I've been asked, via email and personal conversations, about the decrease in blogging activity. The short answer is, I've been working my through a required reading list, several, in fact, and for different purposes. (For one thing, I'm several issues behind in Faith and Philosophy. I have to leave it at that.

Also, I've been involved elsewhere in on-line discussions on topics such as Arizona SB 1070. That one was a knock-about of pure fun, revealing to me that opponents of the bill either haven't read it, or just know things that, as far as I'm concerned, just can't be known. There is a third possibility: they just have an ethnic chip on their shoulder and everything is an attempt to do no more than to knock off that chip.

One with whom I discussed the matter was just certain that he and his father, despite being citizens, were in jeopardy under the law. He couldn't say how, though. I mean, presently Arizona law simply permits law enforcement to check immigration status if there is reasonable doubt about that status. The new law would have required a check of immigration status if there were reasonable doubt. I asked several times precisely how he and his father were in danger under a requirement that they were not under a permission. Nothing. Then there was this silly assertion:

And last time I checked, a valid driver's license is not proof of citizenship.

And that was from someone who says he read the law carefully, the same law which stipulates that a valid driver's license (among other forms of identification) is acceptable as sufficient evidence that the bearer is not in the country illegally. I asked him about that, too. I'm still waiting for answers to both questions.

But mostly, I've been catching up on some reading and attending to family-related and house-hold matters. I intend to resume normal blogging, including the return of Wisdom Sunday, in about a month or so.

These people -- it's never satisfactory for them just to warn parents, and (HORRORS!) let parents decide whether to buy their children Happy Meals which include toys. Of course, they have warned parents; but parents (darn them!) insist on buying Happy Meals for their children. Since the parents won't stop buying, the only alternative is to make McDonald's stop selling the offending product, the product, that is, which offends the Center for Science in the Public Interest, not the parents.

It used to be that parents warned kids to run away from strangers offering candy, but companies have made an end run by laundering their perfidy through electronic media. Now kids absorb countless commercials touting premiums based on their favorite characters -- Shrek, Batman, Barbie, Beanie Babies, etc. -- and, surprise, surprise, ask their parents to take them to McDonald's. Consumer-marketing guru Adam Hanft said, "Happy Meals proved that you could actually 'brand' a meal and make children harass their parents for it."

The Federal Trade Commission has reported that fast-food companies--with McDonald's by far in the lead--spent $360 million in 2006 on toys to market children's meals. In the same year, fast food restaurants sold more than 1.2 billion children's meals with toys to children ages 12 and under, accounting for 20 percent of all child traffic at those restaurants. It should be no surprise that companies employ the practice--it works.

As one reads the article, one gets the impression that, for Jacobson and his ilk, the only market players involved are restaurants like McDonald's and children, where the children are the consumuers. The parents? Oh, those are the people who are "pestered" by the children into talking them to McDonald's and are, apparently, impotent in resisting this pestering. Some of us -- neanderthals, no doubt -- would say this marketing to children via toys works because -- and only because -- parents allow it to work. Jacobson knows better. It's McDonald's; and they've got to be stopped.

Granted "kids absorb countless commercials...and...ask their parents to take them to McDonald's" and that children can be motivated to harass their parents for a product. But the question remains: Who is in charge here? As Bill Cosby might say, "These are not your children!" (I can't tell you what my mother would tell Michael Jacobson.)

I recall the last time I attempted to pester my parents into something. I was about seven years old. Not only did I not get what I wanted, but my pestering was so aggressive I got something I most certainly did not want (but was told I asked for) -- and I got a lot of it!

The children may "pester" and "harass" but Mommy and Daddy are the push-overs who drive the little whiners to McDonald's. Mommy and Daddy are the ones who spend their hard-earned dollars on Crappy Meals. Why doesn't the Center for Science in the Public Interest sue the damn parents? I'll tell you why: McDonald's has more money.

Scumbags.

A man said to the universe,
"Sir, I exist."
"However," replied the universe,
"The fact has not created in me
"A sense of obligation." -- Stephen Crane

A perennial complaint during the Republican Captivity II was that myriads of college graduates were having to take low-paying, even minimum wage jobs. College graduates were "flipping burgers". Oh, the Charles Dickens of it all. That was bad news, because college graduates should just walk right into mid-management jobs. And that's in a bad economy; in a good economy, those graduates should have a seat on the board, no doubt. College graduates flipping burgers and waiting tables was also one of many signs that Republicans don't know how to manage an economy. (Note: an un-managed economy is a good thing to some of us.)

We deserve more, and some power, somewhere, is obligated to make sure we get it.

But now, believe it or not, that low-paying job could actually -- get this -- be a good thing. Paul Facella (ironically, a former burger-flipper), lists six good things, (six career enhancers, even) about starting out on the bottom rung.

That reminds me: remember when the best G.D.P. was a J-O-B?

