Joshua writes about his mother’s final day.
(Hat tip: Brutally Honest)
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From the monthly archives:
August 2004
If the Imam Ali temple (or whatever it’s called) is still standing behind all that smoke, I’ll be quite disappointed. Why? See Bomb The Temple!
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Swift Board veteran John O’Neill is not afraid of John Kerry’s Ivy League lawyers. From WorldNetDaily:
“If he was actually in Cambodia on Christmas Eve in 1968, he should sue me,” said O’Neill. “If, in fact those other five boats on March 13th, 1969, if they all fled like he did instead of staying like he knows they did, he should sue me.”
….“If he didn’t wound himself with a grenade, causing a rice fanny wound, and then reported it to the Navy as a water mine — if he didn’t do that on March 13th he should sue me,” O’Neill continued. “(The point is) on our first ad he (Kerry) had two huge law firms send letters to every station, threatening to sue the stations themselves (if they ran the ad). “Then he challenged the book’s publisher (Regnery) indicating he would sue them if they had continued printing the book.”
I guess I’m an old-fashioned kind of woman. I like strong men who stand behind their words. O’Neill says he’s telling the truth and challenges Kerry to prove otherwise. What does Kerry do? Sic his lawyers on O’Neill and tries to censor him. Good luck with all that, Kerry, Kerry, quite contrary.
(Hat tip: Barking Moonbat Early Warning System)
Update (8:40 p.m.): What’s the first thing you wanted to do when your mother told you not to do something? You wanted to do it!
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The reverberations of the National Review article are still being felt. Ambra Nykol, probably the youngest member of the Conservative Brotherhood at 22, now has her own weekly column as the lone conservative voice for a local Seattle magazine. Congratulations!
Not even I, the Queen of her Domain, has pulled that off. Yet. Not only that, but she was Insta-lanched on three different links! Mindboggling only to another blogger, right?
I tell Ambra from time to time that if I’d had it together at her age, who knows where I’d be by now? But God saw fit to lay a different path before me. Indeed, his will trumps my own, so where he leads, I will follow.
The NRO piece has been great publicity for all of us. I got a radio interview, more exposure, more writing opportunities and more readers. The bloggers over at Booker Rising are scheduled to do a radio interview this Friday. I’m certain we all will continue to benefit from the NRO piece, especially if we strike while the iron’s hot. The time is now!
Addendum: Next week I’m meeting two more Brotherhood members face to face, Ambra and Avery, as Ambra travels to the east coast. Avery is attending the University of Maryland-College Park, just down the “road.” I had the pleasure of meeting Juliette in June.
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Every so often I want to bring to your attention blogs you may not visit or have never heard of. One such blog is Vision Circle. A frequenter commenter on my site recently started blogging there with one other person. As far as I can tell they’re neither liberals nor conservatives.
We have some ideological differences. I commented on the site months ago in response to criticism of a column I wrote. The atmosphere was somewhat contentious, and I certainly wasn’t in the mood to hear “both sides.” I’m only human, what can I say?
But not having a personal stake in the game, so to speak, allows me to at least try to be more objective. I’m learning a lot from Cobb, founder of the Conservative Brotherhood. He’s much more even-handed as he writes about controversial issues from a conservative point of view. I blogged about one of his posts last month here.
The commenter who recently started blogging at Vision Circle contributes to the discussion on my blog, and I wanted to do the same on his. Vision Circle is civil — no black conservative-hating name-calling going on. I think you’ll find it worth the visit. He doesn’t care much for the NAACP, either, but for different reasons than I do.
Note: Joshua Claybourn, whose mother recently died, has returned from hiatus.
I was late for something. (Note to new readers: This is unusual for me.)
Getting ready for church this morning, I got carried away in front of the mirror. You know how it is, ladies. 
So I drive to church, rush in, wind-blown and out of breath, and I had to sit in the balcony with the other “late people.” What would my mother think?
For some reason I was more focused on the study than usual. Something about it resonated. The pastor spoke about Proverbs 1:20-33, titled “The Call to Wisdom” in my Bible (MacArthur Study Bible, NKJV). Through the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, King Solomon, son of the great King David, wrote:
Wisdom calls aloud outside;
She raises her voice in the open squares.
