“We do not believe any group of men adequate enough or wise enough to operate without scrutiny or without criticism. We know that the only way to avoid error is to detect it, that the only way to detect it is to be free to inquire. We know that in secrecy error undetected will flourish and subvert.” –J. Robert Oppenheimer
What is it that feeds our battle, yet starves our victory?
Speaker Johnson Pinging you on January 6 Tapes
Just a friendly reminder Speaker Johnson. You’re doing some good things–or at least trying in the case of the budget–but this is the most important thing out there still hanging. One initial block released with the promise of more…and?
We have American patriots being held without bail and without trial, and the tapes almost certainly contain exculpatory evidence. (And if they don’t, and we’re all just yelling in an echo chamber over here, we need to know that too. And there’s only one way to know.)
Either we have a weaponized, corrupt government or we have a lot of internet charlatans. Let’s expose whatever it is. (I’m betting it’s the corrupt weaponized government, but if I am wrong, I’d like to see proof.)
A Political Statement
One of my stock jokes is to say, as I head off to the bathroom or washroom or restroom, “I’m going to go make a political statement.”
It certainly seems like urinating is a good way to make a statement about the YSM, and defecating works for politicians. Or the other way around is good too, though “#1” just never seems emphatic enough.
Maybe “#1” is just being polite, and “#2” is telling the fixtures what you really think.
Anyhow, I pretty much do plan to be polite to RINOs that electioneer or fundraise. I’ll tell them, Sorry, but I need to GO Pee…
Language Warning
In the next piece I had to discuss a particular topic. Unfortunately, I couldn’t discuss it without naming it. Therefore I apologize in advance for having to do so, and apologize to anyone offended by the sight of the name.
RINO McDaniel
[Well, perfect timing for this one to pop up in the rotation again!]
RINO McDaniel continues to infest the GOP. But RINO McDaniel isn’t the problem.
Let me be crystal clear on this, RINO McDaniel is a lower-than-whale-shit, piss guzzling ratfucking shit eating traitorous rancid syphillitic cunt. Her worth as a human being is substantially less than zero, any oxygen sucked into her lungs is wasted, and it would be, no matter what job she had.
I fear I haven’t been clear enough, but that will have to suffice.
But she is not the problem…or rather, she would not be a problem were it not for others. She’d still be as I have described, but we wouldn’t know who she is and would not care, because she could do no damage. She’d just be anonymous human refuse.
No, the real problem is the fact that a majority of the 168 top GOP people voted for her. And now that has happened five times so they cannot claim they didn’t know what she was.
In spite of the fact that under her “leadership” the party has deliberately sabotaged the will of its base, has deliberately refused to challenge blatant election fraud, had gone out of its way to ensure certain candidates do not get nominated, has diverted donor money to namby-pamby candidates who have all the electoral appeal of a puddle of dog vomit…and in general has done nothing whatsoever to help fix the problems that plague America.
However that last is to be expected; I cannot expect anyone who IS the problem to help FIX the problem.
RINO McDaniel would be powerless without an entire party leadership of the same mind as her. They want this dismal performance; they want to ignore the party base.
If she were to drop dead this instant, it would solve nothing as someone just like her would be elected by those same pustulous people.
According to Charlie Kirk, about 55 people voted against her, 10-12 wanted something different but were too chickenshit to do the right thing, and roughly 100 people voted for her enthusiastically, and even had the unmitigated gall to complain to Kirk about US. Fuck ’em. Rusty 12 gauge bore brushes would be too good for these arrogant pricks and cunts.
Every single one of those hundred is just as bad as she is. In other words, they are all worse than I described at the beginning of this piece. And no doubt those people in turn have people who supported them to be state party chairs and whateveritis they call the other two people from each state and territory who were voting.
It’s time to face up to the fact that the Republican party is effectively owned by the shit-eating RINOs. We’ve got more work to do, a lot more work, to make the GOP an instrument for the restoration of the United States of America. And that’s in addition to cleaning up our elections.
There’s no point in cleaning up elections just to elect ratfucking RINOs.
OK, hopefully now you will have some inkling of my true attitude towards RINOs. Sorry that words were inadequate to give you the full picture.
The Real Fascist is His Fraudulency Joe Biden*
*Or whoever has his hand rammed up that meat puppet’s ass.
Brandon (which I will use as a term for whoever is the power behind the Porcelain Throne) has thrown down the gauntlet…but in a way where most of America will never see it. The networks didn’t carry his tirade. CNN air brushed it (or whatever you call editing the red background) for its five viewers (who aren’t trapped in airports).
Luckily for me I live in Colorado, and therefore, despite my best efforts, I probably didn’t vote for Donald Trump.
Of course, for this purpose who I actually did try to vote for will be essential, and they undoubtedly know.
The prior election must be acknowledged as fraudulent, and steps must be taken to prosecute the fraudsters and restore integrity to the system.
Nothing else matters at this point. Talking about trying again in 2022 or 2024 is hopeless otherwise. Which is not to say one must never talk about this, but rather that one must account for this in ones planning; if fixing the fraud is not part of the plan, you have no plan.
Small Government?
Many times conservatives (real and fake) speak of “small government” being the goal.
This sounds good, and mostly is good, but it misses the essential point. The important thing here isn’t the size, but rather the purpose, of government. We could have a cheap, small tyranny. After all our government spends most of its revenue on payments to individuals and foreign aid, neither of which is part of the tyrannical apparatus trying to keep us locked down and censored. What parts of the government would be necessary for a tyranny? It’d be a lot smaller than what we have now. We could shrink the government and nevertheless find it more tyrannical than it is today.
No, what we want is a limited government, limited not in size, but rather in scope. Limited, that is, in what it’s allowed to do. Under current circumstances, such a government would also be much smaller, but that’s a side effect. If we were in a World War II sort of war, an existential fight against nasty dictatorships on the brink of world conquest, that would be very expensive and would require a gargantuan government, but that would be what the government should be doing. That would be a large, but still limited government, since it’d be working to protect our rights.
World War II would have been the wrong time to squawk about “small government,” but it wasn’t (and never is) a bad time to demand limited government. Today would be a better time to ask for a small government–at least the job it should be doing is small today–but it misses the essential point; we want government to not do certain things. Many of those things we don’t want it doing are expensive but many of them are quite eminently doable by a smaller government than the one we have today. Small, but still exceeding proper limits.
So be careful what you ask for. You might get it and find you asked for the wrong thing.
Political Science In Summation
It’s really just a matter of people who can’t be happy unless they control others…versus those who want to be left alone. The oldest conflict within mankind. Government is necessary, but government attracts the assholes (a highly technical term for the control freaks).
A Few Things We Cannot Blame on His Fraudulency
I am pretty sure Joe Biden had nothing whatsoever to do with the 30 Years War that ran from 1618-1648 and probably killed about a third of the people then living in what is now Germany.
Nor did he cause the collapse of either Roman empire (Western, 476 CE, Eastern 1453 CE). Nor the ignominious failure of most of the Crusades. Nor the collapse of Bronze Age civilization around 1200 BCE (including the collapse of the Minoans and the blowup of Santorini).
However, my utter lack of ability to imagine how he could possibly be responsible for these things is not a valid argument against them, so I await correction if appropriate.
His Truth?
Again we saw an instance of “It might be true for Billy, but it’s not true for Bob” logic this week.
I hear this often, and it’s usually harmless. As when it’s describing differing circumstances, not different facts. “Housing is unaffordable” can be true for one person, but not for another who makes ten times as much.
But sometimes the speaker means it literally. Something like 2+2=4 is asserted to be true for Billy but not for Bob. (And when it’s literal, it’s usually Bob saying it.) And in that sense, it’s nonsense, dangerous nonsense. There is ONE reality, and it exists independent of our desires and our perceptions. It would go on existing if we weren’t here. We exist in it. It does not exist in our heads. It’s not a personal construct, and it isn’t a social construct. If there were no society, reality would continue to be what it is, it wouldn’t vanish…which it would have to do, if it were a social construct.
Now what can change from person to person is the perception of reality. We see that all the time. And people will, of course, act on those perceptions. They will vote for Trump (or try to) if their perception is close to mine, and vote against Trump (and certainly succeed at doing so) if their perception is distant from mine (and therefore, if I do say so, wrong). I have heard people say “perception is reality” and usually, that’s what they’re trying to say–your perception of reality is, as far as you know, an accurate representation of reality, or you’d change it.
But I really wish they’d say it differently. And sometimes, to get back to Billy and Bob, the person who says they have different truths is really saying they have different perceptions of reality–different worldviews. I can’t argue with the latter. But I sure wish they’d say it better. That way I’d know that someone who blabbers about two different truths is delusional and not worth my time, at least not until he passes kindergarten-level metaphysics on his umpteenth attempt.
Lawyer Appeasement Section
OK now for the fine print.
This is the WQTH Daily Thread. You know the drill. There’s no Poltical correctness, but civility is a requirement. There are Important Guidelines, here, with an addendum on 20191110.
We have a new board – called The U Tree – where people can take each other to the woodshed without fear of censorship or moderation.
And remember Wheatie’s Rules:
1. No food fights 2. No running with scissors. 3. If you bring snacks, bring enough for everyone. 4. Zeroth rule of gun safety: Don’t let the government get your guns. 5. Rule one of gun safety: The gun is always loaded. 5a. If you actually want the gun to be loaded, like because you’re checking out a bump in the night, then it’s empty. 6. Rule two of gun safety: Never point the gun at anything you’re not willing to destroy. 7. Rule three: Keep your finger off the trigger until ready to fire. 8. Rule the fourth: Be sure of your target and what is behind it.
Down, then up, and closing down again…but still a net increase for the week if you can stomach the roller coaster. On the other hand palladium is going like gangbusters! It went up 66 bucks on Friday alone.
One person here commented on the fact that it appears the gold price is being suppressed artificially, advocating for people to get into bitcoin.
I don’t see bitcoin as viable for the long term. There are two individuals who hold the lion’s share of the bitcoin, and I’d hate to see them decide to cash in and dump it. That ever present fear will probably dictate agaiinst it being a world standard (plus it’s way too volatile in any case). There’s even worse potential for manipulation here than there is with gold. At least in principle there are plenty of places to find more gold; it’s just not easy.
中国是个混蛋 !!! Zhōngguò shì gè hùndàn !!! China is asshoe !!!
China is in the White House
Since Wednesday, January 20 at Noon EST, the bought-and-paid for His Fraudulency Joseph Biden has been in the White House. It’s as good as having China in the Oval Office.
Joe Biden is Asshoe
China is in the White House, because Joe Biden is in the White House, and Joe Biden is identically equal to China. China is Asshoe. Therefore, Joe Biden is Asshoe.
But of course the much more important thing to realize:
Joe Biden Didn’t Win
乔*拜登没赢 !!! Qiáo Bài dēng méi yíng !!! Joe Biden didn’t win !!!
This Rejoice & Praise God Sunday Open Thread, with full respect to those who worship God on the Sabbath, is a place to reaffirm our worship of our Creator, our Father, our King Eternal.
It’s also a place to read, post, and discuss news that is worth knowing and sharing. Please post links to any news stories that you use as sources or quote from.
In the QTree, we’re a friendly and civil lot. We encourage free speech and the open exchange and civil discussion of different ideas. Topics aren’t constrained, and sound logic is highly encouraged, all built on a solid foundation of truth and established facts.
We have a policy of mutual respect, shown by civility. Civility encourages discussions, promotes objectivity and rational thought in discourse, and camaraderie in the participants – characteristics we strive toward in our Q Tree community.
Please show respect and consideration for our fellow QTreepers. Before hitting the “post” button, please proofread your post and make sure your opinion addresses the issue only, and does not confront or denigrate the poster. Keep to the topic – avoid “you” and “your”. Here in The Q Tree, personal attacks, name-calling, ridicule, insults, baiting, and other conduct for which a penalty flag would be thrown are VERBOTEN.
In The Q Tree, we’re compatriots, sitting around the campfire, roasting hot dogs, making s’mores, and discussing, agreeing, and disagreeing about whatever interests us. This board will remain a home for those who seek respectful conversations.
