Monthly Archives: February 2013

“Woody Wednesday” A 2010 review of Woody Allen’s Annie Hall

February 27, 2013 – 7:34 am

I have spent alot of time talking about Woody Allen films on this blog and looking at his worldview. He has a hopeless, meaningless, nihilistic worldview that believes we are going to turn to dust and there is no afterlife. Even though he has this view he has taken the opportunity to look at the weaknesses of his own secular view. I salute him for doing that. That is why I have returned to his work over and over and presented my own Christian worldview as an alternative. Take a moment and read again a good article on Woody Allen below. There are some links below to some other posts about him.

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An Analysis of Woody Allen’s Film, Annie Hall

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Truly, Woody Allen is one of the most influential film makers of the last 40 years. Annie Hall shows us how and why.

Andrew Smith
on Mar 22, 2010
 

Allan Stewart Konigsberg, a.k.a. Woody Allen, was born in the Bronx on December 1, 1935. As one of the most creative cinema writer/director/producers of his time, Annie Hall (1977) is a mirror to Allen’s life. His work draws from interests in literature, psychology, Jewish culture, philosophy, European cinema and New York City, where he was born and has lived his entire life.

He first became hooked on movies upon seeing Snow White, and “from that day theatres became his second home,” according to WoodyAllen.com. He has played the clarinet since the age of 15, and continues playing it to this day. While appearing socially awkward and clumsy, Allen was said to be quite good at sports in his youth and popular amongst peers.

His type of creativity relies on a certain amount of interaction within culture. Parts of his humour rely on timeliness. We can see then how if his works are to stay relevant, he needs to still be connected to larger frames that operate within society. While a mathematician may lock themselves away, a comedian cannot afford such a luxury.

What makes Woody Allen a creative success, may lay in part to feeling detached from the world, feelings which he explores in Annie Hall . “In 1959, Woody began seeing a psychiatrist, feeling melancholic for no identifiable reason. Ever since he sees an analyst once a week or so, with occasional breaks, not much for treatment but to talk to an objective person unlinked to his personal life,” says WoodyAllen.com. In this film, and in a lot of his works, analysts and jokes feature as large parts of his wit. “The ambiguous reference to the poetically imaginative and the nimbly amusing which ‘wit’ had enjoyed from Elizabethan times was split during the neo-classic age into the meaning of ‘propriety’ which we have observed and a second and lighter meaning of ‘sheer wit’ or repartee in comedy” (Wimsatt, 1957. p243).

Annie Hall

Annie Hall is both a comedy and a tragedy, and contains solid examples of creativity in comedy. It is a film about the absurdity of the human condition. As such, we will explore key scenes from the film and how Woody Allen’s unique style creates comedy through ridicule, jokes, pairing of opposites.

We know that the relationship between Annie Hall and Alvy Singer is doomed from the beginning, because most of the film occurs in flashback. This style also allows great freedom in the structure. “Wit is the Lustre resulting from the quick Elucidation of one Subject, by a just and unexpected Arrangement of it with another Subject” (Wimsatt, 1957. p243). The film can leap back and forth randomly in time, creating different emotions for the viewer. We can dart from romance, to joy, to sorrow, and so on.

Woody Allen is a master of all the best known tools of comedy. In the scene following the opening monologue, begins the flashbacks to visit his childhood. He begins with a caricature of his mother and her need to control, and goes on to talk about his earlier life using farce. “My analyst says I exaggerate my childhood memories, but I swear I was brought up underneath a rollercoaster in the Coney Island section of Brooklyn. Maybe that accounts for my personality which is uh, a little nervous I think” (Alvy, in Annie Hall).

Alvy appears to be a vehicle, as are a lot of his characters, for the issues surrounding Woody Allen’s real life. The character is a classic figure for comedy: a controlling, suspicious male who is consumed by jealousy. When paired with the light-hearted, somewhat ditzy “la dee-da” Annie Hall,

it creates a foundation for comedy. “Relational opposites… cannot be known without the other; to know what a ruled person is you must know whether the ruler is a general or an archbishop. Thus a word which names both parts of a relation may be more precise than a word which only names half of it. Another reason is that, case which out to be distinguished, but being anxious on the point you find it hard to remember which is which. To the senses they may be opposite, but they excite the same feelings” (Empson, 1966. p195). Allen uses a combination of his natural wit, filmic devices, and specific narrative structure to tell this comedy effectively.

Here is a complete list of all the posts I did on the film “Midnight in Paris”

What can we learn from Woody Allen Films?, August 1, 2011 – 6:30 am

Movie Review of “Midnight in Paris” lastest movie by Woody Allen, July 30, 2011 – 6:52 am

Leo Stein and sister Gertrude Stein’s salon is in the Woody Allen film “Midnight in Paris”, July 28, 2011 – 6:22 am

Great review on Midnight in Paris with talk about artists being disatisfied, July 27, 2011 – 6:20 am

Critical review of Woody Allen’s latest movie “Midnight in Paris”, July 24, 2011 – 5:56 am

Not everyone liked “Midnight in Paris”, July 22, 2011 – 5:38 am

“Midnight in Paris” one of Woody Allen’s biggest movie hits in recent years, July 18, 2011 – 6:00 am

(Part 32, Jean-Paul Sartre)July 10, 2011 – 5:53 am

 (Part 29, Pablo Picasso) July 7, 2011 – 4:33 am

(Part 28,Van Gogh) July 6, 2011 – 4:03 am

(Part 27, Man Ray) July 5, 2011 – 4:49 am

(Part 26,James Joyce) July 4, 2011 – 5:55 am

(Part 25, T.S.Elliot) July 3, 2011 – 4:46 am

(Part 24, Djuna Barnes) July 2, 2011 – 7:28 am

(Part 23,Adriana, fictional mistress of Picasso) July 1, 2011 – 12:28 am

(Part 22, Silvia Beach and the Shakespeare and Company Bookstore) June 30, 2011 – 12:58 am

