Opus 2022-187: New Laws: Truth in Plagiarism

We need a new law.  We need it to be required that when someone uses Babylon Bee material that it be clearly labeled.  After spending time looking at the news and raising my eyebrows at some of the click-bait, I go to The Bee and find the same “articles”.  

I enjoy the Babylon Bee.  They are closer to the truth than the so called “real” media.  At the same time it is good to know that their satire is written with the spirit of poking fun at the world.  It is getting to the point where you can’t believe anything you read except the Bee and they are not claiming to be true, just accurate.

I may need to change my morning routine and read the Babylon Bee first and then the news sites.  It will save me some time.  I might even learn more.

homo unius libri

Opus 2022-186: More Than Baby Formula

We are watching the Proregressives* destroy our country.  I was going to say “slowly” but that does not seem to apply.  They are working quickly.  The destruction is in any area they can reach and push their agenda.  We recently saw the Republicans in the Senate jump on board to deny us the rights “guaranteed” by the second amendment, but that is not my theme in this post.  I have recently discovered that supply chain issues are real.

We are all aware of bare spots on the shelves at grocery stores.  So far I have been able to get want I want either by coming back the next day or making a substitution, but we are seeing the selection and surplus become a thing of the past.

It is not just groceries.  Recently I ordered some Pro Club T-shirts from a store in Las Vegas that I have used before.  My son had a yearly computer conference and I would tag along.  It gave me a chance to stop by and stock up on what I wanted or needed.  I have never ordered on line but decided I would not be back in person so I took the plunge.  My order ended up being cancelled.  They called me and said they were not able to get the merchandise I wanted and did not know when new stock would come in.  

For me it was an inconvenience.  I am not close to going naked or freezing to death.  If things get desperate I can start wearing the shirts my local physical therapy clinic gives out.  There are all kinds of cheap substitutes.  I will live.

For the retailer it is a problem.  The people I ordered from have a small store in a strip mall.  They have a good customer base but every time they fail to meet a request they risk losing a customer.  Every time you cancel an order it effects your bottom line.  Frustrated customers do not pay the rent.  I hope they can find a way to survive.

For the manufacturer it is a disaster.  They build a brand and a loyalty over time.  When customers find alternatives they may not be back.  It is hard to recover.  It is similar to the way in which I switched the soft drink choices I make because the big names had gone woke.  I found out that the local store brand was just as good so even if they have an epiphany of values I will not be going back.

It isn’t just a jostling for control and power of the elites.  Lives are being destroyed because the means of supporting your family are being sacrificed on the altar of socialism.  There is little I can do about a store front in Las Vegas.  What I can do is try to support the local businesses that are trying to stay alive.  

November is coming.  Elections are important.  Paraphrasing something a guy named Hugh Hewitt once said, “If we win big enough, they can’t cheat.”  Actually they can but if enough of us show up and get angry enough they won’t be able to cheat enough to steal another election.

And don’t waste my time telling me that they honestly won the last one.  You are better than that, I hope.

homo unius libri

Opus 2022-185: Headlines: Deferred

Will we ever be told the real cause of death?  I had never heard of Tyler Sanders by name.  I recognized one of the photos from his credits but the name itself meant nothing to me.  What got my attention was that he was 18 and no one was talking about why he died.  As I now write it is five days later and there is still nothing except some nonsense “fact checkers” braying out the party line.  What party line?  

I have a question.  Was it covid or vaccine related?  The issue was not even brought up in the articles I read.  I have a feeling we will never see any follow up.  After a quick search I see that the autopsy has been completed but nothing is being released.  Hmm.  So I would say that the party line is “don’t pay any attention to the man behind the curtain.”  

Buried deep in the article is the mention of another death with the same circumstance.  He also has no cause of death released even though he died a week before our actor.  In both cases it says the cause of death is being investigated.  I imagine it will be investigated until no one is paying attention.

Tyler Sanders and his family deserve their privacy.  I can support that.  The public needs to know the truth about all of these people dying of a condition that we have never heard of before, Sudden Adult Death Syndrome.  My guess is you will never get the truth from the media or the government so read and think on your own.  Make your own decisions based on facts that you can rely on.

And let me do the same.

homo unius libri

Opus 2022-184: The Science of Hate Speech

While we are worried about hate crimes and all the bigotry out there we might want to consider something published by a site called PhysicsWorld.  I came across this as I got side-tracked on the question of how many believed the earth was flat.

“Alarming polling data by the firm Datafolha, for example, indicate that 7% of the Brazilian population – some 11 million people – believe that the Earth is flat. This shocking number has been attributed to a resurgent evangelical Christian church, but there are also signs that religious fundamentalism is spreading these ideas in Islamic countries too.”

