Good News: More Hollywood Liberal Entertainers Boycott Florida's Stand Your Ground In Favor of Lie Down and Die

TED NUGENT WEIGHS IN ON SOULLESS STEVIE WONDER AND BRAIN DEAD BOYCOTT

I LIKE YOU STEVIE, BUT NOT THAT MUCH

LATELY....SOME VERY NARCISSISTIC, LIBERAL ENTERTAINERS ARE HAVING A HISSIE FIT OVER TURN-OF-EVENTS IN FLORIDA AND THEY'RE NOT GOING TO TAKE IT NO MO!! 

IT'S SPREADING LIKE, WELL... WEED...They want you to know the Rule of Law and jury system makes them really, really, really mad, and they've having a tantrum until the state of Florida bends to their wishes.  It's not about Tryvon Martin either, it's about power.  And nothing will be enough.

Isn't it interesting that all these boycotting entertainers have a major corps of body guards and security forces that are packing more heat than an ordinary big city police force?  Are they going to let them all go now? 

So take that, Florida! And that!  They're big enough to bring down the  entire state and have more body guards too!

You see, they're bigger than the people, governments and the Rule of Law and the jury system.

Well Stevie, Kanye, Jay Z (without the hyphen for heavens sake)and Madonna--The Material Girl---this is certainly drawing a line in the sand...and a good line.  Meanwhile, my personal response is the title of one of my favorite Stevie classics.... OVERJOYED. So here's some advice fellas---Maybe it's time to sure nuff stay out of Florida and to go to Jamaica or Iran or Venezuela where you might better belong.

Are These Kids Not Adorable With Their Swaddled Newborn Baby Boy?

@HET?: ANTHONY WEINER FOR PRESIDENT!
KLAVAN:  HOLDER FOR LIE DOWN AND DIE!

HOW CAN ANYONE NOT LOVE A GOOD FIRST COMES LOVE, THEN COMES MARRIAGE, THEN COME THE ROYALS WITH A BABY CARRIAGE STORY?

Can you remember taking your first newborn home?  You're excited, scared, fascinated by this new little creature wiggling in your arms.   You have no idea how little sleep you're going to get for the next few months. How utterly exhausted you'll be. No idea.  Or how much one of those little things can scream and poop.

Do you remember how beserk you went the first time that itty bitty looked up and smiled at you?  You thought they were smiling at you, didn't you? but it was really.....gas......followed by the most horrible sounds you ever heard.....ooops! And we won't even mention the smells or the spit up.....Hurry, bring another diaper. And another, and another.....

Then one day, it really is a real smile and you are  simply beside yourself, over-the- moon with joy.

It's all an amazing time.  Good for them for not having a nanny right now.  Of course, she has her mother Carol and plenty of other help and assistance.  But I'm also sure they want  time alone with this little fellow to bond and get acquainted. 

Congratulations to this adorable little family and may God watch over them and bless them greatly.

Sunday---Kiddos On Atlantic, Sermon On Discernment

THANKS TO MY FAVORITE SON.

Here is an interesting brief sermon on why we need discernment in all areas of life, including but not limited to listening to the news.  Never have we needed discernment more as individuals and a nation and never have we had it less:

Bill Whittle: The Lynching That Won't End

ALLAPUNDIT: OBAMA'S TRAYVON SPEECH WAS  FOR LEFT TO KNOW THAT DOJ HAS NO CASE AGAINST ZIMMERMAN

THESE SHOCKING AND SHAMEFUL FACTS JUST DON'T LINE UP WITH THE LIBERAL NARRATIVE, DO THEY? 

Publications like TIME, the NYT, WaPo and many others haven't printed anything like what was in the police, FBI and autopsy reports.

Sadly, many people simply don't make time or bother to get acquainted with the pesky little facts.  They look at some photo and make up their minds in the most superficial of ways.  Especially over-politically correct 'journalists,' grandee celebrities and liberal, racist politicians who would never want the truth get in the way of a modern day lynching.  It's good for their business.

Amazing how many salient and relevant facts were not allowed in the courtroom testimony and yet the jury acquitted Zimmerman anyway.

Justice for Trayvon but none for Zimmerman? You'd have to have part of your brain removed to take the racist bait of such notables as President Barack Obama and his  sidekick, Eric Holder, not to mention Al Sharpton---all who are waging a nuclear Word War devoid of facts but rife with emotion and demagoguery.

