At Last

Here is a peculiar aspect of my new relationship with my sister. She keeps providing me with educational materials and information she has found, relating to Christianity.

The latest item: Bill McKay’s series of documentaries, Against All Odds.

I don’t know much about it. I’ll say that up front. But it’s fascinating. McKay is a Christian, and he interviewed Israelis who served in the IDF. The common thread? They experienced miraculous victories and rescues. And by “miraculous,” I mean “miraculous.” Example: they’re trapped by landmines. The mines are buried about a foot down. A wind rises, and it blows the sand off the mines, and the soldiers walk out. Apparently, some of these guys heard voices–presumably angels–telling them what to do. And supposedly, a number of atheist Jews turned to God as a result of these experiences.

McKay says the scholars at West Point study every military battle they hear about, to learn about waging war. He claims they have thrown up their hands over Israeli battles, because the odds the Israelis overcame were so great, the battles didn’t make sense. That happened in the Bible, and it is still happening today, as 1.2 billion Muslims often tell us.

The trailer is really neat, and you can see it at this site: Against All Odds. Take a look and see what you think.

Another interesting thing: she wants to go to Wayne Cochran’s church on Wednesday. If you don’t know who he is, I’ll tell you. He’s a former rock star, and he started a church here many years ago. My sister had forgotten about it. She and my mother checked it out, back in the 80s. They were impressed by his kindness and concern, but they didn’t join the church. A few years later, I went with my mother, and the church had grown so big, you could barely see the man from the back rows. Anyway, she wants to go, so we may make a run up there.

Tonight a commenter said something about me believing in a “comic book God,” because I believed God and the angels could influence voters and machinery and so on, to alter the outcomes of elections. I deleted the comment because it seemed like it was unnecessarily rude, and an ad hominem, and an attack on my beliefs, and I just didn’t want to fool with it. Maybe that was wrong; I’m trying to change the tone of this blog, and I don’t see how I can do that if I publish obnoxious comments. Maybe I took the wrong approach. But it’s hard to have patience with people who suggest, condescendingly, that God is some sort of detached, aloof being who is too important to involve himself in our business. That’s not how God was in the Bible, and if the Bible is wrong, then the people who wrote it were idiots, and we shouldn’t believe in God to begin with. God is a person, and he is crazy about each of us, and the angels are real, and so are demons, and they intervene directly in people’s lives. I once got a good long look at a demon; I saw it very clearly, in the middle of an ordinary day. I know supernatural beings are real. I don’t want to hear about the silliness of my beliefs. You might as well tell me my feet aren’t real, and I can see one of them right now. The fact that something hasn’t happened to you doesn’t mean it doesn’t happen.

How am I supposed to deny that God exists as we know him from the Bible, when he has done so many remarkable things to prove himself to me?

It’s past my bedtime. I’m out.

Adventures in Food

On a whim, I bought myself a cherimoya. I think it may be ripe. It’s sort of soft. I am about to try to eat it.

Here is some troubling text I found on Wikipedia: “Similar in size to a grapefruit, it has large, glossy, dark seeds that are easily removed. The seeds are poisonous if crushed open and can be used as an insecticide.[4] One should also avoid eating the skin as it may cause paralysis from 4 to 5 hours.”

If I don’t blog for five hours, you’ll know what happened.

I have checked my banana tree, and I now have nine hands of bananas, with about 12 bananas each. I thought I would never be able to grow anything except peppers and limes. God’s way of telling me to be less caustic and sour? Dunno.

Wait, I also managed to grow another fruit. On the other hand, it’s grapefruit.

Dang.

Moxvox

Here is good news. Tonight Moxie will be resuming Nowlive shows!

Read all about it.

Let’s not Oversell It

The other day I said some religious people were fasting and praying, in hopes of securing a McCain victory. And a reader criticized the effort, believing that the existence of free will made it pointless to pray for an election outcome. Votes are cast by people with free will, so it makes no sense to ask God for victory. That is the theory.

