Happy Holidays...

…is what terrorists say. Christmas has been cancelled this year and instead we will be celebrating December 25th.  So Happy December 25th everyone!

I use to cherish the Christmas season; it was truly my favorite time of year.  Besides celebrating the birth of our Lord and Savior, it seems that it’s one of the only times during the year where most people are friendly and kind and where charity seems to be the rule of the day.  Now, however , I find myself irritated at the retailers who push purchasing gifts for that non-descript winter holiday which falls on December 25.  What’s more, any mention of Christmas has been removed from our government square.  Want proof?  Go to the Smithsonian website and check their hours of operations.  They are open “every day except for December 25”, I kid you not, right there in broad daylight on their website.

My fist question is why December 25?  I can almost hear their answer:

 “Well Sir, that’s Christmas.”

“Then why don’t you say, closed on Christmas Day?”

“Well Sir, that might offend someone”

“Then don’t close on Christmas”

“We don’t close on Christmas, we close on December 25.”

Okay, so here’s the breakdown of religious affiliation in the U.S. of A. according to the CIA World Factbook: Protestant 51.3%, Roman Catholic 23.9%, Mormon 1.7%, other Christian 1.6%, Jewish 1.7%, Buddhist 0.7%, Muslim 0.6%, other or unspecified 2.5%, unaffiliated 12.1%, none 4%.  So according to my underachieving high school education, more than 75% of Americans would claim to be affiliated with Christianity in some form or another.  Endo facto the overwhelming majority of Americans—one would think—support the celebration of Christmas rather than the celebration of December 25th.

Yet we continue as a nation to kowtow to the small minority of people who may or may not be offended that as a nation we celebrate Christmas.  Isn’t it true that we live in a democracy where the majority rules?  Yet the minority has hi-jacked Christmas and now my work is having a Holiday Party in the off chance that a Christmas party might offend someone.  If we followed this line of thinking out, shouldn’t have Romney won the election?  Shouldn’t the majority of voters be afraid of offending the minority of voters and concede? Ben Stein, famed presidential speechwriter, author, actor, game show host and economist wrote in 2005:

Next confession: I am a Jew, and every single one of my ancestors was  Jewish. And it does not bother me even a little bit when people call those beautiful lit up, bejeweled trees Christmas trees. I don't feel threatened. I don't feel discriminated against. That's what they are: Christmas trees. It doesn't bother me a bit when people say, "Merry Christmas" to me. I don't think they are slighting me or getting ready to put me in a ghetto. In fact, I kind of like it. It shows that we are all brothers and sisters celebrating this happy time of year. It doesn't bother me at all that there is a manger scene on display at a key intersection near my beach house in Malibu. If people want a creche, it's just as fine with me as is the Menorah a few hundred yards away.

I would venture to say that it is a small percentage of people who are offended by Christmas.  But, they are the ones who are antagonistic about this whole thing and yet we buckle under their attack.   How can this happen, how can the majority of Americans concede that December 25 should be celebrated, but not Christmas?  How can we concede and say “Happy Holidays” when have a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year covers the bases.  What’s the worst thing that could happen?

“I don’t celebrate Christmas L. Kyle.”

“Oh…okay, well have a Happy New Year.”

Do people really go home in a huff, kick their dogs and tell their wives “Well honey it happened four times today! Merry Christmas!  Where do they think they live? This is America, I’m calling the ACLU!”

Upon further investigation there appears to be other forces at work trying to steal Christmas.  For the sake of argument we will call this force “The Grinch” as people generally have an easier time believing in green men living caves above Whoville than they do believing in spiritual forces (either heavenly or demonic). 

The Grinch has devised a two-prong approach to steal Christmas from us.  The first prong is to attack the very day itself.  The Grinch has gotten people’s focus off of the true meaning of Christmas, which is to celebrate the birth of Jesus Christ.  Instead we are caught up in gift-giving and eating lavish meals to the point we forget that while the wise men brought Jesus gifts, they did so to worship Him.  Now, don’t get me wrong, I still enjoy both the giving and receiving of gifts on Christmas morning.  But as a nation our focus is too much on the retail aspect of Christmas.  For Pete’s sake retailers are now open Thanksgiving Day rather than the day after Thanksgiving!

The Grinch has not only succeeded in getting non-Christian’s attention focused on gifts, but they majority of Christians put their attention toward decorating, baking, shopping and parties rather than celebrating their Savior’s birth.  It’s been an effective strategy for the Grinch.  Get people distracted with ancillary items so much they no longer have the strength to fight for Christmas.  If people are so busy shopping, and decorating  and cooking they won't notice that any mention of Christmas at Target has been substituted for “Holidays.”  Distracted people won’t notice that in a predominately Christian society one of their marquee holidays has been removed and replaced with some non-descript winter holiday celebrated on December 25th.

The Grinch’s success rate with this first prong is pretty dang high.  Sure there are a few hold-outs, some boycotts, but really at the end of the day the attack is too widespread, the Christmas supporters are too weak to fight (well with all that midnight shopping and what not).  The destroying of Christmas, however, is really just the by-product of the Grinch’s overall plan of eradicating Christianity as a whole from the public sphere in America. 

Oh come on L. Kyle, why would anyone want to take Christianity away in America?

Because Christianity my dear, is the only religion which claims to be the Truth and the Truth is a threat.  The truth threatens our very selfish way of life; it threatens our in-born desire to do what we want to do.  Christians get called prudes all the time because we seem to put a damper on people’s sinful behavior.  How many times, as kids were we willing to do something bad as long as our parents weren’t around?  That is what Christians are in the rest of the world’s eyes; we are the parent in the room disapproving of bad behavior.

