Category: Society

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No Redemption Absent Admission of Guilt

Or, no one can truly be forgiven if we eradicate “right” and “wrong”.

Mike Adams has a short piece that underscores some of the same issues that brought Dr. Karl Menninger, of the well-known and highly-respected Menninger psychiatric institute to write, “Whatever Became of Sin?” in the 1970s.

There are a number of problems associated with redefining all undesirable forms of behavior as “disorders” to be cured. Among them is the unanticipated consequence of depriving man of his humanity. If a man is merely a victim of some disease then he cannot really be considered evil. If he has no potential to be evil, he has no potential to be good.

C.S. Lewis pointed out another unanticipated consequence of our rush to treat, rather than punish, people who do evil things. He noted that the same intellectuals who determine when an illness has set in will also determine when that illness has dissipated. And they have a powerful incentive to drag out the entire process. Who among us would not rather take our punishment and be done with it – as opposed to waiting in perpetuity for the official clearance of a doctor?

Adams emerges at a slightly different place than Menninger, but both raise the issue of converting what is simply bad behavior into “treatable” so-called “medical conditions”.

The really critical issue to me is that wrong-doers can NOT obtain forgiveness for their wrong-doing and move on to reformation and redemption absent admission of guilt and genuine repentance–a desire to abandon their wrong-doing and change their evil ways. Yes, I said “evil”–so? 🙂 A part of admission of guilt and repentance must embrace a willingness to accept punishment and an attempt to make restitution for wrong-doing. While those last two things may stand apart from being forgiven by those they have wronged, full restoration into (whatever) society must hinge on demonstrations of willingness to make genuine restitution, however much it is possible to do so.

BTW, that last is one reason why I am a firm supporter of capital punishment for some crimes. There are simply some things for which no one can make restitution, and the criminal taking of another human life is one of them. No amount of repentance or genuine expression of remorse can restore the life (or lives) taken by a drunk driver, for example, but as long as society wrongly excuses such drunken manslaughter by giving drunk drivers a “bye” for their supposed “disease”, proper punishment of their crime (and the resultant “encouragement” of other drunks to eschew driving in the condition they created by choosing to be drunks) will not occur. (Yes, I do believe the proper punishment of someone who commits vehicular manslaughter as a result of choosing to drive drunk is execution. Preferably by having their own car–or whatever remains of it–dropped on them repeatedly, in public, until they are a greasy smear.)

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“There Will Always Be An Island Off the Coast of France”

It used to be that it was said, “There will always be an England,” but it ain’t necessarily so anymore.

Caravanner, 61, prosecuted for having Swiss Army knife in his glove box… to cut up fruit on picnics

A disabled caravanner who kept a penknife in his glove compartment to use on picnics has blasted the authorities after being dragged through court for possessing an offensive weapon.

Rodney Knowles, 61, walks with the aid of a stick and had used the Swiss Army knife to cut up fruit on picnics with his wife.

That’s right, folks” a 2.5-inch bladed Swiss Army Knife. Evidence of obvious intent to commit mayhem.

*sigh* And here in the USA, more of the same, as the TSA will confiscate any lil teen-eintsy bladed “weapon” from once-free citizens, when they’re not going full court press to fine and imprison folks for whatever strikes the Thousands Standing Around as an appropriate expression of their goonery.

This in a land where my grandfather and his brothers once took their Model 1895 Winchesters to school–talk about school safety! Imagine some idiot trying to hold up a school where the teacher and students were all armed to the teeth! Ah, but those were different times, you say. Yes, they were, more’s the pity.

As for that “island off the coast of France” thing, well, that may not even be “always” if the Calip-hate has its way… With a completely disarmed populace, how long until Londonistan is added as “the chief city of an island in the Calip-hate just off the coast of Francistan”?