There are a lot of things wrong with that theory. First of all, the Apostle Paul pointed out that secular authorities are placed over us by God. And the Bible is full of leaders who were chosen by God. David, Saul, and Moses are obvious examples. Gideon, Noah, Jeroboam…you could list such leaders all day. Second, if you’re God, you don’t have to control voters and take away their free will in order to change an election. You can discourage people from voting at all. You can send rain to keep people from the polls. You can make cars break down. You can make voting machines malfunction. You can cause damaging news about candidates to be released. Third, free will is way overrated. Our sovereignty over ourselves is very limited. If you think free will is inviolable, ask a recovered crackhead what he thinks. Ask him why free will didn’t prevent him from becoming addicted, and from using crack even after he tried to change. The truth is, people yield to persuasion and temptation, regardless of free will. And sometimes external influences (including God’s) are so powerful, it is almost as though free will did not exist. Think of Pharaoh, whose heart was hardened by God himself.

So, yes, it makes sense to pray that God will change the outcomes of elections. And it makes sense to pray that God will change people’s ways, and that he will help you to be good.

I am thinking about this because I read Psalm 119 this morning. It’s a whopper. In my King James it runs several pages. I had heard that Psalm 119 somehow summarized all the psalms, and I wanted to see for myself. I didn’t see it, but I did notice this: the psalmist kept asking God to help him refrain from sinning. He didn’t say, “I have free will, so let me fix it myself.”

Here are some excerpts.

10 With my whole heart have I sought thee: O let me not wander from thy commandments.

11 Thy word have I hid in mine heart, that I might not sin against thee.

12 Blessed art thou, O LORD: teach me thy statutes.

28 My soul melteth for heaviness: strengthen thou me according unto thy word.

29 Remove from me the way of lying: and grant me thy law graciously.

35 Make me to go in the path of thy commandments; for therein do I delight.

36 Incline my heart unto thy testimonies, and not to covetousness.

37 Turn away mine eyes from beholding vanity; and quicken thou me in thy way.

93 I will never forget thy precepts: for with them thou hast quickened me.

94 I am thine, save me: for I have sought thy precepts.

95 The wicked have waited for me to destroy me: but I will consider thy testimonies.

132 Look thou upon me, and be merciful unto me, as thou usest to do unto those that love thy name.

133 Order my steps in thy word: and let not any iniquity have dominion over me.

For that matter, Jesus told us to pray that we would not be tempted. Why did he do that? He could have said, “You have free will, so don’t ever sin, regardless of temptation.” Obviously he did it because he knew that even good people are subject to influence.

The above verses also underscore the importance of memorizing scripture. The psalm talks a great deal about learning God’s law and word and testimonies.

I remember studying physics. Instructors always said it was bad to memorize laws and equations. They were completely wrong. When these things are imbedded in your mind, they are available for use at all times. You understand them more deeply. It’s easier to apply them, because your conscious mind is like a box with a limited capacity, and you can only hold so many things in it at once. If you’re thinking about quantities and measurements while you’re also trying to keep a complicated equation in mind, you will not think as well as a person who has the equation memorized. Doing physics with equations you haven’t memorized is like trying to speak French out of a dictionary and grammar book, without putting the words and rules in your heart.

The Bible is the same way. It’s good to run to it and open it when you need information. But it’s better to have the information inside you, so it comes to mind instantly. Many Christians call this “the sword of the Spirit.” Satan comes to you with a problem, and you remember an applicable verse, and you pull it out and throw it at him, and you win. This is what happened when Jesus was tempted in the desert. Satan told him to turn rocks into bread, and Jesus remembered his scripture: “It is written, that man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word of God” (Deuteronomy 8:3.) Satan finally started using scripture, himself. He told Jesus to jump off the temple, saying, “For it is written, He shall give his angels charge over thee, to keep thee: And in their hands they shall bear thee up, lest at any time thou dash thy foot against a stone” (Psalm 91:11). Jesus responded, “It is said, Thou shalt not tempt the Lord thy God” (Deuteronomy 6:16).