Of course, adults are just grown up kids.  The responsibility level may change, but like kids, adults want to rebel against the moral good.  And that is where the Grinch is succeeding right now.  He’s lied to us.  He has said that temporary pleasure has no ill consequences.  And as a society we have bought into this lie and are rebelling against what we know (or should know) to be harmful all in the name of self-gratification, greed, lust and gluttony. 

So the Grinch’s plan is simple. Eliminate Christianity from America and do so, in part, by stealing Christmas and replacing it with a non-descript winter holiday celebrated on December 25th. 

So don’t be a terrorist, say Merry Christmas this year.  Keep the true Spirit of this Holy Day alive by telling people the real reason why we celebrate Christmas…Jesus Christ.

Leftovers, enjoy

L. Kyle 

Dearly beloved …

… we are gathered here today to witness the decay of the American society. 

Really L. Kyle?  Why are you always so negative? 

Hey I call ‘em like I see ‘em (unlike the replacement refs in the NFL this year).  I had the opportunity to witness a marriage ceremony recently which prompted my negative brooding; not because the wedding was bad, because it really was a nice wedding and not because marriage is bad, because marriage is a noble institution.  No, what prompted my negative brooding about marriage is the lack of commitment with which people enter into marriage, which is directly linked to the demise of the American family, which is linked to the decline of the great nation.

Demise of the family L. Kyle? There’s no such thing.

Sure there is. Some people don’t see it because they have been duped into believing that family is intact, just in a different form.  So just to be sure that we are all on the same page here, for the purposes of this blog post, family will be defined as the traditional nuclear family (dad, mom, and children). 

The pastor performing the ceremony stated a couple of times that the couple was entering into a covenant with each other.  The word covenant means roughly the same thing as a contract, but has more religious connotations (or is at least more religious sounding).  Marriage takes commitment, it takes work; it takes perseverance.  Families are, or at least should be, born out of this noble institution and the family is the basic building block of our society.

When constructing a building the most important aspect of the building is its foundation.  Without a sure foundation the building is susceptible to the elements, to shifting ground and will eventually topple over.  As an example, did you know the foundation which supports the Empire State Building is 55 feet deep.  The bigger the building, the deeper and more rigid the foundation needs to be to support its weight. 

A nation is a collection of people and the basic unit of a nation, the foundation, is the family.  The purpose of the family is to reproduce citizens.  The future of any nation is dependent on the quality of future citizens.  If the quality of citizens is poor then the quality of the foundation which supports a nation becomes compromised.  Much like a building with a compromised foundation will eventually collapse, nations with compromised foundations will collapse.

America, despite its immense resources, is in danger of collapse because we are no longer producing quality citizens.  Do not mistake a person’s worth for their quality of citizenship.  All human life should be valued from the baby in the womb to the elderly.  There are unfortunately some people who are lousy citizens, which is to say that they are not contributing to the greater goals of society. They are in essence not putting back what they are taking from the rest of society.

That is where family is so important and why the collapse of the family spells the end of this nation.  My job as a parent is to make sure that when my children leave my home I have equipped them with the proper tools to get and hold a job, pay taxes, have a family and ultimately make other productive citizens. 

Recently presidential candidate Mitt Romney made the comment that 47% of Americans are on some form of government assistance.  He has been skewered for his comment, but according to a February 2012 article on CNN.Money it is true that nearly half of America is on some sort of government assistance, the bulk of that is Medicaid.  That means that nearly half of this nation is not self-sustaining, and if they are not self-sustaining they are not really producing and contributing to the nation. 

If it is the family’s job to produce productive, aka self-sustaining citizens, then the family is failing at is job if nearly half of America is not self-sufficient.  The family is failing at its job because the idea of family has failed in this country.  Ward and June Cleaver look draconian in our modern world.  The idea of dad, mom and children has been attacked and discredited to the point that the Leave it to Beaver world is now the punch line in joke. 

The idea of the nuclear family has been replaced with ABC’s Modern Family and NBC’s The New Normal.  Both shows celebrate different forms of family. Both of these programs celebrate the fact that a family can raise children despite not being the traditional nuclear family. This notion in Hollywood is not new. Some might remember with the television character Murphy Brown became pregnant and raised her child by herself.  Very controversial for the times.  Can single mothers produce productive members of society?  Absolutely!

However, I could write pages and present research to back up my position that the breakdown of the family has negative effects on children.  I could show you the data that children from broken homes, blended families and single parent homes are at a greater risk of becoming juvenile delinquents, drug addicts, and teen parents (if you want the research leave a comment I will get it for you). But at the end of the day most people cannot deny that a stable family with a father and mother living in the same house produces more well-adjusted children than other family situations.

So if it is undeniable that stable families produce more productive citizens why are we not fighting  to defend the nuclear family structure?  Quite simply it is because our society’s acceptance of casual sexual relationships.  We no longer hold, or maybe we never did, the virtue of chastity or respect the fact that the sexual relationship was, nay is, intended for marriage. We celebrate on television, in the movies and in music the idea of casual sex, sex merely for pleasure and sex for self satisfaction only. Recent studies have shown that 90% of Americans have engaged in premarital sex. 

So what L. Kyle, everyone’s doing it and besides what people do in private is their business not yours!

But I ask what is wrong with sex only inside a marriage relationship?  If two people wait to get married to have sex, stay married “until death do us part”, what then is the ramification?  No adultery, no sexually transmitted diseases, fewer unintended pregnancies.  Gosh you’re right that does sound terrible. 