(Part 21,Versailles and the French Revolution) June 29, 2011 – 5:34 am

(Part 16, Josephine Baker) June 24, 2011 – 5:18 am

(Part 15, Luis Bunuel) June 23, 2011 – 5:37 am

“Woody Wednesday” The heart wants what it wants”jh67

I read this on http://www.crosswalk.com which is one of my favorite websites. Life Lessons from Woody Allen Stephen McGarvey I confess I am a huge film buff. But I’ve never really been a Woody Allen fan, even though most film critics consider him to be one of the most gifted and influential filmmakers of our […]

“Music Monday”:Coldplay’s best songs of all time (Part 6)

  “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 […]

“Woody Wednesday” Allen once wrote these words: “Do you realize what a thread were all hanging by? Can you understand how meaningless everything is? Everything. I gotta get some answers.” jh31

Woody Allen, the film writer, director, and actor, has consistently populated his scripts with characters who exchange dialogue concerning meaning and purpose. In Hannah and Her Sisters a character named Mickey says, “Do you realize what a thread were all hanging by? Can you understand how meaningless everything is? Everything. I gotta get some answers.”{7} […]

“Music Monday”:Coldplay’s best songs of all time (Part 5)

“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 […]

Steve Jobs’ view of death and what the Bible has to say about it jh55

(If you want to check out other posts I have done about about Steve Jobs:Some say Steve Jobs was an atheist , Steve Jobs and Adoption , What is the eternal impact of Steve Jobs’ life? ,Steve Jobs versus President Obama: Who created more jobs? ,Steve Jobs’ view of death and what the Bible has to say about it ,8 things you might not know about Steve Jobs ,Steve […]

“Woody Wednesday” A review of some of the past Allen films jh32

I am a big Woody Allen fan. Not all his films can be recommended but he does look at some great issues and he causes the viewer to ask the right questions. My favorite is “Crimes and Misdemeanors” but the recent film “Midnight in Paris” was excellent too. Looking at the (sometimes skewed) morality of […]

Good without God?

(The signs are up on the buses in Little Rock now and the leader of the movement to put them up said on the radio today that he does not anticipate any physical actions against the signs by Christians. He noted that the Christians that he knows would never stoop to that level.) Debate: Christianity […]

“Music Monday”:Coldplay’s best songs of all time (Part 4)

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 […]

By Everette Hatcher III | Posted in Current Events | Comments (0)

Video clips of Jonah Goldberg and an interview about his book “Liberal Fascism” (Part 3)

February 27, 2013 – 7:32 am

Liberal Fascism (5) – Jonah Goldberg ** UNEDITED **

Uploaded by on Feb 17, 2008

PLAYLIST: http://www.youtube.com/view_play_list?p=C20E954A7632DCFD
Jonah Goldberg discusses his new book, “Liberal Fascism: The Secret History of the American Left, From Mussolini to the Politics of Meaning”, at The Heritage Foundation on C-SPAN2. 09 JAN 08.

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Below is  a portion of the blog post Interviewing Jonah Goldberg About His New Book, Liberal Fascism by John Hawkins. I thought you would enjoy it:

Yesterday, I interviewed Jonah Goldberg about his new book, Liberal Fascism: The Secret History of the American Left, From Mussolini to the Politics of Meaning.

What follows is a slightly edited transcript of our conversation.

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In Ron Radosh’s review of your book, he says, “Turning to what he calls liberal racism, Mr. Goldberg offers readers his finest chapter. It is a devastating picture of how liberals adopted eugenics — a basic part of Nazi doctrine..” Talk about that a bit.

Sure. You often hear, especially from the fringe feminist Left, that pro-lifers are like Nazis or fascistic because they want to “oppress women.” I’m perfectly willing to have an argument about pro-life, pro-choice, all that sort of thing and even though I might disagree with the pro-choicers on most of their arguments, I don’t think it’s inherently disqualifying to make a pro-choice argument. But, what is simply factually not the case, is that the pro-life position has anything to do with Nazism.

You would think that a half-century after the Holocaust, it wouldn’t be necessary to remind people that Nazis weren’t pro-life. Long before they started the campaign against the Jews, they started a massive euthanasia campaign, killing what they called the useless bread gobblers….What I think a lot of people don’t appreciate and what has been pretty well established now in the historical literature is that the Nazis were in many ways picking up on ideas that first flourished in the United States under the progressives.

The progressives start the forced sterilizations. It is the progressives who talk about weeding out the inferior races. Margaret Sanger, the Founder of Planned Parenthood, was all about weeding out the duskier and darker races…and all of that. The socialists of Britain, the Fabian socialists, George Bernard Shaw, HG Wells, all of those guys, were soaked to the bone eugenicists who considered eugenics and socialism to be the same project. Oliver Wendell Holmes, the author of the Bell Case, where the court ruled it was OK to forcibly sterilize low income whites because they were viewed as sort of sub par genetic filth that needed to be cleaned up; Oliver Wendell Holmes said the first priority of social reform was to build a race. There were plenty of eugenicists who wanted to create a genetic Gulag Archipelago. They were going to put inferior women in, essentially, these interior colonies during their fertile years so that they could not breed.

The welfare state was in many senses a eugenic project. As one famous progressive put it, his argument for the minimum wage was, the Cooley — meaning the Chinese worker — cannot outwork the white man, but he can under-live him. The logic of that was that since these inferior races needed so little to live on, if you created a minimum wage to lock them out, they would sort of die out of their own accord, because no employer in his right mind would hire anybody but a white man if he had to pay a white man’s wage. That logic suffused the founding of the liberal welfare state.

Woodrow Wilson, when he was Governor of New Jersey, he signed a eugenics sterilization law that appointed a eugenics minister for the state of New Jersey, who ended up being a “doctor” in one of the Nazi concentration camps….

Do you think some of the things that now occur on college campuses, school papers being deliberately trashed if they say something politically incorrect, college Republicans being persecuted for simply having different views, conservative speakers being screamed over and attacked with food, is reminiscent of fascist tactics?

