Societal Decay – Page 8

Surprise: Boy Scouts of America File Bankruptcy

The Sith Lord–who is a certified Eagle Scout from back in the days when boys aspired to be men—and the rest of us that remember when BSA was America’s premier organization for young boys are not surprised that the Scouts have filed for bankruptcy.

The Scouts’ membership has cratered since it abdicated its founding values to become politically correct. BSA’s corporate leadership can’t admit their recent foray into social engineering is related to their current woes so instead they are saying that the reason for their problems is litigation for sexual abuse claims. Talk about liberals accusing other of what they do!

BSA trashed all moral rules of conduct and turned the Scouts into a safe haven for sexual deviants of all types to prey upon shall children and then blames the heterosexuals for their woes. Talk about irony.

Participation in the organization’s programs has fallen in recent years, though the group opened some of its programs to girls and transgender boys. The Boy Scouts currently have more than 2.3 million youth members. The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, formerly one of the group’s largest sponsors, has said it will withdraw from Boy Scout programs. The church said it would develop its own program for young men.

The Boy Scouts group has drawn scrutiny over its slow pace to become more inclusive, including by lifting a ban in 2015 on gay men and lesbians serving in leadership roles.

The group has also dealt with fallout from its decision last year to expand its recruitment of girls, putting it in competition with the Girl Scouts of the USA, a separate group that offer ssimilar programming and has also seen membership fall.
Boy Scouts of America Considers Bankruptcy Filing Amid Sex-Abuse Lawsuits

This story is spin at its best. Membership fell because BSA allowed these other groups in. Sure many youth pursue sports over Scouting butthings have cratered not just in membership but financial support as well.Please note that the article makes no mention of declining financial support. Also no mention is made of rural verses urban membership in Scouts.

Like the Liberal churches that have abandoned Christianity—Episcopal, Methodist, Lutheran, etc.— surviving on trusts left to the Church back when they were faithful to their values, BSA is in the same boat. They have vast assets deeded to them when they stood for traditional America and Judeo-Christian values. Scouts could not continue to exist without the generosity of past generations.

Liberals want to control the things that they hate and if they can’t control them then kill them. In this case they have done both. They killed Scouting as it was and replaced it with something else. Sadly the only thing that was allowed to survive is the name. It is only a matter of time before Boy Scouts of America is relegated to the dung heap of Liberal victories in their war against Western Culture.

Addendum: In a rare public appearance, the Sith Lord has the following observation concerning the Scouts:

Here is an interesting statistic, of the reported 2.3 million Boy Scouts today, a third are registered to LDS chartered units leaving the BSA at the end of 2019 for their own newly created LDS program.

Additionally, I checked out the websites of the two BSA councils that I have been a member and found something interesting. There has been a significant reduction in the number of Boy Scout camps listed. The BSA councils have closed several summer camps that were leased from the National Forest Service and have sold other camps and properties. Some of these facilities have been used by the BSA for over 75 years.

God, Europe, and Law

Last week while we were all distracted by the fake bombs sent via snail mail to various Democrat leaders, other things more significant were afoot elsewhere in the world.

Blasphemy is defined as “the act of insulting or showing contempt or lack of reverence for God”

It is part of the Ten Commandments. “Thou shalt not take the name of the Lord thy God in vain; for the Lord will not hold him guiltless that taketh his name in vain.” Exodus 20:7

There is a little known movie about a man that is transported from 1890 to the present (ok 2002) and is shocked at what he sees. On the one hand, marvels of technology and on the other the decay in societal values. At one point he goes into a movie theater and hears God’s name used in vain. Shocked he runs out and complains to the first theater employee that he encounters. The guy selling soda and popcorn looks at him with a blank stare trying to figure out first what using the Lord’s name in vain even means and secondly why this guy is upset when people talk like that all the time.

Time Changer (2002)

The Irish constitution’s preamble still begins “in the Name of the Most Holy Trinity” and acknowledges “all our obligations to our Divine Lord, Jesus Christ, Who sustained our fathers through centuries of trial.” Its text continues to read “the State acknowledges that the homage of public worship is due to Almighty God. It shall hold His Name in reverence, and shall respect and honor religion.”

While 20th century Ireland was a strongly Catholic society where lay political leaders implemented Catholic faith and morals as they perceived them, sometimes in close cooperation with Church leaders and other Catholic institutions, in recent decades the country has secularized.

While Ireland has higher Mass attendance rates than many traditionally Catholic countries in Europe, vocation numbers have plummeted and self-identified Catholics have dropped to 78 percent, according to the 2016 census, and almost one in ten now identify as having no religion.

The secularizing changes are attributed to scandals involving clergy sex abuse, other abuse in other Catholic-run institutions, as well as increasing affluence and influence from international corporations and NGOs.

Ireland’s long-standing pro-life constitutional protections were repealed in a May 2018 vote with over 66 percent voting in favor. In May 2015 Ireland became the first country to implement gay marriage by a popular vote, with 62 percent of voters backing the change.

Ireland is one of 71 countries where blasphemy is illegal.

Irish voters remove blasphemy punishment from constitution

After this weekend, now blasphemy is illegal in 70 countries because Ireland voted overwhelmingly to drop the prohibition from their constitution.

DUBLIN, Ireland – Exit polls indicated Irish voters were expected to repeal the Republic of Ireland’s constitutional prohibition against blasphemy, with close to 70 percent of voters backing the change in a Friday vote, the Irish Times has reported.

Catholic bishops did not put forward a defense of the law, though one Muslim leader spoke in its favor.

