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'Jesus' Resurrection – Dramatic Testimony
http://www.allaboutjesuschrist.org/jesus-resurrection.htm
Jesus' Resurrection - Essential to the Christian Faith
Jesus' Resurrection from the dead is as essential to the Christian faith as His death upon the cross. Paul writes in his first letter to the Corinthians "For I delivered unto you first of all that which I also received, how that Christ died for our sins according to the scriptures; And that he was buried, and that he rose again the third day according to the scriptures" (1 Corinthians 15:3-4). Paul emphasizes the importance of the Resurrection with his statement "And if Christ be not risen, then is our preaching vain, and your faith is also vain. Yea, and we are found false witnesses of God; because we have testified of God that he raised up Christ: whom he raised not up, if so be that the dead rise not" (I Corinthians 15:14-15).
Jesus' Resurrection - An Historical Event?
So, is Jesus' Resurrection from the dead an historical event? It is proclaimed throughout the four Gospels as well as ancient correspondence. If these works are the historical documents they claim to be, then they bare witness to an historical event. According to Aristotle's Dictum, these pieces meet the criteria for legitimate historical documents. However, as they describe miraculous events, they are not recognized by secular society as valid testimony. How then will these accounts be validated? Two questions must be asked. First, do the authors of these literary pieces discredit their work, or do their lives give credit to their testimony? Second, do accepted historical authorities corroborate these accounts?
Jesus' Resurrection - The Disciples' Testimony
The men who believed in Jesus' Resurrection from the dead, known today as Christ's Disciples, certainly had their testimony, as well as their convictions, tested by those who disbelieved. With the exception of John, every one of these men were put to death. These deaths were excruciating and merciless. More so were their lives, as these men were persecuted by the secular world and suffered great hardship for the spreading of their beloved Gospel, which they proclaimed. Paul gives account in his second letter to the Corinthians "Of the Jews five times received I forty stripes save one. Thrice was I beaten with rods, once was I stoned, thrice I suffered shipwreck, a night and a day I have been in the deep; In journeyings often, in perils of waters, in perils of robbers, in perils by mine own countrymen, in perils by the heathen, in perils in the city, in perils in the wilderness, in perils in the sea, in perils among false brethren; In weariness and painfulness, in watchings often, in hunger and thirst, in fastings often, in cold and nakedness." (II Corinthians 11:24-27). Paul was later beheaded after suffering in a Roman dungeon for many years. His death was far less brutal then those of his brethren as he was a Roman citizen and often they were not. These men believed the Lord allowed them to suffer greatly, as there is no better evidence of their sincerity and the truth of their message than their endurance and perseverance without any hope of an earthly reward. Every single one of them could have escaped such torture and humiliation by simply denouncing the Resurrection of Christ. This was the goal of their tormentors. However, not one ceded to their persecutors, and this is dramatic evidence in rebuttal of any conspiracy theory.
Jesus Gave His Life For All Of Us, So All May Be Free From All Sin!
"Daily Motivations"
We are not put on this earth for ourselves, but are placed here for each other. If you are always there for others, then in time of need, someone will be there for you. -- Jeff Warner
"Do not look to the ground for your next step; greatness lies with those who look to the horizon." -- Norwegian Proverb
"Forgiveness does not change the past, but it does enlarge the future." -- Paul Boese
"Daily Devotions" (KJV and/or NLT)
Let everyone in the world fear the LORD, and let everyone stand in awe of Him. (Psalm 33:8)
If we could just grasp even a part of the magnificent holiness of God, then the whole earth would shake with people falling to the ground in worship and adoration of Him. Such a view would precipitate a healthy fear of God, which is the necessary starting point.
True knowledge of God's holiness always elicits a worshipful response from us. Moses fell to his face before the burning bush. Isaiah said, "Woe is me!" (Isaiah 6:5). We cannot stand in the presence of God without acknowledging His holiness and seeing our own sin.
Whenever I meditate on the holiness of God, I am impressed with how worthy He is of our worship. I want to become absorbed with His holiness, rather than with His might, His wisdom, or His other magnificent attributes.
As we meditate on God's supreme holiness, we cannot help but be overcome with a sense of awe. Music can help us express our awe for our Lord. Many of the Christian hymns capture the spirit of worship. I encourage you to select one of them, such as "Holy, Holy, Holy", or "Agnus Dei" and begin to worship God right now.
When we concentrate on God's holiness---His moral perfection and absolute purity---the only appropriate response is humble adoration, which is the basis for all worship.
Your View of God Really Matters …
Read Isaiah 6:1-8 then put yourself in Isaiah's place as you hear or sing a song such as "Holy, Holy, Holy", or "Agnus Dei".
"The Patriot Post"
"One hundred and seventy-three despots would surely be as oppressive as one." --James Madison, Federalist No. 48
"If the present Congress errs in too much talking, how can it be otherwise in a body to which the people send 150 lawyers, whose trade it is to question everything, yield nothing, & talk by the hour? That 150 lawyers should do business together ought not to be expected." --Thomas Jefferson, autobiography, 1821
From the 'Non Compos Mentis' File
"[W]e have to pass the bill so that you can find out what is in it, away from the fog of the controversy." --House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-CA), confirming that too much Botox can kill brain cells
The BIG Lie
On Monday, Barack Obama declared, "Our cost-cutting measures mirror most of the proposals in the current Senate bill, which reduces most people's premiums."
Sen. Dick Durbin (D-IL) disagreed, albeit indirectly: "Anyone who would stand before you and say, 'Well, if you pass health care reform next year's health care premiums are going down,' I don't think is telling the truth."
See the video. http://patriotpost.us/perspective/2010/03/11/durbin-calls-obama-a-liar/
Regulatory Commissars: Pulling the Corker Out of the Bottle
Sen. Bob Corker (R-TN) stunned his Republican colleagues by working with Senate Banking Committee Chairman Christopher Dodd (D-CT) this week to breathe new life into Democrats' financial "reform" package. Feeling pressure from his right, however, Corker has since pulled out of the deal, which Dodd is now pushing without him.
The House version of the bill, crafted by Massachusetts liberal Barney Frank, was recently considered dead in the Senate, and for good reason. It included a $4 trillion bailout provision for rickety financial institutions that would make TARP the official policy of the federal government. No more bankruptcies, no more survival of the fittest -- both characteristics of a free market. Instead, the government would be allowed to manipulate the markets on the backs of taxpayers. This bill would also create the Consumer Financial Protection Agency (CFPA), a massive new federal bureaucracy that would have the power to oversee and ultimately regulate not only financial institutions, but also virtually any organization that deals with consumers.
Corker, a freshman senator with an American Conservative Union rating of 83, should have joined his colleagues in the first place and let the bill die in negotiations. Instead, he worked with Dodd to keep the CFPA alive. His office stated that he doesn't support the bailout provision, but he did in fact vote for the TARP-bank bailout in 2008. Wall Street likes the bailout provision, because it coats big firms with Teflon to keep them from failing under almost any circumstances. It's a good thing that Corker, who has received $3 million in campaign funds from the finance industry since taking office in 2007, reconsidered when he did. Still, he shouldn't have put himself in that position in the first place.
Health Care and Student Loans?
Senate Democrats want to attach a provision to the health care reconciliation bill that would allow the government essentially to take over all student loan lending in the country. Democrats are having enough problems passing health care on its own, and this latest parliamentary trick could shake up the delicate vote balance. The student-lending bill would federalize all higher education lending and would thus cause the loss of tens of thousands of private sector jobs. Senators representing states where those jobs stand to be lost are now wavering on whether they can support health care with this completely unrelated provision attached to it. What a shame.
The student-lending bill doesn't stand much chance of passage on its own. The $67 billion that the White House claims will be saved by the legislation is more than offset by $77 billion in new costs. That figure is a lowball estimate as it doesn't take into account the rate of student loan defaults or accurately figure new spending increases over time. Worst of all, virtually no one in the Senate has seen this bill, and the public isn't aware of the details, let alone the fact that it may become law without much debate.
In related news, according to Roll Call, "The Senate Parliamentarian has ruled that President Barack Obama must sign Congress' original health care reform bill before the Senate can act on a companion reconciliation package." We'll soon see how Democrats plan to work around this legal obstacle.
New & Notable Legislation
Rep. Ann Kirkpatrick (D-AZ) announced a measure that would cut Congress's salary by 5 percent in 2011. It has 21 cosponsors so far, and, if passed, it would save taxpayers $4.7 million. Granted, that's a drop in the bucket considering the deficits we're facing these days, but it would be an important symbolic step for Congress to recognize the economic woes being felt in the private sector. The House voted against an automatic pay raise in 2009 and 2010, but it hasn't taken an actual cut in pay since 1933.
The Senate voted 62-36 Wednesday to extend jobless benefits and temporary business tax breaks. Six Republicans and all but Democrat Ben Nelson of Nebraska voted for the bill, which will add about $130 billion to the deficit over the next 18 months. The GOP "yes" votes were mostly the usual suspects, Christopher Bond (MO), Susan Collins (ME), Lisa Murkowski (AK), Olympia Snowe (ME), David Vitter (LA) and George Voinovich (OH).
Sen. Jim DeMint (R-SC) proposed an amendment last week to block the White House's arbitrary seizure of over 10 million acres of land in nine Western states. The land was designated as "monuments" under a questionable application of the Antiquities Act of 1906, in order to prevent resources development. DeMint pointed out that during times of economic stress, the government should be freeing up resources for development, not locking them up. Unfortunately, most of his colleagues disagreed. His amendment was defeated 58-38.
Sens. John McCain (R-AZ) and Joe Lieberman (I-CT) introduced the "Enemy Belligerent, Interrogation, Detention, and Prosecution Act of 2010," which would provide for military, rather than civilian, detention of terrorism suspects. The bill is ostensibly a response to the Christmas Day undi-bomber incident, in which the perpetrator was read his Miranda rights. It permits detentions based on "the potential intelligence value of the individual," or "such other matters as the President considers appropriate." That's a lot of uncomfortable leeway. Furthermore, the military would have the power to detain high-value detainees indefinitely "without criminal charges and without trial for the duration of hostilities against the United States or its coalition partners in which the individual has engaged, or which the individual has purposely and materially supported." Given that Obama's Homeland Security team views right-wingers as threats, one wonders just where this could lead. With "friends" like McCain...
Finally, in a bid to put their big-spending past behind them (or at least make a good campaign statement), the House GOP adopted a unilateral one-year ban on earmarks Thursday. To paraphrase Ben Franklin, that's a good promise ... if you can keep it.
National Security -- On the Warfront With Jihadistan
As the Long War continues, both expected and unexpected targets were picked off by various American and allied forces this week. In Pakistan, Interior Minister Rehman Malik said that Maulana Faqir Mohammed, a top Pakistani Taliban commander, was probably killed last weekend after helicopters hit a building in Pakistan's Mohmand region, killing at least 16 Taliban militants. Although Malik could not confirm Mohammed's death, he was quoted as saying, "We had real-time intelligence that Faqir Mohammad was in a meeting with another commander, Qari Zia-ur-Rehman, in the hideout at the time of the attack." If true, we got two jihadis for the price of one. Meanwhile, the good hunting continued on Wednesday as U.S. missile strikes killed at least 12 militants near Pakistan's Afghan border.
Also this week, Pakistani officials claimed that an American, Adam Gadahn, a 31-year-old who has appeared in al-Qa'ida videos urging jihad against the West, had been captured. U.S. defense officials said they had received no indication of any such arrest, and by Friday, Pakistani officials were backing away from the story. Gadahn, who grew up in Riverside County, California, before converting to Islam at a nearby Orange County mosque is the first American charged with treason since 1952, and the U.S. government is offering $1 million for information leading to his capture.
Finally, on Monday, a Pennsylvania woman named Colleen LaRose, but known to authorities as "Jihad Jane" (not to be confused with Hanoi Jane), was charged in federal court with using the Internet to recruit jihadis to carry out murders and other violent attacks overseas. One of her targets was Lars Vilks, an artist who had exercised his free speech rights by drawing a cartoon of the prophet Muhammad. The indictment alleges that LaRose received orders to murder someone in Sweden, and to do so in such a way that it would frighten "the whole Kufar [non-believer] world." It also states that LaRose agreed to commit the murder, and that her appearance and American citizenship would help her blend in and carry it out.
Profiles of Valor: U.S. Marine Corps 1st Lt. Elliot Ackerman
AckermanOn November 10, 2004, then-2nd Lt. Elliot Ackerman of the United States Marine Corps led a platoon into Fallujah -- at that time, still a hotbed of insurgent activity. The platoon's mission was to establish a foothold from which the battalion would then clear the city. As the Marines pushed into the city, enemy fighters attacked from all sides. Twice in the early fighting, Ackerman risked himself to pull wounded Marines to safety, and then organized their evacuation. As the battle raged, however, the vehicle sent to evacuate the wounded couldn't find their position, so Ackerman again headed into the open and risked what his citation called a "gauntlet of deadly enemy fire" to direct the vehicle to the Marines.
Later in the battle, Ackerman and his team were working to clear a building when he saw some of his Marines exposed on a rooftop. He ordered them down, but took their place to mark targets for American tanks. Under a barrage of enemy fire, he suffered shrapnel wounds in his leg but continued to direct both the attack and four medical evacuations. For his bravery and leadership, Ackerman was awarded the Silver Star. Semper Fi!
Business & Economy -- Income Redistribution: You Paid for It
Executive salaries reach $500,000, hourly fees top $600, and millions of your dollars are propping it all up. Welcome to the underworld of the environmental industry. According to Richard Pollock of Pajamas Media, "environmental activist groups have surreptitiously received at least $37 million from the federal government for questionable 'attorney fees'" related to lawsuits that "had nothing to do with environmental protection or improvement."
Since 2000, nine national environmental groups have filed the astounding number of 3,300 lawsuits, most based on "alleged procedural failings of federal agencies" rather than "substance or science." Not only has Uncle Sam doled out the millions, but Washington has "neither tracked nor accounted for" any of the outgo. Wyoming attorney Karen Budd-Falen, who helped uncover the fraud, says the $37 million is just the "tip of the iceberg," estimating the actual number is in the hundreds of millions.
Interestingly, according to the Washington Examiner, compensation for the top 10 paid environmental executives ranges from $308,000 to $496,000. Pajamas Media notes that of the $3.4 million that environmental PACs have given in federal campaign contributions since 2000, approximately 87 percent was to Democrats. Coincidence? We think not.
Eco-activists aren't the only ones greening themselves with your money. It seems Wake Forest University is using a $71,623 federal "we must rescue the economy now" stimu-less grant to study the effects of cocaine on a specific neurotransmitter in addicted monkeys. The economic benefit? Apparently a job "saved." For the record, we believe taxpayer dollars already fund too much monkey business in Washington; there's certainly no need to fund it anywhere else.
Administration Delays Oil Drilling
In 2008, then-Senator Barack Obama risked the ire of his leftist comrades when he championed offshore drilling as an opportunity to free America from dependence on foreign oil; he shrewdly hedged his bets in order to lure centrists and other undecideds into his camp. However, as with so many other issues, Obama's campaign promises are proving worthless.
Despite the fact that Americans favor offshore drilling by a 2 to 1 margin, Secretary of the Interior Ken Salazar has used every tool in his bureaucratic box to hinder it, including extending the public comment period before beginning the drilling program, voiding existing contracts for onshore drilling in Utah and announcing the delay of the offshore program until 2012. This program would have created 1.2 million real jobs per year and not doing it will cost the U.S. $2.36 trillion over the next 20 years. Surprise! Economic recovery is not the real agenda of this administration.