Of course it is. Leading the charge of the Nazi movement in the 1930s were student groups. The students far outpaced the rest of society in joining the Nazi Party. The Nazi Party was in many respects — much like the Italian Fascist Party — a youth movement. They appealed to youth, they claimed that they were the voice of the new generation, you had students attacking the conservative teachers who wanted to maintain the traditional notion of a university. The students were demanding that buzzword we hear on college campuses today, “relevance.” You know, why do we have to learn Latin and Greek and all these things? Why can’t we learn about the progressive things of today? All the protests that you saw on campuses were reminiscent of it. At the end of the day, whether you want to call it communist tactics or fascist tactics or whatever, any time you have people burning campus newspapers, shouting down speakers, mobbing the stage like you had at Columbia, those are undemocratic tactics, those are totalitarian tactics, those are mob rule tactics. The thing to remember about all of these “isms” of the Left is that they are rationalizations for mob rule.

Liberal Fascism Q-A (1)

Uploaded by on Feb 17, 2008

PLAYLIST: http://www.youtube.com/view_play_list?p=C20E954A7632DCFD
PART 1: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GsFoiVZDSRs&feature=PlayList&p=C20E954…
Q&A session — Jonah Goldberg discusses his new book, “Liberal Fascism: The Secret History of the American Left, From Mussolini to the Politics of Meaning”, at The Heritage Foundation on C-SPAN2. 09 JAN 08. (heritage.org)

By Everette Hatcher III | Posted in Current Events | Comments (0)

John MacArthur on Larry King Live Part 3 Who was Jesus?

February 27, 2013 – 6:41 am

Who was Jesus? (Larry King Live with John MacArthur)

Published on Jul 17, 2012

http://www.gty.org/video/interviews/I…

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I have seen John MacArthur on Larry King Show many times and I thought you would like to see some of these episodes. I have posted several of John MacArthur’s sermons in the past and my favorite is his sermon on the Tyre prophecy.

Photo of John MacArthur

John MacArthur

Related posts:

Atheist says “It’s not about having a purpose in life..” (Arkansas Atheist, Part 1)jh69

The Bible and Archaeology (1/5) The Bible maintains several characteristics that prove it is from God. One of those is the fact that the Bible is accurate in every one of its details. The field of archaeology brings to light this amazing accuracy. _________________________- I want to make two points today. 1. There is no […]

Book of Mormon is not historically accurate, but Bible is (Part 32) (What are the Dead Sea Scrolls?)

The Book of Mormon vs The Bible, Part 6 of an indepth study of Latter Day Saints Archeology The Book of Mormon verses The Bible, Part 6 of an indepth study With the great vast amounts of evidence we find in the Bible through archeology, why is there no evidence for anything writte in the Book […]

Book of Mormon is not historically accurate, but Bible is (Part 31)

The Book of Mormon vs The Bible, Part 5 of an indepth study of Latter Day Saints Archeology The Book of Mormon verses The Bible, Part 5 of an indepth study With the great vast amounts of evidence we find in the Bible through archeology, why is there no evidence for anything writte in the […]

Book of Mormon is not historically accurate, but Bible is (Part 29)

The Book of Mormon vs The Bible, Part 3 of an indepth study of Latter Day Saints Archeology The Book of Mormon verses The Bible, Part 1 of an indepth study With the great vast amounts of evidence we find in the Bible through archeology, why is there no evidence for anything writte in the […]

Book of Mormon is not historically accurate, but Bible is (Part 28)

The Book of Mormon vs The Bible, Part 2 of an indepth study of Latter Day Saints Archeology The Book of Mormon verses The Bible, Part 2 of an indepth study With the great vast amounts of evidence we find in the Bible through archeology, why is there no evidence for anything writte in the […]

Easter Morning April 24, 2011,List of posts on series: Is the Bible historically accurate? (Updated 1 through 14C)

“In Christ Alone” music video featuring scenes from “The Passion of the Christ”. It is sung by Lou Fellingham of Phatfish and the writer of the hymn is Stuart Townend. On this Easter Morning April 24, 2011 there is no other better time to take a look at the truth and accuracy of the Bible.  […]

Is the Bible historically accurate?(Part 14C)(The Conspirator Part 7)

Critics – Part 1 By Dr In my ongoing debate with other bloggers on the Arkansas Times Blog, I had an interesting response from Dobert: You can’t have it both ways. If the Gospel writers were allowed to adapt their message to a particular audience then it can’t be claimed that God literally took their […]

Is the Bible historically accurate?(Part 14B)(The Conspirator Part 5)

The Institute for Creation Research equips believers with evidences of the Bible’s accuracy and authority through scientific research, educational programs, and media presentations, all conducted within a thoroughly biblical framework. info@icr.org http://www.icr.org Last night I had the opportunity to go back and forth with a couple of bloggers on the Arkansas Times Blog and this […]

Is the Bible historically accurate? (part 14)(The Conspirator part 3)

This is a quick summary of the Bible’s reliability by a famous and well-respected former atheist. Please check out his website (http://www.leestrobel.com) for hundreds of FREE high quality videos investigating the critical aspects of our faith. Todd Tyszka http://www.toddtyszka.com On April 19, 2011 on the Arkansas Blog an entry of mine got this response from […]

Is the Bible historically accurate? (Part 13)

Many Kings and important people in the Bible are also verified by secular documents. From time to time you will read articles in the Arkansas press by  such writers as  John Brummett, Max Brantley and Gene Lyons that poke fun at those that actually believe the Bible is historically accurate when in fact the Bible […]

Is the Bible historically accurate? (Part 12)(Johnny Cash, Famous Arkansan pt C)

Dr Price, who directs excavations at the Qumran plateau in Israel, the site of the community that produced the dead sea scrolls some 2,000 years ago, expertly guides you through the latest archaeological finds that have changed the way we understand the world of the bible. (Part 6 of 6 in the film series The Stones […]

Is the Bible historically accurate? (Part 11)

My sons Wilson  and Hunter  went to California and visited Yosemite National Park with our friend Sherwood Haisty Jr. (Sherwood on left) March 21-27. Here you can see all the snow they had to deal with. Dr Price, who directs excavations at the Qumran plateau in Israel, the site of the community that produced the […]

Is the Bible historically accurate? (Part 10)

Dr Price, who directs excavations at the Qumran plateau in Israel, the site of the community that produced the dead sea scrolls some 2,000 years ago, expertly guides you through the latest archaeological finds that have changed the way we understand the world of the bible. (Part 4 of 6 in the film series The Stones […]

By Everette Hatcher III | Posted in Current Events | Comments (0)

Sequestration only cuts 2.4% of the budget

February 27, 2013 – 6:19 am

Sequestration only cuts 2.4% of the budget.