H/T American Digest

Disgraceful Obama Administration Perpetuates Racism

UPDATE:  OBAMA KEEPS PUTTING ON HIS DADDY HAT ON

I CONTINUE TO BE HORRIFIED at how Mr. Obama and Mr. Holder keep inappropriately interjecting themselves in the Martin/Zimmerman case (closed) only making things  worse. They just keep digging themselves deeper and deeper into a hole.

What an insult to state and local law enforcement agencies and  courts who found there were no racist motives whatsoever involved in this case.  Yet these federal elected and appointed officials keep trying to hijack the narrative, beat a dead horse and make it about something it's not.  Yes, there are many injustices in the mandatory sentencing procedures that incarcerate more blacks for longer than whites....and other things.... and that needs to be changed.

Yet, in this case, justice was served.

Bryan Preston writes about the Obama speech today at PJMedia:

Throughout his remarks, Obama went to his “on the one hand, on the other hand” style in which he appears to be a moderate, but ultimately what he did was fail to lead. The tragic shooting of Trayvon Martin is becoming a cause, or an excuse, for some to commit violence against their fellow Americans.

Rioters have committed numerous acts of violence, including attacking a Hispanic man in Baltimore and assaulting a white grandmother in Houston. This is unacceptable. Unrest has been encouraged by the New Black Panthers, by Sharpton and the refrain “No justice, no peace.”

Obama’s answer to violence? More talk: “If I see any violence, then I will remind folks that that dishonors what happened to Trayvon Martin and his family.” There has already been violence. Has he not seen it?

It may not have occurred to the president, but people who have already resorted to violence are not likely to listen to anyone remind them of anything. How about warning them that the criminal justice system stands ready to deal with anyone who breaks the law ahead of any violence? Obama did not issue such a warning.
That, and his entire tone, constitute a glaring failure of leadership. Barack Obama had a moment when he could have stood above all the factions in the black community, indeed all the factions arguing over the verdict in that trial. He could have spoken to and for more than just one American community. He chose instead to insert himself and race into the story from the world’s largest bully pulpit, while refusing to use that bully pulpit to stand up forcefully for the rule of law.

No fair-minded person will reject the fact that blacks have faced extraordinary mistreatment and racism through American history, from slavery to Jim Crow to backward attitudes that continue to persist. But race played no role in this specific case, according to the prosecution’s case, according to the jury that reached the verdict, and according to Trayvon Martin’s own mother. The president owes the American people a basic, factual accounting, not a third autobiography. By insisting on injecting himself and race into the case, Obama risks inflaming passions when he could have quieted them.

If You Only See One Kitten Rescue Film This Year....This Is It!

LUCKY THE KITTEN GETS  REALLY LUCKY AND MEETS HER KIND RESCUER! Not a minute too soon.

This little gem of a film was done tongue-in-cheek by the Fresno firefighter who always wears a camera on his helmet when working.

Further explanation here:



H/T HotAir

Liz, It's Not Going To Happen For You In Wyoming Right Now, What Are You Thinking?

UPDATE---GAIL COLLINS @ NYT: THE CHENEY IN WAITING

LOOK LIZ, I'VE SEEN YOU OCCASIONALLY ON TV and think you're fairly smart and articulate. Then last year the buzz around Jackson was you and your hubby were moving  here so you could begin to build a political power base for yourself.

But isn't today's official announcement that you're running against senior Republican Sen. Mike Enzi jumping the gun a tad bit? To me it verges on major arrogance.  After all,  you've been living in Virginia for decades even though your dad and mom have a huge second or third home here in Wilson.

If you're really doing this for the people of Wyoming, then shouldn't you wait a while and get acquainted with them ---not just in liberal-leaning Jackson but all over the state?  Enzi has been a Wyomingian for decades and serves the people admirably.  He knows them and their issues. He's also the incumbent, one of the most conservative senior senators in Congress.

But you know all that, and clearly are choosing to shove ahead with the help of your dad and his network of deep-pocket friends.

Carry on, my dear. But I predict this is not going to go the way you'd like it to next year.  You come across as a pushy, impatient, divisive and self-serving  broad who's out for herself. It's simply too soon and way too insincere.

You're using the people of Wyoming---not to mention forcing Enzi to start campaigning a year early, taking him away from doing his job---and I pray they won't let you succeed.

