FRIDAY JOKE

What do you call a guy who is still interested in watching the NBA playoffs?

"

A REFEREE.

Immigrant Assimilation

FLAG OF DISTRESS IS ACCIDENTALLY APPROPRIATE

What have we lost as Americans? I would argue we have undergone some great strides in our thinking, but those strides have gone so far overboard as to cause the death of common sense.

Here is a 1907 quote from Theodore Roosevelt on his ideas on immigrants and being an American:

"In the first place, we should insist that if the immigrant who comes here in good faith becomes an American and assimilates himself to us, he shall be treated on an exact equality with everyone else, for it is an outrage to discriminate against any such man because of creed, or birthplace, or origin. But this is predicated upon the person's becoming in every facet an American, and nothing but an American ... There can be no divided allegiance here. Any man who says he is an American, but something else also, isn't an American at all. We have room for but one flag, the American flag ... We have room for but one language here, and that is the English language ... and we have room for but one sole loyalty and that is a loyalty to the American people."

Do we want immigrants here? Heck yes! My families came from Ireland after the potato famine. We are a country founded on immigration.

Do we want immigrants here who insist on maintains a hold on their country's flag and language rather than embracing their new home? Most assuredly NO!

This subject is something I constantly think of when I am asked to choose "To hear instructions in English press 1, to hear them in Spanish press 2. Para instuctiones en Engles selecto numero uno..."

In case you are wondering, here is my stance:
1) Build a wall. Controlling the border is more important than any other single issue regarding immigration.
2) Guest workers: since companies don't mind hiring smugglers to bring in workers and gain the most benefit... let American business do the guest worker paperwork by invitation. The paperwork would be proportionate to the benefit and not a tremendous burden to the small business owner.
3) Family groups where you have a child who is a naturalized citizen by birth deserve special consideration to exporting. I am not for the destruction of families.
4) Illegals who are working can gain an opportunity to apply through their employer for guest worker status.
5) If a guest worker/illegal immigrant breaks the law, they are deported. My gut instinct is that even something as reckless driving would be a deportable offense but I am inclined to think that may be too harsh.
6) Abolish multilingual forms. Allow private agencies to provide this service and translate it for the immigrants for a fee to the immigrant. Don't make taxpayers pay for a failure to assimilate.

Nothing in my list is as harsh as what Mexico does to its illegal immigrants.

DaVinci Code Questions

DAVINCI'S MONA LISA, CENTRAL TO DAN BROWN'S DAVINCI CODE

Catholics made a conspiracy to cover up Jesus' kid! The Bible was falsified! Is this about the papal black helicopter and the cardinal with the umbrella in the Magruder transcript and the magic nail?

Oh wait, that's mixing my conspiracy metaphors.

Dan Brown has written an engaging and fun work of fiction. I put as much credence in it being of truth as I do the Star Trek movies. It's fiction folks! I do recommend the read because its well written, I also liked the preceding story about the same character. However, it isn't true because there is no conspiracy and no super-children of Jesus out there walking on water.

There are conspiracy theorists within Christ's followers as well. There are those that assert that anything but the KJV (that's King James Version)

is sacrilege.

Apparently God himself gave the good king the best seven manuscripts that were available and his monks gave us the great translation from ancient Greek to more modern 17th century English in the King James Version.

There are those of us who don't particularly like the KJV and use a more modern translation. The hardliners decry: "They changed stuff! They left out stuff! It's Satan's corruption of God's Word! It violates Deuteronomy 2"You shall not add to the word which I am commanding you, nor take away from it, that you may keep the commandments of the LORD your God which I command you.""

What exactly is true?

Archaeologists have uncovered literally hundreds of stored trascriptions dating to within 35 years of Christ's time. These older scrolls/newer finds have shown some discrepancies in the KJV but logic says that they are (first:) reliable due to their dates and the direct translations. (Second:) even with the discrepancies the message is virtually unchanged. If Thou desire reading the version of King James thouest may certainly do so if it so pleases. The rest of us can read the NASB or NIV without fearing that we are being misled and are going to hell.