T. Elliot Gaiser

February 24, 2013 at 11:29 am

Federal spending will explode from $3.6 trillion to $6 trillion over the next 10 years, but the much-maligned sequester will cut only 2.4 percent of this spending.

Sequestration represents a relatively small cut in projected spending. So why are so many in Washington wringing their hands over a two-and-a-half percent reduction?

Because sequestration leaves the largest component of federal spending—entitlements—nearly untouched. Instead, it falls most heavily on national defense, with 50 percent of sequestration cuts impacting national security. Thirty-five percent would impact non-defense discretionary spending. Less than 15 percent would fall on mandatory spending, which consumes 62 percent of the federal budget.

Not one of these cuts will address the dominant underlying cause of growth in government spending: entitlements.

Medicare, Medicaid, and Social Security together drain 44 percent of the budget each year—and their share of spending is growing. By midcentury, these programs and Obamacare together will gobble up all of America’s historical tax revenue, leaving everything else—defense, federal law enforcement, transportation, and veteran care, etc.—to be financed on federal borrowing. But sequestration fails to curb this growth in spending.

Tax increases are no solution. President Obama already grabbed $618 billion in tax increases. These tax hikes harmed opportunity for Americans by increasing taxes on investors and job creators, and yet the budget remains out of balance. Washington has a spending problem—not a revenue problem—and only spending cuts can put the budget on a path to balance.

Spending cuts from sequestration and more are necessary. Without them, Americans will suffer even more in the future as economic uncertainty undermines opportunity and as deficits become growth-reducing debt. The good news is that there are smart ways to cut spending to offset sequestration, and at least six bipartisan ways to reform entitlements.

For example, as Heritage experts J. D. Foster and Alison Acosta Fraser write, Congress could:

  • Correct the cost-of-living adjustment (COLA) for Social Security;
  • Raise the Social Security eligibility age to match increases in longevity; and
  • Raise the Medicare eligibility age to match Social Security.

There are many ways to save money now, too. Congress could cut:

  • The Lifeline program. This program spent $2.2 billion to provide telephones and service to low-income individuals. As Heritage expert Patrick Louis Knudsen writes, “Remarkably, 41 percent of ‘customers’ receiving taxpayer-subsidized service from the top five carriers failed to verify their eligibility, according to the Federal Communications Commission.”
  • Community Development Block Grants. Many of the $3 billion in grants from this program go to economically well-off communities that don’t need them.
  • The Job Corps. According to Knudsen, this is $1.7 billion spent on “a demonstrably ineffective program that has failed to match many of its trainees with the jobs they were trained for.”

These are a few suggestions for how to reduce government spending now and correct the drivers in spending growth into the future. Ordinary citizens will see even more economic growth–reducing debt unless Congress reins in federal spending. Instead of panicking over the 2.4 percent cut that is sequestration, lawmakers should tackle entitlement reform and cut other spending to balance the budget in 10 years.

By Everette Hatcher III | Posted in spending out of control | Comments (0)

Open letter to President Obama (Part 252)

February 27, 2013 – 1:12 am

Dan Mitchell Commenting on Obama’s Failure to Propose a Fiscal Plan

Published on Aug 16, 2012 by

No description available.

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President Obama c/o The White House
1600 Pennsylvania Avenue NW
Washington, DC 20500

Dear Mr. President,

I know that you receive 20,000 letters a day and that you actually read 10 of them every day. I really do respect you for trying to get a pulse on what is going on out here.

We have to change the economic direction of our country!!! The Heritage Foundation gives us a plan to get our country on a firm financial basis again.

Amy Payne

August 31, 2012 at 9:09 am

Entering the final stretch of the presidential contest, Americans are facing a monumental choice. The American people will decide the direction of government and its role in their lives for the coming years.

The debate in Tampa this week raised a number of issues, including preserving the American dream of working hard to achieve success. The Heritage Foundation has extensive research and policy prescriptions on each of these issues:

Energy: America needs to end energy subsidies and restore a free market in the energy sector. We can and should develop our domestic energy sources in an environmentally responsible way. Go to Energy & Environment

School choice: America’s education focus should be our students. The best way to serve the needs of a diverse population is to give families the freedom to choose a school—public, private, charter, or home school—that best fits their children’s needs. See where your state stands

Free trade: America needs jobs, and promoting free trade is an excellent way to create high-quality jobs in America. We should have a free flow of goods, services, and investments between democratic nations. Catch up on the U.S. free trade record

The federal budget: Tackling the federal budget is a complex task, but it must be done. Heritage’s Saving the American Dream plan details ideas for reforming major entitlement programs, permanently balancing the budget, and reducing the national debt. See the Heritage plan

Tax reform: America’s families and businesses need tax relief. A tax cut here and there isn’t enough; we need fundamental tax reform. A tax system that is simple and fair would spur economic growth and protect those at the bottom of the income ladder. How it could be done

Repealing Obamacare: Obamacare doesn’t stop with government intrusion into your relationship with your doctor. It also raises taxes, adds to the U.S. deficit, and attacks religious and personal freedoms. Top 5 Reasons to Repeal Obamacare

Reforming Medicare: Medicare reform is not an option—it is a necessity. To keep the program working for those it is designed to help, we should give seniors more control over their health care decisions and guarantee better access to quality care. The way forward for Medicare

Next week, the debate will continue in Charlotte, and more policy issues may enter the mix.

