Below is a summary of “A Christian Manifesto” which is a very important book written by Francis Schaeffer just a couple of years before his death in 1984.
A Christian Manifesto by Dr. Francis A. Schaeffer
This address was delivered by the late Dr. Schaeffer in 1982 at the Coral Ridge Presbyterian Church, Fort Lauderdale, Florida. It is based on one of his books, which bears the same title.
We must absolutely set out to smash the lie of the new and novel concept of the separation of religion from the state which most people now hold and which Christians have just bought a bill of goods. This is new and this is novel. It has no relationship to the meaning of the First Amendment. The First Amendment was that the state would never interfere with religion. THAT’S ALL THE MEANING THERE WAS TO THE FIRST AMENDMENT. Just read Madison and the Spectator Papers if you don’t think so. That’s all it was!
Now we have turned it over and we have put it on its head and what we must do is absolutely insist that we return to what the First Amendment meant in the first place — not that religion can’t have an influence into society and into the state — not that. But we must insist that there’s a freedom that the First Amendment really gave. Now with this we must emphasize, and I said it, but let me say it again, we do not want a theocracy! I personally am opposed to a theocracy. On this side of the New Testament I do not believe there is a place for a theocracy ’till Jesus the King comes back. But that’s a very different thing while saying clearly we are not in favor of a theocracy in name or in fact, from where we are now, where all religious influence is shut out of the processes of the state and the public schools. We are only asking for one thing. We are asking for the freedom that the First Amendment guaranteed. That’s what we should be standing for.
Now, I come toward the close, and that is that we must recognize something from the Scriptures, and that’s why I had that Scripture read that I had read tonight. When the government negates the law of God, it abrogates its authority. God has given certain offices to restrain chaos in this fallen world, but it does not mean that these offices are autonomous, and when a government commands that which is contrary to the Law of God, it abrogates its authority.
Throughout the whole history of the Christian Church, (and again I wish people knew their history. In A Christian Manifesto I stress what happened in the Reformation in reference to all this) at a certain point, it is not only the privilege but it is the duty of the Christian to disobey the government. Now that’s what the founding fathers did when they founded this country. That’s what the early Church did. That’s what Peter said. You heard it from the Scripture: “Should we obey man?… rather than God?” That’s what the early Christians did.
Occasionally — no, often, people say to me, “But the early Church didn’t practice civil disobedience.” Didn’t they? You don’t know your history again. When those Christians that we all talk about so much allowed themselves to be thrown into the arena, when they did that, from their view it was a religious thing. They would not worship anything except the living God. But you must recognize from the side of the Roman state, there was nothing religious about it at all — it was purely civil. The Roman Empire had disintegrated until the only unity it had was its worship of Caesar. You could be an atheist; you could worship the Zoroastrian religion… You could do anything. They didn’t care. It was a civil matter, and when those Christians stood up there and refused to worship Caesar, from the side of the state, they were rebels. They were in civil disobedience and they were thrown to the beasts. They were involved in civil disobedience, as much as your brothers and sisters in the Soviet Union are. When the Soviet Union says that, by law, they cannot tell their children, even in their home about Jesus Christ, they must disobey and they get sent off to the mental ward or to Siberia. It’s exactly the same kind of civil disobedience that’s represented in a very real way by the thing I am wearing on my lapel tonight.
Every appropriate legal and political governmental means must be used. “The final bottom line”– I have invented this term in A Christian Manifesto. I hope the Christians across this country and across the world will really understand what the Bible truly teaches: The final bottom line! The early Christians, every one of the reformers (and again, I’ll say in A Christian Manifesto I go through country after country and show that there was not a single place with the possible exception of England, where the Reformation was successful, where there wasn’t civil disobedience and disobedience to the state), the people of the Reformation, the founding fathers of this country, faced and acted in the realization that if there is no place for disobeying the government, that government has been put in the place of the living God. In such a case, the government has been made a false god. If there is no place for disobeying a human government, what government has been made GOD.
Caesar, under some name, thinking of the early Church, has been put upon the final throne. The Bible’s answer is NO! Caesar is not to be put in the place of God and we as Christians, in the name of the Lordship of Christ, and all of life, must so think and act on the appropriate level. It should always be on the appropriate level. We have lots of room to move yet with our court cases, with the people we elect — all the things that we can do in this country. If, unhappily, we come to that place, the appropriate level must also include a disobedience to the state.
If you are not doing that, you haven’t thought it through. Jesus is not really on the throne. God is not central. You have made a false god central. Christ must be the final Lord and not society and not Caesar.
May I repeat the final sentence again? CHRIST MUST BE THE FINAL LORD AND NOT CAESAR AND NOT SOCIETY.
Obama: Raise Taxes, Capital Gains – “For Purposes of Fairness”
Everyone knows that if you eliminate the capital gains tax then those who are wealthy will put more money into creating jobs. However, Mitt Romney feels so guilty about being wealthy that he has proposed eliminating the capital gains for everyone except for those making over 200,000 dollars.
As the GOP casts about for a response to Occupy Wall Street, at least one prominent Republican isn’t sweating it. In the war over class, Mitt Romney is already waving a white flag. And therein lies one of his chief liabilities as a Republican nominee or president.
The Occupy masses don’t have a unified message, though the Democrats embracing them aren’t making that mistake. President Obama helpfully explained that the crowds in New York and elsewhere are simply expressing their “frustrations” at unequal American society. The answer to their protests is, conveniently, his own vision for the country. If wealthier Americans and corporations are just asked to pay their “fair share,” if “we can go back to that then I think a lot of that anger, that frustration dissipates,” said the president.
Associated PressGOP Presidential candidate Mitt Romney on the trail
This is a campaign theme in the making, and one with which Mr. Obama has already had plenty of practice. Congressional Democrats, too, see the value of pivoting off Occupy Wall Street to build an election-year class-warfare argument.
Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid’s latest answer to any spending proposal is a “millionaire’s surtax,” which he intends to make Republicans vote against ad nauseam. Labor unions, liberal activist groups—all see an Occupy opportunity to refocus the blame for a faltering economy away from President Obama and to greedy, rich America.
But here’s the other big prize, from the White House’s perspective: The man they most expect to become the Republican nominee, Mitt Romney, is already running from this debate. Mr. Romney, they see, is in the full throes of Guilty Republican Syndrome.