“The publication or utterance of blasphemous, seditious, or indecent matter is an offence which shall be punishable in accordance with law,” said the constitutional passage in question, which dates back to 1937.

As passed, the referendum would remove blasphemy from this list of offenses, and allow the Irish parliament to change laws penalizing blasphemy.

This continues a trend that Europe is moving away from any pretense of holding to its very deep rooted Christianity. However, this is not the end of blasphemy news last week. While Christianity has been further diminished, Islam has been elevated throughout the European Union by the European Court of Human Rights.

Europe’s ever-steady march towards illiberal, totalitarian nonsense continues apace. The European Court of Human Rights ruled this week that defaming the Prophet Muhammad is not protected speech. More specifically, the court said an “Austrian woman’s conviction for calling the prophet of Islam a pedophile didn’t breach her freedom of speech,” the Associated Press reported.

The ECHR explained in its ruling that Austrian courts had “carefully balanced her right to freedom of expression with the right of others to have their religious feelings protected.” The woman explained in 2009 during a seminar discussion that the Prophet Muhammad’s marriage to a six-year-old girl was basically “pedophilia.”

“A 56-year-old and a 6-year-old? What do you call that? Give me an example? What do we call it, if it is not pedophilia?” she said.

The woman was charged and convicted by a Vienna court in 2011 of “disparaging religious doctrines.” The woman was ordered to pay a $547 fine, plus costs, the AP notes. An Austrian appeals court upheld the 2011 ruling.

On Thursday, the ECHR explained in its ruling that the Austrian court’s decision “served the legitimate aim of preserving religious peace.”

The seven-judge panel also argued in its ruling that there’s a difference between child marriage and pedophilia:

[B]y accusing Muhammad of paedophilia, the applicant had merely sought to defame him, without providing evidence that his primary sexual interest in Aisha had been her not yet having reached puberty or that his other wives or concubines had been similarly young. In particular, the applicant had disregarded the fact that the marriage with Aisha had continued until the Prophet’s death, when she had already turned eighteen and had therefore passed the age of puberty.

European Court of Human Rights: Sorry, Charlie Hebdo, but you had it coming

The recent ruling by the European Court of Human Rights (henceforth ‘the Court’), upholding Austria’s decision to charge somebody for insulting Islam, poses an interesting quandary to its regular critics.

On the one hand, it has upheld what a great many liberals and conservatives alike consider to be an absurdly restrictive judgement. It may not (quite, yet) have imposed an Europe-wide blasphemy law, as sometimes suggested, but it has upheld Austria’s.

But on the other, those whose overweening concern is with democratic accountability and national sovereignty, and therefore oppose the imposition of law by a transnational judiciary, cannot without great care demand that the Court ought to strike down Austria’s laws when we don’t like them.

Moreover, Scott argues that the Court is actually suggesting – at a time when blasphemy legislation is falling across the continent, most recently in Ireland – that signatories of the Charter have a duty to “criminalise “improper and abusive attacks” on objects of veneration”.

But in justifying their ruling the judges appear, if I read Scott’s analysis correctly, to be setting precedents which could well lead to impositions on other nations at a later date. If it becomes established that religious persons have a right not to be offended, it will fall on other states to uphold that right. Where Austria leads, other may have to follow.

Of course, Theresa May has backed away from her earlier enthusiasm for withdrawing from the authority of the European Court of Human Rights. But incidents such as this, where rights law starts metastasising and threatening to impose fresh obligations on democratic governments without any popular mandate, remind us why our relationship with it is something which future, post-Brexit governments may need to revisit.

The European Court of Human Rights has set a problematic precedent on religious freedom

Given the above events, when in Europe, you can blaspheme Jesus all you wish but to treat Mohammed the same way is to incur the wrath of the secular elites. Sadly, Mark Stein is vindicated once again in his prediction that it is an actuarial certainty that Europe will be Islamic in a few short decades.

To quote to pop song of a few decades ago,

All in all it’s just another brick in the wall.

— Pink Floyd 1979

Trump Administration to Base Gender on Biology

Why is this even a headline? Because in a world where common sense is not common, people are dumb. The New York Times wrote this yesterday:

Now the Department of Health and Human Services is spearheading an effort to establish a legal definition of sex under Title IX, the federal civil rights law that bans gender discrimination in education programs that receive government financial assistance, according to a memo obtained by The New York Times.

The department argued in its memo that key government agencies needed to adopt an explicit and uniform definition of gender as determined “on a biological basis that is clear, grounded in science, objective and administrable.” The agency’s proposed definition would define sex as either male or female, unchangeable, and determined by the genitals that a person is born with, according to a draft reviewed by The Times. Any dispute about one’s sex would have to be clarified using genetic testing.

“Sex means a person’s status as male or female based on immutable biological traits identifiable by or before birth,” the department proposed in the memo, which was drafted and has been circulating since last spring. “The sex listed on a person’s birth certificate, as originally issued, shall constitute definitive proof of a person’s sex unless rebutted by reliable genetic evidence.”

‘Transgender’ Could Be Defined Out of Existence Under Trump Administration

Thank God Trump is President.

Those of you that disagree with the above policy have a problem with God not Donald J Trump. Oh, and just so you know, God made you and is the same yesterday, today, and forever so He won’t be changing His mind just because you don’t like it.