Apparently, that applies only when a Republican is in the Presidential Palace. When a Democrat resides in the Palace as our Fisher-President, and the jobless hovers just below 10% or is it really closer to 20%?), why it's a great day in His Beatitude's coming paradise. These days, being J-O-B-less (and, therefore, G.D.P.-less) is, or can be, a good thing. If you just alter your perspective, these bad economic times are actually good. Think of it as "funemployment".

Incredible.

I do just happen to agree with Facella, though. Among the many benefits of starting at the bottom is the lesson in humility that some of us need, and some of us more than others. In 1992, while I was still an undergraduate, preparing -- I was certain -- law school, my wife and I suffered a financial set-back to the tune of, well, a lot of money. So long law school. I did well to get that B.A. in 1993.

I well recall the day one of my friends called, just a few days before graduation, to congratulate me. We spent just a few moments half-jokingly speculating on which think tank I'd be working for inside of a decade.

My first job after graduating was in a furniture repair shop; then I tried my hand at telemarketing, followed, rather ironically, by fast-food restaurant management. That fact -- the ugly truth of the matter -- is that life is like this (no, much, much worse) for most of the world's population. And it always has been. I'm not special because I went to university; and neither are you.

Life is difficult. Most people get out of life what they can scrape out of it. Deal with it.

Like suffering -- suffering can change a man. Or, the right woman.

On the other hand, so can the right food. Like Volcano Nachos. I'm not a big fan of Taco Bell: I grew up eating as "food" what most of you people call Mexican food. But I do really like this commercial:



Volcano Nachos...changes a man. Not since the days of the little chihuahuah, have I enjoyed a Taco Bell commercial.

Pero, no quiero taco bell.

It's clean out the pantry day at the Deviant Household. Seems Lady Deviant bought a bit too much and the pantry won't hold it all. Apparently, I have too many bottles of this and that (this=Captain Morgan's; that=Presidente Mexican Brandy). Apparently, the Bushmill's and the Svedka are not in the way.

Well, that's it for the rum. The rum is gone. Except for that flask back in the -- never mind: it's not in the pantry, so it doesn't count.

Did I say the rum is gone? Yes. I believe I did. But why? Why is the rum gone?

I have loved clean out the pantry day since I was a kid. Of course, in the Solís household there usually was only tequila.

Mmmm, tequila.

That reminds me: I wonder how that bottle of Sauza is doing.

Gotta go. The wife wants me to help with something. As if I'm not doing enough already. I mean, here I am, working my liver to the bone. Some people -- it's just never enough.

(Part One)
One assertion Spencer makes (here), and with which I agree, I found particularly worthy of comment:

Despite some very successful developments in the past 25 years, Christian education has not produced a product that can withstand the rising tide of secularism.

I think this is unarguably true. But I also think it must be pointed out, in all fairness, that 25 years is not as long a period of time as he seems to think, especially when the secular counterpart has been around at least twice as long, and is better financed. And, like a sick joke, evangelical taxes have comprised some of that financing.

Even with that in mind, it doesn't strike me that evangelicalism is poised for success against secularism. The reason, I think -- and I'm just spit-balling here -- is that this so-called Christian education is still really very secular. It has not been Christian paideia, the nourishing and training to full development of the Christian soul, the entire person. It's focus has been equally as secular, equally as materialistic, as any secular education. It has been Christian only by virtue of being taught by Christians to the children of Christians, and because it has included chapel services and instruction in Bible and Christian worldview. It has been secular by virtue of being relevant, that is, relevant to this world, practical in the sense of churning out worker drones, or Christian leaders. And, like all relevant education, it has largely ignored, as irrelevant, introduction to The Great Ideas, training in participation in The Great Conversation. (And where it has turned to that sort of education, it has done so after secular educationalists have done.) If it isn't going to help the student get to college so he can get a good job someday, then, being irrelevant, it will not be taught. Consequently, education has been reduced to two goals: missions and evangelism, or job training. I mentioned paideia above. If I had a nickle for every evangelical who, when discussing anyone's university major, asked, "What are you going to do [vocationally] with that?" I'd be independently wealthy.

Riddle me this: Why did the Spartans learn music and dance? What have they to do with being warriors?

Also, evangelicalism's unintentionally trite (and popularized) summation of the doctrine of justification sola fide, pits idea against idea, Christian principles against secular principles. But secularism is not first of all a set of principles. The heart of secularism is violation of the First Commandment. This is not a mere philosophical ideology. It is a matter of the heart, not the mind. We are talking about sin. This is worldliness in the Pauline sense, standing in opposition to God himself.

In reality, therefore, the popularized conception of sola fide pits a statement of faith against the sinful disposition itself. The sinful disposition isn't something one defeats with an idea. If someone commits a sin, we don't recite the Apostles' Creed! It's like flashing a crucifix at a vampire: it looks good in movies, but seriously, are you kidding me? Secularism isn't mere ideology, to be defeated, or simply replaced, with a contrary ideology. Evangelicalism's focus on teaching a Biblical/Christian worldview may thus have back-fired a bit. The Christian worldview, alone, is an ideology rather than a theology. (And by theology I mean way of life, not academic discipline.) Precisely as ideology it is, paradoxically, powerless against secularism. It could not be otherwise.

