These Are the Good Old Days

We will look back on today as "The good old days" because of the prosperity we are in right now, thanks in part to George Bush. There is no doubt that economic growth does occur in an "unfettered" environment. Compared to decades past there aren't as many people suffering or in desperate need of a job as there has been. I believe that today we may indeed be in the twilight of a "Non police state" era. You never know what's going to happen when they start putting video cameras on every street corner. Brittain has over a million of them, but Britain is not the United States and hasn't opted for the state of economic and cultural fascisum we live in here. We are evolving into a corporate fasciest state. This is a state of existence where corporations take part in the power of government and we are "farming more things out" to corporations. Thom Hartman has posed the question "What if General Electric had the power to come after you with troops and throw you in jail?" The internet may not exist the freeforall it is now for much longer. Of course we know of internet outlets like Google threatened and cajoled to allow and take part in government investigations, like they do in China. I've watched enough "Passions" to know that government and other "bigwigs" can bring all sorts of pressure to bear, economic and otherwise, to make entities do your bidding. It's just possible all of these election fraud, rather than go away or be resolved, will only get worse. I forsee a time where there will be massive buying and selling votes for a particular candidate as unfettered capitalism finds another way to make money. Of course I've mentioned how "being normal" will be held at a greater premium than ever before. For diagnosing a disease like autisum this might be a good thing but certain personality traits may suddenly become "abnormal". People such as employers play the odds rather than deal to the man when they hire. They run you through their increasingly obscure psychological tests to screen you out. People think walking around in an atomaton like state is just for the Sci-Fi movies but it might be closser than you think. It seems that polls Dictate the results more than they measure it. The government has learned how to "push people's buttons" with the right psychological phrasing used in questions. I would not be surprised if several decades down the line they actually had a department of Society and Human Management. Hillary Clinton scares me as a candidate because she may be a liberal but she's also a power junky and a manipulator of people and information. Nobody cares about impeaching anybody- - not Alberto Gonzoles, not Bush, not Chaney. People think Congress will change once the Congressmen get back to their voters and the voters give the congressmen a piece of their minds. I hope "feedback" still matters but polls incidate this congress has just as low ratings as the last one they voted out. I don't like the idea of us being a society of entertainment junkeys. It must say something about a society that the two things we're still good at are building bombs and running the "entertainment industry". The government knows we are increasingly distracted and "amused" (that word neans NOT think) The government is coming to think of us as little better than Homer Simpson. We need to wake up in America. We have a better "work ethic" than we had thirty years ago, but we're like two people in a chess game and the government is the superior player always thinking several moves ahead, manipulating you with miscues. The media is in the business of selling Fear. I miss the days when news was really news and educational TV wasn't watered down, and when people had more moral "horse sense" than they do today.

Now they are telling us that the corner is turned in the Iraq War. Al Qaida is splintering into warring factions and people are defecting. Others can't be counted to fight for Al Qaida like they used to. We are told that in a poll the American people "favor the original Invasion" by increasing numbers. There were those two journalists who wrote in that New York Times article that used to be against the war but now have seen the light and thing the Surge is a great thing and we have to pursue our military atvantage. Larry Elder quotes some democrats as wishing we would fail in Iraq. I don't know any of those. One Democrat (was it Feingold) responded "That would be a big problem" when confronted with a possible US victory. I am not one of these negative people who hopes for a defeat. I know what that's like because there are times when I sensed family members were hoping for MY defeat. I think we should thank God or Alah or somebody for any and all advantage in the War. There should be a way our side can exploit any advantage Our way. In a chess game if the "circumstances" are conducive, you exploit every little advantage or Our side benefits. Rather than being a problem I'd say it's an oppertunity for Democrats to say "We could have had this positive turn events a lot sooner if you'd taken our advice. When things look good, it's still possible to blow it and you need a skilled man or woman at the helm who is experianced who knows what they are doing. Joe Byden foresaw a partitioned Iraq and now it looks like Suni and Shiite are cloistering around their own kind, even if Baghdad has gone from Suni to Shiite. People are "voting with their feet". I guess Larry Elder might call it, "Letting market forces resolve the problem". As long as people are firing on each other less, that's a good thing. Let's not discourage it. All I'm staying is that astrologically it will not be a bed of roses in the coming months. New clashes will arise and new crises will rear their heads. In the end the "status quo" will pervail. Iraq won't go democratic. Basically what we have is an unsolvable problem. We have irreconsilable political and religions difference. The sooner we realize this simple truth and pull out our troops, the better.

