Dead American

So I voted on Tuesday, early.

I thought the whole early voting thing was supposed to make things easier?  I waited in line for three hours … and they said that was better than yesterday.

Voting was encouraging to me, though.  I saw a lot of different people of all different reaces and nationalities in line to vote.  That’s cool.  It wasn’t half a century ago that only whiteys got to vote like this.  And even more encouraging was the sight of people being kind and friendly to one another as they voted, possibly for different candidates.

I was also thinking that it’s cool we have a presidential race where one of the four is a black man and another is a woman.  I would love to see a black man as president of the US.  Unfortunately, I just can’t vote for this particular individual because of his beliefs, philosophies, and policies.  I hope one day there will be a black candidate I feel comfortable voting for.

We may end up having a black president in a week anyway.  It is certainly Obama’s election to lose.  He’s a Democrat running after 8 years of an unpopular Republican.  He has inspired not only his own party but many independents, as well.  Obama clearly has the media on his side, even more so than Kerry did.

But the election isn’t lost yet.  I think it is a closer race than they’re making out to be.  Polls had Kerry ahead in ‘04, too, in a close race.  Bush handily won that election.  McCain still has a shot.

Go out and vote your conscience either way.  We’ll see in a week.

Peace.

Nice call on the Exorcist, Rob.  I can’t believe I didn’t include the Exorcist!  Okay, that should be #2, definitely, and push Poltergeist off the list.  Being a “church-going” and God believing young lad, I was completely fascinated and frightened by that movie.  The Exorcist challenged much of my then Evangelical beliefs and instigated a borderline unhealthy interest in the occult and demons and spiritual warfare.

And yes, I really love M. Night’s movies.  I just love his style and sense of character.  His last few haven’t been as good, but I still love how he makes a movie.

Another good call on the original Night of the Living Dead, Matt.  Definitely could be included in such a list and I should have included it in the “also considered” line.

My problem is I don’t really research this stuff … I’m kinda coming up with these movies off the top of my head … which is why the Exorcist really should have been on there.

Peace.

In honor of Halloween, a severely un-Christian holiday, I thought I’d go ahead and share my top ten horror movies.

This list is lacking more modern movies that others might place on the list.  I haven’t watched a lot of the more recent gore fests.  Marrying Becca streamlined my scary movie consumption (she really doesn’t like them), and so you have here a more classic list.

Of course, these movies are designed to specifically scare the crap out of you.  Each does that in its own way.

This was a difficult list to put together for another reason.  How is one better than another?  The equality of quality is more pronounced with horror flicks.  Lemme know what you think.

10.  Poltergeist. This one just barely snuck onto this list.  Nostalgia put it over the top.  I saw this movie as a young dude, maybe 11 years old, and I watched it several times.  I still think it is a great movie with great characters and a creepy baseline.  I think my parents let me watch it because it was only PG.  This is actually a Spielberg movie.

9.  Alien. While this could go on a later sci-fi list, Alien is basically a horror/slasher flick in space.  Great creature effects.  Ridley Scott at his best.

8.  Scream. For those of us who grew up on slasher flicks from the 70’s and 80’s, this movie resonated with us.  Scream mocked the very genre it was in, and it did a great job at the mocking and the scary stuff.  The next two were okay, but really just more of the same.  The Scream movies were transitions into what we would consider more modern style horror.

7.  Frankenstein. This movie made in 1931 is still great.  Shelly wrote one of the first horror stories and developed it into quite a complex story.  Great movies, no matter what genre, have to have more than just style and formula.  They should say something about human nature.  Shelly’s monster gives us a great insight into these things.

6.  Halloween. In my opinion, the best of the 70’s/80’s slasher flicks.  A little more realistic than the others of its time, and that always makes scary movies a little creepier.

5.  Interview with a Vampire. Another great story full of statements about the nature of man and character.  Anne Rice’s drunken rant was a good story and had great character insight into the darkness of humanity.

4.  Carrie. Young outcast girl in high school is the victim of a practical joke at Homecoming (or was it prom?  I can’t remember).  I read the book and saw the movie a couple times.  Carrie then takes revenge on the whole town with her superpowers.  One of the first, and best, adaptations of Stephen King to the big screen.  Somewhat prophetic, too, if you think about it, in light of high school shootings and violence over the last decade or so.

3.  Jaws. Probably the only good time to jump the shark.  Ultimate man verses animal story.  Primal in the protection of humans from an unusually large predator, a white shark.  This was a great book, too.  Great story and final battle.  Made us all think twice about going to the beach.  I try not to put two movies by same director on here … but it’s another Spielberg flick … man!

2.  6th Sense. I love all of M. Night’s movies.  Again, a great spooky story with real character and human issues.  M. Night proved himself the new Hitchcock and freaked a lot of people out with that surprise ending.