There’s no way to predict how the election will turn out. But as Heritage’s Matt Spalding has written, “it will be a turning point in American history: Either our leaders will guide the country even further along the road to ‘progressivism’ or they will begin a long, slow turn back toward the principles of the American Founding.”

“The federal government has acquired an all but unquestioned dominance over virtually every area of American life,” Spalding says. “It acts without constitutional limits and is restricted only by expediency, political will, and (less and less) budget constraints.”

The Heritage Foundation recently published Changing America’s Course, which gives our political leaders recommendations on how to stay within the limits of the Constitution.

To put America on a path toward preserving and growing freedom, Spalding says, “The first step is to reduce the size and scope of government and unleash the engines of economic productivity and the institutions of cultural renewal.”

It is possible to change America’s course.

_____________

Thank you so much for your time. I know how valuable it is. I also appreciate the fine family that you have and your commitment as a father and a husband.

Sincerely,

Everette Hatcher III, 13900 Cottontail Lane, Alexander, AR 72002, ph 501-920-5733, lowcostsqueegees@yahoo.com

By Everette Hatcher III | Posted in President Obama, spending out of control, Taxes | Comments (0)

Video clips of Jonah Goldberg and an interview about his book “Liberal Fascism” (Part 2)

February 27, 2013 – 12:42 am

Liberal Fascism (3) – Jonah Goldberg ** UNEDITED **

Below is  a portion of the blog post Interviewing Jonah Goldberg About His New Book, Liberal Fascism by John Hawkins. I thought you would enjoy it:

Yesterday, I interviewed Jonah Goldberg about his new book, Liberal Fascism: The Secret History of the American Left, From Mussolini to the Politics of Meaning.

What follows is a slightly edited transcript of our conversation.

Well Jonah, you say they’re not militaristic at all, but Bill Clinton went on a lot of “peacekeeping missions”…and liberals seem much more generally willing than conservatives to use our troops for (missions of that sort)…

I think that’s right. There is this notion that you get from liberal foreign policy — that comes straight out of Wilsonianism — that foreign adventure is only worthwhile when it’s not in our natural interest. That’s why Haiti was important. That’s why Somalia was important.

But, the second something is in our national interest, it’s because Halliburton wants us to do it. It’s a weird mixture of idealism and cynicism. Because we’re the bad guys and it’s a blame-America-first mentality, whenever we do things that we need to do as a matter of Realpolitik, the Left seems to have huge problems with it, but whenever we do things that are purely altruistic, it’s our moral imperative to do it.

I’m sympathetic to the moral imperative stuff, more than most people, but I’m more sympathetic to doing it if it’s in our national interest. That comes first. I’m all in favor of helping little old ladies who are being mugged by gangs. But, I think it’s even more imperative, if the gang is mugging the little old lady and me, that my first priority has to be to protect myself before I can do anything for anybody else. It’s there where I think a lot of liberals fall down and think we shouldn’t be doing anything in our national interest.

Now conservatives, rather famously, have a deep and abiding dislike and mistrust of the federal government and believe that private industry does almost everything better than the government does. Is a belief like that ultimately compatible with fascism?

No, the whole point of fascism is centralizing. That’s why they were socialists. All these idiots who go around Googling stuff on the web, they find Mussolini saying, fascism is anti-liberalism and anti-Liberal.

Well, the liberalism that Mussolini was talking about was Manchester liberalism, classical liberalism, free market, capitalistic, individual rights liberalism. That is what the fascists stood against. It’s a totalitarian society, inherently hostile to private property. They believe the state was by far the best means of governing and running society.

One of the things that prompted me to write the book was this fundamental misunderstanding of what conservatism is in America and this slander, this projection, where liberals see in themselves similarities to fascism and project those things on to us.

I often like to ask college kids, except for the murder, bigotry, and genocide, what is it exactly about Nazism that you don’t like? And they can’t name anything. But, conservatives can come up with all sorts of stuff. They were socialists. They wanted free health care. They hated Christianity. They hated tradition. They were statists at the end of the day. All of those things are inherent to fascism and what was anathema to fascism was the idea that you can have, what the scholars of totalitarian theory call “islands of separateness” — that churches can go their own way, that corporations can operate without coordinating with the state, that individuals can have free consciences, that there can be free debate, free and open discussion.

What the Nazis implemented was something called the Gleichschaltung, which is a German word for coordination…and the idea was that the entire society needed to work like a giant machine, where all the cogs were linked together and everyone pushed in the same direction.

Here’s a fascinating quote from your book that I’d like you to expound on a bit, “What distinguished Nazism from other brands of socialism and communism was not so much that it included more aspects from the political right (though there were some). What distinguished Nazism was that it forthrightly included a world view we now associate almost completely with the political left: identity politics.”

That’s right. The Nazis, unlike the Italian fascists — and this is one of the key points people keep not wanting to hear — Italian fascism was not racist, it was not anti-Semitic. It only became anti-Semitic when the Nazis grew so powerful and the Italians grew so weak that they had to cave in to Nazi demands. They fought Nazi demands, tooth and nail, about cooperating with the Holocaust.

The Nazis believed in racial essentialism — that the Aryan race was unique, was pure, was special, that there was no such thing as universal humanity. You know, Hitler had this long section in Mein Kampf where he concludes that Jews aren’t human beings, that they’re a different species.

They talked constantly, in the same way that we hear academics today talk about “dead, white European males,” “white logic,” Eurocentrism, logocentrism, and all these sorts of things. These ideas come straight out of the intellectual tradition that led to Nazism, that flourished under Nazism, and indeed, the words deconstruction and logocentrism, these all come out of the Nazi intellectual project. What they believed fundamentally was that human beings could be categorized in little boxes and they could never escape from them. It was an iron cage of identity.