If you read the Bible a lot, you’ll find that it has the answers to many modern questions. For example, convenience abortion is very clearly wrong. John the Baptist moved in his mother’s womb when Mary approached (Luke 1:44). And the Bible speaks of God consecrating a prophet who is yet in the womb (Jeremiah 1:5).

I know abortion supporters will claim I am citing “talking points,” but I came up with these citations all by myself, on the spur of the moment. I simply thought about the issue, and they came to mind.

One of the unfortunate things about Christianity is that we cheapen it by making it an easy religion, involving no study. It will probably never be as cerebral as Judaism, but that doesn’t mean we shouldn’t learn as much as we can, and try to understand.

I used to know a little bit about the Bible, but when I stopped going to church and fell away, I forgot a great deal. I see now how I cheated myself.

Anyway, don’t let anyone tell you free will is the whole story. God is a motivator and persuader.

We Should All Send her Cards

Nancy Reagan is 87 years old. She lost her husband four years ago, after a long and horrible illness. Last month she fell and broke her pelvis, and she is currently recuperating.

At his first post-election press conference, Barack Obama joked about having consulted every “living” President. And then he joked about how he would not be holding any seances because he didn’t want to get into a “Nancy Reagan thing.”

Is this change? I guess it is. I can’t think of another President who would say a thing like this. Even Jimmy Carter has more class. Suddenly Bill Clinton looks like a statesman.

Americans wanted the favored candidate of the Daily Kos, Amanda Marcotte, and Jeremiah Wright. I guess we got what we asked for.

We Cannot Risk Damaging the Self-Esteem of Thousands

I am reading up on the GM/Ford mess. It seems to me that the US economy is running into landmines and booby-traps we put in our own path in years past, and now there is very little we can do to prevent them from blowing us up. And what’s going on at GM and Ford seems typical.

There are a number of economic time bombs that are now going off and blowing us in the direction of socialism. The most obvious one is the mortgage crisis, which was caused by a government policy of coercing lenders to give money to unqualified minority members and people who were just plain poor or irresponsible. The carmaker problem is another example. Social Security is still plugging along on imaginary money, but it will eventually fail unless we go completely socialist and enslave the young to pay the old.

If GM and Ford go bust, they will have a hard time paying their pensioners. They are supporting 600,000 people who no longer work. If it happens, the federal guarantee program will kick in, and that’s where the pensioners will get their checks. I have seen analysts say that we should bail out GM and Ford because if we don’t, we’ll end up paying off the pensions anyway. But is that true? I’ve been reading about the guarantee program, and apparently, it seizes the assets of failed companies to pay off pensions, and it has other funding sources, and it isn’t funded from general tax revenues. If that’s correct, then you would think letting these companies fail would be the smart move. We would lose 450,000 jobs in the short term, but that’s not catastrophic. And we would gut the parasitic UAW, which apparently drove us to this crossroads. If you include benefits, unskilled autoworkers pull down about $75 per hour, according to web sources. That’s insane. That’s as much as SEVERAL prosecutors, who go to college for seven years and then have to pay off student loans. Many doctors earn less than that.

And who is to say that if GM and Ford die, someone else won’t swoop in and buy the plants and start making cars people actually want and can afford? We don’t know that. Without the UAW, you could pay people what their skills are worth, which is what GM and Ford should have been doing all along.

My dad is a labor lawyer. When he was a student, he used to work in Detroit during the summers, to get money for school. This was in the Fifties. He was shocked by how lazy and overpaid the workers were. When a new hire worked at a normal pace, that person would be taken aside and ordered to slow it down. My aunt worked up there, too, and she said she eventually ended up taking her knitting and sewing stuff to the plant, because she finished her quota in half a day.

In those days, the Big Three had no competition, and America was prosperous, so the carmakers paid the UAW pretty much whatever they asked. Then the Japanese came along, and the UAW still had the Big Three by the throat, and you know the rest of the story. It has been about 38 years since Datsun and Toyota invaded, and we still pay unskilled workers five times what they deserve. On top of that, the management is corrupt and inept, and the people who design the cars simply can’t compete with foreign talent. Many American models are very nice, but overall, we are in fourth or fifth place.