A Few Words On the Zimmerman Verdict

THERE'S VIRTUALLY NOTHING I CAN ADD TO  THIS CORRECT VERDICT  except to repeat what has already been said ad nauseam:   It has been the biggest, silliest and craziest witch hunt---and attempt to make a humongous  mountain out of a sad but minor molehill---that I have seen in my lifetime.  Congratulations to the jury for not bending to massive, highly charged political and emotional pressure,  and instead ruling on the unvarnished evidence.   No other verdict could have come from jurors even mildly in touch with reality (verses manufactured media fantasy propaganda).

As a matter of fact,  I too think this case should never have gone to  trial in the first place.  Fortunately Zimmerman as unfortunate scapegoat and sacrificial lamb had terrific, smart lawyers who did their part to defend him extremely well.

Highest congratulations and best wishes to them.

I blame the MSM media---including  Matt Drudge whom I mostly like--- and the professional race baiters for much of the mayhem and emotional tantrums and group projections on Zimmerman. (Is America really gripped in the second day of mass fury? Or are the usual suspects having their usual cry baby tantrums and getting more than ample attention from the usual media suspects who then try to magnify it into World War XYZ? It's a rhetorical question.)  

Victim consciousness is alive, well and getting louder in American today. In fact, it's big business with all the special interests that stand to gain more hits and money from beating this dead horse and continuing to give coverage where coverage is really not due. Such publicity is only playing into the unthinking, over-emotional masses only too willing to take up their cross of victimhood and follow race baiters' lead like sheep to the slaughter. This is exactly what the liberal media wants them to do.

Eric Holder and Al Sharpton are beyond the pale in every way as far as I'm concerned.  Two race-baiting hacks who love the sound of their own divisive, racist voices and have  no limits to the extent of their power-mongering egos.

Meanwhile, Talk Left gives the finest wrap-up of the Zimmerman trial I've read to date:

The legacy of this case will be that the media never gets it right, and worse, that a group of lawyers, with the aid of a public relations team, who had a financial stake in the outcome of pending and anticipated civil litigation, were allowed to commandeer control of Florida's criminal justice system, in pursuit of a divisive, personal agenda.

Their transformation of a tragic but spontaneous shooting into the crime of the century, and their relentless demonization of the person they deemed responsible, not for a tragic killing, but for "cold-blooded murder," has called into question the political motives and ethics of the officials serving in the Executive branch of Florida's government, ruined the career of other public officials, turned the lives of the Zimmerman family, who are as innocent as their grieving clients, into a nightmare, and along the way, set back any chance of a rational discussion of the very cause they were promoting, probably for years.

The problems of racial disparity and arbitrary enforcement of our criminal laws are real, systemic and need to be addressed. Criminal defense lawyers see it and fight to correct it every day. From charging decisions to plea offers to sentences, the system is not fair and everybody knows it. 

But this case has never been representative of those problems. And perhaps most unfortunate of all, as a result of the false narrative created by the lawyers for grieving parents who tragically lost their son -- a narrative perpetuated by a complicit and ratings-hungry media -- any attempt at meaningful reform is likely to fall on deaf ears for years to come.

Sunday---Pastor Mike Atkins On What 'The Fear of the Lord' Really Means

Faith-Filled Living In Fear-Filled Times (Pt. 8) from River Crossing on Vimeo.

TO MY WAY OF THINKING, this is one of the all-time best, most inspired of Pastor Mike Atkin's many great  sermons. So packed with insight it is, I've listened to it twice and will surely do so again periodically.

 I've learned so much that I want to share it today.

One of the best bottom lines is: Before you can embrace the Good News of salvation in Jesus Christ, you have to really understand the bad news first. There are many more salient points, but you can mine them for yourself from this glowing gem of a sermon.

Greetings From Jackson Hole With My Brand Spanking New Hard Drive

NO SOONER THAN RETURNING FROM CLARK, WY MONDAY EVENING, I found my computer's hard drive crashing as it got slower and slower. 

By early Thursday it was non-existent.

I began assessing my few sad options with no connectivity:  either go to Idaho Falls and buy a new computer with the dreaded new Windows operating system; or find a competent geek here in Jackson to mine my hard drive data and put it on a sparkling new one.  I chose the latter, finding a terrific, adorable guy from Slovakia named Yuri (pronounced your-eye) with a business called Computer Clinic that fixed everything in less than 24 hours.

 Now I'm happy to be back, thanks to my new friend and  computer-snowboard geek---Yuri.

OK, so the pic above is one  I took at the car wash after picking up my newly remade computer this afternoon.  It tells a great story of indigenous Jackson Hole, but the story will have to wait till in the morning when I'm fresh and ready to write again.

