February 7, 2020

At the Friday Sunrise Café...

0DC2D6CD-870F-43A6-A770-34FFBE5DE644_1_201_a

... you can talk about whatever you want... except the debate. Go one post down for the debate discussion.

The photo was taken at 7:04, 3 minutes before the actual sunrise time.

115 comments:

Jersey Fled said...

Vindman fired today.

I'm so sad.

Guildofcannonballs said...

Got every answer, a rarity for me, on Jeopardy "Civil Rights" category.

I always knew I was brainwashed.

Browndog said...

President Trump and his aides wasted little time opening a campaign of retribution against those he blames for his impeachment, firing on Friday two of the most prominent witnesses in the inquiry against him barely 48 hours after the Senate acquitted the president.

Emboldened by his victory and determined to strike back, Mr. Trump fired Gordon D. Sondland, the ambassador to the European Union, within hours of the White House dismissing Lt. Col. Alexander S. Vindman,..


-NYT

Browndog said...

Title:Trump Fires Gordon Sondland Hours After Dismissing Impeachment Witness Alexander Vindman

wild chicken said...

Whoda thought Trump would FIRE anyone?

Browndog said...

Sahil Kapur
‏Verified account @sahilkapur

UMass Lowell poll: 62% of New Hampshire Democrats would rather see a giant meteor strike the earth and extinguish all human life than see President Trump get re-elected.

Hagar said...

President Trump should not have called the impeachment charges "bullshit."
Bullshit has substance and mass besides aroma, at least when first deposited, but these charges never were anything but make believe, a mare's nest of moonshine and horse feathers.

Ken B said...

Lovely video Pelosi tried to get censored. She made the gesture, she did it flamboyantly and prepared it in advance with tiny tears. She wanted viral. Enjoy your viral madame speaker.

tim in vermont said...

UMass Lowell poll: 62% of New Hampshire Democrats would rather see a giant meteor strike the earth and extinguish all human life than see President Trump get re-elected.

Literally!

tim in vermont said...

One of them leaked to Ciaramella, the other leaked Bolton’s book.

Who needs these people around the national security apparatus when they are more interested in playing politics. Surely there is a radio shack in northern Greenland that needs to be manned.

Hagar said...

The Vindman brothers and Ms. Yovanovitch appear to have been very upset about the President interfering with their Ukrainian policies, which seem to have been quite their own, even within the State Department.

Ambassador Sondland appears to have tried his best to agree with everybody and not offend anybody at all, which was impossible in this situation.

n.n said...

Mr. Trump fired Gordon D. Sondland, the ambassador to the European Union, within hours of the White House dismissing Lt. Col. Alexander S. Vindman

First, he came for the hunters and judges, and returned them to the Chamber, then he plugged several national security holes... whores h/t NAACP. Baby steps.

Chuck said...

Bone Spurs versus Purple Heart.

n.n said...

Ambassador Sondland appears to have tried his best to agree with everybody and not offend anybody

This reminds me of the story of Humpty Dumpty who sat on the wall.

David Begley said...

Ann:

You were right that Rush backed Cruz at the beginning.

Drago said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
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Hagar said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
Drago said...

LLR-lefty Chuck: "Bone Spurs versus Purple Heart."

The vast majority of military members who vote will vote for Trump and love the decision to kick Vindman back over to the Pentagon to await his inevitable separation for breaking the chain of command, illegally leaking classified information and participating in a transparent coup attempt with his buddy the fake-whistleblower, Eric Ciaramella.

Vindman is also the little s*** that was reprimanded by a senior officer for insulting America and Americans to his russian pals.

Insulting America and Americans to russians....no wonder LLR-lefty Chuck (who once spent 17 seconds courageously considering joining the US military...but didnt) adores him so.

Anyone who has ever served knows exactly the type of "leader" Vindman is. Every command has one or two.

Hagar said...

What is with "Big Pharma" spending these enormous amounts on advertising for drugs that we cannot buy without a doctor's prescription?
There is something funny about the flow of money here; it is way above my head to divine how it works, but something isn't right.

The one thing that is sure, is that it is us who get to pay for it all in the end.

JaimeRoberto said...

Tweets from Peter Strzok and Christopher Steele's company popped up in my Twitter feed today. It looks like we're in for more Russia Russia Russia.

Drago said...

I wonder what info Grassley and Johnson received from Treasury on Hunter Biden?

Travel reports, meetings with foreign leaders, SARs reports?

Hopefully all that at a minimum.

I sure hope Hunter can explain that $3M of US foreign aid cash that wound its way thru Latvia and Cyprus into Hunters cocaine stained fingers.

tim in vermont said...

Chuck, are you still defending Biden’s corruption? Are you going to pretend that I didn’t give you all of those well sourced news stories from outlets like the New York Times again?

tim in vermont said...

Oh yeah, and that the most significant election interference that can be actually attributed with confidence, came out of the Ukrain, who made up a fake ledger to get Trump’s campaign chief fired. A ledger that was never used in Manafort’s trial. Stories that showed it was actually the DNC who went to Ukraine and asked them to make up dirt on Trump, and Ukraine complied?

Guildofcannonballs said...

How many people slandered or libeled Iowa because Democratics in Iowa are corrupt shitheads?

It's easy to do, since Trump won and it went very smooth.