It’s a curious illness, even if its source is clear: success. Mr. Romney is a multimillionaire, and through his own hard work. It’s a great American story, yet the Republican is paralyzed at the thought of what his opponents might do with it in a 9% unemployment economy. Democrats have already pounced on his time at Bain Capital, accusing Mr. Romney of “stripping down” companies and “laying off” employees for profit. The press has run exposés on his privileged upbringing, his “oceanfront” vacation home, his use of private jets.
Even his Republican opponents, who should know better, are lobbing anti-wealth pot shots. Herman Cain has taken to comparing his own “Main Street” business experience to Mr. Romney’s “Wall Street” past. Rick Perry is running an ad that hits Mr. Romney on his state health-care plan but ends with this bit of class: “Even the richest man can’t buy back his past.”
Having initially fought these caricatures, Mr. Romney has since begun to exhibit all the syndrome’s symptoms. He’s put forth a 59-point economic plan that eliminates the capital gains tax—but only for people who earn less than $200,000 a year. He’s declared, at a New Hampshire town hall (and at every other opportunity): “I’m not running for the rich people. Rich people can take care of themselves. They’re doing just fine.” He’s developed a form of Tourette’s that causes him to employ the term “middle class” in nearly every sentence.
Related Video
James Taranto on how Mitt Romney’s guilt as a millionaire feeds Democratic class warfare.
Mr. Romney is clearly hoping that his own passive form of class warfare will head his opponents off at the blue-collar pass. Really? The 2012 election is shaping up to be a profound choice. Mr. Obama is making no bones about his vision of higher taxes, wealth redistribution, larger government.
Mr. Romney has generally espoused the opposing view—smaller government, fewer regulations, opportunity—but only timidly. This hobbles his ability to go head to head with the president, to make the moral and philosophical case for that America. How can Mr. Romney oppose Mr. Obama’s plans to raise taxes on higher incomes, dividends and capital gains when the Republican himself diminishes the role of the “top 1%”? How can he demonstrate a principled understanding of capital and job creation when latching on to Mr. Obama’s own trademark $200,000 income cutoff?
At a town hall in Iowa Thursday, Mr. Romney took it further: “For me, one of the key criteria in looking at tax policy is to make sure that we help the people that need the help the most.”
These are the sort of statements that cause conservative voters to doubt Mr. Romney’s convictions. It also makes them doubt the ability of a President Romney to convince a Congress of the need for fundamental tax reform. If anything he owes a debt to Newt Gingrich, who in a recent debate gave him a taste of how politically and intellectually vulnerable he is on this argument, asking Mr. Romney to justify the $200,000 threshold.
Mr. Romney’s non-responsive response included five references to the “middle” class and another admonition that the “rich” are “doing just fine.” Mr. Obama can’t wait to agree, even as he shames Mr. Romney over his bank account.
Mr. Romney isn’t the first Republican to develop Guilty Syndrome, and one option would be to form a support group with, say, George H.W. Bush. A better cure might be the tonic of Ronald Reagan, who never let his own wealth get in the way of a good lower-tax argument. Reagan’s message, delivered with cheerfulness and conviction, was that he wanted everyone in American to have the opportunity to be as successful as he had been. If Mr. Romney is looking for a way to connect with an aspiring American electorate, that’s a start.
The Fed fails to grasp that an interest rate is a price, the price of time. Attempting to manipulate that price is as destructive as any other government price control.
To know what is wrong with the Federal Reserve, one must first understand the nature of money. Money is like any other good in our economy that emerges from the market to satisfy the needs and wants of consumers. Its particular usefulness is that it helps facilitate indirect exchange, making it easier for us to buy and sell goods because there is a common way of measuring their value. Money is not a government phenomenon, and it need not and should not be managed by government. When central banks like the Fed manage money they are engaging in price fixing, which leads not to prosperity but to disaster.
WSJ’s Danny Yadron discusses Ron Paul’s proposal for $1 trillion in budget cuts with “Mean Street” host Evan Newmark. Paul’s cuts would come in large part as a result of cutting several cabinet positions. AP Photo.
The Federal Reserve has caused every single boom and bust that has occurred in this country since the bank’s creation in 1913. It pumps new money into the financial system to lower interest rates and spur the economy. Adding new money increases the supply of money, making the price of money over time—the interest rate—lower than the market would make it. These lower interest rates affect the allocation of resources, causing capital to be malinvested throughout the economy. So certain projects and ventures that appear profitable when funded at artificially low interest rates are not in fact the best use of those resources.
Eventually, the economic boom created by the Fed’s actions is found to be unsustainable, and the bust ensues as this malinvested capital manifests itself in a surplus of capital goods, inventory overhangs, etc. Until these misdirected resources are put to a more productive use—the uses the free market actually desires—the economy stagnates.
The great contribution of the Austrian school of economics to economic theory was in its description of this business cycle: the process of booms and busts, and their origins in monetary intervention by the government in cooperation with the banking system. Yet policy makers at the Federal Reserve still fail to understand the causes of our most recent financial crisis. So they find themselves unable to come up with an adequate solution.
In many respects the governors of the Federal Reserve System and the members of the Federal Open Market Committee are like all other high-ranking powerful officials. Because they make decisions that profoundly affect the workings of the economy and because they have hundreds of bright economists working for them doing research and collecting data, they buy into the pretense of knowledge—the illusion that because they have all these resources at their fingertips they therefore have the ability to guide the economy as they see fit.
Nothing could be further from the truth. No attitude could be more destructive. What the Austrian economists Ludwig von Mises and Friedrich von Hayek victoriously asserted in the socialist calculation debate of the 1920s and 1930s—the notion that the marketplace, where people freely decide what they need and want to pay for, is the only effective way to allocate resources—may be obvious to many ordinary Americans. But it has not influenced government leaders today, who do not seem to see the importance of prices to the functioning of a market economy.
The manner of thinking of the Federal Reserve now is no different than that of the former Soviet Union, which employed hundreds of thousands of people to perform research and provide calculations in an attempt to mimic the price system of the West’s (relatively) free markets. Despite the obvious lesson to be drawn from the Soviet collapse, the U.S. still has not fully absorbed it.
