Man Adapts to Climate Change

 Ted Noel at the American Thinker today has an interesting twist on the so-called climate change hysteria. Mr. Noel uses his vacation to Scotland to point out that not everywhere has the same climate as where we live. He lives in sunny Florida, where it gets so hot that he is driven from the golf course. Having lived in Panama for several years, I can tell him that it is no hotter in Florida than in Panama. And in the Summer, it is no hotter here in North Carolina than in Florida.

These observations point to the fact that if we did in fact have man-made global climate change as the "Karens of Klimate Katastrophe" claim, the areas that are hot today wouldn't get uniformly hotter. Instead, the extra warmth would be in the Artic and Antarctic regions. This is where Noel's story gets interesting. You can find Noel's article at Living With Climate Change.

It’s really easy to think that the whole world is like home. I live in Central Florida, so warming seems like a threat. In the summer, it’s hot enough to threaten my ability to play golf, and it’s “hydrate or die.” Any warmer and I won’t be able to swear and beat the ground with sticks. Then this week I visited New Lanark, Scotland.

...snip...

Most of the Karens of Klimate Katastrophe completely neglect the northern (or far southern) climes in their nattering. While various tropical and subtropical areas might have concerns with warmer temperatures, much of the civilized world is actually located in areas where an increase in average temperature might not have such awful effects as are routinely advertised. Florida’s upper crust, who can afford coastal vacation homes made possible by federal flood insurance, might find their property falling into the sea. Ditto for the California coastal elites. The rest of us won’t see much more than dramatic pictures at 6:30 and 11:00.

People in the upper Midwest will be thrilled as winter blizzards diminish. They may have a shorter ice fishing season, but will exchange that for longer growing seasons with fewer parka days. For those who don’t wish to board a giant aluminum cloud for the trip across the pond to experience this, an alternative is readily available. Just get on a floating hotel and cruise the Inside Passage to Alaska. It’s a beautiful trip, and Juneau is the same degree of northern latitude as the Isle of Mull, where I am currently writing. Yesterday the snow level on Ben More was below three thousand feet.

Noel is philosophical about the fact that climate change happens, and always has happened. Man has nothing to do with it, and it is the ultimate hubris to believe we do. I personally attribute this fact to the Creator's plan. After all, would a merciful God give flawed mankind the power to ruin His climate? I don't think so. Indeed, the very idea that meteorologists can't predict the weather with any accuracy a week in advance tells you they have no ability to predict it 100 years from now.

Climate is always changing. Man has nothing to do with this simple fact. Our paltry contribution of carbon dioxide will raise the temperature of the earth by about the same amount that the period at the end of this sentence will block the light from your computer screen. It didn’t begin to rise much until long after warming began at the end of the Little Ice Age about two hundred years ago. If we achieve “net zero,” we may actually see a large part of the green on the earth disappear, since carbon dioxide is essential to all plant life. If, on the other hand, we encourage its rise, then plants will grow more readily in arid climates, allowing deserts to bloom like roses.

...snip...

The very idea that mankind can predict or control the climate is an ultimate act of hubris. The pursuit of climate modification is, rather, a religion, whose sole value inures to the person who declares what penance the rest of us must pay in order to pacify the demigods of green “virtue.” It is a fool’s errand, far more expensive to us in taxes and loss of freedom than any imagined benefit. We can and will adapt, regardless. My proper response to those who choose to be my “better” and command my behavior is not printable in this location. It is time for us to demand that they go away and leave us alone.

I urge you to read all of Noel's article. It is not the usual facts and figures, but just common sense.

J. B. Shurk Asks the Question: Who Are You?

 J. B. Shurk at the American Thinker today has a compelling "must read" article for those suffering in today's turbulent times, entitled And Who Are You?. It is a question both to ponder for ourselves, and also to ask of those who might try to influence us. Shurk gives us a program to help us find the true ground upon which to stand:

It is no longer sufficient simply to turn off the television, avoid the Internet, and head out to the closest wilderness trail in search of momentary respite, if not tactical escape. Because Western Marxism seeks to politicize everything, it is increasingly difficult to find suitable refuge from the abhorrent hordes of “climate change” cultists, pronoun-obsessed wackadoodles, virtue-signaling simps, racial grievance monsters, Hamas enthusiasts, and other angry, “woke” trolls. While we endure the peak surges of Marxist globalism — a totalitarian system destined to crash from the weight of its own contradictions — it can feel as if we are drowning in unrelenting waves.

Please allow me to offer a lifeline. I know of no better daily exercise than to spend time (1) repairing and maintaining your relationship with God, (2) helping and protecting the members of your family, (3) testing and strengthening your own character, (4) improving your mind, and (5) healing your physical body. I have found that if a person works on these goals each day, it is much easier to silence outside noise and find peace.

I can attest to at least some of Shurk's prescription. I have kept a daily lectionary provided by our church. With it, one reads a selection from the Bible each day, which in a year covers the entire Bible and the Psalms twice. Psalms are the prayers of the ancient Israelites. In addition, I have long practiced daily prayer. Of course I read eclectically, indeed always have. But recently I have taken up strength training to stave off sarcopenia. It is already showing results. But I do need to work on character building more.

There are two chief reasons why this is so. First, these five exercises are not easy, and they are not meant to be. You could spend every second of every day dedicated to any one and never accomplish the task. Maintaining a good relationship with God? Priests and pastors struggle to do so all their lives. Helping your family? That responsibility never ends. Improving your character? Even honorable people sometimes fail to do what is right. Becoming a better thinker? Learning new things requires patience and diligence. Remaining healthy? The older a body gets, the more committed a person must become to engage in regular physical activity. No matter how simple they might seem when reading these words, every one of these five activities requires tremendous energy and time.

The second reason this daily routine will reward you with a sense of peace is that none of these extraordinarily difficult tasks requires you to submit to the madness of the outside world. Think about the personal responsibilities I have listed: God, family, character, mind, and body. No matter what level of external chaos afflicts us, we are always in complete control over how we choose to interact with God, how we aid our families, how we weigh what is right and wrong, how we use our brains, and how we direct our bodies to persevere. No Marxist subversive or government agency can dictate to us how we perform these duties. They will certainly tell us that they have authority over how we pray, how we live, what we teach, what we know, and how we choose to protect our families. But what they tell us and what they can make us do are entirely different things. I would suggest that when untrustworthy people insist on interfering in the way you perform these daily resolutions, you consider their intrusion a test and an opportunity to strengthen your own self-purpose, commitment, and character. Outside forces cannot diminish us when we use adversity to grow. After all, as iron sharpens iron, so one person sharpens another.

It does not matter how late in life a person learns to take these five daily exercises seriously. Once they become a part of your routine, you will see the world with more clarity. What is more, you will soon realize that almost everything you do in life gives you a chance to improve one or more of these personal responsibilities. When you are confronted with something uncomfortable or demanding, you will begin to ask yourself how the challenge before you might provide the perfect opportunity to enhance your relationship with God, reinforce the foundations of your family, test your character, help you learn, or make you stronger. Eventually, more and more of the craziness in our world will disappear as the goals you set for yourself lead you down a richer path.

I urge gentle readers to read the entire article by J.B.Shurk, and to ponder the answer to his question "Who are you?" Personally, I am God's servant and soldier in a fallen and pagan world. Who are you?"