Just forget that, and smear the whole state as "too white."

Rush was right when he said Obama would be horrible for race relations in America if elected.

Even though Iowa Democratics gave Obama the win, they are are now racist because of their skin color. They, being Democratics, like this masochism.

tim in vermont said...

That Ukrainian prosecutors were summoned to Washington under the cover of anti corruption training, but instead were pressed by the Obama State Department from dirt on Trump?

This was all in the newspapers. And it’s going to get dragged before the Senate.

Seeing Red said...

Powerline has some goodies on Milwaukee’s convention:

Alonso and Gilbert had previously come under criticism for continuing to do work for New Jersey Democrats while leading the host committee full time.

In interviews, the two experienced political hands described the host committee as having a toxic culture rife with power struggles, backbiting and mismanagement.

They accused Gilbert and Alonso of giving contracts to their friends in New Jersey, calling meetings and then failing to attend them and being more focused on accumulating power than promoting Milwaukee.

Sources said it appears that these current and former employees have been emboldened to speak out after Alonso was accused in his home state of New Jersey of shaking down campaign contributors for his own consulting firm, the Cratos Group.

Julie Roginsky, a former strategist for New Jersey Gov. Phil Murphy, said Murphy’s gubernatorial campaign operation was “toxic” and that she experienced “rank misogyny.”

She has also said lobbyists told her during the 2018 campaign that Alonso and the campaign manager were shaking them down for private business....

Guildofcannonballs said...

"You were right that Rush backed Cruz at the beginning."

I remember months of Rush being pressured to back Trump or not and facilitating.

Rush made the point many, many times he doesn't pick favorites to be the nominee, he just supports them in the general.

Over and over and over he said it. Thanks for your correction, as insignificant it may seem.

Josephbleau said...

Your photos help me understand why Munch painted shreck.

Marc in Eugene said...

I'll point out that some of us are reading St Augustine's Confessions during Septuagesima, Lent, and the first couple of weeks of Eastertide, with discussions once a week on Saturdays 7 to 9 pm Eastern following the schedule proposed by CUA professor Chad Pecknold (@ccpecknold); discussion of the first book tomorrow. Please feel free to join the discussion, or to just follow along-- #TolleLege ('Take it, and read', the words Augustine heard that prompted him to open up the Scriptures at random, to Romans 13,13-14, as he began his Christian life)-- no signing up or anything like that.

My recollection is that some hundreds of people read City of God a couple of years ago. #CivDei worked out well, considering the limitations of the medium. This time around my understanding is that Dr Pecknold isn't able to be as directly involved as he was for #CivDei: he was a ready source of insight, has a profound knowledge of the texts, & was able to move the discussion along with opportune tweets when this or that distraction arose etc etc; we'll see how this iteration works out.

Jimmy said...

Gallup poll- 90percent of Americans are happier with life than anytime in last 40 years. wow, the left wing Gallup Org must be wrong. I thought WW3 was going to start when we killed that one murdering scum( or serious and sensitive islamic scholar-NYT and the left). I thought the market was going to tank, per the nobel prize winning econ guy at the NYT, by way of Enron.
really a tough time to be an angry leftist. reflected in the comments by the left wing types . I don't feel your pain. not even a little bit. I quite enjoy it, actually.
based on 4 years of anti trump hysteria, and 50 years of leftist bullshit and failed policies, I love that Trump is showing them what is possible again in this country. Or MAGA for short.

Guildofcannonballs said...

So this is what Seeing Red was unable to convey and instead misquoted, because the need to say it was felt but the effort to accurately portray what was said is just too darn much work.

From Powerline:

"What’s it all about? The Journal Sentinel doesn’t provide a lot of details, and the politicians have made all the expected, unhelpful noises. This is as close as we get to the facts:"

From the Mil.Jou.Sen.:

"Alonso and Gilbert had previously come under criticism for continuing to do work for New Jersey Democrats while leading the host committee full time."

From Powerline:

"The New Jersey Democratic Party connection does not inspire a lot of confidence."

From the M.J.S. article Powerline is quoting:

"In interviews, the two experienced political hands described the host committee as having a toxic culture rife with power struggles, backbiting and mismanagement.

They accused Gilbert and Alonso of giving contracts to their friends in New Jersey, calling meetings and then failing to attend them and being more focused on accumulating power than promoting Milwaukee."

From Powerline:

"That is easy to believe."

Jimmy said...

Just read that California is talking about taking over PG&E. Gov Newsom has expressed interest in the takeover.
Great! they can't run a primary, an impeachment, or a coup. but yeah, after turning california into a literal shithole, the left will now show us how a command economy will 'fix' the electric grid.
the level of stupid that these people crow about, is normally attained after years of drinking or drug abuse. these people just go to harvard, and bingo. ready to roll right off the cliff.
"State Sen. Scott Wiener, D-San Francisco, said the legislation would create a “safer, more reliable and affordable energy” service for Californians."
Sounds like obamacare, what could possibly go wron?

Ingachuck'stoothlessARM said...

no one knows or cares about Sondman or Porky & Dorky Vindman

Gen. Flynn's Bronze Star

... trumps a Purple Heart

narciso said...



Spelling out what i linked this morning

https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.theblaze.com/news/2020/02/07/glenn-beck-unveils-money-laundering-scheme-linked-to-hunter-biden-and-burisma/amp

narciso said...