Judicial Benchmarks: 9th Circuit Approves of Pledge
"A federal appeals court in San Francisco has ruled that the phrase "under God" in the Pledge of Allegiance is constitutional," reports the Associated Press. Atheist Michael Newdow had filed suit in 2004, claiming his daughter shouldn't be required to say the Pledge at school. However, his daughter and her mother, from whom Newdow is separated, are Christians who don't object to the Pledge, and the U.S. Supreme Court threw out the case saying Newdow didn't have standing. He refiled on behalf of other parents, but, in a 2-1 ruling, a Ninth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals panel rejected his argument that the phrase "under God" violates the separation of church and state. Yes, the Ninth Circuit. Amazing, isn't it?
This Week's 'Alpha Jackass' Award
"I guess what we all underestimated was the degree, the depths of dishonesty, and dirtiness, and cynicism to which the climate change denial movement would be willing to stoop to advance their agenda." --Michael Mann, author of the dirty, dishonest and cynical "hockey stick" graph showing a recent spike in warming
Second Amendment: Guns For Dummies
Federal authorities at the ATF recently intercepted a large shipment of rifles labeled "toys" in Tacoma, Washington, that it claimed "could have had far-reaching and potentially devastating ramifications if they had gotten into the hands of individuals who wanted to do harm in the American population." Could the weapons seizure have prevented a shooting rampage across the nation? Perhaps -- except for one problem. The guns actually were toys.
Apparently, the ATF thought there was no limit to the widespread damage these mostly plastic Airsoft BB guns could have inflicted upon hapless Americans. The lightweight plastic BB ordnance fired by such heavy artillery may actually sting or leave welts on bare skin if fired at close range. Undeterred by such an obvious blunder, the agency justified its seizure by declaring the toy BB guns could be converted into real, fully automatic machine guns -- which is true, if virtually all of the toy's parts were replaced with real machine gun parts from a real weapon. The same holds true for any other toy being converted to the real thing from scratch, like toy pickups or spaceships. The old adage never to attribute to malice that which can be adequately explained by stupidity continues to be true, especially when it comes to bureaucratic bungling. Perhaps in the future, the ATF could refer to Guns for Dummies to help them identify real weaponry.
To Keep and Bear Arms
A burglar had the surprise of his life when he broke into a soon-to-be Marine's home in Delhi Township, Ohio. In the middle of the night, Kevin Boyle noticed that his door had been opened and quickly confronted the suspect. After warning him not to move, Boyle noticed him pull out what appeared to be a gun and raise it towards him. Fortunately, he had his own .45 caliber handgun ready.
Boyle fired two shots at the suspect and ran to get behind the corner wall for protection. He immediately called the police for help. The suspect took off to escape in the woods. It appears a car was waiting to pick him up. He remains on the run, and there is no evidence that he was struck by the bullets.
"I'm glad no one got hurt, including him. He probably thought he could get in for a quick little burglary and luckily I was ready to keep myself safe," said Boyle, who is two months away from leaving for Marine training camp. We'd call that successful early training.
"Liberty Counsel"
Liberty Alert
April 1, 2010
Homeland Security Raid of Religious Tracts Violates Fourth Amendment
www.LC.org
Yesterday a federal district court in Dallas, Texas ruled http://www.lc.org/media/9980/attachments/opinion_rundus_033010.pdf that agents of the U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS) illegally conspired to violate the Fourth Amendment rights of Darrel Rundus when they confiscated his "Million Dollar Bill" gospel tracts.
The judge ruled that DHS violated the Fourth Amendment guarantee against unlawful search and seizure. The ruling contains harsh language against the DHS agents, stating their behavior was inappropriate and they illegally conspired to violate the rights of Rundus.
Liberty Counsel represents Rundus and his Christian ministry, Great News Network (GNC). In June 2006, DHS agents entered GNN’s office without a warrant or permission, and threatened an employee with arrest to pressure him into giving up the gospel tracts, which the agents referred to as "contraband."
The front of the tract has markings similar to paper currency, but no one would ever get the tracts confused with real money. The front is printed with: "This bill is not legal tender," "Thou Shalt Not Steal," "Department of Eternal Affairs." The back has statements such as, "The million dollar question: Will you go to Heaven?" The tract then contains the story of salvation written around all four sides. Rundus says that the tracts are extremely effective in sharing his faith with others.
We are grateful to God for this tremendous victory. All of us at Liberty Counsel want to continue to help people like Darrel Rundus reach others with the gospel. We do not charge for our services, but rely on your faithful donations.
Read the Court Opinion in this case. http://www.lc.org/media/9980/attachments/opinion_rundus_033010.pdf
Read our News Release for more details. http://www.lc.org/index.cfm?PID=14100&PRID=922
"The Web"
Rep. Hank Johnson (D-GA): Guam could 'tip over and capsize'
http://dailyradar.com/beltwayblips/video/youtube-3-25-2010-hank-johnson-guam-tip-over-wmv/
Poll: Almost Two-Thirds of U.S. Oppose Health Law
By: Dan Weil
http://newsmax.com/InsideCover/Poll-Two-Thirds-Oppose-Health-Law/2010/03/31/id/354336
Almost two-thirds of Americans believe the new healthcare law is too expensive and gives too much authority to the government for healthcare, according to a USA Today/Gallup Poll.
That could be bad news for Democrats in November’s congressional elections.
Supporters "are not only going to have to focus on implementing this kind of major reform," Robert Blendon, a Harvard professor of health policy and political analysis, told the paper.
"They're going to have to spend substantial time convincing people of the concrete benefits of this legislation."
Poll respondents are worried that the reform package will cost them more while lessening their quality of care.
Even President Obama has acknowledged problems on the cost front. "We are still going to have adjustments that have to be made to further reduce costs," he said Tuesday on NBC’s Today,
To some extent, poll respondents have contradictory views of the new legislation. A plurality believes the law will generally improve healthcare coverage and the overall health of Americans.
But 65 percent say the government’s role in healthcare is being expanded too far, 64 percent say the program will cost the government too much, 58 percent say it doesn’t do enough to brake rising costs and 51 percent say it doesn’t do enough to regulate the healthcare industry.
Half of respondents in the March 26-28 poll say the law is “a bad thing,” while 47 percent view it as “a good thing.”
That’s a shift from a poll March 22 — one day after the House approved the legislation — in which supporters outnumbered opponents 49 to 40 percent.
A Washington Post-ABC News poll conducted March 23-26 produced mixed results for Democrats.
Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid’s approval rating dropped to 29 percent from 35 percent in January.
But approval of Obama’s handling of healthcare reform rose to 48 percent from 43 percent.
Obama's radical recess appointments
Chad Groening - OneNewsNow
http://www.onenewsnow.com/Politics/Default.aspx?id=957272
A grassroots non-denominational church lobby is blasting President Barack Obama for using recess appointments for two individuals who are so radical they couldn't even be confirmed by a Democratic-controlled Senate.
Since Congress adjourned on Friday (March 26), President Obama has appointed no less than 15 of his languishing nominees. The Traditional Values Coalition (TVC) is concerned about two in particular, including radical professor Chai Feldblum who is to serve as a commissioner on the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission.
TVC executive director Andrea Lafferty says Feldblum is way out of the mainstream (see earlier article).
"She has stated that sexual liberty trumps religious liberty, she's opposed the Boy Scouts being able to determine who should be Scout leaders, and she also is the author of ENDA (the Employment Non-Discrimination Act), which is a bill that will force Christians and everybody to have to hire transgendered people," Lafferty explains. In addition, while speaking at a forum in 2004, Feldblum stated that "gay sex is morally good."
Lafferty also notes her outrage that Obama chose during the congressional recess to appoint Craig Becker to the National Labor Relations Board, which is supposed to be an impartial arbitrator.
"They're supposed to be fair," Lafferty says of the NLRB. "[But] there is nothing moderate about Becker's point of view. He has done nothing but work for union thugs and push unionism all across the country, so it's an outrage that this man was put in a position where he's supposed to be fair and balanced, and it's not possible."
The TVC executive director admits she is somewhat relieved that the recess appointments can only serve without Senate confirmation through the rest of the current session of Congress, which runs through the end of 2010.
Groups Blast Obama's Appointment of Gay Activist
By Nathan Black|Christian Post Reporter
http://www.christianpost.com/article/20100331/groups-blast-obama-s-appointment-of-gay-activist/index.html
Conservative and Christian groups are increasingly voicing opposition to President Obama's recent recess appointment of a homosexual activist to his administration.
Chai Feldblum, a lesbian Georgetown University Law Center professor, was appointed over the weekend as commissioner on the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission.
"She is way beyond what most Americans would consider mainstream," said Shari Rendall, director of Legislation and Public Policy at Concerned Women for America, in a statement Tuesday.
Feldblum, who was nominated by Obama in September, is the primary author of the Employment Non-Discrimination Act which would make it illegal for employers to make decisions on hiring, firing, promoting or paying an employee based on sexual orientation.
Religious employers have argued that they themselves would be discriminated against under ENDA.
Gay rights groups praised the appointment of Feldblum. Opponents, meanwhile, maintain that the openly lesbian professor "would not be impartial in her decision-making process."
"From her own account, Feldblum would have a difficult time ever deciding that religious liberties should trump homosexual rights," said Rendall.
Feldblum has acknowledged the conflict that exists between "laws intended to protect the liberty of LGBT people ... and the religious beliefs of some individuals whose conduct is regulated by such laws."
But in such conflicts, she said society should side with the liberty of LGBT people over the liberty of the religious.
She was willing to make a very limited exception to ENDA, specifically for "enterprises that are engaged in by ... religious belief communities that are specifically designed to inculcate values in the next generation."
"We want to change the American workforce and revolutionize social norms," she said earlier. "Our current public policies undermine the moral and political unit of same-sex couples and families and that's a moral wrong that needs to be rectified."
Feldblum, who has been fighting for LGBT (Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender) rights for the last 20 years and supports polyamory, believes it is only a matter of time before America enters an "era of full LGBT liberty."
Other groups that have publicly denounced the appointment of Feldblum include the Traditional Values Coalition and Family Research Council.
Obama made 15 appointments to his administration over the weekend when Congress began its Easter recess, bypassing the normal confirmation process. Recess appointees serve through the end of the current Congress unless they receive Senate confirmation.
Clinton Blasted for Pushing Abortion in Canada’s G8 Maternal Health Plan
By Patrick B. Craine
http://www.lifesitenews.com/ldn/2010/mar/10033108.html
OTTAWA, Ontario, March 31, 2010 (LifeSiteNews.com) – Canadian and U.S. pro-life leaders are denouncing U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton after she weighed in Tuesday on the debate over the Canadian government's G8 maternal and child health initiative, insisting plainly that abortion is necessary for maternal health.
"You cannot have maternal health without reproductive health. And reproductive health includes contraception and family planning and access to legal, safe abortion," she told reporters when asked about Canada's G8 initiative.
Reacting to Clinton's comments, Mary Ellen Douglas, national organizer for Campaign Life Coalition (CLC), told LifeSiteNews (LSN), “How dare she stick her pro-abortion nose into Canadian politics. Hasn't she done enough damage to the unborn in the U.S.?”
Clinton made the comments at a news conference following a G8 foreign ministers meeting in Gatineau, Quebec. She began her visit in Ottawa on Monday.
"I do not think governments should be involved in making these decisions. It is perfectly legitimate for people to hold their own personal views based on conscience, religion or any other basis," she said. "But I've always believed the government should not intervene in decisions of such intimacy."
Clinton said that maternal health is a “great concern to me and to my government,” noting that the U.S. government is promoting their own global health initiative that promotes access to contraception. “We are also looking for ways to make women’s choices so that they can avoid abortion – more realistic by providing support for them,” she said.
British Foreign Secretary David Miliband agreed with Clinton, saying Britain also does not want to exclude abortion. "We think it's very important to have a comprehensive family planning aspect as part of the development strategy," he told CBC.
Conservative MP Brad Trost criticized Clinton for “pok[ing] her nose in areas that are not her business.”
“Canada can make up its own mind on what its policy is on maternal health care and how we define it,” he said. “The Prime Minister has taken the lead in an initiative to help women's health and rather than trying to interfere in Canada's policies by playing up to a domestic American political audience in her own party, she (Clinton) should stick to more fruitful international matters.”
Clinton's remarks have reheated an ongoing debate over abortion and contraception in Prime Minister Stephen Harper's G8 initiative. Two weeks ago the government indicated that the initiative would not include support for contraception or abortion and that it would simply focus on saving lives through basic care such as inoculations, health services, and food and water, but Prime Minister Harper backed down on contraception following pressure from opposition parties. Since then, the government has repeatedly maintained that they have no intention of debating abortion, leaving it unclear whether or not they will support abortion in the plan.
Pressed by reporters last week about abortion funding, Minister of International Cooperation Bev Oda stated, "We are not closing any options . ... We are not ruling out any options.”
Nevertheless, the Canadian Parliament last Tuesday defeated a Liberal motion proposed by MP Bob Rae that demanded the government offer a “full range of reproductive health services” in the Third World initiative. Though backed by the three opposition parties, the motion failed in a vote of 138-144 because 13 Liberals were absent and three – Paul Szabo, Dan McTeague, and John McKay – opposed it.
Trost noted that the motion's defeat can be interpreted as an indication that the Canadian Parliament does not endorse abortion in the plan.
Liberal leader Michael Ignatieff, who began pushing abortion in the G8 initiative within days of its January announcement, has praised Clinton's 'admirable' comments and jumped on them as a sign that the Conservatives are out of step with other G8 countries.
"Canada took a knock in the last two days and it shouldn't have. The government should have stood up and been clear and understand what the international consensus on that issue is," Ignatieff said, according to Canwest.
"I just think that a G8 country like Canada should get up and be clear. Hillary Clinton was admirably clear about what the international consensus on maternal health is. It's what we've been saying, it's what G8 countries have been saying," he continued. "That's the position Canada should take and Canadians need to notice that's not the position taken by this government."
According to Marie Smith, director of the U.S.-based Parliamentary Network for Critical Issues, “Secretary Clinton is revealing to the world that a pro-abortion ideology at the highest levels of the US government has hijacked the noble goal of reducing maternal deaths by re-defining maternal health to include access to abortion.”
“Governments which value the lives of unborn children must now view with suspicion US efforts to reduce maternal mortality to ensure that access to abortion is not included in the aid package,” she added. “Maternal health is about saving the lives of mothers. Abortion is a violent act which destroys the life of the child and often injures the mother.
Colin Mason of the U.S.-based Population Research Institute called Clinton's comments “disengenuous.” “She says that she doesn't think that governments should intervene in 'intimate decisions' like abortion, and yet she insists that the same should make a hard commitment to 'legal, safe abortion.' This is because she knows that any government that commits to providing abortion as part of healthcare, is affirming abortion as a legitimate clinical service.”
“Mrs. Clinton has repeatedly demonstrated her attachment to abortion-on-demand, and these remarks do nothing but reflect that commitment,” he added.
According to Campaign Life Coalition National President Jim Hughes, “Hillary Clinton is merely trying to force her own pro-abortion agenda onto the world stage as she attempts to influence G-8 leaders and oppose Canada’s position.”
“To suggest that we offer women in developing countries the death of their child rather than safe health care as Prime Minister Harper has suggested is a morally bankrupt position,” he added.
Commenting on NDP leader Jack Layton's remark that the Conservatives have let ideology get in the way of maternal health, CLC's Mary Ellen Douglas said, “It is clear by Hillary’s remark that it is the pro-abortion ideology which is getting in the way of maternal health.”
CLC called on pro-life supporters to contact the Prime Minister's office and urge him to stay the course and do what is best for maternal health.