Saturday Quick Hits

The Blog Father okayed overtime for The Chief, mostly because he needs more money to support his family. Here are some quick hitters in the news from the past 24 hours:

The Las Vegas/Oakland/Reno/Henderson/Los Angeles well anyway the Raiders traded their only good player on defense for a couple first round picks. How did the last time you traded for two first round picks end up? Oh wait… The Chief’s favorite team the Buccaneers beat you in the Super Bowl…so betting advice, take “Da Bears” to win it all. Glad you guys are paying coach Jon Gruden like a billion million dollars over 10 years man….because you traded your only defensive player that could play for like nothing man. Why am I saying man, all the time man? Because that’s how Gruden talks man. Also you guys y=traded for AJ McCarron man…he’s got a hot wife according to Brent Musberger man…….he even ogled her during the national championship game man! Rumor has it you cut back-up quarterback Connor Cook because he never understood the only play in the Gruden playbook of “spider 2 Y banana.” I should probably say man….man. In reality I heard McCarron can inhale a 50 piece at Hooters in about 4.42 seconds ….man!

By the way Mark Davis still looks like Jon Gruden microwaved leftovers…..man!

In addition I heard the Oakland/Vegas Raiders cut weed aficionado Martavis Bryant, rumors leaked to “The Chief” say he failed another drug test…personally I would blame it on the CA wildfires….man! Or maybe because you are in Oakland, blame it on second hand weed….man!

In other non-sports news…we have William Jefferson Clinton….experiencing high levels of excitement!

Clinton; spotted sans Hillary (which is normal for him, when excited)…and again we aren’t sure they have slept in the same bed more than once btw!

Wow…Bill I’ve gotta hand it to you, not needing to pull a Bob Dole, you are always game for a cute chick.

Hopefully you “enjoyed” Ariana Grande….or were you jealous of this move made by a bishop?

Note Jesse Jackson on the left in this photo

Anyway enjoy these photos folks.

“The Chief”

Editor Note: I did get this on Saturday but was out of town when The Chief sent it; thus it wasn’t posted until Sunday.

Catholics Demand Pope Resign

The Catholic Church is suffering from a self-inflicted wound that it can’t cure. The peasants with pitchforks appear to have had enough. Here is one proposed solution.

The sex abuse scandal and its cover-up within the Catholic Church require solutions that the institutional Church will be incapable of achieving on its own.

But the more serious problem is that since Vatican II the Church has been AWOL on Biblically based Christian moral issues affecting the core family and its relationship to God. From marriage, divorce, same-sex relations, sex outside marriage, and the love respect between men and women according to God’s laws, the Church has abandoned its role of moral teacher and spiritual guide telling people where the ‘guardrails’ are.

The Church’s abandonment of focus on the central and natural institution of the family has been accentuated by Pope Francis’ attention to socialist, earthly issues. His progressive politics-overfamily approach is a symptom of the larger problems within the Church and its hierarchy.

No institution that is sick can cure itself, and the Catholic Church is grievously ill. Like any patient, the institutional Church must be a willing participant in the cure. But it will be up to the Catholic laity to administer the necessary fixes.

We join others who have already made the call for Pope Francis to resign, and ask you to do the same by clicking and signing this petition, which will be widely circulated to thousands of Catholic leaders including clergy, laity, and the media. While the Pope’s failures have been many, the flashpoint may be that he chose to ignore the warning issued by Apostolic Nuncio Carlo Maria Viganò about the pattern of sexual abuse under Archbishop McCarrick of Washington, D.C. Pope Benedict had demoted McCarrick. Ignoring the warning, Pope Francis chose to promote and insulate McCarrick, leaving the inescapable conclusion that the current Pope’s resignation is the only acceptable beginning of both the legal and spiritual remedies.

Pope Francis: Resign, and Let Pope Benedict Return from Retirement

Government Regulations Gone Wild

Regulations come in many shapes and sizes and from every state in the Union, red states included; however, today I want to take a closer look at the devastating effects these regulations have on businesses.

Let’s take New York City’s famous, 32 oz. soda ban for example. With the stroke of a pen, if you owned a convenience store, you had to immediately remove any cups over 32 oz. from your store effective immediately. In addition to being a small business owner or franchisee, you are now an officer of the City Council. As such, it is your job (via your employees) to see to it no customer purchases a soda over 32 oz. Failure to adhere to this law will result in severe monetary penalties, potential jail time, and probably could lead to you losing your franchise. Government entities know no bounds these days. Never mind the fact you could still buy multiple quantities of 28 oz. drinks and still be in compliance. So much for banning large quantities of soda for human consumption. Also why just ban soda? Have you seen the ingredients list of a bottle of Sunny Delight? Or even some Iced Tea varieties? Those can have as much or more sugar then soda…..yet because orange juice and ice tea seem to be “healthy” they are spared the hammer from Big Government. This type of lunacy encourages folks to work for the government rather than in the private sector. Image having to run a business with all the heartache that causes, but now you must police your clientele and see to it they aren’t drinking too much soda.

The next example takes us to Soviet California where legislators (notice I didn’t just say Democrats, the GOP is complicit as well) devised a ban on single use plastic bags, like the ones you can get at a grocery store. Never minding the fact the company that produced those bags is located in California, they went ahead and banned anyway. So I guess they want to literally ban entire companies from doing business even in the state they call home. The ban passed at the ballot box with just token opposition. Now as a result we have ugly multiple use bags and paper bags that cost $.10 apiece. No one the Blog Father is aware of (I left California a while ago) actually remembers to bring these bags to the store with them which yields additional “revenue” for the stores.

Editor’s note: Grocery stores agreed to join environmentalists to support the ban as long as they got to keep the ten cents per bag and not give it to the State.

