The Scriptorium

The Israeli government’s despicable eviction of Israeli settlers in Gaza is set to ignite a tinderbox of civil unrest. The government has declared Gaza a military zone, has stormed a hotel to evict the Israeli citizens, and is shutting Gaza down piece by piece, evicting Israelis as they go.

Israeli settlers are not pleased, and have vowed to flood Gaza with tens of thousands of protestors if the government does not change course. Sharon’s plan to hand over promised land to the Palestinian Arabs will undoubtedly result in bloodshed, as Israeli soldiers get in armed confrontations with the settlers whose homes were stripped from them. Pray for Israel.

Protesters to flood Gaza if closure not rescinded

Israeli commandos storm Gaza hotel

You know, at the rate things are going in this country, it wouldn’t surprise me if a student would someday get a failing grade for writing an English paper about God. Whoops!! Just happened.

Yup, you heard me…

A college in southern California is now investigating the case of a student who says she was given an F for mentioning “God” against the expressed wishes of her atheist instructor.

Bethany Hauf, a freshman at Victor Valley Community College near San Bernadino, wrote the G-word 41 times in a paper titled “In God We Trust,” examining the role of religion in government.

She included “God” despite being told not to by adjunct English instructor Michael Shefchik.

“He said it would offend others in class,” Hauf, 34, told the Daily Press. “I didn’t realize God was taboo.”

The mother of four from Apple Valley, Calif., is now demanding an apology from the school, as well as a regrading of her 10-page report.

“I don’t lose my First Amendment rights when I walk into that college,” she said.

By the way, the good professor has an email address, if you’d like to let him know (politely and in a Christian manner) that you disapprove of his unconstitutional grading criteria: shefchikm@vvc.edu

While Canada moves closer to legalizing gay marriage, Spain jumped ahead and did just that, over the objections of that nation’s senate. In so doing, they joined Belgium and the Netherlands in the ranks of nations that have opened legal marriages to homosexuals. Spain’s conservative senate rejected this legislation, but theirs is an advisory role only.

Gay marriage advocates in the United States are facing an uphill battle, with most Americans dead-set against it. States have been amending their consitutions to define marriage as between a man and woman only, and these amendments have met with widespread voter approval. Even today, Americans tend to be more religious than our friends across the Atlantic. However, there is more than just a religious component to gay marriage opposition. Many non-Christians recognize the sanctity of marriage from a values as well as logic standpoint. After all, if equal access under the constitution means homosexuals should be allowed to marry, then that same argument can be used to push for polygamist marriages, bestiality marriages, incestual marriages, and pedophilial marriages. While many gay marriage proponents find such arguments ridiculous, they are a logical extension of the same legal arguments they’re using today.

Canada’s House of Commons passed legislation Tuesday that would legalize gay marriage by the end of July as long as the Senate goes along, which they’re almost certain to do. Do we owe Sodom and Gomorrah an apology?

AP Article

We frequently get e-mails at CM that accuse us as Christians of being either ignorant of science, or scared of it. Rather than engage in an educated debate on the facts they prefer to believe all Christians are stupid. We usually let them know that Ben and I both majored in a field of science. I could hardly have made it through all that Chemistry if I were scared of science, and my professors made it impossible to remain ignorant on the subject, as much as I wished I could sometimes. The truth is, a belief in God is quite common among professionals in science related fields. This article is a good example of that. A majority of doctors say they believe in God and an afterlife.

Predictably, however, the Associated Press alleges this is a surprising number for a science field, but provides no evidence that this is a rare occurrence. How would the AP explain the fact that most scientific advances have come out of the West where Christianity has long been a majority. In the United States all but 3 of the first 126 colleges were Christian schools. These Christian schools educated and graduated the very people who cured illnesses that plagued our ancestors, and invented the technology that propelled us to a world super power. A cursory look through history is sufficient to show that the AP and those who agree with them are in fact the ones who are ignorant of scientific discovery’s progression and evolution throughout history and today.

A survey examining religion in medicine found that most U.S. doctors believe in God and an afterlife — a surprising degree of spirituality in a science-based field, researchers say.

In the survey of 1,044 doctors nationwide, 76 percent said they believe in God, 59 percent said they believe in some sort of afterlife, and 55 percent said their religious beliefs influence how they practice medicine.

“We were surprised to find that physicians were as religious as they apparently are,” said Dr. Farr Curlin, a researcher at the University of Chicago’s MacLean Center for Clinical Medical Ethics.

“There’s certainly a deep-seated cultural idea that science and religion (search) are at odds,” and previous studies have suggested that fewer than half of scientists believe in God, Curlin said Wednesday.

A previous survey showed about 83 percent of the general population believes in God.

But while medicine is science-based, doctors differ from scientists who work primarily in a laboratory setting, and their direct contact with patients in life-and-death situations may explain the differing views, Curlin said. . . . .

Let’s put a large hole in this theory that contact with patients must have caused these doctor’s belief in God. Sir Isaac Newton is considered one of the greatest physicists of all time. Isaac Newton had no contact with life and death situations in his profession that could have caused a belief in God and the afterlife. Yet, we have this quote from Isaac Newton (who, by the way, used his discoveries to calculate the exact date and time of Christ’s death and resurrection):

And as for the Christian worship, we are authorized in scripture to give glory and honour to God the Father, because he hath created all things, and to the Lamb of God, because he hath redeemed us with his blood and is our Lord, and to direct our prayers to God the Father in the name of Christ. . .(McLachlan, H., Sir Isaac Newton: Theological Manuscripts, Liverpool, 1950, pp. 29-35.)