Today on the Left, we have people, like Richard Delgado at the University of Colorado, who says that blacks and Hispanics should flee the enlightenment as fast as they can because there is no way that the regime of white privilege could ever assimilate people who are born black or Hispanic, because you can never transcend your identity or your gender. It’s where the whole logic of quotas come from, it’s where the whole logic of Affirmative Action comes from. It’s the idea that black people think like black people and white people think like white people and therefore, the only kind of diversity you can have is diversity by skin color, gender, and sexual orientation.

The key distinction here though is that Nazi philosophy was rankly evil in applying this. Their quotas, their approach to this sort of thing was flatly evil and exterminationist. That is not what the Left wants to do today. They’re much more benign. There’s not a lot of love for Jews on the hard Left, but their thinking is that they’re trying to help the victims of discrimination, they’re trying to improve the lives of others. It’s a nice sort of approach. It’s a well intentioned approach.

But, it doesn’t have nice consequences. I think it’s bad for social harmony. It’s bad for the people it’s designed to help. Moreover, that sort of categorical thinking is very similar to the thinking we saw under the Nazis.

Liberal Fascism (4) – Jonah Goldberg ** UNEDITED **

Uploaded by on Feb 17, 2008

PLAYLIST: http://www.youtube.com/view_play_list?p=C20E954A7632DCFD
Jonah Goldberg discusses his new book, “Liberal Fascism: The Secret History of the American Left, From Mussolini to the Politics of Meaning”, at The Heritage Foundation on C-SPAN2. 09 JAN 08.

By Everette Hatcher III | Posted in Current Events | Comments (0)

Can the USA be saved?

February 27, 2013 – 12:20 am

I hope the USA can pull out of this debt trap we are in.

Since I routinely spread a message of doom and gloom about the ever-expanding welfare state and warn about the potential for European-style fiscal collapse, I guess I shouldn’t be surprised that I’ve received several emails asking me variants of this question: “Do you think the United States can be rescued?”

Or sometimes, I get questions that I think are somewhat related, such as “Doesn’t Washington drive you crazy” or “Why haven’t you given up?”

I’m not sure I’m good at introspection, but I’ll try to answer, and we’ll start with the main question and then deal with the secondary queries.

To be blunt, if I had to place a bet on the outcome, I think the United States will become a failed European-style welfare state. The burden of government spending already is far too high and our long-run outlook is terrible, as shown by these OECD and BIS numbers, and I don’t think the callow politicians in Washington will fix the problems because they rarely think past the next election cycle.

This doesn’t necessarily mean that we’ll have a Greek-style fiscal collapse. Perhaps we’ll simply descend into permanent stagnation, with anemic growth (at best) and widespread dependency and joblessness.

That being said, even though I would bet on a bad outcome, I think there’s a genuine opportunity to save the country.

My job: Putting my finger in the dyke, trying to hold back the flood of big government

No, I’m not talking about creating a libertarian Nirvana, with the federal government consuming only three percent of economic output. But I think we can at least hold the line and prevent government from becoming bigger than it is today. Sort of a watered-down version of Mitchell’s Golden Rule.

The key is the right kind of entitlement reform. Our long-run fiscal nightmare is entirely the result of programs such as Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid, so the solution is obvious.

But is it achievable?

As I’ve already indicated, I wouldn’t bet on it. We definitely know there won’t be any good reforms for the next four years, but let me give you a plausible scenario for what might happen beginning in 2017.

We’ll start with the fact that the House of Representatives already voted for Medicaid reform and Medicare reform as part of the Ryan budget in 2011 and 2012. We also know that Republicans retained the House in the most recent election and there seems to be a political consensus that voting to fix the healthcare entitlements was not a political liability.

There was no Social Security reform in Ryan’s budget, but we also know that George W. Bush (for all his other faults) supported personal accounts in 2000 and 2004 and didn’t suffer any political backlash. Indeed, personal accounts still seem to be reasonably popular.

With this in mind, I think it may be possible to fix entitlement programs in 2017 assuming that the 2014 and 2016 elections lead to pro-reform lawmakers in the House, Senate, and White House.

That may not be likely, but it’s definitely possible.

My job, simply stated, is to help inform and educate people so that the climate is favorable to reform.

Which brings me to the secondary questions about whether Washington drives me crazy and whether I should give up.

The short answer is that I’m intellectually pessimistic but operationally optimistic.

In other words, my brain tells me that things will probably deteriorate but my heart tells me that this is a battle worth fighting.

So, yes, Washington does drive me crazy. It is both an immoral town and an amoral town, pervasively corrupt and filled with people who seem to think that it is perfectly okay to steal so long as it happens through the legislative or regulatory process.

And, yes, I may decide to give up if something really horrible happens, such as adoption of a value-added tax. Giving politicians a big new source of revenue, after all, would cripple any incentive for fiscal restraint.

But until that happens, I think I’m very lucky that I get to wake up every day and be part of the Cato Institute’s fight to preserve (and restore) American exceptionalism.

P.S. This is the second “Question of the Week” in two days, but I neglected to answer a question last week, so I had to catch up and get back on track. Yesterday’s question and answer generated a lot of interest, so I hope this one is equally thought-provoking.

By Everette Hatcher III | Posted in Cato Institute, Economist Dan Mitchell, spending out of control | Comments (0)

Remembering Dr. C. Everett Koop with pictures and quotes Part 1 (pro-life cartoon)

February 26, 2013 – 8:26 am

Dr. C. Everett Koop is pictured above.

Francis Schaeffer: “Whatever Happened to the Human Race” (Episode 1) ABORTION OF THE HUMAN RACE

Published on Oct 6, 2012 by

Memorial Tribute Former Surgeon General C.Everett Koop © A Genuine G-Shot.wmv

Dr. Koop

On 2-25-13 we lost a great man when we lost Dr. C. Everett Koop. I have written over and over the last few years quoting Dr. C. Everett Koop and his good friend Francis Schaeffer. They both came together for the first time in 1973 when Dr. Koop operated on Schaeffer’s daughter and as a result they became close friends. That led to their involvement together in the book and film series “WHATEVER HAPPENED TO THE HUMAN RACE?” in 1979.