The Fed fails to grasp that an interest rate is a price—the price of time—and that attempting to manipulate that price is as destructive as any other government price control. It fails to see that the price of housing was artificially inflated through the Fed’s monetary pumping during the early 2000s, and that the only way to restore soundness to the housing sector is to allow prices to return to sustainable market levels. Instead, the Fed’s actions have had one aim—to keep prices elevated at bubble levels—thus ensuring that bad debt remains on the books and failing firms remain in business, albatrosses around the market’s neck.
The Fed’s quantitative easing programs increased the national debt by trillions of dollars. The debt is now so large that if the central bank begins to move away from its zero interest-rate policy, the rise in interest rates will result in the U.S. government having to pay hundreds of billions of dollars in additional interest on the national debt each year. Thus there is significant political pressure being placed on the Fed to keep interest rates low. The Fed has painted itself so far into a corner now that even if it wanted to raise interest rates, as a practical matter it might not be able to do so. But it will do something, we know, because the pressure to “just do something” often outweighs all other considerations.
What exactly the Fed will do is anyone’s guess, and it is no surprise that markets continue to founder as anticipation mounts. If the Fed would stop intervening and distorting the market, and would allow the functioning of a truly free market that deals with profit and loss, our economy could recover. The continued existence of an organization that can create trillions of dollars out of thin air to purchase financial assets and prop up a fundamentally insolvent banking system is a black mark on an economy that professes to be free.
Mr. Paul, a congressman from Texas, is seeking the Republican presidential nomination
The Sixty Six who resisted “Sugar-coated Satan Sandwich” Debt Deal (Part 21)
This post today is a part of a series I am doing on the 66 Republican Tea Party favorites that resisted eating the “Sugar-coated Satan Sandwich” Debt Deal. Actually that name did not originate from a representative who agrees with the Tea Party, but from a liberal.
Rep. Emanuel Clever (D-Mo.) called the newly agreed-upon bipartisan compromise deal to raise the debt limit “a sugar-coated satan sandwich.”
“This deal is a sugar-coated satan sandwich. If you lift the bun, you will not like what you see,” Clever tweeted on August 1, 2011.
WASHINGTON, D.C. – After months of debate, tonight the House of Representatives passed S.365, the Budget Control Act of 2011, to raise the debt ceiling and enact some spending reforms. Specifically, it would reduce deficits by $917 billion over ten years by capping spending levels and in return raise the debt ceiling $900 billion. In addition, it requires a vote on a balanced budget amendment in both the House and the Senate after October 2, 2011 but before the end of the year. It then establishes a commission tasked with finding an additional $1.2 to $1.5 trillion in spending cuts by November 23, 2011. A second debt ceiling increase of $1.5 trillion would be permitted at the beginning of next year if the balanced budget amendment is sent to the states for ratification, or if the commission proposal includes cuts equal to or greater than $1.5 trillion and those cuts are passed into law. If neither happens, a $1.2 trillion debt limit increase would be attached to across the board spending cuts that would equal the difference between $1.2 trillion and the cuts enacted by the commission’s proposal. Congressman Westmoreland did not support the legislation.
“When these negotiations began in January, I made a promise that I would not vote for any legislation that didn’t include significant spending cuts and absolutely no tax increases. Unfortunately, the final plan did not include significant enough cuts and left open the possibility for tax increases through this bipartisan commission. In addition, it does not require a balanced budget amendment be sent to the states for ratification. Without that constitutional restraint placed on this Congress and future Congresses, we can never guarantee real spending reforms will happen.
“House Republicans also made a promise to the American people that we would bring back an open process here in Congress. Up until now, we have stuck with that promise. We’ve posted legislation on the internet and given the American people and Members of Congress 72 hours to review it. We’ve brought back open rules on appropriations bills, allowing Republican and Democrat members alike to offer amendments. But now, after this deal was crafted behind closed doors with only a few members of leadership at the table, we were given less than 12 hours to read and review this extremely important legislation. More time is needed to make an informed decision about legislation of this size and scope. Unfortunately, once again, Congress has waited until the last minute to act, pushing us up against this artificial August 2nd deadline and forcing a decision on a bill it seems no one actually likes.
“I and other Republicans in the House stuck by our leadership in the hopes we could keep Cut, Cap and Balance alive and negotiate a deal we could support. And while I know they worked hard to get the best deal possible, at the end of the day, it’s just not a deal I can support. I commend their efforts though. If you will recall, up until a few months ago, President Obama was still calling for a ‘clean’ debt ceiling increase and last night was still pushing for immediate tax increases on job creators. So we came a long way during these negotiations. Unfortunately, Senate Democrats and the White House stalled any attempt at real spending reform, resulting in this unpopular deal,” stated Westmoreland.
In 2002, when the British rock band Coldplay was on tour with its second album, A Rush of Blood to the Head, frontman Chris Martin said, “I just want to make the best music of all time with my best friends.” Since that time, Coldplay, with Jonny Buckland on guitar, Guy Berryman on bass and Will Champion on drums, has become one of the biggest acts in rock.
NPR’s Scott Simon spoke with Martin and Champion on the occasion of their fifth album, Mylo Xyloto, due out this week. Martin says that, at the very least, the part about friends is still true.
“A band’s only unique thing is its chemistry, especially if none of you are prodigious players or particularly handsome,” Martin says. “The one thing you have is your uniqueness, so we hold on to that.”
Champion says he certainly wasn’t a prodigious player when he joined the group — in fact, he hadn’t intended to join at all before a happy accident convinced the other members he was the man for the job.
“My three friends were starting a band, and they needed a drummer,” Champion says. “My flatmate at the time had some drums in our house, and he was a very gifted drummer. They came over to record the drums on some early demos, and when the time came to record them, my flatmate disappeared and went to the pub. So I volunteered my services to play on one song.
“It was the most lazy and technically inept fill-in that I could have possibly managed,” he adds, laughing. “But, like Chris says … it’s just about the chemistry.”
Martin and Champion say the title Mylo Xyloto (pronounced MY-low ZY-low-toe) doesn’t have any special, secret meaning. Instead, it’s the band’s way of kicking off a new chapter in its career.
“What it is, is an attempt to have a completely fresh start, from our history and from anyone else’s recording history, by coming up with two new words,” Martin says. “Which of course, for a while, will seem a little pretentious or ridiculous. We were thinking about things like ‘Google’ and ‘Pepsi’ — those were also words that made no sense for a while. And, although it’s silly, it’s what it had to be. We now have to sort of apologize for it for a couple of months, but eventually it’ll settle into being the name of that particular group of songs.”
