Wait a minute...

Did somebody say the recession was over?

HT: Real Clear Politics

In the market for the Brooklyn Bridge?

If so, the Administration would like to sell you the whopper that the stimulus package is the reason why we may be (slowly) coming out of the recession.

Virginia, whether or not there's a Santa Claus, the stimulus package didn't work. It only dug our children and perhaps our grandchildren into a financial hole many times deeper than it was before.

HT: Real Clear Politics

Not exactly reassuring

Senate Democrats have defeated amendments guaranteeing that any new health care bill would not finance abortions, and which would have required applicants to produce a photo ID to prove that they were in the country legally.

President Obama and the Democratic leadership assures us that abortions will not be covered, and that illegal aliens will not be eligible. But for some reason they are unwilling to assuage fears to the contrary by putting guarantees into the bill.

They lie?

HT: Drudge

The Real Victims

HT: Mollie Ziegler Hemingway

NFL players at greatly increased risk for Alzheimer's

A new study has confirmed that NFL players suffer from Alzheimer's Disease far more frequently than the general population- including a 19% greater frequency than other men in their late thirties and early forties.

Hmmmm. Why do you think that is? Blows to the head? Lead in the training table diet?
Neural damage due to touchdown celebration trauma?

HT: Drudge

Reports of the demise of the Neocon movement...

are greatly exaggerated.

And while our movement owes its recent resurgence to the foreign policy ineptitude of the Obama administration, the truth is that we never went away.

HT: Real Clear Politics

Gloomy thoughts of an autumn Monday night

If there is no God, then everything is permitted. --Tolstoy

Hulu rocks.

My current life situation is such that my TV viewing is limited to broadcast viewing only. While the additional channels available now that American broadcasting has gone from analog to digital are welcome, my antenna isn't the best- and besides, my building (like many I've lived in these past few years) seems to be rather hard on incoming signals; not only am I having to fuss with my antenna to avoid the dreaded "WEAK SIGNAL" or "NO PROGRAM" message on various of my stations at any given time, but I have a remarkably hard time maintaining a cell phone signal at home as well.

But I digress. Hulu has become my method of choice for viewing TV. I simply watch on the computer here at church the night after a show is broadcast. It saves all the hassle of trying to deal with the various problems of digital transmission.

You know. The ones we didn't have to worry about before Congress decided that watching digital TV would be better for us, for some reason.

One of the things Hulu has allowed me to enjoy of late is the reliving of my beloved Babylon 5, a series which has always seemed to me to be superior to Star Trek in any of its incarnations that the question doesn't even bear discussing. But that's another rant for another night.

I watch two or three episodes of B5 every day. Last night, I watched an episode from early in the second season in which G'Kar mentions having come across a poem that makes him think that "maybe the humans are wiser than we've given them credit for."

The poem is one I well remember from high school English: William Butler Yeats' The Second Coming. As I listened to G'Kar read it to Na'Toth, it struck me- and not for the first time- how aptly it describes the world we live in today:

Turning and turning in the widening gyre,
The falcon cannot hear the falconer;
Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold;
Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world,
The blood-dimmed tide is loosed, and everywhere
The ceremony of innocence is drowned;
The best lack all conviction, while the worst
Are full of passionate intensity.

Surely some revelation is at hand;
Surely the Second Coming is at hand.
The Second Coming! Hardly are those words out
When a vast image out of Spiritus Mundi
Troubles my sight; somewhere in sands of the desert
A shape with lion body and the head of a man,
A gaze blank and pitiless as the sun,
Is moving its slow thighs, while all about it
Reel shadows of indignant desert birds.
The darkness drops again; but now I know
That twenty centuries of stony sleep
Were vexed to nightmare by a rocking cradle,
And what rough beast, its hour come round at last,
Slouches towards Bethlehem to be born?

Yeats, of course, wrote the poem in 1920. The horror of the First World War was still vivid in people's minds back then, and Western culture was going through a period of ethical drift similar to- if not quite as drastic and long lasting as- what it experienced in the Sixties, and from which, in a very real sense, we have never really emerged.

It's a comforting thought to remember that Yeats wrote the poem when my mother was a teenager. After all, we've survived since then. It's comforting, too- and for the same reason- to read jeremiads by the ancient Romans who bewailed the passing of the republican virtues that made Rome great. Rome lasted for quite a while after it largely lost touch with those virtues, and even reached the height of its power and influence when they were largely a memory.

They never really passed away, of course. There were always some who kept the flame burning, just as there are many even now who have not given in to the intellectual and moral nihilism which characterizes the Western world in our time. But who, in Yeats' day, would ever have foreseen a day when a third of all American births would be out of wedlock; when genital herpes- an affliction most people back then had probably never even heard of- would infect fully twenty percent of the American people, and fully a quarter of the adult population of New York City; when so few people would be shocked and outraged at the notion of living human embryos being cannibalized for spare parts; when abortion would be so widely seen and even be recognized by the law not as a tragic, desperate expedient, done in dark corners and only whispered about even in extreme circumstances under which essentially decent women might, with horrified reluctance, resort to it, but rather celebrated as nothing less than constitutional right under any circumstances at all, ethically neutral at worst, and nothing to be embarrassed about?

I am something I never thought I would ever be: divorced. And yes, that is something to be ashamed of- even when, as in my case, one is the unwilling party in a divorce not sanctioned by Scripture. No matter the circumstances, no matter who did or said what to whom, or when, or how many times. No matter how common it may be. There are no innocent parties in divorce, and it is wrong that so many people in my situation are not ashamed to be, no matter what the facts of their individual case. I certainly am ashamed. The very concept of "no fault divorce" is obscene. All divorces are always, to some extent, the fault of both parties.

Yeats never watched television, of course. But if he had, I doubt whether he would have foreseen

the day when a vulgar term for sexual intercourse would become acceptable on prime time TV, and used by the man on the street in casual conversation with no particular inking of how vulgar it was. We've gone through many periods of extreme cultural and political polarization before- the Civil War comes to mind- but when before have both Left and Right alike (admittedly under different circumstances) so casually regarded incivility as a matter of free speech, to be engaged in freely and even celebrated, with nary a thought that just because one may say something without having to fear legal consequences does not mean that one ought to do so?

When, in human history, has the notion of marriage between people of the same gender been taken as seriously by as many people as it is today, or the very concept of marriage as such taken seriously by as few? In what previous age could the events of the recent ELCA Churchwide Assembly have been thinkable among Christians- among alleged Lutherans?

Some for whom eschatology seems to rival justification and the Incarnation for pride of place among the articles of the Christian faith see all this as evidence that the Second Coming is indeed at hand. Others, like me- who take more seriously Christ's warning that no one knows the day or the hour of that Coming- are inclined to scoff, and to point out that it seems to every generation as if the wheels are coming off human civilization as it hurtles heedlessly downhill toward the infernal regions, as if "surely the Second Coming is at hand."

We keep surviving, we humans. And after all, isn't it an essential point of Christian eschatology that things will be at their very darkest before the dawn? Perhaps there's even a strange kind of hopefulness all mixed together in the gloomy kind of thinking I find myself disposed toward tonight. And as I mentioned before, we always seem to survive when curmudgeons like Yeats and yours truly are moved to grump and glower by the world in which we find ourselves living.