God is in Control . . . and His Grace is Sufficient, so . . . Keep Looking Up
Hopefully, every Sunday, we can find something here that will build us up a little . . . give us a smile . . . and add some joy or peace, very much needed in all our lives.
“This day is holy to the Lord your God; do not mourn nor weep.” . . . “Go your way, eat the fat, drink the sweet, and send portions to those for whom nothing is prepared; for this day is holy to our Lord. Do not sorrow, for the joy of the Lord is your strength.”
Sacrificial Kindness
H/T to the Shovel Lady.
During this ongoing and interminable political season, most of us probably have developed a large mental list of people who supported policies that resulted in hundreds of thousands of deaths from COVID, the grooming of our children, the theft of our elections, the invasion of our southern border, the loss of our energy independence, the defunding of our law officers, the closure of our businesses, the crime and destruction in our cities, and other destructive liberal policies, and now wish us harm . . . we now consider them our enemies, and want to see some kind of penalty levied.
They supported policies that did us harm, so we now want to see some harm befall them . . . but is this the attitude that we should be holding? Y’know, something like an eye for an eye?
According to Proverbs 25:21–22, the Lord would have us treat our enemies with kindness and generosity: “If your enemy is hungry, give him food to eat; if he is thirsty, give him water to drink. In doing this, you will heap burning coals on his head, and the LORD will reward you.” This passage states the paradoxical kingdom truth that the way to deal with an enemy is to do him good.
Elisha the prophet carried out a similar kindness for the Aramean army when they came against Israel, setting food and drink before the troops and then sending them home. After that, they stayed away from Israel (2 Kings 6:21–23; cf. 2 Chronicles 28:15). Old Testament law even commanded that an Israelite return his enemy’s ox or donkey if it strayed and give aid to his enemy’s ailing beast of burden (Exodus 23:4–5).
Heap burning coals on someone’s head is an expression associated with punishment in the Bible (Psalm 11:6; 140:10). The idea is that under the heat and pressure of applied kindness, the person will feel ashamed, regret his actions, and repent. The phrase could have originated from an ancient Egyptian propitiation ritual in which a person guilty of a crime was made to carry a basin of burning embers on his head as a symbol of his repentance. The goal of treating our enemies with kindness is to bring them to a place of conviction about their wrongdoing and, thus, cause them to repent.
In Romans 12:9–21, the apostle Paul cited Proverbs 25:21–22 to show that we overcome evil through love and goodness. He taught, “Bless those who persecute you. Don’t curse them; pray that God will bless them” (verse 14, NLT). “Never pay back evil with more evil” (verse 17, NLT). “Dear friends, never take revenge. Leave that to the righteous anger of God. For the Scriptures say, ‘I will take revenge; I will pay them back,’ says the LORD. Instead, ‘If your enemies are hungry, feed them. If they are thirsty, give them something to drink. In doing this, you will heap burning coals of shame on their heads.’ Don’t let evil conquer you, but conquer evil by doing good” (verses 19–21, NLT).
Our instinctive human reaction to being wronged is to retaliate against our enemies. Yet, such a response is prohibited to followers of Christ. Jesus taught, “Do not resist an evil person. If anyone slaps you on the right cheek, turn to them the other cheek also” (Matthew 5:39). As Christians, we are to love our enemies and pray for those who persecute us (Matthew 5:43–48). We conquer evil by doing what is good, and we win over our enemies by loving them and treating them with kindness and compassion.
In His great Sermon on the Mount, Jesus called His disciples to be agents of peace in this world: “Blessed are the peacemakers, for they will be called children of God. Blessed are those who are persecuted because of righteousness, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. Blessed are you when people insult you, persecute you and falsely say all kinds of evil against you because of me. Rejoice and be glad, because great is your reward in heaven” (Matthew 5:9–12).
There are reasons why Christians should not take revenge. First and foremost, God has made it expressly clear in Scripture that it is His job to punish sin (Deuteronomy 32:35, 41; Ecclesiastes 12:14). And, since God wants “all people to be saved and to come to the knowledge of the truth,” Christians are to lead “peaceful and quiet” lives, so they don’t hinder the work of the gospel (1 Timothy 2:1–4). When we perform God’s job of avenging ourselves and punishing our enemies, we run the risk of bringing harm to the cause of the gospel. But when we love our enemies sincerely and sacrificially, God will honor and reward us.
For a Christian, the best way to defeat an enemy is to turn that enemy into a brother or sister in Christ. Romans 2:4 says that God’s kindness is intended to lead people to repentance. It stands to follow that our kindness to an enemy might also help bring that person to repentance. Treating our enemies with unexpected benevolence and generosity will have a disarming and discomforting effect, with the potential of leading them to remorse, repentance, and salvation in Jesus Christ.
God sacrificed Jesus, His Son, part of Himself, for us while we were still His sin-filled enemies. Shouldn’t we, as a minimum, make a determined effort to follow His teaching and example in our own lives to our perceived enemies?
What is it that feeds our battle, yet starves our victory?
Speaker Johnson: A Reminder.
January 6 tapes. A good start…but then nothing.
Were you just hoping we’d be distracted by the first set and not notice?
Are you THAT kind of “Republican”?
Are you Kevin McCarthy lite?
What are you waiting for?
I have a personal interest in this issue.
This Man is Pissed!
And if you aren’t…what the hell is wrong with you?
Is This Our Anthem?
Or at least our song to march to?
I’m sure most of you know I don’t believe in “devolution” or any variant of “we’re really still in charge” and certainly not the ones that come with “They’re waiting for everyone to wake up.”
No, I don’t think the good guys are in charge. But that makes it even more necessary that people wake up.
This might be the Uncle Tom’s Cabin of our age. (Or perhaps the recent trafficking movie was it. Or maybe both.)
Certainly there seem to be a huge number of people who are finally having the light bulb turning on when they hear this song.
Joining The Herd Of Lemmings
I’ve had cause to consider a few things. Maybe we’re going about it the wrong way, and we need to ditch Trump
Yeah, NO
Trump all the way! Why? Because being hated by the people who hate him is a sign of impeccable character, that’s why.
The haters can go fuck themselves with rusty twelve gauge bore brushes. I’d prefer ten gauge but that’s kind of scarce, so…I’m willing to compromise.
The RINO’s Dilemma
The RINOs who who have burrowed in and taken over most GOP organizations, from the state down to local organizations, have quite a dilemma on their hands, and most of them have their heads too far up their asses to realize it.
OK, I’m not talking about the liberal in a Republican area, who knows they’re in the wrong party, but is there because it’s the only game in their town; they hope to capture a nomination someday, at which point they’re guaranteed to be elected…otherwise, they never will be. These people are a hazard in any heavily conservative area.
No, I’m talking about the guys who are a little bit conservative and want to do some good by going into politics, and they’re in a closely matched area, closely enough that they can join the party they are most aligned with and still have a chance. They think the Democrats…particularly the ones who end up running for office…are nuts.
They don’t think much better of the Deplorable types, either. A bunch of bumpkins whose hearts are in the right place, mostly…OK a bit extreme. But they think Deplorables can’t understand that first you have to get elected, then work within the system to change things…a slow process. They genuinely want many of the things Deplorables want…just not as much. The government is spending too much. Or they need to spend money on highways instead of welfare for illegal immigrants. But they want to work within the system to get these things done.
Or maybe they think things are pretty close to ideal right now, and they want to nail it in place.
The problem is, that means they don’t stand for anything in particular. And it shows. They’re about as unappetizing to the electorate as a puddle of dog vomit. The folks in the middle, who they think they are appealing to because they themselves are not extreme, would honestly prefer a clear-spoken radical to someone who qualifies everything they say to the point where they sound like they don’t believe anything at all.
The problem these “Mild RINOs” have, is they just can’t see that. And the reason they just can’t see that, is their entire sense of self-worth is tied up in not seeing that. In their minds, they’ve worked tirelessly for their party, to keep those crazy Democrats out…only to have to constantly fight with a small number of crazy Republicans–who are only liabilities if they end up as candidates. They’ve fought the good fight, and if they can just find the right candidate, someone with some charisma, they might stop the crazies…without being too beholden to the OTHER crazies. In the meantime it’s not working. What’s a responsible guy in politics to do?
They simply cannot understand that the Republicans can’t succeed as the party of nothing in particular. Not really in the past, and certainly not today when people are starting to realize that no matter what they do in the voting booth, the country is still about to fly off a precipice. If they did see it, they’d suddenly have two choices: Go away and let the GOP succeed, or stay and fight. But “go away” isn’t really an option, because what’s the point of having a party now owned by the crazies, win?
Well, they have a dilemma…and WE, therefore have a problem. And we would have that problem even IF they realized that they had a problem…that they were the problem.
No one ever thinks they are the bad guy. Even Epstein probably thought he was the good guy. Right up to the moment where he didn’t kill himself.
So if you ever wonder why these unappetizing dufuses cling on even when their fingernails are being left behind…that’s why. They don’t understand no one wants them, and can’t imagine that no one should want them. And oftentimes their greatest pride is in all the hard work they’ve done for the party. They’re not going to give that up; it’d be psychological suicide.
If you’ve worked with these people, there’s a good chance you like them and consider some of them your friends. But even if so…we’re going to have to give them a good, hard shove. Because America is more important than those milquetoasts’ egos.
Justice Must Be Done
The prior election must be acknowledged as fraudulent, and steps must be taken to prosecute the fraudsters and restore integrity to the system.
Nothing else matters at this point. Talking about trying again in 2022 or 2024 is hopeless otherwise. Which is not to say one must never talk about this, but rather that one must account for this in ones planning; if fixing the fraud is not part of the plan, you have no plan.
Lawyer Appeasement Section
OK now for the fine print.
This is the WQTH Daily Thread. You know the drill. There’s no Poltical correctness, but civility is a requirement. There are Important Guidelines, here, with an addendum on 20191110.
We have a new board – called The U Tree – where people can take each other to the woodshed without fear of censorship or moderation.
And remember Wheatie’s Rules:
1. No food fights 2. No running with scissors. 3. If you bring snacks, bring enough for everyone. 4. Zeroth rule of gun safety: Don’t let the government get your guns. 5. Rule one of gun safety: The gun is always loaded. 5a. If you actually want the gun to be loaded, like because you’re checking out a bump in the night, then it’s empty. 6. Rule two of gun safety: Never point the gun at anything you’re not willing to destroy. 7. Rule three: Keep your finger off the trigger until ready to fire. 8. Rule the fourth: Be sure of your target and what is behind it.
Gold went on a really wild ride this week. It broke through $2100 in early trading Monday, before closing down that day. It seemed to be settling in at $2,025 or so but today it took almost a $24 hit. That’s not unusual for Fridays. If you have a big enough position that you don’t get eaten alive on the spread (which for us mortals is a lot more than the dollar an ounce that Kitco indicates), you could probably make money just by selling gold early each Friday and then buying it back late in the day. Sometimes you’d lose, but usually you’d win.
Palladium continues its long term drop; while rhodium seems to have found a new level…quite a bit lower than $30K. Silver took a large hit (almost 10 percent) this week.
Another Voice On Rocketry and Orbits
A while ago I did a series on orbital mechanics. I just discovered this channel on YouTube where the difference between “in space” and “in orbit” are explained; why “zero g” or “freefall” or “microgravity” is not the same as “no gravity” and so on. His visuals make a lot of things I tried to get at, very clear.
His channel has a lot of other material, too, largely on current technology in rocketry. (I know he reminded me of a few things I had forgotten over the last 30 years.) Highly recommended to anyone with an interest in the topic.
Fuck Joe B*d*n
Due to complaints about foul language, I’ve censored the most objectionable word in the title of this section.
B*d*n, you don’t even get ONE scoop of ice cream today.
(Please post this somewhere permanent, as it will continue to be true; the SOB will never deserve a scoop.)
Obligatory PSAs and Reminders
China is Lower than Whale Shit
Remember Hong Kong!!!
中国是个混蛋 !!! Zhōngguò shì gè hùndàn !!! China is asshoe !!!