In the book of Hosea God warns His prophet about what will befall the nation of Israel “For they have sown the wind, and they shall reap the whirlwind” (Hosea 8:7a).  This means that what they have sown they will reap in abundance.  The apostle Paul expounded on this principle and wrote in the book of Galatians “Do not be deceived, God is not mocked; for whatever a man sows, that he will also reap” (Gal 6:7).

You do not have to be a Christian or believe in God to understand the principle that if you plant an apple tree you will reap apples.  What works in nature also works in society.  If we sow the seeds of casual sexual relationships we will reap in abundance the product of those seeds.  The produce of casual sex is not just disease, unwanted babies and broken hearts.  A line can be drawn directly from our acceptance of casual sex to decayed families and a line can be drawn from decayed families to eventual downfall of this great nation. 

Yes I am being so bold as to say that the acceptance of casual sex will be directly linked to the downfall of America. God did not command us not to commit adultery simply because He is a killjoy.  God created the sexual relationship and we have innate sexual desires and appetites, but God gave us boundaries in which to fulfill those desires.  And those boundaries are there for a reason, our protection.  Without boundaries we are like kids in the Willy Wonka factory without any supervision.  We are bound to get into trouble. 

Maybe some don’t know, but children are a byproduct of sex.  It appears that there are a whole slew of people this nation that either missed that day in biology class or weren’t paying attention.  Maybe we could have Bill Nye explain it to them.  Sex is directly related to pregnancy.  Sure there are other ways of getting pregnant, but sex is still the number one cause.  That is why God intended to have sex inside the marriage relationship only. Because if a man and women happened to get pregnant during sexual intercourse then there is already a family unit in place to raise the child.  And when the family is intact raising a child they become more productive members of society, better quality citizens.   Better quality of citizens is tied to a better nation.

But we’re so smart aren’t we.  We think “God, you have no idea what you’re doing, we should be free to have sex all the time with whomever we want. What’s the worst that could happen?”

Well, I guess we will get to find out.

Leftovers, enjoy

L. Kyle

The Showdown

Recently famed scientific prognosticator, William Nye, aka Bill Nye “The Science Guy”, spoke out about the foolishness in denying evolutionary theory.  Some may remember Mr. Nye and his science show geared toward children, which ran from 1993 to 1998 on Disney and PBS.  The crux of Mr. Nye’s comments is that adults can choose to not believe in evolution, but should not dissuade their children from believing in evolution because “we need them to believe in science.”  To be fair to Mr. Nye, he has defended his comments on CBS This Morning and said he was not attacking religion but said that we cannot abandon provable science. 

Provable science?  Let us come back to that comment in a minute. 

Another famed scientist, Richard Dawkins, has also made the news when he did an interview in a certain “gentlemen’s” magazine (as reported by the Blaze.com).  Dawkins, not to be confused with Richard Dawson of hit game show “Family Feud”, has been an opponent of religion on creationism for many years, perhaps most his most notable work was his book “The God Delusion (2006).”  Unlike Nye, however, Dawkins is not ashamed to outright bash on people’s religious beliefs.

I am certainly no Rhodes Scholar and probably couldn’t hold my own with these two science giants in an intellectual grudge match, but I thought it would be interesting to try.

The Champions 

Richard Dawkins – famed evolutionary biologist, author and evolutionary pundit
Stats
-        PhD from Balliol College in Oxford, England, in Zoology.
-        Published 12 books, and dozens of published articles and academic papers the world over.
-        Hates God and religion as a whole
-        Born in England
 William Nye – famed television actor and science educator
Stats:
-        Bachelor’s Degree from Cornell University in Mechanical Engineering
-        Educated young children from 1993-1998 on his own PBS show
-        Has several movie and television show credits including being “Speedwalker” a speed walking superhero
-        Has a full head of really nice hair 

The Challenger 

L Kyle – amateur blogger and winner of two of my last three Words with Friends games
Stats:
-        Public school education and PhD in common sense
-        Nine published blogs
-        Fired from a job by Willie Aames-        Former community college adjunct faculty member (not trying to toot my own horn folks, just stating the facts)

Okay, turns out that Mr. Ney and PhD Dawkins were not immediately available for the challenge so I guess I will have to just use their published and or spoken words for their side of this intellectual showdown. 

Round 1 – Evolution is Scientific Fact

PhD Dawkins – “We are highly evolved apes.” 

Mr. Nye – “If you are an adult and don’t want to believe in evolution and live in your…your world that is completely inconsistent with everything we observe in the universe, that’s fine, just don’t make your kids do it because we need them to be science literate.”

Rebuttal: These to chaps want us to believe evolution is science fact and not just a theory.  Nothing could be farther from the truth.  Evolution is merely a theory; nothing has been proven to be fact.  Gravity is fact.  Newton’s three laws of motion are scientific fact.  Evolution is not.  Science is defined as “the state of knowing” by Merriam Webster’s.  It is also defined as: knowledge or a system of knowledge covering general truths or the operation of general laws especially as obtained and tested through scientific method. 

So using that definition let’s see what else Mr. Nye and PhD Dawkins have to say.

In an episode of “Bill Nye the Science Guy” on evolution Mr. Nye is trying to explain to children where evolution started and he says “As near as we can figure.”  That doesn’t sound like knowing to me.  That sounds like figuring. 

In an interview PhD Dawkins was asked how did the evolutionary process began. His response was “Well nobody knows how is began.” 

Yet both men would have us believe that evolution is science fact, not just a theory.  But at the same time they cannot say for certain how evolution began nor can they replicate the process.  And in scientific terms if something cannot be observed and repeated then it is nothing more than a theory or hypothesis.  It is not proven as Mr. Nye stated it was.  Evolution is just a hypothesis taught as fact.