Permit me to illustrate. Let us take the proposition, God exists. Strictly speaking, a proof of God's existence is no more than a demonstration that the proposition God exists is logically derived from more basic propositions. This, in and of itself, doesn't mean that God exists. It means the proposition can be derived from other propositions. God exists, by such derivation, is not for that reason, a statement about reality. That's contentious, of course; classical apologists would disagree. The important thing, however, is this. Even under conditions which would render the proposition, God exists, a statement about reality, the proposition itself has no power. The true proposition, God exists has no power to save. The same is true of statements of faith. The assertions of a statement of faith may all be true, but there is no power in them. I can very well believe in the forgiveness of sins and the resurrection of the dead. But the power to forgive sins; the power to raise the dead -- these are not in the creed.

This is not to say that statements of faith are unimportant. They are very important. They are important because they mark out doctrinal boundaries within which the Christian life is lived. But statements of faith are not the Christian life. It is the gospel (the subject of statements of faith), and not the statement of faith, which is the power of God for salvation (Romans 1.16). To learn the Christian worldview; to learn to articulate and defend a statement of faith -- these are not the same as to experience the power of God for salvation. They are not the same as possessing and living life in Christ. When young people are taught the contents of the Christian worldview, they are given nothing which can withstand secularism, anymore than they are given something which can withstand sinful temptations. There is no power in the Christian worldview. The power to withstand secularism; the power to resist temptation -- these powers are in Christ himself. A Christian education which teaches Bible, theology, and Christian worldview as academic subjects in which mastery is demonstrated by performance on a written test is doomed to failure.

Apart from life in Christ, the Christian worldview is an ideology. Secularism, however, is not an ideology; it is the current manifestation of the spirit of the age. Against that spirit, ideology, even a Christian ideology, is powerless. (See 1 John 4.4.) Presently, evangelicalism strikes one as an invitation to ideologically sick people to improve their ideological health by adopting a healthier ideology. In actuality the invitation is extended to dead men. (Am I suggesting, sub silentio that evangelicalism's real problem is Arminianism? Oops, my Calvinism is showing.)

Part Three

This article by Michael Spencer, the Internet Monk, has been the subject of some conversation. (Here, for example.)

Some participants in the conversation have pointed out that it doesn't represent any original thinking: various evangelicals have been saying the same thing, or similar things, for years. This characterization is probably correct. I recall as a youth, attending church with my parents and listening to all the talk about how bad things were getting and how the day of the persecution of Christians was coming, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera.

But Spencer's article is valuable at least as a summation of a case made by others, mixed with some personal observations of his own as to why the evangelical collapse is coming.

I do have to disagree with the first reason he gives for evangelicalism's impending collapse:

Evangelicals have identified their movement with the culture war and with political conservatism. This will prove to be a very costly mistake. Evangelicals will increasingly be seen as a threat to cultural progress. Public leaders will consider us bad for America, bad for education, bad for children, and bad for society.

It's easy enough for public leaders to identify evangelicals as a threat to progress. Alignment with the culture war and with political conservatism will be convenient excuses; but I doubt things would be much different if evangelicals had aligned themselves with Libertarians of the Friedman stripe, or if there were no alignment at all. The sort of leaders Spencer must surely have in mind are out-and-out Statists. And let me be clear: by Statist I mean people who, really, worship Humanity (i.e., themselves) by devotion to, and adoration of, the omnicompetent state.

In the end, evangelicals will not worship humanity by adoring the State. (Well, they shouldn't, anyway.) Rome's persecutions of Christians were motivated by concerns that were political. It was not as if Christians had launched a crusade to claim the empire for Christ. Indeed, by and large, they were dropping out and, well, "tuning in"...to Christ. In contrast, one gets the idea, listening to the spokes-persons for evangelicalism, that dropping out of the culture is the eighth deadly sin.

Getting back to Rome, though, one of the many things we fail to take note of is the fact that the word "gospel" (euangelion) was a word with political implications in the Greco-Roman world. It was frequently used with reference to the Emperor. Imagine how the use of that term, in reference to anyone else, especially a Jewish carpenter, must have struck the Roman world. Even in the best of times, it would not have required alignment with a culture war, or any extreme in the empire's political spectrum, to earn Christians more than a modicum. They simply would not worship the divine State, personified by the Emperor. They lacked pietas.And their use of such a seemingly insignificant word as "euangelion" with reference to their Christ was sufficient evidence of that.

The euangelion of Jesus Christ? That, alone, could have been seen as treason.

So evangelicals need not have identified their movement with the culture war and with political conservatism in order to be seen as a threat to cultural progress, or for public leaders to consider us "bad for America, bad for education, bad for children, and bad for society." If Spencer's location of the cause of evangelicalism's demise is correct and identification with the culture war and with political conservatism is the reason for it, then the vitriol will be leveled against us for the wrong reasons.

