Quotes of the Day

"I said to Antoine Winfield on the sideline, 'I think he just broke his leg,' Erin Henderson said. 'That's my blood out there. My brother.' It took me a second, but I got it together and my brotherly instinct kicked in.

"When I got out there, I just kept saying, 'I'm right here with you, I'm here with you.' Don't know why I did this, but I'm telling him to breathe ... 'In your nose, out your mouth, in your nose, out your mouth.' He was in quite a bit of pain, so I said, 'Grab my hand. Squeeze my hand if you've got pain.' He squeezed so hard I thought he was gonna break my hand."

****

"But it is ethos—the persuasive appeal of one’s character—that is responsible for both his inflated reputation as an orator and the disillusionment and disappointment many of his supporters have after hearing him speak. Unlike logos and pathos, ethos is a property of communication that belongs not to the speaker, but to the audience. The listener, rather than the rhetor, determines whether the speaker’s ethos is high or low. Before the election, when he was the embodiment of hope and change, Obama’s supporters imbued him with a high ethotic value. Now that he is President, and making unpopular decisions based on the realities of governing, many of these same fans are finding him less persuasive.

"In some ways, conservatives should be pleased by Obama’s lack of rhetorical ability. Those of us who oppose much of his domestic agenda are relieved that he can’t simply go on a speaking tour and convince large segments of the skeptical populace to support his policies. But in some ways, his failure to persuade may be detrimental to the aspirations and objectives of the nation. As the elected political leader of the United States—and the unofficial spokesman for the West—the President holds the most powerful bully pulpit in the world."

****

"Generations of Sunday school teachers have turned Hanukkah into the story of unified Jewish bravery against an anti-Semitic Hellenic empire. Settlers in the West Bank tell it as a story of how the Jewish hard-core defeated the corrupt, assimilated Jewish masses. Rabbis later added the lamp miracle to give God at least a bit part in the proceedings.

"But there is no erasing the complex ironies of the events, the way progress, heroism and brutality weave through all sides. The Maccabees heroically preserved the Jewish faith. But there is no honest way to tell their story as a self-congratulatory morality tale. The lesson of Hanukkah is that even the struggles that saved a people are dappled with tragic irony, complexity and unattractive choices."

****

"Factory-farmed food is an elitist food; it's a food that's making hundreds of millions of dollars for CEOs of corporations at the expense of normal people. Yes, it seems cheap when we go to the supermarket, but that's because we're being lied to about the true costs. We pay for them in our health care costs, the destruction of the environment and our values. What we call cheap food is the most expensive food in American history."

Quotes of the Day

"Perhaps the greatest measure of Obama's declining support is that just 50% of voters now say they prefer having him as President to George W. Bush, with 44% saying they'd rather have his predecessor."

****

"Pornography is a visual representation of sexuality which distorts an individual's concept of the nature of conjugal relations. This, in turn, alters both sexual attitudes and behavior. It is a major threat to marriage, to family, to children and to individual happiness. In undermining marriage it is one of the factors in undermining social stability.

"Social scientists, clinical psychologists, and biologists have begun to clarify some of the social and psychological effects, and neurologists are beginning to delineate the biological mechanisms through which pornography produces its powerful negative effects."

****

"54 Senators voted to use your money to fund abortions; 45 voted to protect the unborn. Elections matter."

****

"As it turns out, the strain of the downturn hasn’t pushed the divorce rate higher; instead, economic stress seems to have made American marriages slightly more stable overall, as couples develop a “new appreciation for the economic and social support that marriage can provide in tough times,” as the study’s lead author, Brad Wilcox, puts it. Americans are also turning thriftier (saving more, cutting down on credit card debt, reviving home-based economies, etc.), which is good news for wedlock, since financial stability correlates with marital stability, and with marital happiness as well.

"Here’s the pessimistic take. Yes, divorce rates are dropping, but marriage rates are down as well. People aren’t getting divorced because they can’t afford it, not because they’re suddenly happier with their spouses."

"Now...Barack Obama"

Neil Postman, writing in 1985, on the culture of TV news in America and the affect it has had on reason, context and presidential politics, in Amusing Ourselves to Death, p. 110:

My point is that we are by now so thoroughly adjusted to the "Now...this" world of news--a world of fragments, where events stand alone, stripped of any connection to the past, or to the future, or to other events--that all assumptions of coherence have vanished. And so, perforce, has contradiction. In the context of no context, so to speak, it simply disappears. And in its absence, what possible interest could there be in a list of what the President [of the United States] says now and what he said then? It is merely a rehash of old news, and there is nothing interesting or entertaining in that. The only thing to be amused about is the bafflement of reporters at the public's indifference. There is an irony in the fact that the very group that has taken the world apart should, on trying to piece it back together again, be surprised that no one notices much, or cares.