Round 2 – Belief in evolution is necessary to accept the rest of science

Mr. Nye – “Your world becomes fantastically complicated when you don’t believe in evolution .”

Rebuttal – It’s funny that William uses the word believe when talking about evolution.   The word believe means to have confidence in the truth, the existence, or the reliability of something, although without absolute proof that one is right in doing so.  No one has to believe in gravity because gravity happens to us, even if you don’t understand how it happens; you understand that it is there.  But evolutionary science is very much a belief system.  Which is why William Nye and PhD Dawkins cannot wrap their heads around the fact that people don’t believe.  They are so sold out to their belief that they cannot comprehend anything else.  Much like the Christian doesn’t understand how when presented with the facts of their religion that other people don’t believe as they do.

Fortunately for the evolutionary scientist they have the full weight of the scientific community which is to say they have virtually unlimited resources.  This translates into unfettered access to our education system.  Once the scientific community and certain groups were successful in removing Christianity from our education system it has allowed any mention of creation or a Creator to also be removed.  Mr. Nye and PhD Dawkins want you to buy into their belief system rather than a religious belief system, but both require faith.

Round 3 – Science and Religious belief are not compatible

Mr. Nye – ““If you are an adult and don’t want to believe in evolution and live in your…your world that is completely inconsistent with everything we observe in the universe, that’s fine, just don’t make your kids do it because we need them to be science literate.”

PhD Dawkins – “It’s not that I shun [religious people]. It’s that the circles I move in tend to be educated, intelligent circles, and there aren’t any religious people among them that I know of.” Emphasis mine

Rebuttal – So pretty much PhD Dawkins and the Science Guy think that religious people are stupid or at least ignorant.  Nye rebuke’s parents for teaching their children that evolution is false.  He believes that children who believe in Creation will not be productive members of society.  That their mere unbelief in evolution will hamper their ability to be literate in scientific matters.  I wonder what these two gentlemen think about the hundreds of scientists who belong to the American Scientific Affiliation,  or the Christians in Science, societies for those who are both Christians and scientists  Most of the people are far more qualified on scientific matters than Mr. Nye, minus of course the acting credentials. 

Further more belief in God does not mean that one cannot find science extraordinary or the findings of science study fascinating.  One can believe in God and still look at the stars and still be amazed by their beauty.  Belief in God just means that there is a different starting point when thinking about creation. 

That is really the rub between science and Christianity and the reason why Bill Nye and Richard Dawkins want so desperately bad to have evolution be the right answer.  If we are just a cosmic accident, a happenstance, a convergence of chemicals then what is our purpose?  Who are we accountable to?  Their answer is no one.  In the end they don’t want there to be a God, not because God and science don’t mix, but because they don’t want to answer to someone higher than themselves. 

Leftovers enjoy.

L. Kyle

 

You Say Tomato...

The English language is a strange language and I’ve been told one of the toughest to learn as a second language (I'm barely learning it as a first language!).  It is true that we have some strange words and at times hard to understand rules.  We have to, too, two or even hair and hare, or mouse and mice, but not moose and… You get the point. 

One thing Americans are great at doing creating slang words.  Not being a world-traveler myself I’m not sure to what extent other countries do this, but if creating slang was an Olympic event (instead of say synchronized trampoline jumping), we would take the gold.  Think of all the ways to describe something good.  You could call it cool, rad, radical, awesome, neat-o, sweet, dope, off the hook, off the chain, sick, wicked and so on.  You can even call something good, bad (shamon’, shamon…).

Not only do we have slang words, but also depending on where you live or where you were raised different words mean different things.  A shopping cart in the North is called a buggy in the South.  Do you want soda, or a pop, or even just a Coke?  In most places a bra is women’s supportive device, but in Southern California it’s a fellow surfer.  These are only three examples of the differences in American culture and language. 

Despite some differences in our language and some strange usages, language does carry power.  Our words have the power to encourage as well as the power to discourage.  They have the power to lift up and the power to take down.  In the Bible, James, the half-brother of Jesus, writes that no one can tame the tongue, it is an unruly evil full of deadly poison (James 3:8 NKJV).  In all of James chapter three he writes about the tongue and how deadly language can be.  James knows, as many of do, that words do have power.

Unfortunately there are those in our society who are using the power of words for evil pursuits. If you study Nazi Germany you will see how the Holocaust happened.  Unthinkable really, that so many well-meaning people would sit by while millions of their countrymen were tortured and killed.  Hitler did not start out just gassing Jews; he first had to make them out to be the root of the problem, lesser people in everyone else’s eyes.  He did that with propaganda.  Using words and language.

What Hitler did is not new, it’s been done before by many groups, governments and religious leaders.  We are seeing the power of words right now in this election season.  Every word that a candidate says is scrutinized.  Every gaffe is made into fodder for the evening news.  So words have the power to make or break political careers. 

Two words in particular have garnered much power in our society and are used by some groups to hold other groups hostage.  The two words?  Love and hate. 

Love and hate have divided this country because these two words are morally opposed.  Forget the fact that we have skewed the definitions.  We say “I love my wife” and we also say “I love pizza” or “I hate abortion” and “I hate mushrooms”.  So we use these words flippantly, which aides in the division because we do not have solid definitions for love and hate. 

But the biggest reason why love and hate have divided this country is because we have reversed the definitions of the two words.  Love is no longer looking out for someone’s best interests even if that means disagreeing with them.  Love today is letting people do whatever feels good to them and supporting their decisions even if it hurts them in the end or worse, hurts all of us.

Hate is defined in our society as disagreeing with someone’s position.  Far too often we hear “stop being hateful” or “that person is a hatemonger” or “how’s your hate sandwich taste”.  Hate sandwich really? 