This is just one of many similar quotes from Newton. The evidence for a large Christian presence in science fields over many centuries is staggering, and cannot be reproduced in a blog post. Any decline in a Christian presence among scientists in recent years can be attributed to the kind of bias seen in this article. Among scientists in the top positions, atheism has indeed increased. The result of this shift in the upper echelons of the scientific community is a concerted effort to stigmatize, silence, intimidate, and persecute Christian scientists in all fields. However, polls show that Christians are as common in the sciences as they were in the early 1900′s. The Christians are still there, they are just routinely silenced and ridiculed.

Take, for example, the recent Intelligent Design debates in the United States. Pro-evolution scientists boycotted the debates and flooded the media with taunting, condescending propaganda. This response is seen over and over when Christians make their presence known and challenge the atheist point of view. It is the atheists who are scared of science, not those who believe in God. Rather than support their position with the scientific proof they claim they have, they stick their fingers in their ears and pretend their position is unanimously supported. Fortunately for us, no amount of spin, slander, denial, and taunting can shield them from reality forever.

Read more from the article

From the other side

Thank God the ACLU wasn’t around when the United States was fighting for its independence! Can you imagine if the Revolutionary war were being fought today? The ACLU would have slapped General Washington with a lawsuit and then accused him of war crimes, demanded the minutemen be thrown in jail, and protested the war that gave us our freedom. And they would have lobbied for the income tax (it was considered unconstitutional until the next century) in order to pay for their anti-American campaign. Not to mention the frenzy of law suits against Christians who were actually allowed to freely exercise their religion, even. . . .gasp. . . .in public!

The American Civil Liberties Union may fight for those holding unpopular beliefs and taking controversial stands, but the ACLU of New Mexico suspended an entire chapter of the organization because a member of the board of directors is leading the state’s Minuteman group.

The state organization suspended its Las Cruces chapter after learning that a member of the group’s board, Clifford Alford, was heading the formation of a Minuteman group in New Mexico.

Gary Mitchell, a Ruidoso attorney and president of the ACLU board of directors, said the suspension of the southern chapter was a technical move to make sure the leader of the New Mexico Minutemen, a civilian border patrol group, no longer had authority to act or speak on behalf of the ACLU.

“We will not tolerate racism and vigilantism in the leadership structure of our organization,” Mitchell told the Albuquerque Journal. “They are repugnant to the principles of civil liberties and the mission of the ACLU.” . . . .

Worldnet Daily

The evolutionists are running scared. They are afraid to debate the facts, so they resort to name calling and personal attacks.

A discussion about how evolution should be taught in public schools degenerated Wednesday into personal attacks among State Board of Education members.

The board is reviewing proposed standards drafted by three conservative members designed to expose students to more criticism of evolution in the classroom. During the discussion, four board members who want the standards to maintain their existing evolution-friendly tone assailed the proposal.

Bill Wagnon told the three conservative board members they were the “dupes” of intelligent design advocates, who presented what Wagnon said was bad science during public hearings in May.

“It is all based on absolute and total fraud,” Wagnon said of the proposal.

But one of the three board members, Connie Morris, lectured the board’s four moderates for not attending the public hearings in May, during which witnesses criticized evolutionary theory that natural chemical processes may have created the first building blocks of life, that all life has descended from a common origin and that man and apes share a common ancestor.

“Had you attended, you would have been informed,” Morris said. “You would be sitting here as informed individuals and not arrogantly calling us dupes.” . . . . .

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Associated Press

Secularists love to claim abstinence doesn’t work. Here is yet another study that proves otherwise.

Refuting an earlier study, the U.S. Heritage Foundation said Wednesday virginity pledgers have lower rates of sexually transmitted diseases.

Using its own studies, the foundation said these pledgers also engage in fewer risky sexual activities. In a virginity pledge, participants take a verbal or written pledge to abstain from sex until marriage.

But a March 2005 article by Professors Peter Bearman and Hanna Bruckner in the Journal of Adolescent Health said that those who took the pledge had the same STD rates non-pledgers.

The foundation’s authors claimed a re-examination found Bearman and Bruckner’s conclusions were inaccurate. They said virginity pledgers who have become sexually active are still less likely to engage in oral or anal sex when compared to sexually active non-pledgers.

They also said Bearman and Bruckner actually found adolescents who made virginity pledges were less likely to have STDs as young adults than were non-pledgers, but concluded that this difference was not statistically significant.

Separately, the New York Times reported independent experts called the new findings provocative but criticized the Heritage team’s analysis as flawed and lacking the statistical evidence to back its conclusions.

Typical.

World Peace Herald

I think many of us would agree that the great apostasy spoken of in Bible prophecy seems far more possible now than it ever has. Stories like this one seem to add support to that claim. However, some news articles are more liberal, anti-Christian spin than anything. The reality is Christianity is still growing fast, especially in third world countries, and in countries like the United States they are still a majority.

To an uninformed reader, it might seem this article from northjersey.com doesn’t bode well for Christianity. Indeed, the author wants you to think that. He begins the article by reporting that a “A venerable Protestant denomination – at the behest of some of its conservative members – is preparing to vote next month on a measure declaring that Jesus Christ is the Lord, and making it mandatory for clergy to accept his divinity.”