Here is a great site that lays out some of the verses and how text is different across

several translations.

If you are like me, after reviewing this comparison you find yourself asking, what exactly is the big deal here? Clearly there have been positions taken by the individuals and groups when translating Greek to English. Its a translation across two or more languages. There will always be some loss of data when this happens.

Is that quote from Deuteronomy about translation errors or is it about someone like the Mormons adding the "Third Testament of Ancient Americans" to the Bible?

The core of Biblical pursuit is Colossians 2:2 and Luke 24:25 where it takes more than simple perception of the word to understand it. Some have argued to me that not liking the KJV version means I am not blessed to understanding the word? I think I understand just fine, thank you. I also happen to think that Jesus is capable of overcoming some language barriers through translation seeing as how he defeated death itself.

Oil Solutions

Ugly times call for smart measures. $75 per barrel is ugly.

1) Federalize the emissions mixture. Currently different cities make their own specific blend making refining a piecemeal nightmare. Streamline it to a regular or lite mixture to improve refining turn times.

2) Chop the federal gas tax.

3) Maintain the relaxed regulations regarding transportation and shipping that do not impact safety.

4) Build more nuclear power plants.

5) Fund

coal gasification technology.

6) Build more refineries.

7) FUEL CELLS!

The price alone is encouraging us to reduce our consumption. Unfortunately there is only so much that any individual can do to reduce consumption. The other problem is half of these items if started now would take upwards of 2-5 years to come to fruition.

One Bad Apple Spoils

Once upon a time I confess, I was a Mac guy. It was college, free love, tie dye and liberalism.

What the heck was I thinking? I bought a IIe and a laser printer for $4 grand (it had an 8 meg hard drive and 4 meg of ram)?

Anyway, now Apple is arguing in court that those of us online talking about news and events aren't actually journalists. We aren't covered by the same laws and privileges afforded to the press.

That's a self serving load of crap.

A newspaper begins by an individual or company printing words on paper to distribute and makes its revenues from advertising. In the electronic age, the internet is the new medium with exactly the same thing: individuals writing for ad revenue.

Apple is playing big corporate bully and trying to spoil future internet publications through a legal maneuver? That's a bad apple spoiling the whole bunch if ever I saw it. Especially ironic coming from the company that sponsored the 1984 big brother ad to release the original Mac.

ID= Ignorant Democrat

The Democrats say producing a photo ID is restrictive. Maybe that's because dead people don't usually have a drivers license?

Come on democrats! Where is your get out the ID drive? Get those buses rolling and take your constituents down to the DMV and get a free state ID! You have to have an ID to get just about anything nowadays. It isn't like we are requiring them to think about issues before they vote, just prove they are who they say they are. IDs are easy to get, and most DMVs are a stop on the local bus route.

The only valid reason to prevent ID use is to encourage voter fraud.

Minimum Wage Oprah

Waaahhh there is no living wage...
Waaahhhh they can't afford to do anything...
Waaahhh CEOs make $13,000 more per hour...

OPRAH'S EMPTY HEADED WHINE

Get a grip.

First, where does the money come from to pay workers? Trees? The hole in the floor with the timelock on it? No, it comes from the profits made on selling goods and services.

What happens if the cost of providing the goods and services go up? Does the provider graciously eat soup and absorb the difference or does he increase prices to maintain his profit margin?

Let's look at a single mom. She makes $5.15 per hour. She takes her kid for a happy meal at McDonald's once per week as a treat. That happy meal costs her $2.99 until the new increase in minimum wage hits. Her local McDonald's franchise operator has to pay $6.15 per hour under a new law so they increase the price on that happy meal to $3.50 to cover the costs. Take the same increase and spread it across clothing and grocery costs. Where did her increased minimum wage benefit go if prices aren't static?

I'll tell you exactly where the benefit went: to the local union hourly employee. Labor's contracts are based on "minimum wage +" calculations. Those same expenses that drive up the costs of manufacturing that have driven the jobs to countries with a lower wage structure. Those same lower wage structures that provide goods that the minimum wage person chooses to buy instead of a similar item made by an American making "minimum wage +"?