Meanwhile,  have a nice evening;  hope see you  soon!

Sunday, Seeing Pleasure Through the Enemy's Eyes

THERE ARE TWO FATHERS: Our heavenly Father or the Father of Lights and His defeated enemy the father of lies who urges us to sin and self-indulgence---saying it won't hurt us---and be as gods in our own lives. Following the First Father leads to Life and Light and disciplined pleasure and maturity. Following the second leads to death and darkness and the very false belief that all gods are created equal. Partaking in God-designed pleasures in unnatural and depraved ways only leads to pain, addiction and dis-ease.

Greetings From Clark, Wyoming

UPDATE: TEN THINGS EVERYONE SHOULD KNOW ABOUT ISLAM

HAD  MORE PICS and a few other things to post over the weekend, however, there's virutally no internet  where I am and the uploads take forever (except very early in the morning apparently).  So, hope to be back next week.  Meanwhile it's been extremely, extremely hot here but finally cooled off with a massive, epic gully-washing rain last night and more is in the forecast.  That means all the rivers and tribs will be trashed for fishing the next few days.

Still it's wonderful  to be here in old, unglamorous Wyoming, even with  little connectivity where mountain lions, rattle snakes and grizzlies still roam freely and a good cup of cowboy coffee is a girl's best friend. Hope you're having a safe weekend. God Bless America.

 

More Gravitas.

 

150th Anniversary Re-Enactment At Gettysburg With Some Modern Accoutrements

MORE PHOTOS.

The Lumineers @ Glastonbury

VICTOR DAVIS HANSON: FLYING AS TORTURE
IN ADDITION: A TERRIFIC NEW CAUSE FOR SCOTLAND
THE FRESHEST, SIMPLEST,  BEST OF IT.

VIA/FOR MORE: TRB

Piper---Excerpt From Sermon On Dangers of Idolizing Marriage and Family

THE RIGHT SCOOP: HOW CHRISTIANITY SHAPED FOUNDING OF  AMERICAN REPUBLIC 


PIPER DECLARES POWERFULLY THAT BEING IN A REAL HUMAN MARRIAGE  (AND ALL ITS CURRENT MACHINATIONS) AND FAMILY ARE TEMPORARY AND SECONDARY INSTITUTIONS.

 Relationships based on Christ and the Church are the only eternal ones. All else comes to vapor.

H/T Christopher Yuan on Twitter

Why Is This Man Smiling? He's One Lucky Guy

RELATED: 33 STARTUPS THAT FAILED ON TAKEOFF
THIS FROM THE FROM THE JACKSON HOLE DAILY TODAY: Plane Crashes At Charles Peet's Ranch On Takeoff:

An experimental plane crash-landed in a field southeast of Jackson — at a ranch called the Grumpy Moose — on Friday.

The pilot, 80-year-old Charles Peet, of Jackson, was uninjured in the crash, but cut his arm on broken glass climbing out.

“Fortunately, I’m not dead,” Peet said. Peet, who built the single-engine plane from a kit, was taking off from a grass strip at his ranch, the Grumpy Moose, near Highway 191 and Bryan Flat Road. After reaching an altitude of about 100 feet, the left wing of the Zenith 701 lost lift and stalled. The left wing hit the ground first and the plane cartwheeled, landing nose down, Peet said. “I thought all along that it would build up speed and I’d be doing fine, but it just stalled, spun over and spit,” he said.

“The worst thing you can feel is fear.”

Teton County Sheriff’s dispatchers received a witness’ call about the crash at 3:22 p.m. After impact, Peet said he was “totally disoriented.” “Where is the door handle?” he asked himself. After clambering out of the plane, Peet walked back to the end of the airstrip to pick up his ATV so he could drive to the ranch house to tell his wife, Marty Peet.

When asked how she reacted, he said, “She’s used to me.” Peet drove back in the ATV with his wife to the scene of the crash, where Jackson Hole Fire/EMS and Teton County Sheriff’s emergency personnel were waiting. With the plane resting on its roof, emergency crews were worried about fuel draining out of the engine. They called a wrecker to right the aircraft. In the meantime, Peet was instructed by sheriff’s deputies to call the National Transportation Safety Board to report the accident.

Peet built the yellow plane from a kit in his barn and has been flying it for two years. On Friday, he flew the plane over from Driggs and landed safely at the Grumpy Moose. After having lunch at the ranch, he wanted to go up and fly again.