Despite efforts by the plastic bag companies, retailers will keep revenue from sales of alternative bags to cover the costs of complying with the ban, as outlined in Proposition 67.

Californians say farewell to the plastic bag

This ban was deemed necessary due to the quantities of these bags that ended up in your “lakes, rivers, streams, and alongside roadways” I call BS on this as I believe this was done simply to make life more difficult on smaller grocery chains and due to the fact the old bags were not biodegradable. I claim it affects the smaller stores the most due to the fact that they now have to renegotiate a contract with a supplier or terminate the agreement and find a new supplier, this is not easy. While a large chain like Wal-Mart, Safeway etc. would not find this very cumbersome. They are systematically killing business in California and this is just another nail in that coffin. Don’t be misled, this is a direct attack on private workers, the goal of the dictator Gavin Newsom is to eliminate all private sector jobs and replace them with government jobs. (Or at the very least government wants to control the means of production including picking winners and losers in the economy.) Get mad at me and don’t believe me if you will but while you are mad, they are taking away your rights and retirement plans! Yes, they are coming for your 401K’s very soon. The State wants to control every aspect of your life from conception to cremation.

Now let’s take a look at all the states that continuously want to raise the minimum wage for workers. This has led to automation. It’s no small error that in Arizona many McDonald’s fast food restaurants are fully automated now, with only 1 or 2 workers in the store. This has led to a full on automation craze that is killing entry level jobs and summer temporary jobs. The hallmark of a fast food or quick service business is to offer food and beverages as cheaply and quickly as possible. Paying every worker $15 an hour (plus government required benefits) no longer plays to the “cheap” aspect of the business so innovators decided they would create a machine to automatically cook in the kitchen and a kiosk to take your order. Again if you do not believe me that’s ok, but remember the TV commercials advertising a dollar menu? The same commercials I see now feature 5 dollar boxes. This is no coincidence. Can you blame the business owner?

Strangely I feel this is the end game politicians want. They want people working for the government, and they want you comfortable in poverty, as well as be able to control every facet of your life. For example why must a child ride in a car seat until the age of 8? Do we not trust a parent’s ability to simply fasten a seat belt across said child’s lap? Why can’t a child order a soda if they want? We live in the most innovative country on the planet so why is it that a single use bag could not be replaced with a compostable one? Ditto on the new crazy—not being able to ask for a straw law recently enacted.

In summary the nanny state has failed us in several ways, first by banning certain things from our lives; incandescent light bulbs, plastic bags, straws, and soda being just the latest. In some cases these laws actually contradict each other, for example why not just buy two 20 oz. sodas? They banned the Big Gulp but not the smaller gulp. Didn’t California go through a rough drought a couple years ago, I thought they banned water from restaurants unless it was specifically asked for? Now they only want to offer water and milk to a child when they can just go back home and drink all the soda they want? So it’s okay for a child to order an entrée containing 2,000 calories but a soda is not okay? Don’t really get the logic there. By the way I am a supporter of calorie counts existing on a menu as it gives you the chance to re-think your options, not take it away. Regarding those plastic bags, I have heard it from multiple people that take-out places, Home Depot as well as a few other big box retailers still use the single use bags. I guess the rule applies only to evil grocery stores, not everyone else.

Riddle me this: one California law says no water at restaurants while another says only water can be offered

Finally I want to discuss some aspects of our lives that could use regulation, but never will be. I want to give two very concrete examples; tanning beds and smoking. Let’s start with tanning beds, they offer little benefit in the health benefit category, actually zero, and can result in skin cancer issues later in life. Perhaps there is not enough public ire to make politicians act but for health reasons alone tanning beds should be banned. Cigarettes also have zero health benefit, worse yet it is well known they cause cancer and will kill you eventually. Not to mention the fact they litter our streets far more than single use plastic bags and expose people around you to harmful second hand smoke. The reason for this is obvious…tax revenue. Almost 70% of the cost to purchasing cigarettes goes towards taxes, state, local etc. These are two very easy things that could be regulated, but the power of the almighty dollar wins out. Isn’t the real reason pot is legal is to get more tax revenue?

How about this doppelganger of political schizophrenia; the same state that brought you the plastic bag ban and the outlawing of straws, was considering a bill that would keep bars open and serving alcohol until 4 am, thankfully this bill didn’t pass. It is ironic, they want to keep the streets and lakes free of bags and prohibit children from ordering sodas, because, soda causes diabetes, but simultaneously, they want to allow you to hit the bars until 4. So I guess they are okay with you drenching your sorrows and then risking killing yourself or someone else driving home under the influence; but then again, I get it, once again, it’s about government revenue.

PS If no girl’s ugly after 2 AM, what purpose does 4 AM serve?

Christian College Assault Continues

I told you this is coming and here it is. Canada is a few years ahead of California in its moral decline and attacks on
Christianity—although we will pass them up soon.

I have said that the moral stands of Christians will either have to be done away with or that Christian Colleges will not
be allowed money for loans and graduates will not be allowed government jobs. In Canada, they are starting with a key
part of the government education system of denying accreditation if you don’t comply. Please note this has nothing to
do with academic standards or quality of education. This is a bald faced attack on religious freedom.

A Christian university in Canada has decided to eliminate its code of behavior – which had been mandatory – for students after a court ruling that a law society could deny its law-school membership because of the “discrimination” against LGBT students.

The Supreme Court of Canada, in a pair of 7-2 rulings, recent concluded that the law societies of British Columbia and Ontario could refuse accreditation to Trinity Western University’s planned law school because of the community covenant.