Contact Information:
Prime Minister Stephen Harper
80 Wellington Street
Ottawa
K1A 0A2
Fax: 613-941-6900
E-mail: pm@pm.gc.ca
A Political Stimulus, Not A Job Stimulus
by Veronique de Rugy
http://biggovernment.com/vderugy/2010/04/01/a-political-stimulus-not-a-job-stimulus/
I received many emails on Friday and this weekend about the data published here showing that on average Democratic districts are getting almost twice the amount of stimulus money than Republican districts. Republican districts also received smaller awards on average. The average dollars awarded per Republican district is $260,675,663, while the average dollars awarded per Democratic district is $471,533,539.
Several readers asked if the difference could be explained by the fact that Democratic districts have many more people than Republican districts have. So I looked at the numbers and here is the result. It’s not.
Republican districts get $362 per capita on average
Democratic districts get $692 per capita on average
Also, on average, Democratic districts received one-and-a-half times as many awards as Republican ones. Democratic districts also received two-and-a-half times more stimulus dollars than Republican districts ($122 million vs. $46 million). Of course, there are more Democratic districts than Republican districts in the Congress.
Is the politics part of the allocation decision?
Well I checked for the correlation between political indicators and stimulus funding. I found that there are no effect of political variables (leadership, tenure in office …) on stimulus funds allocation with one exception: the district’s party affiliation (whether the district’s representation was Republican or Democratic) does matter.
So how much does party affiliation mattered? While the effect is significant, because of the specifications of the model, more confidence should be placed on the relationship between the two variables then on the quantification of that relationship. In other words, while I am confident that whether the district is represented by R or D matters for funding, I just can’t tell you how much this factor matters compared to the other factors that went into the allocation decision.
On the other hand, I can tell you what factor was not a part of the allocation decision: the level of unemployment in each district or the deterioration of unemployment in each district. In other words, unemployment levels didn’t matter. That’s not what the money was supposed to address. Or was it?
Here is a chart to illustrate this point. As you can see the districts where unemployment increased the most during the recession aren’t receiving more money that the ones that were hit more lightly.
All the data is available for download here. (Ignore the picture)
Five Years Later, Pro-Life Leaders Remember Terri Schiavo's Murder
By Kathleen Gilbert
http://www.lifesitenews.com/ldn/2010/mar/10033104.html
PINELLAS PARK, Florida, March 31, 2010 (LifeSiteNews.com) - On the fifth anniversary of the court-ordered death by starvation and dehydration of Terri Schindler Schiavo, Terri’s family, pro-life leaders and anti-euthanasia advocates have united to call attention to the silent abuse of people with disabilities, and the new dangers posed by the recently-passed federal health care reform legislation.
The Christian Defense Coalition, Faith and Action and Generation Life announced they will pray and leave a single rose on the public sidewalk in front of the Pennsylvania Ave. NW side of the White House to commemorate Terri's death. The groups also reminded Americans that President Obama later called it a "mistake" that, as a U.S. Senator, he had supported Congress' decision to try to save Terri from death.
"End of life issues are a deep concern in this new health care legislation," said Rev. Patrick J. Mahoney, Director of the Christian Defense Coalition and one of the leaders who worked to save Terri's life in Florida, in a press release Tuesday.
"Simply put, how can the American public trust the President and his Administration to deal compassionately with end of life issues when he considered it a 'mistake' to have intervened in attempting to keep a young woman from being starved and dehydrated?"
"Nothing arrested the conscience of the nation like Terri's suffering and needless death," said Rev. Rob Schenck, President of Faith and Action. "Now, she continues her ministry by provoking us all to appreciate and value the worth and dignity of brain injury victims."
Generation Life director Brandi Swindell, who engaged in a 14-day hunger strike while Terri was starved, said that, "as a young woman, my heart broke every day outside of Terri's room thinking about the pain and suffering she was experiencing."
"As a nation, we must offer the most needy of our society compassion, dignity and justice. Regrettably, we forced Terri to die the most painful and barbaric of deaths," said Swindell. "My hope is that we have learned valuable lessons from Terri's death and how we treat the disabled. Those lessons must be founded on equality and human rights for all."
Terri's father, Bob Schindler, did not live to see the fifth anniversary of his daughter's death: the family mourned Mr. Schindler's death of heart failure in August. Terri's mother, Mary Schindler, is still living.
Another blow was delivered to Terri's family earlier this month when an episode of FOX's "Family Guy" mocked the death of their loved one in an episode entitled "Terri Schiavo: The Musical." The show depicted Terri hooked up to various life-support systems and declared her a "vegetable," when in reality Terri required nothing more than a feeding tube and was awake and responsive at the time of her death. Bobby Schindler, Terri's brother and founder of the Terri Schindler Schiavo Foundation, said the episode left him "astonished at the producer’s cruel bigotry directed towards my sister and all cognitively disabled people."
"I wish I could say things have changed for the better since my sister’s death or that people with cognitive disabilities are now better protected in response to the horror she had to endure," said Schindler in an article for Townhall.com Wednesday. "Tragically, however, it seems the rights of the brain-injured, elderly and others are still being violated."
While "the 'death panels' Sarah Palin spoke of sounded like bombastic language," he noted, "many hospitals and facilities already have something frighteningly similar." "Ethics committees are making many life and death decisions about patients, including whether to withhold simple provisions," he said. "In a seemingly clandestine way, these ethics committees – comprised of medical and legal professionals – are empowering facilities to make life and death decisions independent of the family or a person’s own wishes.
"The chilling stories we receive make it clear few citizens have any idea how vulnerable they are when it comes to judgments left in the hands of these ethics committees and facilities," he said. "And with the federal government now controlling our health care, there is no reason not to believe that these types of committees won’t become nationalized. Particularly when a health care system has been sabotaged by cost factors and quality of life judgments."
Schindler expressed concern with the health care rationing that now looms on a national scale following passage of the federal health care bill.
"I think it's very easy to see people like my sister in the crosshairs," Schindler told LifeSiteNews.com in an interview Wednesday.
"These types of ethics committees are going to become nationalized ... it seems to me that it comes down to cost," he said. "Look at assisted suicide - think about the cost of handing somebody some pills to kill themselves, compared to the cost of perhaps giving them the availability of prolonging their lives, if they do have some type of terminal illness."
Schindler pointed out the danger of allowing an administration filled with people who "have no regard for the value of life" to dictate the guidelines for health care on a wide scale. Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius, whose office is granted sweeping new powers and responsibilities in determining health care guidelines by the new health care legislation, is radically pro-abortion.
"The health care reform is going to reflect their values," said Schindler. "If we have an administration that doesn't value life, then how can we expect it to value life when it comes to whether or not they should care for people like my sister?"
Dr. Mark Mostert of the Institute for the Study of Disabilities & Bioethics commemorated Terri's "legalized medical execution" on his blog Tuesday.
"[H]ere we are five years later. Disability groups trash the Schindlers. The President of the United States thinks intervening to help avoid Terri’s execution was a mistake," wrote Mostert. "Now what?
"Here’s what: Never, ever, let Terri’s memory and her martyrdom be forgotten."
Terri's Life and Hope Concert, featuring Randy Travis and Collin Raye, will be held on April 11th in Indianapolis, Indiana. The concert will benefit the Terri Schindler Schiavo Foundation, a non-profit dedicated to helping persons with disabilities, and the incapacitated, who are in or potentially facing life-threatening situations.
Click here for information on Terri's Life and Hope Concert.
Click here to read Fr. Pavone's National Catholic Register column.
Click here to read Bobby Schindler's Townhall.com column.
See related LifeSiteNews.com coverage:
Terri Schiavo Mocked on FOX's Family Guy
http://www.lifesitenews.com/ldn/2010/mar/10032315.html
Bob Schindler, Father of Terri Schiavo and Tireless Fighter for Disabled Persons Right to Life, Passes Away
http://www.lifesitenews.com/ldn/2009/aug/09083112.html
Bobby Schindler’s Letter to Florida Bishop: When Bishops Don’t Do Their Job – Innocent People Die
www.lifesitenews.com/ldn/2007/mar/07032801.html
Terri Schiavo - Denied Rehab, Food, Water, Holy Communion and Now a Christian Burial
http://www.lifesitenews.com/ldn/2005/mar/05032902.html
"The e-mail Bag"
You Might Be A Redneck
Thank you Jeff Foxworthy!
You've ever filled your deer tag on the golf course.
You have ever used lard in bed.
You own more than 3 shirts with cut off sleeves.
You have ever spray-painted your girlfriends name on an overpass.
Your lifetime goal is to own a fireworks stand.
Friday, April 2, 2010
Thursday, April 1, 2010
ConservativeChristianRepublican-Report - 20100401
Motivational-Inspirational-Historical-Educational-Political-Enjoyable
Promoting "God's Holy Values and American Freedoms"!
"Daily Motivations"
You never know when one kind act, or one word of encouragement, can change a life forever. -- Zig Ziglar
"The act of putting pen to paper encourages pause for thought, this in turn makes us think more deeply about life, which helps us regain our equilibrium." -- Norbet Platt
"Great men are they who see that spiritual thought is stronger than any material force, that thoughts rule the world." -- Ralph Waldo Emerson
"Daily Devotions" (KJV and/or NLT)
Do not be afraid or discouraged. For the LORD your God is with you wherever you go. (Joshua 1:9)
Are you discouraged? God tells us not to be. God will help you conquer every discouragement! And when you come through the valleys of discouragement, you will find that God was there all the time. He was waiting patiently for you to exhaust your means and energy and turn to Him for His help. What a tremendous encouragement!
Are you lonely? Some of our most lonely moments can be when we are in a crowd, and yet no one notices us. Our heart aches when we think no one cares. But Jesus is our ever-present friend. He promises, "Never will I leave you; never will I forsake you" (Hebrews 13:5, NIV).
He is also with us as we face lonely tasks. When David Livingstone sailed to Africa for the first time as a missionary, a group of his friends accompanied him to the pier to wish him bon voyage. They were concerned for his safety and reminded him of the dangers. One man even tried to convince him to remain in England. But Livingstone opened his Bible and read Jesus' words from Matthew 28:20: "Lo, I am with you always." He turned to the man and smiled. "That, my friend, is the word of a gentleman...So let us be going."
No person or circumstance can ever remove us from the presence of our loving God. Paul writes, "I am convinced that nothing can ever separate us from His love." (Romans 8:38).
He is here with us right now and forever---because He is our ever-present God. He is our guide for life and for eternity. What an incredible truth!
Your View of God Really Matters …
Are you discouraged or lonely? Read Romans 8:38-39. Thank God for his constant love and presence in the midst of your pain. Then, as soon as you are able, share this truth with someone else in need of encouragement.
"The Patriot Post"
"The legislative department is everywhere extending the sphere of its activity and drawing all power into its impetuous vortex." -- James Madison, Federalist No. 48
"But they have two other Rights; those of sitting when they please, and as long as they please, in which methinks they have the advantage of your Parliament; for they cannot be dissolved by the Breath of a Minister, or sent packing as you were the other day, when it was your earnest desire to have remained longer together." -- Benjamin Franklin, letter to William Strahan, 1784
When Debating a Liberal, Start With First Principles
By Mark Alexander, Publisher, PatriotPost.US
"On every question of construction, carry ourselves back to the time when the Constitution was adopted, recollect the spirit manifested in the debates and instead of trying what meaning may be squeezed out of the text or invented against it, conform to the probable one in which it was passed." --Thomas Jefferson
There are only two rules you need to know when debating a liberal.
Rule Number One: You must define the debate in terms of First Principles, which is to say, you must be able to articulate those principles. (Read Essential Liberty for more.)
Conservatives subscribe to the fundamental doctrine of Essential Liberty as enumerated by our Founders in the Declaration of Independence and our Constitution. We understand that individual responsibility is the foundation of a free society. We advocate for the restoration of constitutional limits on government and the judiciary. We promote free enterprise, national defense and traditional American values.
In short, conservatives endeavor to conserve Rule of Law as our guiding principle, and any legitimate policy debate must start there.
Liberals, on the other hand, subscribe to principles du jour; whatever solution feels best for the day's most popular, fashionable, or prominent cause célèbre.
In short, they believe that the feel-good solution (a.k..a. "rule of man") supersedes Rule of Law.
For the most part, today's liberals are a case study in hypocrisy, the antithesis of the once noble Democrat Party, the party of Thomas Jefferson.
Liberals speak of unity, but they incessantly foment disunity, appealing to the worst in human nature by dividing Americans into constituent dependencies. They speak of freedom of thought -- except when your thought doesn't comport with theirs. They assert First Amendment rights -- except when it comes to religion or speech that doesn't agree with theirs. They promote tolerance -- except while practicing intolerance and seeking to silence dissenters.
Liberals deride moral clarity because they can't survive its scrutiny. They protest for the preservation of natural order while advocating homosexuality. They denounce capital punishment for the most heinous of criminals while ardently supporting the killing of the most helpless and innocent among us -- the unborn, the infirm and the aged.
Liberals loathe individual responsibility and advocate statism. They eschew private initiative and enterprise while promoting all manner of government control and regulation.
Now, I'm not suggesting that everything liberals believe or support is wrong, but their underlying philosophical doctrine surely undermines our "unalienable right to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness," as established by "the laws of nature and nature's God."
As Ronald Reagan observed, "The trouble with our liberal friends is not that they're ignorant; it's just that they know so much that isn't so."
Thus, don't be snookered into defending or denouncing the merits of any issue as framed in liberal terms. Such deliberations are rarely resolved and tend to end in gridlock, or worse, deadlock. (If congressional Republicans really want to end gridlock, they too need to control the debate in terms of First Principles.)
One means of taking control of a debate is to inquire whether an opponent has ever taken an oath to "support and defend" our Constitution. (If you have not, or wish to reaffirm your oath, then we invite you to do so by registering with The Essential Liberty Project.
If your opponent answers "yes," then inquire as to which constitution -- the one upon which our nation was founded, or the so-called "living constitution" adulterated by generations of legislative and judicial diktat.
Of course, you must be prepared to explain the difference -- to explain that only one of these constitutions exists in written form, while the other is a mere fabrication. This can be best accomplished by presenting your copy of the Essential Liberty Guide.
Another means of framing the debate is to ask your opponent to articulate the difference between constitutional Rule of Law and the rule of men. Again, you must be prepared to explain the difference.
You may also start by asking your opponent what "liberal" means. Most liberals will define "liberal" in terms of the issues they support, so ask your opponent if those issues comport with our Constitution.
Once you've framed the debate in terms of First Principles, give your liberal opponent a recess, and a copy of the Essential Liberty Guide.
Principled liberals (admittedly an oxymoron) will remain satisfied that what they feel is equivalent to, or even supersedes, Rule of Law. These poor souls are on their way to becoming über liberals, or Leftists, and are probably beyond any logical redemption.
But if you use your Essential Liberty Guide as an education tool rather than a hammer, some liberals may actually start to come around, and this conversion should be your primary objective.
Further, if confronted by your opponent with a challenge to provide a constitutional defense for some Republican legislation, don't bite. Most Republican legislation, though it may be more in line with our Constitution, rarely comports with the plain language of Rule of Law. Don't let your opponent frame you as a hypocrite. Remember: You are, first and foremost, a constitutional conservative, not a tool of any political party.
Alas, selective interpretation of our Constitution has expanded its meaning beyond any semblance of its original intent, and it will take time and discipline to contract its meaning through due process to restore its original intent.
Finally...
Rule Number Two: You must distinguish between liberals and Leftists. The former subscribe to a plethora of contemporaneous solutions, while the latter are bona fide "useful idiots," those Western apologists for socialist political and economic agendas that terminate with the institution of Marxist-Leninist-Maoist collectivism masquerading as regulation and taxation.