Time, I think, to reflect that our times are still in God's hands, even at an hour in which fewer and fewer of us take Him seriously.

God is- and that fact is subject neither to passing mores, nor to majority vote.

Christ has died, risen, and is ascended- and that will always remain grounds not only for hope, but for confidence.

Inexcusable

The Empire State Building will be lit up in red and yellow on Wednesday in commemoration of the 60th anniversary of history's most murderous regime, that of Communist China.

Look. Maybe they own America these days, but would anybody go to such lengths to celebrate, say, the Nazi takeover of Germany? The Chinese Communists have murdered more than five times as many innocent people as Hitler did.

To say that Wednesday's ceremony is in poor taste would be to put it mildly.

A specter is haunting Europe...

...the specter of the utter collapse of European Socialism.

Drat. Just as socialized medicine was reaching prime time here in the States...

Meanwhile, the latest Rasmussen Poll reports that support for Obamacare has fallen to 41%. 51% are opposed.

HT: Drudge

You have to see this!

The X-Files was a great television series. And Babylon 5: Crusade had the potential to be another. Alas, network politics nipped it in the bud. Crusade was cancelled after a mere thirteen episodes.

But not before it produced this episode, which would have justified the creation of the series even if it had been the only episode ever shown. It's one of the cleverest and most hilarious spoof of one TV series ever done by another.

Well, of two other series, really- if one counts the zinger Captain Gideon deals another well-known space opera in the closing scene, during his conversation with his first officer.

Part Two- the conclusion- is here. If you have an hour, watch this episode. You'll be glad you did- especially if you are an X-Files fan. And I think you'll join me in regretting the fact that Crusade didn't have the long and successful run it so richly deserved.

BEARS 25, SEAHAWKS 19

Golly, but it's nice having a quarterback!

126.4 QB rating for Cutler, and both Hester and Bennett continue to emerge as receivers.



ADDENDUM: This video missed one priceless scene: Sue, the world's largest T-Rex skeleton, wearing her (obviously oversized) Urlacher jersey.

The rest is silence

Every magazine, every pundit, every prognosticator said before the season that the Cubs would win their third consecutive National League Central Division championship this year going away.

The Cardinals clinched the Central Division tonight.

I'm happy for Mark DeRosa.

This ought to be the Cubs' party tonight. Sure, there were injuries. Sure, players had sub-par years. But the major reason why it's the Dirty Birds, and not the Cubs, who are taking the champagne shower tonight is that GM Jim Hendry had probably the single most bone-headed off-season even a Cub general manager has had in the fifty two years I've been following the team.

While I'm pulling for DeRosa, otherwise I really don't care what happens in the playoffs and World Series. What I do care about is Hendry and Tom Ricketts putting together a team capable not only of taking the Central back next season, but of making a legitimate stab at that illusive world championship.

This is the first of my fifty two years as a Cub fan in which I haven't really cared. The season was sabotaged by Hendry before it even began. I made up my mind after the Cubs were swept last October in the first round of the playoffs for the second consecutive year that for me, the season would begin in October. I realized the moment I heard about the DeRosa trade that for me, there would be no baseball season this year.

Taking the division back from the Cardinals is only the beginning of what I expect from the Cubs next year. I will be satisfied with nothing less than victory in the NLDS and a berth in the NLCS. A concerted effort this off-season not only to build a team capable of regaining preeminence in the Central Division, but of legitimately contending for the whole enchilada will be my minimum requirement for caring.

I hope the Ricketts-Hendry regime makes that effort. I want my Cubs back again. But I refuse to accept stupidity, incompetence and inertia any more. Fifty two years of it is quite enough. And I think I speak for Cub fans as a group when I say that from this point on, the Cubs will have to either merit my support, or do without it.

No more taking the team backward, like you did last winter, Mr. Hendry. And no marginal improvement, no minor adjustments here and there. This winter you go all out to put a team on the field that can win it all, and this time you engage your brain. Otherwise, don't expect me to root for what you offer me.

Obama administration confirms: Jail time for those who don't buy health insurance if Obamacare passes

This isn't new, but it needs to be made explicit. And the Obama administration made it explicit this week: if Obamacare passes, and you don't buy health insurance, you could be imprisoned for as long as a year.

President Obama compared this provision in his speech to Congress with the requirement states have that one have auto insurance if one drives an automobile. This is, of course, a faulty comparison. One can avoid having to get auto insurance and still remain within the bounds of the law by not driving.

Under the Obama plan, the only way to avoid buying health insurance- whether one can afford it or not- would be by not living.

HT: Drudge

Barack the Innocent

Ralph Peters of the New York Post has one word to describe POTUS these days: "overwhelmed."

One more voice in a rising chorus of global concern over this administration's appallingly weak foreign policy.

HT: Real Clear Politics

Sermon for Trinity 16

ALL THINGS NEW
Luke 7: 11-17
Trinity XVI
September 27, 2009

Grace, mercy and peace from God our Father, and from our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. Amen.

Some modern theologians claim the resurrection of Jesus is a metaphor. Christ, Rudolph Bultmann wrote, has "risen into the kerygma (or message) of the Church."

Don't feel bad. I don't know what that means, either.

If you tune in to PBS, you'll find Bill Moyers- himself a one-time Baptist pastor- holding forth on the theories of Joseph Campbell and Karen Armstrong and all sorts of writers who proclaim with great confidence that the message of the Gospel is a kind of picture language, an archetype of some sort which points to some remarkably hazy and nebulous reality behind and beyond it. That sort of thinking is very big on the theological Left. But it has one big problem which, alas, the Moyers and the Armstrongs and the Campbells have no answer for.

Our text tells us of a widow who, upon her husband's death, found herself alone- except for an only son. And now, that son had died. She was alone in the world.

But she was worse than alone. There was no way short of prostitution for a woman to support herself in First Century Palestine. To be left first without a husband, and now without her only son, meant that she had no way of keeping herself fed, or a roof over her head.

No metaphor would fill her belly. No archetype would fill the emptiness of her heart, and her life. As she followed the procession which was carrying her only son to his grave, in a very real sense her life was over, too. Her very livelihood from thence forward would depend upon the charity of others- when and if she could find it.

Few of us have been left quite that bereft by the death of a loved one. But all of us have stood by a loved one's grave. Mercifully, we've been in shock; it wouldn't be until later that the enormity of our loss would fully sink in, and that- in the providence of a wise and loving God- in stages. But when it does, no matter how well we cope with our loss, there will always remain a hole in our lives. Time will cause the wound to scar over. The pain will become first duller, and finally hardly noticeable. Life will return to something like normality, But the hole remains- and no archetype or metaphor will ever fill it.

I remember the morning my sister and my brother-in-law and my Alzheimer's-afflicted father and I sat in the living room of the house on Princeton Lane in one of Chicago's southern suburbs waiting for the limousine from the funeral home that would take us to my mother's funeral. She'd been killed in an automobile accident days before. That shock which God, in His mercy, has ordained should beshroud the minds and the senses of people in such a situation hung heavy around all of us. My dad- thank God- was shielded still further by the progress of his disease, and his inability to altogether sort out just who it was who had died.