A belief in the divinity of Christ is the foundation of the Christian faith. If Protestants feel the need to debate this, we are in real trouble. However, if you do a google search for “United Church of Christ”, the denomination debating this resolution, you’ll quickly learn that it is about as far from a “venerable Protestant denomination” as you can get. One of the groups that merged to form the United Church of Christ can trace it’s history back to the Pilgrims, but the UCC was formed in 1957. It is in no way representative of historical Christianity, nor does it have much in common with Christianity today. The vast majority of Bible believing, Christian churches would unanimously agree that the UCC is a heretical, extremely ecumenical, and liberal denomination. In fact, the author eventually admits this.

I’m noticing an increasing number of religion articles like this one that are written more for the purpose of smearing Christianity and portraying it as a religion on the verge of collapse. Their hope, in my opinion, is that true Christians will begin to believe they are becoming a minority view. They hope that, if they can convince us we’re a fading minority, we’ll give up and quietly accept our place as a fringe group of extremists.

It’s a bedrock belief of Christianity – not a topic for debate.

Until now.

A venerable Protestant denomination – at the behest of some of its conservative members – is preparing to vote next month on a measure declaring that Jesus Christ is the Lord, and making it mandatory for clergy to accept his divinity.

It may seem like a slam dunk, but delegates for the 1.3 million-member United Church of Christ may reject the resolution. Several Bergen County pastors, who aren’t delegates to the convention, said they expect the measure to fail.

“Religiously speaking, it sounds like apple pie,” said the Rev. Raymond Kostulias of the First Congregational Church of Park Ridge. “But there is a judgmental quality to it that implies very strongly that those who do not agree with us are condemned or damned or hopeless – and that’s exactly the thing that UCC is against.” . . . . .

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North New Jersey Media Group

We receive e-mails periodically from Muslims who argue that Islam shows more respect for women than Christianity. They claim Muslim women are given great respect, and a place of honor in Islam. We usually point out the many Suras from the Quran and teachings from the Hadiths and Sharia law as proof that the exact opposite is true. However, actions speak louder than words. The news in Canada, in Muslim countries, and anywhere Sharia is enforced is all that’s needed to expose the true suffering of women under Islam’s rule. Women are property. Muhammad even taught that hell is primarily populated by women (Al-Bukhari, vol. 1, 29).

New Delhi – A young Indian woman, allegedly raped by her father-in-law, has been ordered by village elders to live with him as his wife, said a report on Wednesday.

The Asian Age daily newspaper reported that Muslim clerics who served as village elders in Uttar Pradesh, India, decided that the woman’s rape by her father-in-law had “nullified” her marriage to her husband.

The 28-year-old woman, the mother of five children, married rickshaw-puller Noor Mohammed about 10 years ago in Charthawal village.

The report said her father-in-law, Ali Mohammed, allegedly raped her while her husband was away at work nearly two weeks ago, but the husband ignored his wife’s complaints.

It said the wife had decided to walk out on her husband, but family members pressured her to stay and the matter landed before the council of village elders.

Rape case filed against father-in-law

The newspaper said clerics ordered her to stay with her parental family for seven months and 10 days to become “pure” again before taking up her new life as her father-in-law’s wife.

It quoted one Muslim cleric as saying that on her return to her home, she would “then be like a mother” to her husband.

Police said they had filed a case of rape against the father-in-law and planned to arrest him soon.

Police chief Surendra Yadav told the newspaper that “we have registered a case” after getting statements from the victim and her mother.

The state of Uttar Pradesh is one of India’s poorest and most underdeveloped regions. . . . . .

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(SA)

Sharon is willing to sacrifice the lives of his own people to move his disengagement plan forward. Someone add Sharon to the list of people who should be compared to Hitler. Somehow I don’t think the “everyone is Hitler” crowd will be taking advantage of this one. The Democrats understand self-hating politicians.

Political decision makers associated with Prime Minister Ariel Sharon have directed the Israeli Defense Forces to do little to stop Palestinian militants from firing mortars and rockets into Gaza’s Jewish neighborhoods so residents will want to leave when this summer’s withdrawal plan is implemented, the security chief for Gaza’s Jewish communities told WND in an exclusive interview yesterday.

“The political leaders supporting the evacuation from Gaza have told the IDF not to stop the mortars and Qassams. I know this, but anyway it is obvious to everyone,” said Ami Shaked, chief security coordinator for the Gush Katif Block, the slate of Jewish communities in Gaza scheduled for evacuation August 15.

Hamas has been launching almost daily rocket and mortar attacks against Gush Katif. The terror group yesterday fired three Qassam rockets, and last week launched over 15 mortars and six Qassams at several Gaza Jewish neighborhoods.

The Israeli Defense Forces responded last week to mortar fire by striking a truck filled with rocket launchers. The retaliation followed the death a day earlier of two workers in a Jewish Gaza greenhouse hit by a Hamas Qassam rocket.

But rocket attacks here have rarely prompted an Israeli response, with IDF officials routinely citing a cease-fire agreement signed by Sharon and Palestinian Authority President Mahmaud Abbas as restricting their ability to conduct military operations within the Gaza Strip. . . . . .

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WND

I read the entire autopsy report for Terri Schiavo yesterday and had planned to point out the media’s severe distortion of the facts in their analysis of the report, but Michelle Malkin has already done an excellent job of exposing the media’s outright lies and spin.

Late last night, I took the time to read the 39-page autopsy report of Terri Schiavo–something which, it is clear to me, most of the callous gloaters on the other side of this debate have not bothered to do. And will never do. These are people who can only talk about the sanctity of life if it’s enclosed in ghost quotes and pronounced with a sneer.