The best thing is probably to let these companies fail. If we need cars, someone else will come along and build them correctly. Haven’t Toyota and Honda already done that in their US plants? Overpaid workers and incompetent executives will have to take one for the team, but that’s what they deserve. On the whole, they will come out way ahead, because we have been subsidizing their ineptitude and laziness for decades.

If what I say makes you angry, relax. You’re going to win. These companies will be bailed out, and others will follow. Pelosi and Reid and Obama will take care of it. And you’ll pay the bill.

I am extremely optimistic about my own life, but my gut tells me the country is going socialist, and it will happen very quickly. The landmines we buried are going off, one after the other. The stimulus didn’t work. The interest rate cuts didn’t work. The bailouts we have seen so far have not worked. We still haven’t seen the full extent of the mortgage mess. We are setting precedents by bailing out the irresponsible and the dishonest, and we will have to honor those precedents in the future, with more bailouts. It might even be possible to force the government to pay up, using an Equal Protection argument. That kind of thing flies in Florida state courts, to some extent. Economies are tanking all over the place, and that means a bad market for our goods and services. Obama is going to be a very powerful President, and he is going to do everything he can to expand entitlements. Taxes are going to go up, and if you think it’s going to stop at 39%, well, you’re probably the kind of shrewd customer who believed Obama when he said he was going to rely on public campaign funding. Obama knowingly says things that are not true. Why would that change once he’s in office?

This is how the supernatural works. You do something bad, and you think everything is fine, and then after a while, things start going wrong very quickly, and you can’t do anything about it. You do the smartest things you can, but it doesn’t help, because there is more to success than human effort and human ability. You have to be blessed, and you can’t be blessed when you do as you please.

I think America is washed up. I really do. God just looked at our report card and cut off our allowance. Tens of millions of abortions. Gay marriages, officiated by gay clergy. Arrogance and cruelty and greed celebrated as virtues. Increasing anti-Semitism, even among so-called Christian churches. A warped Republican-conceived plan to achieve Mideast peace by carving up Israel and passing it out to barbarians. With our eyes wide open, we elected a new President who sat for twenty years in an anti-Semitic church, approving of everything his pastor said. And the God-fearing among us haven’t done a very good job of winning souls; we don’t seem to work very hard at making people understand the peace and blessings of Christian life. We’re better at turning people off by telling everyone we’re more righteous than they are. I’ve certainly done my share of that, whether or not that was my intention, and whether or not I realized I was doing it. I helped bring us here.

We flunked, by any sane measure. And we flunked consistently, over a period of decades. What possible reason could God have to help us now? “Give us more money, so we can take more drugs and have more extramarital sex and flaunt our wealth and have more abortions!” Who would listen to that? “Give us more money, so we can buy tickets to Urinetown and The Vagina Monologues, while we stiff charities and the church!” Crazy.

I suppose we can make a difference if we change our ways, but I don’t see that happening. I think we’ll be lucky if we only end up as messed up as Europe. I think our enemies are going to push us around with ease, our standard of living will plummet, and when the nations of the world have a problem, they won’t come to us any more, for the same reason they don’t try to get help from India or Mexico. We’ll be just another second-rate nation, trying to be heard at the UN.

I think our only hope lies in the individual. Change your ways, let God fix your life and your family, and hope the effect will spread to your community and the rest of America. Or go rent East of Eden and have a look at our future.

No Wonder Gilligan was so Spry

I came across an interesting news item the other day. A physician who is married to an Alzheimer’s sufferer started adding coconut oil to his oatmeal, and he improved dramatically over a very short time. Here is a link to the article. This guy was a mess, and he sharpened up a great deal over the course of a month. Researchers think coconut oil might benefit people with other types of neurological problems, such as Parkinson’s.

My aunt has been diagnosed with Parkinson’s (prayers solicited), so I sent her a link to the story.