I am not into hate speech accusations so understand this is a bit tongue in cheek, but this sounds like a classic case of haters writing hate.  This is religious bigotry.  Since they threw in Muslims I can write that.  I have been a part of that “religious fundamentalism” demographic all my life.  I attended what was a Christian college at the time.  I have done a bit of traveling, reading and listening.  I don’t think I have ever met an evangelical Christian who believed the world was flat.

Can these so called scientists really be this brainwashed?  I guess so.  

homo unius libri

Opus 2022-183: Johnny Can’t Fly Fish Either

Have you ever wondered why Johnny can’t read?  There are two extremes in ability to read.  At one end you have children that almost teach themselves and then they soar.  We have friends who claim their three year old granddaughter can read.  Our four year old is learning to recognize numbers.  At the other end are some who cannot learn to read for some physical or mental reason.  In between you have the ones who could and do, along with the ones who could but don’t.

Johnny can’t read for the same reason I can’t tie a fly fishing lure.  He has no reason to do so.  An example of this is the summer reading program at our city library.  There was a big send off with free snow cones, bounce houses, and lots of crafts both inside and out.  You were encouraged to sign up for the summer fun.  This program will not help Johnny much because you can get every prize and award without ever getting in touching distance of a book.

The opening lines sound good.

SUMMER READING 2022

Each time you complete an activity from the list below, color in an item. (Repeats are okay!) After completing five activities, come to the library for your first prize.  After completing 10 activities, pick up a second prize! Prize pickup starts June 21.  When you've completed the gameboard (24 activities) you will receive an entry for our grand prize drawing.

Then you come to what they call the Activity Bank

Read 30 minutes | Attend a library program | Visit a park | Download an eBook or eAudiobook | Read a new genre | Read by the water | Visit a RIO stop| Sing a sea shanty | Try a new cuisine | Make a craft or art project | Watch a movie based on a book | Relax with a "beach" read | Read a book on a reading list

I counted thirteen activities.  At best five of them have anything to do with reading.  I don’t think going out for sushi is exactly something that benefits literacy.

On the way out I saw some signs advertising some kind of program offering free meals.  If they use the same criteria for that then it will involves listening to songs about food, visiting city hall, drawing pictures of food and playing in a new park.  Hungry?  Too bad, that isn’t on the program.

The only way to improve reading is to read.  Someone needs to tell our library that.

homo unius libri

Opus 2022-182: Headlines: Utopia Rides Again

There is a reason why I don’t have certain sites bookmarked.  I sometimes end up there because of click bait.  This time the temptation was on Instapundit with a headline that read,

“Why stocks, crypto, and home values are all plunging at once.”

It took me to Hot Air and I began to read.  I did not need to respond to the offer to read more by the author because it was obvious that she lived in a universe alien to me.  This is how she finished the article,

“An extended period of low interest rates has translated into surging asset values. That has made the small share of Americans capable of investing in homes, farmland, stocks, bonds, commodities, art, patents, water rights, start-ups, private equity, hedge funds, and other assets breathtakingly rich, fostering astonishing levels of wealth inequality. Given low labor-force participation and sluggish wage growth,...”

She talks about “the small share” and seems to think that such things as home ownership have been out of the reach of workers in America.  Maybe in the Manhattan ghetto she lives in.  Real estate prices in that enclave are absurd.  Out in the rest of America it is not that way, or it wasn’t until recently.  My understanding is that home ownership is higher than ever.  I heard about someone living in Minnesota who figured they could only get around $175,000 for their home.  Granted you won’t find that price in trendy locations but they do exist.  That is well in the reach of anyone willing to make the commitment.

So I would ask that such writers save their dreams of socialist utopia for their fantasy novels.  Get out and rub elbows with the working class a little.  Maybe they will invite you to their home for a cook out.  Maybe not.

homo unius libri

Opus 2022-181: Headlines: Doom and Gloom

You may have forgotten The Population Bomb, a book from 1968 by Paul Ehrlich.  He predicted that the world would be starving to death by 1980 and at war over food resources.  I don’t know if you have noticed, it didn’t happen.  Or maybe the Fake News just failed to report it.  What is even more astounding is that he is still a respected scholar at Stanford.  Evidently the UN is still on board with that theory.

Current scholarship is drawing a different picture:  Population collapse.  The story has been around for a few months but was recently covered in the Epoch Times.