China is in the White House
Since Wednesday, January 20 at Noon EST, the bought-and-paid for His Fraudulency Joseph Biden has been in the White House. It’s as good as having China in the Oval Office.
Joe Biden is Asshoe
China is in the White House, because Joe Biden is in the White House, and Joe Biden is identically equal to China. China is Asshoe. Therefore, Joe Biden is Asshoe.
But of course the much more important thing to realize:
Joe Biden Didn’t Win
乔*拜登没赢 !!! Qiáo Bài dēng méi yíng !!! Joe Biden didn’t win !!!
This Rejoice & Praise God Sunday Open Thread, with full respect to those who worship God on the Sabbath, is a place to reaffirm our worship of our Creator, our Father, our King Eternal.
It’s also a place to read, post, and discuss news that is worth knowing and sharing. Please post links to any news stories that you use as sources or quote from.
In the QTree, we’re a friendly and civil lot. We encourage free speech and the open exchange and civil discussion of different ideas. Topics aren’t constrained, and sound logic is highly encouraged, all built on a solid foundation of truth and established facts.
We have a policy of mutual respect, shown by civility. Civility encourages discussions, promotes objectivity and rational thought in discourse, and camaraderie in the participants – characteristics we strive toward in our Q Tree community.
Please show respect and consideration for our fellow QTreepers. Before hitting the “post” button, please proofread your post and make sure your opinion addresses the issue only, and does not confront or denigrate the poster. Keep to the topic – avoid “you” and “your”. Here in The Q Tree, personal attacks, name-calling, ridicule, insults, baiting, and other conduct for which a penalty flag would be thrown are VERBOTEN.
In The Q Tree, we’re compatriots, sitting around the campfire, roasting hot dogs, making s’mores, and discussing, agreeing, and disagreeing about whatever interests us. This board will remain a home for those who seek respectful conversations.
God is in Control . . . and His Grace is Sufficient, so . . . Keep Looking Up
Hopefully, every Sunday, we can find something here that will build us up a little . . . give us a smile . . . and add some joy or peace, very much needed in all our lives.
“This day is holy to the Lord your God; do not mourn nor weep.” . . . “Go your way, eat the fat, drink the sweet, and send portions to those for whom nothing is prepared; for this day is holy to our Lord. Do not sorrow, for the joy of the Lord is your strength.”
Build Each Other Up
What is edification, and why is it so important in the lives of believers? The word used for “edification” in the New Testament is oikodomé, which translates literally as “the building of a house.” The word appears in the King James Bible only about 20 times, and then only in the New Testament. It is translated into phrases such as “building up” in more modern translations. Interestingly, its usage is also limited to Paul’s letters. The dictionary definition of edify is “to instruct and improve, especially in moral and religious knowledge.” According to Vine’s Expository Dictionary of Old and New Testament Words, the word indicates the promotion of “spiritual growth and development of character of believers, by teaching or by example, suggesting such spiritual progress as the result of patient labor.”
Vine’s definition captures the meaning rather well. Edification is more than just encouragement; it includes any activity that results in more Christlikeness, either in oneself or in another believer. Edification may be individual or corporate. Individually, one can edify oneself by participating in the various spiritual disciplines (Bible intake, private prayer, private worship, etc).
Generally, however, the concept of edification in the New Testament is applied to the corporate body (mutual edification). Mutual edification involves helping one another along the road to Christlikeness, and it requires the participation of all members of the church. Teaching and preaching improve our understanding of God; encouragement promotes conduct that develops Christlike character. When we exhort one another and hold one another accountable, we are prompted to engage in activities that promote godliness. Accountability means we lovingly check each other’s spiritual progress. Christlike service ensures that the needs of the church are met, and true fellowship is the interaction we have with each other on a deeper spiritual level. The corporate nature of edification cannot be overemphasized. Without mutual edification, the church becomes a collection of spiritual weaklings, a perpetual nursery for spiritual infants, rather than a body (1 Corinthians 12:27) or a building (Ephesians 2:20-22).
Paul tells us in Ephesians 4:12 and repeatedly in 1 Corinthians 14:1-26 that edification is one of the reasons that spiritual gifts are given to believers. In 2 Corinthians, Paul states no fewer than three times that the “building up” of the church is the reason for his apostolic authority (10:8, 12:19, and 13:10). Paul’s goal was to edify. In 1 Corinthians 10:23 and Ephesians 4:16, he states that the church must work to edify itself for the overall health of each member. Finally, each of us is commanded to engage in edification (Romans 14:19; 15:2; Ephesians 4:29; 1 Thessalonians 5:11).
The church exists in community. Throughout the New Testament, the language is rich with communal imagery. The church is described as Christ’s flock, His body, and His building. None of these metaphors denote an individual entity. Paul expounds on this concept in 1 Corinthians 12:12-31, describing the interdependence of the parts of the human body and the necessity of each. He goes so far as to say that we’re actually “members of one another” in Ephesians 4:25 (NKJV).
An analogy is instructive here. The Gothic arch was a very popular structure in medieval architecture. The primary advantage of the arch was its strength and stability, which it derived from the fact that each stone in the arch leaned on the one beside it. This system of mutual support enabled the construction of much larger structures than might otherwise have been built. The Gothic arch could be a symbol of the church. The very fact that we need one another gives the church its strength. And the minute we decide to stop leaning on one another, we fall. https://www.gotquestions.org/Christian-edification.html
For the kingdom of God is not eating and drinking, but righteousness and peace and joy in the Holy Spirit. For he who serves Christ in these things is acceptable to God and approved by men. Therefore let us pursue the things which make for peace and the things by which one may build up another. Romans 14:17-19
Do you hear the shout? Is that the voice of the archangel? And the blast of God’s trumpet? Is it the last trump?
This Rejoice & Praise God Sunday Open Thread, with full respect to those who worship God on the Sabbath, is a place to reaffirm our worship of our Creator, our Father, our King Eternal.
It’s also a place to read, post, and discuss news that is worth knowing and sharing. Please post links to any news stories that you use as sources or quote from.
In the QTree, we’re a friendly and civil lot. We encourage free speech and the open exchange and civil discussion of different ideas. Topics aren’t constrained, and sound logic is highly encouraged, all built on a solid foundation of truth and established facts.
We have a policy of mutual respect, shown by civility. Civility encourages discussions, promotes objectivity and rational thought in discourse, and camaraderie in the participants – characteristics we strive toward in our Q Tree community.
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In The Q Tree, we’re compatriots, sitting around the campfire, roasting hot dogs, making s’mores, and discussing, agreeing, and disagreeing about whatever interests us. This board will remain a home for those who seek respectful conversations.
God is in Control . . . and His Grace is Sufficient, so . . . Keep Looking Up
Hopefully, every Sunday, we can find something here that will build us up a little . . . give us a smile . . . and add some joy or peace, very much needed in all our lives.
“This day is holy to the Lord your God; do not mourn nor weep.” . . . “Go your way, eat the fat, drink the sweet, and send portions to those for whom nothing is prepared; for this day is holy to our Lord. Do not sorrow, for the joy of the Lord is your strength.”
Thorns and Grace
Paul speaks of a “thorn in the flesh” in 2 Corinthians 12:7. He calls it “a messenger of Satan” that had a purpose of “torment.” Many explanations have been offered, but whether Paul is referring to a physical, spiritual, or emotional affliction – or something else entirely – hasn’t been answered with satisfaction. Since Paul wasn’t talking of a literal thorn, he must have been speaking metaphorically. Some of the more popular theories of the thorn’s interpretation include temptation, a chronic eye problem, malaria, migraines, epilepsy, and a speech disability. Some even say that the thorn refers to a person, such as Alexander the coppersmith, who did Paul “a great deal of harm” (2 Timothy 4:14). No one can say for sure what Paul’s thorn in the flesh was, but it was a source of real pain in the apostle’s life.
Paul reveals the thorn’s purpose: “To keep me from becoming conceited because of these surpassingly great revelations.” So, God’s goal in allowing the thorn in the flesh was to keep Paul humble. Anyone who had encountered Jesus and was commissioned personally by Him (Acts 9:2-8) would, in his natural state, become “puffed up.” Add to that the fact that Paul was moved by the Holy Spirit to write much of the New Testament, and it is easy to see how Paul could become “haughty” (KJV) or “exalted above measure” (NKJV) or “too proud” (NCV).
Paul also says that the affliction came from or by a “messenger of Satan.” Just as God allowed Satan to torment Job (Job 1:1-12), God allowed Satan to torment Paul for God’s own good purpose.
No one likes to live in pain. Paul sought the Lord three times to remove this source of pain from him (2 Corinthians 12:8). He probably had many good reasons why he should be pain-free: he could have a more effective ministry; he could reach more people with the gospel; he could glorify God even more! But the Lord was more concerned with building Paul’s character and preventing pride. Instead of removing the problem, whatever it was, God gave Paul more overwhelming grace and more compensating strength. Paul learned that God’s “power is made perfect in weakness” (verse 9).
The exact nature of Paul’s thorn in the flesh is uncertain. There is probably a good reason that we don’t know. God likely wanted Paul’s difficulty to be described in general enough terms to apply to any difficulty we may face now. Whether the “thorn” we struggle with today is physical, emotional, or spiritual, we can know that God has a purpose and that His grace is all-sufficient.
Many of the principles of God’s kingdom are paradoxes. When the apostle Paul pleaded with God to remove his affliction – one he called a “thorn in the flesh” – the Lord said to Paul, “My grace is sufficient for you, for My strength is made perfect in weakness” (2 Corinthians 12:8–9, NKJV), because He delights in taking situations where human strength is lacking to let us see the greatness of His power.
Paul stopped protesting his situation and began to boast and even take pleasure in his weakness so that the power of Christ could work through him: “That is why, for Christ’s sake, I delight in weaknesses, in insults, in hardships, in persecutions, in difficulties. For when I am weak, then I am strong” (2 Corinthians 12:10). Paul expressed the paradox of his condition – that in his frailty, he was strong because his strength came from Christ.
The words “made perfect” in 2 Corinthians 12:9 mean “fully or entirely accomplished or made complete.” Christ’s power is made complete – it is able to fully accomplish its purpose – when His people are weak and depend on Him for strength. When we, like Paul, stop resisting and complaining and let the power of Christ rest on us, we make room to receive countless unexpected blessings from the Lord. By allowing God’s strength to be made perfect in our weakness, we have the opportunity to display God’s glory flawlessly.
Over and over, the Bible gives examples of God’s strength manifesting when His people are weak. Moses, the great leader of Israel, was deeply aware of his human shortcomings (Exodus 4:10). When the Lord called him to go to Pharaoh, Moses cried, “I’m not adequate. Please send someone else!” But God replied, “Go anyway, Moses, because I will be with you” (see Exodus 4:12–15).
Gideon’s story proves that God can accomplish great things through people who forget about their human weaknesses, trust in God’s strength, and obey His guidance (Judges 6:14–16). And, of course, our most notable biblical example, Jesus Christ, was “crucified in weakness” but “now lives by the power of God” (2 Corinthians 13:4, NLT).
First Corinthians 1:27 teaches, “But God chose the foolish things of the world to shame the wise; God chose the weak things of the world to shame the strong.” We must never shrink away from God because of our weakness but run to Him, letting Him equip and empower us to accomplish His will. We must remember His promise: “He gives strength to the weary and increases the power of the weak. Even youths grow tired and weary, and young men stumble and fall; but those who hope in the LORD will renew their strength. They will soar on wings like eagles; they will run and not grow weary, they will walk and not be faint” (Isaiah 40:29–31).
When we are in a position of need, it allows us to see how much we need God (2 Corinthians 1:9; 3:5; 13:4). The more aware we are of our weakness, the more God can reveal His power through us: “We now have this light shining in our hearts, but we ourselves are like fragile clay jars containing this great treasure. This makes it clear that our great power is from God, not from ourselves” (2 Corinthians 4:7, NLT).
God’s strength is made perfect in weakness when we put our faith and trust in Him. The Lord’s presence is all we need in times of weakness. His great power and sufficiency rest on us as we find our strength in Him, and He is glorified. We can say with the psalmist, “My flesh and my heart may fail, but God is the strength of my heart and my portion forever” (Psalm 73:26).