However, within his first point, is a claim with which I do heartily agree:

The evangelical investment in moral, social, and political issues has depleted our resources and exposed our weaknesses. Being against gay marriage and being rhetorically pro-life will not make up for the fact that massive majorities of Evangelicals can't articulate the Gospel with any coherence. We fell for the trap of believing in a cause more than a faith.

But I think it's worse: evangelicals haven't traded the faith for a cause; we have, a sufficient number of us, identified a cause with the faith. (In The Screwtape Letters, C.S. Lewis calls this the problem of "Christianity And".) It is almost as if evangelicals have come to believe that if the world will not repent of their sins and turn to Christ, that's all right: we'll just make them behave as if they have done. This, of course, is why they cannot articulate the Gospel with any coherence. There is no need to articulate the Gospel when the power of the State can be brought to bear in correcting our social ills. (Those of my friends who have known me the longest will attest that I've never been a fan of this maneuver.)

Articulating the Gospel is for the minster. The mission of the "layman" is to write his Congressmen and vote for right-wing (i.e., socially conservative) causes (or left-wing [i.e., fiscally liberal] causes, for evangelicals of the Sojourners ilk). I'm being facetious only for rhetorical effect. The simple fact is, I think Spencer is right. Evangelicals do seem increasingly unable to communicate the Gospel. The answer must surely be that they are spending their time learning to do, or, in fact, doing something else. Not only that, but I think the inability is rooted in an unwillingness to communicate the gospel. And I have a sick feeling, in the pit of my stomach, that the reason for the unwillingness to communicate the gospel is an unwillingness to live it. I could be wrong about that; but I'm not.

Part Two

"The War between the States established...this principle, that the federal government is,...the final judge of its own powers." ~ Woodrow Wilson,Constitutional Government in the United States, p. 178
This day we have inaugurated our Twenty-eighth Constitutional Dictator (a.k.a., our Forty-fourth president), under the "American System". In true, "American" fashion it was a peaceful transfer of power from one ruling junta to another. Well, it's change anyway. We can be thankful for it. Such as it is. The machine over which our new Leader will preside, however, has been there for about one hundred fifty years, and still is. That didn't change.

I know it sounds (what's the word?) disrespectful to call him a dictator. But the fact is, he is, not because of any fault or moral failure on his part, but by virtue of the nature of the office to which he has ascended. He now presides over a government which is, as Wilson observed, the final judge of its powers. Such a government is of the essence of dictatorship, however benevolent, however democratic. And so have they been since good ol' (dis)honest Abe, who would be rolling in his grave to see a black man at the head of the tyrannical government he fought so hard to establish. I can take great pleasure in that, anyway. Anything Lincoln would despise is something I can take pleasure in.

Our government is dictatorial by virtue of its justifications for its increasing size, power, and scope. In his book Constitutional Dictatorship, Clinton Rossiter argued that constitutional democracies must learn the lesson of the Roman Republic (oh, how I wish they would!): adopt and use emergency procedures that empower government to deal with crises beyond the ordinary capacities of democratic constitutional governance while at the same time ensuring that crisis procedures are subject to constitutional controls and codified temporal limits. This government -- this constitutional dictatorship -- has moved non-stop from one national crisis to another since the War for Southern Independence. Such a government is, by virtue of operating beyond the ordinary capacities of democratic constitutional governance, dictatorial. It exists in its present form (and has done for almost one-hundred fifty years) for no other purpose than to manage crises. It is simply a crisis-manufacturing-and-managing machine. (At the very least, if it does not actively create crises, then it does so inadvertently. And when it does not create crises, it certainly baptizes them.) If we could ever be crisis-free (yeah, right) we could dispense with the need for the machine.

The machine over which Bush (America's sole dictator, to listen to left-statists) presided is not only going to be left in place, it is likely to get even bigger, if His Beatitude's inauguration speech is a true indicator of his "change we can believe in". Change which will still be dictated from the top down in order to respond to ever more threatening crises -- education, healthcare, economic unfairness, global climate change, cats and dogs co-habitating. That much won't change. Just like he said: The question is not whether our government is too big or too small, but whether it works. The crises are there; they are real, and they are insurmountable without big government. If they were smaller crises, then, no doubt, we could get by with a little government. Sadly, little government is not on the side of history.

There is one thing I wish Rossiter had taken into consideration. It's one thing to speak glowingly of a "constitutional disctatorship". It's another thing to have one. It's not much of a constitutional dictatorship when the ruling junta is the one deciding whether it has exceeded its constitutional limitations. And let's not have any talk about the Supreme Court being there to reign it in. This is likely to be a Supreme Court, soon, populated in the main by judges who buy into the Living Document Hypothesis. A "constitutional" dictatorship whose powers are limited by a living document, is a dictatorship whose powers are not limited by that document. It's a dictatorship whose powers are limited only by judicial fiat.

Of course, that could mean that, rather than a constitutional dictatorship, we have a sort of consular government, with the Executive playing the role of one consul and the Supreme Court playing the role of the other. Of course, in this case only one of the consuls has veto power of the other.