One can go old school


https://apelbaum.wordpress.com/

traditionalguy said...

Another winning entry in the Sunrise Sweepstakes.

Guildofcannonballs said...

"but yeah, after turning california into a literal shithole, the left will now show us how a command economy will 'fix' the electric grid."

They don't care if you or a million or 10 million die because of their incompetance/evil/stupidity, because the GOP is Satan if need be and if not who cares, they got paid.

They care about power. If they get power, they win. Power equals forever money.

So why do you care about the bullshit they say to get power? Why would you think you argue with these people or their voters using facts and logic? Are you trying to influence? Raise a Jenner or Kardassian like Trump has done already.

This is what buwaya refers to when he talks about the law as a method for those who can to gain and then abuse power, nothing more.

The great thing is the non-statists in America have largely played by the rules and slowly lost power, meaning if we start playing to win, abusing every prog in the process we can, with prejudice, we can avoid the Civil War 2 so wanted by the Soros cabal.

I think a lot of us will have a lot of fun, until we die.

narciso said...


About the new pair of shoes


https://mobile.twitter.com/thejimjams/status/1225950842395619328

narciso said...


A think piece:


https://m.jpost.com/Arab-Israeli-Conflict/Saudi-military-official-what-if-Arabs-states-recognized-Israel-in-1948-611681?fbclid=IwAR1FnGg7phwHzfE4iHyUCr1GEl1unZuBbZQ_oQ0FafAO_Mxq_T-ZsRlIkjs

Guildofcannonballs said...

Narc, from your link, I don't understand the phrase "Judeo-Christian" and am not sure why people use it. When did they start and why?

Why not Atheist-Judeo-Christian? Atheists certainly contributed to Christianity's founding.

Guildofcannonballs said...

What does Judeo add that Christianity lacks?

narciso said...

Because they stem from the same root, atheism and christianity have nothing in common.

Guildofcannonballs said...

If this is about Ros here saying Christians were 1000 years behind Jews or something that is okay, but very weak.

Why bring up what we may believe our, or others, relatives were doing 1500 or 2500 years ago in the context of Christ today, in 2020?

narciso said...

Judaism failed in its promise, it becams tol rulebound,

Guildofcannonballs said...

Judeo-Islam makes some sense, but only if you accept Judeo-Christian, which is the phrase I question.

narciso said...

You would think so, but muhammed says you got it all wrong.

Guildofcannonballs said...

So this search search result didn't really answer my question. It skips from Islamic-Jewish relations ("Judeo-Islam" was the term searched) to Judeo-Christian as the second result. Why is that?

"Islamic-Jewish relations - Wikipedia
Search domain en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Judeo-Islamichttps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Judeo-Islamic
Islamic-Jewish relations started in the 7th century AD with the origin and spread of Islam in the Arabian peninsula.The two religions share similar values, guidelines, and principles. Islam also incorporates Jewish history as a part of its own. Muslims regard the Children of Israel as an important religious concept in Islam. Moses, the most important prophet of Judaism, is also considered a ...
Judeo-Christian - Wikipedia
Search domain en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Judeo-Christianhttps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Judeo-Christian
Judeo-Christian is a term which is used to group Christianity and Judaism together, either in reference to Christianity's derivation from Judaism, both religions' common use of the Bible, or due to perceived parallels or commonalities and shared values between the two religions.. The term "Judæo Christian" first appears in a letter from Alexander McCaul which is dated October 17, 1821."

Guildofcannonballs said...

My questions are a response to Obama's "You didn't build that" ethos.

Guildofcannonballs said...

""You didn't build that" is a phrase from a 2012 election campaign speech delivered by United States President Barack Obama on July 13, 2012, in Roanoke, Virginia. The sentence "If you've got a business—you didn't build that" was publicized by his political opponents during the 2012 presidential campaign, as an attack by Obama on business and entrepreneurs.[1][2][3] The Obama campaign responded that the criticisms were taking the phrase out of context, and the word "that" in the phrase was referring to the construction of "roads and bridges" in the previous sentence.[4]

"Fact-checking organizations reported that Obama's remarks were used out of context in order to criticize the president.[4][5] The president's remarks reflected the belief, common among Democrats, that successful citizens owed their success partly to public infrastructure and government spending, and that they should contribute to finance public goods.[6]" - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/You_didn%27t_build_that

Guildofcannonballs said...

The Chinese, atheists for the most part we assume about those in power, build and build and build and OMG they build roads. I remember The Grand Tour having some spectacular shots.

Why don't they get credit for Christians in China following God's word? Without those atheist roads, not built by Chinese Christians, would they have been able to build their religion?

We can go back about 4-5 thousand years in Chinese history (history means something different to people that can make a buck from it, especially if that person is from a Communist country) and logically claim that any single deviation, such as a butterfly flapping its wings more whimsically one day, would have improved/destroyed any subsequent life, butterfly or not.

narciso said...

Up until 60 years ago, affirmations of faith in public life were not controversial

narciso said...

Whats your argument guild, pointing out the commonality between jews amd christians as opposed to surah 5:33 or 9:t, which mark red lines

Milwaukie guy said...