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Mass MEdia Podpeople Hivemind: Easily Gulled… Because It Wants to Be

Why was the Mass MEdia Podpeople Hivemind and the Leftard Blogosphere so quick to rush to judgement (yeh, yeh, I know Noah Webster thought the first “e” superfluous, but I simply do not agree) on the suicide of Bill Sparkman, blaming it–if only by implication–on “right wing extremists” like… Glenn Beck? (That puppy?!? *sheesh!*) Well, of course they all had good reason to suspect foul play from the redneck Appalachian right wing extremists! How much electronic ink will now be given by those same Hivemind members to the now established fact that SParkman faked his own “homicide” and apologies for the Hivemind’s earlier spew of anti-right hate ? Not much, given the kind of waffling excuses now offered by the Hivemind,

Appalachia has long had an image of being wary of and sometimes hostile toward strangers. Incidents such as the September 1967 shooting of Canadian filmmaker Hugh O’Connor, who was gunned down by an enraged landowner while making a documentary on poverty in nearby Letcher County, have done nothing to dispel such notions. [emphasis added]

Wow. An incident 42 years ago, kept alive as a major reason the Mass MEdia Podpeople Hivemind thinks of Appalachia as “hostile toward strangers”. Now, that makes sense. In the cacotopic1 world of Orwell’s 1984. One of the Mass MEdia Podpeople Hivemind’s own was shot for being where he definitely did not belong, was not invited and was not welcome, while being a nosy parker. That sounds more like a righteous shooting to me (especially since the guy had been told to leave the property owner’s property and had put up an argument, had a crew with him, etc.). Hobart Ison’s eventual conviction for manslaughter (his first trial resulted in a hung jury in a locale removed from his true peers–because the “gummint” knew it’d not get a conviction in his home county) resulted in a year’s time served. Far too great a price to pay for the removal of a Mass MEdia Podperson, IMO. After all, I thought removal of vermin and garbage disposal was one of the prime goods of civilization?

BTW, “trespassers will be shot” isn’t an uncommon sign in the Ozarks, either. And rightly so.

1“cacotopia”–a society built on feces. Rather like the sub-society called “Congress”.

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What Ails US

“A nation of sheep will surely beget a government of wolves.” -Henry de Jouvenel

The ever increasingly lupine nature of our “feddle gummint” tells me that our political elite and “feddle gummint” bureaucraps definitely think we are a nation of sheep.

Is it so?

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A Re-run of Why We’re In the Mess We’re In

This is just the tip of the iceberg, folks. Here’s why we not only have a person occupying the White House who has spent millions avoiding presenting any proof he’s qualified to serve and whose every act since assuming office has been detrimental to the U.S. but also why we have the faithless Congress and despicable courts and federal bureaucrappy we have. You don’t even have to read between the lines to get the picture.

Yep. an electorate that’s barely intelligent enough and well-informed enough to stumble into the voting booth without breaking both legs and decapitating themselves with a butterfly ballot.

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Take Back Your Government

What would you pay to get the tools to take back our government and save our country?

From the author’s preface to Take Back Your Government:

HOW TO SAVE YOUR COUNTRY

This is intended to be a practical manual of instruction for the American layman who has taken no regular part in politics, has no personal political ambitions, and no desire to make money out of politics, but who, nevertheless, would like to do something to make his or her chosen form of government work better. If you have a gnawing, uneasy feeling that you should be doing something to preserve our freedoms and to protect and improve our way of life but have been held back by lack of time, lack of money, or the helpless feeling that you individually could not do enough to make the effort worthwhile, then this book was written for you.

Take Back Your Government (Click for larger image)

The book is currently being sold by Baen Books in a bundle with Taxpayer’s Tea Party by Sharon Cooper and Chuck Asay. The cost for both books bundled together in any of a wide range of eBook formats is just $8. I’m currently reading my copy of Take Back Your Government in my web browser in the html version.

Taxpayer's Tea Party Manual

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How Did The 0! Get Elected, Anyway?

Go HERE and take the simple, easy-peasy (seriously!) “Civics Quiz” and see how The 0! got elected. Americans are simply illiterate when it comes to American history and knowledge of our governing documents, etc.