You do not need a medical examiner’s license to see that the report raises many more questions than it answers, though from the (once again) misleading media coverage, we are led to believe that the matters of Terri’s life and murder are resolved. They are not. . . .

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Have you noticed just about everyone is being equated to Hitler these days? Even our troops are being called Nazis by some Democrat senators. The blog “Beautiful Atrocities” is keeping an “Everyone will be Hilter” list and it’s getting quite long.

Durbin’s comments have ignited a firestorm of reaction on the Internet and talk radio.

“I think this is one of the grossest and sickest statements to be made yet,” writes blogger Art Green. “This is beyond hyperbole and rhetoric. I really do not have to explain how brutal and murderous the three organizations Durbin compared our soldiers to.”

“It really shows his motives and how much affection he has for our troops,” he continued. “Whenever I hear Durbin say that he ‘supports the troops,’ I know it will be a bald face lie. How could you support someone who you think are no better than genocidal maniacs?”

During his nationally broadcast radio show today, talk-show host Rush Limbaugh said he was stunned by Durbin’s remarks, and said he was embarrassed Durbin was an American and a senator.

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WND

I’ve noticed an increasing number of warnings from different sources that the terrorist threat on our wide open southern border is very real and very dangerous to our national security. These dire warnings all sound very familiar. In the months and even years before 9/11 I remember listening to analysts, ex-CIA agents, and even a few politicians warning that a terrorist attack on the U.S. was imminent. Their warnings were largely ignored or dismissed as impossible. We never allowed ourselves to believe that an attack on our homeland could really happen. We were wrong.

Unfortunately, we seem not to have learned our lesson. Militant Islam is spreading rapidly through Central America and Mexico, and we’re depending on Mexico to protect us while we leave our borders wide open.

Mexico has promised many times to help control illegal immigration. Yet, they provide information and advice on successfully crossing into the U.S. illegally, and then turn a blind eye as their citizens pour across our borders. What makes our government believe that Mexico is ever going to monitor the terrorist threat in Mexico or prevent Al Qaeda from forming a new front in the war on terror right in our own back yard? Is cheap labor and a few votes from the Hispanic community really worth another 9/11?

Al-Qaida “communities,” like the one busted in Lodi, Calif., have direct ties to other networks in Mexico and Central America, where jihadi terrorists are not viewed as a local threat, reports Joseph Farah’s G2 Bulletin.

“South of the Rio Grande Valley there exists a dire situation,” said an intelligence researcher who took part in an academic meeting in west Canada.

Intelligence sources and researchers agree there is hardly any effective cooperation between the Department of Homeland Security and the intelligence establishment of Mexico’s President Vicente Fox.

Mexican agencies charged with intelligence and counter-terrorism, such as the Office of Coordination of the Presidency and the Center for Research on National Security, CISEN, do little more than offer half-hearted monitoring of militant Islamic activity, say G2 Bulletin sources.

Mexico is facing a national crisis in dealing with drug lords who are killing elected officials, police chiefs and innocent civilians. Officials there have little interest and fewer resources to devote to law enforcement and intelligence activities that threaten the U.S., not Mexico.

As WND reported last week, Islam is on the move in Mexico and throughout Latin America, making dramatic gains in converting the native population, increasing immigration, establishing businesses and charities and attracting attention from U.S. government officials who have asked their neighbors to the south to keep an eye on foreign Muslim groups.

While Mexico has pledged to monitor these activities on behalf of the U.S., those familiar with the recruitment practices and the Mexican government’s oversight say the U.S. has reasons for concern. . . . . .

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WND

Here’s the truth about the “tortured” prisoners at Guitmo. Would a liberal choose this, or getting their head chopped off by the other side?

After Rep. Duncan Hunter’s eye-opening description of how terrorist suspects are living high on the hog at the U.S. detention center at Guantanamo Bay, prisoners from around the world will no doubt be clamoring for a ‘gulag’ cell of their own.

Appearing on Fox News Sunday, the House Armed Services Committee chairman began by detailing tonight’s dinner menu at Gitmo – which all detainees, including one suspected of being involved in the 9/11 plot, will enjoy.

“For Sunday they’re going to be having Orange Glazed Chicken, Fresh Fruit Roupee, Steamed Peas and Mushrooms, Rice Pilaf – we treat them very well,” he told Fox.

Last night, Hunter said, the U.S. “torture victims” enjoyed the same kind of gourmet fare, including an entree of “Lemon-baked Fish.”

On the other hand, feeding the detainees MREs, the standard fare given to our troops on the front lines, is strictly verboten – considered an “abuse” under restrictions imposed by Congress, Hunter said.

The top House Republican also noted that the religious practices of the terrorist suspects held at the U.S. “gulag” are scrupulously accommodated, explaining:

“We give them honey and dates when they break fast at Ramadan. We give them prayer beads and prayer oil – all paid for [by the U.S. taxpayer.]

“In fact,” he said, “if you did that for American GIs – if you had a call to prayer five times a day – the ACLU would sue on the basis that we violated the separation between church and state.”

News Max

At least one atheist has been foiled in a plot to ban Christianity from the public square. This particular atheist feels crosses should not be allowed on any government property. I wonder how the families of people who’ve died in military service to their country would feel if this atheist forced them to remove crosses from their loved ones graves at Arlington National Cemetery. He would, no doubt, have no problem with the markers representing other religions. I take that back. Bigots usually want to ban the Star of David too.