I voted against Trump in the primary and voted for him in the general. I wasn't sure what the short-fingered vulgarian would do. I was pretty sure that his victory would destroy the Republican Party as I knew it and I was right about that one. It needed killing.

Little did I suspect that Trump would turn the Repubs into the party of the working class. Like Lincoln, free soil and free labor. Will wonders never cease?

Now Trump is ushering in the period of the suicide of the Democrats. The Dems: The party of slavery, sedition, segregation and socialism. It couldn't happen to a more deserving bunch of people.

Can't stop grinning.





walter said...

Please.
Not fired, reassigned.
What kind of guv job allows firing?
Oh..sorry Comey.

Big Mike said...

Both Vindman brothers were escorted from the White House. They had a choice between their integrity and their careers. Now they have neither.

Rosalyn C. said...

I'm not sure what the Guild is talking about but it reminds me a little of a personal experience with a Christian friend who got into a very offended snit when I pointed out that the prayers we were reciting in his church's service were directly lifted from the Jewish prayer book. "No they are not, they are Christian prayers!" my friend insisted. After the service I went up to a visiting church bishop and frankly asked, "Are the prayers from the Jewish prayer book?" and he answered, "Yes, of course." And the bishop and I hugged each other as kindred spirits. It was a lovely moment.
So when I hear someone like the Guild who clearly has no knowledge of Judaism talking about how there is nothing in Judaism which is not in Christianity, all I can do is shrug at the ignorance.

narciso said...

Our pastor makes a point of citing the concordances between the old and new testaments

walter said...

Big Mike,
They will be employed.
No worries.

Guildofcannonballs said...

"Whats your argument guild"

We are hosted by someone who voted for Hillary.

I used Uncle Milt's perfect argument, and it has been seen through further than even Prof Friedman could have foretold. Put someone in office who isn't thinking of personal gain but public gain because of public pressure, regardless of the steward/occupant, to do best.

It didn't work.

What are you doing that's gonna work to get votes for Trump and not the Democrat? I know, I follow you on twitie and JOM. You da man.

I love the same commentators you love.

William said...

I finally finished the second volume of Manchester's bio of Churchill. The way he became the PM offers a useful lesson to Romney. Churchill was allowed back into the cabinet after the fall of Poland. He became the First Lord of the Admiralty. Chamberlain came into increasing disfavor because of his past policies of appeasement. This disapproval of Chamberlain became even greater after Norway and Denmark were conquered by the Germans. Churchill had not been supportive of Chamberlain's appeasement policies and, indeed, had been outspokenly critical of him. Despite that, after Chamberlain had committed himself to war, Churchill rose to speak in his defense. He gave such a spirited and eloquent defense of Chamberlain that the eyes of those in Parliament who wondered who should properly replace Chamberlain, naturally fell on Churchill. Churchill gathered support not by saying "I told you so" but rather by demonstrating his loyalty to the war effort.....If Romney wished to show himself as the alternative to Trump, he would have done better to show himself as the most eloquent and principled Trump supporter--a better kind of Trump.

Guildofcannonballs said...

I remember Shouting Thomas said something like "What's wrong with orgies" or something.

Ros, do you know better?

narciso said...

Yes i realize that, i know enough not to insult the host in her own parlour,

Are we arguing about faith or politics. How did we get to where we are in a lack of faith, which is filled by politics amd other pursuits.

walter said...

I didn't know Berle weighed in on such things.

narciso said...

Churchill was all about principle the gold standard and the india issue kept him out of the circle.

Guildofcannonballs said...

"Chamberlain came into increasing disfavor because of his past policies of appeasement."

No, because they were starting to be seen as failing policies.

Had they succeeded, well, certainly, you know what victors write.

narciso said...

But they couldnt succeed, its like gandhis argument about the nazis

Milwaukie guy said...

The seditious Democrats have just had their Gettysburg. I'm waiting for the new Grant and Sherman to flank them, drive them into entrenchments and then destroy them. Who are Trump's new generals going to be?

William said...

The word appeasement has evolved over the years. It has now become a pejorative word, but back then it meant something more akin to peace making than being a surrender monkey...Manchester is of the opinion that Baldwin and Chamberlain with their peace making efforts were the ones who did the most to enable Hitler and help him solidify his power in Germany. I suppose he's right, but the problem is how do you know Hitler is Hitler. Even someone as monstrously cynical and distrustful as Stalin was to some extent taken in by Hitler. If Hitler had been sated with his victories in the Rhineland and Sudetanland, history would remember Chamberlain as a peace maker and Churchill as a vainglorious warmonger.....Sometimes history has to play out in order to distinguish the bad guys from the psychotic, genocidal really, really bad guys.

Milwaukie guy said...

There should be an alt-history novel where Lincoln serves out his second term in charge of Reconstruction. Utopian, dystopian, I'd read both.

Guildofcannonballs said...

"Are we arguing about faith or politics."

Dumb people, like I was until, likely as it happens lucky for me, about 2 years ago, and ergo many many voters, all need a message. It's that simple. What is the message that can respond like Buckley, W.F.?

None.

So we argue about which message wins. Then figure out what it means, if we don't gain power. Because we don't want to do anything ever that doesn't gain us power.