What happens if there is no minimum wage? Well, good question. Right now there is a convenience store advertising $10 per hour starting pay outside my office. Why does my local Mapco gas station pay $10? Because people won't work there for less money (the minimum wage). They go elsewhere to work for the money they can earn for their services not for the amount the 'govmint forces someone to pay.

The TRUTH is that people earn exactly as much money as they are willing to work for or how much the market will pay them.
The TRUTH is that the same people who gripe about minimum wage have neither a concept of economics or an understanding that their own drive to increase minimum wage is putting Americans out of work.
The TRUTH is that if companies don't offer enough money for the job, people won't work there.

Think about that the next time you buy a pair of jeans or sneakers made in China because the quality is good for a cheap price.

Back to the single mom: why doesn't she look for work elsewhere? If she isn't happy with the money she is making, go somewhere else and apply!

As for the CEO: think of them like professional golfers. 99% of the good golfers who try cannot qualify for the PGA, my nephew missed by 1 stroke so that puts him in the 98%. Not good enough. Should everyone be paid like Tiger Woods? Maybe everyone should make as much money as Oprah? Of course not! Why? BECAUSE THEY AREN'T SKILLED TO DO THE JOB!

Why are people so stupidly short sighted on this? If you are going to do a minimum wage, go ahead and make it $100 per hour. Might as well make it a good wage if you bother to do it at all.

Dick Morris: Sharp Cookie

When a spade is a spade why call it anything else?

Dick Morris has nailed what Bush should do to reinvent his second term. I may not agree with "global warming" but the idea of changing our dependence on foreign oil just makes good sense.

Illegal Immigrants/"Undocumented Workers": Build the wall AND do a guest worker program, simple and brilliant!

Terrorists sell drugs to fund terrorism. Go after drug takers and sellers in the name of fighting terror! BRILLIANT!

Somebody in DC pass this to W's desk, please?

PET STORE DOGS

London Times: 250 dogs in a 40-ft garden shed. Living in their own excrement in small travel carriers. All filthy, some nearly dead. (Linked article in title.)

This is where your pet store dog comes from. Do not buy from a pet store.

ALWAYS go to the breeders HOME and view the mother.

Unless you think this kind of thing is ok?

The Lamb

When Moses told Pharaoh that GOD wanted him to release the Hebrew slaves, pharaoh refused. The last plague that struck Egypt as punishment for Pharaoh's stubborn refusal was by far the most brutal. The first born son of each household was killed from the Pharaoh's son down to the lowest slave.

Except for the Hebrew slave families.

Moses told the Hebrews to take a one year old male lamb and to sacrifice it. Roast with fire and eat it with unleavened bread and bitter herb. Take blood from the lamb and paint the door frame to the home with it. Any uneaten portion of the lamb should also be burned.

"The blood shall be a sign for you on the houses where you live; and when I see the blood I will pass over you, and no plague will befall you to destroy you when I strike the land of Egypt."

The plague was death and it bypassed those under the blood of the lamb. It became regular celebration for the Jews.

It was also the precursor to Jesus, the innocent whose blood redeems the sins of those who would accept him in themselves. There is much more allegory to the message yet many refuse to accept it.

Exodus chapters 9-12.

Academia, Fear and $$

Forgive me if I'm skeptical about global warming. You see, I have history on my side:

Three Mile Island Cancer
DDT Kills
Crack Babies are hopeless

All huge issues of their time. All based on "preliminary studies" sorely lacking in researched proof. In other words, they were a fancy form of folklore. Fancy in that the originate from reputable sources but end up being baseless.

No wonder people believe a high school student can prove that microwaving saran wrap releases carcinogens into food that causes cancer.

Let me preempt the comeback I expect: "Bush is using fear of terror to do X."
My response is history is on his side.

THIS IS SO TRUE!

You're a True Tennessean If....