A San Diego judge ruled today against an effort by an atheist to block statements in a ballot initiative that will decide the fate of the historic cross on Mt. Soledad overlooking the Pacific.

As WorldNetDaily reported, atheist Phillip Paulson, represented by the ACLU, threatened five San Diego-area personalities with legal action over the proposed wording of the July 26 voter initiative.

The five behind the Mt. Soledad initiative are KFMB radio talk-show host Rick Roberts; KOGO radio talk-show host Roger Hedgecock; San Diego Padres radio announcer Jerry Coleman, Rep. Randy Cunningham, R-Calif.; and SoledadNational.com Director Phil Thalmeimer.

Voters will be able to decide if they want to transfer the city owned site to the federal government where it would be designated as a war memorial. Paulson contends the cross should be removed because it’s on government property.

An attorney for the five personalities, Charles LiMandri, said ACLU attorney Jame McElroy was visibly “not pleased with the decision of the judge.”

According to LiMandri, West Coast director for the Thomas More Law Center, the judge agreed to remove only four words and revised one out of the approximately 300 words in question.

The Superior Court judge, William Pate, also ruled that the name of Coleman will be allowed on the ballot as a signer in favor of the initiative. The opposition claimed the paperwork to include Coleman’s name was turned in too late.

Coleman, the well-known radio voice of the San Diego Padres, recently was elected to the Baseball Hall of Fame.

The ACLU’s McElroy had claimed that a number of statements by the area personalities on the ballot are “false and misleading.”

Some statements at issue included, “as in the case with Mount Soledad, wherever veterans are honored with the symbols of the fallen, an intolerant few will launch frivolous lawsuits that waste our tax dollars … .” . . . . .

How true that statement is.

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WND

Craige McMillan does an excellent job of pointing out just how ludicrous the theocracy conspiracy theory currently adobted by the left really is.

If only I’d of known how easy it was to implement a theocracy! So little time, so many adoring subjects. Why, back in high school, I would have worked harder and become class valedictorian. That would have positioned me to offer up the appropriate prayer at graduation and – poof! – instant theocracy.

Or perhaps I’d have volunteered to read the school announcements. One quick prayer slipped in between the times for girls volleyball and Mr. Harmon’s chess club – and before the school principal could wrestle the microphone away from me – and I’d have been set for life!

Legions of adoring leftists would have lined up in front of my throne, kissed my ring, and then gone back to their fields of labor so they could send me a tenth of their fruits and nuts as tribute. Federal judges would bow before inquiring about the disposition of their cases. Mothers would offer up their children, and Democratic presidential candidates would seek my blessing. Not to mention American Civil Liberties Union attorneys, who would tithe a tenth of their courtroom plunders. Ah, theocracy! So many religious kingdoms, so little time.

Today, of course, it’s more difficult. Thanks to the vigilance of Americans United for the Separation of God and America (Church and State) and ACLU attorneys schooled in the international law of Bangladesh or Sudan, it’s no longer a matter of simply offering up a prayer at your local high-school football game and ascending your throne. Why, it’s even harder than placing the Ten Commandments in front of the local courthouse where non-Christians, Jews, Hindus, secular humanists and, of course, the omnipresent atheist might pass by and be converted. . . . . .

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WND

Censorship laws in the UK are now targeting any religious discussion that might lead to hatred. If passed, these vague laws would leave the door open for groups or individuals to demand prosecution of anyone they disagree with. Criticism of Satanists, Jihadists, or violent cults could get you thrown in jail. Sites like Contender Ministries that compare religions (not people) to Christianity and point out what Christians believe are false doctrines, would be made illegal.

Christians in the U.S. can no longer feel confident that our constitution will protect us from this same kind of censorship and thought crimes legislation. Our Supreme Court justices have expressed a belief that international law and the laws of other countries should be considered in decisions in the United States. Judges will feel free to do exactly that, because too many Americans have accepted the false notion that the judiciary can make law and is not limited by a strict interpretation of the constitution. Compounding this threat, the Left has already demonstrated a proclivity toward ignoring our constitutional right to free speech, thought, and religion when it comes to Christians.

Extremist religious groups that advocate child abuse will be given protection under a Bill published by the Government yesterday.

The Racial and Religious Hatred Bill would outlaw remarks considered likely to stir up hatred against all religious groups, including those whose followers believe in beating children to drive out demons.

The Bill contains no definition of “religious belief” and ministers confirmed it would cover members of the African religion whose adherents were convicted last week of cruelty to a girl of eight they regarded as a witch.

Satanists, pagans and atheists would be protected.

Having good reason for making insulting comments that could provoke hatred of a particular religious doctrine would be no defence, nor would the fact that they were true.

Opponents said the Bill would seriously undermine freedom of speech. . . . .

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London Telegraph

A city councilor in Yellowknife has rescinded his request to proclaim an annual Heterosexual Day in the area after gay rights groups complained that it was bigoted and homophobic, according to the CBC.

Councillor Alan Woytuik said he was shocked at the reaction to his proclamation, which he says was introduced following a request for the city to proclaim Gay Pride Day by an outfit called Out North. He said he believes proclaiming Gay Pride Day promotes inequality and animosity in the community.

“I am not anti-gay and I’m not advocating denial of anyone’s rights or promoting discrimination. In fact, my position is just the opposite. I fully support the fundamental principle of democracy that everyone should be treated equal,” he said.