There Is Every Reason to Prevent the Government from Assuming Powers the Constitution Does Not Grant

 Mike McDaniel at the American Thinker once again brings gun issues into clear light through his experience as a law enforcement officer. The issue is so-called "ghost guns." McDaniel is reporting in The Supreme Court and Ghost Guns that the Supreme Court should rule that the government has no right to extend the serial number requirement to firearm components, thus making home made firearms at the very least more expensive, if not illegal.

The Biden’s Handler’s DOJ has done it again. Actually, they did it in 2022, but the Supreme Court has granted cert. The issue is so-called “ghost guns,” guns without a unique serial number.

This stems from the Gun Control Act of 1968, which required a serial number for every firearm manufactured in America. Not every manufacturer before then used serial numbers. The system established by the GCA works like this: serial numbers are recorded on each ATF Form 4473, which must be filled out at the retail point of sale for each gun. Those forms are kept by every Federal Firearm Licensee (FFL).

...snip...

That provision of GCA has always been interpreted as referring to finished firearms. However, in 2022 Garland promulgated a rule extending that requirement to firearm components. This would significantly increase the regulatory reach of the Biden administration over the firearms industry and increase the cost of making and selling firearms, rendering them less affordable and accessible to American citizens, and forcing many firearm makers and sellers out of business.

McDaniel points out that in his experience as a law enforcement officer, he never solved a crime using the serial number of a gun, and he didn't know anyone who did. Even if you can find the first buyer of the gun, you still must do the investigation to put the person at the scene with the weapon in question.  But let McDaniel tell it:

In recent years, many Americans have enjoyed building their own rifles and handguns from parts kits, which is entirely legal. Many of those kits do not have serial numbers, and a gun made from raw materials by someone with the necessary skills and machinery likewise has no serial number. These are the “ghost guns” so commonly demonized by contemporary D/s/cs.

Serial numbers are of little use. Criminals, by nature lazy sorts, rarely if ever obtain guns by building their own. Their guns come largely from thefts and the black market. “Ghost guns” are made and possessed almost exclusively by Americans who will never commit a crime, and certainly not with the guns they make.

During my police career, I never solved a crime by tracing a serial number, nor am I aware of anyone who did. Anti-gun/liberty cracktivists, and Hollywood would have us believe serial numbers are an essential crime fighting tool. Reality, as usual, is otherwise.

The police find a handgun left at a robbery scene and enter the serial number into their computer. The all-knowing government database tells them it was bought by Joe Normal of 1234 Average Street, Placid, Nebraska, at Placid Guns, on 11-02-2010. Ah-hah! They have their man, and the case is solved in less than an hour, minus commercials.

Not quite. There is no such government database, and even if there were, all it would tell the police is the identity of the original buyer 14 years earlier. They would still have to prove Joe Normal was present at the time and place of the crime, and used that handgun in violation of the law. What’s most likely is Joe traded that gun in for another one in another state sometime in the past, and the ownership trail moves on, indecipherably, from there.

If the robbery happened in Placid, NB, and if the police went to every FFL licensee in the area and checked their records, they might be able to find Joe’s 4473. If Placid Guns computerized all their 4473s before 2010, that is. If not, they’d have to go through every paper copy on file at Placid Guns to try to find that serial number. Imagine if the robbery happened in another town or state.

Now, having serial numbers on guns can be very useful to the manufacturer, when it comes to which weapon was sold to who and when if warranty work is needed. Beyond the manufacturer, old guns of historical nature such as the 1911 are of interest because of where they served and who might have carried or owned them. A gun worn by a well-known General at a certain battle for instance is more valuable that a nondescript 1911. But I see little reason why the government needs to get involved, unless it is to track who owns what guns in the event of a mass disarmament. But that goes against the Second Amendment.

A serial number, if the victim of a burglary kept a record of it, might help if the burglary was reported and the local police agency entered that serial number into the federal NCIC database. If the burglar was caught with the gun and an officer ran an NCIC check, the gun might show as stolen. That’s less common than one might imagine. But other than that, there is little reason to require serial numbers.

There is, however, every reason to prevent government from assuming powers the Constitution does not grant. Hopefully, the Supreme Court will agree.

Constitutional Carry in NC?

 I missed this Cam and Company episode when it came out on the 25th, but I am catching up.  Here is Cam Edwards at Bearing Arms reporting that NC Gun Owners Demand Constitutional Carry. Will Republicans Listen. One thing that has always bothered me is that criminals wander around every day carrying firearms in public without a permit. So, what is so difficult about letting honest law-abiding people do the same?

You can read Edwards' article and of course watch his interview with Grass Roots North Carolina founder and fearless leader Paul Valone. He makes a convincing case for doing it this year. But they should have done it years ago. After all, if the criminals can run around essentially Constitutionally carrying, why can't we?

Time To Prosecute the Anti-Gun Lobby?

At Ammoland today Dan Wos asks a serious, and interesting question: Should Anti-Gun Lobbyists Be Prosecuted for Restrictive Gun Laws? We sometimes talk about the fact that both lobbyists who advocate for, and politicians who pass rediculous gun control have blood on their hands, but that is usually rhetorically. But do they really? Wos presents a case for doing just that.

Now, it is one thing to advocate for an unpopular position. Sometimes such advocacy is the right thing to do. For instance, advocating for the unborn is the right thing, although the abortion lobby would have us believe that abortion is the popular thing. Should pro-life people be prosecuted? No, of course not. I feel that the unborn is a human life that should be protected the same as those born. But we can only change peoples' hearts by convincing them, not forcing them.

But of course, the gun banners do not want to wait to convince us, probably because they know we can not be convinced. There is too much experience of the average person to convince them they don't need guns. But there is also so much scholarship; writings of legal experts, of historians, of criminologists, even of statiticians and plain old observers of life in general to tell us that disarming is a bad idea. We know, for instance, that criminals will always be able to have guns when they need them.

It’s ironic how the anti-gun crowd tries to hold firearm manufacturers responsible for deaths that involve their guns but claim no responsibility for the deaths of innocent people who were rendered unarmed and helpless due to restrictive gun laws.

The political left is always using “mass shootings” as justification for more gun control laws. The propaganda and media hype behind so-called “gun violence” is nothing more than fake rhetoric created for the purpose of gaining support for more gun regulations. The idea that the gun-grabbers continue to push is that “if the killer didn’t have a gun, he wouldn’t kill.” This couldn’t be further from the truth and has been proven to be a false claim time and time again.

And there is the difference between honest debate between two sides who see the same issue differently, and the bad faith efforts of the anti-gun lobby and anti-gun politicians. They deliberately cherry pick data, highlight some and cover up others to present their view. But the truth is that guns are not the problem, nor knives, nor even rocks. The problem, as always has been since man first walked the earth is that people kill other people. You will not stop them by taking away tools. They will simply find another way.

What the media won’t tell you is that violence is never the result of a gun, but anytime a gun is used, they will position it as the cause. There is no such thing as “gun violence.”

For example, Australia had two major gun bans under the guise of preventing suicide, yet after the bans, the trajectory of the suicide rate didn’t change. Giffords is notorious for pushing a false narrative that guns shoot all by themselves.

...See the tweet from Giffords about guns shooting themselves in Wos's article...

In the face of such bad faith rhetoric, shouldn't Giffords, Moms Demand Action, Everytown and Brady be held just as responsible as they try to hold gun manufacturers? If a zone is deemed "gun free" then don't police or the entity controlling that "gun free zone" have a duty to protect those in that zone? Perhaps, when there is a mass shooting at a school, those who proposed to make the school "gun free" should be brought up on charges as accomplices before the fact?