*1. You can properly pronounce
Ooltewah, La Vergne, Maury County, Etowah
and Maryville
.
2. You think people who complain
about the heat in their states
are sissies
.
3. A tornado warning siren is your signal
to go out in the yard and look for a funnel
.
*4. You know that the true value
of a parking space is not determined
by the distance to the door,
but by the availability of shade
.
5. Stores don't have bags or shopping carts,
they have sacks and buggys.

6. You've seen people wear bib overalls
at weddings and funerals.

7. You think everyone from
a bigger city has an accent.

*8. You measure distance in minutes
.
9. You go to the lake because
you think it is like going to the ocean.
.
*10. You listen to the weather forecast
before picking out an outfit.
.
*11. You know cowpies
are not made of beef.
.
12. Someone you know has used
a football schedule to plan
their wedding date.
.
13. You know someone who has
a belt buckle bigger than your fist.
.
*14. You aren't surprised to find
movie rental, ammunition, beer, and bait
all in the same store.
.
15. A Mercedes Benz isn't a status symbol.
A Chevy Silverado Extended Bed Crew Cab is.
.
16. You know everything
goes better with Ranch.
.
17. You learned how to shoot a gun
before you learned how to multiply
.
18. You actually get these jokes
and are "fixin'" to send them
to your friends and finally
:
*19. You are 100% Tennessean
if you have ever had this conversation:
"You wanna coke?"
"Yeah."
"What kind?"
"Dr Pepper."

Tornado

Fortunately, we are all ok. The tornado began 3 miles south of my home at 210 PM Central time and left a path of destruction about 25 miles long. My 4 year old daughter was herded into the tornado room of her school and says "there was a big boom, and then it was done."

I managed not to freak out that she was that close to it.

Here are a couple of very bad shots I got while driving home. I took a back road because the interstate was closed and the secondary was also blocked. I came over the hill and drove straight into where the tornado began.





I have to go out today and will post more pictures from the good camera when I get back.

Dealing with this, I wonder how people are still dealing with Katrina, 1000 times this much damage. In contrast, Katrina folks had 3-4 days warning. We had almost none.

Liberal Hot Air: Global Warming

VANUATU (BETTER GO BEFORE IT SINKS)

How do I know that this is a liberal argument? Dave's law: libs will always resort to cursing to make their point.

I really should number those laws, but I digress... here is the curse word in context:

"LIES, DAMN LIES, AND GEORGE WILL'S CITATIONS:"

George's Column that got the Libs so worked up

As a rule, anything that doesn't agree with lefties makes you a racist, liar, murderer, homophobe or all of the above. In this case it makes us planet killers which may deserve a new category. So to be fair let's see exactly what the save the planet types wanted to accomplish with Kyoto.

Time for a new multiple guess game! What would the US signing onto Kyoto have accomplished? Here are your choices:
A) reduced global warming by 10 degrees C by 2040
B) reduced global warming by 2 degrees C by 2100
C) there are no accurate models to predict the outcome
D) reduced global warming by 10 degrees by 2145

The best answer is C: according to

Marshall Institute

Let me clue you into what else would have happened if we signed Kyoto:
Massive blue-collar layoffs in the US due to energy rationing would force companies overseas where Kyoto protocols permit increases in power consumption
Internationally, thousands would have starved as a cash strapped US cuts off foreign aid funding
The UN would bankrupt because the US would have to cut funding, and we carry something like 70% of the dollars used to run the UN
Thousands of birds** would die threatening species as wind power mills multiply (

Alternate Downside

(speculative derived from:

$200 billion economy impact)

Ever notice that they never advertise the details about the benefits of Kyoto? Maybe that's because there AREN'T ANY!

**note: birds are much more likely to be killed by cars than windmills, but the

Audubon Society

has called for a moratorium until more studies can be done to make windmills safer for birds.

Preemies Feel Pain

File this under the category of "The more you know... the less abortion appeals..."

British researchers have compared brain scans of preemies while blood was being taken. They have shown that the small, immature brains are registering pain. Article from BBC News linked in title.


This leads to a logical question: when does a human begin to feel pain? My ultimate train of thought is the better our technology gets, the less people will support abortion.