Coconut oil is a very weird substance. Unlike most plant fats, it’s solid at room temperature (below about 75 degrees). And it’s supposed to have a lot of beneficial effects. A reader suggested it to me a year or two back. I ended up using it to deep-fry doughnuts. If you don’t mind the taste of coconut, this is the ultimate fat for frying desserts.

The doctor who treated her husband with it says she mixed two tablespoons into his oatmeal every day. She eats it, too.

On a given day, I am lucky if I can remember my address, so I tried coconut oil in my oatmeal this morning. Mike brings dark maple syrup when he visits from New Hampshire, and I use it in my oatmeal. When you add coconut oil, it’s like eating a big, hot cookie dissolved in water.

I have been looking for a way to get more calories into my breakfast without adding carbs, and this may be a good way to do it.

In other news, I figured out what was wrong with the Red Star Arms fire control group I had in my PSL (Romak III, Dragunov, FPK). Thought I’d mention it in case other frustrated souls have the same problem later and try to solve it by Googling. If you don’t own guns, this will bore you to tears.

The trigger assembly has a couple of hooky-looking things that project upward in the receiver. One is the trigger sear. This is a hook-shaped thing that holds the hammer in the cocked position and releases it when you fire. The other is the disconnector. I am not totally sure what it does, but I believe it disengages the trigger after firing, so the sear, which drops to release the hammer, can rise again to be in a position to grab it and cock the weapon. I think it also holds the hammer while the sear pops back up. Then I think it releases the hammer so it can swing into the sear and catch. I read the PDF over at Red Star Arms, but it’s very badly written, and the drawings are bad.

Anyway, here is what kept my rifle from cocking itself. When the bolt comes back after a round is fired, it knocks the hammer into the disconnector. Then the hammer catches under the disconnector. It then pops out and catches under the sear. If the disconnector is too far back, the hammer will miss it, and it won’t catch under it. There is a set screw on the front of the disconnector, and it adjusts the disconnector’s position. If you turn the screw counter-clockwise (the “loosening” direction), it will pull back up into the disconnector, and the disconnector will rotate forward, toward the hammer. My screw was too far in, so the disconnector was too far back, so the hammer kept missing it.

You are supposed to adjust this thing until it works, and then you have to apply Loc-tite. The shock of shooting the gun will make the screw rotate unless you glue it in place. Red Star Arms says to use blue Loctite, but some guy on a forum claims there is a special Loctite for set screws, and it’s green.

If your gun works with the screw adjusted flush with the bottom of the disconnector, you can just remove the screw and put it where you won’t lose it.

You can test the disconnector by removing the receiver cover and the gas piston and working the action by hand.

The stock fire control group in this thing is a complete piece of crap. The trigger slap will make your finger numb, it will ruin your accuracy, and it will make it harder to shoot other guns well later in the day. So a new assembly is probably a good idea. The one I have is expensive and adjustable, but there are cheaper ones.

This is kind of a silly gun, but once the trigger starts working, it will seem less silly. The Russian sniper ammunition is supposed to be accurate and highly lethal, and the gun is AK-based, so it should be very tough and reliable. The gun costs a lot for what you get (about $750 with a used Russian 4x scope), but it’s a pretty accurate semi-auto that takes detachable 10-round magazines and kills people reliably at a hundred yards. With ballistics similar to a .30-06, it’s no poodle-shooter. If you get shot with this thing, you stay shot. I’m no gun guru, but it sounds like a good substitute for an M1 Garand.

I am Ready for the Killing Fields

I hope I lived up to Comrade Obama’s expectations today, as I celebrated his victory by practicing my shooting. I want to be ready when we line up capitalists and shoot them so they fall into mass graves.

I started out with the PSL, but I had to quit. For one thing, the zero was like 15″ high, and for another, the rifle did not work. I put a new Red Star Arms (in honor of Uncle Ho Barack) trigger group in it, and I had problems with the spring falling off. Today I adjusted the spring. Now it doesn’t fall off, but for some reason, after the gun goes through a cycle, it’s not cocked.