As a Christian institution, Trinity Western required students and faculty to abide by biblical boundaries on sexual behavior. The covenant also requires students to abstain from, among other things, fornication, obscene language, harassment, lying, stealing, pornography and drunkenness.

But now the board of governors has reviewed the situation, and issued the following conclusion:

“In furtherance of our desire to maintain TWU as a thriving community of Christian believers that is inclusive of all students wishing to learn from a Christian viewpoint and underlying philosophy, the Community Covenant will no longer be mandatory as of the 2018-19 academic year with respect to admission of students to, or continuation of students at, the university.”

Go ahead, fornicate: Christian college drops morality code

And be not conformed to this world: but be ye transformed by the renewing of your mind, that ye may prove what is that good, and acceptable, and perfect, will of God.
Paul of Tarsus letter to Romans ~55 AD

In the same vein of attaching Western Culture (Christianity), the state of California is considering purging all laws and regulations of gender pronouns referencing male and female because they offend folks that embrace morally deviant sexual preferences.

URL at KFBK Radio

Trump’s Opportunity in Chicago

Chicago has been in the news quite a bit lately, for all the wrong reasons. There has never been a better chance for the Republicans to make a difference and their voice and message heard in the inner cities of this country. By making a difference I don’t mean blow fire breathing right wing rhetoric at them, I want us to lay out how the Democrats have literally enslaved them once again.

First a little background, Chicago has been the homicide capital of the United States for about 5 years running, more disturbing is the lack of arrests for said homicides. This goes hand in hand with the culture of “not snitching” so as a result, murderers and gangs are free to continue roaming the streets. Some neighborhoods on the south and west sides of the city could actually be declared war zones since killings and drug abuse so rampant. Keep in mind on the rare chance authorities catch the perp that an illegal weapon is usually found on them such as: a tommy gun, sawed off shotgun, grenade, brass knuckles etc. Keep in mind again, Illinois has some of the toughest gun laws, maybe we should enforce the current laws on the book rather than passing more restrictive ones on its citizens? Frankly if I was in Chicago I would open carry a weapon just to serve as a deterrent.

The heart of the issue:
Many who live in the inner cities of this country feel hopeless, stuck in bad neighborhoods. Most grew up in societies with no father figure in their life. As a direct result they found their father figures by joining a local gang. Schools in the inner city are horrible, this is due to school funding rules; however, there is a lack of a charter school as an option as well, again due to teacher unions. Dropout rates are staggering which shouldn’t be a surprise when you are subjected to teachers “transferred from other schools in the district” with their own issues. This creates a horrible cycle of poverty (due to not being qualified to land a job) anger at police (due to being arrested) and anger toward “the system” (for your current situation). In most cases they are right; they are forgotten and left behind by society, they are stuck with decrepit housing, zero police protection (who wants to go there now, especially with the BLM protests) horrible schools, and no businesses meaning no job opportunities. Their local “elected officials” I say this because they don’t really get a choice, tell them life isn’t bad, and have engrained in their minds government is the solution. Out of work? Get on unemployment. Have a child out of wedlock? Get on WIC or EBT. More kids = more $$$. The reason for you being in your current state is due to GOP policies! Keep voting straight ticket Democrat and your situation will improve.

The solution:
A few very intriguing things happened over the past month. Chicagoans from the inner city shut down the Dan Ryan Expressway (a huge commuter route) calling for the resignation of Mayor Rahm (Rambo, Dead Fish) Emanuel, and police chief Eddie Johnson. Emanuel is Hispanic, Johnson is black by the way. I disagree on Johnson, I think he is more than qualified to turn around the city, Emanuel can pound sand, he is literally the Mariam Webster definition of incompetence! Interestingly enough many protestors interviewed want Donald Trump to come there and step in! Yes, you read that right, they want the federal government to take over. Some even went as far as saying bring in the National Guard, as the situation has spiraled so far out of control. No media group will report the percentage of the black or Hispanic vote Trump won during his election, but I bet it far exceeded any other GOP nominee. Trump gets things done, the folks are noticing this. Chicagoans like many other inner-city dwellers are tired of the gangs, shootings and bad schools, this presents a great opportunity. Rather than the usual GOP hot takes like; MLK was a Republican, or Lincoln freed the slaves, speak directly to them, they are a receptive audience. Harken back to California’s Prop 8 vote in 2008 while Barack Obama won in a landslide Prop 8 passed, mostly due to heavy “yes” voting by both blacks and Hispanics. I would lead with over saturation of police patrols, drive the crime out of the area, and as a direct result people will feel safer, and more hopeful. Address the school choice issue; bring in more charter schools, or allow a voucher program, the real bully in the school choice issue is the teachers union. They protect the incompetent at the expense of the good teachers. While fixing the broken home issue is not easy, neighborhoods being safer and turning around local school choice could play a role.

The people have spoken they want “The Donald” to come to inner city Chicago. Don’t misread this, they don’t want GOP fire breather Donald Trump they want negotiator Donald Trump. Bring in the National Guard, change up the school funding, and get rid of the bad teachers (which is likely all of them) and watch the re-vitalization.

They pull a knife, you pull a gun. He sends one of yours to the hospital, you send one of his to the morgue. That’s the Chicago way!

The Untouchables (1987)

PS do not be scared, downtown Chicago is beautiful and immaculate as well as free from homeless. The bad areas are on the south side and west side which there is literally no reason to go unless you are flying out of Midway Airport, or wish to be carjacked, or want to see a liquor store held up. Get rid of Emanuel, he is a clueless idiot.