Paul had many things about which he could have boasted. His experiences were incredible. He lists some of them in 2 Corinthians 11:22–28 to illustrate that, while he above others might have reason to boast in his own flesh – his experiences and his abilities – he would only boast in Christ. Paul recognizes that we have no real power in ourselves except for Christ in us, and he explains in Philippians 3:4–7 that, even though he has quite a list of impressive achievements, he counts all those as loss for the sake of Christ. They are worthless – even having negative value – in comparison to the joy of knowing Christ.
Paul’s experiences provide a striking example of how a person should not find his or her identity and confidence in personal achievements because only God’s grace is sufficient. While showing mercy might mean not giving, for example, a punishment to the guilty; showing grace might mean giving, for example, a blessing to the unworthy. God shows grace in giving us life and providing for us and strengthening us for the path ahead. That grace is sufficient – it’s all we need.
Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of mercies and God of all comfort, who comforts us in all our affliction, so that we may be able to comfort those who are in any affliction, with the comfort with which we ourselves are comforted by God.
The Lord bless you and keep you; the Lord make his face shine on you and be gracious to you; the Lord turn his face toward you and give you peace.
Well this is the week my old McCarthy vs. Dungsmear question would have repeated.
We know the answer. Dungsmear.
But now let’s talk about RINOs in general, and why they are the lowest form of life in politics.
Many patriots have been involved with politics, often at the grassroots, for decades. We’ve fought, and fought, and fought and won the occasional illusory small victory.
Yet we can’t seem to win the war, even when we have BIG electoral wins.
I am reminded of something. The original Star Trek had an episode titled Day of the Dove. It was one of the better episodes from the third season, but any fan of the original series will tell you that’s a very low bar. Still, it seems to get some respect; at a time when there were about 700 episodes of Star Trek in its various incarnations out there, it was voted 99th best out of the top 100.
In sum, the plot is that an alien entity has arranged for 39 Enterprise crew, and 39 Klingons, to fight each other endlessly with swords and other muscle-powered weapons. The entity lives off of hostile emotions, you see and it wants a captive food source. (The other 400 or so Enterprise crew are trapped below decks and unable to help.) Each side has its emotions played and amplified by the alien entity; one Enterprise junior officer has false memories implanted of a brother who was killed by Klingons. The brother didn’t even exist.
Even people killed in a sword fight miraculously heal so they can go do it again.
The second best line of the episode is when Kang, the Klingon captain, notes that though they have won quite a number of small victories including capturing Engineering, can’t seem to actually finally defeat the Enterprise crew. He growls, “What power is it that feeds our battle yet starves our victory?*”
Indeed. He may have been the bad guy, but his situation should sound familiar.
We are a majority in this country. We have a powerful political party in our corner. There is endless wrangling.
And yet,
What power is it that feeds our battle yet starves our victory?
In our case, that power is the RINOs in our midst. They specialize in caving when on the verge of victory. Think of Obamacare’s repeal failing…by one Republican vote. Think of the way we can never seem to get spending under control (and now our entire tax revenue goes to pay interest on the debt; anything the government actually does now is with borrowed money).
We have a party…that refuses to do what we want it to do, and that refusal is institutionalized. If you’ve been involved with GOP politics, but haven’t seen this, it’s because you refuse to see it. Or because you are part of the problem yourself. (If so, kindly gargle some red fuming nitric acid to clear the taste of shit out of your mouth, and let those not part of the problem alone so they can read this.)
We fight to elect people, who then take a dive when in office. But it’s not just the politicians in office, it’s the people behind the scenes, the leaders of the national, state and county branches of the party. Their job is to ensure that real patriots never get onto the general election ballot. They’re allowed a few failures…who can then become token conservatives who will somehow never manage to win (Jordan), or can be compromised outright (Loren Boebert).
That way it doesn’t actually matter who has a congressional majority. I remember my excitement when the GOP took the Senate in 1980. But all that did was empower a bunch of “moderate” puddles of dog vomit like…well for whatever reason forty years later the most memorable name is Pete Domenici. And a couple of dozen other “moderates” who simply had no interest in doing what grassroots people in their party–those same grassroots people who had worked so hard to elect them–wanted them to do.
Oh, they’ll put up a semblance of a fight…but never win. And they love it when we fight the Dems instead of fighting them. Just like that alien entity, whose motto surely was “Let’s you and him fight. It’ll be delicious!”
If you think about it, your entire political involvement has come to nothing because of these walking malignant tumors.
That should make you good and mad.
The twenty five who blocked Jordan, and the hundred people who took that opportunity to stab Jordan in the back in the secret ballot should make you good and mad.
I’ll close this with another example of RINO backstabbing, an infuriating one close to home.
In my county, the GOP chair is not a RINO. She got elected when the grassroots had had enough of the RINOs. Unfortunately the state organization is full of RINOs, and the ousted county RINOs have been trying to form a new “Republican Party” and get the state GOP to recognize them as the affiliate. I’m honestly amazed it hasn’t happened yet.
In other words those shitstains won’t just leave when they get booted out; they’ll try to destroy what they left behind. It’s an indication that they know we know how important that behind-the-scenes party power is.
So they must be destroyed. That’s the only way they’ll ever stop.
We cannot win until the leeches “on our side” get destroyed.
What power is it that feeds our battle yet starves our victory?*
We know it. What is going to be done about it?
*NOTE: The original line was actually “What power is it that supports our battle yet starves our victory.” I had mis-remembered it as feeds. When I checked it, it sure enough was “supports” and that’s what I originally quoted. On further reflection, though, I realized my memory was actually an improvement over the reality, because feeds is a perfect contrast with starves. I changed it partway through the day this originally posted, but now (since this is a re-run) it gets rendered this way from the start.
If one must do things wrong, one should do them wrong…right.
RINOs an Endangered Species? If Only!
According to Wikipoo, et. al., the Northern White Rhinoceros (Ceratotherium simum cottoni) is a critically endangered species. Apparently two females live on a wildlife preserve in Sudan, and no males are known to be alive. So basically, this species is dead as soon as the females die of old age. Presently they are watched over by armed guards 24/7.
Biologists have been trying to cross them with the other subspecies, Southern White Rhinoceroses (Rhinoceri?) without success; and some genetic analyses suggest that perhaps they aren’t two subspecies at all, but two distinct species, which would make the whole project a lot more difficult.
I should hope if the American RINO (Parasitus rectum pseudoconservativum) is ever this endangered, there will be heroic efforts not to save the species, but rather to push the remainder off a cliff. Onto punji sticks. With feces smeared on them. Failing that a good bath in red fuming nitric acid will do.
But I’m not done ranting about RINOs.
The RINOs (if they are capable of any introspection whatsoever) probably wonder why they constantly have to deal with “populist” eruptions like the Trump-led MAGA movement. That would be because the so-called populists stand for absolutely nothing except for going along to get along. That allows the Left to drive the culture and politics.
Given the results of our most recent elections, the Left will now push harder, and the RINOs will now turn even squishier than they were before.
I well remember 1989-1990 in my state when the RINO establishment started preaching the message that a conservative simply couldn’t win in Colorado. Never mind the fact that Reagan had won the state TWICE (in 1984 bringing in a veto-proof state house and senate with him) and GHWB had won after (falsely!) assuring everyone that a vote for him was a vote for Reagan’s third term.
This is how the RINOs function. They push, push, push the line that only a “moderate” can get elected. Stomp them when they pull that shit. Tell everyone in ear shot that that’s exactly what the Left wants you to think, and oh-by-the-way-Mister-RINO if you’re in this party selling the same message as the Left…well, whythefuckexactly are you in this party, you lying piece of rancid weasel shit?
In Defense of Ranked Choice Voting
One of the biggest obstacles to direly-needed change is RINOs, and one of the weapons in their arsenal is the “Wasted Vote” argument.
Periodically a third party has arisen, trying to hold RINOs to account by putting pressure on them from outside of the party, since doing so from the inside has historically done very little good. But, even if you find a third party candidate who perfectly reflects your views, you’re likely to vote for the RINO anyway. Why? Because if you don’t, the Democrat might win, and that would be even worse. So if you vote for that third party (that few will vote for), you’re throwing your vote away and increasing the likelihood of the Democrat winning. (It’s half as much a gain for the Democrat, as actually voting for the Democrat would be. Not as much, but half as much. Because although you denied the R your vote, you did not flip your vote to the Democrat.)
The Republican Party Establishment knows you don’t love them. But they know you hate the Democrats worse, and they use that to continue to herd you into supporting them. With gritted teeth you cast your vote, but your vote counts the same whether you cast it enthusiastically. And the other alternative, pissing on the voting apparatus to express your actual feelings, is probably a felony.
But what if you could vote for that third party without increasing the chances of the Dem walking away with the prize?
This is what ranked choice voting, or instant runoff voting, can do provided it is properly implemented. (And this includes the votes, and only genuine votes, being counted honestly, of course. However, I’m going to compare it to what we have today, and pretend that is honestly done too. RCV can’t work if it’s not honestly administered, just like our current system isn’t working because it isn’t honestly administered.)
The idea behind RCV is to vote by expressing your order of preference. You could vote for the Patriot Party, then for the RINO Party as your second choice (and ignore the Democrat, the Green, the Overt Socialist Schmuckmonkey Party, etc).
What does this do? It nullifies the wasted vote argument. Your vote will be counted for the Patriot party, first, then instead of it being “wasted” when the Patriot Party loses, it ends up going to the RINO. Actually, it’s just barely possible that the Patriot Party would actually beat the RINO, if people weren’t all individually afraid to vote for it.
It’s just like the famous “Prisoner’s Dilemma” where your fear of other peoples’ actions prevents you from doing the optimal thing–and vice-versa. As long as Job Lowe is afraid to vote Patriot because he’s afraid you’ll vote RINO, you’ll have to vote RINO because you fear that Job Lowe will, because he fears you will.
So on the whole I like RCV. It gives you a no-risk way to vote against the RINO scum, and in favor of someone who deserves your vote.
The problem is, as done here in the US, it comes packaged with a “jungle primary.” A bunch of candidates get to put their name out there, and the top four (or so) candidates get onto the “main” ballot. This gives party establishments their way around the threat of a good third party bumping them off. Because they know that few people bother with primaries, and third parties don’t have the resources to run in a primary…so they throw two or three establishment hacks into the primary and they will probably beat the third party. The result is the RINOs end up with two of the four slots in the general election, and the Dems get the other two. Now there’s suddenly no third party candidate on the ballot at all.
If we were to combine RCV with the present system where each party could nominate exactly one candidate to appear on the November ballot, or at the very least, ensure minor parties could get onto the ballot with at least one candidate regardless of the primary, we would be getting somewhere, but the establishment is smarter than we like to give them credit for. They will support the jungle primary + RCV “solution” rather than the more appropriate one-candidate-per-party + RCV solution.
It’s not RCV that is the problem, it’s the primary structure grafted onto it.
Justice
It says “Justice” on the picture.
And I’m sure someone will post the standard joke about what the fish thinks about the situation.
But what is it?
Here’s a take, from a different context: It’s about how you do justice, not the justice that must be done to our massively corrupt government and media. You must properly identify the nature of a person, before you can do him justice.
Ayn Rand, On Justice (speaking through her character John Galt, in Atlas Shrugged):
Justice is the recognition of the fact that you cannot fake the character of men as you cannot fake the character of nature, that you must judge all men as conscientiously as you judge inanimate objects, with the same respect for truth, with the same incorruptible vision, by as pure and as rational a process of identification—that every man must be judged for what he is and treated accordingly, that just as you do not pay a higher price for a rusty chunk of scrap than for a piece of shining metal, so you do not value a rotter above a hero—that your moral appraisal is the coin paying men for their virtues or vices, and this payment demands of you as scrupulous an honor as you bring to financial transactions—that to withhold your contempt from men’s vices is an act of moral counterfeiting, and to withhold your admiration from their virtues is an act of moral embezzlement—that to place any other concern higher than justice is to devaluate your moral currency and defraud the good in favor of the evil, since only the good can lose by a default of justice and only the evil can profit—and that the bottom of the pit at the end of that road, the act of moral bankruptcy, is to punish men for their virtues and reward them for their vices, that that is the collapse to full depravity, the Black Mass of the worship of death, the dedication of your consciousness to the destruction of existence.