Oh come on L. Kyle, this doesn’t mean anything!

Oh really.  If  someone is going to brand you as hateful just because you don’t agree with the popular thought of the day what are you likely to do?  Not speak you mind for starters, because many see it as not worth the fight it will cause.  Instead people whisper their true opinion or change their public opinion as to not draw attention to themselves.

It’s like that scene from Austin Powers where Dr. Evil’s son tries to speak and Dr. Evil keeps ‘shhhshing’ him.  “I’ve got a whole bag full of shhhsh with your name on it.”  Except instead of a shhshh people start screaming “Hatemonger!” “Hateful bigot!” 

There’s an old adage in journalism that goes “Never get into a fight with the guy that buys ink by the barrel.”  Why? Because they own the media.  And if the media is calling people hatemongers then it won’t be long before the masses start believing that they are hatemongers.  Most Americans are like lemmings in the fact that they will choose a belief system because Oprah tells them to. 

Real love though tells people that they are on thin ice, even it means if it makes that person mad.  Real love is honest even if it is not popular.  Real love is telling a child that the stove is hot and not to touch it even though the child really wants to. 

Some say love is like a river…wait…no, some say love is blind, but in reality love never turns a blind eye to wrongdoing.  God says to really love then you must hate evil. 

The prophet Isaiah said “Woe to those who call evil good and good evil” (Isa 5:20).  Woe to us.

Leftovers enjoy.

L. Kyle

Hostage crisis…

The First Amendment of the Constitution provides every American with freedom o f speech.  The freedom has been tried and tested many times, sometimes in favor of the individual, sometimes in the favor of the government.  Americans are free, for the most part, to criticize their government, like Rush Limbaugh, without a fear of being dragged into the gulag.  Americans are free, for the most, to speak in a lewd manner, like Howard Stern, without fear of penalty (that might even attract more listeners). 

Despite the freedom, legally, to speak our minds we are not free from the court of public opinion.  The recent comments by Dan Cathy, the CEO of Chick-Fil-A restaurants have created an outpouring of anti-Chick-Fil-A comments, sponsorship rejections and even a same-sex kiss-in in August to protest Mr. Cathy’s comments.  For what?  Because he said they support heterosexual marriages?  GASP!  That hate monger! 

This all started last year when an LGBT (that’s lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender for those of you who have not attended a repeal of Don’t Ask Don’t Tell” training session) group accused Chick-Fil-A of donating more than $3million to Christian groups who support traditional marriage.  In an interview which was printed 18 July, Mr. Cathy said that the company was “guilty as charged”.  They indeed do support the idea that marriage should be reserved for a man and a woman.  And he and his company have been tried, convicted and sentenced in the court of public opinion. 

So severe is the sentence that the Boston mayor said he would block future Chik-Fil-As from being started in the Boston area.  Jim Henson and the Muppets, once affliate of Chik-Fil-A has since pulled their affiliation. 

The fact that Mr. Cathy is being halted from building restaurants or shunned by celebrities is proof that we are being held hostage.  We are being held hostage with language not guns.  Dan Cathy did not use hateful rhetoric or mean-spirited language like the idiots from West Borough Baptist Church; he simply and politely stated that he used his money to support a cause he believed in.  The fact that he is being lambasted in the media and demonized as a hatemonger should serve as a wake-up call for everyone in America. 

We have truly come to a place in our society where if you do not subscribe to a certain belief that you are ostracized or labeled as hateful or labeled as ignorant.  It’s not just with the issue to sexual preference, but global warming and abortion carry the same sentence for those who might oppose.  Recently the Susan G. Komen foundation (the foundation responsible for Race for the Cure) recently found itself in the same predicament when the Chairwoman decided to pull funding from Planned Parenthood.  They faced such a backlash that they reversed their stance and continue to give money to an organization responsible for the deaths of millions. 

How could this happen?  How can a non-profit organization and privately held company be bullied into making apologies for an ideological position?  There was nothing hateful in their speech.  Mr. Cathy didn’t say “I hate all of the gay people in the whole world” or the Susan G. Komen foundation didn’t say “All women who get abortions need to go to hell.” 

It has happened because there has been an ideological shift in our society which has taken control of our language.  The exact time the shift happened really can’t be pinpointed to a certain day or year.  Maybe it was when as a society we stopped believing in absolute truth.  At some point the Enlightenment Era, which was steeped in the assumption that science, art, literature etc. searched for or believed in an absolute truth.  Our Declaration of Independence was formed during the Enlightenment Era and it states “we hold these truths to be self-evident that all men are created equal…”

But the Enlightenment Era gave way to the Modern Era where people began to reject the certainty of a Creator.  Science, art, and literature no longer had that foundation to begin with, but a foundation of humanism, which is to say that humans are the center of the world and human pursuit should be above all. Humanism rejects anything supernatural and replaces it with human reasoning and the idea of human nature is essentially “good.” 

This line of thinking is what has led us into the Post Modern Era which further separates us from absolute truth.  Postmodernism rejects any objective way to explaining reality.  So in the post-modern world if a person says they believe the sky to be purple, well, it’s purple.  Even if scientific evidence supports the sky being blue, the sky is purple in their mind and in their mind they are right. 

It is from this line of thinking that our language has been hijacked and anyone who does not subscribe to the postmodern thought process is held hostage.  Postmodernism is responsible for the politically correct world we live in.  No longer can Dan Cathy (or anyone like him) state that he doesn’t support gay marriage.  He can’t say this because he is telling people he believes in a standard and that anything that deviates from that standard is wrong. 