Btw so Great White God Ted Cruz called on Donald Trump to “rescue his re-election” the end of the world is near….or at least maybe the CRA.

Johnnie Does Drug Addiction

By Johnnie Does…

Addiction is a horrible thing, it changes people right in front of your very eyes. This is a real life account of 2 friends I’ve had to say goodbye to in the last 5 months. By saying goodbye, I don’t mean they are no longer with us, quite the contrary, but they may not be with us much longer if they continue following the same trajectory they are on now. I’ve had a relationship with the Blog Father for about a decade now, and he can attest first hand I am by no means perfect, and share his traits of being a slower learner, I am also very trusting, which led to my downfall.

The first is a former girlfriend of mine. We dated for over a year and a half, including her living in my house. We got along great and shared many similar beliefs. It was almost too good to be true…because it was.

I made clear when we began dating that I have a zero tolerance policy on any type of drug. I don’t care if California says it’s legal. She claimed to understand. Things were great at first and then things got weird after she broke her foot. She instantly dropped her two night college classes and took a semester of unpaid leave from her job working at an elementary school.

This seemed pretty drastic as the Blog Father or myself would be expected to report to work within hours of the cast being set. I felt bad for her and let her sleep in the other bedroom on a futon and have her own bathroom. I screwed up.

One day I was cleaning my house and was going to clean her bathroom next. Once she understood my intention, she got off the couch, ran by me using speed that would make a prospective college football recruit jealous and declared her bathroom off limits to me. Whoa! That’s Weird! I relented, blaming myself saying I should have asked. I figured that it could have been a feminine thing she was worried about me finding…again I was wrong.

One night I was up late doing laundry (my laundry closet is located next to her bathroom) when my eyes started burning and I was pretty much sobbing uncontrollably. I thought I might be going blind but it turned out to be nothing. A few days later I came home from dinner with a friend, and with bladder at maximum capacity, I used her bathroom. I noticed a pink pipe and marijuana on my counter, in my house! She declared it was her mothers and produced a text message saying as much. Her mother wanted her to buy product off a co-worker. Sounded plausible, and her mother told me she was known to crank the hoon every so often, I mistakenly believed her.

One night I returned home from work late (9 pm) and was greeted to a locked garage door and when I obtained access via my key, the front door flung open and someone ran out, it was her. She claimed she had to put something in her car, looking back on it, likely weed. In her haste, she left her journal out on the table open faced that night and I decided if it’s open then the perception of privacy is gone. I was stunned at what I read. The comments were primarily about doing weed brownies, edibles, smoking, and vaping, pretty much everything I said no to at the beginning of our relationship. It was like a pre-pubescent rebellious teenager only she was 27.

I called her out and she denied everything saying its things she desired. Again she reiterated that she has never done any of that since we dated. I believed what she said in spite of the evidence. And yeah that’s like strike 9 for me. Again, I’m a self-admitted slow learner. Well things continued to get worse and she finally walked out.

A couple weeks after she moved out, my mother was helping me get my house in order. She began cleaning the bathroom used by my ex when suddenly, mom screamed. I ran in to see what had distressed her and she said, “What is this pile behind the toilet?” It was a pile of weed, likely 6 inches in height, and a foot in diameter. Liar.

While gathering the debris left behind by the ex from my house, I picked up a box of feminine napkins and as I set it down I heard a clank; yep, a glass pipe found inside. Never smoked huh? I undertook a painting project later and painted the spare bedroom she used for a few months. When moving the bed, I found a large pile of ashes from her smoking weed. Literally, feet from carpet, and highly flammable bedding, also feet from a CA required smoke detector, conveniently located in each bedroom. Yes that is right, she was cranking the hoon just feet from a device specifically designed to detect said smoking. Then the big one was this past weekend, I cut my finger on a mirror and reached for a band aid, and found a vape pen. My trust had cost me, I was a fool, unreal.

Commentary: concerning my ex
You could have a great future; but you need to get your life’s priorities in order. You have no money after the 20th of each month due to your addiction. You had no bills or obligations while living here. You even shared in your journal that you crank the hoon with your co-workers at lunch. Hopefully this isn’t true because if it is you are felony stupid. That behavior is still illegal around schools and your dream of being a teacher will go up in flames faster than your next joint. You are living a lie and are in need of a reality check. You possess no degree or full time work, this is due to your own laziness and addiction. I know you read this blog and I will now tell you something that should upset you far more than anything else. You wanted to get married and that dream was going to become a reality. I was set to speak to the Blog Father during lunch together somewhere (I consider him a spiritual and personal mentor) and ask his guidance. If he signed off, I was fully ready to ask your father for his approval and then ask for your hand in marriage. You made the job easy, congrats. Quit cranking the hoon, grab a book, maybe read it.

The second example involves a friend of mine closer to 80 than 60. We met through church and are both in a religious group. I have known him for 15 years, maybe more. He has a serious drinking problem, specifically the grape. I would be remiss to say I didn’t share a few nights having more then I probably should but for this guy it’s a way of life. Things for him have deteriorated quickly over the last few months. He had to have serious leg surgery and thankfully he didn’t lose his leg, but he was rendered pretty immobile and unable to work. So I helped out, even going as far as going across town to get him food with nary a thank you or sign of gratitude.