Though the band’s success has only increased in its 15 years together, Coldplay’s members are no strangers to negative feedback. But Martin and Champion both agree that, from time to time, even the harshest critic can make a good point.
“Sometimes we have criticism that is very constructive,” Martin says. “Although it’s painful at the time, most of the things that people have said about us negatively — some of them are true and you can work on them, and the ones that you don’t agree with, you don’t work on.”
“I think it polarizes you,” Champion says. “It makes you examine your insecurities and sometimes unearth something that you secretly feel yourself. Or it makes you totally resolved to disagree with that opinion, and it reinforces your self-belief. I think it’s inevitable, and in some ways can be useful.”
Views:2 By waymedia Coldplay Coldplay – Life In Technicolor ii Back in 2008 I wrote a paper on the spiritual themes of Coldplay’s album Viva La Vida and I predicted this spiritual search would continue in the future. Below is the second part of the paper, “Coldplay’s latest musical lyrics indicate a Spiritual Search for the […]
Coldplay performing “Glass of Water.” Back in 2008 I wrote a paper on the spiritual themes of Coldplay’s album Viva La Vida and I predicted this spiritual search would continue in the future. Below is the first part of the paper, “Coldplay’s latest musical lyrics indicate a Spiritual Search for the Afterlife.” Coldplay’s latest musical […]
Coldplay – Every Teardrop Is A Waterfall (Official) The new single – download it now from iTunes at http://cldp.ly/itunescp (except in the UK, where it will be released to download stores at 12.01am on Sunday June 5th). Written by Berryman / Buckland / Champion / Martin / Allen / Anderson. Produced by Markus Dravs, Dan […]
Here is an article I wrote a couple of years ago: Solomon, Woody Allen, Coldplay and Kansas What does King Solomon, the movie director Woody Allen and the modern rock bands Coldplay and Kansas have in common? All four took on the issues surrounding death, the meaning of life and a possible afterlife, although they all came up with their own conclusions on […]
Coldplay – 42 Live Coldplay perform on the french television channel W9. I wrote this article a couple of years ago: The Spiritual Search for the Afterlife Russ Breimeier rightly noted that it seems that Coldplay is “on the verge of identifying a great Truth” and their latest CD is very provocative. Many songs mention […]
I wrote this article a couple of years ago. Are Gwyneth Paltrow and Chris Martin looking for Spiritual Answers? Just like King Solomon’s predicament in the Book of Ecclesiastes, both of these individuals are very wealthy, famous, and successful, but they still are seeking satisfying answers to life’s greatest questions even though it seems […]
Coldplay seeks to corner the market on earnest and expressive rock music that currently appeals to wide audiences Here is an article I wrote a couple of years ago about Chris Martin’s view of hell. He says he does not believe in it but for some reason he writes a song that teaches that it […]
“Music Monday”:Coldplay’s best songs of all time (Part 6) This is “Music Monday” and I always look at a band with some of their best music. I am currently looking at Coldplay’s best songs. Here are a few followed by another person’s preference: My son Hunter Hatcher’s 15th favorite song is “trouble.” Even though […]
“Music Monday”:Coldplay’s best songs of all time (Part 5) This is “Music Monday” and I always look at a band with some of their best music. I am currently looking at Coldplay’s best songs. Here are a few followed by another person’s preference: Hunter picked “Don’t Panic,” as his number 16 pick of Coldplay’s best […]
Dave Hogan/ Getty Images This is “Music Monday” and I always look at a band with some of their best music. I am currently looking at Coldplay’s best songs. Here are a few followed by another person’s preference: For the 17th best Coldplay song of all-time, Hunter picks “42.” He notes, “You thought you might […]
The best band in the world. Below I have linked some articles I have earlier about the search for meaning in life the band seems to involved in. Chris Martin, Jonny Buckland, Guy Berryman, and Will Champion formed Coldplay in 1996 while going to University in London. The young band quickly established themselves in the […]
I am presently involved in the counting down of the best Coldplay songs of all time, but I am also in a series here reviewing the upcoming songs on Coldplay’s new cd that will be released soon. Here is a review from Rolling Stone: Coldplay Debut new song ‘Charlie Brown’ June 6, 2011 Coldplay debuted […]
Great documentary on Coldplay. I have written a lot on Coldplay the last few years and I see something spiritually happening with the group as they continue to search for a deeping meaning in life. Coldplay Max Masters – Part 1 of 7 Uploaded by thepostbox on May 6, 2009 The ASTRA Award winning music documentary […]
Several members of the 70′s band Kansas became committed Christians after they realized that the world had nothing but meaningless to offer. It seems through the writings of both Woody Allen and Chris Martin of Coldplay that they both are wrestling with the issue of death and what meaning does life bring. Kansas went through […]
This is “Music Monday” and I always look at a band with some of their best music. I am currently looking at Coldplay’s best songs. Here are a few followed by another person’s preference: Hunter has chosen the song “Viva La Vida” as his number 18 pick. Hunter noted, “The violin synth is a […]
Coldplay – Every Teardrop Is A Waterfall Published on Jun 28, 2011 by ColdplayVEVO The new single, taken from Every Teardrop Is A Waterfall EP (featuring two more new tracks). Download it from http://cldp.ly/itunescp Music video by Coldplay performing Every Teardrop Is A Waterfall. (P) 2011 The copyright in this audiovisual recording is owned by […]
Coldplay – 42 Live Coldplay perform on the french television channel W9. In 1992 Woody Allen took up with one of his adopted kids and lived in with her. He was given over to the pursuit of pleasure. Actually he has made that a major focus of his life. In the latter part of his […]
In the past three years I have written many posts concerning the spiritual meaning of the Coldplay songs. There is something going on with them. Even with one of the songs on their upcoming album there is something spiritual they are driving at. Tonight on Letterman the band will perform. Elusive: Gwyneth Paltrow and Chris […]
This is “Music Monday” and I always look at a band with some of their best music. I am currently looking at Coldplay’s best songs. Here are a few followed by another person’s preference: My son Hunter is a coldplay nut and his 19th favorite song is “Glass of Water.” The whole album is very […]
This is “Music Monday” and I always look at a band with some of their best music. I am currently looking at Coldplay’s best songs. Here are a few followed by another person’s preference: My son Hunter’s 20th favorite song: Coldplay – Speed Of Sound Hunter Hatcher comments: Speed of sound takes me back to […]
Papa Roach – Last Resort (Censored Version) Amy Winehouse died at the young age of 27 and she had lived a life filled with drug and alcohol addiction. This series on Papa Roach is meant to provide answers to those who feel trapped. Hopefully it will people to avoid troubles like Amy Winehouse experienced. Today I […]
Elusive: Gwyneth Paltrow and Chris Martin in a rare shot together at a beach party in the Hamptons I was very interested in the first single that came out from Coldplay a few weeks ago, but this second single escaped my attention. Then this morning my son Hunter told me all about this second song […]
Interview with Tim Foreman and Chad Butler airing February 26th, 2007.