If you're alive today "These are the good old days". Nobody is getting any younger. Young people know the old envy them and try to hide it. The dad is thinking "I wish I were junior's age" and it's his fondest hope that Junior would look foreward to being "older", like the Beach Boy's song. Being older is good for two things- - fine Whiskey and Stratavarious violins. Other than that I don't see the percentage of "being old". Of course Dad is kidding himself if he says "If I were junior I wouldn't act that way". No, he'd act like a 45 year old man in the midst of a bunch of teenagers. "Give me a break!" It's a basic fact that the older you are the less alive you are and the closser to death you are. You're more introspective, but part of this is because you don't have anything better to do. Of course the "Death Merchants" are out in force. I refer to the evangelical Christians. Here's how they sell God and Death. In this world God is Dead. Even they in their saner moments, when cornered, will admit this Truth. But what they market is the idea that Creation still occurs with God. You're soul was "created" at the moment of your conception and that soul was specifically dezigned as a plan for your life. God had just the specialness of You in mind when he created your soul. You have a "beginning". Sylvia Browne may talk about death being a "return" to Eternity or something. The Mormons also believe that Death marks a "Return" to a prior state. Not so the Christians. They paint Heaven as something alltogether new and extatic, like your first Lay, or the first time you shot up Heroin. I asked one Christian, "What if that Minister who preachers there is no Hell for any of us but we all go to Heaven- - turns out to be right?" Her response was, "What would be the point". She saw part of Heaven is being able to feel superior to those who didn't make it there and if you can't, what's the point? Of course you can catch Christians in a lie (among so many lies!) because when they're "Selling their wares" they will tell you that Creating you was a special event and God has a life and destiny planned just for you and it has meaning". Now I look back on Life and say "Even if all my most fanciful wishes were granted tomorrow, that Still doesn't excuse all the wasted years trying to be a Christian, and failing". So in essence if we're all given access to Fort Knox with a bottomless barrel of gold coins there- - I will be partaking with the rest, but knowing that my life before was meaningless. Basically I see little possability that my Life here on earth had any meaning or significance at all- - and memories of it will fade in the Next Life. I'll be happy to take the seventy-two virgins. They will help me forget. Of course the thing is considering what sort of "brownie points" Christian pastors say it takes to heaven, God may decide that he'll pay us in the sort of deeds that got us there to begin with. If we got there by being phoney and putting on a good Act, God may pay us in Phoneyness. If we accrew our place in the Afterlife by giving away eighteen dollar bills, God will look us square in the face on judgement day and say "Do you want to be paid in three sixes or two nines"? The idea that a married man is sexually dissatisfied would be no problem in their world. Don't you know that Walter Martin once said "There is enough sin in a new born baby to send him to Hell a thousand times over". This statement loomed over me as I looked at all the new babies of the people I got saved around. In Dante's Divine Comedy there were two classes of people who went to Limbo, newborn babies, and people who experienced excessive passion during sex. Of course since sex is Sin incarnete- - then the baby, the result of that sin, is also Sin incarnate. But basically the idea that we survive Death at all is at best speculative. I've been searching for that "Divine spark" or "Holy Spirit" or whatever that "thing" in me is that's supposed to be Supernatural, and haven't found it. To base your life on something there is no evidence of - -is faulty reasoning. In the song "How firm a foundation?" my response is, "You don't want me to tell you". Just because you can't "Imagine" what it's like NOT being alive, doesn't deny the reality of it. I don't believe I am the result of creating something "Special" or new at the time of my birth. Sorry, I don't.

Let's think about today. It's back to school if you're a kid. Commercials have started in earnest this week. Football season is only a few days away. The new TV season is coming. But these are all that "entertainment" stuff. People need to be happy at their jobs and if their job doesn't contribute to the country they should get another one that does. People should get involved in politics and by all means vote after studying the issues. People should work for the betterment of society. People should think about the ills of our society that they have the power to correct.