As we sat there, waiting, my sister said, "I don't know how people who aren't Christians can bear times like this." I don't, either. We may joke about the poor atheist at his funeral, who is all dressed up but has no place to go. But to be alone and without hope in the face of that last enemy of both God and man- death- is an ordeal God never intended His human creatures to face. I don't know how unbelievers face it, either.

And there are other kinds of death. There is the death of a marriage- and that's a great deal more like the death of a loved one than most who have never faced it realize. There is that awful moment everyone faces- every man, certainly- when one is suddenly confronted with one's own mortality, and the finite amount of time and opportunity left, and the suffocating sense that the limitless possibilities of youth have collapsed into a finite and depressingly limited realistic prospect for one's career and prospects in life. We lose jobs, and status, and a sense of our own identity and worth in this life, as well as people. The days of man are indeed short, and full of sorrow, and it is not for nothing that the liturgy speaks of this sin-ravaged Earth as "this veil of tears."

We grieve. We mourn. We move on, if we can. We cope as best as we are able. But it is a savage lot we face, we fallen human beings, who live every moment knowing that all that gives live beauty or meaning or purpose is finite and transitory, and that some day we will lose it.

And so, we bemoan our loses, and soldier on. What else can we do? We are tempted to despair. We wonder how we can make it even through the next day, much less through all the years ahead.

But One has compassion on us in the midst of our sorrow and our mourning, and says, "Do not weep." Yes, I have to agree with my sister Kathy. Were it not for that One, I don't know how we could go on. I don't see how those who close Him out and will not listen to His words of compassion and healing can cope.

But to those who, by God's grace, have eyes to see Him and ears to hear Him, He comes in the moment of our sorrow and despair and says, "Do not weep." And He says to our hopes and our dreams and our hearts, "I say to you, arise." And they do.

They do because by faith we see the day when He will speak those same words to our loved ones who seem lost to us in death- and to us, too.

They do because by faith we know that neither our worth nor our prospects are defined by our accomplishments and achievements here on this earth, or by the time we have left. They do because we know that the One Who speaks these words is the One Who, in the words of the Epistle to the Hebrews, "gives life to the dead and calls into being things which do not exist."

"Behold," He says to us, "I make all things new." And He does. And in the face of the worst that either life or death can do to us, we cling to that promise.

But alas, that is not the case for everyone. There are those who mourn as those who have no hope because, in fact, they have none. No metaphors or archetypes will help them. And neither do those who listen to those who do what I vowed at my ordination not to do, and "offer... occasion for false hope or illusory comfort."

I have a friend who is a Baptist minister in Ontario, Canada. I remember his frustration at what apparently was the custom in the town where he had his first parish of the funeral director supplying the Scripture texts on which the funeral sermon would be preached. By implication, Dan Lundy used to say, the operating theology of the entire community was founded on the cardinal doctrine of "justification by death alone."

But that's a lie. And if the truth be told, in our heart of hearts we know that it's a lie. Death, the wages of sin, cannot be sugar-coated and Oprahfied that way. Our instinctive terror of the grave is well-founded. Our reflexive dismay at the howling, insane, inane emptiness of an existence in which we have hope only in this life is quite reasonable. Our horror at what lies beyond the door of death is well-founded. Death was never any part of God's plan. It is unnatural. It is beyond the bounds of anything a sane mind would ever have invented. It is the negation of everything God ever intended when first He said, "Let there be..."

No, I don't know what people do who face death- whether of a loved one, or of one's dreams, or one's own death- in the absence of that One Who comes near, and has compassion, and says, "Do not weep," and Who will say to our loved ones, to our hopes, and to our very selves one day, "I say to you, arise."

There are no substitutes for that Man. No metaphor or archetype will do. No illusions concerning our own merit or the nature of reality or what waits for us on the other side of the grave will help us. Without Him there is only hopelessness, and eternal loss, and perpetual despair.

But He comes to us, that Man- and now only in our moments of sorrow and bereavement. He comes to us day after day- and most especially Sunday after Sunday- in the Word of the Gospel, and in the Supper. "The medicine of immortality," the Church Fathers called that Meal, "the Antidote for death."

Day by day, as we live the covenant of our baptism, with the help of His Spirit we put our old selves to death in contrition and repentance- only to find the very Man Who met the funeral procession of that widow's only son waiting there in the water, and saying to us, "Arise."

And rise we do, day after day, out of the ashes of loses and sorrows and broken dreams and failed resolutions, to live before God in newness and wholeness once again. And as the years take their toll, and live deprives us of the things and even the people we hold most dear, we find in that encounter and in that Word and in that Meal the strength to rise again, and live.

Until finally, on that last great day, the Promise will come true in all its glory- at least for those who have not closed our eyes and our ears to Him in this life. Our loved ones who have died in the Lord will rise- and we will rise, too. They will be given back to us, and we to them, and all good things with them. And God will wipe every tear from our eyes, and there will be no more sorrow for us, or mourning, or weeping. For the former things shall have passed away, and all things will be made new.

We will not be required to sup on the thin gruel of metaphor or the sawdust of archetype. Instead, we will feast in blessed reality forever in the Kingdom of the One Who makes all things new- the very Man who once encountered a funeral procession at the gates of the city of Nain, and had compassion on the widowed mother of an only son, and touched his coffin, and said, "Young man, I say to you, arise."

May the peace of God, which passes all understanding, keep your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus. Amen.

Busted!

According to YouTube, the video I posted yesterday of public school children in Burlington, N.J. being taught to sing Barack Obama's praises ala Kim Il Sung or Joe Stalin has had fewer than four hundred hits in the last twenty-four hours- but over three thousand comments.

Hmmmm.

Coach Q is apparently a detail man

A re-emerging Republican majority?

Maybe- if the Republican party can find a way to combine social conservatism with economic and rhetorical moderation- the Obama majority may turn out to be an ephemeral thing after all.
HT: Real Clear Politics

Open mouth, insert foot

Joe Biden strikes again.

HT: Drudge

We just don't do this sort of thing in democracies!

This is not a partisan issue. It's simply not. Substitute "Ronald Wilson Reagan" or "George Walker Bush" for "Barack Hussein Obama" in the video below, and it's every bit as creepy- and every bit as wrong.

A few days ago I posted a video of various Hollywood personalities "pledging allegiance" to President Obama in terms entirely out of keeping with our democratic traditions. We do not pledge allegiance to our presidents, regardless of party; instead, we hold them accountable to us. We may like them. We may support them. But we never, ever, "pledge allegiance" to them. To do so is to get the relationship between an elected official and the people in a democracy exactly backward.

Ever since Athens, democracies have feared and distrusted the cult of personality, and with good reason. And while I do not believe that President Obama is planning a coup (or anything so preposterous), there simply can be no question but that treating any political leader the way Kim Il Sung is treated in North Korea or Stalin was in the Soviet Union or Saddam Hussein was in pre-invasion Iraq is radically inappropriate in a democracy. If nothing else, it's as unhealthy a precedent as can be imagined. And that adult Americans of voting age should fail to see this is itself a frightening thing.