Don't know about Peet, but I would have been down on my knees thanking God for my lucky stars.  That's my idea of a very close call.

Like You To Meet A Next Door Neighbor

WHAT NIK WALLENDA TEACHES US ABOUT EVERYDAY LIFE @ BROPHY'S WORLD
THESE LADIES ARE EVERYWHERE.  This one prefers hanging out in the willows of a nearby creek. But when a group of boisterous, unruly kayakers came through she ran out of her cover and took refuge on my good friend Poutichi's  grassy lawn.

But don't be fooled by this sweet, bucolic scene.  This young female moose would just as soon kill you as look at you, especially if she has calves in the willows.  The boys are even worse.  These are wild animals and you have to respect that and not get too close within their comfort zones or all hell breaks loose.

This is the first time I've learned how to use my phone to take pics, so who knows what I'll post this summer.

The GOPinata, Or Love Addiction

GOP Senators Who Voted Yeah on Immigration Bill---'A Broken Promise 1,200 Pages Long' (Sessions)

BOTH OF TENNESSEE'S SENATORS VOTED FOR THIS TRAVESTY.  What ever are they thinking?  Marco Rubio has lost all my admiration and support too.

14 GOP yeas on #immigration bill: Alexander, Ayotte, Chisea, Collins, Coker, Flake, Graham, Hatch, Heller, Hoven, Kirk, McCain.. Murkowski & Rubio.

And this from the Weekly Standard:

Senator Jeff Sessions, the chief opponent of the immigration bill, released this statement in response to the Senate passing the law by a vote of 68-32:

“Sponsors of this legislation—despite the array of financial, establishment and special interest support—failed to hit their target of 70 votes. The more people learned about the bill the more uneasy they became. Failure to reach 70 votes is significant, and ensures the House has plenty of space to chart an opposite course and reject this fatally flawed proposal.

"So while the bill passed the Senate, this is just the beginning.

"The legislation adopted today guarantees three things: immediate amnesty before security, permanent future illegal immigration, and a record surge in legal immigration that will reduce wages and increase unemployment.

"There will be no border fence, no border surge, nothing but the same tired illusory promises of future enforcement that will never occur. Americans have begged and pleaded time and again for Congress to end the lawlessness. But this amnesty-first bill is a surrender to lawlessness. As ICE and USCIS officers have warned, it will decimate immigration enforcement and erode the constitutional rule of law upon which our national greatness depends. And it remains unfair to the legal immigrants who put enormous time and expense into following the rules our nation has established.

"This legislation demonstrates that the governing body in Washington has become severed from the people it is supposed to represent. It is a broken promise 1,200 pages long

Today's Supreme Court Decision on DOMA and Gay Marriage

MARK PERRY:  WHY GOVERNMENTS/ POLITICIANS REALLY DON'T HAVE THE ABILITY TO DESIGN AN INTELLIGENT NATIONAL HEALTH SYSTEM

ACTUALLY I'M NEITHER SURPRISED NOR TERRIBLY DISAPPOINTED BY THE SUPREME COURT DECISION TODAY.

We all know this politically-correct gay freight train---which I am not on and never will be---has massive momentum as the foundations of our civilization's primary institutions and personal identities continue to be dismantled and 'redefined.' Boundarylessness and confusion grow  across the land by the minute.

Having said this, I've never had a problem with people in close personal relationships----call it 'marriage' or what you will---being able to specify who gets their social security or other government benefits at their death or retirement. (Of course as to other bequests outside the government checks, there are always wills,  trusts and other estate planning tools which were never in question.)  It's just another expansion of the government entitlement gravy train that will speed on swimmingly until our economy finally collapses for lack of funds and enough viable tax-paying citizens and corporations.

As to the rest of the decision,  it seems to me---and I may be wrong here---that the justices are appropriately leaving the decision to legalize or not to legalize gay marriage to the states rather than the overly-powerful federal nannies. DOMA should never have been federally legislated, because it was never a federal issue. (Bill's bad.)

Now I know that the liberals in Congress are going to do everything in their power to pass another federal law mandating the legalization of gay marriage.  And it will be the most bitterly fought issue of all time, in my opinion.  It is not a federal issue.

The state of California is now left to its own devices---whether within or without the rule of law. We know how the powers there will decide and it amazes me that politicians will go outside and around the will of the people.  But again it's a state battle.

There will be myriad lawsuits  filed to  and clarify this decision, however, I am thankful for its willingness to leave some things to be legislated by the states in keeping with our federalist republic. 