Discuss: cowbell, Christianity, fan connection
_______________________________________
Switchfoot is a Christian Band with a great message (Part 2)
One of my favorite bands is Switchfoot. Tim Foreman is the front man and this band has always been very vocal about their Christian faith. I am really enjoying this series on their band.
Andrew Shirley – guitar – Birthday (married with a daughter)
Switchfoot Bio:
Switchfoot is an alternative rock band from San Diego, CA, that was formed in 1996 by brothers Jon and Tim Foreman and their surfing buddy, Chad Butler. Though they competed in national surf championships on weekends and were good enough to earn product endorsements from equipment companies, their real passion was music. The guys formed a band (originally known as Chin Up) and they released three albums before making their major label debut in 2003.In 2001, Jerome Fontimillas joined the band playing keys, guitar, and singing background vocals.
Drew Shirley started touring with the band as a guitarist in 2003. He officially joined Switchfoot in 2005.
My niece Mallory Nail went to see Switchfoot in concert at John Brown University on Oct 14, 2011 and I am very jealous. 969 Switchfoot Interview #2 Interview with Tim Foreman and Chad Butler airing March 13th, 2007. Discuss: idea of success, fan interaction ________________________________________ Switchfoot is a Christian Band with a great message (Part […]
Members of the Occupy Little Rock group have set up camp outside the Clinton Library, video contributor Gabe Gentry reports. Around 65 are gathered currently with chimineas and grills and pizzas. Thirty plan to camp and remain indefinitely, Gentry said, though a police cruiser had just arrived on the scene to idle 30 yards from the protesters around 8:15 p.m.
I’m going to go take a look as soon as I’m able. More when I’ve got it.
UPDATE: It looks like the police aren’t going to try to disperse the crowd. The protesters have a chiminea going now that they lit only after first getting permission from one of the police officers on the scene.
Some people have tried to praise Occupy Wall St, but they do have any good solutions. The most simple explanation I have seen was by a reader who commented on the story above saying maybe the 99% COULD SCARE THE 1%.
Cato’s Tom Palmer discusses the Occupy Wall Street movement and the Tea Party in a debatewith The Nation‘s Peter Rothberg at PolicyMic:
The Tea Party has a coherent message: Stop the bailouts, stop the cronyism, and stop swindling today’s voters with empty promises and sinking future generations under mountains of debt…
What caused the crisis, the indebtedness, the unemployment, the stagnation? The culprits are state agencies and enterprises, including our Federal Reserve…
The Occupiers have the wrong address. The subprime crisis was designed in Washington, not New York…
Government debts and printing-press money will harm future generations. It’s unfair. It’s immoral. And it’s going to be solved not by occupying Phoenix, or Wall Street, or Atlanta, but by demanding that spendthrift politicians stop the bailouts and the cronyism, put the brakes on spending, and pay attention to a truly radical concept: arithmetic. Those are sound Tea Party values.
I have posted a lot about Steve Jobs and I have the links below after this fine aricle: Steve Jobs to Obama in 2010: ‘You’re Headed for a One-Term Presidency’ Lachlan Markay October 21, 2011 at 12:04 pm Steve Jobs, the late Apple founder and digital pioneer, told President Obama in a 2010 meeting […]
Steve Brawner made the comment: For now, the Occupy movement doesn’t seem to be offering a lot of concrete solutions for the nation’s problems, and until it does, it won’t accomplish much. Captain America is a loyal reader of Brawner and he pointed to a great article on the subject and here it is: Confusing […]
Republican debate Oct 18, 2011 (last part) with video clips and transcript Below are video clips and the transcript. pt 5 pt 6 pt 7 COOPER: We’re going to move on to an issue very important here in the state of Nevada and throughout the West. We have a question from the hall. QUESTION: Yeah, […]
I have written a lot about Steve Jobs recently and I wanted to link those posts below. Here is an interesting article for those who think that government officials are smart as those like Steve Jobs who are able to survive in the private market place and thrive. Indian Bureaucrats Are No Steve Jobs by […]
Dan Mitchell is right about the “Occupy Wall St crowd” Here is some video and pictures of the Occupy Arkansas March of October 15, 2011 followed by an excellent article by Jason Tolbert. Steve Brawner has rightly said: For now, the Occupy movement doesn’t seem to be offering a lot of concrete solutions for the […]
Steve Jobs was raised as a conservative Lutheran but he chose to leave those beliefs behind. Below is a very good article on his life. COVER STORY ARTICLE | Issue: “Steve Jobs 1955-2011″ October 22, 2011 A god of our age Who was Steve Jobs? A revered technology pioneer and a relentless innovator, the Apple […]
Demonstrators march through the streets of Little Rock on Saturday in a protest organized by Occupy Little Rock. (John Lyon photo) Occupy Arkansas got cranked up today in Little Rock with their first march and several hundred showed up. It was unlike the pro-life marches that I have been a part of that have had […]
COUNTER-DEMONSTRATION: At Kappa Sigma house in Fayetteville. The Drew Wilson photo above went viral last night — at least in Arkansas e-mail and social media users — after the Fayetteville Flyer posted it in coverage of an Occupy Northwest Arkansas demonstration in Fayetteville. The 1 percent banner was unfurled briefly on the Kappa Sigma frat […]
I found this article interesting from the Wall Street Journal: OCTOBER 10, 2011 The Corporate Exec: Hollywood Demon Nazis are getting old, moviemakers don’t want to offend foreign audiences, so corporate types top the list of evil stereotypes By EDWARD JAY EPSTEIN It is not surprising that pop-culture protesters are now intent on occupying Wall […]
The Arkansas Times Blog reported today: Around 100 were on hand for tonight’s Occupy Little Rock planning meeting, the second since the group formed in Little Rock earlier this month. Organizers and attendees struggled with a somewhat complicated voting-by-hand-signals process, but the assembly did get some key points ironed out, including the start time and […]
Messi began playing football at a young age and his potential was quickly identified by Barcelona. He left Rosario-based Newell’s Old Boys‘s youth team in 2000 and moved with his family to Europe, as Barcelona offered treatment for his growth hormone deficiency. Making his debut in the 2004–05 season, he broke his team record for the youngest footballer to score a league goal. Major honours soon followed as Barcelona won La Liga in Messi’s debut season, and won a double of the league and Champions League in 2006. His breakthrough season was in the 2006–07 season; he became a first team regular, scoring a hat-trick in El Clásico and finishing with 14 goals in 26 league games. Messi then had the most successful season of his playing career, the 2008–09 season, in which he scored 38 goals to play an integral part in a treble-winning campaign. This record-breaking season was then eclipsed in the following 2009–10 campaign, where Messi scored 47 goals in all competitions, equalling Ronaldo‘s record total for Barcelona. He surpassed this record again in the 2010–11 season with 53 goals in all competitions.