Is this not the perfect soil in which a President like Barack Obama could gain root? Beyond the difference one might have with him on policy is the glaring way in which he can say one thing and the opposite thing in the same sentence. There is firmly held liberal ideology, but then there is crass disinformation. And, sadly, this has little to do with Obama himself (though he perhaps is the grandest exploiter yet) but with we who vote for him. And lest you think that I am harping only on Obama, as Postman makes clear, it all began with Reagan (quoting from a NYT article in 1983):

President Reagan's aides used to become visibly alarmed at suggestions that he had given mangled and perhaps misleading accounts of his policies or of current events in general. That doesn't seem to happen much anymore.

Indeed, the President continues to make debatable assertions of fact but news accounts do not deal with them as extensively as they once did. In the view of White House officials, the declining news coverage mirrors a decline in interest by the general public.

Today news organizations do have "fact checkers" who pour over speeches and press releases. Some twelve AP reporters were assigned to fact check the new Sarah Palin book. But for all the fact checking going on no one seems to care. There is no outrage, no protesting. Presidents, senators and, God help us, preachers, relay contradiction after contradiction and we the people do not bat an eye lash. Unless, of course, they lie about sex.

Quotes of the Day

"People may use religious agents as a moral compass, forming impressions and making decisions based on what they presume God as the ultimate moral authority would believe or want," the team writes. "The central feature of a compass, however, is that it points north no matter what direction a person is facing. This research suggests that, unlike an actual compass, inferences about God's beliefs may instead point people further in whatever direction they are already facing."

****

"The scientific community is not infallible, which is why disagreements over data and its interpretation should be robust and thoughtfully engaged. While claiming that 'No true scientist believes X' or 'No true scientist doubts Y' may be the easiest way to dismiss dissenters, it is often counterproductive. The slow-witted and simple-minded may be dazzled by academic credentials and institutional affiliations but most thoughtful people are harder to fool. They recognize that No True Scientist should fear honest inquiry and solid arguments—even when their colleagues disagree."

****

"A good president is not obsessed with detail at the expense of the big picture. A president cannot master all the details needed to make rational decisions about the issues that cross his desk. He will need a well thought out political philosophy and experts he trusts in order to make good calls. As a result, he need not be a philosopher, Reagan certainly was not, but the president needs a carefully worked out governing philosophy that can guide his decision making. A good president also needs the ability to attract the loyalty of details people, the famed policy wonks, to help frame the issue.

"A good president does not ignore detail and can change his mind in changing conditions. Lincoln and Reagan both had to jettison advisers and generals under changing circumstances. If Lincoln had not been political sensitive to his conduct, he would not have won reelection and the Union would have been lost. He was able to see when a strategy had failed and change....

"A good president can make decisions in a crisis. A James Buchanan tries to wait out his time and does nothing. A Harry Truman acts and saves Greece from a communist revolution.

"A good president understands the complex, but can explain it to the rest of us. We no more want our president to be “like we are” intellectually than we want our heart surgeon to be like we are medically. We hope he has deep and sophisticated knowledge of the political system and of a philosophy of governance. As voters we are picking our representative in Washington and our hope is that he will represent our views better than we could.

"We want someone better at the job than we would be, but who can explain to us what he is doing.

"There are two kinds of bad leader: a bad leader who wonks out on everything and a bad leader who cannot wonk out on anything. The first is a tragic failure of the virtue of prudence and the second of either intellect or diligence.

"Given this, a sound conservative has reasons to worry about Sarah Palin."

Eddie Van Halen: Panama

I am watching President Obama speak at Westpoint. Thus, Panama. Turn it up:

Quotes of the Day

"Take a look at America's self-esteem curriculum or just watch "Oprah" once in a while and you'll see that deep down we're not so sure we are OK. At the very least, most of us need some convincing.

"As a minister, I've witnessed the worry and doubt firsthand. A mother of young children wonders if her house is clean enough and if she'll ever measure up. A cancer patient isn't sure if he prays and loves God as much as he should. A young man struggles to feel like a good person again after his affair. At the bottom of all these fears and anxieties, they are asking the same question....