A constitutional dictatorship. The Founders would be so proud.

Note: With this posting, I do not strike out in any sort of new direction. Anti-"federalism" has been a consistent theme of this blog since I started it. If there is anything new here, it is in making clear that my sentiments are not limited to Congress and the Federal Courts. My failure to be explicit in regard to our Twenty-seventh Dictator was out of a habit of deference, and an attempt to give due consideration to the fact that we are at war. I think an ever-increasingly hostile tone toward both the Big Government Left (i.e., Democrats) and Big Government Right (i.e., Republicans) has been more than evident since at least the campaign season. I know it would have been nice to make this new tone more explicit after Obama's term. But I have no desire to wait another four years (or, gulp, eight) before I cease this habit of deference. Had McCain been the winner he'd be getting this. The people have spoken.

I awoke to news this morning of the passing of Ricardo Montalban, one of my absolute favorite actors, who sounds, when he talks, a lot like my dad (but with just a tad more accent).

I'm posting clips from some great moments in his career.

From the Planet of the Apes series of movies:



In this preview of Star Trek (TOS) episode, "Space Seed" (which you can watch, here):



Dancing La Bamba with Cyd Charisse:



This "spoof" of his Chrysler Cordoba commericial:



Talent. The man had so much talent. So much talent.

Joseph Bottum anounced the passing of Father Neuhaus at the First Things website this morning. His fight -- and not the fight against the cancer with which he suffered -- is over.

Bottum's tribute,

I weep, rather for all the rest of us. As a priest, as a writer, as a public leader in so many struggles, and as a friend, no one can take his place. The fabric of life has been torn by his death, and it will not be repaired, for those of us who knew him, until that time when everything is mended and all our tears are wiped away,

reminds me of something General Lee said of Stonewall Jackson:

He has lost his left arm; and I have lost my right hand.

I would like to offer my own tribute, but Kevin, at After Existentialism, Light, does better than I have time to offer:

During the early semesters of my undergraduate studies, a close friend of mine introduced me to First Things. We would read and discuss the articles, and both of us (he, a confessional Presbyterian, and myself, a devout Baptist) were freed from the limitations of our heritage. Christian scholars were more than just exegetes; they were scientists, philosophers, social theorists, and so on. Strange as it may sound, FT played no small role in saving our faith; otherwise, we would have been overwhelmed by the coherence and interpretive power of the secular narrative, a mechanistic existence presupposed in our coursework.

I also discovered FT during my undergraduate years as I experienced my own struggle not to have my new-found faith "overwhelmed by the coherence and interpretive power of the secular narrative, a mechanistic existence presupposed in [my] coursework."

So, a guy is driving down the country road off of which I live and crashes into and destroys an entire row of those steel boxes which contain the phone lines for my area.

On one hand, it's easy to see how this could happen. I live so far off the beaten path out here, that one could drive down the road at 70 miles per hour and never get caught. On the other hand, the speed limit is 45 miles per hour. And, one would think, if you want to drive 70 miles per hour down a straight-away, you might at least slow down for the curves, especially when there's a warning sign telling you to do so.

Thankfully, no humans were injured, despite this guy's having ended up in someone's front yard.

It took two days, working non-stop, for several shifts of repair crews to restore our phone (and dsl) lines.

Do you know, life without the internet almost seemed impossible.

We make our way, deliberately,
From east to west desperately seeking
A tree under which to place our gifts –
Gold, frankincense, myrrh—
For a child born and living
In a land once flowing
With milk and honey, following
A wandering star, westward, leading
To that land whose inhabitants arrived
Long ages ago on eagles’ wings
And now is trampled under strangers’ feet
(like salt without savor),
By a nation foreign to every covenant.
And we ponder, still we ponder
The meaning of it all—
One people, out of thousands,
This land of all lands,
and the strange legends
Of a Lawgiver, divinely inspired prophets—
Persecuted—
God-selected kings—
Faithless and disloyal,
And of this child
And his star,
Dancing in the sky,
Signing with the constellations,
For those with eyes to hear.

Weary of singing, “A thousand jars
Of wine on the wall”
We debate the importance of it all:
The selection of this land and people,
(stiff-necked and stubborn – could not
God have done better?).
The cause eludes us
Why the land was granted
And a nation created --
Just to raise up a people
Out of rocks and stones
(like pulling a rabbit
From an old silk hat
In a cosmic magic show)?
Surely, we think, no.
These supposed events
Were not without some significance,
However mysterious, incomprehensible.

Bearing gifts we traverse afar
Searching for a little fat man
In a little red suit, driving
A miniature sleigh pulled
By eight tiny reindeer.
Certainly, we think,
This man must know what it’s all about –
This child born king of the Jews.
“Perhaps we shall find him,”
The little fat man, “before the child
In humble adoration, devoutly kneeling."
Seeking, like we, a better country,
With a better king, not like the usual
Administration – devouring his people,
(The people are his;
The livestock are his;
The land is his)
Claiming divinity for himself,
Copulating madly to perpetuate
His godly line—

O King may you live forever and
Et cetera,
Et cetera,
Et cetera.