Tongue Tied

This is good for a laugh. No wonder Kerry didn’t want to release his records during the election. Now if we can just see the rest of his military records.

Sen. John F. Kerry’s grade average at Yale University was virtually identical to President Bush’s record there, despite repeated portrayals of Kerry as the more intellectual candidate during the 2004 presidential campaign. Kerry had a cumulative average of 76 and got four Ds his freshman year — in geology, two history courses and political science, The Boston Globe reported Tuesday. . . .

Had their averages been reversed, the AP would not have used the phrase “virtually identical”. Bush actually had a slightly better average than Kerry.

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Associated Press

I am so glad this man is the new voice for the DNC. It’s the best thing that could have happened to the Republican party. This typical Dean quote wins the hypocrisy award for the entire month.

Dean begins by saying:
“Republicans are “a pretty monolithic party. They all behave the same. They all look the same. It’s pretty much a white Christian party.”

And seconds later he says:
“The Republicans are not very friendly to different kinds of people,” Dean said Monday, responding to a question about diversity during a forum with minority leaders and journalists. “We’re more welcoming to different folks, because that’s the type of people we are.”

Dean is welcoming of everyone but white Christians, which happens to be a large majority of the United States population. Keep talking Deano. White Christians will unanimously vote Republican in the next election, along with the 40% of hispanics that voted for Bush in the last election.

Other recent comments from Dean include:

“Republicans never made an honest living in their lives”

“Republicans don’t represent ordinary Americans and they don’t have any understanding of what it is to go out and try and make ends meet.”

“The republicans are all about suppressing votes.”

“If we’re going to have a democracy, and lord knows this administration is beginning to erode the core of our democracy.”

“The president wants to take away our Social Security and then he’s going to take away the private pension plans, too?” – usual scare tactics

“I hate the Republicans and everything they stand for.”

“But the thing that really bothered me the most, which the 9-11 Commission said also wasn’t true, is the insinuation that the president continues to make to this day that Osama bin Laden had something to do with supporting terrorists that attacked the United States. That is false.”

“Everybody has ethical shortcomings. We ought not to lecture each other about our ethical shortcomings.”

Dean actually thinks he’s going to bring people from the middle to his side with this nonsense. Keep talking Dean.

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San Francisco Chronicle

Bwahahahahahaha! Democrats should have checked their own ethics violations before they jumped on the Tom Delay bandwagon. I wonder if Dean will tell these Democrats to go home and go to jail where they belong? Not.

More than 200 lawmakers have rushed to correct travel-disclosure statements in recent months as reporters on Capitol Hill discover more discrepancies in the wake of questions about travel by House Majority Leader Tom DeLay.

You’re dealing with hundreds, said Kent Cooper, co-founder of PoliticalMoneyLine, a Web site that compiles the forms after they’re filed with the clerk’s office and makes it available at ww.fecinfo.com. There’s a ton more for staffers.

Mr. Cooper said his figure covered parts of April and May, a period during which the scrutiny of gift travel — which is funded by corporations and outside interest groups — heightened on the heels of accusations that Mr. DeLay accepted travel from a registered lobbyist, which is barred under House ethics rules.

The widespread scrutiny — aided by opposition researchers from both parties — has prompted amended reports from top leaders in both parties and even from members of the ethics panel. The most intense scrutiny has focused on the most frequent travelers.

Rep. Harold E. Ford Jr., a Tennessee Democrat who is running for the Senate, holds first place as Congress’ most prolific traveler since 2000. While his travel reports have been trouble-free in recent years, that has not always been the case

From 1998 to 2003, he took 61 privately funded trips. During that period, he failed to file a single travel-disclosure form with the House clerk, as required by the chamber’s ethics rules.

While he listed the trips on his financial-disclosure forms at the end of each year, Mr. Ford did not make public the purpose or value of the trips paid for by companies and outside groups, since the financial-disclosure form — unlike the travel form — does not require such information.

[snip]

According to the Associated Press, the recent late filers have included House Minority Whip Steny H. Hoyer, Maryland Democrat, who recently disclosed 12 trips dating back to 1997. Rep. Ellen O. Tauscher, California Democrat, filed late for 21 trips, Rep. Luis V. Gutierrez, Illinois Democrat, reported 20 past trips, and Rep. Elijah E. Cummings, Maryland Democrat, reported 13.
Rep. John Linder, Georgia Republican, belatedly filed for nine trips, as did Rep. Maxine Waters, California Democrat.

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Washington Times

This should be truly scary to all Americans. It adds to my bewilderment at Bush’s immigration policy. The war on terror is taking place in many countries around the world, but it stops where we are most vulnerable – our borders.

Our leaders have told us often that the murderers and jihadists we’re fighting are cunning, and well organized. They may be evil, murdering animals, but they are not stupid. They watch the same media we watch and we must assume they know of our border problems. It makes sense to me that they also see our southern and northern borders as our biggest vulnerability and their biggest opportunity. By ignoring this obvious threat, we’re setting ourselves up for the same kind of attacks we’re now seeing in Iraq, Israel, and other areas that border Muslim countries. The terrorists don’t need to use airplanes, shipping containers, and fraudulent visas. They can walk right across our unprotected borders and blow themselves up, or use a dirty bomb to kill thousands.

Islam is on the move in Mexico and throughout Latin America, making dramatic gains in converting the native population, increasing immigration, establishing businesses and charities and attracting attention from U.S. government officials who have asked their neighbors to the south to keep an eye on foreign Muslim groups.