Paula-beats-Abe

“If there is any presidential speech that has captured a place in popular culture, it is the Gettysburg Address, seemingly recited by school children for decades. The truth is, however, Lincoln’s most memorable words are now remembered by very few.

“Of the 2,508 Americans taking ISI’s civic literacy test, 71% fail. Nationwide, the average score on the test is only 49%. The vast majority cannot recognize the language of Lincoln’s famous speech.

“The test contains 33 questions designed to measure knowledge of America’s founding principles, political history, international relations, and market economy…

“…The results reveal that Americans are alarmingly uninformed about our Constitution, the basic functions of our government, the key texts of our national history, and economic principles.”

Well, maybe for a majority of the proles that is true, but surely our well-educated college grads fare better? Nope.

“College graduates in all age brackets—except Baby Boomers (ages 45 to 64)—typically earn an ‘F’ on the exam. Baby Boomers who ended their formal education with a bachelor’s degree score an average of 61%, or a ‘D-.'”

(Well, that certainly squares with the report that 69% of college graduates couldn’t read directions to find their way out of a paper bag… *feh*)

But wait! There’s more! From the “Civics Quiz” report:
Continue reading “How Did The 0! Get Elected, Anyway?”

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Writers for C- Movies Should Stick to the SyFy Channel…

…not become “New York Times Best-Selling” authors.

*sigh*

All these idiots do is accelerate the pejoration of the English language as a whole, dumb down the reading public even further (actually, quite an accomplishment, when you think about it) and increase the bloated landfill “wannabes” that our public libraries and book stores seem to aspire to being. Commas splices, split infinitives (where none are needed for jargon or idomatic speech and where such abortions of syntax and semantics actually harm clear communication), and inapropriate word usage when compounded by drearily banal plots, laughable and completely inexcusable historical and factual faux pas, and stereotypes in place of characters, just make for poor reading.

But that’s what passes for “New York Times Best-Sellers” in a post-literate age. *sigh* I know, because I just struggled through another one such book in an attempt to find a new author I might enjoy reading. Why did I not close the book and end the torture after the first page? Frankly, I wanted to give it a fair and honest read and the author a chance to redeem himself, but Raymond Koury just would not cooperate, and so–on to the dreadfully predictable end, slogging through some of the crappiest writing I have ever subjected myself to–I persisted. And I regretted it “alright” (one of Koury’s many, many assinine pejorations of the English language appropriated from such subliterate American pop culture “literary giants” as The Who, The Killers, Janet Jackson and Jennifer Lopez *feh*).

I feel certain that reading Koury’s writing has killed enough brain cells (they suicided as prodigious rates the more I read of Koury’s drek) to lower my IQ by 10 points. Oh, I can afford the loss, though, since I live in a society dominated by stupified dolts who, for one example of many, voted to ensconce The 0! in the White, urm, “Café au Lait” House. The lower ones IQ, the more sense the passing scene makes…

But just a fair warning: if you don’t think you can afford to kill off a lot of brain cells, take a pass on books written by Raymond Koury.

Note 1: It didn’t help Koury much that I had just read a very nice piece of fiction by Lawrence Block. The comparison between Block’s literate style, wry wit, tight plotting and spare but nevertheless vivid charactizations and Koury’s “anything BUT the above” only served to highlight Koury’s faults as a writer.

Note 2: the SciFi channel’s recent name alteration to “SyFy” is just another of the many unutterably stupid word alterations that subliterate idiots in marketing and advertising (and “news” and contemporary “music” etc., etc.) have inflicted on American English. *feh” on them all. Of course, ignoring the SciFi (or SyFy if one wants to be a complete idiot) Channel is no great loss, as a general rule. Has anyone among the readers (assuming more than one *heh*) of this blog yet “succeeded” in watching ANY of the “made for SciFi/SyFy ‘movies'” all the way through? Thought not. Dreck of the lowest order. Labeling them “C- movies” is probably an insult to the makers of C- movies everywhere.