In truth, now anyone from a non-gay marriage state can go somewhere else to get 'married' and proceed get and give federal benefits.  That should make gays everywhere happy, but what I know of human nature---and the real insatiable power trip underneath all this---is that it will not be enough.  Never be enough.

So while the champagne bottles of celebration are being popped on the Supreme Court's front steps, the rest of us can only hold our breaths at the very steep moral and fiscal slippery slope we're on.  Very steep. 

Meanwhile,  get your government benefits while you can and party like there's no tomorrow.  

Sunday on Monday: Should Christians Try To Legislate Morality?

9  THINGS YOU SHOULD KNOW ABOUT THE BIBLE

WORTHWHILE  DISCUSSION @ THE GOSPEL COALITION.

In addition,  real Christians often privately hold themselves to a higher standard than any state or federal legislation.  That shouldn't change them (us) from backing legislation which lines up with our Biblical worldview and the principles of right and wrong they (we) hold deeply in the marketplace of religious and legislative ideas.

 Atheists certainly do.  Muslim do too,  along with anything-goes-relativists.  If they had their way in the fullness of time,  marriage between a man and his  dog(s) will one day be legal and there would be a total breakdown of all moral as we know it boundaries.  It's already happening.

So, the short answer is YES,  Christians should continue to stand up for their moral values in legislation and everything else during this dark time.

 Fear not, however, God with his Son Jesus Christ is in control and will overcome all depravity and darkness in his own perfect timing---not ours. Every jot and tittle of Bible prophecy will be fulfilled.

Meanwhile,  this country was  founded, on Judeo-Christian principles and our nation's history bears this out.

Beautiful Summer Supermoon Over The Tetons

FATHER'S DAY UPDATE: LON SOLOMON ON 10 WAYS FATHERS CAN EXASPERATE THEIR CHILDREN

MOON WILL BE BRIGHT WITH SUPERMOON STATUS OVER THIS SUMMER SOLSTICE WEEKEND.  Here in Jackson Hole,  it's jacket-cool weather---breezy and beautiful.  Not a fire or smoke cloud in sight---so far.

Am enjoying the best downtime I've had this year---arriving exhausted, then going down with a bad cold. That, combined with inevitable altitude adjustment, has given me an excuse to put myself in mild quarantine for a few days. Having little to do except rest, regroup, read and write some letters and emails in an unstressed way is more healing than anything else I can imagine.

Good night moon.....Thank you God.

At the G-8, Gravitas Is Tossed In Favor of Gatsby Strutting Peacock Pastels

UPDATE: PRESIDENT OBAMA'S G-8 DEBACLE, OR THE WORLD HAS FALLEN OUT OF LOVE WITH BARACK

LOOKING LIKE PUFF BALLS AND PIMPS

THE ONLY THING I CAN THINK OF HERE is that these leaders of the free and unfree worlds have all just seen The Great Gatsby and Liberace right before being outfitted and coiffed for the casual chic segment of their G-8 extravaganza. Or perhaps it's summer gangsta style as in Psy Putin prefers Pank that's inspiring the gentleman's fancies. Keith Koffler blames this on Obama's overly-casual style but I dunno.

From this photo, I cannot tell whether President Obama is wearing a white suit or a pale pink/lavender one.  I fear the latter. Either way,  I have to agree with the headline introducing Benedict Brogan article at the Telegraph: These are world leaders dressed like (immature) bachelors after a stag party. He suggests just say no to tie avoidance!

One thing's for sure, they all look grim, like they're not having fun.  Perhaps it's the rigors of non-stop saber rattling over champagne, cold asparagus and liver pate.  Or maybe not one of them feels really manly dressed like those Ken doll outfits.

I know it's  just me, but these men look incredibly silly in all that summer puffery. Maybe I've just been in Tennessee and Wyoming too long. 

Whatever happened to manly summer khaki or denim with a twist of navy, gray with an occasional splash of Master's  green? Or, unbeatable lightweight English summer tweeds?

How can these men take each other seriously when they talk about Syria, Benghazi, world banks and various other serious matters?   Oh, that's right---they don't.

Carry on.