I will let Wos have the last word:

If someone cuts the brake lines on your car, should they be held accountable for any death or injury that occurs? That death or injury was a direct and intended result of their actions. Their actions caused you to be unable to stop your car. The same is true for gun control laws. The actions of the anti-gun activists and lobbyists are intended to keep you unarmed and result in you not being able to protect yourself in public. Anti-gun activists keep Americans unarmed, and criminals take advantage of the situation.

Tennessee Passes Bill to Allow Teachers to Carry at School

 According to a post, by Madeline Leesman at Townhall.com, Tennessee has now past a law allowing staff at schools to carry guns. It remains to be signed into law by the Governor. The post can be found at Lawmakers in One State Pass Legislation to Allow Teachers to Carry Guns in Schools. The bill also calls for strict privacy of carriers from parents, other teachers and school staff, and students. Only the administrators would know.

If the Governor signs the bill, Tennessee will join Texas, Florida and a few other states in allowing this common sense way to protect students. Does that mean we will never have another school shooting? Of course not. But as with all deterrents, those who would target students will have to factor in the possibility of being stopped before they can get started by a teacher with a gun. These shooters hope to gain fame, though not fortune, by having the highest body count before they are killed. Sick, I know. But we are not dealing with rational actors here.

Note too that this is an entirely voluntary program. People who want to carry at school will go through extensive training. They will have to be very responsible with their weapon. Carrying every day is both physically and mentally draining.  It requires a person to be on alert at all times.  No one who doesn't feel like carrying a gun will be required to do so, and no one will be made to feel less than if they don't.

Further, all of the angst about students feeling "threatened and unsafe" with guns around is pure hogwash, a talking point. I suspect that not one in a hundred students will care on whit. They are too wrapped up in themselves, their relative status, what the kool kids are doing, what's in and what's out, to worry about their teachers. They are kids after all, not little adults.

I applaud Tennessee legislators for their guts and forsight. Would that all states had similar laws.

If Teachers Can Not Be Trusted With Guns, Maybe We Shouldn't Trust Them With Our Children?

 Over at Bearing Arms Tom Knighton has a piece entitled Tennessee Teacher Says Her Profession Can't Be Trusted With Guns. Wow! I wonder if this (student) teacher, who appears to be rather new to the profession has done some sort polling of professional teachers to find out? One would think that taking a representative sample of teachers and polling them would be the least one could do if one claims to speak for others. But, well, just read the article.

On Wednesday, I addressed a teacher in Tennessee who said that she didn't want to carry a firearm while performing her job. My take was that if she didn't want to, she shouldn't. It's a pretty simple concept. It's something each person should decide for themselves and they should be able to decide for themselves.

That is my take too. Teachers that want to carry, and are qualified to do so, should be allowed to. But nobody should be forced to. It is a big responsibility. You must keep it concealed at all times, train with your weapon regularly, and have thought ahead where you might store it if it is not on your person 100% of the time. Your primary duty is always to teach the children, and only secondarily to protect them with deadly force if necessary.

But an op-ed out of Tennessee written by a student teacher appears to argue that her profession just can't be trusted with guns. Let's start with the headline that reads: "Teachers like me are trained to educate kids. Arming us will make everyone less safe."

You can read Knighton's total article. Needless to say, she offers no unbiased research, and her sources are things like Students Demand Action, a subsidiary of Moms Demand Action, funded by Bloomberg. But you can decide for yourselves. Knighton also makes the point, and I agree, if teachers can not be trusted with guns, why should we trust them with our children? Maybe we shouldn't?

Are You Listening Mr. Biden?

 Today, at the American Thinker Andrea Widburg tells Biden, and other tyrants around the world that The World's Leaders, Including Biden, Must Learn the Lesson of Passover. Actually, the story told in Exodus has many many lessons for us. God's mercy is but one. That Yahweh is the supreme God of all the other elohim, including Pharoah is another. In leading the Israelites out of bondage to Egypt, it tells the story of God leading each of us out of bondage to sin and the devil, which prefigures the coming of Christ to reconcile us to God. Widburg adds yet another lesson for Biden and other world leaders who want to lord it over men.

Tonight, at sunset, Jews across the world will celebrate Passover, something they’ve been doing annually for around 3,500 years. The holiday commemorates the miracle (and gift) of God leading the Jews out of slavery in Egypt. This was the world’s first slave revolt and led to God’s handing down the moral laws that are the backbone of the Judeo-Christian faiths. But the Passover story also tells us something important about the nature of tyranny, and the world’s governments, from Biden on down, would do well to heed that lesson.

...snip...

Then came that fateful day when Moses, while tending his flocks, encountered a burning bush from which came the voice of God. God set Moses a task for which Moses felt painfully unqualified: Return to Egypt, free the Israelites from their bondage, and lead them to Canaan, the land promised to them in Genesis.

Despite his fears, Moses took up the task and went back to the court in which he’d been raised. He told Pharaoh to release the Israelites from slavery. Pharaoh, naturally, refused.

This refusal began the cycle of the famous ten plagues that Jews have recited at every seder since the Exodus itself:

Widburg thereupon recites the 10 plagues of Egypt. It is here where God shows his mercy. At any point, Pharoah could have cried "uncle" and let the people of Israel go. That he didn't showed him to be unconcerned about the suffering of his people as long as he was safe, and in power. Notice that the plagues become more and more serious, but Pharoah doesn't care. Finally

10. The death of the firstborn. (That Pharaoh didn’t die, incidentally, means that he was not his father’s firstborn.)

Because the Angel of Death passed over the homes of those Israelites who painted their door lintels with the blood of s specially prepared lamb, we get the holiday’s name.

Left unsaid is that Pharaoh's first born son also died. Pharaoh finally felt the consequences of his actions.

Aside from ignoring the fact that Exodus marks the first recognition in human history that slaves are people and deserve liberty, this viewpoint completely misses the profound message attached to the myriad plagues that Pharaoh willingly visited on his people: All tyrants have an almost endless capacity for tolerating others’ suffering, as long as their power remains in place.

What Pharaoh discovered with the first nine plagues is that life can go on, at least for the ruler, no matter the burdens he places on his people. Pharaoh had wine to drink when the Nile turned to blood; physicians when the plagues and boils arrived; baths, unguents, and incense when the irritating bugs settled in; stores of food when the cattle sickened and starved; and a secure palace when the skies poured down hail and fire. As long as Pharaoh’s hold on power was undiminished, he could always reconcile himself to his people’s pain.

The lesson Widburg hopes the various tyrants learn for the Passover is that ultimately God is in control. That governments are established to serve people, not to control them. Whenever a government attempts to control the people, and isn't concerned about the suffering of the people, that government has gone to the dark side, to tyranny and destruction. Christ, on that Passover some 2000 years ago showed us the way by taking on our sins, and dying for us, then rising again as the prophets had said. He set the example of the suffering servant, not of the tyrannical dictator. Are you listening Mr. Biden?

Green Nazis Pushing Society Back to the Stone Age

 At 72, I grew up in a suburban neighborhood, but my parents grew up on farms, not unlike Viv Forbes who grew up in Australia on a farm.  Young people do not realize how fragile the technological society actually is, or how close they are to living as people have lived for centuries.  Forbes, though, can tell us from first hand experience of the coming of electricity to their farm in the 1940s.  Her story can be found at the American Thinker entitled A diesel in the shed. I urge you to read the whole thing.