She cries out in the chief concourses,
At the openings of the gates in the city
She speaks her words:
“How long, you simple ones, will you love simplicity?
For scorners delight in their scorning,
And fools hate knowledge.
Turn at my rebuke;
Surely I will pour out my spirit on you;
I will make my words known to you.
Because I have called and you refused,
I have stretched out my hand and no one regarded,
Because you disdained all my counsel,
And would have none of my rebuke,
I also will laugh at your calamity;
I will mock when your terror comes,
When your terror comes like a storm,
And your destruction comes like a whirlwind,
When distress and anguish come upon you.“Then they will call on me, but I will not answer;
They will seek me diligently, but they will not find me.
Because they hated knowledge
And did not choose the fear of the LORD…
The pastor focused on verses 26-28, which I’ve highlighted in the blockquote. Sounds harsh, doesn’t it? Our good and glorious Creator laughs at us and mocks us? How can this be? The god of secular humanism isn’t mean; he’s nice and flexible and tolerant. In his kingdom, we can do whatever we want (as long as it’s between two consenting adults, of course).
But not in God’s kingdom. In the chapter, wisdom is personified, calling out to us in the street, but we turn away. We prefer our own will and our own standards of morality. God warns that we will suffer the repercussions of our rejection and rebellion. He will laugh at us as we suffer the consequences of our sin. He will mock us as we fear our own destruction coming to us “like a whirlwind.”
This is the God no one likes to talk about. They prefer a pacifist Jesus multiplying bread and fish over a vengeful God pouring out his wrath (which we deserve), but God is all of these things and much more.
Jesus revealed the consequences of our rejection of him as the Messiah. “I am going away, and you will seek Me, and you will die in your sin,” he told the unbelieving Pharisees. “Where I go you cannot come.” (John 8:21)
Christ is also speaking to you. Will you heed the call to wisdom and follow him, or will you die in your sins? As a just God, he must punish lawbreakers. But he is also merciful. He sent another to suffer for our crimes. I don’t know why he did that for me, but I’m eternally grateful.
Will you accept God’s mercy before it’s too late?
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One of the great things about having a blog is that you get to control it. You can run it any way you want. Some bloggers are liberal and open hosts, allowing commenters free reign to insult other commenters and even themselves without being deleted or banned.
Others tolerate no dissent whatsoever. If your views stray in any way from the host’s, you’re banned.
I’m in the middle. I allow dissent and discussion, but I won’t tolerate personal attacks on myself or other commenters. As long as folks are civil, I don’t interfere. Usually.
I am Queen of My Domain and no one else’s. But what if someone insults me in a different kingdom? What control do I have over that? Keep reading.
I don’t usually visit so-called discussion boards because some are a bit too uncontrolled. Even if there’s a moderator, you often find vile and vicious words strewn throughout the “discussion.”
I found myself in one such board because someone had posted a link to my blog and it showed up in my referrers log. Against my better judgment, I decided to take a look. It was an anti-black conservatives thread, and the person who posted the link occasionally comments on my blog. I read several posts by someone who had to be in his teens or early twenties, at the most. Needless to say, this ranter hates black conservatives. Fine. Whatever. Free country.
The purpose of this post: While I can’t control anyone else’s blog or “discussion” board (and don’t want to), I want it widely known that if a commenter on my blog posts anything insulting or offensive or false about me on another blog or board and I find out about it, they will be banished from my territory. Under my rulership, the person can’t even access my site.
Unfortunately, the resourceful and determined can find ways around banning. That goes with the terrority of public web sites. Someone I banned months ago occasionally rears his ugly head, but as soon as I spot him, he’s gone until the next time.
The person who posted the link is quite civil and even-handed on my blog, which I appreciate. But I don’t understand why he/she would want to incite the anger of young, anonymous, unaccountable (and sometimes unstable) discussion board groupies against me. I don’t have the time or the inclination to figure it out. And I don’t want to.
Here’s some advice: If you want to trash me on another site and you want to continue commenting on my domain, don’t link to my URL, OK? Your discussion URL shows up on my referrers list.