But if Dan Cathy says that gay marriage is wrong he is demonized, he is tried in the court of public opinion and found guilty of being hateful.  The scary thing is that in Canada’s hate speech law sexual orientation is included in the protected classes of people.  Please don’t misunderstand me, I’m not advocating for gay-bashing or saying cruel things.  This is scary because a person, let’s say, oh, a pastor perhaps, gives a sermon on Romans 1 and says that homosexuality is wrong.  That pastor can then put into jail.  For what?  For nothing more than his beliefs.

Well, L. Kyle that’s Canada, this is America that would never happen here. 

If Boston and Chicago are successful at blocking the building of a restaurant because the CEO doesn’t support gay marriage,  I would say that we are not far off.

Leftovers enjoy!

L. Kyle

We've been hoodwinked

On June 25 Kraft Foods, the parent company which manufactures the Oreo cookie, posted on their FaceSpaceMyBook page this picture of a rainbow colored Oreo.  Just look at all that stuffing.  I thought Double Stuffed Oreos were good, but, WOW, look at all that filling.  Hold on a sec.  They are not going to make these cookies?  What’s that you say?  The cookie is a celebration.  Of what, God’s covenant, that He will never again flood the earth (after all that is where we get the rainbow)? Oh.  How silly of me, of course Oreo is celebrating gay pride month. 

The tag on the picture is “We support love”.  Well so do most people, but why is it only the gay community has love?  What about the rest of us?  Don’t we have love?  So now you are telling me that first the gay community has high-jacked the rainbow and now they have high-jacked love too? 

Recently the White House saw fit to get in on the celebration and support of “love” by inviting a delegate of the gay community for a little get-together.  Some of the pictures of the event found their way onto the Interweb.  Maybe you have seen the picture of one of the members of the delegation posed by the picture of Ronald Regan.  A sweet picture really save for the woman flipping President Regan the double bird with a huge scowl on her face.  Classy.

Shortly after the White House event the Pentagon held a gay pride event.  One of the speakers was a female Army Colonel and former platoon commander.  She was speaking in front of other military officials stating what a relief it is that she can now openly admit that she is gay.  In her speech she said that it is not about sexual preference, but it’s about moving into a new home and mowing the lawn and all the other regular stuff a family deals with. 

Just days after the Pentagon event Anderson Cooper, famed CNN journalist, announced that he too was gay.  He said that it was time that he stands up and is counted; that he has always been gay, always will be gay and is proud to be gay.  That’s sweet, but why does he get to stand up and say he’s proud to be gay?  Because. This is where the magician is hoodwinking us.

Did you know that in 1962 every state in the nation had a sodomy law?  There were lengthy prison terms or hard labor for those found engaged in sodomy.  Additionally, homosexuality has been considered a mental disease for hundreds of years, but starting in the early 1900s psychologist Sigmund Freud -- and 50 years later Alfred Kinsey --  was making the case that homosexuality was inborn rather than immoral or even a mental disorder. 

According to the UCDavis psychology webpage: 

In 1973, the weight of empirical data, coupled with changing social norms and the development of a politically active gay community in the United State [emphasis mine], led the Board of Directors of the American Psychiatric Association to remove homosexuality from the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM). Some psychiatrists who fiercely opposed their action subsequently circulated a petition calling for a vote on the issue by the Association's membership. That vote was held in 1974, and the Board's decision was ratified.

So what was once illegal and then a mental disorder is not only accepted, but celebrated.  Granted not all of us are celebrating, but the push by the mainstream media of the homosexual agenda is astounding.  And really the mass media is where the magician does his work and tricks us all. 

Even scientists are in on the trick.  Notice that UC Davis cites that empirical data AND changing social norms AND the development politically active gay community as the reason to remove homosexuality from the mental illness list.  Do you think that we could lobby scientists to find that massive amounts of candy and soda are in fact good for you?  If science can succumb to social pressure, who then is immune?

It first started out with tolerance and the eroding of social morals and norms.  The gay community first preached tolerance.  That was their mantra.  Tolerate our behavior, tolerate lifestyle.  Tolerance was not enough though.  Once they received enough tolerance they moved on to a new mantra. 

That mantra is acceptance.  Tolerance is no longer good enough.  Instead of just tolerating the gay community the rest of society must accept their lifestyle as normal.  Smoking has become unacceptable by most in our society.  Some might even argue that smoking is not even very well tolerated.  “If you want to smoke fine, but do it somewhere else, you smell bad.”  What a role reversal we have here!  In the 1920s people were smoking like no tomorrow and homosexuals were being thrown in prison. Now homosexuals are celebrating like no tomorrow and smokers are being thrown in jail…well maybe not jail, but they are being fined in some cases.

L. Kyle, smoking is choice!

So is who you choose to have sex with! But that’s the magic trick.  We have been tricked into thinking that people are born gay.  If being gay is inborn then so is bestiality and pedophilia, right? Why else would people want to have sex with animals or children, it must be inborn, that’s the only logical explanation.  Despite what Freud and Kingsey tell us, sexual preference is not inborn.  Scientists tell us there is empirical data to support inborn abnormal sexual preference, but they also say that there is empirical data to support evolution.  If both are true, wouldn’t have evolution weeded out homosexual tendencies long ago? 

Imagine Ellen Degeneres and Anderson Cooper were the last two people on earth.  Could the human race go on? Which inborn instinct would win the war, sexual preference or survival?  My bet would be on survival.  Because once we strip out all of the pleasure of sex, it serves as a way of sustaining human life, it’s how we procreate.  It just so happens that God is pretty awesome in that he made sex pleasurable, but the magician has tricked us there too.