When I was a kid living on a small dairy farm in Queensland, we relied on green energy -- horses and human muscles provided most motive power; firewood and beeswax candles supplied heat and light; a windmill pumped water and the sun provided solar energy for drying clothes and growing crops, vegies, and pastures. The only “non-green” energy used was a bit of kerosene for the kitchen lamp and the dairy lantern, and petrol for a small Ford utility for a trip to town every fortnight.

Our life changed dramatically when we put a diesel in the dairy. This single-cylinder engine drove the milking machines, the cream separator, and a small electricity generator, which charged 16 lead-acid two-volt batteries sitting on the veranda. This is the exact same diesel engine (built in Toowoomba) we had in our dairy in the late 1940s.

Our 32-volt DC system powered our “modern” marvel -- bright light at any time, in every room, at the touch of a switch.

You can see and hear that diesel engine at the highlighted link. It is noisy, but I am sure it was magnitudes better than they had before. It meant milking machines, which could service more cows and provide more milk. It meant electric light, which reduced the risk of fires. It meant electric pumps for water, thus reducing dependence on the wind. As I said, magnitudes of improvement in living standards.

But now, the green nazis have caused a backward push towards the stone ages:

There were no electric self-starters for diesels in those days -- just a heavy crank handle and a big flywheel. But all that effort, noise, and fumes were superseded when the house and the dairy got connected to clean silent “coal power by wire.” Suddenly the trusty “Southern Cross” diesel engines disappeared from Australian sheds and dairies.

In less than one lifetime, firewood, candles, horses, and kerosene were replaced by diesel and petrol engines plus clean, silent coal-powered electricity.

Today, after Aussies have enjoyed decades of abundant reliable cheap electricity from coal, green energy gambling has taken Australia back to that era which kept a diesel in the shed.

Green energy has a union that works to rules. If winds are too strong or too weak, they down tools and the turbines go silent. And their mates running the solar panels won’t work at night and also produce nothing on cloudy days. If we try to fill the gaps with battery power, where do we get the electricity to recharge the batteries and pump the hydro water back up the hill to keep the lights on?

The point of Forbes' piece is that the entire green energy scam is just that, a scam; a hoax. If wind could power everything, we would have already been doing it. It can't. And the fact is that the amount of solar radiation reaching the earth is (fortunately for us, as it turns out) woefully inadequate. If it were strong enough to power things like steel manufacturing, it would be too hot for us to live. There is no magic, no technological breakthroughs. Of course, if the green nazis don't like coal, gas, and petroleum, there is nuclear. Nuclear breakdown happens whether you put it to use or not. Putting it to good use provides energy without the carbon dioxide emissions. But again, that is really just a giant scam

Forbes closes with this:

Finally, our green media likes to feature some green energy enthusiast who is “off the grid.” But it usually emerges later in the show that there is a diesel in their shed too.

Those who remember the days of relying on a noisy, smelly diesel in the shed have no wish to be dragged back there by green zealots.

I say "Amen."

Bill Maher Hits an Improbable Home Run

 Andrea Widburg has an excellent post today entitled Video: Bill Maher's excellent monologue attacking the left's gender war on children. As Widburg points out, Maher is an amoral, atheistic leftist but sometimes he hits on the truth:

Comedian and talk show host Bill Maher always reminds me of Henry Wadsworth Longfellow’s famous short poem: “There was a little girl, Who had a little curl, Right in the middle of her forehead. When she was good, She was very good indeed, But when she was bad she was horrid.” Maher’s most notable riffs can be truly horrid, as was the case when he conceded that abortion was murder but added that he doesn’t care, or very good indeed, as happened with his most recent monologue addressing pedophiles in Hollywood and the scourge of wokies forcing transgenderism on children.

Widburg notes that Maher knows that abortion is murder, but he doesn't care because of overpopulation (a "problem that doesn't exist.) But as she notes, just because leftists are now killing the unborn doesn't mean they won't start killing other people they don't lik enmass. Widburg suggests they might decide to kill Trump supporters.

But, on the issue of Hollywood pedophilia and child abuse he is spot on. Go ahead and watch the video of Maher's monologue.

Larger Families Yield Better Leaders?

 It happens often, that on reading one article, you find another that hammers the same theme.  Today it is at Townhall.com by Michael Barone entitled Maybe Larger Families Will Produce Better Leaders. He points to a number of our greatest leaders who would not have been born had their parents at the time stopped at two, or one child. As such it is based on anecdote. But it is a compelling theory nontheless.

Why was America in the Revolutionary War era, with 3 million people, able to generate leaders of the quality of Benjamin Franklin and George Washington, while today's America, with 333 million people, generates the likes of President Joe Biden and former President Donald Trump?

That's a question I keep asking as I alternate between writing about current affairs in this space and reading about the Revolution and the early republic for my book "Mental Maps of the Founders."

I think I've found clues to answers in a seemingly unrelated quarter, in my Washington Examiner colleague Tim Carney's book "Family Unfriendly." Carney argues that more people should have more children, that governments and employers should make that easier, and that parents should, as the title of his first chapter reads, "have lower ambitions for your kids."

I think there are many reasons for having more children in the colonial era. First, most people lived on farms, and needed the manpower to produce food. But I also think people's outlook was more optimistic. They tended to see their lives as God intended them to be.

My research on the Founders produced several surprises, including the fact that most of them did not come from cultures of rigid primogeniture -- in which not only inheritances but families' hopes were concentrated on oldest sons.

On the contrary, among large families -- seven children seems to have been the median family size -- parents and even the children themselves were on the lookout for brothers with exceptionally high talents and concentrated on developing them. Many outstanding leaders had such backgrounds.

The author cites several such cases including George Washington and Benjamin Franklin. Notice that it is not just the parents, but the siblings as well who spot special talents and help develop them. But if the family has only one child, and both father and mother are working, who notices the child's special abilities? The so-called "experts" have proven to be woefully inadequate. Thus we end up with "leaders" like Biden.

None of these leaders would ever have been born if their parents, like typical people today, had no more than two children. Today's aspirational upscale parents, Carney writes, "worry that they are failing if their kids are not prodigies by age 8, or aren't on the path to dominance in violin, tennis, or math." But the odds that any one child will -- like Washington and Franklin, Jackson and Adams, Calhoun and Garfield -- have exceptional talents are less than if their parents had had a houseful of children.

Demographers worry that adults aren't producing enough taxpayers to pay for Social Security and Medicare. Reading Carney and about the Founders has me worried that people, unlike their forebears, aren't producing enough exceptional leaders.

Trust in God and Have More Children

 Please also go an watch Marissa Streit of Prager University interview Marian Tupy about his new book Superabundance which claims the earth needs more people, not fewer. I have noted before that the fact that some products even exist is a testament to a wide market for them and that they would be prohibitive to make were it not that so many people needed them. But Tupy goes even farther. He points out that because we are a reasoning and inventive species, we have in the past, and will continue to make, in his terminology, the pizza bigger and bigger.

I am naturally inclined toward Tupy's ideas because they are hopeful. More to the point, I believe God's first command was to be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth. I also believe that Malthusianism is wrong headed and has been proven wrong many times in the past. Which is why I believe that the belief in the population bomb, and climate change and all of it is a substitute for true religion, which is loving God and one's neighbor. Therefore, trust in God, and have more children.