1.  Psycho. The order of the list is pretty debatable … up till this one.  Hard to argue with this being #1 on this list.  Very creepy movie with the most classic slasher scene ever: the shower scene.  Perfectly done, Hitchcock was good at pretty much anything he wanted to do. Birds and Rear Window didn’t make this list because I made Psycho #1, but they could have been on here, too.

Also considered:  Friday the 13th, Texas Chainsaw Massacre, Dracula (1931), The Shining, Misery, The Birds, Rear Window, The Hitcher, Silence of the Lambs

Peace … or not … mwah hah hah …

Well. you can see the cycle that we’re in.  The liberal and “mainstream” media skewed even further left over the past twenty years and the “alternative” media flourished under oppression, especially with the advent of the (huh!) internet.

So what you have now is a situation where no media source, with the possible exception of Fox News, gives a fair marketplace for both sides.  And since Fox News does so, they’re called a conservative propoganda mouthpiece by liberal politicians and media.  Talk about the pot and the kettle.

The major newspapers (few read them) and stations (like NBC, CBS, ABC, CNN, MSNBC, PBS and others) might as well all be wearing an “Obama for president” T-shirt.

So people begin to watch and read only what already fits into their particular perspective.  If they’re open minded enough to want to hear both sides, people have to watch, listen, and read everything with a grain of salt — which actually isn’t a horrible thing for those who do it, but mostly people get spoonfed according to views the already hold.

Or they watch Fox News.  It can be a little on the conservative side, but mostly they do a good job of sharing both.  (a quick plug: I actually like the show Hannity and Colmes.  Hannity gets a little pushy for me, even though I more agree with his views, but Colmes does a good job thoughtully asking questions and challenging conservatives on the show to answer hard questions.  Colmes is not so communist that he can’t be open to discussion or common sense.  Most conservatives I know hate the guy, but I like him.)

What is ironic is the overwhelming desire by liberals to minimize, discredit, or even remove Fox News and conservative talk radio from the airwaves.  If Obama becomes president with a Democratic Congress, there will be legislation to censor conservatives and call it “hate speech” or something like that.

This is the act of a facist regime.

Anyone else see a problem with a party who supports the right to produce and sell child porn and yet seeks to censor talk radio?  Funny idea of “freedom of speech” to me.

The scary thing about the Obama campaign is how unashamedly pro-Democrat the media is and what they will do to support their candidate.  In 1988, even with the liberal media at that time, if a candidate had the kind of corruption and associations that Obama has, even that media was honest enough to report it.

But not today.

For instance, Obama has funded educational programs led by domestic terrorists.  He hasn’t produced a birth certificate.  Obama has become one of the most corrupt politicians in the Senate in THREE YEARS.  And recently, the LA Times admitted to having a video of Obama at a dinner with pro-terrorist (anti-Israel and US) factions in the US … but they refuse to release it.

If not a presidential candidate, Obama wouldn’t be able to get past the security at the Air Force base at Osan in Korea … but he’s trying to be the next commander in chief.

With this evidence, the modern media would have probably hailed Dukakis as a progressive hero for pardoning a murderer who went on to take more life.

By the way, can you imagine if the LA Times had a video of John McCain or Sarah Palin speaking at a dinner with self-ascribed white supremacists?  What would happen with that video, ya think?

Big difference over twenty years.

Peace.

A little history to begin:

Back even with abolition before the Civil War, the American media has had an agenda, keeping slavery legal (much like pro-baby-killing is with the modern media).  The “alternative” media served its purpose then, too … generating articles and literature designed to stop slavery.  It worked then.  That’s part of the power of freedom of speech.

After the Civil War, the media turned more liberal … at least in some ways.  The media has always taken upon itself theresponsibility of pushing certain agendas and policies.  It is the nature of having to choose what to report and how that manipulates what people think.  This is the “bully pulpit” of the media.

This liberal leaning was exacerbated in the 50’s when many people in the entertainment industry were openly suspected of being communists and even traitors.  Years later, even though many of them were actually giving information to the Soviet Union, the damage was done, the media was decidedly anti-conservative and Republican.

So while the media has gone through cycles of being more or less objective, it cannot by nature BE objective.

With that in mind, the complaints of a skewed media can never be solved or addressed.  Humans have opinions and agendas, and those in certain power positions take it upon themselves to slant information.

The problem with slanted media is when truth or facts are suppressed and an honest exchange of ideas is openly discouraged.  This is oppressive and harms a “free press”.  Over the last twenty years, this has become the norm for the “mainstream” media.  Let’s quickly look at the progression.