Ayn Rand identified seven virtues, chief among them rationality. The other six, including justice, she considered subsidiary because they are essentially different aspects and applications of rationality.
I’m sure enough of this that I put my money where my mouth is.
The prior election must be acknowledged as fraudulent, and steps must be taken to prosecute the fraudsters and restore integrity to the system. (This doesn’t necessarily include deposing Joe and Hoe and putting Trump where he belongs, but it would certainly be a lot easier to fix our broken electoral system with the right people in charge.)
Nothing else matters at this point. Talking about trying again in 2024 or 2026 is pointless otherwise. Which is not to say one must never talk about this, but rather that one must account for this in ones planning; if fixing the fraud in the system is not part of the plan, you have no plan.
This will necessarily be piecemeal, state by state, which is why I am encouraged by those states working to change their laws to alleviate the fraud both via computer and via bogus voters. If enough states do that we might end up with a working majority in Congress and that would be something Trump never really had.
Lawyer Appeasement Section
OK now for the fine print.
This is the WQTH Daily Thread. You know the drill. There’s no Poltical correctness, but civility is a requirement. There are Important Guidelines, here, with an addendum on 20191110.
We have a new board – called The U Tree – where people can take each other to the woodshed without fear of censorship or moderation.
And remember Wheatie’s Rules:
1. No food fights 2. No running with scissors. 3. If you bring snacks, bring enough for everyone. 4. Zeroth rule of gun safety: Don’t let the government get your guns. 5. Rule one of gun safety: The gun is always loaded. 5a. If you actually want the gun to be loaded, like because you’re checking out a bump in the night, then it’s empty. 6. Rule two of gun safety: Never point the gun at anything you’re not willing to destroy. 7. Rule three: Keep your finger off the trigger until ready to fire. 8. Rule the fourth: Be sure of your target and what is behind it.
Markets appeared to have closed at 11:45 on Friday, rather than 3 PM mountain time.
Silver is doing very well right now for some reason, it has busted $24.
Some people who analyze this stuff online are puzzled at gold’s recent climb, so it’s possible it’s being pumped and dumped.
Star Trek Was Often Clueless
As gigantic a leap ahead as Star Trek might have represented for TV science fiction (I don’t think it was beaten for almost 30 years, and that was by Babylon 5) it still had its forehead-smacking moments when it comes to the science.
Yes science fiction is considered by many to be arbitrary flights of fancy, but the fact is, when it is written science fiction, there are conventions to be followed. It should at least display an understanding of natural laws. This is even honored in the breach. By which I mean that oftentimes, the premise of the story involves a new scientific discovery, so of course there will be violations of current scientific principles. But the point is that everyone understands it’s a new thing–and the “new” science has to be internally consistent.
By no means is all, or even a majority, of science fiction about space travel, but when it is (especially in the sub-genre called “space opera”), it almost certainly will assume that some sort of faster-than-light travel is possible. Either there will be some sort of propulsion system that does it, or there will be some sort of wormhole or jump point, where you instantaneously jump from one star’s planetary system to another. (The wormhole is infinite speed, effectively…travel time involves getting to (or from) the wormhole, from (or to) some nearby planet or other location the action is going to be.)
Star Trek went with the former. A lot of other Hollywood produced stuff went the other way, or with some combination. It saves them from some opportunities to really be stupid.
In general, Hollywood doesn’t follow the convention I mentioned above; it regularly has ridiculous science howlers in it. The scriptwriters came nowhere near a STEM education and are a) clueless and b) usually don’t give a rip.
In particular, every single Hollywood production I am aware of that uses propulsion systems for faster than light travel simply doesn’t do the math and has no conception of what they’re dealing with. They don’t understand how fast light goes, and they don’t understand how big things are.
And that includes Star Trek.
When I remembered that bit about “What is it that feeds our battle yet starves our victory” I blew the dust off my original Star Trek Blurays and watched that episode. Then I got sucked in; I’ve been lightly binge watching Star Trek (the Original Series, as it’s now referred to to disambiguate it from all of the spinoffs) since then. And it’s just appalling sometimes, on this score (but it must be said the main goal was to tell good stories, which it was much more successful at).OK so first things first. Let me explain the actual situation.
Let’s discuss interplanetary travel first.
The distance between the Earth and the Sun averages out to about 93 million miles or 150 million kilometers. For historical reasons I’m not getting into now (but did in other posts), this is called an astronomical unit (AU) and is the “yardstick” we use inside the solar system. We in fact used it for a yardstick long before we had any idea how much it was…because we knew the ratios of planetary distances long ago. We knew, for instance that Jupiter was 5.2 times the distance from the Sun as is Earth, long before we knew how much in absolute terms either of those distances was. Today. of course, we’ve measured an AU to within a few hundred meters, and as of 2012 it’s now defined to be exactly 149,597,870,700 meters. (If we end up refining the measurement, we’ll end up with an AU not quite equaling the distance between the Earth and the Sun, because we’ve nailed the number in place.)
The furthest planet out is Neptune; its orbit is almost exactly 30 AU in radius. There are a lot of smaller objects further out; the furthest one that’s reasonably well known to science popularizers is Sedna. It’s in a very elliptical orbit with an average radius of 484 AU, with a maximum distance of 892. (It’s much much closer right now). Another body, Leleakuhonua, is at 1085 AU average distance, max is 2106 AU. It too is near its closest approach of “only” 65 AU. Right now it’s roughly 80 AU away. (We would never be able to see either body if it were at its furthest distance. This tells us there are almost certainly many bodies way out there, at or near the farthest extents of their orbits, that we can’t see.)
When we do start traveling between the planets of our solar system in earnest, we’ll probably spend most of our time inside the orbit of Neptune, or perhaps a bit outside it where Pluto is, but places further out than where Sedna is today, will be lengthy undertakings–expeditions.
What sorts of speeds will be needed? We’ll certainly want to move faster than the planets themselves do! The Earth moves 6.28 AUs in one year (i.e, 1 AU times 2π or times τ if you like using τ instead of π), or roughly an AU every two months. It’s moving at 29,785 meters per second or 107,230 kilometers per hour. If that’s as fast as we travel, Neptune is roughly five years away, one way. (And Earth moves a lot faster than Neptune does.) If you are thinking 5 weeks to Neptune is what people would put up with (similar to oceangoing ships crossing oceans), you need to be able to move 52 times faster, or at over 5 million kilometers an hour.
That, as it happens, is about one half of one percent of the speed of light, which is roughly a billion kilometers an hour. This is way, way ahead of anything we can do now, but much slower than light speed. And though it would require engineering we haven’t even imagined yet, it doesn’t necessarily bust the laws of physics (unless you insist it be done with souped-up rockets…like in The Expanse). One could write good stories with speeds and timespans like this.
And Star Trek got this nearly right, at least once. The Enterprise has “impulse” drives that push it at slower than the speed of light, c, and there was an episode, Elaan of Troyius, where the Enterprise was traveling from one planet to another…in the same planetary system. The command was for “speed factor point zero three seven”, which probably meant 0.037c. This allowed for a leisurely (several days) trip between two planets. It’s probably still about ten times too fast, but…maybe the star was bright and the planets had to be farther apart than (say) Earth and Mars would be. However, in spite of this rare moment of near-lucidity, this episode is no paragon of doing simple arithmetic to sanity check things, as there is a rather big blunder in it elsewhere. I’ll get to that.
OK, now let’s consider interstellar distances and travel.
It’s bigger. A lot bigger. And we’re going to need a bigger yardstick. There are two yardstick between stars. The one astronomers use amongst themselves is the parsec. How big is that?
A parsec is the distance at which, something an AU across will appear to only be one arcsecond wide. (That’s not how it was originally derived, but it’s equivalent…and a lot easier to describe.)
Those of you that shoot (and I hope that’s all of you) likely know that by happy coincidence, two spots an inch apart on a target that is 100 yards away are just about 1 arc minute apart. Which is to say the angle between the line from the first spot to your eyeball, and the line from the other spot, to your eyeball, is 1/60th of a degree. Almost but not quite parallel. Since a quarter is very close to an inch across, one MOA is how big a quarter appears at 100 yards.
One second of arc is an angle 1/60th as big as that. So it’s 1/60th the width of a quarter at a hundred yards…or you can move the object further away instead of making it smaller: it’s also the width of a quarter at 6,000 yards, or 18,000 feet…or about 3 1/2 miles.
Now put an object 1 AU across (some stars are actually that big), far enough away that it’s one arc second across.
An AU is BIG, so this has to be far, far away. In fact, it’s 30,856,775,814,913,673 meters away (almost 31 quadrillion million meters). That’s not an exact figure, and there can’t be one, because computing it from an AU (which can be expressed exactly) involves π.
The other yardstick, the one astronomers use talking to non-astronomers, is the light year. This is the distance that light (traveling at about a billion kilometers an hour) travels in 365.25 days. This is: 9,460,730,472,580.8 meters. Nine and a half trillion kilometers. Or a bit under 6 trillion miles.
The nearest star to our Sun is Proxima Centauri. It’s 4.2 light years or 1.3 parsecs away. The sun itself would be impossible to see without binoculars at about 75 light years’ distance. Many of the bright stars in our night sky are intrinsically much brighter than the sun and are hundreds of light years away.
Four light years is often taken to be a good average distance between stars (though I suspect it’s high).
The entire galaxy is a disc a hundred thousand light years across. Even as we gallivant around from star to star…getting outside of the galaxy is a long trip, unless of course you go perpendicular to the disk. The center of the disc is about 26,000 light years away. This is plenty of room for Star Trek to write zillions of episodes, especially given that the galaxy is estimated to have anywhere between 100-400 billion or even more stars in it, and as near as we can tell, a large percentage of them have planets.
Now that I have given you both scales, let’s relate the interplanetary scale to the interstellar scale.
A light year is 63,241 AUs. A parsec is 206,265 AUs.
Those are commas not decimal points.
Proxima Centauri, the nearest interstellar destination, is about 268,000 AUs away. And we can’t even do one AU yet!
If a single AU is likened to a mile, Proxima Centauri is about as far away as the moon. We can walk a mile. To get a man to the moon we need the biggest rocket ever built.
For our previously-supposed society that can travel around the solar system in a few weeks, to make the transition and be able to travel to the nearest star, is like going from a man who can walk 30 miles…to the Apollo moon rocket, all at once. It’s by far the biggest “jump” in capability we will ever make; it will make crossing the oceans instead of hugging the coasts in sailing ships look like a tiny innovation. It’s basically impossible without huge advances in technology.
And, let me just remind of something. The furthest we have actually sent a manned mission is to the Moon. How far away is the Moon? Sit down and realize how puny we are: The Moon is 0.00257 AUs away. Roughly 1/400th of an AU. No, we haven’t begun manned interplanetary travel! We’ll need to go several AUs to get to Mars (the shortest route is under an AU but is much harder). Thousands of times further than we have yet gone.
OK with the stage set, let’s consider interstellar travel. If we want the ship to get there in less than years, we must have faster than light travel. Because light takes 4 years or so to get from one star to the next. For this the creators of Star Trek invented warp drive and wrote some word salad about how it works by warping space. (Interestingly, a serious physicist has postulated that if we could bend space a certain way, we could actually travel faster than light…and the press has called it a warp drive; you may have seen articles about it. He’s done the math to back it up, so it’s not word salad. All we need is a way to bend space.)
Warp drive speeds are given in Star Trek as “warp factors.” It’s never explained in the show, but in a book written by Gene Roddenberry, the creator of Star Trek, it’s stated that to figure out how fast a warp factor is, you cube it. So for Warp Factor 2, you’re traveling 2x2x2=8 times the speed of light. Which means getting to Proxima Centauri in just over six months. That’s too long, honestly. But you can go to Warp 6 and cruise forever without damaging the engines, and that’s 6x6x6=216 times the speed of light. And that puts Proxima Centauri 7 days away. It’s just barely possible that’s the sort of time Star Trek‘sEnterprise spends going from one star to another, but realistically, you’re not going to always be going from one star to its next door neighbor. The next crisis could be dozens or even hundreds of light years away.