If we fail in this mission, which WFB taught, as CIA, in the 1950's, well, then, you end up in Iraq.

stephen cooper said...

the thing is, the old testament was full of people who were VERY SUCCESSFUL IN THEIR ENVIRONMENT .... Moses was sort of like poor Lincoln, meaning Moses was someone who had little love in his heart but who succeeded in making people think he was some sort of hero ....
and poor Adam and Eve never understood what their grandchildren would have to suffer because of their sins ....

trust me, I am kind hearted and because I am kind hearted I do not want and I never did want Adam or Eve to understand how bad the world they left for losers like me actually was .....

you wanna hear more about the Old Testament, read on, if you don't, stop reading, it is your choice:

Solomon was sort of wise, in a phony way, but did not have love in his heart ...
and David, his father, was a good man but A TERRIBLE HUSBAND and a TERRIBLE FATHER and not even a decent human being.

Look, if you are someone who cares about other people, THIS IS YOUR WORLD.

If you are a good spouse you are as good as Adam or Eve was at the whole being a good spouse thing.

It is easy to be a better person than King David or King Solomon.

The Old Testament was what it was, trust me my friends, if you get to heaven you will understand every word in the Old Testament and you will know that GOD LOVES US ALL.

I don't like bullies.

Was Moses a bully, was Kind David a bully, was poor Solomon a bully?

GOD LOVES US ALL

and yes Moses, for all the goodness in his heart, was a bully, poor King David sent Uriah out to be killed so that the evildoer David could have sex with Uriah's wife, and Solomon ended his life as a befuddled sinner, despite his earlier knowledge.

God loves us all my friends, and trust me, God has better plans for your future then you can imagine, and

since you are so fortunate ....

try and pray a little for poor Adam, for poor Eve, for poor David and his awful son Solomon.

GOD HAS BETTER PLANS FOR YOUR FUTURE THAN YOU CAN IMAGINE

Proverbs 8.

I don't like bullies.

Trust me, there are billions of people who understand.
Proverbs 8.


stephen cooper said...

don't bother praying for me i do not need your prayers

almost a hundred years in this world has taught me not to expect any one to pray for me.

Sad!

That being said, GOD LOVES YOU AND GOD EVERYBODY YOU LOVE.

Trust me on that.

Me and God are very good friends and when I say GOD LOVES YOU

I am speaking from my heart.

William said...

Here's something interesting: When Churchill was out of favor with Baldwin and Chamberlain, he still had some supporters in the deep state. They passed along to him sensitive and, occasionally, secret reports of England's weapon developments and preparedness. Churchill used those reports to press the Tories for further military spending and development in both Parliament and in his newspaper columns. Churchill was famous in the thirties for his knowledgeable warmongering....The Conservatives didn't want to spend money on arms because it would put the budget out of balance. Well, they were better than Labor who considered that re-armament was not only wrong but that arms factories were themselves immoral and a cause of war....Anyway, we're perpetually stuck with the dilemnana of whether we're passing a Munich agreement or a Gulf of Tonkin resolution. The lessons of history are spelt in the sibyl's leaves.

Seeing Red said...

Via Rantburg from Frontpage:

An Al Qaeda Leader Came to America as a Refugee, And Applied for Disability for Bullet Wounds
How Biden helped an Al-Qaeda leader come to the USA.

February 6, 2020
Daniel Greenfield


...Only 2 years after being the Emir of an Al Qaeda group, Al-Nouri had traded the deserts of Al-Anbar for the deserts of the Southwest. How was an Al Qaeda leader able to move to the United States?

Easy. He claimed to be a refugee from Al Qaeda.

In 2008, the United States raised the refugee admission celling to 80,000 to accommodate the surge of Iraqis applying to come to the United States. The Iraqis claimed to be fleeing terrorism, but some, like Al-Nouri were terrorists, and our refugee resettlement program was not interested in telling them apart....

...In-country processing", as noted by the Center of American Progress, makes "the process less onerous and cumbersome for Iraqis seeking asylum by allowing for in-country visa processing, making screening less restrictive." And what migrants from Al-Qaeda’s stronghold needed was less restrictive screenings.

The less restrictive screenings were one of Senator Ted Kennedy’s final immigration gifts to America. The Refugee Crisis in Iraq Act was introduced by Ted Kennedy, backed by Grover Norquist, and co-sponsored by Joe Biden, Pat Leahy, Chuck Hagel, Dick Durbin, Bob Menendez and Barack Obama....

stephen cooper said...

"God loves everybody you love"


trust me, I have seen ... and you might think I am crazy, but I really have seen .... rats and cockroaches and mice and dogs and cats and very very bad people look at me with a look of friendship and trust.

God loves you and God loves everybody you love.
Trust me when I say that.
God and me are friends, not the best of friends (God abandoned me for years and years, SAD), but still, we are friends, and
I know that God loves you.


narciso said...

Moses was where he was supposed to be, was he prone to anger, probably, was david infallible by no means.

effinayright said...

Hagar said...
What is with "Big Pharma" spending these enormous amounts on advertising for drugs that we cannot buy without a doctor's prescription?
******************

Why would you want to buy those meds without a prescription?

Do you feel competent to do so w/o knowing all the details about side effects, efficacy, and interactions with other drugs you are taking? Or whether other drugs offer better outlooks?

Might the advertising be aimed at people who have the conditions the drugs are meant to treat, so that the latter ask their doctors about them?