One of the trends that has long been noted is that as income increases the number of children decreases.  This is true in every culture around the world.  The replacement rate to keep a steady population is 2.1 children per female.  All advanced countries are below that now and even the poor countries are getting closer.  Evidently the UN hasn’t got the word yet,

“The United Nations has predicted that humanity will continue its rapid expansion into the next century, growing to more than 11 billion by 2100 from just under 8 billion today.”

but it is obvious to the rest of the world.  

What I found amusing was that the article expresses the idea that once population starts to decline we are doomed to extinction.  

“Once a country’s fertility rate falls below 2.1, it never comes back.”

It is as if people would never decide to start having children again.  Maybe they would if they were forced back to the farms to feed themselves.  The show gets better.

One scholar, Charles I. Jones, gets really dramatic.

“Economic growth stagnates as the stock of knowledge and living standards settle down to constant values,” Jones writes. “Meanwhile, the population itself falls at a constant rate, gradually emptying the planet of people.”

Before you take him too seriously notice that he teaches at the same university as Ehrlich who says we are doomed because of overpopulation.

If they were not so tedious I would suggest that scholars put together an act and try out for Dry Bar Comedy.

So which is it?  Are we going to starve to death from too many people or are we going to die in nursing homes because there is no one to take care of us?  I think the main thing they want us to do is buy all of their books so they can retire while there are still illegal aliens to hire as nannies.

homo unius libri

Opus 2022-180: Ode to Old: Playing Airplane Again

One of the standard joke lines about the elderly is that they take a lot of naps.  It is not really a joke; it is an observation.  Of course if I go back to my working days I started wanting to fall asleep on my drive home from work years before I reached retirement age.

I know that I am tired a lot more than I used to be.  I think other old people are the same.  I am sure there are many reasons but one occurred to me today when I was spilling popcorn.  I did it twice in a few minutes.  I am quite capable of making popcorn without spilling it but you would not have known that today.  I am also capable of mowing the lawn without running into low branches, but I already visited that scenario.  

I spilled the popcorn because I was not paying attention.  As we get older some of the automatic things that we did in the foolishness of youth and the assumptions of middle age no longer happen so well on auto-pilot.  As a result we are forced to put more energy into paying attention.  That drains the reserve we have for staying awake in the afternoon.  I have watched people a decade older than me feed themselves and it is almost like watching a wrestling match.  If you have ever done that you may have found yourself straining and struggling with the combatants.  There comes an age when the toddler feeding game of “airplane” becomes a reality again.  It takes a lot of concentration to make a safe landing when the spoon is full of soup.

I guess I need a nap.

homo unius libri

Opus 2022-179: Headlines: SADS

One of the claims that we are hearing more and more is that there are a rising number of deaths of healthy people since the introduction of the Covid vaccines.  It is hard to verify this and easy to ignore because of the kind of reporting under this article about Sudden Adult Death Syndrome in the Daily Wire.

I am frustrated at the lack of investigative reporting being done by the writer.  Take this statement,

“Dr. Elizabeth Paratz, from Melbourne’s Baker Heart and Diabetes Institute, said the Victorian registry shows ‘there are approximately 750 cases per year of people aged under 50 in Victoria suddenly having their heart stop.’”

There is no information supplied which we can compare.  Am I just supposed to believe.  I would assume that this Victorian registry has more information that is readily available.  The doctor quoted tries to dodge the obvious questions about correlation with the vaccine.

“Paratz noted that ‘the numbers had remained tragically consistent over the years,’ according to 7News.com.au.”

That is all very well and good but a little bit of research could have verified what that means in real numbers.  Since we have been lied to by government, medical and pharmaceutical voices so many times I would think that looking deeper might be in order.  

Alas, it is not to happen.  Nowhere in the article is the vaccination status of these dead even questioned.  I think that is grounds for journalistic malpractice if there is such a thing.  If there isn’t there needs to be.  If this is just business as usual then why does it rate a headline?

homo unius libri

Opus 2022-178: What Is That in New Speak?

We keep allowing the left to define the conversation.  They take words and change the meaning.  It is a reflection of the concept of “New Speak”.  Part of this is to confuse any opposition.  Part is simply to lie while appearing to tell the truth.  A good example would be the choice of  “pro-choice” for people who believe it is acceptable to kill your baby before it is born.  It is New Speak because they are against choice in anything that goes against their agenda.