When it comes to debating Leftists, the outcome is utterly dependent on who has superior firepower.
Semper Vigilo, Fortis, Paratus et Fidelis!
"The Web"
No Treats From Obama
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XivhwO_zWWg
Jesus and the Folded Napkin (email) Examined
By Jeff Kluttz
http://www.returningking.com/?p=78
Many of us have received an email concerning Jesus’ folding of his napkin upon his resurrection. As a pastor, I’ve received it dozens of times, myself. At first, I – like many people- found the story fascinating and was actually moved at the thought of it. But, a bit of internet wisdom compelled me to investigate further.
The Email
The email heading asks this question, “Why Did Jesus Fold the Napkin?” And, the answer (with some variations, of course) is contained in the text below, a condensed version of the original email, usually beginning with: “I’VE NEVER HEARD OF THIS!!!”
Why did Jesus fold the linen burial cloth after His resurrection? I never
noticed this… .
The Gospel of John (20:7) tells us that the napkin, which was placed over
the face of Jesus, was not just thrown aside like the grave clothes.
The Bible takes an entire verse to tell us that the napkin was neatly folded, and was placed at the head of that stony coffin.
Early Sunday morning, while it was still dark, Mary Magdalene came to the
tomb and found that the stone had been rolled away from the entrance.
She ran and found Simon Peter and the other disciple, the one whom Jesus
loved. She said, ‘They have taken the Lord’s body out of the tomb, and I don’t know where they have put him!’
Peter and the other disciple ran to the tomb to see.. The other disciple
outran Peter and got there first. He stooped and looked in and saw the linen cloth lying there, but he didn’t go in.
Then Simon Peter arrived and went inside. He also noticed the linen
wrappings lying there, while the cloth that had covered Jesus’ head was folded up and lying to the side.
Was that important? Absolutely!
Is it really significant? Yes!
In order to understand the significance of the folded napkin, you have to
understand a little bit about Hebrew tradition of that day. The folded
napkin had to do with the Master and Servant, and every Jewish boy knew this
tradition.
When the servant set the dinner table for the master, he made sure that it was exactly the way the master wanted it.
The table was furnished perfectly, and then the servant would wait, just
out of sight, until the master had finished eating, and the servant would not dare touch that table, until the master was finished.
Now if the master were done eating, he would rise from the table, wipe
his fingers, his mouth, and clean his beard, and would wad up that
napkin and toss it onto the table.
The servant would then know to clear the table. For in those days, the wadded napkin meant, ‘I’m done’.
But if the master got up from the table, and folded his napkin, and laid
it beside his plate, the servant would not dare touch the table,
because……….
The folded napkin meant, ‘I’m coming back!’
A Magdalene of Our Times
Written by Gary Isbell
http://www.tfp.org/tfp-home/articles/a-magdalene-of-our-times.html
Eve Lavallière, the stage name of Eugénie Fenoglio, was born in Toulon, France, on April 1, 1866. The second child and only daughter of Emile and Albanie Fenoglio, she later described her painful youth. “As a child, I knew not what the love and care of a mother was. My life was tears and suffering from the time I reached the age of reason.” Her father, a tailor, alcoholic and libertine, often gave himself over to jealous brooding and fits of rage. Her mother often had to flee with the children, seeking refuge in relatives’ homes, until her husband had calmed down. This continued until one day, he shot and killed his wife, pointed the pistol at his daughter but did not shoot, and then shot himself.
Eve Lavallière
Eve lived a life of privation and suffering until entering a theater company. Her beauty, voice and poise took her to the best theaters in Paris. She became the foremost actress in France and the idol of the multitudes. The entire world viewed her coiffures and clothing as models and ran after perfumes, soaps and cosmetics “à la Lavallière.”
King Carlos of Portugal, King Leopold II of Belgium, King Edward VII of England, Henry of Bavaria, diplomats, magnates, and princes all came to hear and applaud her. Dazzled by glory, she threw herself “into the vast sea of sin.
“Gold ran through my hands,” Eve confessed. “I had everything the world could offer, everything I could desire. Nevertheless, I regarded myself the unhappiest of souls.” Despite living in a rich palace in Paris, surrounded by luxury, with a carriage and even an automobile—then very rare—at her disposal, she felt tortured by remorse. More than once she attempted suicide, even once after a magnificent performance in London.
On Her Way to Damascus
In June 1917, Eve wanted to rest far from the world’s agitation to prepare the repertoire of songs and pieces she was to perform in the United States. So she rented the palace of Porcherie in Chanceux, near Tours. She retired there with Leonia, a young Belgian refugee she had met in Paris in 1915 and who accompanied her as a lifelong confidante. The trustee of this palace was the parish priest, Father Chasteigner, a simple, austere and pious man, genuinely solicitous for his parishioners’ souls.
The day following Eve’s arrival was a Sunday. Father Chasteigner, noting her absence from Mass, called upon her to express his concern. Eve promised him she would not miss Mass again, and on the following Sunday, when the good pastor preached on the great converted sinners, she attended the Mass with a frivolous attitude.
Eve Lavallière dressed for stage.
Returning to the palace that afternoon, the pastor commented to Eve, “What a pity that you have no faith!”
“But what is faith?” replied Eve, in the tone of one who has permanently lost it.
She then told him of her experiences with spiritism, in which, she said, the devil took part. “I took advantage of the occasion to ask him to restore my youth, which was what I most desired, and to cure me of enteritis. Satan promised he would do so on the condition that I would become his. I accepted, adding that my lifestyle was perfect for gaining him many adepts. Obviously quite content, he disappeared.
“Some days later I was at another session, with a new presence of the devil. I denounced him for failing to fulfill his promise. In reply, he guaranteed that he would grant what I asked, but under one more condition: that I not bless myself when I encountered a funeral. That was the only vestige of religiosity that remained in me.
“But Satan still did nothing for me. In the following session, filled with indignation, I called him an impostor and a cheat. By then I had concluded that spiritism was nothing but a farce and that the devil did not exist.”
“Well, I assure you that he exists,” the good priest said, and with that, he mounted his bicycle and left without further ceremony.
Eve, struck by his conviction, began to think. “If the devil exists, God also exists. And if God exists, what am I doing in this world? What am I doing with my life?”
“On the following morning,” Leonia recalls, “we were walking in front of the castle when the pastor appeared.”
“Mademoiselle,” he said, “what you told me yesterday disturbed me. I confess that I spent the better part of the night in prayer, asking God to inspire me in your regard. I also celebrated Holy Mass for the same intention. Here, I brought you The Life of Saint Mary Magdalene, by Father Henri Lacordaire. Read this book on your knees and you will see what God can do with a soul such as yours.”
“After lunch,” Leonia continues, “Eve settled down near the kitchen and, opening the doors so that the servants might hear, began to read in a loud voice. Enthusiasm seized her. Never had I heard her read with such conviction. Sitting at her feet, I began to cry. The servants were likewise moved. Eve continued reading, her voice broken by sobs.”
Eve and Leonia spent the rest of the week in piety and recollection.
“And I, Reverend Father?”
“Sunday arrived, the tenth of June,” says Leonia. “We went to Mass, but Eve’s disposition differed completely from that of the previous Sunday. It was on this day, during lunch, that I ventured to say to her, ‘I would like to make my first Communion. I have reached 23 years of age without ever receiving, but I want to do so.’”
Eve was quite moved. Not only did she encourage Leonia, but offered to make the necessary arrangements and affirmed that she too would receive Holy Communion with her. At the same time, she told her, “From now on do not address me as ‘my lady.’ Simply call me ‘Eve,’ for you are my sister and I am yours.”
When the pastor arrived later and learned of Leonia’s resolve, he promised to assist her. Since she first needed instructions, he said he would provide her a catechism. The priest then prepared to leave, but Eve detained him.
“And I, Reverend Father?”
“You?”
“Yes, me! I promised this little one that I would help her, be her sponsor, and receive Holy Communion with her.”
“But...”
“Yes, I know well. I am a sinner and have not lived as a Christian, but even so, I hope I still have the right to return to God.”
Leonia writes, “I can still see Eve on the main avenue of the palace, walking decisively at the pastor’s side and, in a loud voice, accusing herself publicly of her sins. The good priest seemed embarrassed.”
“Wait! Wait a moment!” he protested. “And above all, don’t shout so loud!”
“Wait? Wait for what? Can Leonia’s happiness not also be mine?”
“It’s just that... it’s that, compared to you, Leonia is a child. Her case is simple. You, you are Eve Lavallière... you are well known... your life is public. I cannot treat you in the same manner. Moreover, you gave yourself over to spiritism. We are talking about a reserved sin.”1
“Oh, my God! How unhappy I am! God does not concern Himself with me because I am such a sinner.”
“Be calm, Mademoiselle! God does love you, and to prove that, I shall leave immediately for Tours, to request the necessary permission.”
“And if they do not wish to grant it?”
“They will. What motive would they have for refusing? Mademoiselle, I will be back in less than a hour, and I will come with all the powers.” With that, the good priest disappeared on his bicycle. Eve remained in a state of anxiety, lamenting and weeping.
Eve’s sole consolation amid her sorrow, from Leonia’s account, was her confidence in Our Lady! “How good it now feels to think of her. In times past I used to love her, and I never completely forgot her. I used to send her the flowers they offered me. She will have pity on me!”
Nevertheless, as she waited, Eve’s anxiety grew. Despair nearly took hold of her. Falling upon her knees, she raised her hands to Heaven. Bathed in tears, she exclaimed, “Lord, take me! Send me death, I can endure no more!”
Just then, Leonia, peering through the window, shouted, “Good news! I see him, I see him at last! He is pedaling with all his strength!” Eve rushed out to meet him.
“For the rest of my life,” writes Leonia, “I will never forget her great cry of joy. I will ever see her there, kneeling on the grass, expressing to God her happiness and gratitude.”
“The peace of the Lord be with you, my daughter!” said the priest, leaping from his bicycle. “The Vicar-General immediately gave me all the authorizations requested.” Eve stood up, calmed, transfigured. With what attention and gratitude she heard those words of peace!
For an entire week the two friends prepared themselves for confession and Holy Communion. They walked through the wheat-covered fields each morning to the rectory. There they sat side-by-side on the old sofa in the parlor and, like two well-behaved children, recited their catechism lesson. In the afternoon, Father Chasteigner would go to the palace to speak of Heaven and the things of God. Father Chasteigner gave each of them a Rosary, and it was Eve who taught Leonia how to pray it. Preparing for their general confessions, “We wrote out our sins on sheets of paper so as not to forget anything,” said Leonia.
On the afternoon before the important day, the two were in Eve’s room saying their prayers aloud. Eve said, “When I was a child, on the day before first Communion day, we used to ask forgiveness of our parents for the faults we committed against them.” Then, throwing herself on her knees at Leonia’s feet, she implored, “Forgive me, Leonia, for the bad example I have given you and all the affliction I have caused you.” Leonia, in turn, did the same, and afterwards they retired to await the great day.
The château of La Porcherie where Eve Lavalière converted on June 7, 1917.
Dead to the World
Morning finally dawned. It was overcast and raining. “Naturally,” said Eve, “today you have precedence, for you are making your first Communion. Confess and receive Holy Communion ahead of me.”
They found the church draped in mourning, for a Mass was going to be offered later for a soldier killed in the war. “They are preparing for a funeral,” declared Eve. “And on this day, Leonia, we will also bury our life of sin.”
Eve right after her conversion.
"Father Chasteigner was waiting for us in the deserted church,” Leonia recalls. “He lit a candle before the image of the Most Holy Virgin and entered the confessional. I went in first and knelt down. After I had confessed, Eve took her turn. After her confession I had the impression that she had already received Holy Communion, such was the purity of her countenance and so great her recollection.”
The Happiness That Can Only Come From God
Father Chasteigner returned to the sanctuary. Eve and Leonia knelt expectantly at the Communion rail. “While lighting the altar candles, the Reverend Father’s eyes were bathed in tears. As it had been agreed, I received Communion first and Eve right after. The priest’s hand trembled upon giving her the Sacred Host. She was white, as if dead, upon receiving her God. Returning to my place, I remained only a short time in recollection, for prolonged prayer was not for my temperament. But Eve seemed in another world.
“We had been invited to have brunch in the rectory. At a sign from the Reverend Father, I called Eve several times. But she, deeply absorbed, heard nothing. Finally, Father Chasteigner went and roused her himself and she returned to earth.
“What a joyful and radiant celebration! Afterwards, we returned on foot through the sun-drenched fields, the sun having overcome the clouds and rain. Eve was exultant with joy. ‘Does it not seem to you, Leonia, that the fields have prettier tones and that the flowers today are more beautiful than ever?’ We felt ourselves as delicate as shadows.
“Eve always considered that day, June 19, 1917, as the most special day of her life. She considered it the day her life really began. She renounced the theater forever, canceled her contracts, rid herself of her jewels, and repudiated all that reminded her of her worldly life. After her conversion, she was to affirm, ‘It was the devil that led me to God!’
“‘My resolution is made,’ Eve wrote. ‘From now on, only Jesus has a right to my life, for He alone gave me happiness and peace.’”
A True Repentance
“She left Paris in order to be safe from its dangers, distributing her immense fortune to the poor, the missions, and religious houses, and went to live in remote locales. She asked of God much suffering in order to atone for her past sins and ascend to the heights of contemplation, virtue and sanctity.”
The Divine Majesty granted her request for suffering in a variety of ways. For example, she desired to enter a convent to expiate her sins and to labor for the conversion of sinners. Notwithstanding her great ability to love and her purity of heart, she was repeatedly rejected on account of her poor health and notoriety. It was a trial that she fully accepted, realizing it to be God’s will.
For four years she devoted seven months a year serving on a lay-missionary nursing team in Tunisia, but poor health and periods of depression forced her to give up this work and return to France. There, with Leonia, she led a life of prayer, meditation, almsgiving and much suffering from illnesses.
She, who had been the toast of Paris, faced extreme suffering at the end of her life. There was not one of her once-beautiful features that did not become a means of expiation, sanctification and apostolate. Rendering gratitude to God, Eve herself said, “I have sinned through these faculties, good Lord. Now I thank Thee for permitting me to expiate my sins through this suffering.”
In 1929, a large Parisian newspaper published an interview of the former celebrity.
“Do you suffer a lot?”
“Yes, horribly,” she responded.
“Have you any hope of being cured?”
“None. But I am so happy! You cannot imagine how great my happiness is.”
“Even with so much suffering?”
“Yes, and because of it. I am in God’s hands. Tell my friends of days gone by that you met the happiest person on earth.”
In her last letter she wrote, “All my being and all my will are turned toward this last end: to love God, Who loves me so much in spite of my past and present miseries.”
She died on July 10, 1929, at the age of 63. On her grave was placed a simple cross with these words, engraved according to her request:
I left everything for God;
He alone is enough.
O Thou Who didst create me,
Have pity on me.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Note: 1. “Reserved sins” are those that a confessor cannot absolve without special authorization of the bishop or the Pope. This permission is always granted when requested.
Rep. Bachmann: Do We Want ‘To Watch Ourselves Collapse From Our Own Welfare State?’
By Nicholas Ballasy, Video Reporter
http://www.cnsnews.com/public/content/article.aspx?RsrcID=63559
(CNSNews.com) - Rep. Michele Bachmann (R-Minn.) told CNSNews.com that "expensive entitlement programs" are "bringing our country down," and Americans will have to choose between surviving as a country or collapsing "from our own welfare state."