More on the Betrayal of the American People

 At the American Thinker today, David Prentice has an article entitled Betrayal and the Democrats. Now if you vote Democrat, don't get hot and bothered, because he is talking about our Democrat leaders (and some of them are Democrats running as Republicans. But that is part of the betrayal.) So please read on. It is an eye-opening experience to read the laundry list of the things the garbage "elites" have done to subvert the Constitution and reduce all of us to serfdom.

The story of Judas Iscariot is the archetypal story of betrayal, fascinating and terrifying at the same time.

It's fascinating, because Judas Iscariot was the Apostle who betrayed Jesus to the Pharisees for 30 pieces of silver. He felt so guilty afterwards that he tried to give the silver back.

It's a terrifying story because Jesus was tortured and put to death and then Judas hanged himself. The field where Judas died became known as the field of blood at the time of the New Testament writings. It was a terrifying end to a horrific story.

Judas was picked by Jesus himself. He was one of the original twelve Apostles. He had walked with Jesus for three years, seen miracles, heard the finest teaching ever given, and because of this action, his name has become synonymous with the worst of betrayals, the most graphic of betrayals: Judas telling the guards he would kiss Jesus on the cheek to show them who to arrest.

Judas became incensed because a woman used very expensive oil to anoint Jesus, when it could have been sold and used to feed the poor. I know people today who say the same things. But in truth all that we have and all that we are belonged to God from the beginning. He created us and everything around us. Therefore, it is not entirely wrong to spend some of our money and wealth honoring Him. But I digress. Prentices offers also the case of Benedict Arnold, whose name became a byword for betrayal in the United States as another example.

Prentice then offers a long laundry list of actions the Democrats have taken, most of them since Obama was in office, but the betrayal starts with the founding of the Democrat party. These people do not care about the causes, or the people they are championing. All they care about is power and privilege.

Let me be blunt. The worst of our betrayers are found in the Democrat party. They are betraying America right now and have been for years. Their contempt for America as founded is for a combination of all the above reasons, in spades.

A leftist might say that a difference of opinion does not mean you are a traitor. But that’s not what this is. This is a group of leaders committed to upending all of our institutions. This is a group of leaders who have agreed to seek power above all, while reaping corrupt, unearned, ill-gotten gains. While foisting huge debt on the American public, they preen in the public eye, proud of their fame, proud of their deceit; in their small-souled thinking, they are doing it for the revolution. All while, they are not comprehending the destruction they are foisting on the world of others.

...snip...

They have contempt for the Constitution any time it constrains them. They willfully change the meaning of clear pronouncements, proclaiming elasticity when it’s needed to forward their ideas.

They censor, and no longer champion free speech. They hide their evil deeds.

They want to disarm law-abiding Americans, while allowing violent criminals to go free to wreak havoc again. They want a defenseless population to rule.

They criminalize people for not agreeing with them. They go after anyone who effectively counters them and are doing so regularly using the Justice Department and the FBI (the new Stasi).

They have, and are, spying on their political opponents with the technology available through the Patriot Act. They do this on a massive scale, to anyone in power who is against their ideas. Even against ordinary citizens who align with the center-right.

They intimidate individuals and groups simply because they outwardly disagree with their policies.

They have instituted Soviet-style show trials to imprison their political opponents and have unleashed the horrid practice of lawfare on the country.

The policies enacted to forward the green new deal are psychotic. The poor have a harder time working out of poverty. The middle class can no longer thrive as easily, while the new class of leftist multi-millionaires and billionaires easily glean even more wealth. The green new deal is designed to neuter and ruin us economically, preventing human achievement they don’t like. It’s all about control.

They have weaponized the bureaucracies, the judicial system, the DOJ, and the FBI against its political enemies. These collude with the big tech companies to slander, defame, and destroy while shielding evil from criticism, turning good into evil, and evil into good.

These add up to one truth: Betrayal. Purposeful betrayal of the ideals of our founding. Purposeful betrayal of the American public. All in the name of social justice and compassion.

I alluded to the fact that the leadership of the Democrat party is doing these things in spite of the Constitution that prevents them. As a famous founder of the Democrats, Andrew Jackson said "John Marshall (Supreme Court Chief Justice) has made his decision; now let him enforce it." It has been this way with these people ever since. They don't care, the just want power. So, if you vote Democrat, why?

First they came for...

 Today, at The Federalist Kyle Seraphin has a must read article entitled Why The FBIs Assault on Catholics Threatens All Christians.

Betrayal. If I could sum it all up in one word, it would have to be “betrayal.”

“This is what being stabbed in the back feels like,” I thought to myself on that winter day when I first laid eyes on the FBI’s anti-Catholic “Richmond memo.”My reaction was predictable. I am Catholic, and I thought it was appalling, plain and simple.

Of all the groups our top federal law enforcement agency would write an 11-page document targeting, they picked us. With all of the crime going on in the country, especially in the last few years, the FBI decided we Catholics were the problem.

“Radical-traditionalist,” I thought, trying to make sense of the term the FBI used more than 40 times throughout the memo. It was certainly not a term I had ever heard before in the counterterrorism space.

Who is a “radical-traditionalist Catholic?” (Let’s call them “RTC” for short.)

In a nutshell, RTCs are specifically identified by their desire to worship in the old Latin Mass. But in reality, anyone who believes abortion is murder, who believes homosexuality is an abomination, that children shouldn't be exposed to drag queens and on and on is a target.

The FBI is establishing a gateway in what they think is “fringe Catholicism,” as a means to go after Christians in general and declare them to be the real “threats” and “potential terrorists” in the country.

Slowly but surely, the FBI is probing its way into all religious communities. All Christians are in the crosshairs. They may be gung-ho on RTCs now, but the idea of them targeting a so-called “radical Baptist” or “radical Lutheran” in the near future is certainly on the table.

These days are looking more and more like the times described by Paul in his various epistles. In those days, Christians stood out from their pagan surroundings by not giving in to the devil, whether he called himself by Baal, or Astarte, or Molock, or a host of other names. We all must remain strong and refuse to be herded into the pens the so-called "elites" have waiting for us. They do not care about babies, either born or unborn. They do not care about the gays and lesbians, or the drag queens. What they care about is power, and they are trying to distract us with the equivalent of bread and circuses. In the process they are doing the devils bidding.

I implore you to read the entire article highlighted and remember Pastor Niemöller's poem "First they came for the..."

Congress Lays Down a Marker

At Ammoland the National Shooting Sports Foundation has an opinion piece entitled Gun Lobby Welcomes Sen. Hagarty's Protecting Privacy in Purchases Act Introduction. Needless to say, by sorting through the private sales records of individuals to find out who bought guns and ammo, the government has committed a gross violation of the 4th Amendment that everyone involved should have recognized. And I believe they did. They just ignored it for ideological reasons.

The Firearm Industry Trade Association, hails the introduction of S. 4075, the Protecting Privacy in Purchases Act, by U.S. Sen. Bill Hagerty (R-Tenn.), which would ban the use of a firearm retailer-specific Merchant Category Code (MCC). The legislation would protect the Second Amendment privacy of firearm and ammunition purchasers from financial service and payment card providers compiling purchase history that has already proven to be exploited by the federal government for political purposes.

...snip...

“The Biden administration has already admitted that it unlawfully used the private firearm purchase data of law-abiding citizens to label them as potential domestic terrorists in a politically-driven gun control scheme,” said Lawrence G. Keane, NSSF Senior Vice President & General Counsel.