L. Kyle you hateful bigot!   

See that’s my point exactly.  The gay community has pushed the agenda of acceptance to the point that anyone who speaks out against their lifestyle is labeled as hateful and a bigot.  Did I say that I hate gay people?  No.  I am simply resistant to the idea that homosexuality is anything but a choice.  Is an adulterer born that way?  “I’m sorry I had sex with that other woman, but honey I was born that way.” 

“Don’t hide yourself in regret, just love yourself and you’re set, I’m on the right track baby, I was born this way” sings Lady Gaga. 

And our society is no longer questioning Lady Gaga and her statement. We simply accept what she says because that is what we were tricked into doing by the magician.   The problem is that while we were watching the magic act and captivated by words like sexual freedom, enticed by endless pleasure we have ushered in a new era in which all sexual choices cannot be questioned. 

The sad part is that rather than hate and bigotry I truly have compassion because just as much as the rest of society has been hoodwinked by the magician so has the gay community…

Leftovers enjoy.

L. Kyle.

We are going downhill...

…and we are picking up speed.  

On June 10, 2012 the Netroots Nation conference was held  in San Jose, California.  Most people were probably unaware that the conference happened or even what Netroots is even about. Suffice it to say that this conference was a gathering of progressive-minded people who get together a couple times a year to discuss how to be activists using the internet and other technologies.  Don’t think pocket protectors and WOW, but think of people set on changing the political landscape of this country.  Netroots is to the left side as the Tea Party is to the right side.

If you go to their website you can see an archive of their different topics and even listen to most of the speakers.  Most of their topics are typical leftwing type items: “From Defeat to Triumph: Erasing the Death Penalty in America”, “Inside the Activists’ Studio: What to Do When the Right Comes After You”, “People, Not Polar Bears: Digital Revolutions and the New Fight Against Climate Change”.  Then there was this…”Liberate Your Ass: Why Sexual Freedom is Key to Fighting the Right”. 

You might think the Tea Party is comprised of a bunch of crackpots, but they probably don’t sit around and discuss sexual freedom in this country.   That’s the point though.  Believe it or not there is a segment of this country that sees sexual freedom as the defining issue in this country.  They believe that if somehow everyone has the right to express themselves sexually that this country will be healed, the economy will be booming and all will be right in the universe.  This is their all; sex in any form, sex with anyone (perhaps anything?), sex no matter what the cost. 

One of the panelists for “Liberate your ass” was Elizabeth Fernandez-Kimmel one of the staff members at the Woodull Sexual Freedom Alliance.  There’s an alliance for that?  Really?   The WSFA is all about making sure that people have the opportunity to have as much pleasure as possible.  Here’s an excerpt from their website

            Woodhull has been hard at work to combat the prohibition of pleasure, the rollbacks on hard-won freedoms and protections and to advance an agenda that recognizes the wonderful diversity of sex, sexuality and our rights to make informed, consensual choices in our lives.

Prohibition on pleasure?  Hard-won sexual freedoms?  Oh come on! Now they’re just making this stuff up.  Right?  Wrong.  There is a definite element in society whose goal is to sexualize our society to the point that sex between a married man and women in the privacy of their own bedroom will become deviant.

The WSFA wants to advance an agenda that recognizes, which is to say that they want you to recognize, the wonderful diversity of sex.  What does that mean?  Well for starters they want you to forget that there is a God-given standard in regards to sex.  Sex is intended to be between one man and one woman who are married. 

L. Kyle you old-fashioned prude! 

Let’s suspend reality for a minute and think what we would have to live without if everyone subscribed to this standard for sex.    Adultery. Gone. Teen Pregnancy. Gone.  STDs.  Gone.  AIDS. Gone.  Pornography.  Gone.  Prostitution.  Gone.  Dang, the WSFA’s is right, we need to champion the diversity of sex and pursue pleasure at all costs because we have gained so much. 

I’m no fool, I realize that even in the most conservative of places in our nation that sexual desires are lived out which deviate from this standard. But it’s alarming to what rate we as a nation have embraced the idea of sexual diversity and we have unabashedly thrown decency out the window.  It’s been 50 years since the sexual revolution of the 1960s.  Free love was the theme of the day.  But today, as the WSFA puts it, it’s all about sex and pleasure.  At least the hippies tried to sell their debauchery as love and not just self-gratification. 

In the past year a series of books have taken this country and the U.K. by storm.  The first in the series is titled 50 Shades of Grey.  The story is about a young college student becoming sexually involved with a Billionaire banker who has a panache for kinky sex.  What started as books sold only in digital format has now come to sell more than 10 million copies worldwide and currently is #1 on the New York Times Bestseller list, both in paperback and digital.  There is even talks of a movie deal some in the future. 

The problem?  The books (from what I’m told) are beyond graphic in their sexual content.  The New York Times dubs this book as “mommy porn”, not because there are mommies in them, but because now mommies can read books with graphic sexual content and feel okay about it.  After all, 10 million Elvis fans can’t be wrong, can they?  Ten million readers have purchased a book with a central theme of graphic, pornographic sex.  Although critics may have panned the books as poorly written it has not stopped millions from celebrating the sex scenes.  “I read it for the dramatic story line.” 

Millions are celebrating deviating from the standard.  The problem with deviating from the standard is that there are often times severe consequences.  We however began to minimize the consequences.  When AIDS became a problem we taught “safe sex.”  That is we taught that sex without a condom and with multiple partners was dangerous.  When teen pregnancy was on the rise we taught sex education.  That is we demonstrated to kids how to put on a condom, passed out free condoms and gave them some stats on STDs.  When unintended pregnancies happened we legalized abortion.