What's wrong with that?

effinayright said...

stephen cooper said...
I know that God loves you.
***********************************

Did God love Hitler, Stalin, Mao, Pol Pot, Tamurlane, Genghis Khan, Vlad the Impaler?

If so, explain why.

Churchy LaFemme: said...

Churchill eulogized Chamberlain as well:

It fell to Neville Chamberlain in one of the supreme crises of the world to be contradicted by events, to be disappointed in his hopes, and to be deceived and cheated by a wicked man. But what were these hopes in which he was disappointed? What were these wishes in which he was frustrated? What was that faith that was abused? They were surely among the most noble and benevolent instincts of the human heart-the love of peace, the toil for peace, the strife for peace, the pursuit of peace, even at great peril, and certainly to the utter disdain of popularity or clamour. Whatever else history may or may not say about these terrible, tremendous years, we can be sure that Neville Chamberlain acted with perfect sincerity according to his lights and strove to the utmost of his capacity and authority, which were powerful, to save the world from the awful, devastating struggle in which we are now engaged. This alone will stand him in good stead as far as what is called the verdict of history is concerned.
...
He had a firmness of spirit which was not often elated by success, seldom downcast by failure, and never swayed by panic. when, contrary to all his hopes, beliefs and exertions, the war came upon him, and when, as he himself said, all that he had worked for was shattered, there was no man more resolved to pursue the unsought quarrel to the death. The same qualities which made him one of the last to enter the war, made him one of the last who would quit it before the full victory of a righteous cause was won.


Of course in private Churchill remarked, to the effect he could have easily gon the other way in that speach..

effinayright said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
effinayright said...

Guildofcannonballs said...
What does Judeo add that Christianity lacks?
*************

Ass-backwards. Christianity is the fulfillment of Jewish teaching, i.e. that a Messiah would redeem humans from The Fall of Man in the Garden of Eden.

Today's Jews obviously don't think Jesus was the Messiah.

And not to be a prick about it, but "Judeo", correctly "Judaeo", is an adjective for Judaism. "Judaeo" never stands alone.

You question indicates you know jack about Judaeo-Christianity in general.

wildswan said...

Guild,
Tolkien translated Beowulf and it finally was published with notes about 1990. You might like it.

"Judeo-Christian" isn't a religious term (what would that mean), it is a literary term. It started as a literary term in, I think, the 19C. It looked back - where did characteristic European culture come from? The Jews gave us the Old Testament, the Christians the New and everything based upon it. The term usually was used along with "Hellenic" to suggest a religious culture which included a strong rationalist component. This referred to the Greek philosophers, mathematicians and artists whose work was recovered in Europe in the late Middle ages and fueled movements such as the Renaissance. Hellenic included the Romans sice they were students of the Greeks. A work such as the Divine Comedy or The Last Judgment by Michelangelo shows the three influences.

Guildofcannonballs said...

William I apologize for not responding in kind.

Guildofcannonballs said...

"wholelottasplainin' said...
Guildofcannonballs said...
What does Judeo add that Christianity lacks?
*************

Ass-backwards. Christianity is the fulfillment of Jewish teaching, i.e. that a Messiah would redeem humans from The Fall of Man in the Garden of Eden.

Today's Jews obviously don't think Jesus was the Messiah.

And not to be a prick about it, but "Judeo", correctly "Judaeo", is an adjective for Judaism. "Judaeo" never stands alone.

You question indicates you know jack about Judaeo-Christianity in general.

2/7/20, 11:52 PM"

Guildofcannonballs said...

wholelot you win.

Your logic, even though never spelled out, well, it is just right.

You know. It's right!

Duh!?

Guildofcannonballs said...

Atheism used to be the fulfillment of Satan until Christ saved us all.

Guildofcannonballs said...

"(God abandoned me for years and years, SAD)"

You wanna fuck Satan?

Only those who have chosen to have God abandon them can say yes, so I will never, not once, be in a position to hurt a little one, hence drown upon the weight of my neck.

And you aren't gonna be in that position either Mr. C.

Snap out of it!

You live in a land where others die just to get to.

Guildofcannonballs said...

This continual focus on trauma long gone is Satanic Mr. Cooper.

Guildofcannonballs said...

Why don't you logically convince our host to panic and start believing nonsense like:

http://www.woodpilereport.com

You think you're a better writer, or wit, or have something more to say than "don't be me and sacrifice any single thing" then okay.

Go pack up supplies, Althouse has some living to do. She inspires me.

narciso said...

Faith can be redemptive, stephen cooperbut its not maudlin, God doesnt care what you did, just stop doing it and follow him.

Mark said...

Did God love Hitler, Stalin, Mao, Pol Pot, Tamurlane, Genghis Khan, Vlad the Impaler?
If so, explain why.


God is what He is, that's why. And He is not -- and cannot be -- what He is not.

God is Love. His essence is to love. The question then is -- what does "love" mean? What is this "love" such that Jesus tells us to love each other unconditionally, to even love our enemies?

And since God is the Creator of all things, including us humans, and since also being by nature all-good, whatever God makes is good, He loves what He has made. The evil that men do, however, is of their own creation, not His, and that He does not love and cannot love, since the nature of "evil" is necessarily that which is contrary to Him, which/who is good.