On my last visit he stated he needed food and was hungry. I told him I’ll have Safeway deliver groceries and said I would even pay. I asked, “What do you want?” He answered negatively. I didn’t quite understand this. He insisted on me picking him up on my lunch break and taking him to Safeway. Keep in mind the closest Safeway to him is 20 minutes away, his house is 25 minutes from where I work and I have one hour for lunch. The math doesn’t work out.

It was during this time that I found out who I was in his life, the errand boy, also known as another term for a female dog. I told him “No” so he found some other sucker to do the job; this person also is a friend of mine. My friend drove him to Foods Co 30 minutes from his house, to get 3 items, yeah you read that right 3 items.

Around July 4th our church was having a fundraiser selling a hot dog, chips, and a soda for $5 to benefit the church. Sure as the sky is blue he called me and said “shut up and listen” Whoa! That’s Weird! “Get me 10 hot dogs, no buns, chips, and a couple sodas. Tell them it’s free for me.” Yep, next level arrogance there. Keep in mind I attend service at 7:30, nowhere near 12:00 when said BBQ was going to be going on. He knows this. But like anyone with an addiction issue, it did not deter him. He called me later that night. I sent the call to voicemail. I was done with him. He started “crying” on the phone saying “I’m hungry, and you need to help a fellow brother in need” “Where are the hot dogs? I need food.” Yeah, I never retrieved said hot dogs. It was a fundraiser not a take advantage of us opportunity. Sorry dude. No pay, no play.

He called me the following Friday during my lunch, leaving a voicemail, saying you need to leave work early, get me food and just explain it later to my boss. Yeah I would get terminated instantly for cause, all for what? He saw me at a meeting (a church one) and had an ear to ear grin, saying hey dude, I want some of that good wine (I’m the head bartender at our events) I poured him a glass, and told him leave me alone and to get bent. He didn’t like this one bit.

Some background on this guy. He rents a house and sublets a bedroom. He has gone through no fewer than 10 roommates in the last decade, getting along with none of them.

He called me later that night, and again the following 2 Sundays leaving voicemails each time. I finally decided to call him and extend a little courtesy, so I did. He answered saying he went to church and asked God for forgiveness and that I should forgive him as a result, keep in mind no apology or change in behavior on his part. Then he claimed he was joking when he called me about the hot dogs. Yeah I told him no he wasn’t. He claimed he was drunk when he called me saying to leave work early, the voicemail is time stamped 12:15pm, that’s starting very early, by anyone’s standards. He then changed his story and said he has been on medication. Ummmm that’s a felony stupid reason to drink.

Realizing he was going to get nowhere with me he has decided to do what any bully tries to do, force me out via proxy. He has contacted some leadership in our group and is trying to convince them I’m not worthy to lead. That’s right, I own a house and recently cut a deal to be a part owner of a small business. Yes I’m the one with no leadership skills. His biggest accomplishment in the last 10 years is his recording 2 DUI’s, demonstrating that he has as much credibility on the leadership issue as Geoffrey the Giraffe. Here is his “chief issue” with getting me removed, I hold the #3 leadership position in this group and sadly for him I am universally loved by all members of this 257 member group, including our 2 priests. The leadership is 100% behind me, and I don’t think anyone really likes him.

Commentary: Concerning grape man
The book has pretty much been written about you already. You are in your last chapters of life. Put down the grape. If you lack the willpower to do that at least don’t start before 4 PM. It’s made you a shell of your former self. You would rather get ripped than just have a good time. You need serious help.

We went to a BBQ and you proceeded to grab 6 samples of hokee poke ahi tuna off a sample platter. Dude, take 1 or maybe 2, but 6? At the same BBQ you demanded your burger be cooked medium rare. It was a frozen patty. Dude I’m pretty sure that’s impossible and then you barked at the poor guy grilling like you were a drill sergeant. God bless him, I would have thrown the burger in your face and told you to eat poop.

As for your demand to get 10 hot dogs, just think about that for a minute……maybe a minute more. Yeah super unreasonable and to do it through proxy nonetheless. Letting the messenger look bad not the source, classic bully move. Rebuild your life. It won’t be the same but learn to accept people for who and what they are. Telling someone to leave work early because I’m hungry or saying I asked God for forgiveness so you need to forgive me is behavior straight out of the Devil’s playbook. I tend to be suspicious of folks that claim to know what God’s will for my life is especially when they didn’t get the beam out of their own eye first.

Learn these words, “I screwed up. I’m sorry. What can I do to correct this?”

Most importantly come to grips with this: you have gotten at least 2 DUI’s in the last 10 years. At your stage in life, you should be a wise and honored person in our congregation but the master you serve is on tap, you know better. You need to own-up to your problems and deal with them. You behave more like a Pharisee than a follower.

Final Thoughts
Addiction is bad, really bad. The Blog Father will second my motion saying legalizing “the hoon” was a big mistake in California. We will look back on this one day as the opening of Pandora’s Box. This will lead to the destruction of many lives. My advice to people who have loved ones who struggle with substance abuse, try to be there, but it’s not your job to ensure sobriety. Most of all, understand you need to let go. You cannot change people with substance abuse issues and don’t let them guilt trip you otherwise. Walk out of their lives like I did with my friend. Or maybe consider the health effects. Hey ex, you mentioned having kids was very important to you, have you looked at the direct link between cranking the hoon and infertility? Your eggs may not be fertile.

Maybe if you’re a junkie, or know one and you’re reading this blog, google Shaun Weiss arrest, he played Goldberg, the goalie, in the mighty ducks a movie from my childhood. He was around my age in that movie, Take a gander folks, he is 48 going on like 88.