Over field and flood
And moor and mountain
We listen to a tedious tale
Told by a magic snowman
With a button nose,
A corn cob pipe,
And two eyes made of coal,
And who knows all about it—
The buying and selling,
The deadly stampeding
For what thieves can steal,
And moth and rust destroy;
The children, screaming,
Clutching cubit-long lists;
The hoping, tragic and ironic,
For a little peace on the earth,
Goodwill to men;
Some manifestation of the spirit
Of the true
And obscure
Meaning of the season
For which generic greetings
Are exchanged,
The tidings of comfort and joy
(Let nothing dismay you,
Somehow);
And as always, the not-comprehending
Why peace and goodwill
Are not forthcoming.
“Can you truly hope,”
I ask our hitch-hiking snowman,
“To find such things where men say,
‘Let us make bricks
And construct
An everlasting city
And establish for ourselves
An everlasting Name’?”

“We have seen his star in the east,”
We explain upon our arrival,
“And have come to worship him.
“Where shall we find
“Your new-born king and ours?”
And no one seems to know or care
About anything but eating and drinking
And marrying and giving in marriage,
The typical power – now troubled
By the thought, “The party may soon be ending.”
Scrolls untouched perhaps for decades
are sought and dusted and searched;
An answer is forthcoming.
And we continue as we set out:
Alone, to see and worship
Their new-born king.

In Bethlehem we find him,
Thanks to certain poor shepherds
To whom the first Noel was said,
A snot-nosed toddler, prancing about
In soiled diapers.

Is this what we came all this way for?
What? A king with no palace, no crown,
No purple robes, no servants attending?

“What sort of king,”
I say to my companions with me,
“Can this be?”

It seemed, long ago,
An uncommonly silly way
To save the world,
A stupid way to make the crooked straight,
To justify the ungodly
And redeem the abandoned.

The eldest among us cautions:
Recall the star. Can it have misguided?
It points to this place and to this child.
Recall the scrolls. Can they have deceived?
If star and scroll say, ‘Behold’
Then shall we not behold?
Shall we now abandon star and scroll
In favor of some self-flattering ordinary regime,
With its palaces and crowns and robes,
Fawning court-scholars serving
Ravenous wolves on thrones?
I saw fear and loathing in Jerusalem:
Better this child, in such mean estate,
Than that monstrosity.

I had just then a vision:
A thorn-stuck brow,
Nails through hands and feet,
A spear in the side,
Blood and water—
Will this one die, slain by wolves,
For nothing?

So many long years later,
My companions both gone,
Again to see the child
(who prepares a place),
And I await another journey,
Or another advent, coming
Like lightning from the east,
Flashing even to the west,
A coming in clouds,
A blowing trumpet,
And the gathering together
From the four winds.
I would be happy
Just now indeed to see
A second coming.

James Frank Solís

As I was fueling my car over the weekend, I struck up a conversation with a young lady at the pump beside me, at the conclusion of which she wished me a Merry Christmas, rather than the now-popular, Happy Holidays.

Today I read Jeffrey Tucker take on the notion of a war on Christmas:

The idea that there is a "war on Christmas" has been promoted by Bill O'Reilly and other...talking heads for years, and they intend to fight back by demanding that private enterprise make Christmas overt and with legislation requiring governments to use the phrase "Christmas tree."

To the extent that business has taken up the "Happy Holidays" cause, Tucker argues that it is not opposition to Christmas, or even Christianity itself:

This isn't a conspiracy, but just good customer relations. True, it makes some people angry, but you have to appreciate the difficulty that this conundrum presents for business. They want to contribute to the spirit of the season, if only to make a buck. But no matter what they do, there is trouble waiting. I promise you this: the instant it turns up that they are losing more revenue by saying "Happy Holidays" than by saying "Merry Christmas," the policy will change.

[...]

[I]f you aren't satisfied with this argument on capitalism's behalf, there is something you can do. There are many vendors that specialize in Christmas and appeal to every conceivable sensibility. They sell cards, trees, ornaments, icons, books, and a million other items. There is nothing wrong with favoring them over the mass market. Capitalism has provided room for them, too, so you can do your part by buying from them.

A final word: Christmas is the worst time of the year to enter a holy war. Make your peace with religious diversity. Come to understand the driving forces behind a free economy and thank God for it. Christ was born into a world that did not yet celebrate Christmas, and the kings from the East had to lie to the magistrate about the recipient of their gifts. Christmas can survive and thrive even if it is not culturally dominant. To be free to practice our faith should be our prayer.

Christians don't really need non-Christians to care about Christmas. I'm always shocked and amazed that Christians and shocked and amazed when non-Christians act like they are not Christians.

They have commercialized Christmas. Wow. What a shock.

(And no it's not, It's a Wonderful Life. Not that there's anything wrong with it.)