In other words, even a few hundred times light speed is too slow for Star Trek to make sense.
Later on (and this is not official Star Trek as far as I know) it was posited that those warp factor multipliers apply in completely empty space, but interstellar space always has some dust and gas, plus the occasional actual star, and so warp factors get boosted…by over a thousand times, depending on how thick the interstellar medium is. (And even in a nebula, it’s actually a near perfect vacuum.) I’ll call this the “fudge factor.” And again, so far as I know it’s not “official” Star Trek.
The fudge factor does make things make more sense. Many episodes end with Kirk ordering the Enterprise on a course to the next episode (basically) at Warp 1 or 2. Unless you want the entire remaining five year mission to be taken up just getting to the next episode, you’ve got to move faster than 1x1x1=1 or 2x2x2=8 times the speed of light.
Sometimes the bridge crew actually says something is a parsec away (or so) and they can be there in minutes. Again, you need the fudge factor for this to make sense.
The problem comes in when Warp speed is mixed up with short distances.
That same Elaan of Troyius episode that I praised before, has another scene in it. A hostile ship is charging at the Enterprise at warp speed. I.e. as fast, or faster, than the speed of light. The problem came in when the bogie was 100,000 km away, and the bridge crew was counting down how far away it was.
At one times the speed of light, it would take 1/3 of a second for that ship to cover the distance. But it’s doing warp six. So the distance gets covered in 1/648th of a second instead. And that’s without the fudge factor, which makes it 1/1000th as long a time as that. The bridge crew would literally have no time at all to react.
Sigh.
But there is worse.
Another episode where the Enterprise is traveling within a planetary system is Paradise Syndrome. The Enterprise has to divert an asteroid heading for an inhabited, Earth-like planet. The asteroid is two months away. In our solar system it would be a “near-Earth object” traveling about the same speed as Earth…which as I mentioned is about 1 AU in two months. So the distance to cover is 1 AU or so. Since they are delayed on the planet (Kirk was missing, and of course they were searching for him), they have to get to the asteroid as fast as possible.
Spock orders warp nine. 9x9x9=512 times the speed of light (without fudge factor). How long will it take to cover that 1 AU distance?
Light takes 500 seconds to get from the Sun to the Earth…which is 1 AU. In other words, it should take less time for the Enterprise to travel that distance at warp nine, than it took for Spock to give the “Ahead warp factor nine” command. (That’s assuming, of course, the ship can accelerate from 0 to warp 9 in less than a second.)
Even if it’s two or three AUs away…it’s still going to take at most a handful of seconds to get there, even without the fudge factor. Since warp nine stresses the engines, it would probably have been okay to order warp six and take a few extra seconds. (Not that a mere one second of warp nine should cause problems!)
Instead this is shown as taking hours, if not days. And the engines are near the breaking point when they get to the asteroid. They end up frying the engines trying to divert the asteroid, and the Enterprise has to go back to the planet on impulse power, hours ahead of the asteroid…for two months…to try to find Kirk and rescue him before the asteroid destroys all life on the planet. (This too also ignorant, this time ignorant of orbital dynamics. The asteroid is in an orbit about the star, not under power. Therefore the Enterprise can be on the same trajectory without using power. If it is using any power at all, it should outrun the asteroid.)
Another episode that needs a callout is Space Seed. It wasn’t that famous an episode…until Star Trek II hit the movie theaters. Because Space Seed is the episode that introduced Khan Noonien Singh (played by Ricardo Montalban).
Khan’s backstory is that he and his band of merry supermen and superwomen escaped Earth in 1992 aboard a DY-100 ship…a ship far, far ahead of anything we can build today (anything interplanetary that can hold 3 people in it is…much less something with the big corridors we saw in Star Trek, holding dozens of people). The ship was meant for interplanetary travel but fortunately for the viewer (unfortunately for the Enterprise), they had suspended animation, and so the ship could travel for nearly 300 years…and somehow end up WAY out there among the stars for the Enterprise to find it.
Uh, but look at those numbers. Interstellar travel is tens of thousands times further than interplanetary travel.
We have sent objects out of the solar system, five of them. The furthest is Voyager 1, which after almost 50 years is a mere 152 AU away, and it will be tens of thousands of years before it gets as far away as Proxima Centauri (and it’s not headed in that direction).
There’s simply no way Khan’s ship could be at interstellar distances, much less far enough out that the Enterprise is only now stumbling across it, three centuries later.
Fortunately, I can usually ignore stuff like this for the sake of enjoying the story. But it would be nice if these TV shows would actually employ someone who can do arithmetic and use a calculator! Because that’s literally all it takes…that and knowing that distance equals speed multiplied by time.
I’m lucky that I can see all of this and still enjoy the show.
A couple of postscripts.
First, everything I’ve said applies to the original series. Star Trek the Next Generation (and Deep Space Nine and Voyager) are set a century after the original series, and the warp drive there is quite different…it’s probably the same as the “Transwarp” that was being tested in some of the movies made to go with the original series. Warp factors are much higher, and warp ten is infinite speed.
Also, here is a video about a scale model of our solar system in Melbourne, Australia. Distances and planetary sizes are to the same scale, 1:1,000,000,000 or 1 millimeter = 1,000 kilometers. The thumbnail shows the sun. Pluto is almost six kilometers away.
But there is a little surprise. Proxima Centauri is part of the model…quite close to the Sun in fact! What is it doing there? Didn’t I just get finished trying to convey how ridiculously far away it is compared to planets?
Well yes. But it just so happens that at the scale of the model, Proxima Centauri is 40,000 km away…and that’s one trip around the earth! So start at the sun, go past Mercury, Venus, etc…and Neptune, and yes they included Pluto for laughs. Then keep on going…all the way around the world and you’ll hit Proxima Centauri just before getting to the Sun again.
Obligatory PSAs and Reminders
China is Lower than Whale Shit
To conclude: My standard Public Service Announcement. We don’t want to forget this!!!
中国是个混蛋 !!! Zhōngguò shì gè hùndàn !!! China is asshoe !!!
China is in the White House
Since Wednesday, January 20 at Noon EST, the bought-and-paid for Joseph Biden has been in the White House. It’s as good as having China in the Oval Office.
Joe Biden is Asshoe
China is in the White House, because Joe Biden is in the White House, and Joe Biden is identically equal to China. China is Asshoe. Therefore, Joe Biden is Asshoe.
But of course the much more important thing to realize:
Joe Biden Didn’t Win
乔*拜登没赢 !!! Qiáo Bài dēng méi yíng !!! Joe Biden didn’t win !!!
This Rejoice & Praise God Sunday Open Thread, with full respect to those who worship God on the Sabbath, is a place to reaffirm our worship of our Creator, our Father, our King Eternal.
It’s also a place to read, post, and discuss news that is worth knowing and sharing. Please post links to any news stories that you use as sources or quote from.
In the QTree, we’re a friendly and civil lot. We encourage free speech and the open exchange and civil discussion of different ideas. Topics aren’t constrained, and sound logic is highly encouraged, all built on a solid foundation of truth and established facts.
We have a policy of mutual respect, shown by civility. Civility encourages discussions, promotes objectivity and rational thought in discourse, and camaraderie in the participants – characteristics we strive toward in our Q Tree community.
Please show respect and consideration for our fellow QTreepers. Before hitting the “post” button, please proofread your post and make sure your opinion addresses the issue only, and does not confront or denigrate the poster. Keep to the topic – avoid “you” and “your”. Here in The Q Tree, personal attacks, name-calling, ridicule, insults, baiting, and other conduct for which a penalty flag would be thrown are VERBOTEN.
In The Q Tree, we’re compatriots, sitting around the campfire, roasting hot dogs, making s’mores, and discussing, agreeing, and disagreeing about whatever interests us. This board will remain a home for those who seek respectful conversations.
God is in Control . . . and His Grace is Sufficient, so . . . Keep Looking Up
Hopefully, every Sunday, we can find something here that will build us up a little . . . give us a smile . . . and add some joy or peace, very much needed in all our lives.
“This day is holy to the Lord your God; do not mourn nor weep.” . . . “Go your way, eat the fat, drink the sweet, and send portions to those for whom nothing is prepared; for this day is holy to our Lord. Do not sorrow, for the joy of the Lord is your strength.”
The Sting is Gone
I declare to you, brothers and sisters, that flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God, nor does the perishable inherit the imperishable. Listen, I tell you a mystery: We will not all sleep, but we will all be changed— in a flash, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trumpet. For the trumpet will sound, the dead will be raised imperishable, and we will be changed. For the perishable must clothe itself with the imperishable, and the mortal with immortality. When the perishable has been clothed with the imperishable, and the mortal with immortality, then the saying that is written will come true: “Death has been swallowed up in victory.”
“Where, O death, is your victory? Where, O death, is your sting?”
The sting of death is sin, and the power of sin is the law. But thanks be to God! He gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ.
Therefore, my dear brothers and sisters, stand firm. Let nothing move you. Always give yourselves fully to the work of the Lord, because you know that your labor in the Lord is not in vain.
1 Corinthians 15:50-58
Christ has conquered death by His resurrection. He who was dead is now alive (see Revelation 1:18). These three words—Christ conquered death—define the most important difference between Christianity and all other religions. No other religious leader ever predicted his own death and resurrection (Matthew 16:21), based his claims about himself and his teaching on that prediction (John 2:18 –22; Matthew 27:40), and then kept that promise (Luke 24:6).
Jesus’ resurrection marks the first time in history that someone rose from the dead never to die again. Others who were resurrected eventually died a second time (see 1 Kings 17:17–24; 2 Kings 4:32–37; Mark 5:39–42; John 11:38–44). Jesus’ resurrection was a true and total defeat of death. As the Holy Son of God, Jesus overcame death once and for all, as Peter explained: “It was impossible for death to keep its hold on him” (Acts 2:24). The triumphant, risen Christ said, “I am the Living One; I was dead, and now look, I am alive for ever and ever! And I hold the keys of death and Hades” (Revelation 1:18). Keys are a symbol of authority. Jesus is sovereign over death. Christ’s conquest of death was permanent and eternal.
Christ conquered death because He was sinless. The curse upon mankind in the Garden of Eden, brought about by their sin, was plainly stated: “You will certainly die” (Genesis 2:17). Ever since, we have seen the truth of Romans 6:23, “The wages of sin is death.” But Jesus Christ had no sin (1 Peter 2:22); therefore, death had no power over Him. Jesus’ death was a voluntary sacrifice for our sin, and, given His sinless perfection, His resurrection logically followed. “I lay down my life,” Jesus said, “only to take it up again” (John 10:17).
The fact that Christ has conquered death has eternal consequences for us. The good news—the gospel—is grounded in Christ’s victory over death. Without the resurrection, there is no gospel; indeed, there is no hope for us at all: “If Christ has not been raised, your faith is futile; you are still in your sins” (1 Corinthians 15:17). But Christ has risen, and, as fellow conquerors with Him, Christians “have passed from death to life” (1 John 3:14). Christ “has destroyed death and has brought life and immortality to light through the gospel” (2 Timothy 1:10).
The fact that Christ has conquered death means that believers have also been granted victory over death. We are “more than conquerors through him who loved us” (Romans 8:37). Christ is “the firstfruits of those who have fallen asleep” (1 Corinthians 15:20), which means that Jesus’ resurrection is the first of many: believers who have “fallen asleep” (died) will be likewise resurrected. Jesus promised His followers, “Because I live, you also will live” (John 14:19).
The fact that Christ has conquered death is a fulfillment of prophecy. The psalmist predicted the Messiah would overcome death: “You will not abandon me to the realm of the dead, nor will you let your faithful one see decay” (Psalm 16:10). Other prophets filled God’s people with the hope that the Lord would one day abolish death: “He will swallow up death forever. The Sovereign LORD will wipe away the tears from all faces” (Isaiah 25:8), and “I will deliver this people from the power of the grave; I will redeem them from death. Where, O death, are your plagues? Where, O grave, is your destruction?” (Hosea 13:14; cf. 1 Corinthians 15:54–55).