Messi has won five La Liga titles, three Champions League titles, scoring in two of those finals, against Manchester United in both 2009 and 2011. He was not on the pitch as Barcelona defeated Arsenal in 2006, but received a winners’ medal from the tournament. After scoring 12 goals in the 2010–11 Champions League, Messi became only the third player (after Gerd Müller and Jean-Pierre Papin) to top-score in three successive European Champion Clubs’ Cup campaigns. However, Messi is the first one to win the Champions League top scorer titles for three consecutive years after Champions League changed its format in 1992.[14]
Messi was the top scorer of the 2005 FIFA World Youth Championship with six goals, including two in the final game. Shortly thereafter, he became an established member of Argentina’s senior international team. In 2006, he became the youngest Argentine to play in the FIFA World Cup and he won a runners-up medal at the Copa América tournament the following year. In 2008, in Beijing, he won his first international honour, an Olympic gold medal, with the Argentina Olympic football team. At international level Messi has scored 17 goals in 61 games.
I love the Cato Institute because they give us the facts that liberals just can’t refute. Instead of trying to raise our taxes, President Obama should be cutting spending.
Kathy says that recent U.S. spending data is “exaggerated” because of the recession, and indeed, spending has soared not only here, but in most major countries because of the unfortunate popularity of Keynesian pump-priming theories. My point was that the American smaller-government advantage eroded both during the Bush growth years and during the Obama recession years, as seen in Figure 2 of my testimony.
Kathy noted that the OECD data I used are different than U.S. national income accounts data published by the Bureau of Economic Analysis. Well, that’s right. Every country has quirks in the way they do their national income data. The advantage of using OECD data is that the economists at the OECD adjust for these quirks and create spending data that is comparable across countries. If Kathy has more accurate international comparisons, I’d love to see them.
Finally, Kathy says that just because American government spending divided by GDP is about 40 percent, that “doesn’t mean that government controls about 40 percent of the U.S.economy.” I don’t agree. She means that government does not produce 40 percent of gross domestic product, which is true. The broader figure of 40 or 41 percent includes not just government production but government transfers. And transfers do entail government control over resources because both the taxing and spending activities involved in transfer programs distort private sector behavior. Thus, the government misallocates resources both when it “produces” useless solar power activities in its own labs and when it subsidizes failed private solar companies.
Anyway, thanks to Kathy for raising the important issue of the overall size of government because it is something that the policy community should focus more attention on. For data geeks, the OECD has all kinds of cross-country comparison data here. Government spending is Table 25.
Everyone wants to know more about the budget and here is some key information with a chart from the Heritage Foundation and a video from the Cato Institute.
The federal government is spending more per household than ever before. Since 1965, spending per household has grown by nearly 162 percent, from $11,431 in 1965 to $29,401 in 2010. From 2010 to 2021, it is projected to rise to $35,773, a 22 percent increase.
INFLATION-ADJUSTED DOLLARS (2010)
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Source: U.S. Census Bureau, White House Office of Management and Budget, and Congressional Budget Office.
The charts in this book are based primarily on data available as of March 2011 from the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) and the Congressional Budget Office (CBO). The charts using OMB data display the historical growth of the federal government to 2010 while the charts using CBO data display both historical and projected growth from as early as 1940 to 2084. Projections based on OMB data are taken from the White House Fiscal Year 2012 budget. The charts provide data on an annual basis except… Read More
Authors
Emily GoffResearch Assistant
Thomas A. Roe Institute for Economic Policy StudiesKathryn NixPolicy Analyst
Center for Health Policy StudiesJohn FlemingSenior Data Graphics Editor
Aaron Douglas played for Vols and Bama before dying because of drugs jh39
Aaron Douglas was a lineman for Alabama and I have already written about another Bama lineman by the name of Barrett Jones who was a teammate of Aaron’s. Here are the two links below:
This Saturday is the famous “Third Saturday in October” series between Tennessee and Alabama but Aaron Douglas will not be there. Here is a story that ran in the paper yesterday.
View full sizeKarla Douglas hugs her son, Aaron Douglas, during his high school senior night.
TUSCALOOSA, Alabama — The clothes still embrace his scent.
Journals preserve his handwriting, and the words reveal the creative flow of his mind.
Each time Karla Douglas and David Douglas begin packing away his room, vivid memories of their son open their emotions.
Karla seeks therapy. David goes hunting to think. Five months after Aaron Douglas died from a drug overdose at a house party in Florida, his parents still weep often for their son.
Aaron was an offensive lineman at Alabama when he died May 12, his body discovered on a second-floor balcony after a random visit to a house party in Fernandina Beach, Florida, where he was vacationing.
The thought of Aaron alone in his most vulnerable moment has been difficult for his parents to grasp.
Aaron was 21, but had always been “Momma’s boy,” Karla said. He once said in a song to his father, “Pops, you’re the man for always having my back.”
“He died all alone on that balcony,” Karla said, “and we were not there to help him.”
***
Aaron Douglas, wearing 77, was a 6-foot-7, 275 pound offensive tackle at Alabama.
Aaron wanted to earn a college degree and play in the NFL. At 6-foot-7, 275 pounds, he was a physical phenomenon with enough talent to compete for the starting offensive left tackle spot at Alabama. After starting his career at Tennessee, he would have been at the center of attention during this rivalry week.