Look Out! - Here Comes Tomorrow

Well here we are the last Friday in July. Football season isn’t starting nearly as early as it did, for instance in 1991 when the official season began September first. I have only heard one Back to School commercial, and other than the Atlanta Falcons, I haven’t heard of other teams opening training camps. In terms of what I predict for the future astrologically I’m supposed to be careful in the statements I make verbally and in writing the next two months. I’ll consider myself warned. Sylvia Brown predicts weather stuff. I don’t. Weather will be the last thing on our minds in the coming months and once again the hurricane season will have much fewer hurricanes than average. What I do see is a lot of sudden, new, troubling international incidents that will push the stock market down. August will of course be a record bad month in Iraq, and Bush will be very glad that congress is not in session. What I see in the campaign is one candidate dropping out suddenly, which will surprise and even shock people. In fact it might be due to unnatural causes such as an assasenation, that will invite much speculation for years to come. . A name just came to me out of the ether waves - - Berock Obama - - as a campaign whose campaign will suddenly be aborted, perhaps involuntarily. Housing declines will be only the first harvenger of an overall general decline in the economy starting at the beginning of next year. If Rush Limbaugh really is up in the ratings it only goes to show that media management has become more effective in making the population in general more conservative. It is my guess that this drought we’re in in Southern California will continue for most of next year. To summarize, the amount of governmental cover-up during the next few months will be unprecedented. A virtually identical version of the I Phone will be selling for $299.00 Several weeks ago we predicted Fred Thompson would not run, and we are right. We have become a country where the arrests of celebrities or the latest movie sequels are more important to the TV viewer than hard news. Candidates have lost control of their image in campaign thanks to You-Tube.

Thank you, Neil Diamond. This is Saturday morning and I just waited nearly a half hour for a pancake and bacon breakfast. It was a big old slab of bacon. I like a little fat on my bacon as well as the next fellow but this was rediculas. I decided I'd cut off the fat and dedicate it to Jehovah and eat the rest of the meat as a peace offering. So much for the religious mockery. Marcus was outside reciting a line from "The Godfather" as he loaned John Metz a cigarette.

On Passions they have this guy named Vince who has raped one woman and framed someone else for it. He then killed a lezbian and a bar tender when they each announced they had enlightening evidence to offer. He then had homosexual relations with a woman's husband just to get even with her. Now his mother and father, on the eve of the innocent man's scheduled execution, are debating what they should do with their newfound knowledge about their son. The concensus seems to be that even if an innocent man has to die that it's worth it to spare their murderous son any potential pain or disconfort. After all "He needs help" and the mercy of God. This is what a priest told him. (Too bad he didn't show the "Mercy of God" to his three victums) I forgot, he killed his therapist, too. That makes three. A lot of people have questions about God because it would seem that if God were "getting good advice", he'd be rewarding good people and punishing bad people. If God were getting advice from an evil person he'd be punishing the good- - - and rewarding evil people. We know from the book of Job that Satan sometimes advises God. Satan was there in heaven with God (where man is not allowed to go according to the O T) along with others of God's "Sons", whom most people believe are arch angels of some sort. Of course most of the O T has certain teachings about Jehovah, which, if you are an anti - dyspensationalist like I am, you believe that Jehovah still retains. In Jehovah's world the guilty are brought to a sure and certain death and the innocent are looked after. Yes you had polygamy - - but you also had a system of blood atonement using animals (most of the time) by which the ongoing curse of sin could be lifted from your life, and you would go your way removed from the curse and your life would be "blessed going out and blessed coming in", and all that stuff from Deuteronomy. They say "The wages of sin is death" but that's only the FINAL result. There are a lot of steps in between. The wages of sin is NOT, "Eternal damnation in a firey Hell". Such a state was unknown to the Hebrews. When Jesus came the Marcionites argued that whatever attributes Jehovah had were now passe and no longer opperative. John the Baptist asked from his prison cell whether Jesus was the Messiah and Jesus said, "Tell John that the sick are healed and the demon posessed are delivered". Stewart Sutcliffe has comented on this verse "It doesn't matter whether a hundred received healing meracles or a thousand were delivered from demonic oppression- - are you the deliveror of the nation of Isrial from its bondage to Rome; that's the $64,000 question." Is good winning over evil? Even Dennis Prager believes in a God who rewards good and punishes evil, be they individual people or whole Nations or races yearning to be free.