I certainly applaud the Senator as well as the companion bill in the House. But I have to wonder, it the Biden administration is willing to knowingly violate the 4th Amendment, why are they going to pay attention to a mere statute? After all, since the DOJ is part of the Biden administration, so the law will not likely be enforced. But, Perhaps it is good that Congress lays down a marker.

Do you need an AR-15?

 Mike McDaniel asks the question Should I buy an AR-15? He then answers with an absolute "Yes." You can read his reasons, many of which are the same as why everyone in the old days needed to have a 22LR. But, McDaniel's first, and major reason is:

But why? There are many good reasons, including the Mummified Meat Puppet Administration doesn’t want you to have one and they’re willing to lie about it and threaten to bomb, even nuke, you to get them. Also, it has been scientifically proved there is no such thing as too many guns or too much ammunition. Trust the science.

So, sure, if the so-called "elites" don't want the unwashed masses to have them, it seems to me very important to have one. On the other hand, most of us live in urban and suburban settings where finding a range to practice is difficult. My own range doesn''t allow anything other than pistol caliber weapons. So, if I had a rifle chambered in...say...357 Magnum, that would be acceptable. But that means it would probably be a lever action, not an AR-15.

You can probably think of other reasons why you might want something other than an AR-15. But please read McDaniel's post and think about it for yourself.

Never Give Up Your Guns. Never!

 Andrea Widburg has a post today at the American Thinker that is simply precious. In it, Lily Tang Williams, an immigrant from China and a survivor of Mao's Cultural Revolution takes down David Hogg. You can find Widburg's post at Video: She escaped Communist China and destroys David Hogg on gun control. Please also check out the two pieces form the Bookworm Room. She makes excellent cases for the Second Amendment in both.

Lily asks if Hogg can promise her that the United States government will never turn totalitarian. Hogg answers, surprisingly honestly, that no, no one can promise such a thing. Of course, that is exactly why the Founders put the Second Amendment in the Bill of Rights. They all knew that the Constitution is just a piece of paper; that what gives the Constitution power is the people's belief in its principles. And when the Constitution is ignored, as is now happening with alarming regularity, when the President defies the Supreme Court regularly, when all this fails, We the People have the right, and duty to change our government. This is exactly what the Second Amendment was written for. And no, I am no advocating for staring a revolution, but at the same time, if our so-called "elites" do not back down, there remains that one last resort.

So, the lesson here is never give up your guns, your ammunition, or your rights. Never. Stand with Lily.

Don't Be Like the Movie Guys Who Rack the Slide Before Engaging the Bad Guy

Mike McDaniel has a post telling us that Yes, chambered semi autos are safe. Col. Jeff Cooper advocated the "cocked and locked" carry method for the 1911 pistol. I have carried in that manner for close to 20 years. I do dry fire practice often to keep the need to draw and push down the thumb safety in muscle memory. But I don't put my finger in the trigger guard until I make a decision to shoot.

But most new gun buyers don't buy 1911s, do they? It is an old style weapon, an elegant weapon for another age, as they say in the Star Wars movies. Most buyers buy the plastic fantastic pistols, which are usually striker fired and have no safety. Are these also safe to carry with a live round in the chamber?

Full disclosure: I learned to shoot handguns with revolvers, attaining expert status, but as semiautos evolved, becoming not only as reliable as revolvers, and with the advent of Glocks, which took over the police and civilian markets, became expert with those as well. I’ve fired and owned every trigger mechanism, single action as in the 1911 and P-35 Hi-Power, double action, double action only and striker fired as in Glocks.

Other than the 1911 and Hi-Power, I’ve never used the safety on any other semiautomatic I’ve owned, and have been entirely safe in so doing. Why not the 1911 and Hi-Power? They’re early 1900s single action designs with cocked hammers and light triggers with short travel. I had the grip safeties on my 1911s pinned in the “off” position. John Moses Browning, America’s greatest firearm inventor, did not include a grip safety on the Hi-Power, which he invented after the 1911.

Here's the ultimate consideration: any gun is safe if the trigger finger is kept in register—straight and in contact with the frame, outside the trigger guard—until fractions of a second before it’s necessary to pull the trigger. After the trigger is pulled, so long as immediate follow-up shots aren’t required, the trigger finger immediately returns to register.

A secondary concern is always using holsters that completely cover the trigger guard and trigger so it’s difficult to accidently pull the trigger when drawing. It’s equally important to always keep the trigger finger in register when reholstering, and to look to ensure neither clothing nor anything else can get in the way and pull the trigger.

McDaniel makes a good point that if you are afraid to carry a live round in the chamber, you need to get more training. You should respect your weapon, but not be afraid of it. I once dropped a Kahr PM9 on the floor due to fumble fingers. It did not go off even though it had 7 rounds in the magazine and one in the chamber. It is a small, plastic fantastic gun, and I let my brother try shooting it. He also dropped it, and again, nothing. If a modern gun is functioning properly, they are safe to carry a round in the chamber. Don't be like the movie guys who rack the slide before engaging the bad guy. You want to draw and be immediately ready to engage. Half seconds count.

Nazis Strike Again

 D. Parker, at the American Thinker has an excellent series of articles showing how the Democrat party is aping the Nazi party of the 1930s and 40s. Now Monica Showalter gets into the act with Yellow star? Biden plans to lable goods produced by Jewish settlements in the West Bank. First of all, the "West Bank" is historically part of Israel. Jesus walked these roads from Galillee to Jerusalem. But second, this shows, once again, that the Democrats are on the side of Hamas, of Iran, in general of the Muslims. If you want to know how evil this implies, just not that Islam is the direct opposite of Christianity in everything.

Republicans and all people of goodwill need to shut this creeping Naziism down now.

I don't know that there is much I need that Israel supplies, but if I do, I will make it a priority to buy it. Meanwhile, go read Showalter's post.

Elites Will Resort to Violence If You Don't Comply

 In the last week, John Daniel Davidson has opened my eyes to the fact that no matter what variety of Marxism globalist "elites" are intending to herd us into, they are all a return to paganism.  Whether communism, or fascism, or any other collectivist materialism, these globalists believe that there is no truth, and anything is permitted.  The laws protect only the rich and powerful.  Logic, of course is nonexistent because there is no truth, no correct answer.  And, as J. B. Shurk tells us Marxist Globalists Will Resort to Terror and Violence.

It is important to understand that censorship does not occur in a vacuum. It is a symptom of a worsening disease. It is an early indicator of the political repression to come. Like a canary in a coal mine, the criminalization of speech forewarns that State-sponsored terror and murder are not far away. First, certain words and thoughts are banned. Next, certain people are rounded up and imprisoned. Finally, certain “enemies of the State” are executed quite publicly. The imposition of fear supersedes the rule of law. Terrorism undergirds social order. Oppression replaces popular support.

What is happening in the West today is a concentrated push for global communism. We could bicker about precise definitions — whether we are under attack from Marxists, socialists, Leninists, Trotskyites, Maoists, or other “revolutionaries” — but the end goal is clear. A small group of global “elites” seek to use ideological and economic leverage to centralize political power and direct all human activity. They seek the abolition of private property. They seek absolute control over individual lives and local communities. They are rebuilding twentieth-century totalitarianism with the privacy-destroying surveillance technologies of the twenty-first century.