Goodbye Dave

When I was going through the adoption process my counselor Tammy told me that her son David had identified with something I said. We were talking about the Everclear song "Wonderful Lyrics" about a child who doesn't want his parents to be divorced, he just wants life to be as it was before the break up. I mentioned to her that the song really spoke to me as my parents divorced when I was nine. I did not realize that Tammy divorced while we were adopting and she asked her son about the song that day when they heard it on the radio while driving home. David really responded to her question and they had a great talk about it.

David joined the Marines last year when he graduated high school. He went to Iraq, and was killed in a flash flood- of all things? I think this is the story that covers the event in a brief opening paragraph. Apparently it happened Sunday. We just heard about it today.

Keep Tammy in your prayers for me.
Semper Fi Dave!

Clerical Errors: Planned Parenthood

Why does a group of clergy support Planned Parenthood over muffins, coffee and orange juice?
LINKED ARTICLE IN TITLE

To be fair, they support a portion of planned parenthood's agenda: pregnancy prevention. That in of itself is not a bad idea. I'll list a few other good ideas and you tell me if you support them:

Charitable giving to single mothers
Education support tools
Immigration reform
Scholarship programs
Self Defense courses
Homeschooling programs
Dating advice

OF COURSE all of these programs are worth supporting! Now what if I told you these were all platforms of the STORMFRONT group of

white supremacist?

GOTCHA!

Just like those well-intentioned clergy supporting Planned Parenthood, supporting any agency means you support everything that agency stands for. Do these clergy support partial birth abortion? Do they support late term abortions? I seriously doubt it! No, scratch that: I seriously hope they don't!

Let's look at what the author of this piece deemed an important quote from Reverend Susan thistlethwaite, PHD.


""The more we are able to cultivate the capacity in every person women and men— to make informed ethical judgments both in ourselves and our society, the more we are coming into relationship with the transcendent, with God," said the Rev. Susan Thistlethwaite, president of Chicago Theological Seminary. "Human existence as a materialistic quest for power and dominance, a crass manipulation of fear and intolerance for political gain, drives us apart both from one another and from God," she said. "For what does it profit you to gain the whole world and lose your soul?""


My response to this inflammatory statement is purely Biblical:
Madame Reverend Thistlethwaithe, seeing as how you and I both hold the Bible as a common logical reference point we should go there for the answer. We find that you, Reverend are formed in sin and imperfection just as I and every other human being are(Galatians 3:19-24-fruits of the flesh; Romans 7:1-25 acting under flesh decisions versus decisions of the spirit).
We are incapable of making perfect judgements because we are not Jesus. Our decisions and actions are only relevant to our relationship with God as he guides us to be (Phil 3:3-no confidence in the flesh).
In short, we cannot elevate ourselves to God through our own actions (John 14:16- No one comes to the FATHER except through ME")

My purely logical question to you Reverend, is how does supporting a pro-abortion organization make us all closer to God as you imply? Or the converse, how does denying a pro-abortion group remove us from God?

If it is as you say, is that a God worthy of knowing?

SEC Revenge

Before you ask, normally I prefer football and I am not a basketball fan. Another factor to consider is my geographic and legacy infused orange blood has bread me to be a Tennessee fan. With all that said, I am very surprised and impressed by this guy:

TN HEAD COACH BRUCE PEARL
I can't wait to see what Pearl can do with his team next year as I'm finding myself interested in basketball again (a fair weather fan thing I'll admit).

Because there are people out there who know way more than I do and I don't like looking foolish, I typically avoid blogging about sports. Now there is something about this season that needs to be ranted about.

The SEC snub in rankings.

As is self-evident by the final four having two SEC teams present, and the championship game being attended by one SEC team (Florida might beat UCLA but not if UCLA plans and executes like they did against LSU).

Let's face it, Kentucky smelled rotten this year. What happened, according to some pundits, is that because Kentucky wasn't good the AP ranking coaches and press downgraded the entire SEC. Just search the rankings for yourself and see where SEC teams stood in relation to the other conferences

all year.

Living well is the best form of revenge. Does having the other conferences iced out of the final four says volumes against the quality of the poll system? I'm no expert but it doesn't look good to me.