But what is below is much worse. This is children in a public school- the children of Republicans, Democrats, and Independents alike, who may or may not have voted for Mr. Obama or approve of his policies- being indoctrinated into the Cult of Obama at taxpayer expense.

Some have reacted to the previous video with the red herring that the goals and values and objectives recited by the Hollywood Obamaphiles in themselves were commendable. But they were neither the point of the video, nor of my objections to it. The point of both was the glorification of a national political leader in terms more appropriate in a totalitarian state than in a democracy.

Similarly, the wonderful values the kids chant and sing about it aren't the issue here. The issue is that the taxpayers of Burlington, N.J. were, without being consulted, compelled to pay for the indoctrination of their own children into Saddam or Kim-like cult of a president of whose policies their parents may or may not even approve. And both the name and the party of that president are entirely irrelevant.

ADDENDUM: As you can see, they've removed the video. Don't know about the people responsible for this.

Singing to the Beloved Leader

The place: B. Bernice Young Elementary School in Burlington, N.J.- a public school.

No, not North Korea. No, not China during the Cultural Revolution. No, not Cuba or Venezuela or Iraq under Saddam. And before anybody even says it, the laudability of the sentiments the chant and the song express otherwise are beside the point.

In democracies, we do not inculcate our school children into a cult of personality centered around the adoration of national leaders. And again, before anybody says a word, no honest Democrat will be able to deny that he or she would be just as disturbed by this as I am if public school kids were being taught to sing the praises of Ronald Reagan or George W. Bush on the public dime during their presidencies.

This stuff has no place in the schools- and especially in public schools, where it's being financed by the money of taxpayers who may or may not have voted for President Obama, much less signed off on the indoctrination of their children into Barack Obama's creepy cult of personality.

The real incivility in the health care debate

Tony Blankley maintains that the most uncivil language in the debate over the health care issue has not been that of a Republican back bencher, but of the very leadership of the President's own party.

And once again, the hypocrisy of the Democratic rhetoric on the matter of civility becomes manifest.

HT: Real Clear Politics

"Indecisive and pushed around"

Dee Dee Myers- former press aide to Bill Clinton- agrees that President Obama looks "indecisive" and "pushed around" on Afghanistan.

Give Obama credit for this one

The President, addressing the UN General Assembly, chided world leaders for their "almost reflexive anti-Americanism," and pointed out that those who complain when the United States acts alone cannot stand aside and wait for the U.S. to solve all of the world's problems alone.

A welcome dose of frankness from an administration which has at times seemed hard pressed to say "no" to anybody about anything.

Even Ralph Nader sees Obama as a weakling

Ralph Nader is as loony as ever, but even he sees Barack Obama as out of his depth and possessed of a bananna for a backbone.

HT: Drudge

The Keystone Cops of diplomacy

The longer Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton run this nation's foreign policy, the clearer it becomes that they simply don't know what in the world they're doing.

HT: Real Clear Politics

Black Caucus joins Carter race baiting

It seems that the Congressional Black Caucus has by-and-large bought into the Jimmy Carter-style race baiting that has followed Joe Wilson's impulsive (and boorish) cry of "You lie!" during President Obama's health care speech.

There's simply no other way to parse it: the Caucus seems to believe that to oppose an African-American president, one must necessarily be motivated by race. This kind of downright silliness is a major obstacle to the Caucus and its members being taken seriously, and effectively works to lessen the impact a charge of racism ought to have when it's legitimately made.

Consider this quotation from a Caucus member concerning the portrayals of Obama in a Nazi uniform and in similar derogatory guises during the recent "teaparty" demonstrations: "This sort of behavior would never be tolerated toward a white president.

No? Er.... ever heard of a fellow named George W. Bush?

And for attacks on the manifesty corrupt vote stealing and pimp-abetting outfit ACORN to be considered racially motivated is to show a grasp on reality that has long since slipped.

This kind of self-pitying paranoia on the part of African American leaders causes racism to be taken much less seriously than it ought to be. The members of the Black Caucus do the cause of racial justice no favor when they wallow in this kind of extremist nonsense.

Job one for Hendry: get DeRosa back

Mark DeRosa- the one member of last year's Cubs squad who will play with a division champion for the third straight year- is a free agent again after the season. He says that he would be open to coming back to the Cubs.

It's a given that the toxic Milton Bradley won't be back. Doubtless walking disaster Aaron Miles will be outrighted, if nothing else. But if Cubs GM Jim Hendry- whose job should be hanging by a thread- doesn't make re-signing DeRosa a priority- if only to send a message to the fans- it will be hard to make the case that he realizes just how badly he screwed up last off-season, and in how many ways.

The Cubs can return to the playoffs next year, with the intelligent application of Ricketts money and Hendry brains in the proper combination. We know that Hendry has a brain; he used itto good effect in putting together the team that won two consecutive NL Central championships, before demolishing it last off season. For that matter, he's used it far more often than most Cub general managers have used theirs over the years. But if he doesn't get the Cubs to the NLCS next year, Hendry needs to go- and to be replaced by somebody who realizes that when a team is ousted from the playoffs in three games ctwo years running (scoring a grand total of six runs each year) and then collapses like the Cubs did this season, something more than a minor tweak is needed.

Hendry needs to get the Cubs the players they need not only to get back to the playoffs next year, but to win when they get there. If he can't, he needs to get out of the way for somebody who can.

Is this for real?

I have my doubts. But if it was faked... how?

Sometimes a gesture is more than it seems

Is there more to Barack Obama than meets the eye?

Paranoia concerning President Obama is as rife on the Right as paranoia concerning President Bush was on the Left. But Professor Paul Rahe thinks he sees some disturbing double-meanings in what Mr. Obama does and says.

"Signifyin'" is a time-honored rhetorical device in the African-American community. An interesting question: could some of Mr. Obama's gestures- both physical and otherwise- contain more than one level of meaning?

Giving credit where credit is due. Sort of.

Steeler's coach Mike Tomlin said after yesterday's loss to the Bears, "We recognize that they (the Bears) had a role in the outcome (of the game)."

Big of him.

HT: Pittsburgh Tribune

Minnesotans heart Pawlenty, candidate or not

72% of Minnesotans think that Gov. Tim Pawlenty will seek the 2012 Republican presidential nomination. Half think that he'll win it.

And 56% in this grotesquely liberal state- Al Franken, who is both grotesque and liberal, represents it in the Senate- approve of the job social conservative Pawlenty is doing as governor.

Even more encouraging, almost a third of Minnesotans think Franken is doing a poor job in the Senate.

HT: Real Clear Politics

Don't say we didn't warn you

From across the pond, The Telegraph's judgment on Barack Obama: unqualified and 'out of his depth.'

Score one for the good guys

Here's the inside story of how the people who broke the expose of ACORN- the corrupt far Left
activist group for which Barack Obama was once a consultant- managed to avoid having the story killed by the liberal media.

HT: Real Clear Politics

Just sayin'

Believe it or not, New York magazine wants to know "Who is Barack Obama? And why do people say such loopy, ugly things about him?"