"Most of us are desperate for reassurance, yet today a large and growing number of Americans are looking for answers to their deepest questions outside the church. Churches across the country are struggling to define their purpose in this postmodern and increasingly secular age. Many are de-emphasizing the Gospel and emphasizing social issues. Others are attracting crowds with self-help messages. And some are swimming with the cultural current, embracing doubt itself as a narrative.

"The problem today is that the "good news" is often replaced with good advice and good causes. Churches that should be talking about the work of Christ on the cross and the grace of God for sinners are stuck on recycled pop psychology, moral exhortation, or entertainment. But these fail to speak to the eternal question that haunts all of us: How do I know that I'm OK? We all want to know we are justified."

****

"Indeed, the closer you look at the scandal the more you realize it's all one big outrage. The same journalistic tribalism that allowed Dan Rather to destroy his career over "Memogate" keeps reinforcing itself. Rather picked sources who said what he wanted to hear, then he reported what they said as if it were indisputable. The same thing is happening on climate change. Ideological bias is a major factor in the news media's work as a transmission belt for the climate industry. But part of the problem is also that the journalists do a bad job when the majority of "respected" experts agree on anything complicated. For instance, it was pretty impossible for reporters to independently investigate whether Saddam Hussein had WMDs, and since the most established authorities agreed he had to have them, the news media reported the consensus, which turned out to be wrong."

****

"[I]f you want to hear honest talk about the realities of abortion, go speak with those abortion counselors and providers. Even the most radically pro-choice will tell you that the political discourse they hear about the subject, with its easy dichotomies and bumper-sticker boilerplate, has little correspondence to the messy, intricate stories of her patients. They hear about peace and guilt, relief and sin. And it is they who will acknowledge, whether we like it or not, that the rhetoric and imagery of the pro-life movement can touch on some basic emotional truths. Peg Johnston, who manages Access for Women in upstate New York, remembers the first time her patients unconsciously began to co-opt the language of the protesters outside. 'And it wasn’t that these protesters were brainwashing them,' she says. 'It’s that they were tapping into things we all have some discomfort about.'"

****

"I imagine when she approached the car with a club, he said: No, don't use a wood, use a nine-iron."

Quotes of the Day

“When we started watching his shows, we had intended to apply his advice toward our dogs,” said Amy Twomey, a blogger on parenthood for The Dallas Morning News who is raising three children under 10 with her husband, Matt. “But we realized a lot of ideas can be used on our kids.”

****

"Y'all well know that I really don't like Sarah Palin. In fact, more than one of you has yelled at me about this. And I find the whole schtick about how the media is just a bunch of elitist hooligans who are out to get her really grating.

"That's why I really wish the media wouldn't act like, well, a bunch of elitist hooligans who are out to get her. I've coined a new phrase to cover the situation: Palinoia. It's when you think people are out to get you, and then they do their best to justify your erroneous belief."

****

"Predominantly, Christians will need to consider the implications of having the most powerful woman in the world be a career woman who holds such a job despite having young children. While Christians will be pleased to be able to support a woman who is strongly pro-life, pro-family and pro-constitution, they will also wrestle with the fact that she will want to lead the country even as the mother of several young children. And Christians may wonder what she really believes and how strongly she believes it. She is anxious to win over evangelicals but in the end she offers little of spiritual substance beyond what we might expect from any American politician. After all, no President has yet denied being a Christian."

****

"The New Gospel...usually starts with an apology: 'I’m sorry for my fellow Christians. I understand why you hate Christianity. It’s like that thing Ghandi said, ‘why can’t the Christians be more like their Christ?’ Christians are hypocritical, judgmental, and self-righteous. I know we screwed up with the Crusades, slavery, and the Witch Trials. All I can say is: I apologize. We’ve not [given] you a reason to believe.'”

Quotes of the Day

"A lot of Christians, especially people who have had dramatic conversion experiences, go sailing out of the harbor with wind in their sails. They are so confident in Christ and what he has done for their salvation, and that gospel wind is in their sails. Yet after two years, they have heard just one imperative after another. They have lots of course plotting, lots of books on how to do this and that. They've read every manual on spiritual disciplines. They have heard their pastor tell them they need to pray more, to read the Bible more, to evangelize more. Now they are dead in the water. There's no wind in the sails."

***

"Not only will we be right back where we started, it will expose the federal trial as nothing more than a show trial. Show trials are conducted by despots and dictators to give only a thin veneer of legality to political detentions and executions. If the state isn’t prepared to abide by the decision of the court, including dismissals and acquittals, then the use of the trial system is worse than useless. It demeans the federal system needed for Americans to seek unbiased justice."