Most Western nations are working together to promote a public vision that achieves their private totalitarian goals. Governments do not care about “hate speech”; they are dedicated to seizing control of the press, punishing dissent, censoring political opposition, and regulating public debate. Governments do not care about “climate change”; they are dedicated to seizing control over all economic activity by first establishing a monopoly on available energy. Governments do not care about “systemic racism,” “social justice,” or “income inequality”; they are dedicated to maximizing social divisions and distorting the meaning of fundamental rights, so that they may undermine long-cherished personal liberties. Governments do not care about “gun violence”; they are dedicated to disarming their populations and making it impossible for them to fight back against tyranny. Governments do not care about minimizing vicious and costly wars; they are dedicated to distracting their citizens with false threats to their personal security. Governments do not care about maintaining the integrity and value of their monetary currencies; they are dedicated to printing and spending money that inflates household costs, taxes middle class savings, maximizes Wall Street profits, and increases welfare dependency. Governments do not need to create central bank digital currencies to stave off economic disaster; they are dedicated to creating economic disasters, so that they can justify a future communist system that runs on privacy-destroying CBDCs.

...snip...

What is important to understand is that the various Western projects active today all reflect this long conflict among Marxists about the best way to achieve their “revolution.” Sure, there still remain a few residual peaceniks in the faculty lounge who believe — as Kautsky did — that human societies will naturally evolve into Marxist Utopias and “equitable” communes from the sheer deterministic forces of historical materialism. There are far more, however, who believe political repression, terror, and violence are essential for success. Standing somewhere in the middle — for the time being, at least — are the great majority of governmental and non-governmental forces pushing demonstrable forms of Marxist socialism under the guise of public policies ostensibly meant to advance environmentalism, mass migration, pandemic preparedness, minority rights, or “sustainable” economic development in impoverished communities.

We are familiar with their many names: the World Economic Forum’s “Great Reset,” the United Nations’ “2030 Agenda,” the “Green New Deal,” the “Build Back Better” initiatives, George Soros’s “Open Society Foundations,” and the World Health Organization’s “Pandemic Treaty.” There are many others, of course. Every perceived global problem provides Marxist socialists with an opportunity to “solve” that problem by constructing financial and governmental institutions that advance their “revolution.” They believe that they can “speed up” the “progression” of human history by creating painful conditions that justify communism’s architecture. The vast majority of globalists who run central banks, newsrooms, intelligence agencies, administrative departments, legislative assemblies, religious nonprofits, and too many corporate boardrooms are all “true believers.”

Make no mistake, when these Marxist globalists conclude that an increasingly popular resistance force within Western society threatens their “long march” toward domination, they will not throw up their hands in defeat, shrug, and concede, “Well, that’s democracy.” In their twisted totalitarian minds, only ideological allies merit “democratic” respect or civil rights protections; ideological foes deserve dictatorial force and bloody despotism.

Please read the whole article. If these guys get what they want, we are all serfs to these few so-called "elites." We have rights only because we are a Christian nation. For those who don't believe in God do not also believe in rights. They believe in power.

The New Paganism

 I just got to this book by John Daniel Davidson of The Federalist entitled Pagan America: The Decline of Christianity and the Dark Age to Come. Unfortunately, authors keep coming out with great books and I have something of a backlog of reading.  The book is makes clear that reason, fairness, rule of law and such concepts will in the future not hold sway.  Instead, it will be raw power.  I had thought to write a book report when, as chance would have it, Casey Chalk has already written a very good one. You can find his book report at As Christianity Declines, We Must Confront the Threat of Pagan America.

The historical narrative grade-school and collegiate students learn today portrays pre-modern societies across the world living in peaceful symbiosis with nature… until they were brutally defeated, if not destroyed by an intolerant Christian civilization. Davidson relates a number of historical anecdotes proving how blinkered this story is. Whether we are talking about the ancient societies of the Mediterranean, pagan northern Europe, or indigenous America, all demonstrated a profound disregard for (or exploitation of) the weak and vulnerable. Davidson cites the Vikings, Aztecs, and 19th-century kingdom of Benin as civilizations engaging in ritual human sacrifice to appease angry, bloodthirsty gods, but there are plenty of others.

Judaism and then Christianity repudiated such societies, built as they were on power, fear, and the fulfillment of base sensual desires. It was the church that rejected the common Roman practice of abandoning (if not murdering) unwanted children, stopped human sacrifice in northern Europe, and discouraged polygamy in the Americas and Africa.

Citing Tom Holland’s popular book Dominion, Davidson writes: “Human rights, equality, care for the poor, mercy for the condemned, refuge for the persecuted, charity for the marginalized and downtrodden: these were never self-evident truths.” Rather, “they are unmistakably Christian ideas that rely on specifically Christian doctrines, without which they are unintelligible.” Obviously, Christian societies were by no means perfect and were often hypocritical, but it’s undeniable that they ushered in a paradigmatic shift via their understanding of the dignity of the human person.

Davidson notes, and I agree with this, that this paradigmatic shift profoundly influenced the Founders such that the founding documents of our Constitutional republic create a very Christian identity for our nation. The secular nature of our government was meant not to discriminate against any of the many denominations of Christianity to avoid the bloodshed that had plagued Europe. At the same time, this neutrality was not meant to count Islam, or wiccan, Mormonism, Jehovah's Witnesses or any other pagan religion as "religion."  Indeed, some of these did not exist at the time.  I doubt the founders even considered cults outside of Christianity.

Davidson's thesis is that:

...an increasingly secular America is not ushering in a rational, neutral, and indifferent regime, but rather a revitalized form of paganism. Indeed, that irrationalism is on full display in the growing popularity of superstitious beliefs such as horoscopes, crystals, tarot, occultism, wiccanism, and an unwavering faith in “the science” even when what “the science” declares is reversed only a short time after it was considered dogma. But Davidson is just getting started here.

He argues that neo-paganism is visible across our polis. Abortion and euthanasia, for example, are new forms of human sacrifice; transhumanism and transgenderism reflect man’s attempt to usurp God’s authority over nature. Moreover, warns Davidson, if minors have the autonomy to decide their own “gender,” what’s stopping our paganizing establishment from also claiming that minors have the autonomy to pursue sexual relations with whomever they choose? Artificial intelligence, in turn, serves as a “godlike” artifice, a “Promethean power” to be worshiped.

I would argue that the Climate Change scam is also a pagan religion. The notion that we puny humans have the power and ability to control the weather is the height of hubris, and again seeks to grant to humans "godlike" powers. But we can't even predict with accuracy two days out, let alone 100 years.

I am only a little way into Davidson's book, but Chalk's report pretty well hits on the high points of his work. It will be again, as it was in the Roman era when God entered the world and died on a cross for our sins, because we couldn't do it ourselves. Gird your loins, Christian warriors. Prepare to do battle not with earthly authorities by with principalities and powers in the spiritual realm. Oh, and go read Chalk's report.

A Murderer and a Liar

 Sarah Arnold at townhall.com notes that a High-Ranking Cardinal Calls for Americans to Reject Biden's Pro-Abortion 'Murderous Ideology'

President Joe Biden— a “devout” Catholic— is under fire for repeatedly going against what the church believes in due to his pro-abortion stance.

This week, Cardinal Gerhard Müller, the former prefect of the Vatican’s highest doctrine office, called for Biden’s ex-communication as the president vowed to reinstate Roe v. Wade in his State of the Union Address.

Müller described Biden’s efforts to keep abortion legal for American women as “infanticide.”