What caught my attention was a paragraph in Live Not by Lies, by Rod Dreher.  He was comparing attitudes and thinking in early 20th century Europe with today’s America.  In the process he wrote the following,

“Arendt’s judgment of the postwar elites who recklessly thumbed their noses at respectability could easily apply to those of our own day who shove aside liberal principles like fair play, race neutrality, free speech, and free association as obstacles to equality.” p. 33

He is referring to Hannah Arendt and a book she wrote in 1951 called The Origins of Totalitarianism.  What struck me was the definition of “liberal principles” that he is assuming.  I don’t know about you but these are values I associate with conservative thinking today.  The modern liberal is out to destroy all of these values.

I have heard before that the classic liberal of the past has a lot in common with the conservatives of today.  This would back up that declaration.  I wonder if we could begin to reclaim some of the words that have been stolen from us by the creeping scourge of the Proregressives*.  Every day it gets harder.  Now you can get in trouble for saying “he” or “him”.  Keep in mind that they are just beginning.

*(Liberals, educators, the media, socialists, communists, crony capitalists, elites, Rinos, Democrats, leftists, Never Trumpers, Antifa, BLM, MSM, Deep State, etc.  Synonym for swamp dwellers)

Dreher, Rod.  Live Not by Lies.  New York:  Sentinel, 2020.

homo unius libri

Opus 2022-177: Let’s Start a Rumor

I finally finished The Brothers Karamazov and found myself wondering if Dostoevsky was really a woman.  I see that happening a lot in current science fiction.  If you see an author with initials instead of a first and middle name then there is a good chance it is a female author.  But my question is based more on style than the handle.

While it is not politically correct to bring it up, women tend to be more in contact with their emotions than men.  When they write they tend to focus more on emotions and relationships.  Men will get into action and physical conflict.  Obviously there is overlap and there are exceptions.  I realized that one of the reasons I had such a hard time finishing The Brothers Karamazov was because of all the long, tedious scenes that focused on emotions and relationships.  If it had not been a classic I felt duty bound to read, I would not have finished it.  I fell into scan mode.  The reader is faced with page after page of sharing inner thoughts about love and hate and visions and temper tantrums and all kinds of things that would be at home in a mental hospital.  I found that by skimming through I missed nothing I needed to know.

About the time of this thought I came across a short clip by Andrew Klavan about women swordfighters.  In discussing a movie with a woman as protagonist he commented that women heroes were no problem as long as they were women.  He said the main character was excellent.  The conflict she was having as part of the story was well done and entertaining but then she was dropped into a spot where she had to pick up a sword.  She defeated two trained soldiers, presumably with no training herself.  At that point the movie lost him because she became a man.  The catalyst for this was a discussion of the fact that a woman could never defeat a man in a sword fight.  I will let you listen to him and see if you agree but the point was woman and men are stronger in different ways.

If I really wanted to write a doctoral dissertation on my speculation I would be forced to read all of Dostoevsky’s works to test my hypothesis.  I am getting too old to make it through such a task and I find I am not serious enough to be interested.  I will leave that to you.

homo unius libri

Opus 2022-176: Call Me Cynic

I am constantly reminded that my attitude of questioning everything is the right place to be.  Call it skepticism, cynicism, realism, or whatever ism you want, we need to make sure that our brains are always turned on and we are constantly on the lookout for deception.

This tangent is generated by a podcast I am listing to on the Alice Childers You Tube channel.  She is talking to J. R. Miller and they are discussing a recent book by William Lane Craig, In Quest of the Historical Adam.  I have heard Craig referring to his research on this for years and I guess the book is finally out.

I have listened to Craig for a long time, not religiously but enough to have a feel for him.  I used to listen to his podcasts when I walked.  I have found him informative and orthodox.  I have never heard him say anything that I thought was heretical or pushing the envelope.  

I have not listened to Childers long enough to have a firm knowledge of where she is on different issues.  J. R. Miller is totally unknown to me.  So when they tell me that Craig does not accept the doctrine of Original Sin I begin to wonder.  They also say that in his new book he seems to accept the “consensus” of science about evolution.  If they are right I am grateful for the heads up.  At the same time I need to keep my baloney meter on and keep listening.  I know enough about both topics to have a feel for the truth Biblically and scientifically.

I will continue to listen to the podcast and keep my mind in gear.  I hope you are finding a lot to stimulate your thinking and encourage your faith.

homo unius libri

Opus 2022-175: Monday Pulpit: A Request Fulfilled

I was asked by a friend to listen to a sermon preached at his church.  The preacher had reportedly told someone in the church that we did not believe in the infallibility of the Bible.  That came as news to me and my friend.  Normally I would never bother listening to someone who preached from a book he thought was inaccurate but this was the request of a friend.

I will only share a couple of things about the sermon.  It was Pentecost Sunday and the sermon had to do with Pentecost in theory.  That is the day we remember the coming of the Holy Spirit on the disciples gathered in the upper room.  You can find it in Acts 2.  