Aaron also challenged himself through music, penning rap lyrics he could pound out through his mouth. He hoped one day to own a recording studio.
Football and music were his passions, and he would cling to them living in the sparse desert landscape of Yuma, Arizona, one of the nation’s small border towns in the southwest corner of Arizona on the California border.
This was the place where he would wrestle back control of his world.
“His decision to go 1,989 miles away from home was a welcoming challenge,” Karla said. “He grew as a player and a person, and we saw a young man excited about life and football again.”
***
David Douglas (pictured), was an offensive lineman for Tennessee. Aaron Douglas, his son, followed in his footsteps and took No. 78 after he moved from tight end to offensive line.
The way Aaron’s collegiate career began was a dream for his parents. He attended Tennessee, where mom and dad had been athletes.
When Karla and David were married, Phillip Fulmer promised their yet-to-be-conceived son a football scholarship.
Aaron thrived in orange and white, making the transition from tight end to tackle. When he learned he was moving to the offensive line, he called David, then switched to jersey No. 78, the number his dad wore in college.
On the football field where linemen such as Anthony Munoz had been carved, Aaron proved worthy by earning freshman All-American honors in 2009.
But off the field, Aaron’s world had unraveled.
As a redshirt freshman, he began abusing prescription drugs, Karla said. She said Aaron was introduced to them by “several upperclassmen.”
“This had been going on, undetected, for months and after the third coaching change in less than two years, Aaron fell into severe depression,” Karla said. “We were so proud of him when he acknowledged his problem and asked for help.”
That’s how Aaron made the decision to leave Tennessee and regroup at Arizona Western, a junior college with a reputation of offering football players a place to resurrect their collegiate careers.
“Before he left for AWC, he spent many days and nights writing and recording ‘Lyrical Rehab,'” Karla said. “And out in Yuma with no car and not much to do, he also spent many hours writing and recording. We saw him grow from a tired, depressed, hurt boy into a smiling, happy, focused young man.”
***
Not surprisingly, Aaron thrived in a place void of the many signs of life he was accustomed to in Tennessee.
On the field, he earned All-American honors recruiting interest from some of the nation’s top programs. The process energized Aaron because he never truly experienced it coming out of high school. Most programs assumed he was a lock for Tennessee.
Aaron ultimately signed with Alabama last winter and joined Matadors’ teammate Jesse Williams, who is a starting defensive end with the Crimson Tide.
“We were friends in junior college,” Williams said last month. “After transferring here, we kind of stuck together.”
***
Aaron was brought to Alabama to compete for the starting left tackle position vacated by two-year starter James Carpenter, now with the Seattle Seahawks. He competed throughout the spring with Alfred McCullough.
After three weeks, Alabama experimented with Barrett Jones, who made the move from right guard. Few could have anticipated the move would stick, especially due to circumstances out of their control.
“I still think about it when I see the locker,” Jones said. “It’s weird to see him gone.”
***
Aaron Douglas with his younger sister, Ashley.
“May 12 was like any other day,” Karla said. “Ashley (Aaron’s younger sister) off to school. Karla to work, and David working in his office. … Around 10 (a.m.), coach (Jeff) Stoutland called David to see if we had heard from Aaron. We both started calling and texting him over and over. Coach Stoutland called David again, and David heard concern and worry in his voice and asked what was going on.”
Word began to spread before Stoutland’s call through various websites.
Karla was on her way to a 12:30 p.m. appointment when her husband called. Stoutland had conveyed Internet reports that Aaron had been in a fatal car accident or died at a party.
“I pulled into the parking lot and called information for the police station,” Karla said. “I spoke with an officer and I recall him saying, ‘We have him. He is deceased, and we haven’t released anything to the media.'”
***
Social media left clues to the last hours of his life. Police later filled in some holes.
Aaron Douglas, 21, died May 12, according to a Florida medical examiner’s report due to a “multiple drug toxicity” of methadone, diazepam and carisoprodol.
Karla and David both stressed Aaron had no issues with drugs at AWC or Alabama.
Rodney Young Odum, 50, was arrested in August and charged with manslaughter and sale/delivery of a controlled substance (Methadone). He has pleaded not guilty. Four others were charged with throwing an open house party.
Witnesses said Aaron was seen as late as 2 a.m. at a house party he attended while on vacation. Staying in Jacksonville, Aaron answered a call from two local women, then directed his taxi to drive him to the home where he later died.
His last words are like scattered bread crumbs. On his Facebook page his last entry was May 10: “Anyone who’s in Jacksonville, FL hit me up.”
On May 11, Douglas wrote on his Twitter account about meeting a person, who “accomplished 12 purple hearts” in Vietnam. He later sent a Tweet about the Miami Heat’s performance against the Boston Celtics. Then he wrote, “Bout to kick it with my new friends Emily!!”
His final message: “Who’s still up right now?!?”
Police responded to a call at 8:13 a.m. after a male resident and others discovered Aaron’s body on a second-floor balcony “apparently deceased.”
Aaron was pronounced dead at the scene.
***
Alabama is wearing stickers on its helmets to recognize two tragedies. The houndstooth ribbon acknowledges the April 27 killer tornado outbreak across the state. The No. 77 recognizes the death of Aaron Douglas.
This week, Aaron’s parents will attend the Third Saturday in October wearing crimson and white.
They anxiously anticipated the day they would watch their son face their alma mater for the first time playing for Alabama.
Aaron started for the Volunteers in 2009 when Alabama defeated Tennessee 12-10 at Bryant-Denny Stadium in a win preserved by a Terrence Cody blocked field goal in the final moments.
Those thoughts will be weighing on the minds of some.
“I wasn’t in the country when it happened. (Aaron’s death) kind of hit me by surprise,” Williams said. “I came back from working out in Australia and my dad told me. It was a bit of an emotional thing. I feel really bad for his family and everything they’ve had to go through. I try and go out there and represent not only myself, but Aaron as well when I’m playing. I just wish all the best for his family.”
Alabama coach Nick Saban, who has two children, said the loss has affected the entire program, and has made him come to terms with a unique approach.
Alabama is wearing black stickers on its helmets with Aaron’s No. 77, and the media guide has a portrait of Aaron on Page 3, the years of his life 1989-2011 below.
The school also has left his locker vacant.