Side note: A HaloScan user informed me that she gets error messages when trying to trackback to my posts. If you are a HaloScan user, please let me know if you’re having similar problems.
Rest easy, everybody!
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When FOX news sued Al Franken last year, I was a little embarrassed to be a conservative. Franken’s book, Lies and the Lying Liars Who Tell Them: A Fair and Balanced Look at the Right, was about to come out, and FOX decided to sue because the title contained the words “fair and balanced.”
I thought the whole thing was stupid and brought unnecessary and unneeded press to Franken and his liberal cohorts. See this Washington Post (registration req.) story for background.
In a developing story on the Drudge Report, John Kerry’s band of legal thugs is “asking” Regnery Publishing to withdraw the book that exposes him as a liar. What a gaggle of idiots. (I try not to call people “idiots”, but it’s Friday and I feel like doing it.)
I think it’s just as dumb for John Kerry to try to ban the book. Why? Because it’s giving the book and his lies unnecessary press. Either answer the charges (with specifics, not generalizations) or ignore the book. In the words of someone I “know”, Kerry whines, cries, but does not answer.
Besides, even if Regnery withdrew the book, Kerry’s still got problems with his ever-changing war stories. Good grief. At least Bill Clinton was slick, John. Learn from your great savior!
When Michael Moore’s trash came out, the RNC didn’t sic a bunch of slick lawyers on the pitiful, desperate, overreaching liberals, did they? The generously-proportioned Moore is still raking in the dough. Liberal dupes.
Articles referring to Kerry’s lies: Kerry should show records and Swiftee John O’Neill Speaks Out on Kerry’s False Claims.
Blogs For Bush, Patriot Paradox, Ramblings’ Journal and Evangelical Outpost weigh in.
By the way, Michelle Malkin will be on Rush Limbaugh in the 1 o’clock hour. She’ll talk about her treatment last night by Chris Matthews on Hardball. Michelle’s blog is being overrun. You may not be able to access it for a while.
Update (6:50 p.m.): It’s getting really muddy. Kerry goes crying to the Federal Election Commission.
(Hat tip: Ramblings’ Journal)
Update II (8/21): Unfortunately, the GOP also cries.
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That should have been the title and theme of the discussion panel at the Cato Institute last night because what I sat through was boring and uninspiring. The highlight of the evening was when Walter Williams, who was the moderator (he’s the tall one), interjected a comment or two.
The panel included Douglas Besharov, a professor at the University of Maryland School of Public Policy, Marie Gryphon of the Cato Institute, Tonya Clay, People for the American Way and Harry Holzer, Georgetown University.
As far as I could tell, Gryphon, a former education policy analyst at Cato, was the only anti-affirmative action panelist, but in a libertarian way. I’ll elaborate later. Tonya Clay is a black lawyer who is pro-race preferences, and believes, as do most liberals, that “affirmative action” is a fair policy that “levels the playing field.”
I squirmed in my seat as she rattled off the usual excuses for lowering standards for blacks: diversity and fairness (shameful!).
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A “holy” site ceases to be one when used as a base camp for death. Is this how to fight a war? To play shoot ‘em up and run back to your respective corners when we have the military might to turn the whole country into a pile of sand in the middle of a pile of sand? George Bush and his politically correct war. Senseless.
The great and powerful Moqtada al-Sadr can thank his lucky stars this isn’t WWII and Bush isn’t Roosevelt or Truman. He and his rag-tag bunch of toy soldiers would’ve been in their graves by now. Instead, they get to fight their way and make headlines all over the world. Unbelievable. A weak enemy dictates when and how and on what terms it will surrender. I long for the 1940s when men were men and nationalism and support for the war were running high. Yeah, I would’ve had a problem with race segregation and all that, but at least I’d be protected from my foreign enemies. Not anymore.
Middle Eastern men are crossing our porous southern border alongside Mexicans. Bush is too politically correct to close the darn thing and put an indefinite moratorium on Arab immigration. No one has a right to come to the United States, and we’re not required to let anyone in. Sometimes we forget that.