Death is the devil’s most powerful, terrifying weapon against us. At the cross, Christ defeated Satan on behalf of us helpless sinners: “Now is the time for judgment on this world; now the prince of this world will be driven out” (John 12:31; cf. Colossians 2:15). With the empty tomb, Christ destroyed the devil’s most powerful weapon, death. Satan, our accuser, is now powerless to condemn Christians. We will not share his fate (Revelation 12:9–11; 20:10, 14).
When Christ conquered death for us, He removed the “sting of death,” sin (1 Corinthians 15:56)—that is, we will not be judged by God according to our sins; rather, we will stand before God robed in Christ’s own perfect righteousness. That is why believers in Christ “will not be hurt at all by the second death” (Revelation 2:11), and “the second death has no power over them” (Revelation 20:6). Christ has received our death penalty for sin and, through His death, has conquered death (Revelation 20:14).
Believers “are more than conquerors through him who loved us” (Romans 8:37). What can separate us from the love of God in Christ? “Neither death nor life” (verse 38). Christ has conquered death, and believers stand firm on Jesus’ words: “I am the resurrection and the life. He who believes in Me will live, even though he dies. And everyone who lives and believes in Me will never die” (John 11:25–26, BSB).
“Eye has not seen, nor ear heard, nor have entered into the heart of man the things which God has prepared for those who love Him.”
Speaker Johnson has released some of the January 6 tapes. From what I saw all of the tapes are from inside the Capitol building.
Apparently some 4,000 hours out of 44,000 hours are withheld.
It’s a good start, and thank you for that, but America needs them all.
And I want to see if I was targeted.
News Flash
Today, it is still the case that Joe Biden didn’t Win.
I realize that to some readers, this might be a shock; surely at some point things must change and Biden will have actually won.
But the past cannot actually be changed.
It will always and forever be the case that Joe Biden didn’t win.
And if you, Leftist Lurker, want to dismiss it as dead white cis-male logic…well, you can call it what you want, but then please just go fuck off. No one here buys that bullshit–logic is logic and facts are facts regardless of skin color–and if you gave it a moment’s rational thought, you wouldn’t either. Of course your worthless education never included being able to actually reason–or detect problems with false reasoning–so I don’t imagine you’ll actually wake up as opposed to being woke.
As Ayn Rand would sometimes point out: Yes, you are free to evade reality. What you cannot do is evade the consequences of evading reality. Or to put it concretely: You can ignore the Mack truck bearing down on you as you play in the middle of the street, you won’t be able to ignore the consequences of ignoring the Mack truck.
And Ayn Rand also pointed out that existence (i.e., the sum total of everything that exists) precedes consciousness–our consciousnesses are a part of existence, not outside of it–therefore reality cannot be a “social construct” as so many of you fucked-up-in-the-head people seem to think.
So much for Leftist douchebag lurkers. For the rest of you, the regular readers and those lurkers who understand such things: I continue to carry the banner once also carried by Wheatie. His Fraudulency didn’t win.
Let’s Go, Brandon!!
Hey China!
Or rather, “Hey Chinese Communist Party and your entire array of servitors, ass-wipers, and fellators!”
You’re not even worth my time this week. When you decide to act like civilized people, maybe I’ll give you a lesson or two in how non-barbarians behave.
Hey BiteMe! (Or, Whoever Has Their Hand Rammed Up That Putrefying Meat Puppet’s Ass)
[Language warning]
You and yours have caused a lot of injury. Literal injury with your war on people who don’t want to take an untested vaccine. When people die in an emergency room because a hospital won’t admit them because they haven’t had their clot shot, that’s a crime.
I’m going to address here the insult on top of the injury, because I am among the insulted. I still have my health but apparently you want me to live under the 8th Street Bridge (which actually isn’t on 8th Street, but whatever, that’s what the I-25 overpass over Cimarron is called), so maybe if you have your way that won’t be true for long. Dreadful time of year to become homeless.
No, you’re just trying to make me unemployed, because I won’t take your fucking shots.
Well, that threat is NOT going to work. I. Won’t. Take. Your. Fucking. Shots.
And it looks like enough people agree, that you’re having to back down, you worthless asswipe.
You’re LOSING.
You LOSER.
You Chinese-bought ratfucking traitor.
I would love to see you die an agonizing, humiliating death. (This isn’t a threat, because I am not threatening to cause that death. I am just announcing my intention to party if it happens.) It would be just recompense for the way you’re killing America…and millions of Americans.
His Fraudulency
Joe Biteme, properly styled His Fraudulency, continues to infest the White House, we haven’t heard much from the person who should have been declared the victor, and hopium is still being dispensed even as our military appears to have joined the political establishment in knuckling under to the fraud.
One can hope that all is not as it seems.
I’d love to feast on that crow.
(I’d like to add, I find it entirely plausible, even likely, that His Fraudulency is also His Figureheadedness. (Apparently that wasn’t a word; it got a red underline. Well it is now.) Where I differ with the hopium addicts is on the subject of who is really in charge. It ain’t anyone we like.)
Justice Must Be Done.
The prior election must be acknowledged as fraudulent, and steps must be taken to prosecute the fraudsters and restore integrity to the system.
Nothing else matters at this point. Talking about trying again in 2024 is hopeless otherwise. Which is not to say one must never talk about this, but rather that one must account for this in ones planning; if fixing the fraud is not part of the plan, you have no plan.
Lawyer Appeasement Section
OK now for the fine print.
This is the WQTH Daily Thread. You know the drill. There’s no Poltical correctness, but civility is a requirement. There are Important Guidelines, here, with an addendum on 20191110.
We have a new board – called The U Tree – where people can take each other to the woodshed without fear of censorship or moderation.
And remember Wheatie’s Rules:
1. No food fights 2. No running with scissors. 3. If you bring snacks, bring enough for everyone. 4. Zeroth rule of gun safety: Don’t let the government get your guns. 5. Rule one of gun safety: The gun is always loaded. 5a. If you actually want the gun to be loaded, like because you’re checking out a bump in the night, then it’s empty. 6. Rule two of gun safety: Never point the gun at anything you’re not willing to destroy. 7. Rule three: Keep your finger off the trigger until ready to fire. 8. Rule the fourth: Be sure of your target and what is behind it.
(Hmm a few extras seem to have crept in.)
Tranheuser Busch
Those asshats either get the world, all time record for obtuseness…or this is deliberate somehow. And their namby pamby non-apology that amounts to a “We’re sorry you’re too much of a knuckledragger to appreciate what we did” simply underscores the stupid. It’d be like a 400 pound golfer wearing spikes tromping on your instep and being utterly clueless why you are screaming in pain.
Me
I wrote that months ago, and they are casting about now trying to figure out how to get people to come back. However the one thing that might work (an abject admission that they were wrong to even think of doing this) is the one thing they cannot do. Because the decision makers are woke and cannot conceive that they were actually fuckheadedly wrong to do this.
Gold’s weird behavior continues. One analyst I read (an amateur) says that he finds gold’s climb this week inexplicable given the direction other related things (like the dollar index) are heading.
It’s possible, I suppose (and this is me now) that “normal” behavior is changing as people begin to contemplate that we might soon end up in a fiscal death spiral. 30 percent of all tax revenue just goes to pay the interest on the existing debt. If that number hits 100 percent, we’re in deep kimchee.
Obligatory PSAs and Reminders
China is Lower than Whale Shit
Remember Hong Kong!!!
Whoever ends up in the cell next to his, tell him I said “Hi.”
中国是个混蛋 !!! Zhōngguò shì gè hùndàn !!! China is asshoe !!!
China is in the White House
Since Wednesday, January 20 at Noon EST, the bought-and-paid for His Fraudulency Joseph Biden has been in the White House. It’s as good as having China in the Oval Office.
Joe Biden is Asshoe
China is in the White House, because Joe Biden is in the White House, and Joe Biden is identically equal to China. China is Asshoe. Therefore, Joe Biden is Asshoe.
But of course the much more important thing to realize:
Joe Biden Didn’t Win
乔*拜登没赢 !!! Qiáo Bài dēng méi yíng !!! Joe Biden didn’t win !!!
This Rejoice & Praise God Sunday Open Thread, with full respect to those who worship God on the Sabbath, is a place to reaffirm our worship of our Creator, our Father, our King Eternal.
It’s also a place to read, post, and discuss news that is worth knowing and sharing. Please post links to any news stories that you use as sources or quote from.
In the QTree, we’re a friendly and civil lot. We encourage free speech and the open exchange and civil discussion of different ideas. Topics aren’t constrained, and sound logic is highly encouraged, all built on a solid foundation of truth and established facts.
We have a policy of mutual respect, shown by civility. Civility encourages discussions, promotes objectivity and rational thought in discourse, and camaraderie in the participants – characteristics we strive toward in our Q Tree community.
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In The Q Tree, we’re compatriots, sitting around the campfire, roasting hot dogs, making s’mores, and discussing, agreeing, and disagreeing about whatever interests us. This board will remain a home for those who seek respectful conversations.
God is in Control . . . and His Grace is Sufficient, so . . . Keep Looking Up
Hopefully, every Sunday, we can find something here that will build us up a little . . . give us a smile . . . and add some joy or peace, very much needed in all our lives.
“This day is holy to the Lord your God; do not mourn nor weep.” . . . “Go your way, eat the fat, drink the sweet, and send portions to those for whom nothing is prepared; for this day is holy to our Lord. Do not sorrow, for the joy of the Lord is your strength.”
Canaanite Genocide
Now that the bloody corpses of Israeli civilians . . . seniors, mothers and fathers and their children and babies – many raped and desecrated . . . have been cleared from the dusty streets of southern Israel towns, the urgent topic of the day from expected quarters is the “disproportionate response” of the IDF, including accusations of the horror of a genocide of the inhabitants of Gaza.
God’s Word contains numerous incidents of God commanding the Children of Israel to utterly destroy a number of inhabitants of the Promised Land . . . men, women, children, babies and livestock.
The following discussion presents some rationale for such brutal actions . . . not that God’s decisions need to be supported by human logic or rationale. Nor is the following discussion presented to suggest that Israel’s actions in Gaza are commanded by God. God is obviously permitting those actions for the time being, but, although there are surely a number of people seeking God’s guidance with respect to actions in Gaza, there appears to be an absence of reports of God actually giving that specific guidance.
However, in Gaza, as in everywhere, over all time, God’s Will and Plans will be carried out without fail. It’s not for us to fully understand God’s plan or His specific actions. It falls to us to have faith in God and to trust Him in all that He does.
In Deuteronomy 20:16–17, God commanded the Israelites, “In the cities of the nations the Lord your God is giving you as an inheritance, do not leave alive anything that breathes. Completely destroy them—the Hittites, Amorites, Canaanites, Perizzites, Hivites and Jebusites—as the Lord your God has commanded you.”
A similar command is given concerning the Amalekites in 1 Samuel 15:2–3. This is what the Lord Almighty says: ‘I will punish the Amalekites for what they did to Israel when they waylaid them as they came up from Egypt. Now go, attack the Amalekites and totally destroy all that belongs to them. Do not spare them; put to death men and women, children and infants, cattle and sheep, camels and donkeys.’”
Why would God have the Israelites exterminate entire groups of people, women and children included?
Before we look at the reasons given in Scripture for the commands to exterminate certain groups of people, it’s important to realize that the Israelites were not given free rein to slaughter everyone they met. Consider the following:
• The standard procedure for battling a city was to first extend terms of peace (Deuteronomy 20:10). If the terms were accepted, the people of that city lived and became subservient to Israel (verse 11). If the terms were rejected, the city was besieged and the men were killed, but the women and children were spared (verses 12–14). Attacking a city within Canaan called for different rules and represented an exception to this standard.
• God didn’t sanction all of the wars recorded in the Old Testament. The battles that were part of the conquest of Canaan were intended for a particular time and limited to a particular people group. The conquest of Canaan had clear limits, geographically and historically.
