectly executed hook and ladder play. The trick play stunned Oklahoma, who thought they had the game won. It went into overtime.
In overtime, each team gets a possession. Oklahoma, wanting to end the game gave the ball to its big back who bulled his way into the end-zone on their very first play. On Boise State’s possession, their drive stalled and they faced a 4th down. Out comes another gadget play – a halfback pass executed perfectly for the touchdown. How many times could Boise State pull out a magic play?

At that time, you could sense that this was no ordinary game. Forget the reputations and pedigrees. There was something happening that was almost surreal. Boise State needed to kick the extra point to tie the game again and send it to round two of the overtime. Instead, they came and lined up for a 2-point conversion. They were invited to the Fiesta Bowl because they were undefeated and they came to the game to win it. They would win or lose it on this play.
Oklahoma called time-out. Coach Stoops warned them to watch for another gadget play. Both teams came out on the field and lined up. The ball was snapped and Boise State then ran the perfect Statue of Liberty play. The quarterback pretended to throw the ball to the right side of the field with his right hand but instead, handed it to his running back with his left hand. Everyone in the stadium (minus eleven guys), saw it. The running back was untouched as he raced to his left into the end-zone. Game over. David had beat Goliath with a kids’ play.

The air was electric. People were rubbing their eyes. Did that really happen? The Oklahoma coach was visibly stunned. The announcers who were in place to interview the winners had to race to the other side of the field. One caught up with the winning running back who calmly said that they came to win. Then to everyone’s amazement the running back turned to the Boise State cheerleader standing next to him, got on one knee and proposed to her. “Yes,” she said.
I was alone in the family room. I looked around for someone to ask, “Did you just see that?” No one there, but Charlie. For a moment I thought he was going to reply, but the magic had gone.

See for yourself, here

Be a Truth Seeker

In earlier posts, I have written about the fact that we are at war. My first posts were about Jesus saying, “Know the truth and the truth shall set you free.” That verse is inscribed upon the famous Clock Tower building on the University of Texas campus in Austin. I am sure that there are many people who have attended UT and have thought that this inscription was a challenge to gain knowledge. But Jesus was actually giving an invitation to really know Him. And he was giving a promise that to really pursue and get to know him was to pursue the ultimate truth and to do so was the door to real freedom.

This is what the Pope will see when he visits Turkey.



So this war that we see being carried out with bomb blasts and words of hate and condemnation really is not about border disputes or traditional war prizes but is all about the real truth and who the real truth is. This has become really evident in the protests that are now happening in Turkey.
Fortunately, Muslims believe that prophets, especially Prophets of Islam, do not lie.

They should then ponder the fact that their prophet Jesus said, “I am the way, the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except by me.” They should reconcile the fact that Jesus left no room for any definition of who He is but the Son of God. To say he is merely a prophet of God then makes this statement blasphemous. And for Mohamed to claim that a blasphemous person is a Prophet of Islam makes Mohamed, himself blasphemous.

But wait, before we take the speck out of the Muslims’ eyes, lets look around at ourselves. People in our culture hoist up similar signs all the time. The inscription on the Clocktower in Austin can be read the same way.

Muslims, Christians, good people, sincere people, and those who reject religion altogether will all have the same opportunity one day. Jesus told about that day. He will be approached by people who will plead with him and will say, “Don’t you remember? I even prophesied in your name.” And Jesus will say, “Be gone, for I do not know you.”

Know him. Seek Him out while He may be found. He made that possible by sending the Holy Spirit who “will lead you to all truth”. It is His greatest desire and your greatest reward.

HAPPY FEET is destined to make you sad

Going to see the latest holiday movie at the box office with your family is a fun holiday tradition. This year's chosen movie for your enjoyment is Happy Feet. Have you seen the trailer on TV? Wow! The advertisement says that it will have you "dancing in the isles." What could be more lovable than a warm animated story about happy penguins? But before you pick up the grandchildren and head to the theatre for that wonderful quality-time experience, please read what Michael Medved is saying about the movie. He believes that Hollywood is at it again. He thinks that while they are promising a warm, happy, family friendly experience, they are really delivering a dark, politically correct, anti-religious, film guaranteed to give the kids nightmares. Here is what he says:

"This may be the darkest, most disturbing feature length animated film ever
offered by a major studio. At least 80% of the film’s running time shows its
penguin characters in pain or danger. Scenes of terrifying leopard seals and
killer whales trying to devour the protagonist and his friends are so intense as
to guarantee nightmares; the PG rating is a joke since the film is wildly
inappropriate for young viewers under seven (and their parents). Rather than
sending you out of the theatre with a song in your heart (there’s a big focus in
the script on “heart songs”) the movie produces feelings of fright, discomfort,
even guilt. The title “Happy Feet,” suggesting a feel-good frolic, could hardly
be more deceptive for a deeply ill-considered project that will make most
audience members feel gloomier and more depressed than they did when they
entered the theatre."

Read the rest of his review here

Now, is it a crime to put out a dark animated movie just in time for the holidays? Of course not. But when the promotion takes advantage of what we all want to see at Christmas time and then brings us into a theatre under that premise, only to deliver more Hollywood agenda propaganda, we need to rise up and take notice. Hollywood does not play fair anymore. They are all too willing to take advantage of our trust. They don't deserve our trust anymore.

The Problems of Being in Charge

Yesterday, the Democrats in Congress chose their leaders. Nancy Pelosi graciously accepted the Speaker of the House position. Then she saw Jack Murtha, her hand-picked person for the House Majority Leader position go down in flames to Steny Hoyer, 149-86. That was a much better result in my opinion because Hoyer is apparently a very good Israel ally. Murtha is not.
I think there are a couple of things to note about this defeat for Pelosi. Apparently, it is traditional that the Speaker of the House stands clear of the politics of choosing the Majority Leader. However, Pelosi not only did not stand clear, but she campaigned for and endorsed Murtha. The lop-sided vote count for Hoyer gives us a hint that Pelosi does not rule the roost like she thought she did.
Pelosi has been given credit for finding and running conservative Democratic candidates that could win against Republicans. Well done, however now she has to live with the problem that she created. Part of the problem that the Republicans had for the last 6 years was that even though they had a majority in both houses, they could not get their legislative agenda passed because some of their Congressmen had a habit of drifting across the line to vote.
Could the Democrats have the same problems now? The Murtha / Hoyer vote sure makes it look that way. This really means that those who hang out in the middle, the RINO Republicans and the Blue Dog Democrats, should they reach consensus on issues, could really become a force on Capitol Hill. It is ironic that Pelosi, who demanded and got loyalty when her party was in the minority, now may not have enough power to do the same now that they are in the majority. Her strategy of electing conservative Democrats may have gotten her the Speaker position she coveted. But it also may have lost her the unanimous voice that the Democrats seemed to have had in the past.