I just want to say a word about the future. Sometimes you think you can hide from it. Some people get Life Insurance and some people don't. Some people think their lives are so good they don't need religion of any sort because they're "Set for life". They are married and have a good job and earn lots of money, and their wife is free from scandal in her past. Their family is well respected in the community. Their children are well liked and they keep out of trouble, and it school they don't get involved in any questionable left-wing projects. But the thing is with this list I could be describing a pastor's children, too. You know, the "good people". The thing is with Christians who are snobs and look down on others Jesus says, "They have their reward". Chuck Swendoll is a perfect dyspensationalist. Trust doctors. Don't go for devine healing. After these were "only to prove a theological point" and not for our time. Likewise don't get caught up in any "deliverance minestries" that deliver you from demons and Satan. And don't do any of this praying in tongues stuff. Jesus on KFI says "These people only pray in tongues to feel important". Basically what the ideal Christian seems to do is to get a God whom he doesn't need and brag about it to others how much he's been blessed, and make them feel spiritually inferior and not "flowing in the spirit" like his family is. Chuck Swendoll used to be the head of Evangelical Free church of Fullerton. Of all the church I've ever attended in my life this one wins first pries for most unfriendly. They were cold and unfriendly both when Chuck was there and after he'd departed. Swendoll left the church after delivering a number of sermons on how the congragation had let him down- - and in general was discontent with them. In a Pastor's mind you don't get Mad- - you get Even, by moving on to a bigger and better job. In this case that is Dallas theological seminary or some such thing. Head of the Baptist Church. Jesus said of these people, "You have your reward". Marcus, the guy here- - said this morning there were two things you should always remember. Never let go of your Dreams, and every time you point a finger there are two pointing back at you. In an attempt to appear pious, some Pastors will even envoke this line. If it's so for people like Chuck Swendoll, who questions your patriotisum if you didn't fight in the Viet Nam war- - then I am tempted to pronounce judgement on these pastors saying, "Be it done unto you as you have said." But the thing is you might not land up in Hell like the Rich Man in the Lazerus parable. Because that might not be the worst thing God could do to you. If you point the finger at others for the SIN of being poor and not being "blessed" and have no compassion for them, I'm sure fire and brimstone isn't the worst punishment God could think of. Some pastors might just consider that "Ambience". A little atnosphere. If Death is "the end" then this might not be the worst thing. Because the worst thing like Job that could happen is God takes away from you the things you value most. I'm just saying if God wants to punish you he knows how to hit below the belt.

Some look at the future still and say "Well your threats don't matter. Religion is alive and better than ever in George Bush's America". Let me offer you this one thought. They are discovering genes for new things every day. They may even have isolated biological causes of homosexuality. They're looking for the cause of autisum. They say there might even be a "religion" gene. There are Genomes. There are also epi-genomes, where genes are either switched ON or switched OFF by the substances identical twins ingest, that makes them diverge after a while. Sometimes a gene can cause cancer and sometimes a gene can prevent it. Suppose they declare Religion and notibally Conservative Religion as a "mental illness"? Don't laugh. There are already people from World Net Daily that think it's happening now. The thing is if Religion ever comes under government persecution that way where it's judged a mental illness- - these Christians are going to need something besides the toothless, emasculated God of the dyspensationalist. People say "If Jesus did another thing besides die on the cross I'd be happy" Don't be too sure. The Future may be here before you know it and Christianity may be snuffed out like yesterday's cigarette, which has also been banned. There may be a move twords Conformity that you can't believe government may decree. This stuff about "Diversity" is bull. Rush is right. The Rainbow coalition is anything but diverse. If and when Hillary Clinton becomes President we're all going to get used to a whole lot of new, oppressive things, which we never had to worry about before. Christianity is in mortal danger from future government.