Close the borders and start kicking in doors to find the Muslim scourge hiding in our midst, laughing at our stupidity.
If only I were queen of the world!
Addendum: How many of our men died during this pointless scuffle? Even if the number is only “1″, shame on you, Mr. Bush!
Update: Moqtada al-Sadr is still running things. Not even Bill Clinton would put up with this.
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From WorldNetDaily, October 6, 2003:
“On all the matters that touch upon the critical moral issues, Arnold Schwarzenegger is on the evil side. This is a fact. A mere list of the positions he supports is enough to make this plain: abortion as a ‘right,’ cloning of human beings, governmental classification of citizens by race, public benefits for sexual partners outside of marriage, disrespect for property rights against environmental extremism, repudiation of the right to bear arms — no more need be said to show that this candidate is wrong where human decency, human rights and human responsibility bear directly on political issues.” [my emphasis]
What changed?
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Fringe does a beautiful job showcasing this week’s submissions to the Carnival of the Vanities.
Christian Carnival is up at Parablemania. I wish I had the time to comment on a few of these submissions. I may do so sometime tomorrow, so stay tuned.
In the meantime, go give a blogger some love.
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Either Alan Keyes has lost his mind, or he’s getting back at The Man. You may have heard of The Man. He’s responsible for all that ails the black community.
Keyes is now a slave reparations proponent. A commenter at Ramblings’ Journal suggested (tongue-in-cheek?) that Keyes may be taking revenge on the Illinois GOP for using him as a token. I wasn’t following this story because frankly, I couldn’t care less about Keyes or the race in Illinois; however, now that I’m thinking about it, I can’t figure out why else Keyes would support such nonsense.
This is why I’m not a liberal, and I thought it was the reason why Keyes wasn’t a liberal. Without the ability to read his mind, I have no idea why he’s supporting reparations. The possibility that gets top billing is his desire, subconscious or otherwise, to mock the GOP while garnering publicity for himself.
According to the Chicago Tribune (registration req.):
Speaking at a news conference at the Hotel InterContinental in Chicago, Republican Keyes added to his now familiar talking points his stance on slavery reparations.Prompted by a reporter’s question, Keyes gave a brief tutorial on Roman history and said that in regard to reparations for slavery, the U.S. should do what the Romans did: “When a city had been devastated [in the Roman empire], for a certain length of time — a generation or two — they exempted the damaged city from taxation.”
Keyes proposed that for a generation or two, African-Americans of slave heritage should be exempted from federal taxes — federal because slavery “was an egregious failure on the part of the federal establishment.” In calling for the tax relief, Keyes appeared to be reaching out to capture the black vote, something that may prove difficult to do, particularly after his unwelcome reception at the Bud Billiken Day Parade Saturday.
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Just kidding, Mrs. Williams!
I may get to meet Walter Williams tomorrow at the Cato Institute’s “Affirmative Action after Michigan” policy forum. Williams will moderate a panel of speakers representing different organizations (People for the American Way? Aren’t they communists?) If you’re in town, I’ll see you there. If not, you can listen or watch live online.
You might hear my disembodied voice asking a question on the pretense of challenging one of the speakers, but all I’m really doing is plugging my blog. Confession is good for the soul. Just kidding…
This is a wonderful opportunity to listen, learn, take notes and gather material for blogging and column-ing. And network. Blurb from Cato:
One year after the Supreme Court decided twin affirmative action cases involving the University of Michigan, colleges across the country have retooled their systems to comply with the Court’s decision. Because legal questions about preferential admissions policies are largely settled, policymakers must focus on important recent studies about the practical effects of affirmative action. Does affirmative action raise the incomes of minority students? Does it reduce minority graduation rates at selective schools? Join several scholars for a crucial update on recent legal and policy developments.
I’m going to pretend to be somebody important and try to get involved in the discussion. The forum begins at 4:00 p.m. EST with a reception to follow. That’s when I’ll make my move!
Just kidding, Mrs. Williams!
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If you heart GWB, show your support for the president and click on the link to buy “I heart GWB” merchandise: yoga pants, and t-shirts, even tiny tees for babies. Go check it out!
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