In the film series “WHATEVER HAPPENED TO THE HUMAN RACE?” the arguments are presented  against abortion (Episode 1),  infanticide (Episode 2),   euthenasia (Episode 3), and then there is a discussion of the Christian versus Humanist worldview concerning the issue of “the basis for human dignity” in Episode 4 and then in the last episode a close look at the truth claims of the Bible. 

In this 1979 film series they dealt with the big social issues and predicted what social problems we have in the future because of humanism. For instance, they knew that the Jack Kevorkians of the world would be coming down the pike. They predicted that there was a slippery slope from abortion to infanticide to youth euthanasia brought on by the materialistic worldview.

Actually I have written the President several times about abortion and have received several responses from the White House. In several of the letters I emailed to the White House I included links to the episodes of “WHATEVER HAPPENED TO THE HUMAN RACE?” and in one letter I included the article Francis Schaeffer and C. Everett Koop’s Invaluable Impact on Pro-Life Evangelicalism written by Dr. Richard Land from 2003.

I have received several form letter responses from the White House and the most popular goes like this:

 

Thank you for taking the time to share your views on abortion.  This is a heart-wrenching issue, and I appreciate your input and thoughts.

I am committed to making my Administration the most open and transparent in history, and part of delivering on that promise is hearing from people like you.  I take seriously your opinions and respect your point of view on this issue.  Please know that your concerns will be on my mind in the days ahead.

Thank you, again, for writing.  I encourage you to visit www.WhiteHouse.gov to learn more about my Administration or to contact me in the future.

Sincerely,

Barack Obama

______________

Sanctity of Life Sunday began in 1983 when the Christian Action Council (now known as Care Net), founded with the help of Francis Schaeffer and former Surgeon General C. Everett Koop, “asked President Ronald Reagan to create a special day to focus on the intrinsic value of human life.”

In the film series “WHATEVER HAPPENED TO THE HUMAN RACE?” in the first episode “Abortion of the Human Race” Dr. Koop takes on the lies of the abortion crowd. One of those lies is that abortion will keep down child abuse numbers. Child abuse has been rising dramatically in the last forty years. 

In 1972 there were 60,000 reported child-abuse incidents in the U.S.  In
1976, the number had soared to over 500,000!  Child Abuse is now the fifth most frequent cause of death among children.  (Francis Shaeffer and Dr.  C.  Everett Koop, “Whatever Happened to the Human Race?”, Crossway Books, Westchester, IL., )

At the 32 minute mark in the episode you will see Dr. C. Everett Koop make this comment (in 1979):

There are those who try and justify abortions by saying that abortions get rid of unwanted children and therefore will cut down on child abuse, but consider this, since 1973 there have been 6 million abortions in the USA and there are therefore 6 million fewer children than there would have been without the liberal abortion ruling and yet child abuse has increased in incidents year by year from that date.

Dr. Koop went on to point out concerning the Hippocratic oath:

The graduates of American medical schools have traditionally taken the Hippocratic oath, which goes back more than two thousand years at the time of their commencement. The Declaration of Geneva (adopted in September 1948 by the General Assembly of the World Medical Organization and modeled closely on the Hippocratic oath) became used as the graduation oath by more and more medical schools. It includes, “I will maintain the utmost respect for human life; from the time of conception.” This concept for the preservation of human life has been the basis of the medical profession and society in general. It is significant that, when the University of Pittsburgh changed from the Hippocratic oath to the Declaration of Geneva in 1971, the students deleted “from the time of conception” from the clause beginning “I will maintain the utmost respect for human life.” The University of Toronto School of Medicine has also removed the phrase “from the time of conception” from the form of oath it now uses.

_____________

There is a question that I have asked pro-abortionists over and over and they just don’t like answering it. It comes also from the first episode of “WHATEVER HAPPENED TO THE HUMAN RACE.” Dr. Koop put forth the question:

My question to the pro-abortionist who would not directly kill a newborn baby the minute it is born is this, “Would you have killed it a minute before that or a minute before that or a minute before that or a minute before that?” You can see what I am getting at. At what minute does an unborn baby cease to be worthless and become a person entitled to the right to life and legal protection?

_____

Dr. C. Everett Koop was appointed to the Reagan administration but was held up in the Senate in his confirmation hearings by Ted Kennedy because of his work in pro-life causes.

___________

February 25, 2013

Died: C. Everett Koop, Surgeon General Who Taught Evangelicals To Hate Abortion

(UPDATED) Koop brought abortion into the social conscience of American evangelicals.

Kate Shellnutt

NIH

C. Everett Koop, the Christian physician and former U.S. Surgeon General who brought abortion to the forefront of evangelical social action, died today at 96.

Together with theologian Francis Schaeffer (they met when Koop operated on Schaeffer’s daughter), Koop—a pioneering pediatric surgeon—exposed the issues of abortion and euthanasia in a series of films and books in the early 1980s. Their arguments began the movement against abortion that continues within American evangelicalism today.

(Editor’s note: Philip Yancey wrote a 1989 CT cover story on Koop’s embattled career spent attempting to “fight disease, not people.”)

A graduate of Dartmouth College, Cornell Medical College, and the University of Pennsylvania, Koop established the first neonatal surgical intensive care unit and was the first surgeon to separate twins conjoined at the heart, according to the National Institutes of Health (NIH).

“Operating on newborns with life-threatening birth defects, spending nights at the bedside of a sick or dying child, and consoling bereaved parents gained Koop acclaim as a pioneering surgeon and empathic healer, and led him to reexamine his Christian faith and the ethical implications of medical procedures, above all abortion and euthanasia,” his NIH biography said.

During Koop’s seven years in office, NBC News reports:

Koop changed the previously low-profile position of surgeon general into a bully pulpit for seven years during the Ronald Reagan and George H. W. Bush administrations.Yet, as an evangelical Christian, he surprised conservatives when he endorsed condoms and sex education—in order stop the spread of AIDS, which blossomed into a national epidemic on his watch.

He also embarked on a mission to end smoking in the United States by 2000. A former pipe smoker, he said cigarettes were as addictive as heroin and cocaine.