What first got my attention was that the preacher repeated referred to the Holy Spirit as “it”.  I don’t believe I have heard that before from anyone who knows what they are talking about.  The Holy Spirit is the third person of the trinity and in the Bible is referred to as “He.”  Pagans and heretics would say “it” because to them the Holy Spirit is an impersonal force if it exists at all.  I decided to try and check that out to see if it was just me.  I did some searches of the word Spirit in the New Testament in both the KJV and the NASB.  I never found the Holy Spirit referred to as “it” in the NASB.  I did find one place in the KJV but it usually said “he”.

The choice of a pronoun is a theological issue not a matter of translation.  It speaks of the presuppositions of the translator, not the text.  In the Greek the pronoun is included in the verb and although it has person it does not have gender.  Another difference from English is that nouns have a gender and everything referring to it shared the gender.  I remember in German that you have a pencil and a pen.  One is feminine and the other is masculine.  For the life of me I can’t remember to this day which is which.  Christian theology teaches that the Trinity is one God in three persons.  Thus the third person cannot be an it.

This is important because it strikes at the core of our faith and our doctrine of God.  I don’t think it was an accident.  This was reinforce at the end of the service when he prayed “O heavenly God” rather than “O heavenly Father”.

Pentecost Sunday was also being recognized as a day to take a stand against gun violence.  Everyone on the church’s e-mail list got a notice to wear orange and if they did not have anything orange then ribbons would be available.  This is what we call left wing political theater.  In the service we were told it was not anti gun but anti gun violence.  Sure.  If it was about violence why were they not dealing with the causes of more deaths than guns, such as fists, knives, drugs, drunk drivers and so many others.  Sorry.  It was about guns.  

Someone once said, “The Devil is in the details.”  I did a take off on that and said “The adversary is in the adjectives.”  Think of the way in which the adjective changes the meaning.  We have the term “social justice” being thrown around.  It has nothing to do with the concept of justice.  Justice is about equal treatment before the law.  Social justice is about special privileges for favored groups.  The same is with gun violence.

And the pastor shared how he had gone down and participated in the accompanying parade.  He praised all those people he marched with as noble and caring.  The problem, in addition to being one of those useful idiots that were praised by the Soviets, is that the pastor’s do not have a history of marching in other issues.  Every January we have Right to Life Sunday in protest of abortion.  They did not join any parades or wear ribbons on that day.  I am guessing that he would not have referred to pro-life people as noble and caring.  The usual adjectives are bigoted and harsh.  I went back and checked the video to see if they wore ribbons during the service.  

I could go on but I think this gives you a feel for why the church in America is dying.  It has become a tool of anti-Christian forces.  It has been infiltrated and seduced.  It has lost its first love.  Every day I pray for my country.  I also pray for the church because if the church does not have a revival there will be nothing to keep America from going on the list right under Sodom.  Actually we might have earned top slot by now.

homo unius libri

Opus 2022-174: JIT

Supermarkets are finding that it no longer works to keep no inventory on hand.  What is that called?  Just in Time delivery (JIT).  The supply chain had become so efficient that stores did not need to keep warehouses full of merchandise that would eventually sell.  All they had to do was put in their order for the next day and it would arrive before the shoppers.  That is not working anymore, thus we have shortages.  

Consumers are also going to need to stop living that way.  You need to have enough of what you use on hand so that you will be able to get over the empty shelf moment.  What you want will probably show up sometime.  You need to buy it when you can, not when you need it.  You might keep your feelers out and buy what you know a friend needs.

I recently ran out of ground cinnamon.  I know my wife has it stocked up somewhere but I could not find it.  Rather than ask and be told it was where it always is, I figured I would stop by the dollar store and pick some up on my next shopping trip.  The spice shelf was not empty but it seemed that there was a poor balance of choices.  There was row after row of dill but I could not find any cinnamon.  I was out of luck.  I found it an another dollar store a few days later and if I had wanted to pay a premium I could have found it that day, but you get the point.

One of the strategies we will use is the same one that people used before modern transportation, canning and refrigeration.  We will plan our menu based on what is available instead of what we want.  Fresh corn is only priced for common people a few weeks a year.  Plums are a summer fruit.  I am sure there are many more cycles I am not aware of.  It is why my mother went to the grocery store almost every day.  She wanted to check out what was on the mark down shelves.

A lack of cinnamon is not the end of the world but notice what has been happening with baby formula.