I have a confession: one of my favorite movies to watch this of time year is Ernest Saves Christmas, starring Jim Varney (the voice of "Slinky Dog" in Toy Story). (I know it has nothing to do with the "reason for the season". I don't watch movies when I want to reflect upon the reason for the season. It's one of my favorites only because Varney, a Shakespearean actor, by the way, was one of my favorites, just so we're clear.)

There are two scenes in it I particulary enjoy. In the following, he and a young girl disguise themselves, go into a jail in order to break Santa Claus out of it.




Here's another one, in which he's helping Santa Claus break onto a movie lot:



My wife and I watched it (as we do every year at this time) on Friday. That's how it comes to be on my mind. It's great for stupid lines, and obscure references for all occasions, such as, "Would anyone else like some cranberry sauce shaped like a can?"

As long as we're thinking about Jim Varney, he's an interview he did on Good Morning American:




People who don't know me well always ask how a guy like me can enjoy stupid movies. Well, as Roald Dahl wrote: A little nonsense now and then is relished by the wisest men.

Note: I'm not a wise man, but play one on the internet.

One of the things I occasionally miss about being a Roman Catholic is all the art which is part of that history. Protestants in general, and evangelicals in particular, have not been known for their contributions to the arts. And such meager contributions as there have been amount to every more sophisticated (and mediocre) religious tracts. One gets the idea that art, if it’s not somehow “evangelistic,” is a waste of time.

Can there be such a thing, for Christians, as art for art’s sake? Well, perhaps not for art’s sake, but for God’s sake.

The ancients were afraid that if they went to the end of the earth, they would fall off and be consumed by dragons. But once we understand that Christianity is true to what is there, including true to the ultimate environment—the infinite, personal God who is really there—then our minds are freed. We can pursue any question and be sure that we will not fall off the end of the earth. Such an attitude will give our Christianity a strength that it often does not seem to have at the present time.

[T]he Lordship of Christ…involves the total culture—including the area of creativity. [E]vangelical Christianity has been weak at this point. About all that we have produced is a very romantic Sunday school art. We do not seem to understand that the arts too are supposed to be under the Lordship of Christ.

[…]

The arts and the sciences do have a place in the Christian life—they are not peripheral. For a Christian, redeemed by the work of Christ and living within the norms of Scripture and under the leadership of the Holy Spirit, the Lordship of Christ should include an interest in the arts. A Christian should use these arts to the glory of God—not just as tracts, but as things of beauty to the praise of God. An art work can be a doxology in itself. – Francis Schaeffer, Art and the Bible, Complete Works of Francis Schaeffer, Vol. 2, 377, emphasis mine.

I’m glad I discovered Schaeffer within the first several years of leaving the Roman Catholic church. Protestantism had been like dry toast. Schaeffer showed me where the butter and jam were hid.

I am in shocked disbelief. My Texas Tech Red Raiders are getting beat like they stole something!

I keep telling myself its only a game.

But it doesn't work.

I can't watch anymore.

But I must: I'm a loyal fan to the awful, horrible, terrible, bloody end.

This is gonna hurt.

Correction: 52 to 7. It already hurts.

No, it doesn’t mean what you think it means.

In the midst of otherwise somewhat dismal news, at least my Texas Tech Red Raiders are ranked second in the BCS. My sister’s Texas Longhorns have dropped to fourth as a consequence of their Saturday loss to the aforementioned RED RAIDERS!!! (*ahem*).

I can’t remember where my brother’s Aggies are, but no one cares about them anyway. ;)

Note: One has to admit that Texas Tech worked hard for every point, as indicated by the score. I myself thought it was all over in that last minute and a half. Even when Crabtree caught that final pass and made it into the end zone I thought it was no good because he stepped out of bounds. But then, when I saw the replay, I jumped up so high that if not for the vaulted ceiling in my house, I might have bumped my head.

Also, depite being a fan (and therefore biased), I must say I was really impressed by Tech's agility at switching, even from play to play, from a passing game to a running game -- like picking up a beer. It was a beautiful thing. But that's why they call Coach Leach "The Mad Scientist".

I have no idea who the author of this is, but it was emailed to me and I found it refreshingly amusing, tired beyond belief of the campaign season.

'Twas the night before elections
And all through the town
Tempers were flaring
Emotions all up and down!

I, in my bathrobe
With a cat in my lap
Had cut off the TV
Tired of political crap.

When all of a sudden
There arose such a noise
I peered out of my window
Saw Obama and his boys

They had come for my wallet
They wanted my pay
To give to the others
Who had not worked a day!

He snatched up my money
And quick as a wink
Jumped back on his bandwagon
As I gagged from the stink

He then rallied his henchmen
Who were pulling his cart
I could tell they were out
To tear my country apart!

'On Fannie, on Freddie,
On Biden and Ayers!
On Acorn, On Pelosi'
He screamed at the pairs!

They took off for his cause
And as he flew out of sight
I heard him laugh at the nation
Who wouldn't stand up and fight!