I got out the K31, and the zero was off. Here is me, trying to find the bullseye at 100 yards. I was not able to move the POA far enough to the right to make the bullets go where I aimed.

After that, I managed to do some shooting. I believe this is 20 rounds. I felt pretty good about it. It seemed like the flyers were due to obvious mistakes, and other than that, things were fairly tight. But I found I was having a problem with the trigger guard biting my middle finger when the gun went off.

Here are my last 20 shots, which I shot after changing my grip to protect my finger. I was perfectly content with these. There are flyers above and to the right, caused by mistakes I was able to perceive as I made them. Other than that, I sent the bullets through a pretty small hole. It’s frustrating when you think you’re doing everything right and you somehow end up way off; it doesn’t teach you anything. When you’re off and you know what you did wrong, it’s a good thing, because you know what to fix.

I got out the SW1911 and fired off 50 shots. Here are the first 25, from 7 yards. It’s amazing how rifle shooting improves your trigger pull. It seems to reduce my tendency to shoot to the left.

Here are the last 25 shots. I was tired, and you can see what that did to my shooting.

Some alien life form was at the range, shooting into a 3″ circle at 25 yards. I have no idea what planet he came from.

I’m going to contact the people at Red Star Arms and find out what’s wrong with my trigger. I’ll bet they can tell me.

Range Time

Here is my prescription for the Obama Blues. A trip to the gun range! I’ll go celebrate the second amendment, while it lasts. If Obama had appointed the last two Supreme Court justices, the Heller decision would have been much different, and we would have no federal protection against Nazi-style gun bans and confiscation. If he gets his way, that will be the situation when he leaves office.

I’m taking the K31, the SW1911, the .17 HMR, and the Kommunist Kannon with me. By “Kommunist Cannon,” am, of course, referring to my Romanian-made PSL, which is an Eastern-bloc rifle similar to the Dragunov. If Obama’s comrades had gotten their way a generation ago, we would have seen rifles like this in the hands of “liberating” Soviet forces. So I can’t think of a better weapon to take, in honor of the President-Elect.

I had problems with the PSL after I installed a new trigger group. Today I adjusted it using brute force. We will see if it works.

Let the Socialist Looting Begin

What happened last night is a reminder that human beings are less powerful and capable than they think. Civilization is very complicated. There are millions of very slippery and unpredictable factors that influence its function. Although we try, no one–especially not voters–really understands how it works. Voters are incompetent; they always have been. They vote based on things like looks and charm, or because of crazy, discredited ideas they refuse to let go of, or because they make conscious choices to believe proven lies uttered by dishonest candidates. We often talk about the common sense of the American voter and how it will save us, but the truth is, that’s pride talking. We are just as clueless as people in hellholes like India and Haiti, when it comes to choosing leaders. Think about it. SOMEBODY elected Cynthia McKinney and David Duke. If people like that can be elected, Americans are capable of electing the next Hitler or Castro.

We are not prosperous and safe because we’re smarter than Europeans and Africans and Asians. It’s not because we’re a mongrel master race, although we tell ourselves that all the time. We do well because God guides us and watches over us. Last night, we saw how stupid we can be when he withdraws his influence. We elected a nobody with very poor qualifications. A man who was largely sponsored (and openly supported) by our enemies. It was one of the dumbest things ever done by voters in a democratic nation.

Why did this happen? It’s obvious. We begged for it. We are proud and venal and rebellious. We have killed millions of our children in their mother’s wombs. We think sexual morality is obsolete. We are greedy and cruel. We like to go to church, but many of us only feel that way as long as pastors tell us Jesus is more or less like Oprah; a warm, maternal, fawning, obsequious presence who wants us to have tons of self-esteem regardless of our immorality. We are exhausting God’s patience.

Obama’s election is a bad sign. If God can permit us to choose a flashy liar over John McCain, he can also permit us to have an economic depression. He can permit us to be conquered militarily. He can allow Al Qaeda to explode nuclear weapons here. He can take his blessings elsewhere; maybe to Africa and South Korea. We could end up like Greece or Italy. Or Cuba. This may be the beginning of our decline into true socialism and the misery it always brings.