Hello! Why did people say such loopy, ugly things about George W. Bush? For pretty much the same reason. There are nasty, extremist nutballs on both sides. Sore losers, too. But after the last eight years, for liberals to complain about the way conservative extremists talk about President Obama is very nearly funny.

One thing the article does get right: the "enduring rot in American politics." If we ever had the knack of disagreeing civilly, we've lost it.

Of course, a person with some sense of history might point out that long before Dubyah was "the Chimp," Abe Lincoln was "the Original Gorilla." Still, the only thing sadder than the fact that such garbage goes on is that defenders of the current president can't seem to get their minds around the concept that for every nut job who insists that Barack Obama is a closet Muslim who was born in Kenya, there is another nut job who insists that Bush stole both the 2000 and the 2004 elections, conspired with Osama bin Laden to bring down the Twin Towers, and was AWOL from the National Guard.

HT: Real Clear Politics

Leno vs. ACORN

ACORN- the alleged lobby for poor people which played a role in getting people who couldn't meet the payments mortgages and helped bring on the crash, and whose electoral funny business has been notorious enough that the President of the United States tried in last year's campaign (with a great deal of success, due to the political leanings of the media)to downplay his own history as a consultant with the organization- has been busted giving tax advice on the establishment of brothels.

Even Jay Leno has gotten on the case of Barack Obama's former associates:



HT: Alamo City Pundit

BEARS 17, STEELERS 14!

Perhaps last week was an aberration after all! Let's see whether the Chicago media get off Jay Cutler's case for a while (27 for 38, 236 yards, two touchdown passes, 104.7 quarterback rating).

Looks like the Bears have found a receiving star in Johnny Knox.

Jaw-dropping time

I have no idea how he did this.



HT: Andy Webber

Sermon for Trinity XV

Our only security

Matt. 6:24-34
Trinity XV
September 20, 2009

Grace, mercy and peace from God our Father, and from our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. Amen.

The late Sen. Everett Dirksen once said, “A billion here and a billion there, and pretty soon you’re talking about real money.” And so you are. But there’s also another side to the coin. We can understand a hundred dollars, or even a thousand. Then thousand provides no problem in comprehension, either. Maybe the same is true for twenty, or thirty, or a hundred thousand. But somewhere around a million, things get a little hazy. And while what Sen. Dirksen said is certainly true, when we start talking about billions, much less trillions, most of us have a difficult time getting a feel for just how much money that is.

Discussions of the deficit tend to be handicapped by the fact that the numbers are so big that we lose our sense of proportion. And while few of us have that problem while balancing our checkbooks, there are some who do. Several months ago a family from Iowa won the Powerball prize, something like ninety million dollars. They said that they wouldn’t allow it to change their lives- that they wouldn’t quit their jobs or anything. But when one of the TV stations interviewed a financial expert from one of the banks, the expert just laughed. Managing that much money, he said, is a full-time job.

There’s a part of me- and probably a part of you, too- that would like to have that problem. But there’s a catch far bigger than the difficulty that comes in comprehending numbers that big. While Jesus had nothing against money as such, he commented more than once on how hard it is for rich people to enter the Kingdom of Heaven. The reason, I think, becomes clear when we listen to the thoughts that run through our mind as we contemplate what it would be like to be that family that won the lottery.

No more money worries. No more need to work- unless we wanted to. No limit, as a practical matter, to how big a house we could have, or how expensive a car- or how many of them. We’d be fixed for life!

But it’s very difficult, when one is fixed for life financially, not to trust in money as our refuge and our strength, a very present help in trouble. Poor people have to trust in God. They have nothing else to trust in. And that makes faith a great deal easier for the person who is poor than for the person who is rich. And then, there’s another problem: no amount is ever enough. That’s what the Aramaic word “mammon” refers to- a surplus, a surfeit, more than we need. More. More. And always more. Soon “more” becomes the most important part of our lives. It doesn’t matter how much we have. All that matters is that we have more. We simply cannot have enough.

Jesus tells us in our text not to be anxious about what we will wear, or what we will drink. God provides for the animals and he birds and the plants. And we’re higher on His own list of concerns than they are!

Worry doesn’t help. That’s something we all know at some level. But there’s a part of us that seeks to believe that somehow it must. Last Sunday night the Bears’ Jay Cutler had an absolutely terrible night against the Packers. He threw four interceptions- the most of his career. And all week Chicago sportswriters have been criticizing him for not acting more worried about it. Whether it’s our worries or someone else’s, there’s a part of us that confuses worrying about something with being concerned about it. But they’re not the same thing.

God is very much in favor of prudence. The Book of Proverbs is almost entirely devoted to encouraging it. But prudence means taking precautions and making intelligent decisions, not worrying about outcomes.

One does not sin when one buys in bulk, or makes a prudent investment, or makes plans for the future. No, the problem comes when we concern ourselves, not about what the best thing to do in a particular situation might be or what precautions we might take against this or that mishap, but with outcomes.

Man proposes, the proverb says, but God disposes. The best laid plans o’mice and men, as Rabby Burns put it so well, gang aft aglay- or, for those of you without Scottish roots, often go astray.

God created the good things of this earth to be enjoyed, and to meet our needs. But there is no good thing- whether it be money, or power, or even our own talents and abilities- that cannot be a stumbling block if we forget that they are merely the means God uses to the end of taking care of us. When they, rather than God, become what we trust in to keep us safe and happy and fed and housed and to meet our other needs, we are leaning on a broken reed. One of the few good things about the financial disaster our nation and the world have faced these last couple of years is that we’ve been reminded how little careers and pensions and other human bulwarks against disaster finally mean.

It’s easy for our fallen natures to take the recession and its consequences as evidence that what we needed was more money, a better job, a more profitable career, better investments. But no amount of money will ever make us safe; ask Bernie Madeoff’s victims. Any job can vanish. Any investment will go sour. And they who put their trust in such things finally build on sand. Their lives may look rock solid, but that sand can shift at any moment and send it all tumbling down into ruin.

There is only one Rock that will not move, only one source of security that is truly secure. No, faith in God is not a guarantee of wealth; Jesus Himself was poor. It is not a bulwark against suffering; they nailed Jesus to the cross, and among the things He promises His followers is that their lives, too, will be marked by the cross. The lives of Christians are not protected from sorrow and loss and disappointment and disaster and suffering- nor even, necessarily, from want. But we are promised that in the midst of all these things God will be at work to turn even them to our benefit. We are promised that He will be with us even in the darkest hours of our lives- and that, in the way and at the time that is best for us, he will bring us out of them again, into the sunshine.

No one can serve two masters. We can live our lives putting our faith in things, and storing up material bulwarks against disaster, or we can live them trusting in God to supply, not necessarily everything we want, but everything we need; not necessarily on our schedule, but in the time and in the way that will benefit us the most. Not even our own sin can finally harm us, if our sin is washed away in our baptism. And not even death can harm us, if we belong to the One Who conquered death.