The monitoring of foreign groups is intended to “avoid problems in Mexico that have an impact in the United States,” said the head of the Attorney General Office’s special terrorism investigation unit, Gen. Jorge Serrano.

“The ones who … are being watched by migration (authorities) are foreigners,” Serrano said, without revealing the number of people being monitored or their countries of origin.

Serrano said no Muslim terrorists have been found living in Mexico, though the office is investigating alleged terrorist activities being carried out by Mexicans.

The recruitment of new followers is especially active in southern Mexico and among the indigenous Mayans who are converting by the hundreds, according to a report in Der Spiegel. The Mexican government, the report says, is concerned about a culture clash in its own back yard.

About 300 Tzozil-Indians have converted to Islam in recent years and it’s a development that is beginning to worry the Mexican government, said the Der Spiegel report. The government even suspects the new converts of subversive activity and has already set the secret service onto the track of the Mayan Muslims. Mexican President Vincente Fox has even gone so far as to say he fears the influence of the radical fundamentalists of al-Qaida. . . . . .

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WND

The United States has long held freedom of religion and speech to be one of the necessary attributes of a representative democracy. For two centuries it was one of the freedoms that set us apart from other countries. Sadly, those days appear to be coming to a close. Freedom of speech and religion now have limits. Groups like the ACLU want us to believe that the constitution affords these freedoms to everyone but Christians. Mentioning the name of Jesus Christ in public has become a form of bigotry, and public displays of a Christian nature are portrayed as the worst kind of evil. These anti-Christian groups are succeeding because the left has been successful in dumbing down the public. People are willing to believe that the constitution bans only Christian prayers. They believe it because they never learned the history of their own country.

If it were truly unconstitutional for a Christian prayer to be given before a state House of Representatives, how is it that the courts in the first one hundred-plus years of our history didn’t know it was unconstitutional? How is it that those courts allowed states to require that people believe in Christ before running for office? Christian prayers were not only allowed, but expected in the House and Senate, and the courts never stood up and declared it unconstitutional. It wasn’t the consitution that changed, it was the nature of the courts. Judges no longer interpret the constitution, they stretch it and twist it to fit their political agenda.

No one demands that the ACLU explain this. No one holds them accountable for banning the mere mention of Jesus Christ, while allowing Muslims to pray to Allah, and Wiccans to pray to Goddess. Americans are free to publicly worship their deity, unless they’re Christian, and then they’re bigoted if they do so and must be silenced by a herd of ACLU lawyers and an activist judge.

You see, under this new constitution the secularists have created through activist judges, it’s unconstitutional to offend anyone, unless of course that someone is Christian. The day we allow one religious people to be banned from the public square and forbidden from speaking, is the day we become no different than the dictatorships and Muslim theocracies we are asking to embrace democracy.

A civil-liberties group has sued the speaker of the Indiana House of Representatives, claiming the use of the name of Jesus in prayers to open the body’s daily sessions is unconstitutional.

The federal lawsuit by the Indiana Civil Liberties Union says including such phrases as “In the strong name of Jesus our savior,” “We pray this in Christ’s name,” and “I appeal to our Lord and savior, Jesus Christ” exclude people who aren’t Christians.

The legal action targets House Speaker Brian Bosma, a Republican and a Christian.

“The suit does not seek to prevent opening the House session with prayers,” ICLU Legal Director Ken Falk said in a statement, but asks that such prayers show “respect for the beliefs of all Indiana residents and the constitutional guarantee of religious freedom for all.”

The House invites clergy from around the state to open sessions in prayer. Those offering prayers have included a Muslim imam and Jewish rabbi. When a member of the clergy is not available, a House member will pray instead.

Christians have criticized the ICLU, saying it is attempting to restrict free-speech rights.

“This is a further outrage from the Indiana Civil Liberties Union as it continues an unrelenting attack on people of faith in the public square,” Curt Smith, president of the Indiana Family Institute, told the Indianapolis Star. “I am confident that every court in the land will reject this crass ploy.” . . . . .

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WND

These are the people the Left wants released from Guantanimo immediately. I wonder why Amnesty International didn’t mention the common occurrence of incidents like this in its latest bash America report? Curious.

Army “block guards” were making their daily walk through the stifling heat of the cellblocks inside the barbed wired camp here in late May.
But after a guard discovered a dangerously sharp object hidden in the empty cell of a detainee, a violent confrontation ensued, illustrating military officials’ contention that criticisms from human rights groups only tell part of the story.
According to two Army prison guards, one 22 years old and the other 28, the prisoner was temporarily in another part of the prison for a bath when the jagged, rectangular piece of metal, three to four inches long was found and removed.
But the two guards, who spoke in a rare interview with The Washington Times on the condition of anonymity, said an altercation then followed in which the detainee tried to gouge out one of the guards’ eyes.
After first allowing the detainee to return from his shower to the cell, a five-man team of guards then began a carefully choreographed “cell extraction” to move him to another cell, where he would not be able to do further damage.
“He was extremely aggressive from the moment we went in,” said the 28-year-old guard, whose job it was to “push the detainee back” as another guard quickly handcuffed the prisoner.
Before the cuffs could go on though, things went wrong and the detainee forced his hands up under the first guard’s plexiglass face mask and began digging for the eyeball.
“He tried to insert one finger into my eye socket, then he transitioned into a fishhook maneuver,” the guard said. “He got his finger into my mouth and was trying to rip my cheek off.” After another moment, the detainee’s hands were forced down and into the cuffs.
The entire incident was videotaped, as are all cell-extraction procedures under the tight protocol with which military officials have been running the Guantanamo prison amid scrutiny and harsh criticism from human rights advocates. . . . .