1988.  Fairly liberal media then.  Regan was continually mocked and criticized despite winning in landslides.  His VP, George Bush, runs for president at the end of a successful two terms for Republicans.  His only copetition is Dukakis.  Well, a story breaks about how Dukakis pardoned a criminal, a murderer, who went on to kill again.  Bush, Sr., wins in another landslide, much to the chagrin of the liberal media.

Once Bill Clinton comes along, the liberal media leared their lesson.  IF they want a Democratic candidate to win … which they do … then they can’t report certain things … or if they do, report them in a way that makes the Democratic candidate look like a victim.  Which is what they did with Clinton.  Stories about his abuses of power while in Arkansas were glossed over and the “scandal” that broke considering his adultery was skewed as if he were some sort of victim … along with poor Hillary.

Not that ‘92 was that simple, but you get the idea.  Conservatives then felt completely disenfranchised by an already hostile liberal media.  In the opinion of conservatives, the media failed to properly scrutinize him.  Hence, talk radio emerged as a political force for conservatives … which really pisses liberals off because they don’t actually believe in equal expression of ideas.  But freedom of speech wins out, and Boortz and Limbaugh and Hannity and others paved the way for a conservative revolution that won both House and Senate in ‘94 for Republicans.

Conservatives adopted terms like “mainstream” and “alternative” media, and what used to be obscure voices and stations on the AM dial actually influenced politics and how people thought.

Part 2 tomorrow.

Peace.

Mostly from one side of the political aisle and most of the “mainstream” media, you hear it all the time.  Evil oil companies, price gouging, all that.

And while I’m not here to defend oil companies (while the price of gas continues to fall), I’m left wondering why we don’t have the same attitudes about the entertainment industry.

One movie ticket costs ten bucks.  Really?  But not just movie tickets, the price of entertainment (and the money they make) continues to skyrocket beyond average inflation.  Why don’t we hear talk of evil movie or television companies?  Oh, yeah, 99% of them vote Democrat and make “documentaries” that support ultra-liberal causes.  You get to make as much money as you want, then.

I would personally support major “windfall taxes” on movie and music companies.  While we’re at it, let’s throw in professional athletes that rake in millions for fairly useless but impressive skills (throwing a pitch, dunking a basketball, throwing a touchdown, etc.)  Entertaining, sure, but otherwise useless for civilization.  The prices for sports events have also become outrageous.

Why don’t we talk about a price freeze on a Coke and popcorn at the movie theater?

I would support a tax system that did this: rewarded actual producers.  Do you make millions providing an actual service or producing an actual product that enhances people’s lives?  We’ll cut your taxes.  A lot.  Do you make millions in some form of entertainment that waste’s people’s time and money instead of providing a service?  We raise your taxes.  A lot.

That sounds pretty fair and neighborly to me.

Peace.

We went to Huntsville, Alabama last weekend.  Had an awesome time with some close friends from Korea.  We drove over on Saturday, going through Chattanooga.

We made a wrong turn off of 24 onto hwy 72.  We followed the directions from Google exactly.  The directions were wrong.

I felt we had made a wrong turn from the beginning, but we trusted Google.  Luckily, our wrong turn landed us back towards Chattanooga, and we were able to internet booty call the E-man and get back on track.

Our first mistake: trusting Google without looking at a map.

Our second mistake: not having an atlas in the car.

Our third mistake: not trusting our own instincts.

Our fourth mistake: stopping to ask for directions.

As we increasingly felt like we were going in the wrong direction, I finally stopped and asked for directions.

I’m old.  I understand that.  I distinctly remember a time when you could stop at a gas station or other roadside store and some dude would roll his eyes, say something like, “You ain’t from ’round here, are ye?” and you would just humbly admit your own ignorance in submission to this gentleman in exchange for some directions.

Well, nowadays you get some kid at a convenience store who barely passed English and Tech math in some public school and needs the cash register to do such simple things like ADD and SUBTRACT.

So I stopped at this store and asked if I was going the right way to get to Huntsville.  The response I received: “Huntsville?  Hmmn.  I’ve heard of Huntsville.”

You know how you can sometimes immediately tell if something is a lost cause?

Yeah.  No Child Left Behind, baby.

So I had Becca call the E-man.  I was so frustrated at my own stupidity and public schools in general that I couldn’t really talk.  Turns out E-man was a big help in telling us how we went wrong, but I got us back on track using … wait for it … my brain.  And I tried not to curse too much in front of my three year old son.

I swear, one of these days I’m gonna write a book called The Dumbest Generation.  Our modern gadgets have become our crutches in more ways than one.  And living in Georgia, like 49th in education, gives great resource material.

Peace.

p.s. per last statement … yes, I realize Chattanooga is in Tennessee.