Don’t get down to the point of running out.  Learn to plan ahead.

homo unius libri

Opus 2022-173: More Than Not Saying You Are Sorry

I was working through I Corinthians 13 and it occurred to me that if I really had agape I would not need to keep working on these as discipline; they would be automatic.  As I moved to I Peter 3:8 where it talked about not returning evil for evil or insult for insult I asked myself, “If these are automatic then why are there so many lists of things for us to work on?”

One of the controversies in Christian circles is found in the tension between obedience and grace.  Both are referred to regularly.  It is obvious that both are expected.  The Calvinist and Reformed camps focus on grace.  The Wesleyan and Catholic traditions make it clear that obedience is also vital.  Take it as a paradox or a mystery if you can’t work out the balance.

On the question of love it reinforces an observation I have made and I have heard others make that the agape love of the New Testament is not an emotion but a decision.  Thus when Paul tells us that love is patient, kind and not jealous, those are decisions that are to be made by us on a daily basis.  This applies to both our children and our enemies.  When it comes to love, it is not pivotal how you feel but the decisions you make.

I personally would rather it was a magic pill that God would give us.  Grace and regeneration can make it easier but they will not take the choices of free will out of our hands.

homo unius libri

Opus 2022-172: Headlines: What’s for Dinner?

One of the headlines a few days ago was about a Norwegian feminist who has been threatened with jail for saying men can’t be lesbians.   We have also been hearing about some liberal who retweeted a joke that was off-color, but even worse was not politically correct and approved by the commissars.  He has been put on leave for a month without pay if my memory serves me correctly.  Then another liberal who made a fuss because he was not punished enough was fired.  What we are seeing is the left eating its own.

This is just the beginning.  If you have read anything about the Russian Revolution and the take over of the Bolsheviks then you have read about how they had waves of executions.  They killed a lot of peasants and people who were standing on the wrong corner when they needed to arrest someone but they also made it a habit of executing last week’s heros.  It is what they do.  As the disciples of Stalin strengthen their grip on American culture you can expect to see more of it.

Before you get to excited remember that the Norwegian is just an hors d’oeuvre.  The hack journalists are just side dishes. We are the main course.  Keep in mind that they will be coming for us.  They don’t really care if anyone is guilty of anything or not.  They don’t have a quota in mind.  The purpose of it will be political terrorism.  They want to cripple us with fear.  They want to condition us to be always looking over our shoulder or going for a walk in the park if we want to talk politics.  

If you are a Christian then start reminding yourself that you are on God’s side.  Usually He will shelter us from the worst but when He allows us to suffer He will also be there to hold us up.  If you are not a believer then look deep down inside and find a foundation you can stand on when the going gets tough.  It may be something like a belief in the rule of law or the Constitution.  It could be family.  It needs to be something worth suffering for and even dying for.

Stand tall and speak up.  Vote and pray.  If all you can do is think good thoughts, then think good thoughts.

homo unius libri

Opus 2022-171: Playing Hard to Get

As I stated recently I have begun to read The Gulag Archipelago by Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn.  I had to do a bit of sleuthing to be able to do so.  I figured since it is a very famous work, it would be available at every library.  I began to get frustrated when I could not find it anywhere.  There is a tool that will search all of the 27 libraries in the area even if you do not have a card.  It came up empty.  I had given up and was starting to work up to a purchase when I tried one more thing.  

Instead of typing the author’s full name or the complete title I just typed in “Gulag”.  Almost instantly is showed up, all three volumes.  Amazing.  Being a trouble maker I copied the name as it appeared on the page of the library website and pasted it in the search box:  Nada.  I went to the library, pulled volume one off the shelf and went to the help desk.  “According to your computer you do not have this book.”  The librarian did all that I had done and had the same results.  She had some excuse.  I will check in a few weeks and see if the database has been repaired.  What is more likely is that they will discard the books.

This is just one of the types of things that “coincidently” seem to happen in our modern culture.  I remember going to Barnes and Noble looking for a best selling book by a conservative author.  I could not find it so I asked.  The clerk checked the computer and told me that none of the stores in the area had a copy but they had them in their central warehouse and I could get it an about a week.  Don’t you love liberals?

As I began reading The Gulag Archipelago I quickly started seeing why they would want to make this book hard to find.  Check out this from a footnote on page 13,

“And how we burned in the camps later, thinking:  What would things have been like if every Security operative, when he went out at night to make an arrest, had been uncertain whether he would return alive and had to say good-bye to his family?  Or if, during periods of mass arrests, as for example in Leningrad, when they arrested a quarter of the entire city, people had not simply sat there in their lairs, paling with terror at every bang of the down stairs door and at every step on the staircase, but had understood they had nothing left to lose and had boldly set up in the downstairs hall an ambush of half a dozen people with axes, hammers, pokers, or whatever else was at hand?...  Or what about the Black Maria siting out there on the street with one lonely chauffeur - what if it had been driven off or its tires spiked?  The Organs would very quickly have suffered a shortage of officers and transport and notwithstanding all of Stalin’s thirst, the cursed machine would have ground to a halt!”