Sunday---Two Equally Lost Sons In the Parable of the Prodigal Son

      
THIS IS ONE OF THE MOST AMAZING BIBLE TEACHINGS I'VE EVER LEARNED AND HAS COMPLETELY CHANGED MY LIFE OVER THE YEARS. Here Tim Keller excerpts the main teaching of his classic The Prodigal God:

“Throughout the centuries, when this text is taught in church or religious education programs, the almost exclusive focus has been on how the father freely receives his penitent younger son. The first time I heard the parable, I imagined Jesus’s original listeners’ eyes welling with tears as they heard how God will always love and welcome them, no matter what they’ve done. We sentimentalize this parable if we do that. The targets of this story are not ‘wayward sinners’ but religious people who do everything the Bible requires. Jesus is pleading not so much with immoral outsiders as with moral insiders. He wants to show them their blindness, narrowness, and self-righteousness, and how these things are destroying both their own souls and the lives of the people around them. It is a mistake, then, to think that Jesus tells this story primarily to assure younger brothers of his unconditional love.

No, the original listeners were not melted into tears by this story but rather they were thunder-struck, offended, and infuriated. Jesus’s purpose is not to warm our hearts but to shatter our categories. Through this parable Jesus challenges what nearly everyone has ever thought about God, sin, and salvation. His story reveals the destructive self-centeredness of the younger brother, but it also condemns the elder brother’s moralistic life in the strongest terms. Jesus is saying that both the irreligious and the religious are spiritually lost, both life-paths are dead ends, and that every thought the human race has had about how to connect to God has been wrong.”

- Tim Keller on Keller Quotes

On the Road

FLASHBACK: 26 YEARS AGO, RONALD REAGAN GAVE HIS GREAT TEAR DOWN THIS WALL SPEECH

T'WAS A WARM, BRISK HEADWIND blowing against my Honda Pilot as I crossed the Missouri River at Rocheport, Missouri today.  Had left Nashville with its 90+ heat and 100% humidity last night to begin  the long drive West and after weeks of non-stop work and projects.  Several hours later I collapsed in a  motel in Cadiz, Kentucky and slept for nine hours.

Today along with the wind, there was heat and more heat driving west.  I managed to stop in Rocheport this afternoon for a short hike along the muddy, fast Missouri.  It was almost too hot to walk at that hour.

Now in central Kansas and a good friend called to say the Front Range in Colorado was covered in smoke from new fires spreading in Colorado Springs and Rocky Mountain National Park. Over 100 houses are already gone up in flames and evacuations are increasing..... so sad but nature's way of cleaning house of dead wood..... Going to be another long, hot, smoky summer in the Rockies as this drought and the pine beetle blight grinds on, I fear.

Meanwhile,  it's a beautiful, breezy night in the center of the country on the High Plains.

Wow, Double Wow.....Tebow Headed to New England Patroits, AKA Bradyville...

           

TWO ALPHA MALE QUARTERBACKS....on the same team.  What fun, and  will make both of them  better.

 

 

AND WE THOUGHT TEBOW WAS WASHED UP......

WOW!

It's not really over till it's over....is it?

Tea Party's Becky Gerritson Gives Epic IRS Testimony Before Congress---A Must See

MONDAY UPDATE---DISBAND THE IRS WILLIAM KRISTOL--BORN FREE: One night last week Jay Leno remarked in his monologue, “President Obama says he’s renewing his efforts to close Guantánamo Bay. Guantánamo Bay? How about closing the IRS? Why don’t we do that?” Thunderous applause. Leno continued, “How about shipping the IRS to Guantánamo Bay?” Thunderous applause again. If Republicans proceed with the nerve of Blonde and the wit of Leno, they’ll get the thunderous applause they deserve....

THIS IS A MUST SEE, MUST HEAR, MUST TAKE TO HEART SPEECH. She fears the America we grew up in is slipping away..... I do too.

Big Nanny Government has become our master, rather than our servant, and has gotten far, far out of the zone of enumerated powers of our prized and precious Constitution.

And the further truth is, we citizens have let this happen over the past 40 years.  We've been too occupied with ourselves and own interests, thinking government would keep running as it should.  We can't go on as a free country unless we begin and continue to take a stand and back it up with actions the way this articulate and brave woman has done before the ways and means committee this week.

I say amen to everything she says.

At A Celebration of Reading and Family Literacy With Barbara Bush

DELIGHTFUL CHANGE OF SUBJECT MATTER

WHAT A FUN SPEECH BARBARA BUSH GAVE RECENTLY---light, clever, funny, poignant and colorful. Thank you, Barbara and George for this refreshing interlude.

H/T

Pardon Me, While I Become My Victorian Grandmother, Or Why I Find Michael Douglas Disgusting

UPDATE:  RUN CATHERINE RUN!