I feel pretty good today, but it has nothing to do with the election. I am not optimistic about America. We may have jumped the shark. This may be our Samson moment. Our divine protection may be gone, and we may be entering into a new age of mediocrity and humiliation.

Obama will get to appoint a large number of federal judges, and they will reinterpret our laws, including the Constitution, to advance Obama’s Marxist notions. Maybe he won’t get to appoint Supreme Court justices. So what? Non-lawyers never seem to realize that the district and appellate judges are much more powerful in the daily lives of Americans. What if he does appoint a couple of justices? Kiss the second amendment goodbye. Forget property rights. And the first amendment will be gutted.

Obama’s underlings will work to bring back the LBJ era. Look forward to higher taxes, more handouts, more damage to our national work ethic, and soaring deficits.

I’m not depressed, because I know my welfare is not directly dependent on the welfare of the nation. I know where the good things in my life come from. But I hate to see America get a spanking like this.

My advice for the next four years is to be astute and zealous in your dissent, but to keep it respectful. Don’t permit the existence of Obama Derangement Syndrome. We have to try to win people over; we’re not going to do it by mimicking Ann Coulter. Pray that God will guide Obama and his administration. Pray for America. Try to be good. Be a witness for God, to increase the number of his people here. And look out for yourself and your family, because very hard times may be right around the corner.

I am Sitting This One Out

I am getting ready to turn off the computer. Not because I am too nervous to watch cable and read websites and blog the election, but because I am tired and I have things to do before bed, and I have no interest in what is happening at the polls. Once again, I have to say how grateful I am. I don’t understand it at all, but I am not looking a gift horse in the mouth. For years I have not slept well, so I am very sensitive to my need for sleep, and I resent anything that keeps me up late. I am extremely pleased to know I won’t be getting out of bed to check the TV at 3 a.m.

It has occurred to me that this could mean our prayers for a McCain victory are going to be answered in the affirmative, and that somewhere inside me, I know better than to worry. On the other hand, it could be the result of a deep realization that I am becoming separate from the world, and that my security comes from God, not politicians.

I would say I have been conservative since about 1980. But since the mid-80s I’ve been more of a religious conservative than a political conservative. I mean that I’ve been conservative mainly because Christianity is inherently conservative. A lot of confused liberal Christians think the personal generosity and forgiveness taught in the Gospels is somehow supposed to be applied through government. That’s crazy, because forcing the government to practice virtue for us, and to take our money to practice it, deprives us of the ability to decide to be virtuous on our own. It takes the virtue out of virtue, by making it compulsory and not heartfelt. It also deprives us of money we could direct to God’s work. Jesus would not have approved of drug abuse, homosexuality, sex outside of marriage, civil disobedience, immodest dress, profanity, high taxes, or socialism, and he encouraged his disciples to go about armed with swords. He would have fit in better in Texas than in Massachusetts. His respective influence and presence in those states probably reflects that.

I think that in the past I worried too much about man’s efforts to influence the world through politics, and not enough about getting my own life in order so that I would not rely so much on our government to protect me. It’s very important to vote for politicians whose policies are least offensive to God, but in the end, the only way to take care of yourself and your family is to put your religious duties first and exercise faith. So I voted and cajoled and prayed and fasted, but I am not going to worry. I am going to be all right, and I will have the power to help others get in the lifeboat with me, over the course of my remaining years. I wish I could be sure I would continue to live in a nation blessed with prosperity and security; a nation which nurtures Christianity and protects the Jews and pleases God. But other nations have fallen and lost their blessings, and I accept the fact that America may be beginning to deteriorate at an accelerated rate. Maybe we’ll end up like France. As far as I know, Israel is the only nation destined to endure forever. I’m glad I got to see America in its glory. If the destroyers and wasters and barbarians manage to loot her until she falls, at least I’ll have memories of an America that is beyond their reach.