It seems we don’t have to minimize the consequences any longer.  Groups like the Woodhull Sexual Freedom Alliance see it as their goal to maintain the “hard-won” freedoms to seek pleasure.  Books like 50 Shades of Grey will apparently continue to sell so that mommies can have their porn in a socially acceptable way.  To what end?  What is the eventual outcome of all this hedonism? 

The moral decay of our society, that’s what.  And when decency and morality stand in the way of seeking pleasure, then decency and morality will become deviant behavior.

Leftovers.  Enjoy

L. Kyle.

Something’s wrong with the world today…

…and I don’t know what it is.  I can tell you that our priorities in this country are severely misplaced. Just type into Google “mom leaves kids in car” and you will get quite a few recent stories of mothers leaving their kids in the car so they can do things like get piercings, go to parties or buy drugs.  And although this is not representative if all mothers out there, there seems to be a rash of parents making some pretty stupid decisions involving their kids. 

Stupid decisions and misplaced priorities do not stop with moms and dad in the American heartland, no, they go the highest levels of government.  Several months ago I had the somber task of telling a mother and father that their son had died in combat.  A difficult task indeed, but part of my job and one that must be done.  I must admit that days after giving the news I was still affected by watching these parents receive the worst news of their lives. 

I know some of the process which goes on during a death notification for our military men and women.  I know that there are a lot of tough decisions to be made by family members within hours of hearing the news.  I know that each family of the deceased service member receives proper notification by senior ranking officer or enlisted member in their Class A uniform.  I know the family receives letters of condolences by the Service Secretary, perhaps a phone call or personal visit by their child’s or spouse’s commanding officer.  But I have often wondered if they receive a phone call from the President. 

I hope they do.  I believe that the families of our fallen service members deserve the 10 minutes or less of The Commander and Chief’s time.  If they don’t get a phone call then this is the perfect example of misplaced priorities.  Some of you might be thinking “L.Kyle, the President is a busy man, he doesn’t have time.”  True.  The POTUS is a busy man.  I would not want his job.  I couldn’t imagine the burden that he carries and the decisions he must face. That’s probably why our presidents take so many vacations. 

However, I believe that our President has made the time to call, address or comment on other stories which do not even come close to the gravity of American sons and daughters losing their lives in the defense of this great nation. 

Here are four instances when the President has taken time out of his busy schedule  to address issues or groups of people in our nation.  You decide if you think these are more or less important than our fallen service members.

March 2, 2012

http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/election-2012/post/obama-calls-sandra-fluke-georgetown-law-student-assailed-by-rush-limbaugh/2012/03/02/gIQAIoW0mR_blog.html

Ms Sandra Fluke, a Georgetown University law student, testified in front of Congress about the need for institutions like Georgetown, to make contraceptives available at no cost. We should all remember the debate several months ago regarding a provision in the President’s healthcare law, which would require institutions to make contraception available, even if that institution did not agree with idea of contraception (i.e. the Catholic Church).  Ms Fluke wanted free condoms because she estimated that the average female Georgetown law student spends nearly $1000 on condoms a year during their time at law school. Ms Fluke was demonized by the likes of Rush Limbaugh who called Ms Fluke a ‘slut’. 

Well just so happens that when you get called a derogatory name over the airwaves it warrants a call from our President (unless you are Sarah Palin, or Michelle Bachman or S.E. Cupp).  And our president did just that.  He cleared at least a few minutes to console Ms Fluke on a private phone call. 

March 15, 2012

http://www.latimes.com/news/politics/la-pn-obama-ncaa-bracket-picks-20120314-002,0,5272586.photo

The President released his, much anticipated NCAA March Madness bracket picks. Now I’m not a huge college basketball fan, but I do know that the tournament starts off with 64 teams.  Now whether the POTUS picks based on actual knowledge of the teams or favorite colleges or jersey colors I’m not sure, but I do know it must have taken at least 10 minutes of his busy schedule to fill out. -- I wonder what the buy-in is in the White House bracket pool, $10, $20, $50?  Does the winner get a free game of bowling and a pizza party…veggie pizza of course with fat free cheese and gluten free crust and only 16 ounces of soda.

March 23, 2012

http://www.usatoday.com/news/nation/story/2012-03-23/trayvon-florida-obama-protest/53734214/1

We all should remember in March when the story of a black teenager was shot and killed in Florida started garnering national attention.  It made national headlines for weeks and captured much of our lives. It was such a hotbed issue that the President had to weigh in and he took time out of his busy schedule to comment.  He said that if he had a son that his son would look like the victim, Trayvon Martin and that this tragedy should give the nation pause.  This is a tragedy, but 130+ men and women have lost their live in Afghanistan since January1, 2012 and if the death of a teenage boy in Florida should give us pause what does a 130+ dead service members give us?  Don’t just pause; take a 15 minute break…smoke if you got ‘em!  

June 9, 2012

http://www.netrootsnation.org/nn_events/nn-12/closing-keynote/

The President give a pre-recorded video presentation at Netroots Nation.  Now those not familiar with Netroots Nation, it is a conference which caters towards “progressives” and how to organize politically and trumpet the progressive message.  *Think grassroots, but for the more tech savvy among us.*  Some of the agenda items from the three-day conference were Turn it Up: How to use hip-hop to mobilize in 2012, okay, fairly benign.  How about Liberate your ass: why sexual freedom is key to fighting the Right. Wait. What? If you don’t believe me, you can see it here. 

Really, our president had time to address a group of people who think that liberating your backside (whatever that means) and sexual freedom is good political discourse.    But he doesn’t have time to call a family member who just lost a loved one in battle?

Something is wrong with the world today.

Leftovers enjoy.

L. Kyle