In an exclusive interview, CNSNews.com asked Bachmann if she supported, for example, phasing out Medicare Part D, a program enacted in 2003 by President George W. Bush and a Republican-controlled Congress that subsidizes the cost of prescription drugs for Medicare beneficiaries. (The program is currently estimated to cost $16.6 trillion over the next 75 years.)
“I think that program needs tremendous reform, because we're now at a precipice here in our nation where we can't afford all of the entitlement programs,” said Bachmann. “Just like you saw with GM and Chrysler, the very weighty, expensive benefit-heavy packages rendered those companies uncompetitive with Toyota and other companies. We're seeing the same thing in the federal government.”
Bachmann continued: “These very expensive wage-and-benefit packages that we're paying to federal employees, but also very expensive entitlement programs are frankly bringing our country down and we have to make a decision: ‘Do we want to survive as a country or are we going to watch ourselves collapse from our own welfare state?’ It's really up to us to make the decision.”
Rep. Bachmann, elected to Congress in the 2006 mid-term election, blamed Democrats for making entitlement programs like Social Security and Medicare “unworkable” today.
“They (Democrats) like to act as though they want to save them (entitlement programs) and we want to end them when, in fact, it's been just the opposite,” said Bachmann. “The Democrats unfortunately have been in a situation where they have made those programs unworkable, which means vulnerable people who are dependent on those programs may not have them to take care of the needs that they need.”
“That's what we are trying to do,” she said. “We're trying to help those who are the most vulnerable in the United States to make sure that they can have benefits that they are hoping for and that they worked for but that won't be the case.”
She also warned that the United States is close to losing its AAA bond rating.
“This year, not into the future, but this year is the first year that Social Security is putting more money out than what it’s taking in,” said Bachmann. “Well, that's called being overdrawn at the bank.”
“That’s happening this year, seven years ahead of schedule,” she said. “Medicare is dead broke within seven years, and it could happen sooner than that. In the midst of that, we're seeing a brand new entitlement (the new health care law) waking up that is being forced upon us? When the boat is already sinking financially? Remember, Moodys is coming out saying the United States in all likelihood will lose our triple-A bond rating. This isn't a game anymore, this isn't a political sound-bite anymore. This is reality.”
In a previous interview with CNSNews.com, Rep. Paul Ryan (R-Wisc.) echoed Bachmann’s concerns about entitlement programs. Ryan cited a Government Accountability Office (GAO) report that says the federal government already faces a “fiscal gap” of $76 trillion, meaning that over the next 75 years the cost of the benefits promised in federal entitlement programs exceeds the tax revenues expected to pay for them. This amounts to almost $250,000 for every single American and about $650,000 for every American household.
“All those unfunded liabilities, all that debt I’ve been telling you about, is before you pass this budget,” said Ryan. “That’s if we don’t pass the budget. If we pass the Obama budget, it just gets worse. He doubles the debt in five years and triples it in 10.”
A transcript of CNSNews.com’s interview with Rep. Michele Bachmann (R-Minn.) follows below:
CNSNews.com’s Nicholas Ballasy: “Every House Republican voted against the health care bill. Are you partaking in any efforts to repeal the legislation?”
Rep. Michele Bachmann (R-Minn.): “Oh, absolutely. The bill passed near midnight on Sunday night. I instructed my staff on Sunday night, ‘We have to repeal this thing.’ I spoke with Mike Pence on the floor and said we've got to repeal, we have to have a discharge petition. At the same time my colleague, Steve King, went to Eric Cantor and gave the same exact message and so that morning, on Monday morning, we independently had bills drawn up for repeal, dropped them, and introduced them first thing in the morning. So did Sen. Jim DeMint [R-S.C.] on the Senate side.
Bachmann: “We're urging all of our colleagues, both in the House and in the Senate, everyone should file repeal bills of Obama-care and we should all get on each others’ bills to let the American public know that we are unanimous in wanting to repeal this unconstitutional bill and replace it with true, good, honest health care reform that will actually benefit the American people and not break the bank.”
Ballasy: “Thirteen state attorneys so far are suing the federal government over the individual mandate in the health care bill. Do you agree with those lawsuits and what do you think the end result will be?”
Bachmann: “Oh, I believe that we're going to see challenges at every level. I was just, as a matter of fact this morning, with the Virginia attorney general, and he is going to be the first one in the country to file his claim. He's in the ‘rocket-docket,’ which is the fastest legal court system in the United States, and he anticipates in about a year and a half, this case should be before the United States Supreme Court.
Ballasy: “Do you think they have the grounds for a repeal, overturning it?”
Bachmann: “I believe, he, I know that the attorney general in Virginia is basing his claim on the individual mandate and I think that there is merit in this claim, because never before in the history of our country has the federal government forced an American to do something pro-actively, forcing an American as a mandate of citizenship to purchase a product or service against their will. And again, this is a government- mandated product and government essentially will set the price on that product.
Bachmann: “So, there’s no way out. The American people will be forced to purchase it. This is the grounds for redistribution of wealth. This is how President Obama will achieve his objective of redistribution of wealth. When you force an American -- as a condition of citizenship -- to purchase a product or service against their will and the federal government essentially sets the price for that product, then there's no freedom left for the individual. It is a different matter when a state makes a mandate -- the federal government is limited. The federal government, Article 1, Section 8, has limited enumerated powers. The federal government is without power to force an American citizen to purchase a product or service against their will. So yes, I do believe there's strong grounds for the unconstitutionality of this individual mandate in Obamacare.”
Ballasy: “I interviewed Delaware Senator Tom Carper (D) who is also a former governor of the state. He said it's not likely that this is ultimately going to be overturned, and he knows some pretty good lawyers who would agree.”
Bachmann: “I would disagree. I think it has a very strong chance of being overturned and I hope that it is, and I think you'll see challenges immediately in the court system, challenges immediately here in the legislature – you've already seen them. We've already seen the lawsuits filed, we've already seen the legislation filed. What's interesting is President Obama campaigned, when he was running for president as being a ‘uniter.’ Unfortunately, the president has proven to be one of the biggest dividers of this nation that we've ever had in the presidency.”
Ballasy: “When looking at the tea party movement, the last rally, we've seen some stories that have come out: Representative [John] Lewis and Representative [James] Clyburn have said there were racial incidents at the tea party. Did you see anything like that, that was consistent with their stories?”
Bachmann: “I did not. We had over 30,000 people here on Saturday [March 20] at the west side of the Capitol, a tremendous group of individuals trying to get the attention of Speaker [Nancy] Pelosi and the Democrats saying, ‘Don't take away my health care from me.’ I met with – the media tends to portray the people who are in the tea party movement as toothless hillbillies, as rubes from the backwater who don't know what they're talking about.”
Bachmann: “Do you know who I met on Saturday? I met surgeons, anesthesiologists, family practice guys, interns, I met pharmacists, I met business owners, lawyers. I met people from all walks of life – apolitical people, 75-year-old women who came out. I didn't see any indication of racial tensions. I didn't see any indication of being personal, against personal members of Congress. What I saw were people that were fighting for their constitutional liberties and fighting for our country. And I think it's a tremendous affront trying to castigate people who are fighting for our country as somehow being racially motivated. I didn't see that at all.”
Ballasy: “You, during your time in Congress, have been critical of excessive government spending and social programs. Can you point to any social program that the Republican Party has dissolved and shut down over the last 50 years?”
Bachmann: “Well, let me go to the first part of your question. President George Bush spent way too much money as president and he did that with the help of a Republican Congress. But in his worst year, he spent something over $450 billion dollars. In just his first year alone, President Obama spent over $1.4 trillion in deficit. There's no comparison. There’s no moral equivalency. George Bush's worst year was $458 billion or more in debt as compared to Barack Obama, $1.4 trillion in debt.”
Bachmann: “This year President Obama is going to break even his own record. He's going to quadruple that amount of debt; that's more than -- if you take all the presidents from the first day George Washington came into office as president through George W. Bush leaving office, President Obama in his first year accumulated more debt than all of those presidents combined. So there's just no comparison in the amount of debt that was accumulated.”
Bachmann: “Now, the second part of your question had to do with spending programs, and I'm without knowledge as to what programs they did or didn’t do away with. I was here during the last two years of President George W. Bush, but that was under Democrat rule in the Congress. Speaker Pelosi dominated the House and [Sen.] Harry Reid [D-Nev.] dominated the Senate, and so I was never here when the Republicans were in control in the House.”
Ballasy: “Do you think programs like Medicare Part D, which had a lot of Republican support, with a Republican-controlled Congress -- and I understand you were not in Congress at that time – but do you think a program like that, specifically Medicare Part D, should that program be dissolved?”
Bachmann: “I think that program needs tremendous reform because we're now at a precipice here in our nation where we can't afford all of the entitlement programs. Just like you saw with GM and Chrysler, the very weighty, expensive benefit-heavy packages rendered those companies uncompetitive with Toyota and other companies. We're seeing the same thing in the federal government. These very expensive wage and benefit packages that we're paying to federal employees, but also very expensive entitlement programs are, frankly, bringing our country down, and we have to make a decision: ‘Do we want to survive as a country or are we going to watch ourselves collapse from our own welfare state?’ It's really up to us to make the decision.”
Ballasy: “You see some Democrats who say, ‘Okay, if Republicans are so concerned about the cost of our social programs that we started, let's see them try to end them, politically. Let's see them try to get out there and tell the American people we're going to end Medicare, we're going to end Social Security over time.’ Do you think those kind of programs could be ended at this time and we could begin to phase those programs out?”
Bachmann: “Well, that's the scare tactics that the Democrats like to bring up every year. They like to act as though they want to save them and we want to end them when, in fact, it's been just the opposite. The Democrats unfortunately have been in a situation where they have made those programs unworkable, which means vulnerable people who are dependent on those programs may not have them to take care of the needs that they need.”
Bachmann: “That's what we are trying to do. We're trying to help those who are the most vulnerable in the United States to make sure that they can have benefits that they are hoping for and that they worked for but that won't be the case because, remember, this year, not into the future, but this year is the first year that Social Security is putting more money out than what it is taking in.
Bachmann: “Well, that's called being overdrawn at the bank. That’s happening this year, seven years ahead of schedule. Medicare is dead broke within seven years and it could happen sooner than that. In the midst of that, we're seeing a brand new entitlement waking up that is being forced upon us? When the boat is already sinking financially? Remember, Moodys is coming out saying the United States in all likelihood will lose our triple-A bond rating. This isn't a game anymore, this isn't a political sound-bite anymore. This is reality. What this means is all of our interest rates will go up if you're buying a home, if you're buying a business, if you're buying a car, student loan, interest rates are going up. Plus for the United States, our interest rates will go up too and that's the biggest problem we have in the United States today is all of the welfare payments we're paying out, the entitlement payments – that, coupled together with interest on the debt, those two alone have the potential of wiping out all other spending at the federal level. It's really about spending. At the end of the day, that's America's problem.”
Ballasy: “The ‘Contract with America’ released by the Republican Party in the 1994 congressional elections called for the following departments to be shut down: Commerce, Education, Agriculture and Energy. Do you think any of these should be closed today?”
Bachmann: “I think that the contract that was made in 1994 was one where, I think it was 10 items -- I wasn't here at the time, I was at home having babies at the time -- but I think that was one where the Republicans promised that they would have a vote on a certain number of bills within the first 100 days. I think the current Republican Congress needs to also come up with a vision for the American people -- how we're going to right the ship. And this is a different time than 1994, and we have to come up with an agenda that gives the best path forward for the United States, and I believe we will.”
Help the American Legion support family of fallen Marine Lance Cpl. Matthew Snyder Updated
By Michelle Malkin
http://michellemalkin.com/2010/03/30/help-the-american-legion-support-family-of-fallen-marine-lance-cpl-matthew-snyder/
My stalwart friends at the American Legion have stepped up to raise funds to cover the legal expenses of fallen Marine Lance Cpl. Matthew Snyder’s family. As you all know, Snyder’s funeral was targeted by the evil miscreants of the bogus Westboro Baptist Church. The Snyders took the protesters to court. In October 2007, a jury awarded the Snyders $2.9 million in compensatory damages, $6 million in punitive damages for invasion of privacy and $2 million for causing emotional distress. It was thrown out on appeal by the Fourth Circuit. Federal judges have now ordered the family to pay $16,510 to ringleader Fred Phelps as they pursue a Supreme Court case. SCOTUS agreed earlier this month to hear the Snyders’ appeal.
Regardless of how you feel about the merits of the Snyders’ suit, the Snyders deserve to know that Americans are forever grateful for their son’s heroism and for the family’s sacrifice. We shouldn’t stand by and watch them bankrupted.
MOTHAX at The American Legion Burnpit tells me the group’s National Adjutant is seeding a fund-raising effort for the Sndyers with his own funds. The group will also be submitting an amicus brief in the Snyders’ case and intends to raise enough money to cover the court-ordered legal expenses and any other expenses incurred by the Supreme Court appeal.
They need your help.
Go here to donate now — and spread the word.
More from Cassy Fiano in the Green Room at Hot Air.
Allahpundit has more and the Baltimore Sun, which broke the story, has a follow-up on the outpouring of generosity and support the Synder family has received:
As news of the order to pay Westboro’s court costs spread through the media and online, strangers were moved to send money and set up funds to support Snyder’s court battle.
On Tuesday, Mark C. Seavey, new media director for the American Legion, posted a message on his Legion-affiliated blog, The Burn Pit, urging readers to donate to the Albert Snyder Fund. The American Legion’s message was picked up by conservative political blogger Michelle Malkin, who called the Westboro protesters “evil miscreants” and urged readers to donate.
“Regardless of how you feel about the merits of the Snyders’ suit, the Snyders deserve to know that Americans are forever grateful for their son’s heroism and for the family’s sacrifice. We shouldn’t stand by and watch them bankrupted,” Malkin wrote.
Money from donations will go toward covering the money owed to Phelps, and beyond that, toward preparing further appeals, Seavey said.
“As soon as we heard this we just knew that it was going to go through the roof, and people were going to be upset. We seized on it,” Seavey said. “On an issue like this that cuts across political lines, it’s relatively easy, and it’s the kind of fight we want to wade into because it’s not right or left, it’s right or wrong. We’re going to do the best we can to make sure that Mr. Snyder doesn’t have to deal with this. We’re going to make sure he doesn’t have to pay a red cent.”
In a phone interview Tuesday, Snyder said he was “exhausted” by the long legal ordeal, but heartened by the outpouring of support. He said he has received about 3,000 e-mail messages from people across the country who wanted to show their support and planned to contribute.
“It kind of restores your faith in mankind after dealing with this wacko church,” Snyder said. “Win or lose, I’ll know that I did everything I could for Matt, and for all the soldiers and Marines who are still coming home dying.”
Morning Bell: One Nation Under Arrest
http://blog.heritage.org/2010/03/31/morning-bell-one-nation-under-arrest/?utm_source=Newsletter&utm_medium=Email&utm_campaign=Morning%2BBell
Before President Barack Obama took over the White House, no United States citizen had ever been forced by the federal government to buy a product against their will. But now, thanks to the passage of Obamacare, Americans, by dint of their mere existence, are now required to purchase Obama administration approved health insurance or face a penalty assessed through the Internal Revenue Code. This is simply unprecedented. The income tax doesn’t kick in until an American earns income. Auto liability insurance doesn’t become mandated until an American chooses to drive (and even then it’s only by the state). And farmers must first grow food before they are subject to the regulations of the Department of Agriculture. But facing federal government sanction for simply breathing? That is a troubling assault on American liberty.