Koop continued to speak out on abortion as recently as 2009, when he wrote and hand-delivered a letter to Congress to voice his opposition to proposed federal funding for the procedure.

In addition to Yancey’s cover story on Koop’s career, CT featured his thoughts on death and dying in an essay Koop wrote called “The End Is Not the End.” CT’s first interview with Koop was in 1973 when he and five other evangelical scholars discussed technology and bioethics.

___________

In the film WHATEVER HAPPENED TO THE HUMAN RACE? Dr. C. Everett Koop makes the same pointhttps://thedailyhatch.org/wp-content/uploads/2013/02/prolifecartoon.jpg

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By Everette Hatcher III | Posted in Francis Schaeffer, President Obama, Prolife | Tagged | Comments (0)

John MacArthur on Larry King Live Part 2 What Happens After We Die

February 26, 2013 – 7:44 am
 

Pt 1 John MacArthur – Larry King Live – What Happens After We Die.wmv.mp4

Uploaded on Feb 25, 2010

What happens after we die? A short series with John Mac Arthur, along with a Roman Catholic Priest, Muslim, Rabbi, spiritualist and an Atheist.. What do you think? There is no greater thought than this…billions of years of eternity hinge on your answer.

___________

___________

I have seen John MacArthur on Larry King Show many times and I thought you would like to see some of these episodes. I have posted several of John MacArthur’s sermons in the past and my favorite is his sermon on the Tyre prophecy.

Photo of John MacArthur

John MacArthur

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Is the Bible historically accurate? (Part 10)

Dr Price, who directs excavations at the Qumran plateau in Israel, the site of the community that produced the dead sea scrolls some 2,000 years ago, expertly guides you through the latest archaeological finds that have changed the way we understand the world of the bible. (Part 4 of 6 in the film series The Stones […]

By Everette Hatcher III | Posted in Current Events | Comments (0)

Open letter to President Obama (Part 251)

February 26, 2013 – 2:08 am

Is Washington Bankrupting America?

Uploaded by on Apr 20, 2010

Be first to receive our videos and other timely info about economic policy. Subscribe at http://www.bankruptingamerica.org
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According to a recent poll, 74 percent of likely voters are extremely or very concerned about the current level of government spending. And 58 percent think the level of spending is unsustainable.

Is the public right? Is Washington bankrupting America? Some facts from the video:

Spending per household has risen over 40 percent in the last 10 years and is set to do so again in the next 10 pushing debt (and interest on the debt) to unprecedented levels. But that’s just a result of PAST spending…

Our government owes $106 trillion in FUTURE spending commitments – that cannot be paid for.

We can solve it, but politicians will have to make tough choices. Increasing taxes can’t do the trick ($106 trillion is equivalent to taking all of the taxable income from every American nine times over), nor is it fair to saddle taxpayers with a problem created by government irresponsibility.

We need real spending reform. Merely returning to the spending per household levels of the 1990s would balance the budget in three years.

___________

 

President Obama c/o The White House
1600 Pennsylvania Avenue NW
Washington, DC 20500

Dear Mr. President,

I know that you receive 20,000 letters a day and that you actually read 10 of them every day. I really do respect you for trying to get a pulse on what is going on out here.

I wish we would eliminate several departments of the federal government  and in the process get back to the vision of founders. That is what the GOP Platform has done in 2012. Take a look at this article below by Dan Mitchell of the Cato Institute.

I wish the Republican Platform was binding.

Too bad it’s meaningless fluff

Why? Because the GOP, for all intents and purposes, has just proposed to eliminate the Department of Education, the Department of Housing and Urban Development, the Department of Energy, the Department of Agriculture, the Department of Transportation, the Department of Health and Human Services, along with a host of other government programs, agencies, and departments.

More specifically, they endorsed the 10th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, which means they put themselves on record in favor of getting rid of all federal spending and intervention that is inconsistent with the Founding Fathers’ vision of a limited central government.

Here’s some of the story, as reported by The Hill,

All federal spending should be reviewed to ensure powers reserved for the states are not given to the federal government, according to the GOP platform approved Tuesday. The platform language is meant to ensure all federal spending meets the requirements of the 10th amendment, which prohibits state powers from being given to the feds. “We support the review and examination of all federal agencies to eliminate wasteful spending, operational inefficiencies, or abuse of power to determine whether they are performing functions that are better performed by the States,” the platform reads. “These functions, as appropriate, should be returned to the States in accordance with the Tenth Amendment of the United States Constitution.”

For those of you who don’t have your Cato Institute pocket Constitutions handy, here’s what the 10th Amendment says.

The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people.

In other words, the 10th Amendment is basically a back-up plan to re-emphasize that the federal government was prohibited from exercising power in any area other than what is specified in the enumerated powers section of Article I, Section VIII.

And if you look at those enumerated powers, that pretty much invalidates much of what happens in Washington.

That’s the good news. The bad news is that the Republican platform will have less impact on a potential Romney presidency than this blog.  In other words, Republicans don’t intend to live up to this promise. Heck, they don’t even know that they have such a position. That’s why I included the asterisk in the title and must draw your attention to this fine print.

*Offer not good when GOP holds power.

But I suppose it’s good that they included this language in the platform, even if it’s merely empty political rhetoric

P.S. If they did abide by the 10th Amendment, it means that Obamacare also would be repealed.

P.P.S. Yes, this implies limits on democracy. Our Founding Fathers, contrary to E.J. Dionne’s superficial analysis, were opposed to untrammeled majoritarianism and wanted to make sure 51 percent of the people couldn’t vote to rape and pillage 49 percent of the people.

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Thank you so much for your time. I know how valuable it is. I also appreciate the fine family that you have and your commitment as a father and a husband.

Sincerely,

Everette Hatcher III, 13900 Cottontail Lane, Alexander, AR 72002, ph 501-920-5733, lowcostsqueegees@yahoo.com

By Everette Hatcher III | Posted in Cato Institute, President Obama, Social Security | Comments (0)