LIBERAL HYPOCRISY: CHAPTER 12,186

9 high-stakes issues the Supreme Court will take up this coming term

Though written from a left wing perspective, this article is useful in outlining some significant cases on the docket in the upcoming Supreme Court term.

House May Pull Infrastructure Bill as Manchin Deals Knock-out Blow on Reconciliation: "Fiscal Insanity"

This is the second time a vote has been scheduled and postponed.  

Points to Ponder:

A nation which can prefer disgrace to danger is prepared for a master, and deserves one.[Alexander Hamilton]

New York Post Pens Delicious 'Toldjah So' After Politico 'Confirms' Some Hunter Biden Laptop Emails

They knew this was true last year but tried to bury and/or discredit it for political reasons. The media in this country is even worse than it was sixteen years ago when I referred to "[t]he depravity to which the journalistic profession has fallen since the days of Watergate" and other such statements in a lengthy expository musing on the death of Deep Throat and the problems in journalism that were wrought in the wake of what Woodward and Bernstein did. Here is just a sample: 

The depravity to which the journalistic profession has fallen since the days of Watergate can be to some extent pinned on Woodward and Bernstein...not as much them personally as what they ushered in in the aftermath of the Nixon resignation.[...] The journalistic profession has become one where you "make it" by finding someone whose reputation you can destroy. Ethics are often not a factor, indeed morals and ethics often get the screw from journalists who are trying to "make it" and then (for those who "make it") the same tactics are utilized to try and stay "on top." The same is the case with the legal profession and the political profession: oftentimes those who "make it" do so by screwing other people. So the parallel to prostitution is an apt one. The only difference of course is that prostitutes are somewhat honest about it. But enough on that subject for now. 

To summarize these musings, Woodward and Bernstein by their approach to "Deep Throat" ushered in a new era of journalism which is rotten to the core. It is comprised of people who seek to create news and who are interested in spinning the facts to advance an agenda rather than report on what is happening and letting the readers draw their own conclusions. The ethics in this field are abysmal and a strong reason why the MSM is slowly becoming more and more irrelevant in this new age of alternative media is because they are no longer a monopoly.{1}

If I can criticize myself a bit from the vantage point of more than sixteen years, I was a bit too optimistic back then about alternative media. Yes it does serve to a certain extent as a hedge against the mainstream media but as the coverage of the last election showed, they are just as susceptible to being corrupted as the mainstream media to an escalated degree has been in recent decades. 

The bottom line here is potentially damaging information for the Biden presidential aspirations was deliberately ignored, downplayed, or covered up by the lions share of mainstream media outlets as well as by those running social media platforms. This was done in a coordinated attempt to benefit one political candidate over another with absolutely no possible claim of plausible deniability being possible. For those who wonder why some of us put an asterisk next to President Joe Biden*, it is not without good reasons for doing so.

Note:

{1} Excerpt from the Rerum Novarum Posting On the Subject of "Deep Throat", the Correlative Ramifications Thereof, Etc. (circa June 1, 2005)

Points to Ponder:

I am sure there are many things better than a good cigar, but right now, I can't think of what they might be. [Richard Carleton]

Fugees reunite with Lauryn Hill as they announce first tour in 25 YEARS to celebrate critically-acclaimed 1996 album The Score

Cigar Thoughts, Game 2: Derrick Henry kicked our asses, man

Pre-Snap Reads 9/18: Seahawks vs Titans preview

News and notes from the Seahawks’ Friday press conference

Seahawks-Titans preview: 5 Qs and 5 As with Music City Miracles

Cigar Thoughts, Game 1: Seahawks emerge from the darkness of old to blind Colts with bright vision of the future

Russell Wilson dominates, defense gets timely stops in Seahawks’ 28-16 win over Colts

 

Guest Editorial On Masks, Mandates, and Jesus:

MASKS, NO MASKS, or JESUS? 

By Mike Ryan 

Masks to me are not saviors.  Vaccines are not going to save the world.  If they help, they will only help get us to the next plague.  As a Christian I really do not care about the cloth on your face.  I care about the pride and rebellion that keeps us from wearing something so small.  (I am not speaking about those with special medical conditions, as verified by competent medical professionals. You have a reason to refrain from wearing masks.)  