Unfortunately, Obamacare is just the latest example of the growing reach of the federal government into all aspects of our lives. While the final bill passed by Congress specifically made the noncompliance with an IRS individual mandate penalty not a crime, far too often when the spotlight of American attention is not focused on an issue, Congress has gone ahead and criminalized what was once before perfectly normal behavior. Consider, for example, small-time inventor and entrepreneur Krister Evertson, whose story is recounted by Heritage fellows Brian Walsh and Hans von Spakovsky:
In May 2004, FBI agents driving a black Suburban and wearing SWAT gear ran Evertson off the road near his mother’s home in Wasilla, Alaska. When Evertson was face down on the pavement with automatic weapons trained on him, an FBI agent told him he was being arrested because he hadn’t put a federally mandated sticker on a UPS package.
A jury in federal court in Alaska acquitted Evertson, but the feds weren’t finished. They reached into their bag of over 4,500 federal crimes and found another ridiculous crime they could use to prosecute him: supposedly “abandoning” hazardous waste (actually storing, in appropriate containers, valuable materials he was using for the clean-fuel technology he was developing). A second jury convicted him, and he spent 21 months in an Oregon federal prison.
Putting the wrong stamp on a package. Storing your own property own your own land. When did these actions become federal crimes? Why? How can we stop them? A new book launched yesterday and published by The Heritage Foundation answers these questions. One Nation Under Arrest: How Crazy Laws, Rogue Prosecutors, and Activist Judges Threaten Your Liberty documents how over the past 50 years the politicization of American criminal law and practice has created traps for millions of innocent and unwary Americans and threatens to make criminals out of those who are just doing their best to be respectable, law abiding citizens.
In 1998, an American Bar Association task force estimated that there were over 3,000 federal criminal offenses scattered throughout the 50 titles of the United States Code. Just six years later, that number is estimated to be over 4,000 and Columbia law professor John Coffee estimates that the federal government could use the criminal process to enforce as many as 300,000 federal regulations.
Lavrentiy Beria, the chief of the Soviet security and secret police under Stalin reputedly said, “Show me the man, and I’ll find you the crime.” Our country is by no means a Soviet police state yet, but a federal government empowered with a sprawling code that makes all of us potential criminals is more than just an existential threat to American Liberty. This overcriminalization trend must end. Become informed. Learn the issues. Buy the book. And fight back.
From the front lines: Ranchers speak out on border chaos
By Michelle Malkin
http://michellemalkin.com/2010/03/30/from-the-front-lines-ranchers-speak-out-on-border-choas/
I will continue to keep you updated on the investigation into Arizona rancher Rob Krentz’s brutal murder. The latest:
*Funeral services have been set for April 9-10 in Douglas.
*Police are working on theories about the shooter possibly belonging to “a drug cartel scout or a band of thieves terrorizing Arizona ranches.”
*Open-borders Sen. Johnny Come Lately McCain, in the political battle of his life, is now calling for the National Guard. Don’t read his lips. Read his border security-undermining, law enforcement-abandoning record.
*The Arizona Farm Bureau sends the following statement:
“The murder of Cochise County rancher Rob Krentz this last weekend should not have happened and was preventable,” said Arizona Farm Bureau President Kevin Rogers. He and his organization send their deepest sympathy to the Krentz family for their loss.
According to Rogers, the ranching and farming community along the border, have been asking for a secure border for many years. “Our members are the ones who see the illegal traffic including drug and human cargo smuggling coming across their farms and ranches.” Rogers explained that over the last several years, his members have reported coming face to face with these smugglers that are well armed and menacing. “It is time for the federal government to fix this problem before another one of our ranch or farm families are injured or killed. No family should have to endure what the Krentz family is experiencing.”
Rogers said inaction by Congress can no longer be tolerated. “The border needs to be secured,” said Rogers. His organization has long called for securing the border and fixing the worker visa program so we know who is coming into the U.S. and who is overstaying their permission to be here. “Fixing the worker visa program becomes part of securing the border,” he emphasized.
If this tragedy is connected to smuggling from Mexico, swift action is needed to make sure this will not lead to an escalation in Arizona of the violence associated with the drug cartel brutality now just south of our border. “Until Congress addresses securing the border, all necessary resources should be focused on Arizona’s border,” concluded Rogers.
"The e-mail Bag"
You Might Be A Redneck
Thank you Jeff Foxworthy!
You take a fishing pole into Sea World.
You think a turtleneck is key ingredient for soup.
You've ever stood in line to have your picture taken with a freak of nature.
You think the French Riviera is foreign car.
You go to a stock car race and don't need a program.
Promoting "God's Holy Values and American Freedoms"!
"Daily Motivations"
You never know when one kind act, or one word of encouragement, can change a life forever. -- Zig Ziglar
"The act of putting pen to paper encourages pause for thought, this in turn makes us think more deeply about life, which helps us regain our equilibrium." -- Norbet Platt
"Great men are they who see that spiritual thought is stronger than any material force, that thoughts rule the world." -- Ralph Waldo Emerson
"Daily Devotions" (KJV and/or NLT)
Do not be afraid or discouraged. For the LORD your God is with you wherever you go. (Joshua 1:9)
Are you discouraged? God tells us not to be. God will help you conquer every discouragement! And when you come through the valleys of discouragement, you will find that God was there all the time. He was waiting patiently for you to exhaust your means and energy and turn to Him for His help. What a tremendous encouragement!
Are you lonely? Some of our most lonely moments can be when we are in a crowd, and yet no one notices us. Our heart aches when we think no one cares. But Jesus is our ever-present friend. He promises, "Never will I leave you; never will I forsake you" (Hebrews 13:5, NIV).
He is also with us as we face lonely tasks. When David Livingstone sailed to Africa for the first time as a missionary, a group of his friends accompanied him to the pier to wish him bon voyage. They were concerned for his safety and reminded him of the dangers. One man even tried to convince him to remain in England. But Livingstone opened his Bible and read Jesus' words from Matthew 28:20: "Lo, I am with you always." He turned to the man and smiled. "That, my friend, is the word of a gentleman...So let us be going."
No person or circumstance can ever remove us from the presence of our loving God. Paul writes, "I am convinced that nothing can ever separate us from His love." (Romans 8:38).
He is here with us right now and forever---because He is our ever-present God. He is our guide for life and for eternity. What an incredible truth!
Your View of God Really Matters …
Are you discouraged or lonely? Read Romans 8:38-39. Thank God for his constant love and presence in the midst of your pain. Then, as soon as you are able, share this truth with someone else in need of encouragement.
"The Patriot Post"
"The legislative department is everywhere extending the sphere of its activity and drawing all power into its impetuous vortex." -- James Madison, Federalist No. 48
"But they have two other Rights; those of sitting when they please, and as long as they please, in which methinks they have the advantage of your Parliament; for they cannot be dissolved by the Breath of a Minister, or sent packing as you were the other day, when it was your earnest desire to have remained longer together." -- Benjamin Franklin, letter to William Strahan, 1784
When Debating a Liberal, Start With First Principles
By Mark Alexander, Publisher, PatriotPost.US
"On every question of construction, carry ourselves back to the time when the Constitution was adopted, recollect the spirit manifested in the debates and instead of trying what meaning may be squeezed out of the text or invented against it, conform to the probable one in which it was passed." --Thomas Jefferson
There are only two rules you need to know when debating a liberal.
Rule Number One: You must define the debate in terms of First Principles, which is to say, you must be able to articulate those principles. (Read Essential Liberty for more.)
Conservatives subscribe to the fundamental doctrine of Essential Liberty as enumerated by our Founders in the Declaration of Independence and our Constitution. We understand that individual responsibility is the foundation of a free society. We advocate for the restoration of constitutional limits on government and the judiciary. We promote free enterprise, national defense and traditional American values.
In short, conservatives endeavor to conserve Rule of Law as our guiding principle, and any legitimate policy debate must start there.
Liberals, on the other hand, subscribe to principles du jour; whatever solution feels best for the day's most popular, fashionable, or prominent cause célèbre.
In short, they believe that the feel-good solution (a.k..a. "rule of man") supersedes Rule of Law.
For the most part, today's liberals are a case study in hypocrisy, the antithesis of the once noble Democrat Party, the party of Thomas Jefferson.
Liberals speak of unity, but they incessantly foment disunity, appealing to the worst in human nature by dividing Americans into constituent dependencies. They speak of freedom of thought -- except when your thought doesn't comport with theirs. They assert First Amendment rights -- except when it comes to religion or speech that doesn't agree with theirs. They promote tolerance -- except while practicing intolerance and seeking to silence dissenters.
Liberals deride moral clarity because they can't survive its scrutiny. They protest for the preservation of natural order while advocating homosexuality. They denounce capital punishment for the most heinous of criminals while ardently supporting the killing of the most helpless and innocent among us -- the unborn, the infirm and the aged.
Liberals loathe individual responsibility and advocate statism. They eschew private initiative and enterprise while promoting all manner of government control and regulation.
Now, I'm not suggesting that everything liberals believe or support is wrong, but their underlying philosophical doctrine surely undermines our "unalienable right to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness," as established by "the laws of nature and nature's God."
As Ronald Reagan observed, "The trouble with our liberal friends is not that they're ignorant; it's just that they know so much that isn't so."
Thus, don't be snookered into defending or denouncing the merits of any issue as framed in liberal terms. Such deliberations are rarely resolved and tend to end in gridlock, or worse, deadlock. (If congressional Republicans really want to end gridlock, they too need to control the debate in terms of First Principles.)
One means of taking control of a debate is to inquire whether an opponent has ever taken an oath to "support and defend" our Constitution. (If you have not, or wish to reaffirm your oath, then we invite you to do so by registering with The Essential Liberty Project.
If your opponent answers "yes," then inquire as to which constitution -- the one upon which our nation was founded, or the so-called "living constitution" adulterated by generations of legislative and judicial diktat.
Of course, you must be prepared to explain the difference -- to explain that only one of these constitutions exists in written form, while the other is a mere fabrication. This can be best accomplished by presenting your copy of the Essential Liberty Guide.
Another means of framing the debate is to ask your opponent to articulate the difference between constitutional Rule of Law and the rule of men. Again, you must be prepared to explain the difference.
You may also start by asking your opponent what "liberal" means. Most liberals will define "liberal" in terms of the issues they support, so ask your opponent if those issues comport with our Constitution.
Once you've framed the debate in terms of First Principles, give your liberal opponent a recess, and a copy of the Essential Liberty Guide.
Principled liberals (admittedly an oxymoron) will remain satisfied that what they feel is equivalent to, or even supersedes, Rule of Law. These poor souls are on their way to becoming über liberals, or Leftists, and are probably beyond any logical redemption.
But if you use your Essential Liberty Guide as an education tool rather than a hammer, some liberals may actually start to come around, and this conversion should be your primary objective.
Further, if confronted by your opponent with a challenge to provide a constitutional defense for some Republican legislation, don't bite. Most Republican legislation, though it may be more in line with our Constitution, rarely comports with the plain language of Rule of Law. Don't let your opponent frame you as a hypocrite. Remember: You are, first and foremost, a constitutional conservative, not a tool of any political party.
Alas, selective interpretation of our Constitution has expanded its meaning beyond any semblance of its original intent, and it will take time and discipline to contract its meaning through due process to restore its original intent.
Finally...
Rule Number Two: You must distinguish between liberals and Leftists. The former subscribe to a plethora of contemporaneous solutions, while the latter are bona fide "useful idiots," those Western apologists for socialist political and economic agendas that terminate with the institution of Marxist-Leninist-Maoist collectivism masquerading as regulation and taxation.
When it comes to debating Leftists, the outcome is utterly dependent on who has superior firepower.
Semper Vigilo, Fortis, Paratus et Fidelis!
"The Web"
No Treats From Obama
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XivhwO_zWWg
Jesus and the Folded Napkin (email) Examined
By Jeff Kluttz
http://www.returningking.com/?p=78
Many of us have received an email concerning Jesus’ folding of his napkin upon his resurrection. As a pastor, I’ve received it dozens of times, myself. At first, I – like many people- found the story fascinating and was actually moved at the thought of it. But, a bit of internet wisdom compelled me to investigate further.
The Email
The email heading asks this question, “Why Did Jesus Fold the Napkin?” And, the answer (with some variations, of course) is contained in the text below, a condensed version of the original email, usually beginning with: “I’VE NEVER HEARD OF THIS!!!”
Why did Jesus fold the linen burial cloth after His resurrection? I never
noticed this… .
The Gospel of John (20:7) tells us that the napkin, which was placed over
the face of Jesus, was not just thrown aside like the grave clothes.
The Bible takes an entire verse to tell us that the napkin was neatly folded, and was placed at the head of that stony coffin.
Early Sunday morning, while it was still dark, Mary Magdalene came to the
tomb and found that the stone had been rolled away from the entrance.
She ran and found Simon Peter and the other disciple, the one whom Jesus
loved. She said, ‘They have taken the Lord’s body out of the tomb, and I don’t know where they have put him!’
Peter and the other disciple ran to the tomb to see.. The other disciple
outran Peter and got there first. He stooped and looked in and saw the linen cloth lying there, but he didn’t go in.
Then Simon Peter arrived and went inside. He also noticed the linen
wrappings lying there, while the cloth that had covered Jesus’ head was folded up and lying to the side.
Was that important? Absolutely!
Is it really significant? Yes!
In order to understand the significance of the folded napkin, you have to
understand a little bit about Hebrew tradition of that day. The folded
napkin had to do with the Master and Servant, and every Jewish boy knew this
tradition.
When the servant set the dinner table for the master, he made sure that it was exactly the way the master wanted it.
The table was furnished perfectly, and then the servant would wait, just
out of sight, until the master had finished eating, and the servant would not dare touch that table, until the master was finished.
Now if the master were done eating, he would rise from the table, wipe
his fingers, his mouth, and clean his beard, and would wad up that
napkin and toss it onto the table.
The servant would then know to clear the table. For in those days, the wadded napkin meant, ‘I’m done’.
But if the master got up from the table, and folded his napkin, and laid
it beside his plate, the servant would not dare touch the table,
because……….
The folded napkin meant, ‘I’m coming back!’
A Magdalene of Our Times
Written by Gary Isbell
http://www.tfp.org/tfp-home/articles/a-magdalene-of-our-times.html
Eve Lavallière, the stage name of Eugénie Fenoglio, was born in Toulon, France, on April 1, 1866. The second child and only daughter of Emile and Albanie Fenoglio, she later described her painful youth. “As a child, I knew not what the love and care of a mother was. My life was tears and suffering from the time I reached the age of reason.” Her father, a tailor, alcoholic and libertine, often gave himself over to jealous brooding and fits of rage. Her mother often had to flee with the children, seeking refuge in relatives’ homes, until her husband had calmed down. This continued until one day, he shot and killed his wife, pointed the pistol at his daughter but did not shoot, and then shot himself.
Eve Lavallière
Eve lived a life of privation and suffering until entering a theater company. Her beauty, voice and poise took her to the best theaters in Paris. She became the foremost actress in France and the idol of the multitudes. The entire world viewed her coiffures and clothing as models and ran after perfumes, soaps and cosmetics “à la Lavallière.”
King Carlos of Portugal, King Leopold II of Belgium, King Edward VII of England, Henry of Bavaria, diplomats, magnates, and princes all came to hear and applaud her. Dazzled by glory, she threw herself “into the vast sea of sin.
“Gold ran through my hands,” Eve confessed. “I had everything the world could offer, everything I could desire. Nevertheless, I regarded myself the unhappiest of souls.” Despite living in a rich palace in Paris, surrounded by luxury, with a carriage and even an automobile—then very rare—at her disposal, she felt tortured by remorse. More than once she attempted suicide, even once after a magnificent performance in London.