“I never had a player die before,” Saban said in July. “I have a tremendous amount of respect and a completely different feeling talking in front of our team now. Maybe you take it for granted that they’re all always going to be there. It’s probably the same thing with your children at home if you’ve ever lost one. These things all have a tremendous impact and change the perspective of things.”
***
Aaron’s Facebook account remains a living tribute to his memory.
Dozens of people posted self-portraits holding candles, a virtual candlelight vigil on Sept. 19, which would have been his 22nd birthday.
There are photos of Aaron through the years. A painted portrait of him at Tennessee with an embrace with his mother in the background.And a video rap tribute for Aaron and his younger sister, Ashley, who shared the same birth date.
Aaron’s father dreamed about his son every night for two months and still does on occasion. He now has a tattoo over his chest that reads, “RIP AD.”
What Karla and David remember about Aaron: He was tough. Aaron gave himself a cross tattoo when he was 15.
“He played most of his high school senior season with completely torn labrums in both shoulders and would not have surgery to not let his team down,” Karla said. “He had foot surgery the week after the A-Day game to remove a golf-ball-plus-sized bone. The doctor was amazed that he was walking, much less finished spring at Alabama.”
They said Aaron was kind and sensitive.
“He was always thinking of others,” Karla said. “He had a genuine smile that would go straight to your heart and he shared it.
“He stood up for people when they were being ridiculed or bullied. Every negative word that was said or written about him ripped his heart in two. When fans in Neyland booed the 2009 team, it hurt him to the core.”
Aaron could handle the criticism.
“When it got malicious and hateful,” Karla said, “he could just never understand why people had to be so cruel and hurtful.”
And he was their son.
“For the first few weeks after his death, I put his cologne on one of his favorite hoodies and slept with it,” Karla said. “I have two shirts in my closet to see and touch and I have listened to many of his songs, so I can hear his voice.
One of the songs, ‘Keep Your Head High,’ played at his service, Aaron says, ‘Momma I love you and you have your son back.’ This brings comfort along with tears.”
Aaron Douglas has first Alabama spring football practice Lane Kiffin praises RT Aaron Douglas In the last part of July, then I spent the next few days researching the “27 Club.” It was very sad to read about these famous musicians that all died at age 27 because of suicide or drugs. Just a few weeks ago I read about Aaron Douglas […]
cc ‘Janis Joplin’ 2/5 from True Hollywood Story (Janis was having affair with Pigpen) Jerry Garcia (guitar, vocals), Ron “Pigpen” McKernan (vocals, harmonica), Bob Weir (guitar, vocals), Phil Lesh (bass), Mickey Hart (drums), Bill Kreutzman (drums). Grateful Dead “Don’t Ease Me In” Live @ Canadian National Exhibition Hall Toronto, CA June 27th, 1970 Grateful Dead […]
Recently Amy Winehouse joined the “27 Club” when she died of a drug overdose. The “27 Club” is a group of rockers that died at age 27. Unfortunately Jimi Hendrix died at age 27 in 1970 and Janis Joplin did the same three weeks later. Today we are going to look at her life and […]
JIMI HENDRIX : FINAL INTERVIEW . The other day when Amy Winehouse died she joined the “27 Club” which includes other famous rockers who died at age 27. Most of them died because of drugs. Unfortunately Jimi Hendrix joined the club for the same reason. Something special for all music and Beat Club-Lovers on YouTube: […]
Brian’s Blues, Brian Jones on guitar in the early stones years. unreleased track Brian Jones died at age 27 just like Amy Winehouse did. I remember like yesterday when I first heard the song “I can’t get no satisfaction” by the Rolling Stones. I immediately thought about Solomon’s search for satisfaction in the Book of […]
The Rise And Rise Of Kurt Cobain part 1/3 Amy Winehouse joined the “Club 27 the other day with her early death. I am going through the others one by one. Today is Kurt Cobain. 7. Kurt Cobain very rarely does an artist come along and not just upset the “apple cart” but drops […]
Jim Morrison – Feast Of Friends – (The Doors Documentary) (1969) (Paul Ferrara) 1/4 I was saddened by the recent death of Amy Winehouse and her inclusion into the “27 Club.” This series I am starting today looks at the search that each one of these entertainers were on during their lives. Today I look […]
Amy Winehouse’s family speaks out Parents, Public Braced for Amy Winehouse’s Death Through Five-Year Fade Posted Sun Jul 24, 2011 12:13pm PDT by Chris Willman To Amy Winehouse’s family, the singer/songwriter’s death was not unexpected. It was “only a matter of time,” her mother, Janis Winehouse, was quoted as saying in the Sunday Mirror. She’d […]
Drama: Members of the press and local residents watch as Winehouse’s body is taken to the van I read this article in Christianity Today about Amy Winehouse a couple of years ago and it rings more true today than ever. How to share your faith using Amy Winehouse‘s ‘Rehab’ by Jane Dratz, Guest ColumnistPosted: Monday, February […]
Papa Roach – Last Resort (Censored Version) This series of posts concerns the song “The Last Resort.” Amy Winehouse died today and it was a tragic loss. That really troubled me that she did not seek spiritual help instead of turning to drugs and alcohol. This post today will give hope to those we feel like […]
I am in the middle of a series on the Papa Roach song “Last Resort” which deals with suicide and then today I hear this sad story about Amy Winehouse. Inside Amy Winehouse’s troubled life With the news that British R&B star and tabloid target Amy Winehouse has died from as yet undisclosed causes, […]
Papa Roach – Last Resort (Censored Version) Amy Winehouse died at the young age of 27 and she had lived a life filled with drug and alcohol addiction. This series on Papa Roach is meant to provide answers to those who feel trapped. Hopefully it will people to avoid troubles like Amy Winehouse experienced. Today I […]
Federal Spending Is Growing Faster Than Federal Revenue
Aaron Douglas, wearing 77, was a 6-foot-7, 275 pound offensive tackle at Alabama.
David Douglas (pictured), was an offensive lineman for Tennessee. Aaron Douglas, his son, followed in his footsteps and took No. 78 after he moved from tight end to offensive line.
Aaron Douglas with his younger sister, Ashley.
Alabama is wearing stickers on its helmets to recognize two tragedies. The houndstooth ribbon acknowledges the April 27 killer tornado outbreak across the state. The No. 77 recognizes the death of Aaron Douglas.
The Daily Hatch 