Johnnie Does………out

Disney Fires Guardians’ Gunn: Conservatives Blamed

Ok, class here is an example of pretzel like logic that only Liberals can understand.

First the players:
Walt Disney corp. owns most Marvel Comic properties including Guardians of the Galaxy. James Gunn directed the first two movies and has been working diligently one the third. Per the article that I will get to in a minute, the first two movies took in a box office of 1.6 billion dollars. Disney is buying the 20th Century Fox movie studios for 71 billion dollars.

Rupert Murdock—the seller of 20th Century Fox—also owns Fox News which is not part of the sale to Disney.

With this background, let me try to walk you thru the Bloomberg story Disney Faces a Backlash From Its Stars for Firing ‘Guardians’ Director

Friends and fans of “Guardians of the Galaxy” director James Gunn are urging Walt Disney Co. to rehire the filmmaker, a rare moment in an era when bad behavior has gotten some of the biggest names in Hollywood summarily fired.

Actors including Zoe Saldana, Chris Pratt and Selma Blair have tweeted in support of Gunn, who wrote and directed both “Guardians” pictures and was working on a third. Some 228,000 people have signed a Change.org petition asking Disney to bring him back amid concerns that he was targeted by conservatives.

Disney terminated Gunn on July 20 after the right-leaning website Daily Caller published 8-year-old Twitter comments by the director…

There could also be a political element at work. Gunn, like many people in Hollywood, was an outspoken critic of Donald Trump, while the Daily Caller is supportive of the president.

Disney is poised to complete the $71 billion acquisition of entertainment assets from 21st Century Fox Inc., whose Chairman Rupert Murdoch has forged close ties with Trump since the 2016 presidential election.

The above quotes appear in the same order as the story. Folks let’s look at their alleged logic.

The authors—yes, it took two people to write this story—state as fact that James Gunn was targeted by conservatives. Why?

Proposition 1 Daily Caller leans right
Proposition 2 Rupert Murdock owns Fox News Network which leans right
Proposition 3 Murdock is friends with Donald Trump
Proposition 4 Disney is buying a movie studio—20th Century Fox from Murdock
Proposition 5 James Gunn is a movie producer, not employed by Murdock
Based on the above, Liberals have concluded

Therefore Donald Trump ordered Rupert Murdock to order Disney to fire James Gunn

Makes total sense to me.

What about the claim that “… a Change.org petition asking Disney to bring him back amid concerns that he was targeted by conservatives.”

Folks here is the petition in its entirety. The petition says nothing about conservatives, politics, Fox, Murdock, Trump, or anybody else.

URL RE-HIRE JAMES GUNN

I’m smart enough to know this most likely won’t change anything but hopefully, this could get Disney to realize the mistake they made and not do it again in the future.

I agree on the point that if people say a bunch of stupid shit while working for a studio, the studio has full right to fire him over the possible controversy. This situation is very different though as he made these jokes years before he was working for Disney and also the fact that they were jokes. I agree with most, including Gunn himself that the jokes were shitty and un-funny but they were still jokes, it wasn’t an opinion or a statement, it was just a bad attempt at being funny.

The other thing is if you do this to Gunn you have to do it for all the other directors who have said some crappy joke sometime in their life, which is all of them, cause I doubt there’s one human on this planet who hasn’t made a shitty joke once or twice in there life.

If Marvel would come to their senses and re-hire Gunn that would be great but if all we can do is have proof by your signatures that Disney made a mistake i would still count that as a win.

Thanks

Chandler Edwards

The gist, as you can see above, is that Gunn said some stupid things but it was years ago, Disney you overreacted, please hire him back. Implied in this petition is the logic is that in this situation, two wrongs don’t make a right.

Oh, please note that the originator of the petition is not from the United States. Chandler Edwards is from the United Kingdom.

Ok, let’s circle back to more stupid stuff in the story. Earlier, I only partially quoted one line above because it deserves separate treatment. Now I’d like to analyze this quote further. Here is the entire paragraph.

Disney terminated Gunn on July 20 after the right-leaning website Daily Caller published 8-year-old Twitter comments by the director that included jokes about the Holocaust, pedophilia, overweight people and violence against women. In tweets last week, Gunn said he had apologized many times for a sense of humor that hurt people.

Please remember that the authors said that conservatives are responsible for firing Gunn. In the article they state that Gunn was fired for “jokes about the Holocaust, pedophilia, overweight people and violence against women.”

Let’s use logic again. Note to self, logic is a devastating weapon when used against stupidity.
Given the above paragraph, conservatives oppose jokes on killing Jews (Holocaust), pedophilia, overweight people, and violence against women (rape). Therefore Gunn had to be fired.

Consequently, Liberals must support said things or why else would politics matter. Applying the logic of the authors we learn that Liberals must support killing Jews (after all they were National Socialists), pedophilia (no dispute they support sexual deviance), overweight people (hosts of The View and Oprah), and violence against women (Harvey Weinstein and most rap music).

Here are a few of the Tweets that Liberals don’t find offensive but apparently conservatives do.

From Daily Caller

After Attacking Conservatives, Disney Filmmaker’s Tweets Reveal Racism, Homophobia And Assault Against Children

The article from Bloomberg stated that the Tweets were 8 years old but by my math 2008 was ten years ago. I guess that neither author of the Disney story ever looked-up the story on Daily Caller they just went on a rant. Lastly, Gunn doesn’t deny that he posted these things just that it should have consequences. After all, Disney hired him after he posted these things not before. Funny that nobody mentions that inconsistency.