The Right Spin

Russian Chief Rabbi Berel Lazar believes the Earth will soon see the coming a Messiah to judge all mankind.

States this article.

I find it very interesting. This is the first I've heard a Jew feel that we are living in the End of Days. His take on the whole thing, what with the Messiah having to be born and all, is quite interesting and understandable. As Jews rejected Yeshua as Messiah it only makes sense that they would expect Him to be born to a woman in modern times. Obviously Christians believe that Yeshua's return will be a lot less subtle.

Still, that Jews are feeling what many Christians have felt for a long time is quite... comforting. I firmly believe that we are living in the End Times and that I will see the return of Yeshua within my lifetime. Everything is almost in place and the field is ripe for a harvest.

The return of our Lord is upon us! Praise be to Him!

What's everyone up to? Kinda quiet around here. I posted stuff that should have really annoyed some people but I got nada.

Just really quite here. That's all.

Oliver North has some words of wisdom for U.N. Amdassador Bolton. Good stuff.

P.S. If you're wondering about all the recent links to Human Events it's because I've subscribed to their magazine and have been spending a lot of time at thier site. I also subscribed to Commentary Magazine but as they tend to publish essays rather than articles I didn't spend too much time with them.

Starting August 15th the Israeli government will forceably remove 8,000 Jews from their rightful homes in the hope to end terrorist activities that use the "occupied lands" as their rallying cry. It's doomed to fail. The fact that Israel exists is all the reason terrorists need to murder civilians. The "occupied lands" are simply a petty excuse they use to appeal to sympathetic leftists in the West in order to weaken their relations with Israel.

How many times must history repeat itself before people realize this?

This article attacks leftists who seemingly use the bombings to further attack America.

This article ponders how the bombings flush with Christian morality. While I disagree with Mr. Buchanan's belief that the bombings were not needed, I certianly see and appreciate where he's coming from.

I believe the two articles present a balanced and respectful view on it all.

Just reading this article has got me all kinds of interested in reading the new book: Lincoln's Emancipation Prolamation. The author sums up my feelings nicely with:

Professor Guelzo's book does more than give us some sense of realism about a major event in American history. Perhaps if we come to understand the complexities and constraints of Lincoln's turbulent times, we might not be so quick to seize opportunities to reduce other times -- including our own -- to cartoon-like simplicities that allow us to indulge in cheap self-righteousness when judging those who carry heavy responsibilities.

Often too many people (myself included) look at events of the past through the dark prism of modernism. We're so far removed from the time we're talking about we don't know the full story and are quick to judge based upon the snippets of information we get, usually, from sources with a specific agenda. Typically an agenda we support so we get a bit lazy about the fact checking. It doesn't help any that almost anyone can get published today so it's difficult to find the jewel amongst the chaff.

Anyway, I'm gonna check this book out. I've always wanted to learn more about Lincoln and this seems like a good place to start.

Here I thought their job was to only intrepret our Constitution. I'm pretty sure they agreed to that when they took the job. I guess I was wrong.

Impersonating an officer is still a federal offense. Even if you are old.

Vox Day seems to think so.

My thoughts? I think he's makes a good point. If you look upon the ages of human history male and female roles in life have stayed pretty consistent. It wasn't until the last 100 years or so that those roles have become blurred. To believe that this shift in the fundamental building blocks by Western society would have no negative effect on said society as a whole is dangerously naive. Civilizations that do not propagate themselves die. It's simple as that. With near worldwide preference for male infants and Western women feeling it is their right to kill their most precious contribution to the world on a whim, things to not bode well for the continuation of civilization as we know it.

Maybe I'm being overly dramatic. I'll grant that that is possible. But it cannot be denied that upsetting a millennia old system of civilization building could have unforeseen consequences.

Strangely this too is part of my argument against granting homosexual “union” equal footing with straight marriage. Homosexuality can only thrive in a society in which heterosexuality is the clear majority. Homosexuality is a parasite upon the further development of said society because homosexuals cannot reproduce. Thusly they can only take from the benefits gained by a heterosexual society but cannot add to it. Should homosexuality become the “lifestyle” of the majority of a society that society will die simple because it could not produce enough offspring at that point to replenish the population and pass along its values.

In time a heterosexual society would then fill the gap left by the now dead society. The cycle may repeat itself but the fact remains that (1. homosexuality is a drain upon society and (2. a homosexual society is doomed to extinction.

Hmm... had more to say about gays than women. Well, Mr. Day said plently so I guess that's alright then.

With the anniversary of the bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki having just past there have been a lot of discussions going on about the morality of it. Dean has three great threads, with three great discussions going on, here, here and here. I do feel that America was justified in doing what it did, and saved countless hundreds of thousands (if not millions) of lives by doing so. However, that's not what I want to talk about here. Much more qualified ink has been spilled on that topic.

I want to think for a moment about the horror that is war. It seems people have a sanitized vision of what war is in their head. Sure, it's nothing we'd like to be a part of but even that isn't real. Unless you're there you simply cannot fathom it. I started reading a book I put down awhile ago titled The Story of World War 2. I wanted to learn more about the Hiroshima and Nagasaki bombings but I flipped the book open to the fire bombing of Tokyo and what I read brought tears to my eyes. I have a lump in my throat thinking about it right now. I want to share this with you.

LeMay [general in charge of the firebombing of Tokyo] called it a strategic raid, an attack on Japanese war industries, As he wrote after the war:

It was their system of dispersal of industry. All you had to do was visit one of these targets after we'd roasted it, and see the ruins of a multitude of tiny houses, with a drill press sticking up through the wreckage of every home. The entire population got into the act and worked to make those airplane or munitions of war... men, women, children. We knew we were going to kill a lot of women and kids when we burned that town. Had to be done.

Morality aside, this was not a "strategic bombing." The Japanese had the right word for it: slaughter bombing. Did "moral considerations" affect his decision to firebomb cities? LeMay was asked by an Air Force cadet after the war. "Killing Japanese didn't bother me very much at that time. It was getting the war over that bothered me...

"I guess the direct answer to your questions is, yes, every soldier thinks something of the moral aspects of what he is doing. But all war is immoral and if you let that bother you, you're not a good soldier."

Then he added, tellingly: "I suppose if I had lost the war, I would have been tried as a war criminal. Fortunately, we were on the winning side."

We have treaties signed and international rules to follow when it comes to war. We try to inject some civilization into the most uncivilized human endeavor. If we were really so civilized, so moral, we wouldn't have cause to go to war. But we're not. All of us, you, me, everyone, is simply a monster waiting to come out. Given the right set of circumstances anyone will throw away civility and kill.

However, we don't like the reality of this. We don't like the idea that each and every one of us can kill. So, we take the art that is killing and try to sanitize it. We think we can put this wild beast, this bloodthirsty dog, on a chain and tell it what to do. And maybe we can, for a time. But the problem is: holding that chain is a wild dog on a chain.

I'm not sure if this is making much sense. Maybe it’s not supposed to. Civilization exists to protect us from the harshness of nature. I think we may try to inject civilization in war because we know that it's not just nature that can do us harm. But in doing so we create a false impression of what war is. War is necessary and war is terrible. And, ironically, it is war that protects us from ourselves.