He said that it is unacceptable to declare yourself a Catholic but to promote the killing of another human being.

As quoted by from the American Life League:

"The outrage that Biden would proclaim this on the Feast of the Resurrection of Christ is NOT an accident."

"This is proof positive that Biden has no respect for the teachings of the Catholic Church, and does not understand the basic truth that God created man in His image, male and female, and that anyone or any statement that violates that basic teaching is an abomination. It is the work of the devil who is operating through the actions and words of Biden himself."

While masquerading as a "faithful" Roman Catholic, Biden in fact is advocating the human sacrifice that was common among pagan cultures throughout history. Often enough, this human sacrifice took the form of child sacrifice such as parents throwing their infants into the fiery belly of Molock.  This is the work of the devil, who was always a murderer and a liar.

Speak Now

 Kurt Schlichter has an article today at Townhall.com entitled Use Their Calculated Insults Against Them.

Of course the proclamation that Christianity’s most holy day had been replaced by National Day of Visibility for the Mentally Ill and/or Perverted was intended to offend. Understand that communism is really a manifestation of hatred for others – the others being us – and that part of the fun is exercising power over the normals. They intend to insult us, then they gaslight that it was just a coincidence. But everyone – us and them – know that it is, in fact, a disgusting and disgraceful blasphemy designed to disrespect us.

The real problem is that we notice. Why are you Jesus people so triggered? This comes from people who scream like little girls when you point out that they are not actually little girls.

But do not get wrapped up in the right or wrong of it, at least when dealing with the communists. There is no right or wrong for them; there is only what is required right now, this minute, to solidify or increase their power. You cannot reason with them and you will not talk them out of anything. Their rejection of reason and facts and objective truth is really their greatest advantage. It puts normal people on the defensive because normal people’s tools are utterly ineffective since those tools include debate and argument and analysis.

Understand that it is about power. But it’s not the optimal type of power, not usually and not yet. The optimal power is a gun, and while they do have federal law enforcement, there are still barriers to their full exercise of the kind of power to imprison and murder their opponents, like their heroes in Stalin’s Russia or China or the fake nation of Palestine or Cuba or wherever. They can’t just kill you, not en masse, not yet, though make no mistake – that is where they want to end up. And this is why you need to buy guns and ammunition to have in reserve to lawfully defend your freedom against open tyranny.

So, in the first four paragraphs Schlichter lays out exactly what is happening here. These insults are about power. They don't really care about the causes and people they are screaming about.  They just use them as tools to gain power.

The first step is to understand the enemy. Understand the nature of their power. The fat mutant womyn shrieking on the streets, the chestless femboys throwing paint on paintings, the credentialed cretins in the regime media – they cannot make you do anything. They can only convince you to do their will. They are nothing unless you give in, unless you buy into their premises and accept their paradigm.

Don’t.

Let’s look at the Easter blasphemy. They get an erotic thrill from insulting you, sure. Remember, communism is largely driven by the stunted, immature emotional chaos of its practitioners. It’s a daddy issue writ large as an ideology. That’s communism’s weakness – it overreaches because its adherents do not have the mental strength or discipline to forgo the giddy thrill of showing their contempt for you before they have fully locked-in their power. We can still resist, and their short-term jollies will inspire normals to do so. Biden and the rest just could not pass up a chance to get in your face and compare their weirdos buddies with our Savior. As a bonus, if we do nothing and accept it, we are trained in submission. Their next atrocity will be even worse. Eventually, we will be serfs.

So don’t give in.

Our reaction determines how this goes. Do we freak out? No, we point out the insult not to reaffirm to each other the badness of our enemies – we are based and already know how bad our enemies are – but to awaken those who are not yet based. Remember, there is a default to normality on the part of normal people. They assume the system is working, that people are operating in good faith, and that everyone functions on the basis of objective truth. The communists exploit this default assumption of normality, knowing that normals will assume that the communists’ actions cannot be as crazy or evil as they seem. But they are as crazy or evil as they seem.

That’s why incidents like the Trans Day of Nonsense are useful to us to help us break through the normals’ benefit of the doubt for the communists. There are red lines that normals will not cross, and when the communists do push over them – because they cannot help themselves – there is pushback. Look at the military – normals won’t join. Look at the school boards – normal people are firing them. The country is falling apart, and Donald Trump is ahead despite being framed and outspent. That’s pushback. The potential to fight back exists. And cultural abominations like this proclamation are powerful tools for us to radicalize the normals and let them see the truth they would prefer to ignore.

Go read Schlichter's entire article. He makes a good point that right now they still can not do anything to you. You need to speak up. The one thing that you need is courage. But once you see that what Schichter suggests works, the need for courage disappears. Speak now, while you still can, because they intend to take away all your rights and imprison you or kill you for speaking up. Don't let them go there.

Tears and Hope

 Here's a real life story that should bring both tears and hope to many.  The story can be found at Bearing Arms entitled How a Gun Saved My Life When It Almost Took It by Eddie Davenport.

First the tears:

I stand there perfectly calm, relaxed even, loading shells into my Remington 1100. After the third shell, I pull back the charging handle, putting the gun into battery. Like any good hunter, I top it up with an additional shell. Except, I'm not hunting today. I'm preparing to end it all. Years of stress as a first responder have led me to this moment, but just as I’m about to pull the trigger, the phone rings.

On the line is my friend from my rescue years, going through similar struggles. I share my dark intentions, and he yells, "IF YOU HANG UP, I’LL BEAT THE S*** OUT OF YOUR CORPSE!"

Davenport explains that his years as an EMT had so traumatized him, that he felt ending his life was the only way. Apparently, the fact that he did not do anything to cause these traumas, but he was one of those to respond anyway never crossed his mind. But, we don't want to leave gentle readers hanging on the phone. What happened?

As a first responder, we are taught that we are heroes; we don’t need help; we can do it on our own. We also knew that if you actually spoke up and sought help, your career was over. You wouldn't be trusted anymore by your superiors. Now, I’m about to be another EMT’s reason for going home and crying. Who knows, maybe I’d be the reason they go home and kill themselves as well. None of these thoughts crossed my mind as I stood there; what did cross my mind was why was I loading more than one round. The majority of suicides I responded to, the firearm was loaded with multiple rounds as well. I still don’t know why.

Fast forward to our opening lines, and my friend arrived; he took my shotgun, made me pour out the whiskey, and come with him. I slept for about a day, and then we went shooting.

...snip...

My friend knew what he was doing. He knew the only way forward for me was to face my fears and stop distracting myself with alcohol. We shot guns and we talked; I cried a lot. In the end, I became a better man.

It wasn't an overnight change. There were years of hardship; I took my anger out on my new girlfriend (now wife), and I took my anger out on my wonderful dog who to this day loves me unconditionally; I do not deserve that forgiveness, but both of them gave it to me.

That moment we opened up happened over a decade ago, but I can still remember every move I made.

Today I work with an organization called Walk the Talk America; we are the intersection of guns and mental health. We train therapists in what gun culture is and work with firearm owners to seek care without fear of rights restrictions. When I was loading my gun, I needed something to grab ahold of my consciousness and cause me to pause and think. Luckily, I had a phone call. But not everyone is that lucky.

Gentle readers are urged to read the entire article. It really is not about guns in the usual sense, but in a periferal sense it may be. Most of us never have to use our guns in self defense. But, we practice all the time in various gun sports that prepare us. And shooting helped Eddie Davenport at a critical time in his life.