On Her Way to Damascus
In June 1917, Eve wanted to rest far from the world’s agitation to prepare the repertoire of songs and pieces she was to perform in the United States. So she rented the palace of Porcherie in Chanceux, near Tours. She retired there with Leonia, a young Belgian refugee she had met in Paris in 1915 and who accompanied her as a lifelong confidante. The trustee of this palace was the parish priest, Father Chasteigner, a simple, austere and pious man, genuinely solicitous for his parishioners’ souls.
The day following Eve’s arrival was a Sunday. Father Chasteigner, noting her absence from Mass, called upon her to express his concern. Eve promised him she would not miss Mass again, and on the following Sunday, when the good pastor preached on the great converted sinners, she attended the Mass with a frivolous attitude.
Eve Lavallière dressed for stage.
Returning to the palace that afternoon, the pastor commented to Eve, “What a pity that you have no faith!”
“But what is faith?” replied Eve, in the tone of one who has permanently lost it.
She then told him of her experiences with spiritism, in which, she said, the devil took part. “I took advantage of the occasion to ask him to restore my youth, which was what I most desired, and to cure me of enteritis. Satan promised he would do so on the condition that I would become his. I accepted, adding that my lifestyle was perfect for gaining him many adepts. Obviously quite content, he disappeared.
“Some days later I was at another session, with a new presence of the devil. I denounced him for failing to fulfill his promise. In reply, he guaranteed that he would grant what I asked, but under one more condition: that I not bless myself when I encountered a funeral. That was the only vestige of religiosity that remained in me.
“But Satan still did nothing for me. In the following session, filled with indignation, I called him an impostor and a cheat. By then I had concluded that spiritism was nothing but a farce and that the devil did not exist.”
“Well, I assure you that he exists,” the good priest said, and with that, he mounted his bicycle and left without further ceremony.
Eve, struck by his conviction, began to think. “If the devil exists, God also exists. And if God exists, what am I doing in this world? What am I doing with my life?”
“On the following morning,” Leonia recalls, “we were walking in front of the castle when the pastor appeared.”
“Mademoiselle,” he said, “what you told me yesterday disturbed me. I confess that I spent the better part of the night in prayer, asking God to inspire me in your regard. I also celebrated Holy Mass for the same intention. Here, I brought you The Life of Saint Mary Magdalene, by Father Henri Lacordaire. Read this book on your knees and you will see what God can do with a soul such as yours.”
“After lunch,” Leonia continues, “Eve settled down near the kitchen and, opening the doors so that the servants might hear, began to read in a loud voice. Enthusiasm seized her. Never had I heard her read with such conviction. Sitting at her feet, I began to cry. The servants were likewise moved. Eve continued reading, her voice broken by sobs.”
Eve and Leonia spent the rest of the week in piety and recollection.
“And I, Reverend Father?”
“Sunday arrived, the tenth of June,” says Leonia. “We went to Mass, but Eve’s disposition differed completely from that of the previous Sunday. It was on this day, during lunch, that I ventured to say to her, ‘I would like to make my first Communion. I have reached 23 years of age without ever receiving, but I want to do so.’”
Eve was quite moved. Not only did she encourage Leonia, but offered to make the necessary arrangements and affirmed that she too would receive Holy Communion with her. At the same time, she told her, “From now on do not address me as ‘my lady.’ Simply call me ‘Eve,’ for you are my sister and I am yours.”
When the pastor arrived later and learned of Leonia’s resolve, he promised to assist her. Since she first needed instructions, he said he would provide her a catechism. The priest then prepared to leave, but Eve detained him.
“And I, Reverend Father?”
“You?”
“Yes, me! I promised this little one that I would help her, be her sponsor, and receive Holy Communion with her.”
“But...”
“Yes, I know well. I am a sinner and have not lived as a Christian, but even so, I hope I still have the right to return to God.”
Leonia writes, “I can still see Eve on the main avenue of the palace, walking decisively at the pastor’s side and, in a loud voice, accusing herself publicly of her sins. The good priest seemed embarrassed.”
“Wait! Wait a moment!” he protested. “And above all, don’t shout so loud!”
“Wait? Wait for what? Can Leonia’s happiness not also be mine?”
“It’s just that... it’s that, compared to you, Leonia is a child. Her case is simple. You, you are Eve Lavallière... you are well known... your life is public. I cannot treat you in the same manner. Moreover, you gave yourself over to spiritism. We are talking about a reserved sin.”1
“Oh, my God! How unhappy I am! God does not concern Himself with me because I am such a sinner.”
“Be calm, Mademoiselle! God does love you, and to prove that, I shall leave immediately for Tours, to request the necessary permission.”
“And if they do not wish to grant it?”
“They will. What motive would they have for refusing? Mademoiselle, I will be back in less than a hour, and I will come with all the powers.” With that, the good priest disappeared on his bicycle. Eve remained in a state of anxiety, lamenting and weeping.
Eve’s sole consolation amid her sorrow, from Leonia’s account, was her confidence in Our Lady! “How good it now feels to think of her. In times past I used to love her, and I never completely forgot her. I used to send her the flowers they offered me. She will have pity on me!”
Nevertheless, as she waited, Eve’s anxiety grew. Despair nearly took hold of her. Falling upon her knees, she raised her hands to Heaven. Bathed in tears, she exclaimed, “Lord, take me! Send me death, I can endure no more!”
Just then, Leonia, peering through the window, shouted, “Good news! I see him, I see him at last! He is pedaling with all his strength!” Eve rushed out to meet him.
“For the rest of my life,” writes Leonia, “I will never forget her great cry of joy. I will ever see her there, kneeling on the grass, expressing to God her happiness and gratitude.”
“The peace of the Lord be with you, my daughter!” said the priest, leaping from his bicycle. “The Vicar-General immediately gave me all the authorizations requested.” Eve stood up, calmed, transfigured. With what attention and gratitude she heard those words of peace!
For an entire week the two friends prepared themselves for confession and Holy Communion. They walked through the wheat-covered fields each morning to the rectory. There they sat side-by-side on the old sofa in the parlor and, like two well-behaved children, recited their catechism lesson. In the afternoon, Father Chasteigner would go to the palace to speak of Heaven and the things of God. Father Chasteigner gave each of them a Rosary, and it was Eve who taught Leonia how to pray it. Preparing for their general confessions, “We wrote out our sins on sheets of paper so as not to forget anything,” said Leonia.
On the afternoon before the important day, the two were in Eve’s room saying their prayers aloud. Eve said, “When I was a child, on the day before first Communion day, we used to ask forgiveness of our parents for the faults we committed against them.” Then, throwing herself on her knees at Leonia’s feet, she implored, “Forgive me, Leonia, for the bad example I have given you and all the affliction I have caused you.” Leonia, in turn, did the same, and afterwards they retired to await the great day.
The château of La Porcherie where Eve Lavalière converted on June 7, 1917.
Dead to the World
Morning finally dawned. It was overcast and raining. “Naturally,” said Eve, “today you have precedence, for you are making your first Communion. Confess and receive Holy Communion ahead of me.”
They found the church draped in mourning, for a Mass was going to be offered later for a soldier killed in the war. “They are preparing for a funeral,” declared Eve. “And on this day, Leonia, we will also bury our life of sin.”
Eve right after her conversion.
"Father Chasteigner was waiting for us in the deserted church,” Leonia recalls. “He lit a candle before the image of the Most Holy Virgin and entered the confessional. I went in first and knelt down. After I had confessed, Eve took her turn. After her confession I had the impression that she had already received Holy Communion, such was the purity of her countenance and so great her recollection.”
The Happiness That Can Only Come From God
Father Chasteigner returned to the sanctuary. Eve and Leonia knelt expectantly at the Communion rail. “While lighting the altar candles, the Reverend Father’s eyes were bathed in tears. As it had been agreed, I received Communion first and Eve right after. The priest’s hand trembled upon giving her the Sacred Host. She was white, as if dead, upon receiving her God. Returning to my place, I remained only a short time in recollection, for prolonged prayer was not for my temperament. But Eve seemed in another world.
“We had been invited to have brunch in the rectory. At a sign from the Reverend Father, I called Eve several times. But she, deeply absorbed, heard nothing. Finally, Father Chasteigner went and roused her himself and she returned to earth.
“What a joyful and radiant celebration! Afterwards, we returned on foot through the sun-drenched fields, the sun having overcome the clouds and rain. Eve was exultant with joy. ‘Does it not seem to you, Leonia, that the fields have prettier tones and that the flowers today are more beautiful than ever?’ We felt ourselves as delicate as shadows.
“Eve always considered that day, June 19, 1917, as the most special day of her life. She considered it the day her life really began. She renounced the theater forever, canceled her contracts, rid herself of her jewels, and repudiated all that reminded her of her worldly life. After her conversion, she was to affirm, ‘It was the devil that led me to God!’
“‘My resolution is made,’ Eve wrote. ‘From now on, only Jesus has a right to my life, for He alone gave me happiness and peace.’”
A True Repentance
“She left Paris in order to be safe from its dangers, distributing her immense fortune to the poor, the missions, and religious houses, and went to live in remote locales. She asked of God much suffering in order to atone for her past sins and ascend to the heights of contemplation, virtue and sanctity.”
The Divine Majesty granted her request for suffering in a variety of ways. For example, she desired to enter a convent to expiate her sins and to labor for the conversion of sinners. Notwithstanding her great ability to love and her purity of heart, she was repeatedly rejected on account of her poor health and notoriety. It was a trial that she fully accepted, realizing it to be God’s will.
For four years she devoted seven months a year serving on a lay-missionary nursing team in Tunisia, but poor health and periods of depression forced her to give up this work and return to France. There, with Leonia, she led a life of prayer, meditation, almsgiving and much suffering from illnesses.
She, who had been the toast of Paris, faced extreme suffering at the end of her life. There was not one of her once-beautiful features that did not become a means of expiation, sanctification and apostolate. Rendering gratitude to God, Eve herself said, “I have sinned through these faculties, good Lord. Now I thank Thee for permitting me to expiate my sins through this suffering.”
In 1929, a large Parisian newspaper published an interview of the former celebrity.
“Do you suffer a lot?”
“Yes, horribly,” she responded.
“Have you any hope of being cured?”
“None. But I am so happy! You cannot imagine how great my happiness is.”
“Even with so much suffering?”
“Yes, and because of it. I am in God’s hands. Tell my friends of days gone by that you met the happiest person on earth.”
In her last letter she wrote, “All my being and all my will are turned toward this last end: to love God, Who loves me so much in spite of my past and present miseries.”
She died on July 10, 1929, at the age of 63. On her grave was placed a simple cross with these words, engraved according to her request:
I left everything for God;
He alone is enough.
O Thou Who didst create me,
Have pity on me.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Note: 1. “Reserved sins” are those that a confessor cannot absolve without special authorization of the bishop or the Pope. This permission is always granted when requested.
Rep. Bachmann: Do We Want ‘To Watch Ourselves Collapse From Our Own Welfare State?’
By Nicholas Ballasy, Video Reporter
http://www.cnsnews.com/public/content/article.aspx?RsrcID=63559
(CNSNews.com) - Rep. Michele Bachmann (R-Minn.) told CNSNews.com that "expensive entitlement programs" are "bringing our country down," and Americans will have to choose between surviving as a country or collapsing "from our own welfare state."
In an exclusive interview, CNSNews.com asked Bachmann if she supported, for example, phasing out Medicare Part D, a program enacted in 2003 by President George W. Bush and a Republican-controlled Congress that subsidizes the cost of prescription drugs for Medicare beneficiaries. (The program is currently estimated to cost $16.6 trillion over the next 75 years.)
“I think that program needs tremendous reform, because we're now at a precipice here in our nation where we can't afford all of the entitlement programs,” said Bachmann. “Just like you saw with GM and Chrysler, the very weighty, expensive benefit-heavy packages rendered those companies uncompetitive with Toyota and other companies. We're seeing the same thing in the federal government.”
Bachmann continued: “These very expensive wage-and-benefit packages that we're paying to federal employees, but also very expensive entitlement programs are frankly bringing our country down and we have to make a decision: ‘Do we want to survive as a country or are we going to watch ourselves collapse from our own welfare state?’ It's really up to us to make the decision.”
Rep. Bachmann, elected to Congress in the 2006 mid-term election, blamed Democrats for making entitlement programs like Social Security and Medicare “unworkable” today.
“They (Democrats) like to act as though they want to save them (entitlement programs) and we want to end them when, in fact, it's been just the opposite,” said Bachmann. “The Democrats unfortunately have been in a situation where they have made those programs unworkable, which means vulnerable people who are dependent on those programs may not have them to take care of the needs that they need.”
“That's what we are trying to do,” she said. “We're trying to help those who are the most vulnerable in the United States to make sure that they can have benefits that they are hoping for and that they worked for but that won't be the case.”
She also warned that the United States is close to losing its AAA bond rating.
“This year, not into the future, but this year is the first year that Social Security is putting more money out than what it’s taking in,” said Bachmann. “Well, that's called being overdrawn at the bank.”
“That’s happening this year, seven years ahead of schedule,” she said. “Medicare is dead broke within seven years, and it could happen sooner than that. In the midst of that, we're seeing a brand new entitlement (the new health care law) waking up that is being forced upon us? When the boat is already sinking financially? Remember, Moodys is coming out saying the United States in all likelihood will lose our triple-A bond rating. This isn't a game anymore, this isn't a political sound-bite anymore. This is reality.”
In a previous interview with CNSNews.com, Rep. Paul Ryan (R-Wisc.) echoed Bachmann’s concerns about entitlement programs. Ryan cited a Government Accountability Office (GAO) report that says the federal government already faces a “fiscal gap” of $76 trillion, meaning that over the next 75 years the cost of the benefits promised in federal entitlement programs exceeds the tax revenues expected to pay for them. This amounts to almost $250,000 for every single American and about $650,000 for every American household.
“All those unfunded liabilities, all that debt I’ve been telling you about, is before you pass this budget,” said Ryan. “That’s if we don’t pass the budget. If we pass the Obama budget, it just gets worse. He doubles the debt in five years and triples it in 10.”
A transcript of CNSNews.com’s interview with Rep. Michele Bachmann (R-Minn.) follows below:
CNSNews.com’s Nicholas Ballasy: “Every House Republican voted against the health care bill. Are you partaking in any efforts to repeal the legislation?”
Rep. Michele Bachmann (R-Minn.): “Oh, absolutely. The bill passed near midnight on Sunday night. I instructed my staff on Sunday night, ‘We have to repeal this thing.’ I spoke with Mike Pence on the floor and said we've got to repeal, we have to have a discharge petition. At the same time my colleague, Steve King, went to Eric Cantor and gave the same exact message and so that morning, on Monday morning, we independently had bills drawn up for repeal, dropped them, and introduced them first thing in the morning. So did Sen. Jim DeMint [R-S.C.] on the Senate side.
Bachmann: “We're urging all of our colleagues, both in the House and in the Senate, everyone should file repeal bills of Obama-care and we should all get on each others’ bills to let the American public know that we are unanimous in wanting to repeal this unconstitutional bill and replace it with true, good, honest health care reform that will actually benefit the American people and not break the bank.”
Ballasy: “Thirteen state attorneys so far are suing the federal government over the individual mandate in the health care bill. Do you agree with those lawsuits and what do you think the end result will be?”
Bachmann: “Oh, I believe that we're going to see challenges at every level. I was just, as a matter of fact this morning, with the Virginia attorney general, and he is going to be the first one in the country to file his claim. He's in the ‘rocket-docket,’ which is the fastest legal court system in the United States, and he anticipates in about a year and a half, this case should be before the United States Supreme Court.