Now, back to what "love" means. True love is not merely pleasure or sentiment. Love is more than just an emotional feeling, more than attraction and affection, and more than a desire for personal happiness or fulfillment. Love is a conscious commitment of the will to seek the good and welfare of the other, including the gift of self for the other’s benefit.

Yes, God loves even the evil doer. God seeks their good.

Mark said...

And the very fact that persons who do evil have life, the fact that any of us have life, is precisely because of God's love. Why? Because love is life.

Love is by its very nature dynamic and fertile, it is life itself, and it is this fullness of love that has the power to transform dull and social lifelessness and even death itself into new life.

Now, if we were to honestly and justly consider the matter, we must concede that NONE of us "deserve" such love. After all, mankind has given God little more than rejection and infidelity throughout history. And yet, He continues to love us, fully, completely, and unconditionally. He refuses to stop loving us, even when we torture Him and murder Him. He continues to give Himself to us.

God does not love us because we are attractive and pretty, funny and smart, or because we are so likeable. He loves us regardless of these things, and even in the absence of these things. He loves us, God gives Himself to us, even though we do not deserve it. He gives us His love because He is Love and He seeks the good for us, because we need love. Love is life.

Ken B said...

Oh great, more Christian than thou comments. It’s like reading a Buttigieg speech.

Mark said...

From the experience before Jesus --

Moses and Aaron and the Israelites are the People of God. But we would do well to remember that Pharaoh and the Egyptians -- indeed, all the oppressors of the world -- are God's children too. As His children, He loves them too. Just as He gives us many, many opportunities to repent, so to did He give Pharaoh many chances to do the right thing. God did not strike him down immediately, He did not destroy Egypt with one blow the first time, but only upon the tenth time.

Understanding the symbolism of the number ten -- which means completeness -- God gave Pharaoh (who can be seen as symbolizing all sinners, all those who separate themselves from God) ten chances to begin to do the right thing. That is, in imposing the ten plagues, the ten rebukes and demonstrations of His power, God gave Pharaoh not one chance, not just a second chance, but a complete number of chances to do good. Why? Because God loved Pharaoh. He wanted the good for him.

But ultimately we run out of chances, we run out of time to turn to God because ultimately death comes, the final plague. If we do not "convert," which is from the Latin for "turn toward," if we do not turn to God who is Life itself before worldly death comes, then we have the ultimate death.

If that is God’s approach to evildoers, it should give those of us who are also sinners hope. In the plagues of Egypt, we see how He prods us, He pokes, He warns, He chastises, He is patient when the sinner back-slides, He gives countless chances, and His divine mercy is everlasting, so that no matter how obstinate we might have been in sin, so long as we turn toward Him while there is still time, before death, when it is then too late, in His love we can still have life.

Quaestor said...

Why not Atheist-Judeo-Christian? Atheists certainly contributed to Christianity's founding.

If one is determined to expand the meaning of Judeo-Christian to agree more with history, then Platonism should be acknowledged long, long before atheism. In reviewing my (very limited) understanding of the contribution of Christianity and Judaism to Western civilization, I cannot see any contribution made by atheism, per se. The accepted definition of atheism is simply the absence of belief in God or gods. That's it. Nothing else.

There are atheists who adhere to a moral or ethical paradigm, which they largely derive from belief systems that do not acknowledge divine authority. A number of Enlightenment-era deists tried to construct internally consistent non-theistic ethics, among them are Jeremy Bentham and David Hume, however their efforts have been generally discounted by 20th-century successors. Lately, ethical atheism has returned to the classical Stoics, particularly Marcus Aurelius, who was himself a non-Christian platonic monotheist.

rehajm said...

From WSJ-

For more than half a century, the Mormon Church quietly built one of the world’s largest investment funds. Almost no one outside the church knew about it....

...Its assets did total roughly $80 billion to $100 billion as of last year, some of the former employees said. That is at least double the size of Harvard University’s endowment and as large as the size of SoftBank’s Vision Fund, the world’s largest tech-investment fund. Its holdings include $40 billion of U.S. stock, timberland in the Florida panhandle and investments in prominent hedge funds such as Bridgewater Associates LP, according to some current and former fund employees.

Big Mike said...

The Trump administration will no longer allow New York state residents to enroll in Global Entry or other Trusted Traveler programs, citing new sanctuary policies that limit federal access to state driver's license data, acting Homeland Security Secretary Chad Wold said on Fox News late Wednesday.

Actions, meet consequences.

Meade said...

"Title:Trump Fires Gordon Sondland Hours After Dismissing Impeachment Witness Alexander Vindman"

We cannot spare this president. He fights.

stevew said...

Is this, the Sondland and Vindman firings, the modern day equivalent of heads on pikes?

Certainly Trump should be impeached over this, and his scurrilous attack on states such as NY (Global Entry rules).

BUMBLE BEE said...

Perhaps you've heard about the dyslexic philosopher who wondered whether there was/wasn't a dog?

Rusty said...

"Love is a conscious commitment of the will to seek the good and welfare of the other,"
IOW charity

Matt Sablan said...