And one constant in the history of the church- and in the lives of individual Christians as well- is that we not only learn to trust God, but get to know Him and draw close to Him and grow in our relationship with Him not in times of prosperity and success and personal happiness, but in the dark valleys of our lives. It is out of the experience of need that we learn to trust in God. It is out of the experience of guilt that we learn about grace. It is out of our lack that we learn that He supplies all we need.

But I must confess nevertheless to being a worrywart myself. My weak and sorry faith is apt to falter in the face of want or sorrow, and when my prospects look bleak, I am tempted to despair. My guess is that you, too, have moments like that. And that’s why we need the Means of Grace- God’s Word, the Blessed Sacrament, and the mutual conversation and consolation of the saints. That’s why we need to be continually reminded of something that every Christian learns over and over again in the course of his or her life, but which somehow we keep forgetting, and have to learn over and over yet again:

Sing, pray, and keep His ways unswerving,
So do thine own part faithfully,
And trust His Word, though undeserving,
Thou yet shalt find it true for thee!
God never yet forsook in need
The soul that trusted Him indeed.

May the peace of God, that passes all understanding, keep your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus. Amen.

Irving Kristol, 1920-2009

Irving Kristol- the father of Neoconservatism, that brand of right-of-center thought based on pragmatism but often caricatured by ideologically motivated and the simply ill-informed as essentially Bush-style interventionism, is dead at 89.

Kristol himself once described a Neoconservative as "a liberal who has been mugged by reality." He will be missed by all those who value sound, realistic and independent thinking in the realm of politics.

The founder of Neoconservatism is dead

Irving Kristol, the founder of the pragmatic brand of right-of-center thought called Neoconservatism, is dead at 89.

Kristol's ideology is often confused by misinformed liberals and conservatives alike with interventionism in foreign affairs. It would be more aptly described as a political philosophy which puts realism above ideology. Indeed, Kristol once famously described a neoconservative as "a liberal who has been mugged by reality."

Kristol's realistic conservatism lives on. His heritage has taken root, to the nation's benefit; no longer is it necessary to live in a previous century to be a conservative, or a make-believe world based on reality as we would like it to be. May he rest in peace.

HT: Real Clear Politics

Obama rejects Carter's race baiting

President Obama has explicitly rejected former President Jimmy Carter's charge that the emotional opposition to the Administration's health care proposals are racially motivated. Race, the Chief Executive said, "is not the overriding issue here."

Instead, Mr. Obama cited a long-standing philosophical debate in America over the proper role of government.

The President should be given due credit for disavowing Carter's ad hominem attack on those on the other side of the political fence. Perhaps the former president will learn some discretion in his old age.

Obama: Legalize aliens, and cover them!

President Obama said today that those illegal immigrants whom his health care plan wouldn't cover need to be legalized so that it will.

Be afraid.

This could be Nazi Germany, or Mao's China, or the Soviet Union under Stalin, or North Korea under Kim Sung Il. But it's not. It's the good ol' US of A, folks- and for all the fine sounding rhetoric that surrounds the attempt to create a cult of personality wholly incompatible with democracy, this is one scary video.



HT: Ted Sporer

Bush, Obama, and deficits

National Debt Road Trip - Watch more Funny Videos

HT: Scott Schreiber

A blast from the (not too distant) past: the origin of that "death panels" remark that got Palin in hot water

This Dickensian quote by President Obama went largely unnoticed by the media. Yet it is the point of origin for the fear of "death panels" resulting from a government-run health care system which Sarah Palin, among others, have voiced.

Both the Administration and its water carriers in the media (even Conan O'Brien!) went to great lengths to point out that there were no "death panels" in the Obama health care legislation. Of course, nobody ever claimed that there were. But all one has to do is read that quote from the President to know precisely why, say, the mother of a Down Syndrome child like Trig Palin might have good cause to fear this proposal.

What's good for the goose...

Finally! Somebody has recognized that the in-your-face strategy conservative activists have used on the health care issue in "town meetings" and elsewhere is nothing more or less than the Saul Alinsky-style rabble-rousing the Left used for eight years against George W. Bush!

The hypocrisy of Nancy Pelosi and others who deplore the very strategy their own allies used for eight long years need to be pointed out by conservatives at every opportunity. This was the stuff the anti-Bush people thrived on. Apparently, though, they don't like it when they're on the receiving end!

She's back for Samoa attention

The Mother of God- last sighted in Mexico, on a restaurant griddle- has reappeared on an office building in Samoa, apparently still holding the rosary she had when she made her appearance a few years ago on the wall beneath the Fullerton Avenue overpass in my native Chicago.

Besides quoting a Catholic priest as idolatrously equating the Blessed Virgin with God, the AFP account provides another piece of embarrassing information for those who go in for this sort of thing: the building in question is owned by a Congregational church. They don't go in for rosary beads, so I guess her choice of location can't be cited as an argument that the Blessed Virgin is a Protestant.

Democrats rush to denounce Carter and Dowd

It seems that Democrats- including the President of the United States- are falling all over each other to disassociate themselves from the zany, mean-spirited suggestion by Jimmy Carter, Maureen Dowd, and others that those who oppose President Obama's policies are motivated by race.

Good. I am always encouraged by evidence that there are substantial numbers of Democrats who are not moonbats, as well as by evidence that there are substantial numbers of Republicans who are not wingnuts. There are times when I wonder.

Haters and extremists on both sides need to be marginalized, not least of all by those with whom they claim political and ideological affinity. We had quite enough of this nonsense during the last administration.

Now THIS is a father!

Personally, I'm afraid my first impulse would have been to throw the kid right after the ball...

A modest proposal

Michael Barone has a point: wouldn't it be a good idea, at a time when Americans are out of work in numbers even the Obama Administration admits aren't likely to fall much any time soon, for the Administration to begin advocating policies that will put people back to work rather than keep them unemployed?

The Bush (and Reagan) tax cuts might serve as a model here. Tax increases- by whatever name, and on whatever economic class- are, on the other hand, pretty much the opposite of what any administration seriously interested in putting people back to work ought to promote.

HT:Real Clear Politics

A little ambivalent

Does this headline mean that the Blackhawks can't wait to start playing, or that Hawks' enforcer Ben Eager (below) is going to lose a lot of fights this year ?

EmBearassing

Even more embarassing to the Bears than Sunday night's debacle in Green Bay...

The Chicago Park District doesn't want the statue of Walter Payton the great running back's family has commissioned to be erected outside Soldier Field. And while I hadn't realized this, another Bear great (both on the field and on the sidelines)- Mike Ditka- was petulently excluded by the McCaskey family from a granite relief already on display at Soldier Field portraying outstanding players from the team with the most NFL Hall of Fame members and the second most NFL championships in history.

The desire to preserve Soldier Field as a memorial soley to those who have given their lives in the service of their country, while commendable, has already gone by the boards. Payton deserves a statue of his own. And given the slight, so does Ditka.

The Democrats' Stark hypocrisy

Victor Davis Hanson herein takes on Democratic hypocrisy regarding Joe Wilson, recalling that Rep. Pete Stark accused Dubyah on the House floor of deriving amusement from the deaths of American servicemen in Iraq, and that virtually the entire Democratic membership of Congress booed and heckled Mr. Bush during his 2005 State of the Union address.