My advice to you is to turn off the TV, turn off the PC, pray, and go to bed early. And if you can’t do it, maybe you need to ask yourself where you can find the strength next time.

Thank You, Lord

I am still feeling totally relaxed about the election. Hard to believe. I’m so glad. I did not need yet another sleepless night of fretting about the evils of socialism.

Place your bets. Will I be able to go to bed tonight and sleep, without knowing who won? Man, that would be fantastic. The 2000 thing was a nightmare, and ’04 wasn’t much better.

More

I had a confusing moment while voting on the gay marriage amendment today. I couldn’t figure out which of the following propositions I was supposed to vote on:

PROPOSITION 1: No poufters!

PROPOSITION 3: No poufters!

PROPOSITION 5: No poufters!

Luckily I was able to get some help from Bruce the pollworker.

Is “poufter” a slur? If so, make me go sit in the corner with Ann Coulter. I figured it was like “flamer,” which is still more or less acceptable.

Gerber v. Cold Steel

I went nuts a week or two ago and ordered not one but TWO machetes. They arrived today. Here is my review.

I got a bolo-shaped macheted made by Cold Steel, plus a classically shaped machete made by Gerber. The Gerber came with a sheath. I ordered a sheath to go with the Cold Steel. The Cold Steel machete is made in South Africa. The Gerber is Chinese.

The Cold Steel machete is a little short for my tastes. A machete is supposed to be long enough to whack brush with. I would say this thing is around 15″ long, which is more like a big knife than a machete. The weight and balance seem fine; having weight near the far end is good. The blade is dull, and the black oxide coating covers the edge as well as the sides. The handle is a very plain plastic job. It’s a little on the thick side, and it doesn’t feel all that natural in the hand.

The Gerber Gator machete is a few inches longer. The blade seems heavier. The back of the blade is a tree saw. I haven’t tried it, but people who have say it really works. The handle of the machete is maybe eight inches long, so I suppose you could put both hands on it if you needed to. It’s made of some kind of hard rubber over plastic, and it’s attached to the blade by two bolts. The oxide coating on the blade does not cover the edge, which is pretty sharp by garden tool standards. The blade has an eye toward the far end, so you can hang the machete on a nail.

The Gerber looks very nice, and it seems to be well made. The Cold Steel looks like something someone made in shop class. The Gerber sheath seems nicer, although they are both made of heavy nylon, and I assume they would wear equally well.

I am too lazy to go out and test-whack the hibiscus bushes, but as things stand now, the Gerber seems like a very nice deal, and the Cold Steel is a lot less appealing. You can get the Gerber and the sheath delivered to your door for about twenty bucks. The Cold Steel and sheath cost maybe six bucks more, depending on the breaks, and you get less. I have had two Cold Steel knives, and they were both great. Not sure why their machetes are so boring.

These things were both very cheap; much better than Home Depot, where they charge $22 for a Chinese machete with no sheath and a dull blade and no oxide coating.

The sad thing is, I really didn’t need a second (or third) machete. But I was bored, and I was not happy with the Home Depot job. And how can you turn down a ten-dollar machete? It’s impossible.

I’m thinking I may reserve the Gerber for pig-slicing. It looks ideal for the job. That saw on the back will make short work of the stubborn bits. If I sharpen the knife edge up, it should slice pork really well. And while I love my 14″ Forschner scimitar knife, a machete sends a message a kitchen knife just can’t equal. It says, “Men are eating. Go back in the house until the police come.”

YI YI YI YI YI YI YI YI

In case you didn’t know, Mike Huckabee has hooked up with The Nose on Your Face, and he is actively soliciting stuff from the site for his show!

I was not thrilled with Huckabee as a candidate, but I think he’s a natural for TV, and it’s great to see TNOYF hit the big time. Go look.

Worst Pun of 2008

Feel like taking a well-deserved poke at the so-called Church of Scientology? Run over to Agent Bedhead and Digg her entry about Scientology goons roughing up Anonymous protesters.