This is not the kind of talk that Big Brother would want to get around.  No wonder the book is hard to find.

Solzhenitsyn, Aleksandr I.  Translated by Thomas P. Whitney.  The Gulag Archipelago.  New York:  Harper & Row, Publishers, 1973.

homo unius libri

Opus 2022-170: Who Is Next?

I have begun reading The Gulag Archipelago by Solzhenitsyn.  I keep reading quotes without any kind of page reference so I am curious what I will find.  The first 100 pages are enough that if this book were required reading in high school we would be running out of socialists quickly.  The scariest part is that I can see the Proregressives* running our administrative state are heading down this same path.  The arrest and incarceration of the January 6 citizens is a good example of what Stalin’s era would look like from the outside.  Like then we now don’t know what is going on behind the doors.

Between reading the first chapters and being in the process of reading The Brothers Karamazov I have gotten the feeling that even in the worst of times there were peasants and working people who were able to plan and work hard to achieve financial success.  The difference is that the Soviets had a religious belief, communism, that demanded that anyone being successful be destroyed.  That seems to be the goal of the Biden handlers.  At this point they are using regulation and executive orders to destroy our economy and the freedom of action that comes with it.  The big question is whether they will ever be able to move to the deluge of midnight arrests by armed thugs.  

Will Americans put up with massive arrests on trumped up charges?  I think that much of it depends on whether the elites get in a hurry or are willing to lull the population to sleep.  We see the way in which they like to arrest unarmed elderly men.  They took Roger Stone in the early hours from his home and Peter Navarro in an airport.  What would have happened in the airport if an angry crowd had surrounded the “law” and scared them spitless?  It may come to that for us.

This is also why they want to Balkanize us.  They want us divided because as long as we are “one nation under God” they will be doomed to defeat.  It brings to mind a quote attributed to Benjamin Franklin, “We must hang together or we will hang separately.”

Hang together people.  Remember that history is written by the victors and we want to be those authors.

*(Liberals, educators, the media, socialists, communists, crony capitalists, elites, Rinos, Democrats, leftists, Never Trumpers, Antifa, BLM, MSM, Deep State, etc.  Synonym for swamp dwellers)

homo unius libri

Opus 2022-169: Revisions

What if today were the fullness of time and Jesus had just been born of a virgin?  For now I don’t want to look at how He would use technology.  I want to ask myself, “How would He revise the parables to reach modern city dwellers.  Take for instance the parable that goes by different names, the seeds, soils or sower if you prefer.  How would it be reworded today if Jesus had waited to come until now.  Most of us are not familiar with farm life.  I had kids in my classes that had no idea where eggs came from.  I think He would have gotten the same points across using different word pictures.

Instead of seeds and soils producing a return He might have used different investments.  At one end the money would go to buy a bridge.  At the other end in might be time with your family.  

Perhaps we would have the parable of the Tuitions paid, Colleges attended or Major selected.  The payoff would vary from flipping burgers to living in luxury.

Perhaps He could have focused on how your favorite recipe seems to come out different every time.  Quality of ingredients, attention to detail and even clean pans could be the variables with payoff from food poisoning to robust health.

Of course it is just idle speculation.  I have a feeling that God would not ask me for my suggestions.

homo unius libri

Opus 2022-168: Emerging Again

I have been finding new voices in the spiritual war that is trying to overwhelm us.  They are not something that emerged yesterday, just new to me.  If you are looking for truth and inspiration then just start looking.

Two terms have been floated around by these apologists.  The first is Progressive Christianity.  They make it clear that these people are not Christians.  They are typical liberals in the sense that they keep changing their name to protect the guilty.  This is the movement that came out as the Emergent Church.  Their leaders must have realized that a growing number of people were catching on so they came up with Progressive Christianity.  It seems like their mission in life is to infiltrate the genuine church and destroy the spiritual lives of believers.

This brings us to the second word that is being thrown around:  Deconstruction.  The way it is used is to help insecure believers deconstruct the beliefs that they had and move away from a faith in the Biblical Jesus.  I find this word so appropriate.  