The Democratic House blocked an attempt by Republicans to reprimand the chronically erratic and intemperate Stark.

It had no such compunctions, of course, about reprimanding Wilson- who, unlike Stark, actually admitted that he was out of line. Stark's "apology" merely regretted the possibility that his boorish behavior might distract attention from important matters of public business.

Carter goes totally moonbat on race and Obama

Jimmy Carter- for whom I voted twice, and once greatly admired- has morphed from a moderate if feckless liberal to an out and out moonbat.

His irresponsible behavior and rhetoric during the George W. Bush administration cost him my respect. But now, he's buying into the silly is pattern of seeing racism in every critical response to Obama which so many of us predicted long before Obama was nominated would become the default response to dissent during any administration he led. Worse, Carter- who apparently wasn't listening to his own rhetoric or that of his fellow Democrats during the last adminstration- somehow thinks there has been an increase in "hate rhetoric" since Mr. Obama became president.

The man is simply delusional, and I continue to be amazed that I ever was taken in by him.

HT: Drudge

So much for the football season.

What was Rex Grossman doing playing QB for the Bears last night, and wearing number 6?

With Urlacher done for the year, Tinoisamoa out for a month, Desmond Clark nursing a knee injury, and especially with the Cutler-to-the-other-team's-secondary combo as impressive as it was last night, I think we can pretty much do for the Bears what I personally started doing for the Cubs the moment I heard they'd traded Mark DeRosa for essentially nothing: recognize that once one awakens, misplaced dreams of glory dissolve like all the others.

That, and look forward to the hockey season. Go Hawks!

At this point, he Bears will be lucky to go 9-7, even with the easy schedule they have.

This season will not be a cakewalk for the Bears

My fellow Bear fans are in such a tizzy over the Bears signing their best quarterback since Sid Luckman that they appear to be in a state of denial about our receiving corps. Granted, nobody has a one-two punch at tight end like Greg Olsen and Desmond Clark, and Matt Forte is a fine receiver as well as an outstanding runner. Our new upgrades on the offensive line will help both our running game and our passing game. But we really don't have any go-to wide receivers, and until we do Jay Cutler will simply not be... well, Jay Cutler.

We helped ourselves at linebacker this off-season, but our secondary, like the receiving corps, is suspect. I'm especially nervous about our cornerbacks. Mike Ditka is right: in order to even win the division, the defense has to step up. I am not confident.

Tomorrow night's Green Bay game should tell us something. If we lose to the Snot 'n' Pus, it will mean more that simply that the season can't be a true success and that we're only one game away (the second Packer game) from its being a failure no matter what else happens. It will probably mean that we will be hard pressed to even make it to the playoffs on a wild card.

Having Favre back in the division (and on a team that's otherwise as strong as the Men in Braids are) makes me nervous. But the distinct possibility that we may turn out to be the third best team in this me want to retch. The only silver lining would be if De Angelo and the Bears' management is moved by an unfavorable outcome this season to do what they should have done once they'd signed Cutler: move heaven and earth to get him some people to throw to.

In the meantime, despite my misgivings, my prediction is Bears 31, Packers 28. Keep your fingers crossed, fellow Ursophiles.

May we never forget September 11, 2001

Though it seems that some of us have.

Some of us remember

Today is the eighth anniversary of the attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon which left over three thousand Americans dead.

Some of us remember- and intend not to permit the present administration to forget that dark day.

This remains a nation at war- and not only in Afghanistan. Those who hated us on September 11, 2001 still hate us. Their hatred remains as irrational and uncompromising. Surrender in the War on Terrorism is not an option.

For eight years the Bush administation kept us safe. Let us rededicate ourselves to not allowing the Obama administration pretend that it can do the same by making nice-nice with monsters.

The GOP the "Party of Cranks?" That's a laugh!

Want a good laugh? Click on this link to read one breathtakingly silly article!

Has the author forgotten the even greater personal hatred and vitriol the Democrats showered on Mr. Obama's predecessor for eight years? A general with Alzheimer's mentions that he didn't remember George W. Bush serving under his command in the National Guard during a specific period in which Bush wasn't even required to be on base. Within months, witnesses come forward to share their memories of his serving with them at that base anyway at the time in question, and the general- citing his illness-withdraws his comment and apologizes. All of this before Bush is even elected. Yet the "Bush was AWOL" lie continues to spread for the next eight years, even repeated by the 2004 Democrat candidate for president, John Kerry!

Despite the fact that the election officials in precincts in question were Democrats and that every recount or investigation done by independent parties concluded that George W. Bush won Florida and the presidency fair and square in 2000, the lie that the election was stolen is cherished by left wing zanies as an article of faith. As if the damage to the country were not enough, when Bush is re-elected, sore losers in the Democratic party claim that that election was also stolen, on the basis of even flimsier evidence.

Bush is compared to Hitler and members of his administration to Nazis for eight years. The over-the-top rhetoric continues to this day- as do the loony charges that he personally plotted the 9/11 attacks! Coller rightly decries the "birther" nutjobs, but seems to have forgotten the "truthers" who continue to maintain even now that Bush, and not Osama bin Laden, was responsible for the attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentegon eight years ago today!

An admittedly narticulate and dyslexic graduate of Yale with a Harvard MBA is attacked as somehow lacking in mental acuity for eight years, and the media not only doesn't say a word, but snickers sympathetically whenever possible But let one of its congressmen challenge Barack Obama- however inappropriately- for a deceptive claim made in his health care speech, and suddenly the GOP as a whole is not only in danger of being seen as the party of vitriol, but presumed guilty of racism for the simply opposing a president of the opposite party who happens to be an African-American! Incredibly, the media as a whole seem to have forgotten that Bush was heckled and booed by virtually the entire Democratic membership in Congress during his 2005 State of the Union address. Where was the outrage then?

The lies and personal attacks from the Democrats continue. And the Republicans are in danger of being dismissed as the party of hate? The Democrats richly earned that title over the past nine years, and the GOP has a long, long way to go before it's in any positon to challenge their monopoly on it.

Those square fish are more appetizing

The fish to the left is a hokie. It is found in the deep, dark waters off New Zealand. It, and not those square, bun-sized fish they pull up in the net in the "That ain't natural" commercial, is what McDonald's Fillet of Fish sandwiches are made of. And they're threatened.

Not to worry, though. If enough people see what they look like, demand will decrease very quickly.

The president's health care speech- and the facts

As I noted last night, Rep. Wilson's cry of "You lie!" was as boorish and disrespectful of the presidency itself as it was politically stupid. "Lie" is a harsh and uncharitable word, even if it had been uttered in more appropriate circumstances. But the fact remains that on several points, Mr. Obama told something less than the whole truth.

I received this from Steve Mallory today by email. It does a good job of running down the list of Mr. Obama's claims last night, and holding him accountable for them.

Quote: “And it’s why those of us with health insurance are also paying a hidden and growing tax for those without it—about $1000 per year that pays for somebody else’s emergency room and charitable care.”