EVEN IF I BELIEVED THIS PATHETIC MAN'S STORY about the reason for his throat cancer, which I don't for one second,  I find his attention grabbing, too-much-information 'admission' to be beyond the pail even for a Hollywood creep seeking more of the limelight.   I'm sure his agent told him this kind of headline grabbing confession would do wonders for his aging career.  Yes, yes,  I know nothing is sacred anymore-- as we all act as if we deserve to know everything, all the time about the most lurid and boring details of a celebrity's life. We are a world of addicted voyeurs.

For me,  it makes me cringe for him,  his poor wife and  family.  What goes on---or doesn't go on---behind closed doors is his business and should stay behind closed doors. In the meantime,  I find his soothsaying to be in poor taste behind belief and desperately booooring.  And again,  I don't believe this for a minute---because his is or has been a life of heavy drinking and smoking----and may have to turn off my computer for the rest of the week so I don't have to look at his desperate-for-attention face.

UPDATE:  Douglas Backpedaling

Sheryl Sandberg's New Book, 'Lean In--Women, Work And the Will to Lead' With Its Remarkable Lack of Transcendence

   
HAVE TAKEN TIME OFF THIS WEEK TO TEND TO SEVERAL WORK PROJECTS AND ALSO READ A REAL BOOK. My read du jour is Victor Davis Hanson's new release The Savior Generals --How Five Great Commanders Saved Wars that Were Lost From Anciet Greece to Iraq. I know nothing about military history past or present. However, this week, I began to learn, especially with the book's section on William Tecumsah Sherman's Civil War victory in Atlanta and subsequent March to the Sea in 1864. It's a real eye-opener that I highly, highly recommend But more about that some other time.

Today however,  I want to post a review of a book I have not read and which I am more interested in reading the reviews for than the actual book.  Called Lean In by Sheryl Sandburg of Google and Facebook fame,  I think its critique by Kathleen Nielson at The Gospel Coalition has as much if not more value than the book itself. That's because Nielson opines that while Sandburgs writing and wishing for exact eqaulity for men and women in both the workplace and home and her definition of ultimate success (money, power and influence) are interesting, if not novel ideas, there are several reasons it fails to satisfy: it's because  Sandburg lacks an eternal perspective among other things.

To wit:

For Sandberg, success is tied up with money and influence. She asserts “earning money increases [women’s] decision-making ability in the home, protects them in case of divorce, and can be important security in later years” (118). If this life is all there is, such logic might suffice. For good reason, then, Walsh’s final question about Sandberg is whether she realizes she’s someday going to die. What stands out in Sandberg’s values, in other words, is a dramatic lack of transcendence. If she thinks there’s anything beyond the good of this material life, she’s not talking about it. 

Rich and Powerful--- 

Such values determine Sandberg’s overarching goal, which, at first, might appear rather grand and unselfish: she wants equality for the human race. The irony, however, is that she herself has determined what’s good for all human beings and constructed it in her own image—that is, in the image of a rich and powerful leader.

Oh what a privilege it would be to discuss with Sandberg the good news of a God who made all of us—women and men alike—equally in his image, who desires good for us, and who sent his Son to make that good possible even though we in ourselves fall helplessly short. That good doesn’t have anything to do with this world’s money and power, either; it has to do with the goodness of God himself, who came in weakness to die so that by faith in him we might forever live and reign with him in glory.

In the context of such biblical values and goals, we can indeed talk about “leaning in” to utmost excellence in every dimension of our lives—for God’s glory, according to God’s Word, by God’s Spirit, and with results left to him. No doubt all of us too often settle for less excellence and fruit than we’re capable of, in all sorts of ways and workplaces, by God’s grace. But even with differing values and goals we can learn from people like Sandberg about certain kinds of excellence—being challenged, for example, to honor each other as women and men more thoughtfully and respectfully. Leaning in to our work sounds a lot like work. It strikes me, then, that Christians have the liberating privilege of leaning in not simply to our work, but to the very presence of God himself—invisible yet with us in Christ and through the Spirit. There is the source of ultimate power to wield, the ultimate treasure to seek.

I couldn't agree more with Nielson: While worldly success can be achieved and enjoyed for what it is for both women and men, nothing takes place to the real, long-term leaning in to God and the Good News of the Gospel of Jesus Christ. This world is fleeting and the success we've attained here can't be taken with us.  So it seems important to have both a temporal as well as a long-term spiritual measure of  true success. And it's not always dictated for us by the prevailing, popular, feminist worldview of the day.