***

"He’s a little on the short side, neither fat nor thin, and he wears jeans and a sports jacket, not a shiny suit and an oily smile. With his goatee and what’s left of his graying hair trimmed close to his head, he looks mostly like what he is—a well-groomed, middle- to upper-middle-class American professional. But when he runs out onstage and starts dispensing financial advice, you realize that he could have been a great preacher."

Obama's Teleprompter Malfunctions During Family Dinner

Top 10 Reasons it is Awesome Obama Won the Peace Prize

Doug Wilson:

10. Because this means that the Vatican must have verified that reports of the president floating around the top of the Washington monument were reports of a genuine miracle, and were not a deceitful trick by the devil.

9. Because the prize was funded and named after the inventor of dynamite, and it has ever been the destiny of this prize to be wreathed in ironies, the same way a smoking tank is after it runs over one of Nobel's inventions. So this just continues a long and honored legacy.

8. Because there is no apparent reason for the prize, this must mean that the committee is inviting all of us to assign our own meanings to it -- and so I would submit that Obama got it for continuing the Bush policies of rendition, roving wiretaps, indefinite detention of accused terrorists, urging continuation of the Patriot Act, and so forth.

7. Because the prize did not go to David Letterman, it shows that the Nobel committee does in fact have its limits. But on the down side, it also shows they are willing to go right up to those limits.

6. Because it means that intelligent liberals won't know which way to look for at least a couple months.

5. Because this shows that our secular civilization's great awards now have about the same value as the Montessori preschool participant ribbons in a block-stacking contest.

4. Because this is yet further testimony to the deep affinity that necessarily exists between awards and their recipients, kind of like rich little old ladies and their poodles. In this case that affinity is the shared characteristic of being as hollow and as shiny as one of those over-sized vases at Pottery Barn.

3. Because this is a boon to American conservatism almost as great as if Obama won People's Sexiest Man Alive award. This morning, as the news spread across red state America, that noise you heard was howls of delight, happy applause, bloggers typing, cheerful sharing, and gladsome whoops.

2. Because American narcissism is never fulfilled until Euro-weenies join in the applause, which means we might be almost done now.

1. Because soft tyranny can always be effectively fought with the horse laugh. And soft tyrannies never understand this. And on they go, as solemn as a judge. You know, provoking us.

Obama Awesomely Gets Peace Prize Quotes of the Day

"Mr. Obama sees the U.S. differently, as weaker than it was and the rest of the planet as stronger, and so he calls for a humbler America, at best a first among equals, working primarily through the U.N. The world's challenges, he emphasized yesterday, 'can't be met by any one leader or any one nation.' What this suggests to us—and to the Norwegians—is the end of what has been called 'American exceptionalism.' This is the view that U.S. values have universal application and should be promoted without apology, and defended with military force when necessary."

***

"Yet even within that context, the giving of the peace prize to President Obama is absurd. He doesn't have a body of work; he's a young man; he's been president less than nine months. He hopes to accomplish much, and so far--nine months!--has accomplished little. Is this a life of heroic self-denial, of the sacrifice of self for something greater, of huge and historic consequence, of sustained vision? No it's not. Is this a life marked by a vivid and calculable contribution to the peace of the world? No, it's not.

"This is an award for not being George W. Bush. This is an award for not making the world nervous. This is an award for sharing the basic political sentiments and assumptions of the members of the committee. It is for what Barack Obama may do, not what he has done. He hasn't done anything.

"In one mindless stroke, the committee has rendered the Nobel Peace Prize a laughingstock, perhaps for as long as a generation. And that is an act of true destruction, because it was actually good that the world had a prestigious award for peacemaking."

Fed Spending Don't Increase No Test Scores

Boy, am I clever. Chart (via JC):

I am Just Like Michael Moore

Russell Moore today on Michael Moore's new film:

But the more I think about it, Michael Moore isn’t all that different from me, and most of the Christians I know.

Michael Moore believes (I’ll take him and face value) that the market system is destructive and evil, and should be replaced with something else. He just doesn’t want to live in the “something else.”

I believe the market system is often destructive and evil, and everything it could be replaced with is even more dehumanizing, until it’s replaced with the kingdom of Christ.I don’t mind a limited, bounded market system (one that is people-centered; treats workers right, respects the creation, maintains local traditons and the social order).

But I also know what I’ve received from the prophets and apostles of Jesus. The issue, ultimately, isn’t the economic system itself (although that’s important). It’s the rebellion of money-worship and greed.