Fact: An even larger tax—of nearly $1,800 per year—is paid by individuals with private coverage who are forced to subsidize lower payments made by government-run health plans like Medicare and Medicaid, according to a study conducted by independent actuaries at the consulting firm Milliman.

Quote: “Nothing in this plan will require you or your employer to change the coverage or the doctor you have. Let me repeat this: nothing in our plan requires you to change what you have.“

Fact: Independent experts all agree that the legislation proposed would result in millions of Americans losing the coverage they have—the Congressional Budget Office believes several million, the Urban Institute 47 million, and the Lewin Group as many as 114 million.

Quote: “Under my plan, individuals will be required to carry basic health insurance – just as most states require you to carry auto insurance.”

Fact: Senior Obama Administration official Sherry Glied has previously written that a mandate “is in many respects analogous to a tax”—and furthermore has the potential to be a “very regressive tax, penalizing uninsured people who genuinely cannot afford to buy coverage.” Thus this policy stance breaks the signal promise of the Obama campaign: “I can make a firm pledge. Under my plan, no family making less than $250,000 a year will see any form of tax increase. Not your income tax, not your payroll tax, not your capital gains taxes, not any of your taxes.”

Quote: “There are also those who claim that our reform effort will insure illegal immigrants. This, too, is false—the reforms I’m proposing would not apply to those who are here illegally.”

Fact: Nothing in any of the Democrat bills would require individuals to verify their citizenship or identity prior to receiving taxpayer-subsidized benefits—making the President’s promise one that the legislation itself does not keep.

Quote: “And one more misunderstanding I want to clear up—under our plan, no federal dollars will be used to fund abortions, and federal conscience laws will remain in place.”

Fact: The National Right to Life Committee, among other independent pro-life groups, have confirmed that the legislation will result in federal funds being used to pay for abortions—both through the government-run health plan, and through federal subsidies provided through the Exchange, despite various accounting gimmicks created in an Energy and Commerce Committee “compromise.”

Quote: “I will not sign a plan that adds one dime to our deficits—either now or in the future. Period.”

Fact: The non-partisan Congressional Budget Office has found that H.R. 3200 would increase deficits by $239 billion over ten years—and “would probably generate substantial increases in federal budget deficits” thereafter. The Peter G. Peterson Foundation released a study today which found that in its second decade, H.R. 3200 would increase federal deficits by more than $1 trillion.

Quote: “Not a dollar of the Medicare trust fund will be used to pay for this plan.”

Fact: Among more than $500 billion in proposed savings from Medicare, the Democrat bills also propose re-directing $23 billion from the Medicare Improvement Fund to fund new health care entitlements. According to current law, the Medicare Improvement Fund is designated specifically “to make improvements under the original Medicare fee-for-service program.”

Quote: “Reducing the waste and inefficiency in Medicare and Medicaid will pay for most of this plan. Much of the rest would be paid for with revenues from the very same drug and insurance companies that stand to benefit from tens of millions of new customers.”

Fact: The Congressional Budget Office has previously found that the cuts to Medicare Advantage plans included in the Democrat legislation would result in millions of seniors losing their current plan—a direct contradiction of the President’s assertion that “nothing in this plan requires you to change what you have.”

Quote: “This reform will charge insurance companies a fee for their most expensive policies, which will encourage them to provide greater value for the money – an idea which has the support of Democratic and Republican experts. And according to these same experts, this modest change could help hold down the cost of health care for all of us in the long-run.”

Fact: While some Republicans support addressing the current employee exclusion for health insurance in the context of overall tax reform, the President’s proposal would raise “fees” in order to finance new federal spending—a tax increase of hundreds of billions of dollars, and one that many Republicans may not support.

Quote: “Add it all up, and the plan I’m proposing will cost around $900 billion over ten years.”

Fact: The Congressional Budget Office, in its score of H.R. 3200 as introduced, found that the legislation would spend approximately $1.6 trillion over ten years—nearly double the President’s estimate.

Quote: “I will continue to seek common ground in the weeks ahead. If you come to me with a serious set of proposals, I will be there to listen. My door is always open.”

Fact: On May 13, House Republican leaders all wrote the President a letter reading in part: “We write to you today to express our sincere desire to work with you and find common ground on the issue of health care reform….We respectfully request a meeting with you to discuss areas for potential common ground on health care reform.” Nearly four months later, that meeting has yet to take place.

"You lie?" As I said last night, that was harsh and uncharitable- and the manner of its speaking inexcusable (though I can't help but reflect that anyone who has ever watched Prime Minister's Questions on C-SPAN has seen both Gordon Brown and Tony Blair treated nearly as roughly by Her Majesty's Loyal Opposition).

And I seem to recall a certain incident in 2005, when a president named Bush was heckled and booed by a goodly percentage of the Democratic membership of Congress. While "lie" might be a harsh word for Mr. Obama's claims concerning his health plan and illegal aliens, "hypocrisy" seems to be about the right word for those who are pretending that only Republicans are rude during presidential speeches in such circumstances.

Rude is rude no matter who is being rude, and to whom

Calling POTUS a liar from the floor in the middle of a speech to a joint session of Congress is not only uncivil, but politically dumb. Congressman Wilson at least had the good grace to apologize afterward.

I'm still waiting for all the apologies Dubyah is due for the uncivil way he was treated by the other party during his administration.

My prediction is that if a health reform bill is passed, it will bear little resemblance to anything the administration is aiming for.

I just hope we recognize that a nation with our wealth which nevertheless ranks worse than twentieth among the nations of the world in infant mortality and has as many folks as we do with no access to decent health care at all is indeed in need of reform for its health care system. At the same time, any "public option" will put the government in direct competition with private industry- never a healthy thing- and private insurance companies don't have pockets deep enough to compete with the government.

If we wind up with a single-payer system after all, where will the Canadians go?

Bad form

Callng the president of the United States a liar in the middle of a speech to a joint session of Congress is bad form, whether POTUS is telling the truth or not.

It's also stupid politics, when the president is of the other party and is on the ropes concerning especially the very topic of his speech.

Apology or no apology, Congressman Wilson did Mr. Obama a big political favor tonight. How big remains to be seen.

Something else I don't get

Ever since Mitt Romney came up with "Romneycare" in Massachusetts- a scheme whereby folks are legally required to have health insurance- I've been a bit puzzled by the whole concept. The problem becomes acute because there has been talk lately of health care reform taking the form of something similar on a national scale- a scenario in which if you don't buy health insurance, you'll have to pay a fine of $3,800.

Ok. So health insurance is too expensive. You're poor. You can't afford to buy it. The solution to this is to levy a $3,800 fine (and you presumably don't have that much money, or else you would be able to buy health insurance) and in essence assess a civil penalty for poverty?

And this is supposed to help- how? Help me out here.

ADDENDUM: Gov. Romney's association with this truly bad idea is one of the chief reservations I have about him as a presidential candidate. But he has company in wanting to fine people for not being able to afford health insurance as some kind of solution to the fact that... well, they can't afford health insurance.

It's a key feature of President Obama's plan for so-called healthcare reform for the whole nation.

I don't get it

What's all this fuss about President Obama's address to the school kids? Dubya did the same thing.

So did his dad.