I have written before about deconstructionism.  It is a real term in the world of philosophy.  It has a core principle that all things are relative.  Thus a word may mean something to you but mean something totally different to another person.  This is not just the normal problem we all have in being accurate and communicating what we think.  This is a foundational principle that the words actually don’t have a standard definition.  Now take that to the rest of your life.  There is no absolute truth.  Facts are not as important as feelings.  Reality is subject to your imagination.  The roots of this are anti-God.

This is a great philosophy for these people.  It allows them to say things to you using your own vocabulary, build up a trust because you feel they are on the same page with you and then manipulate you into spiritual disaster.  They are perfectly okay with lying by simply meaning different things than you do.  The lying comes from the fact that they know what you mean and know they are deceiving.

Be alert.  The liars are not just in the media and politics.  The sad truth is that they are also common in the church.  The only real defense is to know your Bible well enough to recognize distortions when they are laid on you.

homo unius libri

Opus 2022-167: Start Simple

I start each day with worship.  That worship has various aspects:  Prayer, contemplation, Bible reading, guitar playing and whatever else moves me toward hearing the voice of God in His many manifestations.  Almost invariably God gives me a promise for the day, and that promise is good for the year and eternity.

Psalm 121 starts of with some verses that are very familiar,

(Psa 121:1-2 KJV)  A Song of degrees. I will lift up mine eyes unto the hills, from whence cometh my help.  My help cometh from the LORD, which made heaven and earth.

Modern translations change the punctuation.  The source of help is changed to a question of where it comes from and verse 2 is the answer.

But what stood out to me recently was verse 3-4,

(Psa 121:3-4 KJV)  He will not suffer thy foot to be moved: he that keepeth thee will not slumber.  Behold, he that keepeth Israel shall neither slumber nor sleep.

This is a reminder that God gives us a foundation that is not slippery.  I miss this to a degree.  I have big feet and for most of my life proper athletic shoes have been something I watch on other people’s feet.  I don’t  know what it is to bowl in proper shoes.  I always did it in my sox.  When I have played golf I have no concept of how spikes would give me more stability when I swing.  Have you ever tried to take off for first base in smooth bottomed sneakers?

It is also reassuring to know that God does not fall asleep on the job.  I can remember being on guard duty and finding it hard to stay awake.  I have driven cross country when I could not afford a motel room.  I have nodded off during less than inspiring sermons.  God is like that sensor on the front of newer cars that goes off when you pull into the garage.  It may be irritating but it saves a lot of dents.

Simple reminders make for a more productive day.  They do wonders for attitude.  I recommend starting the day with meaningful worship.

homo unius libri

Opus 2022-166: When the Skinny Lady Sings

If you don’t believe that the 2020 election was stolen by illegal actions then I am wondering if there is any hope for you.  Perhaps it could be a litmus test in deciding who has the right to vote.  Maybe a constitutional amendment requiring belief in the fraud would be in order.  To be fair we need to realize how ignorant the general public really is.  Ask a middle school student what they would do about the problems in the economy and they say, “Print more money.”  I know this because I used to ask them questions like that.  

Or take something that is hard to miss if you have ever been on a beach with a clear view of the horizon or in an airplane on a cloudless day, the earth is round.  And yet Forbes tells us,

“Millennials in America sometimes get a bad reputation, this time for good reason. A recent survey found that just 66 percent of young adults aged 18 to 24 years old have ‘always believed the world is round.’"

I didn’t read the whole article.  Maybe there is some mitigating data.  I doubt it.  I could go on but I digress from my concern about our culture in the wake of the 2020 election.

I have been a part of conversations where people are beginning to believe that the only way we can defeat the cheaters is to start cheating ourselves.  I have heard it said we will never win another election unless we learn to ballot harvest, pay off poll workers and generally get involved in the perfection of the party machine that has taken place.

Personally I reject that tactic.  I understand the point.  When I have played games with people who cheat I have made sure I don’t join their games again.  When I shop in a store or buy a product that is dishonest I find other places to shop and products to buy.  I may say something but I generally walk away.  I can’t do that with my country.  

We cannot adopt their way of doing things.  If we do then we deserve to lose.  We might win a battle but we would lose the war.  We need to win the war.  If we are simply going to become Proregressive* Lite, then why bother fighting.  Join.

We need to move forward the way real Americans have always done it.  We need to stand tall.  We need to speak up.  We need to use the courts and the legal system.  Lawsuits and suing for damages goes both ways.  We need to move forward as Christians.  If you are not a Christian then at least admit you need to take the moral high road.  

We are on the side of justice, real justice, and truth.  Don’t give up until the skinny lady sings.  It may be that the fat lady will be almost starving before we get to the point of victory.

homo unius libri