I know as a follower of Christ Jesus that one of the most dangerous forces in this age is the passion for money or, more often, the passion for things. I know what Jesus has taught us that Mammon is a god, and a jealous one at that.

And yet, I’m able to know this, believe this, think this, while having too many of my decisions made by “care for tomorrow,” even though I’m able to repeat back from memory what Jesus said about this.

Yes, Michael Moore is a hypocrite. But aren’t we all. And shouldn’t his hypocrisy remind us to take up the plank in our own eye, and start giving away some money, some stuff, from our homes and, more importantly, from our affections.

Jesus Wouldn't Participiate in a Hedge Fund!

He wouldn't?! Crazy! I was sure "Render to Casear" meant "Get yourself into an aggressively managed portfolio of investments that uses advanced investment strategies such as leveraged, long, short and derivative positions in both domestic and international markets with the goal of generating high returns!" Back to seminary for me. Maybe MM can recommend one.

Good News: Only 8% of NJ Residents Think Obama is the Anti-Christ

13% aren't sure, which clearly means they haven't read Revelation 20 yet. Had they, the choice would have been obvious.

Obama is Boring. But Why?

Peggy Noonan:

Mr. Obama has grown boring. And it's not Solid Boring, which is fine in a president and may be good. It's sort of Faux Eloquent Boring, especially on health care. The president likely doesn't know this, and his people won't have told him because they don't know it either, but Mr. Obama always has the same sound, approach, logic, tone, modulation. He always has the same stance. There's no humor or humility in it. News is surprise, and he never makes news.

I don't disagree with her, that Obama is b-o-r-i-n-g. It's the why I might think differently about. She explains herself of course, and you can read away her diagnosis, but I can't help but think that the answer is just that we get bored very easily. We're a people "amusing ourselves to death" Postman said, exposing the dark side of the conjoining of picture and prose in our culture. It's not that we're unintelligent, it's that we're hyperactive. Images require serious engagement, but very little serious interaction. And so we get bored quite quickly and become increasingly irascible.

What is fascinating about all of this is that Obama ran on, and was elected based on, this very premise. New is good. It is the best. And boy was he new. But not anymore. He is so old (much less than a year, if you're counting). They say that Obama has spoken some half a million words in public since entering office. Of course they would think more Obama the better. But what they've missed is that too much of anything for contemporaneous Americans just won't do.

In my perfect world, politicians would be voted for based solely on their character and beliefs; that is, their substance. And this goes even for men and women I wouldn't vote for. By engaging with truth, ideas, it seems to me that the right kind of change would happen. As it stands, who knows what we have. Do any of our politicians actually believe anything resolutely?

I have heard that Obama's approval ratings have gone up since he sequestered himself at the Vineyard. If he's smart, he'll hide until Americans forget about him. In a year or so, his reappearance will be refreshingly new.

Christians Are Morally Obligated to Support ObamaCare Because Jesus Would

Good lesson to be learned here on how not to do biblical theology from "Ed":

Dear Ed,

When Jesus comes back, his offer of free, universal healthcare will be off the table.

Sincerely,

R

Americans are Idiots

Well, that's how I would say it, but not Daniel Hannan. He says it much more eloquently, much more convincingly. Really, it is quite breathtaking when you think about it. Here's to hoping our congressmen and senators think about it!

WSJ Quotes of the Day

"By now it is beyond obvious that Democrats view whole segments of the health-care industry as expendable. After all, what do insurers really do, besides bilk consumers? Government already pays Medicare bills; it can handle the under-65 crowd too. Over time doctors can be transferred into the civil service, but if they’re good sports maybe at a higher pay grade than the DMV. As for drug research and development, the National Institutes of Health can fill in—and as a bonus, all those government-funded professors won’t care about profits either. For the Democrats running Congress, merely allowing a business to continue to exist is a concession."

******

"All of this is unnecessarily and unhelpfully divisive and provocative. They are mocking and menacing concerned citizens. This only makes a hot situation hotter. Is this what the president wants? It couldn’t be. But then in an odd way he sometimes seems not to have fully absorbed the awesome stature of his office. You really, if you’re president, can’t call an individual American stupid, if for no other reason than that you’re too big. You cannot allow your allies to call people protesting a health-care plan 'extremists' and 'right wing,' or bought, or Nazi-like, either. They’re citizens. They’re concerned. They deserve respect."

No Brown M&M's

Hilarious and depressing post from Joe Carter, here. David Lee Roth for Senate!