I don't understand Romney's votes. It isn't that I think you can't come to the conclusion Trump DID ask for a quid pro quo; I suppose one could. But, I find it odd that anyone who voted for more witnesses to get to the truth of the matter could vote that someone was guilty. At best, you could abstain by saying you don't know -- but if you thought someone was guilty, then there was no need for more witnesses. The only rational and ethical choice if you want more information is to try for a mistrial or go for an acquittal. I can't imagine in any trial, if I were a juror, or in any arbitration or investigation where I was asked to find fault, if I said, "I need to hear from X, Y and Z before making a decision," if I was then told I could not talk to X, Y and Z, how I could ethically decide: "Well, guess I actually had enough information after all!" You could ethically vote to acquit with an asterisk that you have doubts, but that justice demands the prosecution prove its case, and it did not, or you could ethically abstain from voting and saying the process was flawed. But, how do you condemn someone when you said you needed more information? How is that ethical?

Matt Sablan said...

"Is this, the Sondland and Vindman firings, the modern day equivalent of heads on pikes?"

-- Eh, the purging of opposing political partisans from the President's staff is a relatively benign thing. Trump should have vetted people better, and he certainly should have purged every political appointee he was legally allowed to as soon as there were reports of an underground #Resistance. The fact he STILL hasn't declared a mass purge of those who serve at his pleasure due to the fact that government employees are openly declaring that they will undermine him and thwart government policy is either a sign he's as stupid as people say he is, or way, way more tolerant of insubordination than any executive wisely should be.

Mark said...

Atheists certainly contributed to Christianity's founding

Atheists? No. Not at all -- if only because 2000 years ago, there really were no atheists.

There were pagans though. And absolutely the early Church looked to Greek and Roman philosophy in an attempt to better understand the mystery of God. After all, God did not speak only to the Jews and Christians. He revealed Himself to Greece and Rome (and Egypt and Babylon, etc.) too, even if the people there did not realize it.

Beloved Commenter AReasonableMan said...

Mark said...
Not at all -- if only because 2000 years ago, there really were no atheists.


Many Greek philosophers qualify as atheists in their skepticism of the gods.

Wiki says:
Philosophical atheist thought began to appear in Europe and Asia in the sixth or fifth century BCE.

Char Char Binks, Esq. said...

Doesn’t a Lt. Colonel outrank the president in our military dictatorship? Orson Bean was right!

Narr said...

Vindman Bros., a pair of jokers.

The reason we can't trace a strong atheist influence in Western Civ until recently is very simple: public (and almost all private) confession of skepticism towards the shamans, much less outright rejection, was a sure and swift ticket to the gibbet or the oubliette. In the more backward reaches of the planet and in scattered pockets everywhere, that is still the case and probably always will be.

It is Western Civ's greatest glory that secular thought emerged, but only after a centuries-long process in which the practical limits and drawbacks of religious bigotry were demonstrated so clearly even kings and theologians could see them.

Narr
Secularism is its own reward

stephen cooper said...

Guildofcannonballs, narciso, and Mark ---- thoughtful responses like yours are why I still post here. (by the way, GoC - Satan and me are not friends at all! - Quite the contrary!)

Narciso - when I speak of God abandoning me, I have in mind 2 Biblical ideas - first, the beautiful speech in which Saint Paul said that Jesus suffered much for us but that we as Christians also have to suffer ..... and by doing so we join with Jesus to fulfill the efforts that need to be made to defeat evil. Remember some of the last few words of Jesus on the cross (some people think he was actually saying, as if he meant it as a statement of fact, God, my God, why have you abandoned me, but what he was really doing, I think, was merely reciting the proper Biblical verse for that time of the day in the Passover season. Trust me on that, I come from a long line of amateur theologians, Jewish on my poor father's side, English on my poor mother's side).

The second Biblical idea is found in the Gospel of John. Remember how Jesus told the woman at the well that she was right, she had never been married, after she had told him she had several husbands? You might think he was rebuking her for having tried again and again to be married, without doing in the right way, and you might be right. But think of the words of Jesus in the context of his last few words on the cross.
That woman wanted all her life to be happy but she was unable to be happy before she met Jesus, who would never marry her. She HAD TO LIVE DEPRIVED OF THE SACRAMENTAL JOY OF MARRIAGE year after year in order to be THE WONDERFUL WOMAN, ONE OF THE FIRST CHRISTIANS EVER in order to be what she is described as being in the Bible.

Aquinas explained these things, John Scotus explained a few of the things that Aquinas got wrong.

I know I come across as "dwelling" on past problems.
I do that because once or twice, back in the day, I was the humble vessel of God who helped heal a soul that had suffered much much more than I could have imagined, and .... cor ad cor loquitur ....... nobody wants to think they are the only person who feels as if God abandoned them. Well I would like to think that way but I am not nobody, if you take my meaning, as Sam Gamgee used to say.

stephen cooper said...

"comment" here, not "post" here.

Mark said...

Skepticism of the gods is skepticism, or agnosticism. It's not atheism.

Mark said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
Mark said...

And skepticism of the gods is certainly not the anti-theism that we see today.

Beloved Commenter AReasonableMan said...

As others pointed out atheism could get you killed because religion is the handmaiden of the thugs known as kings.

Narr said...

Thanks for the lesson, Mark.

I forgot that the Three Great Monotheistic Faiths all have that "Believe or else, but 'skepticism' never hurt anyone so that's fine" exception in the fine print.

Narr
I guess you need to know where to look