So I leave you to think
On this one final note-
If you don't want socialism
Get out and vote!!!!

Caveat lector: Technically, Obama is not a socialist since he doesn't advocate government ownership of the means of production. But he doesn't need to be a socialist. He doesn't need to advocate government ownership of the means of production as long as what is produced will be distributed at will by the government. And it is, and shall be.

Well, after a brief rally, the market is heading down again. The Dow is at 8,556.33 (down 21.58), the NASDAQ at 1,641.28 (up 12.95 from yesterday’s close of 1,628.33) and S&P at 900.80 (down 7.04) -- and falling.

Typically, what would be behind a crash is lack of confidence. Not surprisingly talk, especially as it relates to the bailout, has centered around restoring confidence in the market.

But the bailout moves have failed to restore this confidence, so far. But is the lack of confidence a lack of confidence in the market, or a lack of confidence in the government’s ability to affect the market? I happen to think the latter and said so to a friend last week. My friend was skeptical.

Thorsten Polleit, however, agrees with me, to some extent. Confidence is leaving the government; but more specifically, argues that this confidence is leaving the fiat money system.

Were it not for ever-greater increases in central-bank money and the market expectation that governments are about to make taxpayers shoulder commercial banks' huge losses, the fiat money systems would presumably collapse right away.

International interbank short-term lending rates say it all: the latest drastic increases in yield spreads between money-market rates and official central-bank rates are indicative of the growing reluctance among banks to extend loans to each other, for fear that borrowers could default on their payment obligations.

Under today's fiat-money regime, banks, under governments' auspices, increase the money stock "out of thin air" whenever they extend loans. The money supply is built on credit, which, in turn, hinges on peoples' confidence in banks and banks' confidence in their borrowers' ability and willingness to service their debt.

As confidence leaves the system, banks refrain from extending loans and demand repayment of outstanding loans, and the money stock contracts. Economies that have for decades been fuelled by ever-higher doses of credit and money fall into depression — that is, declining production, employment, and prices.

(Okay, Polleit doesn’t really agree with me. He doesn’t even know me. But it does seem clear that the lack of confidence, as it relates to the market is directed towards the government and its role in the market. I mean so far, nothing the government has done, or promised to do has had any lasting effect on the market.)

Speaking of government intervention, I mean bailouts…

Apparently the capital injection banks received was an offer they couldn’t refuse.

Uncle Sam? …or, Don Corleone.

One question very few people, especially in the news media, do not seem preoccupied with is this: Since the money’s leaving the stock market, where is it going? Into safes? Savings accounts? Some of it is going toward the payment of debts, in which case it’s still in the market, though not on the stock market. Of course, even if all of the money leaving the stock market is going to debt payment that isn’t an unqualified evil: the money is still in the market, somewhere – just not in the stock market. Even if it’s going into savings accounts, that isn’t an unqualified evil: if banks are going to resume lending money, they’ll need deposits.

The money isn’t vanishing into thin air. It’s leaving the stock market, yes. But it’s going somewhere.

I have my ideas, one of which was confirmed by some news I heard about where Bloomberg has his money.

Oh, yeah. The debate last night. What’s to say? More mini-campaign speeches by believers in the omnicompetent state. Big government liberal. Big government conservative. Big deal.

Yes, I'm settling once again for the big government conservative: smaller mess to clean up when the libertarian revolution comes. :)

This is a rant. I freely admit it.

Phil Gramm got in trouble for saying that we are a nation of whiners. That’s one of the difficulties in this country right now: people who complain about a man calling them whiners with no – absolutely no consideration – ever given to the question of whether the statement is true.

I don’t know how many people out of 300 million half to whine in order for us to be called a nation of whiners without the one who does so getting in trouble for it. But you have to love it when, in the course of a conversation which is not even political (yes, I have those sorts of conversations more than one might think) one mentions hearing a news story on the radio that, so far, about 93% of mortgages are still being paid, what is immediately shot back (and I do mean shot) is, “What about the 7%?”

If unemployment is at 6% and you point out that this means, thank the good Lord, that 94% of us are still working, you get told that you care nothing for your fellow man, or the plight of the poor or some such thing.

If you are told that such-and-such-a-number of people live below the poverty line and compare how relatively good the poor have it compared to what ‘poverty’ means in MOST OF THE WORLD, you will be told you have no compassion.

Quite obviously, for liberals, a glass half-full (or half-empty) is completely empty. Heck, a glass 93% full might as well be empty. News not 100% good is 100% bad. Moral or economic imperfection is morally or economically wholly evil. No surprise that these are the same people who, when it comes to things like race relations in America, do not acknowledge any improvement whatsoever. No surprise that, to them, we are losing in Iraq.

If the news is 7% bad, then there is absolutely, positively, without question or exaggeration, any good news. At all.

One wishes we could, and would, just stop listening to liberals. Nothing is, or will ever be, good enough for them. They want heaven on earth and until they get it they will insist they are living in hell.

Okay. Rant over.