Many Christians refuse to wear masks for political reasons.  Personal rights and freedoms are more important than lives.  Christians refusing expert medical advice from the majority leaves many within wider society feeling there are more deaths than there should have been.  America, the most medically advanced nation, could have knocked out this virus by April of 2020 and showed the world how it is done.  But, we rebelled.  We argued over whether the virus was real instead of being part of a solution.  We pointed fingers at China instead of getting ahead of the pandemic.  We cared more about where the virus came from, whose fault it was, and whether it was a covert military strike, than we cared for our brothers and sisters dying around us.  

I watched as fellow Christians triviliazed deaths as age or pre-conditions.  Many denied it was actually Covid killing people.  There seems to be no sympathy or compassion for those hurt and dying.  Only screaming preachers, pundits, and politicians  declaring at the top of their lungs that we are sheep and masking is the beginning of communism.  

I DON'T care about your mask.  I care about your heart.  

Jesus said the love of many would grow COLD.  I am seeing this before my eyes.  It is the reason Donald Trump was a train that could not be stopped in 2016. We are filled with anger and frustration.  Ready to bash anything.  Give us a target.  Trump gave us targets daily.  

Now we need something new to be angry at.  We christians could choose to be angry at flesh, sin, satan, death, lost lives, lost souls dying without Christ. Instead we are angry that society asks us to wear cloth over our mouth to save lives.  

Why are we CHRISTians upset about saving lives? Paul circumcised Timothy JUST so they could minister to Jews about Christ. These early Christians loved people so much that they allowed a knife to be put to their manhood; yet we modern Chrisitans cry about a cloth mask with our favorite sports team on it?  

This is why we are hated now by the lost.  Our intolerance and anti-science stance makes us look like fools.  And hateful.  We will be declared 'dangerous' soon because we quite literally help cause death. We spread it willy nilly as its preachers and apostles, and we do not care.  

We could have been done with this pandemic months ago.  Because, as many of us claim...its just a little flu...right? We say 'God is in control'.  Yes He is.  He is the one giving us opportunity to love our neighbors.  An opportunity to preach the Gospel by our actions, to the sick and to the lonely. To show the world how to love each other and show the love of God.  

We could be God's helpers in the eyes of the world, willing to place ourselves in danger to help and love others.  We could be God's hands and feet.  Instead we are too caught up in our freedoms and rights to care about how non-believers see us right now. We fear communism--not God.  

We are losing our Christian witness and have for years.  Do you not understand? The world does NOT see us following Christ. The world sees us as hateful and intolerant--not of sin, but of everyone and everything.  

They do not hear us preaching Jesus to the lost and the hurting.  They hear us preaching "CONSPIRACY!"  "FREEDOM!"  "No-MASKS!"  "No Mandates!"  "Vaccines are the mark!"  "Science lies!"  "Government takeovers!"  "Run for your lives!"  "People are not really dying!"  "Your loved ones were going to die anyways!" "Sheep..You are all Sheep!" (And why should Christians be ashamed to be called sheep anyway? Isn't sheep the bilblical image Christ uses to describe His true followers?)  

Mandates.  There should not have to be mandates for a Christian.  We are to be servants of all for the sake of ministering the Gospel. Christ calls us to gladly walk two miles when the government only asks for one.  

But, that day is gone. Our witness is dying.  We have forgotten that Jesus commands us to act a certain way in front of non-believers.  Because if we act unrighteously, no one will hear a righteous message from us. 

Pope Francis is preparing a radical reform of the church's power structures

NBC News Reporter Triggers Leftists After Brutally on-Point Assessment About Afghanistan Legacy

Chief Justice Roberts's Long, Longer, and Longest Games

I have been saying something eerily similar about Chief Justice John Roberts for a long time. One point this article notes that I had not considered is reading the Chief Justice's concurrence on Citizens United as a template for how he would approach cases like Casey and possibly Roe as well. 

Points to Ponder:

No cigar-smoker ever committed suicide. [William Maginn]

Huge study supporting ivermectin as Covid treatment withdrawn over ethical concerns

As I am seeing some in social media tout Ivermectin for Covid, it is worth pointing out that the study often used to endorse Ivermectin has issues of ethics involved.