Ballasy: “Do you think they have the grounds for a repeal, overturning it?”
Bachmann: “I believe, he, I know that the attorney general in Virginia is basing his claim on the individual mandate and I think that there is merit in this claim, because never before in the history of our country has the federal government forced an American to do something pro-actively, forcing an American as a mandate of citizenship to purchase a product or service against their will. And again, this is a government- mandated product and government essentially will set the price on that product.
Bachmann: “So, there’s no way out. The American people will be forced to purchase it. This is the grounds for redistribution of wealth. This is how President Obama will achieve his objective of redistribution of wealth. When you force an American -- as a condition of citizenship -- to purchase a product or service against their will and the federal government essentially sets the price for that product, then there's no freedom left for the individual. It is a different matter when a state makes a mandate -- the federal government is limited. The federal government, Article 1, Section 8, has limited enumerated powers. The federal government is without power to force an American citizen to purchase a product or service against their will. So yes, I do believe there's strong grounds for the unconstitutionality of this individual mandate in Obamacare.”
Ballasy: “I interviewed Delaware Senator Tom Carper (D) who is also a former governor of the state. He said it's not likely that this is ultimately going to be overturned, and he knows some pretty good lawyers who would agree.”
Bachmann: “I would disagree. I think it has a very strong chance of being overturned and I hope that it is, and I think you'll see challenges immediately in the court system, challenges immediately here in the legislature – you've already seen them. We've already seen the lawsuits filed, we've already seen the legislation filed. What's interesting is President Obama campaigned, when he was running for president as being a ‘uniter.’ Unfortunately, the president has proven to be one of the biggest dividers of this nation that we've ever had in the presidency.”
Ballasy: “When looking at the tea party movement, the last rally, we've seen some stories that have come out: Representative [John] Lewis and Representative [James] Clyburn have said there were racial incidents at the tea party. Did you see anything like that, that was consistent with their stories?”
Bachmann: “I did not. We had over 30,000 people here on Saturday [March 20] at the west side of the Capitol, a tremendous group of individuals trying to get the attention of Speaker [Nancy] Pelosi and the Democrats saying, ‘Don't take away my health care from me.’ I met with – the media tends to portray the people who are in the tea party movement as toothless hillbillies, as rubes from the backwater who don't know what they're talking about.”
Bachmann: “Do you know who I met on Saturday? I met surgeons, anesthesiologists, family practice guys, interns, I met pharmacists, I met business owners, lawyers. I met people from all walks of life – apolitical people, 75-year-old women who came out. I didn't see any indication of racial tensions. I didn't see any indication of being personal, against personal members of Congress. What I saw were people that were fighting for their constitutional liberties and fighting for our country. And I think it's a tremendous affront trying to castigate people who are fighting for our country as somehow being racially motivated. I didn't see that at all.”
Ballasy: “You, during your time in Congress, have been critical of excessive government spending and social programs. Can you point to any social program that the Republican Party has dissolved and shut down over the last 50 years?”
Bachmann: “Well, let me go to the first part of your question. President George Bush spent way too much money as president and he did that with the help of a Republican Congress. But in his worst year, he spent something over $450 billion dollars. In just his first year alone, President Obama spent over $1.4 trillion in deficit. There's no comparison. There’s no moral equivalency. George Bush's worst year was $458 billion or more in debt as compared to Barack Obama, $1.4 trillion in debt.”
Bachmann: “This year President Obama is going to break even his own record. He's going to quadruple that amount of debt; that's more than -- if you take all the presidents from the first day George Washington came into office as president through George W. Bush leaving office, President Obama in his first year accumulated more debt than all of those presidents combined. So there's just no comparison in the amount of debt that was accumulated.”
Bachmann: “Now, the second part of your question had to do with spending programs, and I'm without knowledge as to what programs they did or didn’t do away with. I was here during the last two years of President George W. Bush, but that was under Democrat rule in the Congress. Speaker Pelosi dominated the House and [Sen.] Harry Reid [D-Nev.] dominated the Senate, and so I was never here when the Republicans were in control in the House.”
Ballasy: “Do you think programs like Medicare Part D, which had a lot of Republican support, with a Republican-controlled Congress -- and I understand you were not in Congress at that time – but do you think a program like that, specifically Medicare Part D, should that program be dissolved?”
Bachmann: “I think that program needs tremendous reform because we're now at a precipice here in our nation where we can't afford all of the entitlement programs. Just like you saw with GM and Chrysler, the very weighty, expensive benefit-heavy packages rendered those companies uncompetitive with Toyota and other companies. We're seeing the same thing in the federal government. These very expensive wage and benefit packages that we're paying to federal employees, but also very expensive entitlement programs are, frankly, bringing our country down, and we have to make a decision: ‘Do we want to survive as a country or are we going to watch ourselves collapse from our own welfare state?’ It's really up to us to make the decision.”
Ballasy: “You see some Democrats who say, ‘Okay, if Republicans are so concerned about the cost of our social programs that we started, let's see them try to end them, politically. Let's see them try to get out there and tell the American people we're going to end Medicare, we're going to end Social Security over time.’ Do you think those kind of programs could be ended at this time and we could begin to phase those programs out?”
Bachmann: “Well, that's the scare tactics that the Democrats like to bring up every year. They like to act as though they want to save them and we want to end them when, in fact, it's been just the opposite. The Democrats unfortunately have been in a situation where they have made those programs unworkable, which means vulnerable people who are dependent on those programs may not have them to take care of the needs that they need.”
Bachmann: “That's what we are trying to do. We're trying to help those who are the most vulnerable in the United States to make sure that they can have benefits that they are hoping for and that they worked for but that won't be the case because, remember, this year, not into the future, but this year is the first year that Social Security is putting more money out than what it is taking in.
Bachmann: “Well, that's called being overdrawn at the bank. That’s happening this year, seven years ahead of schedule. Medicare is dead broke within seven years and it could happen sooner than that. In the midst of that, we're seeing a brand new entitlement waking up that is being forced upon us? When the boat is already sinking financially? Remember, Moodys is coming out saying the United States in all likelihood will lose our triple-A bond rating. This isn't a game anymore, this isn't a political sound-bite anymore. This is reality. What this means is all of our interest rates will go up if you're buying a home, if you're buying a business, if you're buying a car, student loan, interest rates are going up. Plus for the United States, our interest rates will go up too and that's the biggest problem we have in the United States today is all of the welfare payments we're paying out, the entitlement payments – that, coupled together with interest on the debt, those two alone have the potential of wiping out all other spending at the federal level. It's really about spending. At the end of the day, that's America's problem.”
Ballasy: “The ‘Contract with America’ released by the Republican Party in the 1994 congressional elections called for the following departments to be shut down: Commerce, Education, Agriculture and Energy. Do you think any of these should be closed today?”
Bachmann: “I think that the contract that was made in 1994 was one where, I think it was 10 items -- I wasn't here at the time, I was at home having babies at the time -- but I think that was one where the Republicans promised that they would have a vote on a certain number of bills within the first 100 days. I think the current Republican Congress needs to also come up with a vision for the American people -- how we're going to right the ship. And this is a different time than 1994, and we have to come up with an agenda that gives the best path forward for the United States, and I believe we will.”
Help the American Legion support family of fallen Marine Lance Cpl. Matthew Snyder Updated
By Michelle Malkin
http://michellemalkin.com/2010/03/30/help-the-american-legion-support-family-of-fallen-marine-lance-cpl-matthew-snyder/
My stalwart friends at the American Legion have stepped up to raise funds to cover the legal expenses of fallen Marine Lance Cpl. Matthew Snyder’s family. As you all know, Snyder’s funeral was targeted by the evil miscreants of the bogus Westboro Baptist Church. The Snyders took the protesters to court. In October 2007, a jury awarded the Snyders $2.9 million in compensatory damages, $6 million in punitive damages for invasion of privacy and $2 million for causing emotional distress. It was thrown out on appeal by the Fourth Circuit. Federal judges have now ordered the family to pay $16,510 to ringleader Fred Phelps as they pursue a Supreme Court case. SCOTUS agreed earlier this month to hear the Snyders’ appeal.
Regardless of how you feel about the merits of the Snyders’ suit, the Snyders deserve to know that Americans are forever grateful for their son’s heroism and for the family’s sacrifice. We shouldn’t stand by and watch them bankrupted.
MOTHAX at The American Legion Burnpit tells me the group’s National Adjutant is seeding a fund-raising effort for the Sndyers with his own funds. The group will also be submitting an amicus brief in the Snyders’ case and intends to raise enough money to cover the court-ordered legal expenses and any other expenses incurred by the Supreme Court appeal.
They need your help.
Go here to donate now — and spread the word.
More from Cassy Fiano in the Green Room at Hot Air.
Allahpundit has more and the Baltimore Sun, which broke the story, has a follow-up on the outpouring of generosity and support the Synder family has received:
As news of the order to pay Westboro’s court costs spread through the media and online, strangers were moved to send money and set up funds to support Snyder’s court battle.
On Tuesday, Mark C. Seavey, new media director for the American Legion, posted a message on his Legion-affiliated blog, The Burn Pit, urging readers to donate to the Albert Snyder Fund. The American Legion’s message was picked up by conservative political blogger Michelle Malkin, who called the Westboro protesters “evil miscreants” and urged readers to donate.
“Regardless of how you feel about the merits of the Snyders’ suit, the Snyders deserve to know that Americans are forever grateful for their son’s heroism and for the family’s sacrifice. We shouldn’t stand by and watch them bankrupted,” Malkin wrote.
Money from donations will go toward covering the money owed to Phelps, and beyond that, toward preparing further appeals, Seavey said.
“As soon as we heard this we just knew that it was going to go through the roof, and people were going to be upset. We seized on it,” Seavey said. “On an issue like this that cuts across political lines, it’s relatively easy, and it’s the kind of fight we want to wade into because it’s not right or left, it’s right or wrong. We’re going to do the best we can to make sure that Mr. Snyder doesn’t have to deal with this. We’re going to make sure he doesn’t have to pay a red cent.”
In a phone interview Tuesday, Snyder said he was “exhausted” by the long legal ordeal, but heartened by the outpouring of support. He said he has received about 3,000 e-mail messages from people across the country who wanted to show their support and planned to contribute.
“It kind of restores your faith in mankind after dealing with this wacko church,” Snyder said. “Win or lose, I’ll know that I did everything I could for Matt, and for all the soldiers and Marines who are still coming home dying.”
Morning Bell: One Nation Under Arrest
http://blog.heritage.org/2010/03/31/morning-bell-one-nation-under-arrest/?utm_source=Newsletter&utm_medium=Email&utm_campaign=Morning%2BBell
Before President Barack Obama took over the White House, no United States citizen had ever been forced by the federal government to buy a product against their will. But now, thanks to the passage of Obamacare, Americans, by dint of their mere existence, are now required to purchase Obama administration approved health insurance or face a penalty assessed through the Internal Revenue Code. This is simply unprecedented. The income tax doesn’t kick in until an American earns income. Auto liability insurance doesn’t become mandated until an American chooses to drive (and even then it’s only by the state). And farmers must first grow food before they are subject to the regulations of the Department of Agriculture. But facing federal government sanction for simply breathing? That is a troubling assault on American liberty.
Unfortunately, Obamacare is just the latest example of the growing reach of the federal government into all aspects of our lives. While the final bill passed by Congress specifically made the noncompliance with an IRS individual mandate penalty not a crime, far too often when the spotlight of American attention is not focused on an issue, Congress has gone ahead and criminalized what was once before perfectly normal behavior. Consider, for example, small-time inventor and entrepreneur Krister Evertson, whose story is recounted by Heritage fellows Brian Walsh and Hans von Spakovsky:
In May 2004, FBI agents driving a black Suburban and wearing SWAT gear ran Evertson off the road near his mother’s home in Wasilla, Alaska. When Evertson was face down on the pavement with automatic weapons trained on him, an FBI agent told him he was being arrested because he hadn’t put a federally mandated sticker on a UPS package.
A jury in federal court in Alaska acquitted Evertson, but the feds weren’t finished. They reached into their bag of over 4,500 federal crimes and found another ridiculous crime they could use to prosecute him: supposedly “abandoning” hazardous waste (actually storing, in appropriate containers, valuable materials he was using for the clean-fuel technology he was developing). A second jury convicted him, and he spent 21 months in an Oregon federal prison.
Putting the wrong stamp on a package. Storing your own property own your own land. When did these actions become federal crimes? Why? How can we stop them? A new book launched yesterday and published by The Heritage Foundation answers these questions. One Nation Under Arrest: How Crazy Laws, Rogue Prosecutors, and Activist Judges Threaten Your Liberty documents how over the past 50 years the politicization of American criminal law and practice has created traps for millions of innocent and unwary Americans and threatens to make criminals out of those who are just doing their best to be respectable, law abiding citizens.
In 1998, an American Bar Association task force estimated that there were over 3,000 federal criminal offenses scattered throughout the 50 titles of the United States Code. Just six years later, that number is estimated to be over 4,000 and Columbia law professor John Coffee estimates that the federal government could use the criminal process to enforce as many as 300,000 federal regulations.
Lavrentiy Beria, the chief of the Soviet security and secret police under Stalin reputedly said, “Show me the man, and I’ll find you the crime.” Our country is by no means a Soviet police state yet, but a federal government empowered with a sprawling code that makes all of us potential criminals is more than just an existential threat to American Liberty. This overcriminalization trend must end. Become informed. Learn the issues. Buy the book. And fight back.
From the front lines: Ranchers speak out on border chaos
By Michelle Malkin
http://michellemalkin.com/2010/03/30/from-the-front-lines-ranchers-speak-out-on-border-choas/
I will continue to keep you updated on the investigation into Arizona rancher Rob Krentz’s brutal murder. The latest:
*Funeral services have been set for April 9-10 in Douglas.
*Police are working on theories about the shooter possibly belonging to “a drug cartel scout or a band of thieves terrorizing Arizona ranches.”
*Open-borders Sen. Johnny Come Lately McCain, in the political battle of his life, is now calling for the National Guard. Don’t read his lips. Read his border security-undermining, law enforcement-abandoning record.
*The Arizona Farm Bureau sends the following statement:
“The murder of Cochise County rancher Rob Krentz this last weekend should not have happened and was preventable,” said Arizona Farm Bureau President Kevin Rogers. He and his organization send their deepest sympathy to the Krentz family for their loss.
According to Rogers, the ranching and farming community along the border, have been asking for a secure border for many years. “Our members are the ones who see the illegal traffic including drug and human cargo smuggling coming across their farms and ranches.” Rogers explained that over the last several years, his members have reported coming face to face with these smugglers that are well armed and menacing. “It is time for the federal government to fix this problem before another one of our ranch or farm families are injured or killed. No family should have to endure what the Krentz family is experiencing.”
Rogers said inaction by Congress can no longer be tolerated. “The border needs to be secured,” said Rogers. His organization has long called for securing the border and fixing the worker visa program so we know who is coming into the U.S. and who is overstaying their permission to be here. “Fixing the worker visa program becomes part of securing the border,” he emphasized.
If this tragedy is connected to smuggling from Mexico, swift action is needed to make sure this will not lead to an escalation in Arizona of the violence associated with the drug cartel brutality now just south of our border. “Until Congress addresses securing the border, all necessary resources should be focused on Arizona’s border,” concluded Rogers.
"The e-mail Bag"
You Might Be A Redneck
Thank you Jeff Foxworthy!
You take a fishing pole into Sea World.
You think a turtleneck is key ingredient for soup.
You've ever stood in line to have your picture taken with a freak of nature.
You think the French Riviera is foreign car.
You go to a stock car race and don't need a program.
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