“The democracy will cease to exist when you take away from those who are willing to work and give to those who would not.”  Thomas Jefferson

I work with Nelya.  She’s a math teacher at Faith Academy.  Nelya moved to this country in 1994 from the Ukraine with her husband, three boys (ages 9,8, and 4) and a 4 month old daughter.  They had $100 to their name.

Her husband got a job and worked his tail off.  They bought a house within the first two years.  She still doesn’t know how they managed or survived on a single salary while she stayed at home with her young daughter.

Nelya grew up in the Soviet Union, even started her family while communism had its full sway (its not really that different now in Russia … although the Ukraine has improved).  Being a social studies major, I love to hear her tell me stories of her time in the Soviet Union.

Her parents were Christians under a communist regime.  As a child, people from her school would come to her house every week and rebuke her parents for their beliefs, especially threatening them to stop indoctrinating their children with such lies.  At school, the teachers would pull her and her siblings aside and try to convince them that Christianity was a false belief.

Almost the whole family persevered and still believes in God.

I was talking with Nelya the other day, and she told me she was very worried.  About Obama.  She said, “These people, Obama and other people, they don’t know what they’re talking about.  Take from rich, give away, make everyone equal.  I came to America to get away from this.”

She went on to explain the poverty and oppression such a government will create.  She’s seen the end result of such ideals, and she ran from it to a place she could be free and earn a better living through her labor and hard work.  She now owns a bigger house and one of her sons just started Georgia Tech as an honor student.

Nelya’s suggestion is this, to Obama and other people preaching socialism: go live in a communist (or even former communist) country, as a normal person.  See what the results of such philosphy will be.  This is the direction you’re taking us.

I laughed because there’s no way these politicians would do any such thing.  They live in million dollar houses here … what makes you think they can live under the poverty level in another country? 

Funny how we’re embracing the very communistic ideals we did such a great job proving were foolish and destructive.

Peace.

Ritual and ceremony leads to idolatry.  Every time.

Peace.

So Micah is getting bigger … turned three in September and is still just growing by leaps and bounds.

But I wanted to just share a couple awesome stories that I thought were great examples of why we do what we do.

First of all, in the meeting the other night, Micah crawled up next to me on the couch.  As I opened the Bible to teach from a scripture the Lord had put on my heart, he opened a Bible (not to any specific scripture, just copying me).  I read from the psalms.  I noticed after the second line that Micah was repeating everything I said.  He repeated the whole psalm.  Then he wanted to read another one.  I told him that Daddy felt like we needed to teach on that scripture, which he accepted and quietly sat while I did.

Becca and I have intentionally tried to teach and train Micah to be in the meetings while there is worship and teaching and prayer going on.  Sometimes he does really well at this, at other times … well, it can be a struggle every now and then.  But our goal is that Micah sees what adults do in a meeting as normal, and something he can participate in as he is able, and that this is his standard for maturity and what a man is and does.  I’d rather my son be brainwashed that a spiritual man is a real man.

Second of all, we live with some other individuals, as I’ve shared before.  Eric and Heather, a married couple, and Jason, a 19 year old single guy.  Micah really likes Jason, and Jason has even shared with us that our kids, Micah and Elisha, are the only two babies/toddlers he’s ever liked … although to be fair he’s admitted to not being around kids a whole lot either.

So Micah goes to preschool the other day, and they trace their hands on a piece of paper and make their family tree, where they’re supposed to put people like mommy and daddy.  Well, Micah puts Mommy, Daddy, and Elisha down … and he also puts Jason on his family tree.

The teacher asks who Jason is.  An uncle?  A big brother?  “No,” Micah says thoughtfully.  “Just My Jason.”  (Micah actually has an Uncle Jason, my sister Shane’s husband, so to differentiate, he calls Jason, My Jason)  The teacher was confused and asked Becca about it later.  Becca explained.

To me, calling the Church the “family of God” is more than just words.  I love that my son equates people in our fellowship as his family.  He routinely asks, “who’s coming over tonight?  Saji?  Stacy?”  He plays with other kids in the community as if they were brother and sister, and that’s in a good way.  He hugs them when we leave and gets excited to see them when they arrive.

But he also has good relationships with adults and people of all ages.  He’s just excited to see an adult as a kid.  That’s family.  To the degree Micah will place one of those people on his family tree.

I’m glad Micah has a community of people, of men especially, that he can look to and identify with as different expressions of manhood.  I love that he can see Josh throw himself into a song of the Lord or Larry laugh and sing with abandon.  I love that he can climb trees and throw frisbee with Saji and cut wood with Eric in the back yard.

Believe it or not, I’m not all a man can be.  And I love that God can lead my son to be the man he needs to be and give Micah a myriad of different expressions to learn from.

Peace.