How sad that our military has to video tape everything they do in order to protect themselves from a media that treats them like the enemy instead of the murderers they are guarding.

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Washington Times

David Limbaugh does an excellent job of pointing out the absurdity of Amnesty International’s claim that Guantanimo Bay is comperable to Soviet gulags.

While I am sympathetic with the American Left’s outrage over Amnesty International’s slander of Soviet gulags by likening them to the United States’ incomparably evil prison detention center at Guantanamo Bay, I thought I would review Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn’s description of the Soviet Camps in his classic, “Gulag Archipelago.”

Since Amnesty International’s executive director, William Schulz, is indignantly standing by his assertion that “The U.S. is maintaining an archipelago of prisons around the world, many of them secret prisons …” I decided to reminisce with Mr. Schulz and his ilk, who are doubtless avid readers of this column, about the “Archipelago” Solzhenitsyn exposed.

In the first place, it might be noted that prisoners of the Soviet camps were generally not those who had declared war on modern civilization, who had taken up arms against the state, or who had aided, abetted and collaborated with those who were at war with the regime. They were not arrested on the battlefield while waging war against the mother country. . . .

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David Limbaugh

This is what the secular left in the U.S. fails to understand.

Religious devotion sets the United States apart from some of its closest allies. Americans profess unquestioning belief in God and are far more willing to mix faith and politics than people in other countries, AP-Ipsos polling found.

In Western Europe, where Pope Benedict XVI complains that growing secularism has left churches unfilled on Sundays, people are the least devout among the 10 countries surveyed for The Associated Press by Ipsos.

Only Mexicans come close to Americans in embracing faith, the poll found. But unlike Americans, Mexicans strongly object to clergy lobbying lawmakers, in line with the nation’s historical opposition to church influence.

“In the United States, you have an abundance of religions trying to motivate Americans to greater involvement,” said Roger Finke, a sociologist at Penn State University. “It’s one thing that makes a tremendous difference here.”

The polling was conducted in May in the United States, Australia, Britain, Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Mexico, South Korea and Spain.

Nearly all U.S. respondents said faith is important to them and only 2 percent said they do not believe in God. Almost 40 percent said religious leaders should try to sway policymakers, notably higher than in other countries. . . . . .

Continue Reading Article. . .
Associated Press

Kerry has been pondering his loss for a while now and decided to find out what that “values voter” thing is all about. He broke down and read the New Testament. Actually, I think he noticed Hillary’s sudden interest in religion, and is trying to keep up with the Left’s phony “move to the middle”.

Unfortunately, I don’t think Kerry got any more out of reading the Bible than do most secularists. He picked out the same few verses that liberals usually like, and ignored the rest. After reading the entire New Testament, Kerry came up with this bit of wisdom:

“Nowhere in the three-year ministry of Jesus Christ did I find a suggestion at all, ever, anywhere, in any way whatsoever, that you ought to take the money from the poor, the opportunities from the poor and give them to the rich people.”

Any Christian could have told him that and saved him a lot of time. Of course it doesn’t say that! It says to give to the needy and help the poor. That’s why Christians give more money to charity than any other group. That’s why Christians run homeless shelters, soup kitchens, hospitals, relief agencies, and other charities for the poor. That’s why churches collect special offerings on Sunday for needy families.

I think Kerry is trying to imply here that the Bible teaches socialism and the redistribution of wealth. Nowhere in the Bible does it say Christians should give all of their money to the government to be redistributed in the most politically advantageous way possible. That’s the individual Christian’s job along with the Church. Why does Kerry want us to believe that money for the poor must first pass through the greedy hands of politicians in Congress? Perhaps so people like Kerry can lord it over those he claims to be helping, and maybe con a few extra votes out of the peasants in the process.

Theological errors aside, Kerry’s plan is to pretend he’s really the one who has values, and the evil republicans are steeling money from poor people. It’s fascinating how things evolve when they hit the liberal spin machine. Giving money back to everyone who pays taxes, becomes taking money away from the poor.

In this country, largely because of our Christian heritage and culture, poor people don’t pay taxes. Until your income reaches a certain level above the poverty line, you pay nothing, nada, zilch. A small percentage of the wealthiest people pay 80% of the taxes and the middle and upper classes pay the rest. The tax cuts gave money back to everyone who paid taxes. No money was taken away from anyone. I don’t know why Democrats can’t understand this.

I’ll use an analogy for any liberals reading that still don’t understand. Say you went out to dinner at an expensive restaurant with three of your friends. At the end of dinner the waitress brings you a check for $250.00 (it’s a nice restaurant). Two of your friends realize the tab is more than they’d expected and they don’t have enough. You completely forgot your purse, so you have no money. The other friend, however, happens to have quite a bit of money. She agrees to pay for all of the meal, and the other two friends pitch in $20.00 each for the tip. You get your dinner free. When the waitress comes back for the money, the friend who had money hands the waitress three one hundred dollar bills. Now, when the waitress comes back with the $50.00 in change, who should get the change? Republicans would say the person who just paid for most of that outrageous dinner tab should get it. Democrats would say the person who didn’t have to pay anything should get to keep the change, and they should order desert too.

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News Max