• The wars sanctioned by God beyond the time of Joshua were defensive in nature. A number of the battles that Israel fought on the way to and within Canaan were also defensive in nature (Exodus 17:8; Numbers 21:21 –32; Deuteronomy 2:26 –37; Joshua 10:4).
Here are the reasons Scripture gives for commanding ancient Israel to annihilate certain people groups:
1. To judge the Canaanites for their abominations. The Canaanites were a brutal and wicked culture that frequently engaged in incredibly decadent behavior. Leviticus 18 provides a list of sins that Israel was to avoid at all costs: incest, child sacrifice, homosexuality, and bestiality. All these sins were practiced by the people of Canaan: “This is how the nations that I am going to drive out before you became defiled. Even the land was defiled; so I punished it for its sin, and the land vomited out its inhabitants. . . . All these things were done by the people who lived in the land before you, and the land became defiled” (Leviticus 18:24–27).
In ordering the destruction of the Canaanites, God enacted a form of corporate capital punishment on a people that had been deserving of God’s judgment for some time. God had given the Canaanite people over 400 years to repent (Genesis 15:13–16). Then came judgment day. God could have used any means to destroy the Canaanites, but He chose to use the Israelites as the instrument of judgment. This method not only rid the world of an evil and deeply depraved society, but it also provided a ready-made home for God’s chosen people, the Hebrews.
The Canaanites knew what was coming and had heard of God’s awesome power (Joshua 2:10–11; 9:9). Such awareness should have prompted their repentance, but they remained resistant to God. The Canaanite Rahab was saved, and so was her family, and they are proof that the Canaanites could have avoided destruction if they had repented (Joshua 2). No person had to die. God’s desire is that the wicked turn from their sin rather than perish (Ezekiel 18:31–32; 33:11).
2. To stave off idolatry and compromise. In Deuteronomy 20, immediately after God commanded that the Canaanites be completely wiped out, God gave the reason: “Otherwise, they will teach you to follow all the detestable things they do in worshiping their gods, and you will sin against the Lord your God” (Deuteronomy 20:18). The reason for the extermination was to prevent religious compromise and spiritual adultery: if the Israelites left survivors, the sin of idolatry would follow.
The Israelites failed in their mission and left many Canaanites alive (Joshua 16:10; 17:12–13; Judges 1:29). Exactly what God said would happen occurred. Israel compromised with Canaanite culture and fell into idolatry time and again (Judges 2:1–3; 1 Kings 11:5; 14:24; 2 Kings 16:3–4). God’s order to exterminate the Canaanites was meant to guard His relationship with His people.
3. To prevent future problems. God knows the future. God knew what the results would be if Israel did not completely eradicate their enemies. The Amalekites were not Canaanites, but they attacked Israel several times and forged alliances with the Canaanites (Exodus 17:8–13; Numbers 14:45; Judges 3:13; 6:3), so they also fell under God’s judgment. King Saul was given the responsibility to exterminate the Amalekites (1 Samuel 15:2–3). Saul shirked his duty and lied about it (1 Samuel 15:20). The results were dire—just a couple of decades later, there were enough Amalekites to take David and his men’s families captive (1 Samuel 30:1–2). Several hundred years after that, a descendant of the Amalekites, Haman, tried to have the entire Jewish people exterminated (see the book of Esther). So, Saul’s incomplete obedience almost resulted in Israel’s destruction. If Saul had obeyed the voice of the Lord, it would have saved David’s men and the Jews of Esther’s day a lot of trouble.
4. To fulfil the curse on Canaan. Centuries before Moses’ command to eradicate the Canaanites, Noah had cursed one of Ham’s sons: “Cursed be Canaan! The lowest of slaves will he be to his brothers” (Genesis 9:25). Canaan was the ancestor of the Canaanites, as Genesis 10 makes clear. The descendants of Canaan include the Sidonians, the Hittites, the Jebusites, the Amorites, and the inhabitants of Sodom and Gomorrah (Genesis 10:15–19). Noah’s curse/prophecy came true during the time of Joshua. The Canaanites were conquered by the Israelites, who were descendants of one of Ham’s brothers, Shem. Not all of the Canaanites were exterminated; true to God’s Word, some of the Canaanites became slaves (Joshua 9:27; 17:12–13).
The most difficult part of the command of Deuteronomy 20:16–17 is that, when the Canaanites were exterminated, women and children were not spared. Why would God order the death of noncombatants and innocent children? Here are some things to remember:
⁍ No one is “innocent” in the sense of being sinless (Psalm 51:5; 58:3).
⁍ These women were participants in the degrading sins of Canaan, and the children would have grown up sympathetic to the evil religions and practices of their parents.
⁍ These women and, eventually, the children would naturally have been resentful of the Israelites and later sought to avenge the “unjust” treatment the Canaanite men had received.
Another perspective we should consider is the divine. We cannot know the mind of God or comprehend the depths of His wisdom (Isaiah 55:8–9). But we can know that, given this depravity, God’s command to kill children and babies might have been an act of divine mercy. In His perfect knowledge—including His knowledge of what would happen in the lives of those young people, had they lived—it’s possible that God brought them to Himself before they had the opportunity of choosing to reject Him. It’s highly possible that, had these young people grown to maturity, they would have embraced the wanton rebellion and idolatry of their forefathers. From God’s perspective, it may have been better for them to die at a young age than to endure a life of depravity and the attending temporal (and eternal) consequences.
In the end, God is sovereign over all of life, and He can take it whenever and however He sees fit. God alone can give life, and God alone has the right to take it. God is under no obligation to extend anyone’s life for even another day. How and when we die is completely up to Him. In the case of the Canaanites, their end came after a time of tolerance and patient grace. But Judgment Day finally comes to all, and it came to the Canaanites via the Hebrew people.
The DemonRat Commies plans just became clear as I wrote this comment! It explains John Kerry’s travels and consultation with Iran during the Trump Admin. and so much more. I am going to flesh it out into an article.
The DemonRats were ALWAYS PLANNING ON USING TERRORISTS TO DESTROY THE USA and the plans were laid Years ago.
THAT is why Obama shipped the cargo planes of cash to Iran.
That is why the BILLIONS of $$$ and Arms sent to Ukraine have gone missing. That is why the Arms were left in Afghanistan.
It was NEVER BUMBLING. It was STOCKPILING the money and weapons needed to INVADE THE USA over our open borders, disguised as illegal immigration!
We tend to ignore John Kerry but I think we do so at our peril. On 2013-02-01 John Kerry succeeded Hillary Clinton as Obama’s US Secretary of State. Kerry was a former Chairman of the powerful Senate Foreign Relations Committee.
Here are some articles about Kerry and the rest of the players in no particular order.
The Biden-Ukraine or Biden-Burisma scandal involves prominent members of the Obama administration, the DNC, and the Clinton campaign. Vice President Joe Biden publicly admitted that he had threatened Ukrainian leaders to withhold $1 billion in U.S. aid unless they fired a prosecutor who was looking into a money laundering operation for which the Biden Family, thru Hunter Biden (right) received $50,000 a month in kickbacks.[10][11] …
New reports from OANN indicate that Biden’s son Hunter is not alone in corruption related to oil companies in Ukraine. Nancy Pelosi’s son Paul Pelosi Jr. has had business dealings with Viscoil, and those videos are being systematically removed from YouTube to prevent further investigation….
Hunter Biden, Joe Biden’s son, and Christopher Heinz, John Kerry stepson, formed Rosemont Seneca Partners, a private equity firm in 2009 with their friend, Devon Archer. …
U.S. banking records show Hunter Biden’s American-based firm, Rosemont Seneca Partners LLC, received regular transfers into one of its accounts — usually more than $166,000 a month — from Burisma from spring 2014 through fall 2015, during a period when Vice President Biden was the main U.S. official dealing with Ukraine and its tense relations with Russia. Vice President Joe Biden threatens Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko that the Obama administration would pull $1 billion in U.S. loan guarantees, sending the former Soviet republic toward insolvency, if it didn’t immediately fire Prosecutor General Viktor Shokin who was investigating his son, Hunter Biden, on the board of the Ukrainian oil and gas company Burisma Holdings….
This is the Algerian Strategy on full display AND Biden’s Admin is busy importing more people to terrorize us into submission.
I found Wictor’s archived version. (Feb 7, 2020) It does not hurt to have another copy:
In reading this twitter thread it becomes OBVIOUS that the HAMAS – Israel mess WAS VERY MUCH PLANNED AS ANOTHER EXCUSE TO SET OFF A ROUND OF TERRORIST ATTACKS IN THE USA. Only this time it will be multiple attacks on many of our major cities.
Want a reason to ‘postpone the elections in 2024? How about rampant country wide terrorism.
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
[QUOTE]
A couple of days ago I wrote that the Democrats are implementing the Algerian Strategy in the United States.
@SpeakerPelosi tore up the State of the Union address to signal that she’s on board with the Algerian Strategy.
During the Algerian Civil War of 1991-2002, the Algerian government helped the Armed Islamic Group or GIA (Groupe Islamique Armé), the most violent terrorists in human history.
The GIA’s motto was “No agreement, no truce, no dialogue.”
All they did was mass murder civilians in night raids. They cut the throats of entire villages and dumped them into wells.
What the GIA wanted was preemptive nationwide surrender.
The government helped the GIA for almost eleven years, until the Algerian populace agreed to support the government.
Only then did the government take on and destroy the GIA.
The Democrats are doing the same thing here.
All over the country, the most violent criminals are being released.
Violent felonies such as killing a police officer while resisting arrest are being decriminalized.
Cash bail is being abolished.
Incarceration itself is on the verge of being abolished.
I said that the Democrats are even IMPORTING violent criminals.
During the Algerian Civil War of 1991-2002, the Algerian government helped the Armed Islamic Group or GIA (Groupe Islamique Armé), the most violent terrorists in human history.
The GIA’s motto was “No agreement, no truce, no dialogue.”
All they did was mass murder civilians in night raids. They cut the throats of entire villages and dumped them into wells.
What the GIA wanted was preemptive nationwide surrender.
The government helped the GIA for almost eleven years, until the Algerian populace agreed to support the government.
Only then did the government take on and destroy the GIA.
👉The Democrats are doing the same thing here.
All over the country, the most violent criminals are being released.
Violent felonies such as killing a police officer while resisting arrest are being decriminalized.
Cash bail is being abolished.
Incarceration itself is on the verge of being abolished.
I said that the Democrats are even IMPORTING violent criminals.
And now we have the proof.
H. R. 5383. The New Way Forward Act.
It not only abolishes any form of punishment for illegal-alien criminals, it forces the government to REPATRIATE criminals we deported.
The bill is over 4000 pages long.
I’ll just post the titles.
TITLE I—End Mandatory Detention and Require Probable Cause for Arrest
SEC. 101. Phase-out of private for-profit detention facilities and use of jails.
SEC. 201. Time for commencing removal proceedings.
(After an illegal is ordered deported, release them, and if they evade custody for five years, the deportation order expires. Even for murderers.)
TITLE III—Limit Criminal-System-to-Removal Pipeline
SEC. 301. Criminal offenses and immigration laws.
(Eliminate aggravated felonies as a reason for deportation.)
TITLE IV—Restore Judicial Discretion and End Removal Without Due Process
SEC. 401. Immigration procedural changes.
(Give immigration judges the power to vacate all deportation orders, regardless of the conviction.)
TITLE V—Prohibition against Performance of Immigration Officer Functions by State and Local Officers and Employees
SEC. 501. Local enforcement.
(Make it a federal crime for state, county, and local law enforcement to cooperate with federal immigration authorities.)
TITLE VI—Decriminalize Migration
SEC. 601. Repealing migration criminal laws.
(Abolish all American immigration laws. Eliminate the borders.)
SEC. 701. Reconsidering and reopening immigration cases.
(Force the federal government to transport previously deported illegal aliens back to the United States.)
The New Way Forward Act will make it impossible to prevent illegal immigration, impossible to incarcerate illegal-alien criminals, and impossible to deport anybody for any reason.
This is the first nationwide attempt to implement the Algerian Strategy.
